Seymour Hersh report: WH lied about Bin Laden raid

Is bin Laden un-dead?
Then IDGAF.

 

Since Abu Ghraib:

He's claimed that much of the US special forces is controlled by secret members of Opus Dei, that the US military flew Iranian terrorists to Nevada for training, and that the 2014 chemical weapons attack in Syria was a "false flag" staged by the government of Turkey. Those reports have had little proof and, rather than being borne out by subsequent investigations, have been either unsubstantiated or outright debunked. A close reading of Hersh's bin Laden story suggests it is likely to suffer the same fate.

The many problems with Seymour Hersh's Osama bin Laden conspiracy theory - Vox

This about sums it up for me:

Hersh's proof is that he finds the official story of the Osama bin Laden raid to be unconvincing. And he points out that in the first days after the raid, the administration released details that cast bin Laden in a negative light — saying he tried to use one of his wives as a shield, for example — that it later walked back. But raising questions about the official story is not the same as proving a spectacular international conspiracy.

If that seems like worryingly little evidence for a story that accuses hundreds of people across three governments of staging a massive international hoax that has gone on for years, then you are not alone.

 

The story appearing in the London Review of Books makes me a bit curious as well. Hersh usually appears in the New Yorker, and I can't help but wonder if having his story hang on one anonymous source might have made them queasy about printing it.

 

I wondered about that as well. I figure either the New Yorker wouldn't fund this idea, it wanted nothing to do with it, or a combination of the two.

 

I posted this on the other Hersh/bin Laden thread on the Journalism board:

I wouldn't describe much of that story as "explosive," especially not this long after the fact.

I wasn't surprised by much of it. The part that bothered me most was the fact of how much the Pakistanis were in the United States' back pocket, and how much the U.S. was in the Pakistanis' back pocket, and according to this article, Pakistan "let" the U.S. just come in and assassinate bin Laden. But many of the lies and inconsistencies surrounding the events were acknowledged and addressed not long after the raid, hence all the various versions of the facts and the story.

And, the SEALS couldn't live with killing bin Laden, whether he was defenseless or not? Somehow, I doubt that. This was not some random helpless elderly man who "wasn't operationally important" anymore. It was Osama bin Laden. And as to whether he presented any danger to the SEALS, well, I don't know how anyone can argue that if they were in the same room as bin Laden, they weren't in danger. Again, that goes whether he had or fired a gun, or not. This was Osama bin Laden.

I generally don't like the idea of our president lying, and I don't just think the end justifies the means, no matter what. But this case is different as far as I'm concerned. I'm not saying it's right to lie. But I'm also not sure how much any non-jihadi person really cares about lies told in the pursuit of Osama bin Laden, or his death.

 

To that end, even if he WAS those things, it wouldn't have changed anything.

He masterminded the murder of thousands of Americans. He was never going to be taken alive. Nor should he have been.

 

I wonder what percentage of people are of the mindset of, "If we had to do all of these things to kill Bin Laden, we should not have done it."

I would hope that number is very, very low, but I don't know that.

 

Besides, we showed great care and precision in how we terminated bin Laden. Should we have, instead, flown a jet plane into the entire compound, killing everyone within 200 feet?

 

Obama lied about Bin Laden's death?

Oh well, he just lost my vote.

 

Turn on the radio. Have the barf bag ready.

 

Yeah, I'm purposely avoiding that shit today.

I don't care who lied, even though I would look at it as, "Telling us what we need to know..."

I care that the guy is dead. Period.