The Night We Got Bin Laden

The civilized world celebrated when President Barack Obama announced that Osama Bin Laden had been killed. And, it continued to rejoice as we learned more of the details of that night. The Navy Seals, Seal Team 6, or some such name, got all the notoriety. They are supposed to do things in secret, drink a little Jack Daniel and enjoy a quiet celebration among themselves, and then go off to their next rendezvous which may or may not be a meeting with destiny. No one should ever know.

That’s not the way it happened this time. It really doesn’t bother me that the Seals broke a cardinal rule of engagement by allowing their existence and involvement to be made public. What bothers me is that if they are not going to hold the Seals to their code of secrecy, my friend and I shouldn’t be forced to be silent either. So, I am going to tell you the story of our involvement even if it is against orders. What are they going to do, shoot me? Perhaps it isn’t discreet to ask it just like that. They may. I’ll just have to risk it.

It started back when my friend Jerry and I learned about the Navy Seals. We both had a little extra time on our hands, having retired a few years earlier. We were just a little tired of the fact that the man who admitted to his involvement in the 9/11 attack was still running around free. We had a few ideas on how we could take him out. It involved the two of us and a rusty pocket knife. The plan also called for our friend David carrying the knife in his Depends for a couple of weeks prior to our leaving on our mission, but that part’s classified as it comes under the heading of “bacterial warfare.”

We first went to an Army recruiter and volunteered to sign up. “You want to join the Army?” he asked.

“Hell, no,” I replied. “We want to sign up for Special Forces, Delta Force preferably.”

At first, they laughed. But, when they saw we were serious they explained that they were full up with Delta Forces types. As we were leaving, one of them suggested we visit the Navy recruiter, he thought they might be taking applications for the Navy Seals. We thanked him and agreed that we should check it out. “In fact,” he said, “I hear they’re putting together a special group of Navy Seals to go after Bin Laden. You know, they can’t find him in Afghanistan because they think he’s hiding out down in the Tahiti Islands. It’s just the mission for a group of Navy boys.”

“Really,” said Jerry. “Hersh,” he said, turning to me, “that makes a lot of sense. He can’t be hiding in Afghanistan, or even Pakistan for that matter. These Army boys would’ve found him by now if he was there. They haven’t found him, it just stands to reason that he’s not there.”

“You’re right,” I said. “It’s brilliant. He’s hiding in plain sight right there in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.”

As we were walking out the door to go see the Navy man, the recruiter told us not to tell them we heard about the plan from him. He explained that it was highly classified. He also told us not to take “no” for an answer. He told us to tell the Navy we were “By God Republicans” and that we were close friends with John McCain. “And, don’t just walk in and say, ‘Hey, I’m a Republican.’ No, sir, you guys just march right in there and say, ‘Hey, I’m a By God Republican!’”

We thanked him for that and left to see the Navy man.

At the Navy recruiting office, we thought seriously about seeking a different assignment other than killing Bin Laden. We thought seriously of joining the N.C.I.S. Neither of us ever knew about the Naval Criminal Investigation Service (NCIS) until we began watching a show about it on television. We didn’t think we would be too old for that since we had seen Mark Harman in that show. Hell, we couldn’t be a lot older than he was. And, that little girl from Israel on the show was clearly a bonus. Sharp, good looking, and she could help me fight my way out of any bar or football game against Louisiana State University. But, when we presented the idea to the recruiter he told us the NCIS was full up. I was getting a little curious about that situation. I thought there was a shortage of people volunteering for service and here Jerry and I had run into “full up” twice in one morning.

Going back to our first plan, I said, “We’re here to join the Navy Seals.”

“The Navy Seals?” he replied.

“Yep.”

“Aren’t you guys a little old to want to be Navy Seals?”

“Is there an age limit to wanting to serve our country, sailor?” I asked.

“Well, I guess not. But, but…”

“Don’t tell me they’re full up,” I interrupted. “Because I’m getting a little tired of hearing that.”

“Oh, no, no, I wasn’t going to say that. It’s just that…”

I could see he was trying to be evasive. “Did I mention that I’m a Republican?”

“You’re a Republican?”

“Hell no,” I answered, “I’m a By God Republican!”

“A By God Republican?”

“That’s right,” I said, “and not only that, we know John McCain.”

I had him with that one. He looked around the room to make sure no one was listening. Then, in a low voice, something like a whisper, he said, “Look guys, you seem to have a good sense of what we need. I would have some difficulty placing you with the Seals. You men have too much to offer for those guys, but, we have a special category of service just for you. Instead of the Seals, I would suggest you be placed with the Navy Walruses.”

“Navy Walruses?”

“Right, the Walruses. It’s kind of an auxiliary unit for the Seals. You back them up. Those guys sometimes get into some things they shouldn’t because they don’t know how to back up and evaluate a situation before rushing in. They’re young and they sometimes rush in where angels fear to tread, if you know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I think I know,” said Jerry.

“We make special use of your talents, especially your wisdom which comes only from living a good long life and we call you when needed.”

“Sounds good,” said Jerry. “What’s the training like?”

“That’s the beauty of the program,” he replied, “you train at home on your own. Just go home and train and wait for us to call.”

We shook on it and Jerry and I went home. Jerry had a set of tapes of Richard Simmons and another of Jack LaLanne we watched and worked out with. They proved a little strenuous, so I broke out my old Jane Fonda tapes which we were satisfied to simply watch. We continued following this training regimen for a week or so, but we slowly lost interest when the minutes rolled into hours, the hours into days and the days into a week. We tapered off on our training, but felt we were as ready as anyone should the Navy call.

It was a couple of years before we got that call. Jerry was the one who got it. The voice on the phone began with, “I can’t believe I’m doing this,” and Jerry assumed this was some kind of code talk. He wasn’t certain how to respond, so he simply said, “Nor can I.”

“Listen,” the voice said, “our records show you guys were helicopter pilots in Nam.”

“Yes,” Jerry replied.

“Well, listen, we’ve found ourselves in some kind of a bind. Can you guys still fly?”

“Heck, yeah,” Jerry told him. “It’s like riding a bicycle. Once you learn how you never forget.”

“Alright, we’ve planned a mission that has to go off tomorrow night. Get your buddy and go to Tinker Air Base. Transportation will be waiting for you and you’ll be briefed on route here.”

He immediately came and got me, explaining what he knew which wasn’t very much. But, our country needed us so we were off. While being flown to our rendezvous with the other team members, we were told what was going to happen. We were informed that Bin Laden was hiding in plain sight in Pakistan and that they were sending a mission of Seals in to get him. They were going to use two helicopters to send in the team, get him and then get out. It was a well-planned mission, but one of the crews, the pilot and co-pilot, of one of the helicopters got food poisoning at a local restaurant and their recovery would take too long for them to participate in the raid. There weren’t any other teams available on such notice and that was why we got the call.

I took Jerry aside and asked him if they had inquired into whether we still flew helicopters. He said they hadn’t asked that, they simply asked whether we could still fly. He had assured them we still could. “Don’t you remember how?” he asked me. I replied that I thought I did. “Sure you do,” he said, “you never forget a thing like that. To say otherwise would bring into question our military training and that’s, By God, un-American.” I agreed to that line of reasoning and we both reasserted our commitment to be By God Americans. So we returned to the briefing.

Ours was the second helicopter that flew into Bin Laden’s compound on that fateful night. Ours was the one which crashed on landing, but it wasn’t really our fault. It was late at night and we had been flying for some time. We’re old and with age comes not only wisdom but problems as well. I had excused myself to go back to the head. I had no idea that as I was taking a leak Jerry was taking a nap. He dozed off just as we were nearing the landing zone. Jerry woke up just as the wind shear from the other chopper caused us to lose lift and we crashed in the back yard of our target.

The Seals came running to us, in whispered shouts they asked us how we were. We were all safe, but that wasn’t good enough for them. “I don’t know why they let you old walruses come along on this mission,” the mission leader said. I started explaining that they needed pilots and that they called us on short notice. I tried to explain the wind shear caused by the first chopper in the enclosed compound walls, but I didn’t mention mine and Jerry’s peculiarities just before the crash. He cut me off and called over a Seal named Mike, giving him orders to stay near and take care of us. It was a little condescending.

We all approached the building closest to the landing and immediately met resistance. There were several people out there shooting at us and we were shooting back. Everyone was shooting except Jerry and me, we didn’t have any guns. I crawled over to commander of our group and asked for our guns. He replied that they forgot to bring them and ordered me to get back over with Jerry and Mike. Then he yelled over to Mike to take “those old geezers into that building and keep them out of the line of fire. If I’ve gotta lose someone I’d rather it be them, but let’s try not to lose anyone at all.”

Mike took us into the building and closed the door behind us. All of those Seals looked alike. They were tall and muscular and they cut their hair off leaving a look similar to Mr. Clean. On the other hand, Jerry looked a lot like Stan Laurel and I looked a lot like Oliver Hardy. It rather amazed even me that we were on the same team.

As I was making these observations, I suddenly realized sending us into this building was a stroke of genius. It became evident that this building was the heart and soul of the Bin Laden operation. Four men and a young teenage girl, about thirteen years old, came charging us. They were unarmed, but they were screaming like a banshee as they rushed toward us. Mike told us to take out the little girl while he dealt with the others. Mike crammed the heel of his open palm into the first one’s nose and we saw him fall down in a heap. He grabbed another in a headlock and while holding him in a deadly lock he swung him around, knocking another one to the floor. He then drove his hand in a chopping motion into another’s throat, rendering him unconscious, and then knocked the one in the headlock out with a single blow to the face. The other man, the one he had knocked down to the floor using the one he held in a headlock, had gotten up off the floor and was staggering toward Mike.

“I don’t understand,” he said, “we trained for just this type of encounter. We trained on monkey bars.”

“Yeah,” replied Mike, “I’m sure training that intense would’ve washed out a lot of us Seals.” He then reached over and pinched the guy’s nerve at the base of his neck, something like a Vulcan Nerve Pinch Mr. Spock would have put on someone.

In the meantime, Jerry and I were trying to take out the little girl. Don’t ever underestimate how tough one of those little girls can be. She was scratching and biting and clawing, kicking and kneeing, while all the time screaming at us in some language we couldn’t understand. We were trying to be gentle with her at first, both of us having a daughter. It just wasn’t in us to hit a girl, but she sure had no reservations about hitting an old man. She knocked Jerry down and he rolled across the floor, nearly upending Mike as he was trying to get the four men under control. I grabbed her while her back was turned and threw her to the floor, actually falling down with her where I luckily fell on her and was able to use my superior weight to hold her down.

Jerry got up off the floor and rejoined the fight. I was trying, without success, to put a spinning toe hold on her and Jerry was slapping her with his open hand when Mike came over to assist us. “Good God Almighty,” he said as he reached down and put the Vulcan Nerve Pinch on her, thus putting her into a deep sleep for about the next forty-five minutes. Jerry started jumping around like a monkey, looking for someone else to slap. I slowly got up off the floor with Mike’s help, bending over to catch my breath. “You two fighting warriors come with me,” said Mike.

We went outside and found that the rest of the crew had pretty well wrapped up their assignments. They were gathering Bin Laden into the chopper, together with a treasure trove of papers which would later prove helpful in our country’s fight against terror. We were going to load up to leave when the commander came over to the three of us. “Mike,” he said, “what with losing a chopper and with all this stuff, we’re going have to let you guys walk out.”

“Skipper, you don’t have room for the three of us?” asked Mike.

“No. We have room for just one more.”

“Well?”

“Now, Mike, I can’t leave these old walruses here by themselves and the two of you work so well together. You can walk them out of here, but I’m afraid they’d never find the way by themselves. You can do this, Mike. Remember, we can’t leave anyone behind.”

“Skipper,” said Mike, “I apologized already, and I didn’t know she was your sister.”

The commander smiled as he loaded up in the chopper and they flew off into the night. Mike, Jerry and I walked out, a little jaunt that took nearly a week to cover the thirty miles or so to a friendly base.

I have probably violated several secrecy laws by telling this story. I will probably lose my security clearance, but this story needs to be told. When the President announced we got Bin Laden, everyone was elated. I listened to everything he said and every report on the incident and in all that euphoria there was absolutely nothing said about the contribution of the Navy Walruses.