Updated 3:02 p.m.
A major question lingers unanswered at the center of this story: Why was bin Laden killed? Michael Scherer has reported that the Navy Seals who landed at Osama bin Laden’s safehouse were not given orders specifically to kill, but were on a “kill or capture” mission. That implies they were prepared to accept bin …
In his first interview since commanding the mission to kill Osama bin Laden, CIA chief Leon Panetta tells TIME that U.S. officials feared that Pakistan could have undermined the operation by leaking word to its targets. Long …
Shortly after hearing confirmation on Sunday that Osama bin Laden was dead, President Barack Obama walked down to chief of staff Bill Daley’s West Wing office to discuss what he would say in his address to the nation.
The …
U.S. intelligence officials estimate that Osama bin Laden had been living in the $1 million Abbottabad compound where he was killed for up to six years, according to Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein. “That’s what we estimate at this stage,” Feinstein told TIME. Bin Laden “could have been there for five or six years.”
The people who gathered Sunday in the Situation Room know all about high-pressure situations. But this was something else. For 40 minutes, the President and his senior aides could do nothing but watch the video screens and listen …
Reuters’ Mark Hosenball is reporting that the U.S. special forces that raided Osama bin Laden’s compound Sunday were under orders to kill the terrorist leader, not capture him. But an administration official tells TIME that the report is not accurate.
“No U.S. forces go in and, if someone surrenders to them, will kill them,” the …
As the news of Osama bin Laden’s death moves from exhilarating novelty to accepted reality, one group in the U.S. government will emerge as key to the win: the Central Intelligence Agency. From the earliest identification of a …
When American troops dragged Saddam Hussein from his spider hole in Dec. 2003, the political implications seemed huge: Pundits quickly asked whether George W. Bush had just clinched reelection, whether the anti-war candidate Howard Dean was now “toast”, and whether public support for the Iraq war might surge. But in the end, Saddam’s …
It was the world’s biggest death party. The news of Osama bin Laden’s killing drew a few thousand Washingtonians to the White House on Sunday night, transforming Pennsylvania Avenue and Lafayette Park into the site of a jubilant frat party. Draped in American flags, the jumbled mass of strangers chanted “U-S-A,” mugged for the …
President Obama walked down an empty corridor to the East Room of the White House on Sunday night to announce the killing of Osama bin Laden. It was like he was walking out of a forgotten dream. Remember that quest we began …
Updated at 2:30 a.m.
Nearly 10 years after he launched the deadliest domestic attack in U.S. history, al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden has been killed by American forces. Late Sunday evening, President Barack Obama addressed …
In the final week of the 2004 campaign, President Bush was barnstorming across Florida. During the last of six Sunshine State speeches Karl Rove was joking with a group of reporters about Osama bin Laden’s October surprise and how the videotape had boosted Bush’s poll numbers. Yes, Rove told us, I’ve been keeping bin Laden in my …
