Monday, May 02, 2011

Thoughts on the death of Osama Bin Laden

Note; greatly changed from original post, as I considered what I wrote, and don't think it appropriate to rejoice over the entry of a man, even a wicked one, into Hell.

Thanks go to the Navy Seals and the men who interrogated Osama's lieutenant at Guantanamo Bay.  Thanks to President Bush, who opened the war that put the Taliban out of power and Al Qaida on the run, and also created "Club Gitmo" for the exclusive use of terror suspects.  Thanks also to President Obama for breaking his promise to close the prison there, and for authorizing a strike.

Right to simply kill him?  It is certainly deserved, and the blood of tens of thousands of innocents was partially avenged.  That said, who knows what he would have told us after a bit of waterboarding at Club Gitmo?  How many more innocents could have been saved?

Big loser in all this; Pakistan, as Bin Laden was in the biggest house in the city that houses their military academy.  It's almost certain someone high up knew exactly where this mass murderer was living, and did nothing.  What do we do with them?  I don't know; we can't get to Afghanistan to prevent the resurgence of the Taliban without air lanes over Pakistan. It's not like the Russians, Iranians or Chinese are going to let us fly over their countries to get there.

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