[WS:] That crossed my mind too. But on the second thought, I do not think OBL would cooperate if taken alive. The reasons why he was killed rather than taken alive were probably much simpler - the live OBL would be a tremendous liability to the USG. The right would almost certainly demand handing him to a military tribunal, the hoi polloi celebrating his killing would demand dragging him in a cage through the streets or other forms of public humiliation, international community would demand handing him over to the ICJ in the Hague, and his celebrity status in the Muslim world would probably skyrocket. And who knows, maybe he would reveal some dirty secrets to embarrass, say, the former administration or its allies. Shooting him on the spot killed all those problems with one bullet or two, so to speak.
Wojtek
On Wed, May 4, 2011 at 1:45 PM, <123hop at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Peter Fay" <peterrfay at gmail.com>
>
> For example, he did not resist, did not use a woman as a human shield, his
> wife was not killed, he was captured and then was executed in front of
> family and daughter while he was in custody. He did not live luxuriously in
> a million-dollar palace, but in a barren home with spartan furnishings -
> home was worth $250k. There were no weapons found in the entire home during
> the search after the execution. There was therefore no firefight - no one in
> the home fired at the US Seals. It was a simple capture then execution of
> Bin Laden and his son.
>
> http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/05/04/147782.html
>
> ----------
>
> I guess there were stories they didn't want him to tell. Thanks for the link.
>
> Joanna
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