Zero Dark Thirty

Osama Bin Laden was the most wanted man in the world, after the attacks of September 11. On September 11 2001 two planes crashed in to the Twin Tower, another plane crashed in to the pentagon, and another crashed into a field on rout to the nation’s capital, killing three thousand people mainly civilians. (Benson) Hours after the attacks the CIA and FBI stared a search to find who was responsible for the attack; with in the day they found that the terrorism group al-Qaeda was the brains behind the operation. With extensive research American FBI came to the understanding that Osama Bin Laden was the leader of an anti-American terrorism group al-Qaeda group and ordered for the attack. (Benson) After the Bush declared to war on terror (the war to end terrorism) in September 2001 he appointed the CIA and FBI to start the search for Bin Laden, the search started October 2001. (Benson) Shortly after Obama was elected in to office in 2008 he made finding Bin Laden the top of the priority list (Obama). The search for al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden took ten years after extensive CIA research and the brave efforts of seal team six.

Al Qaeda was founded in 1988 by the most wanted terrorist in America, Osama Bin Laden, to bring together Arabs who fought in Afghanistan against the Soviet Invasion. Al Qaeda works with allied Islamic extremist groups to take over regimes it deems "non-Islamic" and remove Westerners from Muslin countries. The organization first began with three members and now there are approximately 200 to 1,000 current members. Al-Qaeda began to construct and offer training camps and guesthouses to its recruits; while they also attempted to pull in U.S. citizens for financial, communication, and operation reasons for the benefit of Al-Qaeda and its other affiliations. By 1990 Al-Qaeda was providing military and intelligence training in various areas including Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Sudan.

On May 2nd, 2011, the people of the United States awoke to some of the best news they would hear for many years to come; Osama bin Laden had been killed. President Barack Obama delivered the message at 7:30AM and the country was buzzing about it for weeks after. Osama bin Laden was a name that every American man, woman, and child knew. On 9-11-01, four planes were hijacked by terrorists and crashed into strategic locations to sow chaos, confusion, death, and destruction into the American people. 2,977 innocent Americans died on that fateful day, and the man who decided they should die and be subject to terror was Osama bin Laden. Since that fateful day, America has donated massive amounts of time and money to find Osama, and bring him to justice. However, time and time again he evaded capture and kept us chasing him.

President Obama introduces idea of Osama bin Laden as a ‘murderous terrorist’ and connects bin Laden’s ties to September 11, 2001. The imagery and emotion Obama evokes is immense and hits hard. He recounts back to the “cloudless September sky,” he then steers

The USS Cole Navy destroyer was attacked on October 12, 2000, by a small boat loaded with explosives while it was being refueled at the harbor in Aden, Yemen. This terrorist attack killed 17 of the ship’s crew members and extensively damaged the ship, and injured 39 others. The facts of this terrorist attack to date indicate that it may have been executed by Islamic radicals with credible links to the terrorist group headed by Usama bin Ladin (O’Rourke & Perl. 2001).

The development of technology is the third important factor in a successful command and control environment. Technology has become a crucial and vital necessity for modern armies. There are many advantages and disadvantages of technology depending on how to use it. Nowadays, one of the advantages is the fact that you can gain many information about the enemy from your place by using the technology and analyze it to build your plan on it. According to a top-secret U.S. intelligence document, the U.S. commando raid that killed Osama bin Laden was guided from space by a fleet of satellites, which aimed dozens of receivers over Pakistan to collect a torrent of electronic and signals intelligence as the mission unfolded. The National Security Agency also was able to penetrate guarded communications among al-Qaeda operatives by tracking calls from mobile phones identified by specific calling patterns, the document shows. Analysts from the CIA pinpointed the geographic location of one of the phones and linked it to the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, where other evidence suggested bin Laden was hiding.

After al-Qaeda was formed and the initiation of the 9/11 plans and attacks, bin Laden set an undeniable manhunt upon himself. Despite the warnings, 9/11 was a very unexpected terrorist attack considering that the United States hadn't been attacked on its land in more than half a century. They hadn't seen any blood spilled during war on their own soil since 136 years earlier. It was almost impossible for the United States to be prepared for this attack because it had a very peaceful history overall within its borders for the years leading up to the attacks. However, the U.S. responded correctly, and less than ten years later Navy SEALS captured the man who took thousands of lives, in Operation Neptune

Osama Bin Laden changed the world on September 11, 2012, when he orchestrated the 9/11 bombings on the World Trade Center in New York City. He has also formulated many other attacks including the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, and attacks on the US embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in 1998 (Encyclopedia of World 1). Osama Bin Laden had a negative influence on societies, economies, and religion throughout the world because of his actions in masterminding many radical terrorist attacks, and because he created and funded al-Qaeda.

The events of 9/11 shocked the nation. One of the most highly acclaimed countries in the world was now lost and extremely vulnerable. The last terrorist attack on American soil had been ages ago dating back to Pearl Harbour in 1945, so far back that most Americans were not even alive to remember the incident. Now our nation was in a state of mourning, a feeling that does not come often. Everyone wondered if this was just the beginning or if it would lead to something more drastic. What was the motive or cause of this event? The answer lies in the past of their leader, Osama Bin Laden. Many critics have claimed that the terrorists in the Middle East just wanted to see us suffer and show that they are superior. Thus, they targeted the most symbolic places in our nation:the World Trade Center, the White House, and the Pentagon. The Terrorist attacks on 9/11, resulting in great devastation, can be traced back to Osama Bin Laden’s home environment, and these circumstances explain Osama Bin Laden and his

Prior to the September 11, 2001 many Americans were unaware of the unrest that existed in many Middle Eastern countries such as Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan. Regrettably on this day, America came under attack by Al-Qaeda. "Al-Qaeda is an international Islamist extremist terrorist network founded in the late 1980s by Osama bin Laden, who was killed in a U.S. military operation on May 1, 2011, and others who were involved in the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan”( "FAQ ABOUT 9/11).

May 2, 2011 Osama Bin Laden was officially killed.At the age of 54, Osama was killed in a raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan by U.S. special forces.in 9/11, 2,976 people died. U.S. Embassies in Nairobi were bombed 213 were killed, bombing of Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania 11 killed,coast of Yemen bombed and 17 were killed. All of this causing thousands dollars in damage and people's lives.

The original plan was to take to helicopter and take group 1 onto the roof and Team 2 on the ground. The didn't go so well when one of the Modified black hawk helicopter had started to lose altitude because of the 10 ft wall. The helicopter crashed inside the compound. Then instead the other helicopter landed outside of the wall to drop of the seal. The team at first had no idea what happened and when the were gonna blow a hole into the wall to get inside tone of their teammates had opened the front gate for them. When inside of the compound they were engaged by men who came from the compound and were quickly neutralized. A team had gone inside while the other team had stayed outside for security. When securing the house they encountered children which were believed to have suicide vest were shot in the leg and were moved out of the way. Once they reached the 2nd floor of the 3 story house they encountered bin laden's son who had a weapon and was shot and killed. When they proceed to the final floor 2 women came out of the room and were tackled by the point man because he believed they carried suicide vest and wanted to absorb the blast in order to save his teammates they weren't carrying suicide

Many people were blinded into thinking the President was capable of improving the nation based on his successful mission in capturing Bin Laden. When the results of the election came out, it showed that “Obama secured a second term with fewer electoral votes and fewer popular votes than he had accrued in the 2008 election cycle, becoming only the second Democrat in U.S. history, the other being Franklin Roosevelt, to win a majority of the popular vote more than once.” (Costas and Cohen 1). Although, he won a majority of the popular vote again, he was still losing many of his followers because of his other policies. Not many people were content with his health care reform (Obamacare), for example, “Over the first six months of 2012, well into the reelection season, disapproval on health care ran ahead of approval by 15-25 percentage points in almost all Gallup polls” ( Costas and Cohen 2). He also made several other foreign decisions which were erroneous, like taking troops out of Syria and establishing a “red line” in Syria-which he later ignored. Eventually, all of this was covered in the frenzy of his successful mission of killing the leader of Al Qaeda. Mostly, the movie was propaganda to seek votes from the public despite his repeated errors in foreign

4. When Mark Owen was a kid, he read a book written by a former SEAL and from page one, he knew he wanted to become a SEAL. It was something that was bigger than himself. Later, he describes watching the second plane crash into the World Trade Center. It was a moment he had been training for, and he longed to stand up and fight whoever was behind such a destructive crime. He says, “I was frustrated. I hadn’t trained so hard and for so long to become a SEAL only to watch the war on TV” (13). Owen thinks back to the days following the attack he waited for the phone call that he would be on his way to fight Al Qaeda’s leader. However, he never received the call. Years later, he remembers his thoughts from inside the helicopter on his way to bin Laden’s compound, “This was a mission I’d dreamt about since I watched the September 11, 2001…” (12). These SEALS all want to be on the frontline, risking their lives, taking down the most well-know terrorist in U.S. history: Osama bin Ladin.

In the film 11'09"01, directors around the world detail their perspectives on the events of 9/11 with a 11 minute short film. Idissa Ouédraogo presents a film set in Burkina-Faso, which details a group of schoolchildren, led by a boy named Adama, who attempt to pursue and capture Osama Bin-Laden after seeing a man matching his description on a magazine cover; Their objective was recieve a 25 million dollar reward for Bin-Laden’s capture in order to purchase medicine for Adama’s mother. Ouédraogo used a variety of techniques to presesnt his perspective of the events of 9/11.