No Easy Day - good book about catching Bin Ladin
 

Just finished this book written by Mark Owen (not real name), a Seal Team Six member who was second in the room when Usama Bin Ladin UBL was finally taken out (yes, I realize it has several spellings). The book gives a good deal of insight into the sacrifices the guys make to be a Seal and gave me a new appreciation of what they do. According to him at least it also tells the accurate story of swooping in and taking UBL out. Not a lot of puffery and it feels real.

Hillary Clinton's book got such a lot of publicity from the broadcasters but I have not really seen anything about this excellent book.

Read it - tell some folks about it; that is what I am doing.

PS - did not know that the whole concept for the Seals came after the failed hostage rescue during Jimmy Carter's presidency. After that the military realized they needed something else and had Richard Marchinko develop the program.

I sure wish that clandestine and covert ops stayed clandestine and covert. Telling everybody the nuts and bolts tells the next enemy how to counter those activities.

But I'll still read the book. Damn it, I like that stuff!

I wondered if anyone from the govt or military vetted the narrative before it was published.

Now I hear that the govt may be pursuing the Seal who wrote the book.

The book has been out for awhile and the Pentagon was not happy about it. They made a lot of noise about how this was not right and stuff when it came out, but the US has no Secrets law like they do in England so it turns out there was little they could do about it.

I think the Pentagon backed off because all they were doing was helping to hype the book.

And...... I would doubt that all of it is totally true. Small details would be changed to keep real secret stuff secret. This is not uncommon when military people, those that really know what's going on, write a book about a historical event. This does not change the history in anyway as events such as this do not turn on a small and secret detail.

After all, the reason for the book is two-fold: Profit for the author but also a record for history. Getting real secrets is not a part of the purchase price.

good book. I imagine the writer did NOT tell all or disclose completely what actually occurred for them to get to the point where they took UBLs brains out the back of his cranium. Operational factors at that level are not really security issues, as SPECOP tactics are fairly well known. And, for most, that's the part people want to read about, because of the exciting "you were there" nature of it.

I agree with this 100%. The only things that might be left out, or slightly altered, would be devices that it is best not everyone know about.

Back in the early 70's I interviewed a guy who claimed to have invented a camera that could see through walls. He would not say how it worked but he gave a demonstration and sure enough he could describe in great detail what was going on behind a wall he could not see through.

I thought it was some sort of trick until he sold the patent. Today we know this as a heat signature camera, but at the time it was a secret device that he described as working in anyway that you would buy into. He would never tell you what was really going on.

But it was enough for a story that the person could see though walls.

Good book.

The Navy Seal program predates the Carter Admin. It began during the Vietnam War iirc. Former Senator Bob Kerrey* (D- Neb.) was a Navy Seal who was awarded the CMOH in for action in 1968.

Joseph (Bob) Kerrey, Medal of Honor, Vietnam War - YouTube


*We need more men like him, imho.