Bin Laden Was In Our Grasp? What Will Not Be Widely Reported

“….it would take weeks to get a large enough U.S. contingent on the scene and bin Laden might disappear in the meantime.”

“….there were sufficient troops available in Afghanistan and nearby Uzbekistan to mount a genuine assault on Osama bin Laden’s position at Tora Bora. And they could have been augmented within about a week by reinforcements from the Persian Gulf and the United States.”

The assault would not have required thousands of conventional forces. A large number of troops would have taken too long to deploy and alerted Al Qaeda to the approaching attack. ‘‘My opinion is that bin Laden would have left even earlier as soon as he received word that the U.S. troops were surrounding him,’’ Fury told the Committee staff. ‘‘I think he only stayed as long as he did because he thought the mujahedin would not aggressively pursue him.’’

“…..deploying 1,000 to 3,000 American troops would have required several hundred airlift flights by helicopters over a week or more.

DeLong defended the decision not to deploy large numbers of American troops. ‘‘We didn’t have the lift,’’ he told the Committee staff. ‘‘We didn’t have the medical capabilities. The further we went down the road, the easier the decision got. We wanted Afghanistan to be peaceful for Karzai to take over. Right or not, that was the thinking behind what we did.’’