The killing of Osama bin Laden: how the White House changed

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The killing of Osama bin Laden: how the White House changed its storyBin Laden not armed and did not use woman as human shield, US admits; Barack Obama's spokesman blames 'fog of war'The White House press secretary, Jay Carney, had to backtrack on White House claims that Osama bin Laden had been armed when he was shot dead, as well as other key points of the official account.US officials have given the clearest version yet of the killing of Osama bin Laden in an account that directly contradicts previous assertions by the director of the CIA, Leon Panetta, and White House chief security adviser, John Brennan, that he died in a firefight.Officials have said no one fired on the US navy Seals in Bin Laden's house. They only exchange fire with a Bin Laden associate whom they killed in an adjacent guesthouse at the start of the operation, according to a report in the New York Times. The latest account, which could not be verified by the Guardian, claimed that Bin Laden was shot in his house when the commandos saw he was within reach of an assault rifle and pistol.The substantial change in the story came after the White House decided to stop providing details about the firefight. It had attributed mistakes and contradictions to "the fog of war". Jay Carney, the president's spokesman, told reporters on Tuesday: "We provided a great deal of information with great haste in order to inform you ... and obviously some of the information came in piece by piece and is being reviewed and updated and elaborated on."Here are the main areas where the official story of the raid on the al-Qaida leader's Abbottabad compound have changed.Osama bin Laden was armed and died in a firefight after resistingA senior Pentagon official told reporters on Monday in a background briefing that the American team engaged in a firefight and Bin Laden resisted. The official gave the strong impression Bin Laden had been armed and may have been shooting."He was engaged in a firefight with those that entered the area of the house he was in," said John Brennan, White House security adviser. "And whether or not he got off any rounds, I quite frankly don't know … The president put a premium on making sure that our personnel were protected and we were not going to give Bin Laden or any of his cohorts the opportunity to carry out lethal fire on our forces. He was engaged and he was killed in the process."The concern was that Bin Laden would oppose any type of capture operation. Indeed he did. It was a firefight. He, therefore, was killed in that firefight."Brennan told PBS NewsHour: "There were some firefights that were going on as these guys [the Navy Seals] were making their way up the staircase of that compound."How the story changedAccording to the New York Times, administration officials said on Wednesday that the only shots fired by those in the compound came at the beginning of the operation when Bin Laden's trusted courier, Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti, opened fire from behind the door of the guesthouse next to the house where Bin Laden was hiding. After the Seal members shot and killed Kuwaiti and a woman in the guesthouse the Americans were never fired upon again, the paper reported.Asked on Wednesday: "Is the fact of a firefight solid?", Carney said: "You heard the account that I read yesterday, and that is information that I provided. And I'm not – I'm just simply saying I'm not going further than that."He had said at a White House briefing on Tuesday that Bin Laden had not been armed. "On the first floor of Bin Laden's building two al-Qaida couriers were killed, along with a woman who was killed in crossfire," he said. "Bin Laden and his family were found on the second and third floor of the building. There was concern that Bin Laden would oppose the capture operation – operation rather, and indeed he did resist. In the room with Bin Laden, a woman – Bin Laden's – a woman, rather, Bin Laden's wife, rushed the US assaulter and was shot in the leg but not killed. Bin Laden was then shot and killed. He was not armed."When pressed on the nature of Bin Laden's resistance Carney said: "I think resistance does not require a firearm." He declined to elaborate on what other form it had taken.Brennan told Fox the troops would have to be confident he posed no threat "in terms of not having an IED [improvised explosive device] on his body".Leon Panetta, the CIA director, told PBS News Hour that he did not believe Bin Laden had been armed but there were "some threatening moves that ... represented a clear threat to our guys. And that's the reason they fired."On Wednesday officials gave the New York Times the most detailed version yet. They said that when the commandos moved into the main house they saw the courier's brother, who they believed was preparing to fire a weapon. They shot and killed him. Then, as they made their way up the stairs of the house, officials said they killed Bin Laden's son Khalid as he lunged toward the Seal team.When the commandos reached the top floor they entered a room and saw Osama bin Laden with an AK-47 and a Makarov pistol in arm's reach. They shot and killed him, as well as wounding a woman with him.Al-Arabiya, a Middle East news channel, reported that Bin Laden's 12-year-old daughter had told Pakistani investigators the US forces captured her father alive and shot him dead in front of family members. An official of the ISI, the Pakistani intelligence agency, told the Guardian the girl had seen her father killed but did not suggest Bin Laden had been captured at that point.In a further White House briefing on Wednesaday, Carney refused to comment further on the details of the combat. He told reporters: "We've been as forthcoming with facts as we can be. A lot of information came out quickly. When we needed to clarify some of the information that we had as more information came in, we've provided that. But in terms of further details of the operation, I don't have any for you."Bin Laden used women as human shields, including his wife who was killed in the processBrennan said on Monday: "There was family at that compound and there was a female who was in fact in the line of fire that reportedly was used as a shield to shield Bin Laden from the incoming fire."He added: "I think it really just speaks to just how false his narrative has been over the years."A journalist asked if the woman was his wife. Brennan replied: "That's my understanding. It was one of them … She served as a shield … when there was the opportunity to get to Bin Laden she was positioned in a way that indicated that she was being used as a shield – whether or not Bin Laden or the son, or whatever, put her there, or she put herself there."The story was partially backed up by an off the record Pentagon briefing at which reporters were told by a senior defence official that Bin Laden and some other male combatants "certainly did use women as shields".But the official said the woman who was with Bin Laden was injured and not killed. The woman who ended up being killed had been used as a shield by "a military age male" who was firing from behind her, they saidHow the story changedThe president's spokesman on Tuesday corrected Brennan, saying: "In the room with Bin Laden, a woman – Bin Laden's – a woman, rather, Bin Laden's wife, rushed the US assaulter and was shot in the leg but not killed."Bin Laden had been 'living high on the hog'Defence officials briefed reporters on Monday that Bin Laden's compound was worth $1m and was in stark contrast to the "much more dire conditions" endured by his "terrorist colleagues" and speculated on what they might be thinking "when they see that their leader was living, relatively speaking, high on the hog".How the story changedLocal estimates suggest the house is worth $250,000. Footage from inside the compound shows little sign of luxury. Cooking equipment was shown on the floor, the decor seemed shabby, medicines were left on a shelf with no cabinet and the pantry seemed rudimentary. The paint was peeling outside the building and there was no sign of airconditioning.Bin Laden's son Khalid was killed in the raidBrennan told reporters: "Bin Laden died, the two al-Qaida facilitators – the brothers, who were the courier and his brother in the compound; Bin Laden's son Khalid; and the woman, presumed to be his wife, who was shielding Bin Laden."How the story changedThe name of the son was changed to Hamza in the transcript.Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and senior White House officials watched the raid unfold live on monitorsBrennan said on Monday: "We were able to monitor in a real-time basis the progress of the operation from its commencement to its time on target to the extraction of the remains and to then the egress off of the target… we were able to monitor the situation in real time and were able to have regular updates and to ensure that we had real-time visibility into the progress of the operation. I'm not going to go into details about what type of visuals we had or what type of feeds that were there, but it was – it gave us the ability to actually track it on an ongoing basis."How the story changedCarney said on Tuesday the updates were "minute-by-minute" and "they were looking at and listening to those updates". CIA director Leon Panetta told PBS on Tuesday: "Once those teams went into the compound, I can tell you that there was a time period of almost 20 or 25 minutes that we really didn't know just exactly what was going on."