When intelligence officers expose secret operations

When six soldiers of the United States’ elite seal team went after Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad in northern Pakistan on May 2, 2011, there was palpable tension within President Barack Obama’s kitchen cabinet.

A presidential election was in the offing and the soldiers knew that a success or failure of the highly concealed operation would have serious implications on the outcome of the polls.

Nevertheless, before them was the high-risk raid coded Operation Neptune Spear, to capture or eliminate the world’s arguably most dangerous and wanted man.

But four years later, the operation during which Osama was taken out with a shot on his forehead, has come back to haunt the seals and America.

Two of the soldiers involved in the operation have separately gone public with details of the raid contrary to military ethics, and have somehow incriminated the US government.

In August 2012, ex-navy seal Matt Bissonette stirred controversy in the US military and political circles when he published an account of the Osama Raid which contradicted the Government’s version.

In his book, No Easy Day, which he authored using the pseudonym Mark Owen, Bissonette narrated how he and the other seals trained their gun lasers on “Bin Laden’s still-twitching body, shooting him several times until he lay motionless”.

And as The Guardian reported shortly before the publication of the book, the revelation raised queries as to whether the operation was solely poised to kill Osama without the option of capture if he was cornered unarmed.

‘Owen’ instantly became a celebrity in the US and larger Europe as the demand for his book rose – but this only rubbed the US government the wrong way.

The Government claimed the seals shot Osama after he ducked back into the room – ostensibly to pick a weapon, a statement which the soldier’s book contradicted.

“The pointman (the one who fired the killer shot) pulled the two women out of the way and shoved them into a corner...the Seals later found two weapons stored by the doorway, untouched,” the author said, this according to The Guardian.

The book, gave the general public a sneak peak into the concealed conversations of soldiers; the author disclosing none of his colleagues in the squad was a fan of Obama – and that they knew Obama would ultimately use the raid to get re-elected.

They respected him as Commander-in-Chief and for giving the operation the go-ahead, The Guardian reported.

Two years later, Matt Bissonette’s fame would seemingly dwindle after his colleague who claims to have killed Osama went public about the raid.

And unlike Bissonette who used a pseudonym to tell his story, ex-navy seal Robert O’Neill went against the taboo by seemingly chest-thumping for the successful operation.

O’Neill’s open declaration as the one who killed Osama angered not only his colleagues but Mr Bissonette too – who claims he had stuck to a “gentleman’s agreement” by using a pseudonym in his book. I think there are some major inconsistencies, and information is lacking in the story.” He sighs. “Some large ones,” Bissonette told The Guardian regarding O’Neill’s version of the raid.

Meanwhile security chiefs in the US are still working overtime to place a veil on classified military operations by among other things, asking the soldiers to stick to the secrecy policy.

- Additional reporting by agencies