Osama Bin and Gone

For the last decade, US and Allied forces had searched for Osama Bin Laden, flushing out caves with cluster bombs, studying video evidence and looking for pins in a haystack of intelligence data.  Finally, closure was achieved for many Americans on Sunday night when Bin Laden was finally found, shot in the head and immediately chucked into the sea.

Unlike Saddam Hussein, who was hauled out in his underpants from a squalid underground lair, Bin Laden’s hideaway was positively “Five Star”.  The Al Qaeda figurehead had been enjoying the fruits of his labour in defiance, relaxing in what appeared to be an enormous, purpose-built Al Qaeda retirement villa in a quiet suburb of Islamabad, the capital city of Pakistan.

It seems Bin Laden had lost his marbles back in 2001 (the caves of Tora Bora are full of dark corners), as he had not even bothered to hide his whereabouts very well.  There is some merit to the “hiding in plain view” approach, but not when everybody can see you.

The obvious, picture-postcard terrorist hideout was situated in a sleepy suburb, just outside Islamabad.  The mansion was surrounded by 14-foot walls topped with barbed wire, basically suggesting a lack of cohesion with the neighbourhood.  The residents only entered and left the premises in an armoured vehicle, through high steel gates which closed immediately after. The mansion was built about six years ago, and locals had always been wary of it.  It had been busted at one early stage during its development, but that seems to have blown over.

In the words of Loyd Grossman, “Who would live in a house like this?” Indeed, the question had simply been “Which high-ranking terrorist lives here?”  The resulting intelligence exercise was perhaps a little like a special episode of “Through the Keyhole”.  A list of the usual suspects had been drawn up.  For reasons which remain unclear, after a process of elimination, the only name left had been Osama himself.  It seemed there was no doubt. Even James Bond evil villains know to hide their obvious lair inside a volcano, away from Neighbourhood Watch schemes.

Strangely though, it took them a while to find him. Perhaps the hideout was easy for the local council to tolerate - after all, the residents burned their own rubbish inside the perimeter, rather than burdening refuse collection vehicles.  It was fairly close to the military academy, so perhaps it was something to do with that.  Maybe the residents of the compound were just very nice people, making huge, generous donations to local causes, and hence didn’t warrant investigation. To be fair, ears had pricked in Washington when it was discovered that there was no land-line or internet connection to the mansion.  With no telephone line to tap, there could only be a devious, suspicious, terrorist-y purpose to the building, and it was time to do some homework.

However, all this leaves us wondering: “Why now?” Perhaps it’s significant that the recent Wikileaks release revealed the name of Bin Laden’s courier.  Within the week, Navy Seals were paying Osama a special visit. Obama could do with more support at this time, too. Anyway, now that the body of Bin Laden is reduced to fish food, perhaps his hideout could be used for other purposes?  Indeed, users of Google Maps have granted it 3 out of 5 stars, with username “Joric” claiming it is a “Nice little B&B if you want the rustic life and be completely off-the-grid, in complete privacy”. Future occupants may want to take advantage of the “Do Not Disturb” door hanger though, to prevent untimely Special Forces visits.