Worst-case scenario w/bin Laden

[Agnostic Muslim]

ST6 does not surrender. They will try to kill the entire OPFOR. Apparently a heavy US Navy strike force was readied as air support in case of combat.

So the US would potentially start a regional war and demolish any chance of stabilizing the region and weakening terrorist organizations, the very purpose for which the US is militarily engaged in the region and conducting said mission to take out OBL, than have ST6 surrender, returned, and OBKL still arrested/killed?

Sounds like a lot of stupid bravado and testosterone pumped generals in the US military decision making process if that is the case.

The OBAMA presidency will not survive the scenario you outlined above. Ask yourself this, what does Obama value more? Being president for 4 more years or the lives of a couple hundred, or couple of thousand Pakistanis? The answer is obvious, and you can keep adding zeros behind that number.

So are you suggesting that the US leadership would display 'stupid bravado and testosterone pumped decision making' at the expense of the entire strategy and goals that have cost over a trillion dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives?

[Agnostic Muslim]

They would not have contacted the Pakistanis to maximize the duration of uncertainty regarding the identity of the US assault force.

The US assault force had already suffered one kink in the mission with the crashed chopper - they had no idea what kind of resistance they would eventually meet inside the compound from the residents (as it happened it was essentially none, which allowed the OP to be completed in the time it did), so why would they risk not contacting Pakistan?

Or were they prepared to leave without OBL if the mission seemed like it would go over 40 minutes?

The US knew the exact characteristics and programming of the F-16s' radars. Once the choppers were on their way out, the F-16s never had prayer of finding them.

How did the US know it was the F-16's that would be scrambled?

[gunnut]

Why would ST6 not surrender and the US political and military leadership immediately contact the Pakistani leadership to press for OBL's release as well as go public with the fact that OBL had been found/killed in Pakistan by US forces and everyone was in Pakistani custody?

ST6 does not surrender. End of story.

[citanon]

So the US would potentially start a regional war and demolish any chance of stabilizing the region and weakening terrorist organizations, the very purpose for which the US is militarily engaged in the region and conducting said mission to take out OBL, than have ST6 surrender, returned, and OBKL still arrested/killed?

Sounds like a lot of stupid bravado and testosterone pumped generals in the US military decision making process if that is the case.


So are you suggesting that the US leadership would display 'stupid bravado and testosterone pumped decision making' at the expense of the entire strategy and goals that have cost over a trillion dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives?

There can be no unanswered challenge to the sovereign power of the United States.

If Pakistan came out in force violently opposing US efforts to kill Bin Laden, what do you think the reaction would be in the US public? Do you think at that point, there would still be debates regarding the subtleties of whether the Pakistanis knew whether Bin Laden was there?

The US force went in for Bin Laden. An OPFOR against that operation would be one opposing the effort to avenge 3000 Americans. To allow it any type of success would be to convey the message that the US could tolerate active protection of someone who poses what's characterized as an existential threat to the US. A weak response would substantively degrade any deterrence value of the strike. Any Pakistani attempt at mounting such, would have been met with a "robust" response.

The results would be messy, but at the end of the day, one side is The Superpower, and the other side, is a 3rd world country.

[S2]

It's an odd scenario.

I believe there was high confidence of no significant response from the Pakistani military. Without divulging specific operational considerations you can bet that philosophical discussions regarding this particular "what if" have been held. In fact I'd suspect this particular target entailed a "get out of jail free" card. I personally doubt, if true, the Pakistani powers-that-be ever contemplated such would occur within a mile or so of their military academy.

Had Rangers been deployed I'd have imagined a longer duration on the ground and a more thorough sanitizing of intelligence information. Had this been the hills of FATAville or even Khyber-Pakhtunka perhaps this might have been the case.

As to air cover, it was unquestionably within very, very quick response range. That won't be disclosed anywhere we can read about it anytime soon. In fact, much about this operation will remain sealed. At least I sure hope so.

[gunnut]

How did the US know it was the F-16's that would be scrambled?

List of Pakistan Air Force Bases - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Looking at the chart, only Mushaf air base is within range with fighters. Those are F-16As.

F-16Cs are deployed at Shahbaz base in the south, facing India.

[calass]

Why would the US push the issue to a confrontation given that they stand to gain nothing from it either, even if they are capable of destroying the Pakistani military?

How do we know that the reason the PAF jets never intercepted the Blackhawks was because the US did in fact contact Pakistan
(1) When the operation at the compound was underway and it was a matter of time when Pakistani forces would arrive.
(2) When the PAF jets were scrambled.

Because both sides said so..and the Seals used stealth helicopters..

[Agnostic Muslim]

ST6 does not surrender. End of story.

Useless bravado.

End of story.

[Agnostic Muslim]

Because both sides said so..and the Seals used stealth helicopters..

I know what both sides said, but perhaps you should revisit the first post in the thread to understand which hypothetical scenario is being discussed.

[Agnostic Muslim]

List of Pakistan Air Force Bases - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Looking at the chart, only Mushaf air base is within range with fighters. Those are F-16As.

F-16Cs are deployed at Shahbaz base in the south, facing India.

The F-16 A's are not the only fighters at the base.

[calass]

I know what both sides said, but perhaps you should revisit the first post in the thread to understand which hypothetical scenario is being discussed.

So you agree that that Pakistanis being informed comes only under a hypothetical scenario?..

[citanon]

Useless bravado.

End of story.

This isn't a debate about how you feel about what would happen, we are talking about what would actually happen. In that case gunnut is 100% correct.

[Agnostic Muslim]

This isn't a debate about how you feel about what would happen, we are talking about what would actually happen. In that case gunnut is 100% correct.

Why?

Again, are US leaders stupid enough to set back, perhaps irreversibly, US goals in the region with respect to stability and ending support for extremism, that they would take choose 'pointless bravado'?

If so, no wonder the US continues to flail in Afghanistan.

[Agnostic Muslim]

So you agree that that Pakistanis being informed comes only under a hypothetical scenario?..

No - but we are only discussing a hypothetical scenario.

I believe the moderators already closed the other thread over the arguments over 'who knew what and when', and I and the other Pakistanis made our case over why we thought Pakistan was aware of the raid before hand, so lets leave that discussion out of this since it was going nowhere.

[gunnut]

The F-16 A's are not the only fighters at the base.

What else would you send from Mushaf?