She was seriously injured in a parachute accident. But occupied France and John F. Kennedy are not what usually come to mind when special operators look for a reference point. Dazed at the impact, he pulled his cord only to find himself tangled up in the parachute's lines. Having said that, I knew bin Laden was about six foot four And I thought, well Im six foot two. 00:23:10 He knew I'd been in a parachute accident. on. But I knew immediately the guys were okay. And fortunately, you know, the guys found me, took me to the hospital. HOOVER: Admiral William McRaven, welcome back to Firing Line for a special edition episode honoring Independence Day. The guy stomped around on the floor and found this trapdoor, if you will. Having said that, I knew bin Laden was about six foot four And I thought, well Im six foot two. (Photo Credit: United States Navy / Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain) McRaven's plan was successful and bin Laden was killed by SEAL Team 6 on May 2, 2011. Im listening to the radio. Taking Apart al-Qaeda The fact of the matter is, the law of armed conflict and the rules of engagement were pretty clear. . Well, because I was tumbling, the pilot chute came out and wrapped around one leg, and then another part of the parachute called the riser came out and wrapped around my other leg. So I get hit," he recalls. We werent going to put him in a cell with other people, that his days as the leader of Iraq were over. MCRAVEN: You know, I think the military guys - what I know is, you know, we go where the nation asks us to go, and we do what the nation requires us to do. Theyre the superheroes. Few believe it will be his last. In his thirty-seven years as a Navy SEAL, he commanded at every level.As a Four-Star Admiral, his final assignment was as Commander of all U.S. Special Operations Forces. We know that theyre getting ready to launch aircraft to come intercept us. The Commander in Chief staked his presidency on a military plan with risks that daunted his Secretary of Defense. . You were in the joint operation center and you heard the C squadron commander who was on the ground saying, we have Jackpot. Take us inside the Joint Operation Center at that moment. But it was probably 15 minutes after that. TOM HANKS: Four skiffs carrying armed men. McCraven is best known as the Navy SEAL commander who oversaw the raid that killed Osama bin Laden. MCRAVEN: Oh, absolutely. His father, a career Air Force officer, was stationed at Pope Air Force Base, now known as Pope Field, part of Fort Bragg. But I knew immediately the guys were okay. What were you seeing? I loved the sense of patriotism. I had been talking to the leader of the Army Task Force. "He walked again, which was amazing," sister Nan recalls. But it was pretty clearly bin Laden. But when we were in training, he did not hesitate to pick me out of a crowd and turn me into a sugar cookie, as we say, where you roll around in the sand, and that kind of good natured harassment on a routine basis. "There now has been an accumulation through the course of 2011 of very significant losses in core al-Qaeda and also the affiliates in Yemen and some of the other offshoots," Petraeus says, citing two al-Qaeda figures, Atiyah Abdel Rahman in Pakistan and Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen, whose deaths have not been officially acknowledged as JSOC's work. Will they be, you know, somebody of importance? We were holding our breath . "All in all, a pretty good year," McRaven says, "but frankly it has been a big year for us really since 9/11.". Im listening to the radio. There he produced an original treatise, "The Theory of Special Operations," that the Navy credits with "considerable impact not only on the special-operations community but on [the Defense Department] at large." 20. Admiral William McRaven (ret), former commander of Special Ops during OBL raid, writes: "Truth be told, I am a pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, small-government, strong-defense and a national . "I want to confirm we have a call of 'Geronimo EKIA,' " he said evenly. INSKEEP: He wasn't in a very good position to negotiate, I suppose. We fly in by helicopters, we assault compounds, we, you know, we grab the bad guy or whatever is required, and we get out. MCRAVEN: (Laughter) Again, some things are better not questioned. False, Marcinko says. And in the case of the rescue of Captain Phillips, the guys on scene made all the right calls. Accuracy and availability may vary. INSKEEP: You write that somehow your staff sometimes lost people's paperwork. As it turned out, in a dark room at night. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. Those were the Wild West days of special operations, and McRaven did not share his commander's easygoing attitude about rules. What kind of intelligence did we get off the target? Kurt Ganapathy. William H. McRaven. Updated at 5:38 p.m. I was heading out of Iraq, heading to AL U.D.(?) But again, to your point, I had a moral and legal obligation to make sure that we took good care of him. Operation Neptune Spear stripped al-Qaeda of its iconic leader and offered a kind of recompense for the traumas of 9/11. But after SEAL training, we were stationed at the same team and we became very close friends. I got on the plane with my aide, Captain Hank Henry. Capture him if you can, but if he presents a threat at all, any threat whatsoever, kill him.. Adm. William McRaven, who oversaw the raid on Osama bin Laden's home, says as it went beyond the planned time, he feared Pakistani forces might find U.S. troops . hour.s about an mr. axelrod: admiral, great to see you again. He never had his hands raised. Im absolutely ok with that. She was seriously injured in a parachute accident. I had a moment of relief, you bet. We'd had a lot of leads on him, but frankly, none of the leads had panned out. And I think he was probably glad I didn't ask him. "Special forces have taken greater measures in the last year and a half to reduce civilian casualties," says Erica Gaston, who wrote a report for the Open Society Foundations, "but one night raid in a village can be enough to turn [people] against international and Afghan government efforts. . At the time, ST-6 was commanded by the legendary (and infamous) Richard . When McRaven jumped he found himself falling at 125 MPH and hitting the parachute of another, who had deployed his chute too soon. Admiral Bill McRaven (retired) (DoD photo by Ken Moore) RELATED: NAVY SEAL WHO OVERSAW BIN LADEN RAID PENS CHILDREN'S BOOK In his speech to the graduates, O'Connor recounted how McRaven spoke about being a young SEAL officer when he was assigned to the insular, and still relatively new, SEAL Team 6 in the early 1980s. Yeah, well, obviously, like a lot of people who watched it on TV, it was a horrifying moment for all of us. They took care to avoid civilian casualties. Admiral McRaven also explains how it isn't necessary to change everyone's lives for the world to change. Michael Thornton is one of a handful of Navy SEALs that have been awarded the Medal of Honor. What happened was the down blast from the helicopter hit this 18 foot high wall, created a vortex, kind of a vacuum over the blades, caused the helicopter to lose lift. So I reflect back on that 10 years ago and Im just proud to have been a small part of it. So, yes, we believed we had bin Laden. MCRAVEN: In Iraq and Afghanistan, of course, you saw these horrific injuries. Four skiffs carrying armed men. Not your color, not your ethnic background, not your education and not your social status. Speaking to MS News, the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) was alerted to a traffic accident on 1 Mar at about 6.45pm. McRaven's special operators, meanwhile, are flying high. . Thank you for your service. And just something said, hey, we got to turn around, weve got to get back, because, you know, tonights going to be the night. Thanks to the footage owner for stopping to help.Thomas LeongSi. it showed that we as Americans can do the hard things and do them well. Then, in 2001, came the parachute accident and the long climb back. The potency of that image may depend on making sure the triumph in Abbottabad is not succeeded by another Desert One or Black Hawk down. "There is nobody in the U.S. government that thinks we can kill our way to victory, certainly not the special-operations guys," he says, "but what happens is, by capturing and killing some of these high-value targets, we buy space and time for the rest of the government to work.". McRaven says civilians die in fewer than 1% of the raids, a good record in close urban combat, but it still means U.S. commandos are killing noncombatants twice a month. So anybody that claims that theyve got a helmet cam video, nobody was wearing helmet cams. I think he still felt that he would come back into power. Television, film and video games have infused popular culture, and the political debate, with the power of special warfare to get the job done on the cheap. And as I would find out later, it wouldnt be the last time. Admiral, tell me about that premonition. Sometimes you need a boatload of people to help you through. One was to parachute in a SEAL . And so on Jan. 29, it was McRaven who began to plan "finish options" for bin Laden alongside his counterparts in a seventh-floor CIA conference room. we are two days after veterans day and that was the occasion for this event. HOOVER: Duty is among the virtues that you write about in the hero code. And so what we had to do pretty quickly was to make sure he understood that he was a prisoner of the United States and we were going to treat him well. The second helicopter, which was supposed to come in and land on the roof, lands outside. But it was pretty clearly bin Laden. . And I certainly didn't make it to where I was as a result of my own wonderful talents. I unzip the body bag and without getting too graphic he obviously didnt look too good, he had a couple of rounds in his head the beard was a little smaller, I think, than what we usually anticipate. Credits. Now, when I walked in, I made sure that my name tags were off and my stars were off. The most recent internal tally counted more than 2,500 such commando missions in and around Afghanistan over 12 months. Judge plans to appoint Special Master to Dominion, Fox News . McRaven had to watch the American response on television as he recovered. We know that theyre getting ready to launch aircraft to come intercept us. As you point out. Yeah, I couldnt hear any of that. And you think that contributed to his decline in custody? Then, I thought, well, you know, thats probably not very distinguished for the three star admiral to be lying down next to the body. And you know what? Late in 2010, you know, we were getting ready to pull out of Iraq by early 2011, for the most part, and yet, my guys were still conducting operations in downtown Baghdad. Yeah, theres a lot of people out there that think that this was a kill only mission. Why is that, Admiral? I wonder what you think we can do to convince more people to make their beds every morning? And every day that I went in, he tried to engage me in a conversation. . And every day that I went in, he tried to engage me in a conversation. Duty is among the virtues that you write about in the hero code. Thornton is a former Navy SEAL that was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions during a mission in the Vietnam War. And I thought it was a fair question, and it's a question that needed to be answered. I'm not exactly sure what's happened. All rights reserved. So Im getting radio calls from the ground force commander. Each chapter of Make Your Bed provides more context and stories for each lesson from the original speech. And now I'm tumbling out of control towards the ground. HOOVER: You write about a skydiving accident that you were in in 2001 that nearly cost you your life. From 2015 to 2018, he was the chancellor of The University of Texas System.. McRaven served from June 13, 2008 to August 2011 as commander of Joint Special Operations . As you point out. According to Shin Min Daily News, the motorcyclist allegedly sustained fatal injuries . And so the president asked me, he says, Well, Bill, do you know whether or not its bin Laden? I said, Sir, I dont. As chancellor, he oversaw 14 institutions that educate 221,000 students and employ 20,000 faculty and more than 80,000 health care professionals, researchers and staff. I mean, we flew the 162 miles really without incident. So Rob ONeill and his teammate, when they came up Again, there were no helmet cams. Jocko Willink. It was July 18, 2001, midway through that quiet summer before the whole world learned Osama bin Laden's name. President George W. Bush had asked Downing to inaugurate a new position as Deputy National Security Adviser for Combatting Terrorism. I loved the sense of patriotism. On the downside, "relative superiority" does not last long. Well, thank you president Powers, Provost Fenves, deans, members of the faculty, family and friends, and most importantly, the class of 2014, it is indeed an honor for me to be here tonight. During a routine exercise, while serving as a Navy captain with decades of command of SEALs around the world, Admiral William H. McRaven was involved in a parachute accident: he fell more than 1,200 metres before the parachute deployed! "Look how much of their leadership we've taken apart and how long it's taken, and the movement is still not dead," says Wade Ishimoto, a former Delta Force intelligence officer. The lead, in fact, had led them to Saddam. William McRaven: We were doing a freefall. Today, McRaven calls Marcinko a "charismatic figure" who deserves credit for building an important new unit from scratch. Starting your day off by completing a task will initiate your momentum to do the next task, and then the next, and so on. HOOVER: Admiral McRaven, on this Independence Day weekend, thank you for your service and thank you for sharing your stories from your recent books, Hero Code, Sea Stories and Make Your Bed. And then. William H. McRaven was born in Pinehurst, North Carolina. Thanks so much. So upon reaching the third floor, the raids second SEAL, Senior Chief Petty Officer Rob ONeill, came face to face with a, quote, tall, thin man. OBAMA: Tonight, I can report to the American people and to the world that the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, // A small team of Americans carried out the operation with extraordinary courage and capability. But he was not going to have outside contact with any of his former Iraqi leaders. This Week on a special, Independence Day Firing Line. SINGAPORE - The Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) had to prise open a taxi's roof to rescue two female passengers following an accident in the early hours of Saturday morning (July 10). INSKEEP: Admiral, one other thing occurs to me. And, oh by the way, the guys are still in the compound. Just like the young female sergeant who I just visited at Walter Reed this week. On May 17, 2014, Admiral William H. 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