So much for all for one

CNN has been all over a story regarding the May 2011 commando raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

It involves an apparent dispute over which of the SEALs fired the shots that took out the world’s most notorious terrorist.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/26/world/bergen-who-killed-bin-laden/index.html?hpt=hp_c2

Perhaps the most amazing aspect of this story is that it’s even taking place. Whatever happened to espirit de corps? We are now being treated to an exhibition of dueling accounts regarding the top-secret mission by a team of the world’s most elite fighting units. Frankly, I find the whole thing disgraceful.

Bin Laden’s death was conducted in the dead of night by a combined force of Navy SEALs, CIA operatives and Army Special Forces pilots. I always had understood that the men who took part in that raid lived by a code, that the team did the job and that none of them would take individual credit for firing the fatal shots.

Indeed, a lengthy article in The New Yorker not long after the raid told of President Obama’s visit with SEAL Team 6 at Fort Campbell, Ky., and how the men who met the president wouldn’t tell him who did the deed. The story told of how the Secret Service advised the president not to ask the question. He didn’t. Instead, he thanked every member of the team collectively for completing the harrowing mission successfully.

Now comes a member of the SEAL team saying in a recently published book that he fired the shot that killed bin Laden. Others are disputing the claim, saying that someone else did it.

As much as I would love one day to shake the hand of the man who put bin Laden out of our misery, there are some things none of us needs to know.

All that matters is Osama bin Laden is dead. Each of the SEALs who stormed bin Laden’s residence is a hero.