StormWarning’s Counterterrorism

A Story - Why it’s Important to Kill bin Laden

With the recent and disputed reports that bin Laden had succumbed to typhoid fever in the mountains of Pakistan, the question of the importance of bin Laden’s death in the total scheme of the War on Terrorism was raised. One such comment was, "Have you ever stomped your foot down in a water puddle and watched the water fly out leaving the center of the puddle empty? What happens next? If water remediation was your original mission… stomping the water out shouldn’t then become the focus."

The simplest response goes something like this:

The other day I was standing outside of one of my friend’s office in the technology office co-op building that we and others occupy.

From the corner of my eye I saw a roach crawling out of the greenery (its an inside atrium with lots of plants). My friend told me that it was a tree roach (a roach with wings!). I continued talking to my friend. But then the roach started crawling toward us. I told him that if the roach got too close to me, I would have to eliminate it. He looked at me, amused as we continued our discussion.

Well, the damn thing insisted on coming right at me. When it came into range (I had actually moved to a strategic position in its path), I lifted my foot, and with the swiftness of a special operations unit, stomped down. The roach, in a flash of milliseconds, was not only dead, but obliterated. At the center of the detonation lay a puddle of guts…splayed out in six directions, body parts had spread. My friend and I continued our discussion. I commented to him that he had just witnessed and example of "ten-for-one" retaliation. About an hour later, the maintenance people had removed the body, but the stain of the guts remained on the hard tile ceramic of the floor even last Friday. Of course, there are still other roaches lurking in those green bushes and plants…and I am always vigilant.

My retired spec-ops friend from SoCal and I have had this conversation a number of times, and most recently a few weeks ago on September 11th. He still doesn’t understand why a strategic operation was never mounted to search and destroy the one man who is at best, the chief conspirator and mass murderer of this conflict. bin Laden’s death will not end and may not even change the War on Terrorism. His death might only be symbolic. But if he did not die from typhoid (as now many government and counterterrorism officials doubt that he is dead), then he should die and best at our hands. With all of the resources being expended in this War on Terrorism, allocating a small portion to seek out and destroy bin Laden seems justified and right.