ABBOTTABAD/NEW YORK, (Reuters) – Extensive surveillance of Osama bin Laden’s hideout from a nearby CIA safe house in Abbottabad led to his killing in a Navy SEAL operation, U.S. officials said, a revelation likely to further embarrass Pakistan’s spy agency and strain ties.
The U.S. officials, quoted by the Washington Post, said the safe house was the base for intelligence gathering that began after bin Laden’s compound was discovered last August, and which was so exhaustive the CIA asked Congress to reallocate tens of millions of dollars to fund it.
“The CIA’s job was to find and fix,” the Post quoted one U.S. official as saying, using special forces terminology for locating a target. “The intelligence work was as complete as it was going to be, and it was the military’s turn to finish the target.”
U.S. officials told the New York Times that intelligence gathered from computer files and documents seized at his compound showed bin Laden had for years orchestrated al Qaeda attacks from the Pakistani town, and may have been planning a strike on the U.S. rail sector this year, the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
One U.S. official said there was no indication from the intelligence that further plans were drawn up for the railway plot or that steps were taken to carry it out. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said it had no information of an imminent threat.
The fact bin Laden was found in a garrison town — his compound was not far from a major military academy — has embarrassed Pakistan and the covert raid by U.S. commandos has angered its military.
