Osama bin Laden was killed on May 2, 2011 at his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan after a daring mission led by elite US military operators who pulled off the seemingly impossible
The Navy SEAL who killed Osama bin Laden has claimed he heard him “take his last breath” after he shot the al-Qaeda man in the face three times.
Operation Neptune Spear saw the revered SEAL Team 6 hunt down and kill the leader of the terrorist group at his compound in Pakistan. Rob O’Neill was on the mission to Abbottabad on May 2, 2011, and has previously opened up on bin Laden’s final moments.
Speaking on The Shawn Ryan Show, he said: “I can hear bin Laden taking his last breath. When I shot him he fell to the foot of the bed.
“I shot him in the face three times. I moved Amal [bin Laden’s wife] and… his two-year-old son is now standing there, and this is the humanity of everything. This kid has got nothing to do with this. I’m a father. I picked him up and I move them to the back of the bed.”
He also previously said he feared the mission would be his last.
Speaking on the Full Send Podcast, he explained: “We were actually calling ourselves the martyr’s brigade. “We knew we were going to die. Shot down on the way in, immediate fight when we get there. We were going to run out of fuel and end our short lives in a Pakistani prison.”
Speaking on The Shawn Ryan Show, he said: ‘I can hear bin Laden taking his last breath’
He also explained his reasons for taking part in the mission. He said: “We’re going after Osama bin Laden for the single mom who dropped her kids off at elementary school on a Tuesday and then 45 minutes later, she jumped to her death out of a skyscraper because that’s a better alternative than whatever the hell was going on inside the 2,000 degree Fahrenheit.
“And her last gesture of human decency was to hold her skirt down as she killed herself.
“She was never supposed to be in the fight. We’re supposed to be in the fight.”
But despite the horrors of the mission facing them, he said he remained steadfast, as all his comrades did in the face of death.
‘I recognised his nose, his beard, how tall he was, how skinny he was,’ O’Neill said
“There was no fear involved with this mission,” he said.
“I recognised his nose, his beard, how tall he was, how skinny he was. He’s not surrendering, he’s a threat. So I got to take him down. And when you’re dealing with a suicide bomber – which he should have been – you shoot them in the face. I shot him in the face twice then once more on the ground.”