Bin Laden's killers flew stealth Black Hawks

Mission helo was secret stealth Black Hawk

By Sean D. Naylor 
Posted : Wednesday May 4, 2011 18:07:39 EDT

The helicopters that flew the Navy SEALs on the mission to kill Osama bin Laden were a radar-evading variant of the special operations MH-60 Black Hawk, according to a retired special operations aviator.
The helicopter’s low-observable technology is similar to that of the F-117 Stealth Fighter the retired special operations aviator said. “It really didn’t look like a traditional Black Hawk,” he said. It had “hard edges, sort of like an … F-117, you know how they have those distinctive edges and angles — that’s what they had on this one.”

In addition, “in order to keep the radar cross-section down, you have to do something to treat the windshield,” he said. If a special coating was applied to the windshield it is “very plausible” that would make the helicopter more difficult to fly for pilots wearing night-vision goggles, he said. The helicopters carrying the SEALs arrived over the bin Laden compound at about 1 a.m. Monday local time. One crash-landed in the courtyard and was so badly damaged it was unable to take off again.
That crash landing might have been caused by a phenomenon known as “settling with power,” which occurs when a helicopter descends too quickly because its rotors cannot get the lift required from the turbulent air of their own downwash. “It’s hard to settle with power in a Black Hawk, but then again, if they were using one of these [low-observable helicopters], working at max gross weight, it’s certainly plausible that they could have because they would have been flying so heavy,” the retired special operations aviator said, noting that low-observable modifications added “several hundred pounds” to the weight of the MH-60, which already weighs about 500 to 1000 pounds more than a regular UH-60 Black Hawk.
The special operations troops on the bin Laden mission destroyed the stricken aircraft — most likely using thermite grenades — but the resultant fire left the helicopter’s tail boom, tail rotor assembly and horizontal stabilizers intact in the compound’s courtyard.
Photographs of the wreckage taken the next day raced around the Internet, creating a firestorm of speculation among military aviation enthusiasts because the tail of the helicopter did not resemble any officially acknowledged U.S. military airframe.
This was to be expected, the retired special operations aviator said. “Certain parts of the fuselage, the nose and the tail had these various almost like snap-on parts to them that gave it the very unique appearance,” he said. He and another source referred to the disc-shaped device that is seen covering the tail rotor in the photographs as a “hubcap.”
If the radar-evading technology worked, it “would be a true statement” to say that the use of the low-observable Black Hawks was evidence that the United States gave Pakistani authorities no advance warning of the mission, the retired special operations aviator added.
The low-observable program started with AH-6 Little Bird special operations attack helicopters in the 1980s, said the aviator. During the 1990s U.S. Special Operations Command worked with the Lockheed-Martin Skunk Works division, which also designed the F-117, to refine the radar-evading technology and apply it to the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment’s MH-60s, he said. USSOCOM awarded a contract to Boeing to modify several MH-60s to the low-observable design “in the ’99 to 2000 timeframe,” he said.
Initial plans called for the low-observable Black Hawks to be formed into a new unit commanded by a lieutenant colonel and located at a military facility in Nevada, the retired special operations aviator said. “The intent was always to move it out west where it could be kept in a covered capability,” he said.
USSOCOM planned to assign about 35 to 50 personnel to the unit, the retired special operations aviator said. “There were going to be four [low-observable] aircraft, they were going to have a couple of ‘slick’ unmodified Black Hawks, and that was going to be their job was to fly the low-observables.”
SOCOM canceled those plans “within the last two years,” but not before at least some of the low-observable helicopters had been delivered to the Nevada facility, the retired aviator said. “I don’t know if it was for money or if it was because the technology was not achieving the reduction in the radar cross-section that they were hoping for,” he said. In the meantime, MH-60 Black Hawk crews from the 160th’s 1st Battalion, headquartered at Fort Campbell, Ky., would rotate to Nevada to train on the stealthy aircraft, he said.
The low-observable MH-60s were armed with the same sort of door mini-guns as standard MH-60s, he said. “There was not a DAP conversion,” he added, referring to the MH-60 variant known as the Direct Action Penetrator, which is equipped with stub wings upon which can be fitted a variety of armaments.
The early versions of the low-observable Black Hawks were not fitted with air-to-air refueling probes, the retired special operations aviator said. “The probe would disrupt the ability to reduce the radar cross-section,” he added. “There was no way to put some kind of a hub or cowling over the probe that would make it stealthy.” However, he said he did not know whether the models that flew the bin Laden mission had been equipped with such probes.
USSOCOM spokesman Army Col. Tim Nye said his command had no comment for this story.
Marcus Weisgerber contributed to this story.

Bin Laden killed in dramatic night-time raid near Islamabad

By Faisal Mehmood

Mon May 2, 2011 2:55am EDT

ABBOTABAD, Pakistan (Reuters) - Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed in a U.S.-led operation involving helicopters and troops on Sunday night less than two hours' drive from Islamabad, putting Pakistani officials under pressure to explain how he could have lived so close to their capital.

Officials said bin Laden was killed inside a mansion near a Pakistani military training academy in the town of Abbotabad.

Pakistan's arch-rival, India, was quick to comment, saying the news underlined its "concern that terrorists belonging to different organisations find sanctuary in Pakistan".

A Reuters photographer in the valley town of Abbotabad north of Islamabad said police had blocked the road leading to the area where the night-time raid at a huge compound took place.

"After midnight, a large number of commandos encircled the compound. Three helicopters were hovering overhead. All of a sudden there was firing toward the helicopters from the ground," said Nasir Khan, a resident of the town.

"There was intense firing and then I saw one of the helicopters crash," said Khan, who had watched the dramatic scene unfold from his rooftop.

Senior Pakistani security officials said the operation, carried out at around 1:30 a.m., involved both helicopters and ground troops.

A Pakistani military helicopter crashed near Abbotabad on Sunday night, killing one and wounding two, according to local media. It was unclear if the crash was related to bin Laden's death, but witnesses reported gunshots and heavy firing before one of two low-flying helicopters crashed near the military academy.

Express 24/7 television showed an image of what it said was bin Laden shot in the head, his mouth pulled back in a grimace.

PAKISTAN FACES AWKWARD QUESTIONS

Bin Laden was the mastermind of the Sept 11, 2001 attacks that killed almost 3,000 people and put the United States on a decade-long war footing.

Just 10 days ago Pakistan's army chief addressed army cadets at the academy near where bin Laden was killed, saying the country's military had broken the back of militants linked to al Qaeda and the Taliban.

"For some time there will be a lot of tension between Washington and Islamabad because bin Laden seems to have been living here close to Islamabad," said Imtiaz Gul, a security analyst.

"If the ISI had known then somebody within the ISI must have leaked this information," Gul said, referring to the Pakistani intelligence agency. "Pakistan will have to do a lot of damage control because the Americans have been reporting he is in Pakistan ... this is a serious blow to the credibility of Pakistan."

Pakistan's government has not commented on the operation, raising questions about how much it knew in advance.

President Barack Obama told a news conference in Washington he had called Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari, but it was unclear if that was in advance of the CIA-led attack.

"Over the years, I've repeatedly made clear that we would take action within Pakistan if we knew where bin Laden was. That is what we've done," Obama said.

"But it's important to note that our counter-terrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding."

Defense analyst and former general Talat Masood said the fact bin Laden was killed in a joint operation would limit the damage to Pakistan's image.

"There should be a sigh of relief because this will take some pressure off Pakistan," Masood said. "Pakistan most probably has contributed to this, and Pakistan can take some credit for this -- being such an iconic figure, it's a great achievement."

Abbotabad is a popular summer resort, located in a valley surrounded by green hills near Pakistani Kashmir. Islamist militants, particularly those fighting in Indian-controlled Kashmir, used to have training camps near the town.

Resident Sahibzada Salahuddin said he was asleep when explosions woke him.

"I was sleeping when all of a sudden there was a blast. It was followed by two more small blasts ... I opened the door and saw the entire compound was on fire," he said.

Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, last month accused Pakistan's intelligence agency of maintaining ties to militants targeting U.S. troops in neighboring Afghanistan.

U.S.-Pakistan ties have been strained this year by the case of a CIA contractor Raymond Davis, who shot dead two Pakistanis in Lahore on January 27, as well as by tensions in Pakistan over U.S. drone strikes that have fanned anti-American sentiment.

Pakistan's powerful ISI has long been suspected of maintaining ties to the Haqqani network, cultivated during the 1980s when Jalaluddin Haqqani was a feared battlefield commander against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.

(Additional reporting by Rebecca Conway, Zeeshan Haider, Kamran Haider, Faisal Mehmood and Chris Allbritton; Writing by John Chalmers; Editing by Dean Yates)

Osama dead!

...Courtesy of the U.S. Military... Allah be Great!