It has emerged that though the United States Navy SEAL team which stormed into Osama bin Laden's Pakistan compound referred to the Al Qaeda leader as "Geronimo," Pentagon and CIA officials knew him by a more culinary nickname: "Cakebread."The rare details of the operation that led to bin Laden death and the handling of news of his death by President Barack Obama are contained in a new book published by ABC News called Target: Bin Laden—The Death and Life of Public Enemy Number One.A preview of the book gleaned on an online publication, Atlantic Wire, contain other startling revelations about bin Laden’s death.It became clear that President Obama actually wanted to wait until DNA results came back on bin Laden before telling the world of his death.The code name for Al Qaeda leader’s Abbottabad compound is given asAC-1...According to the book, CIA Director Panetta’s last call to the special forces that killed bin Laden went thus: "Go in and find bin Laden, and if he's not there, get the hell out."Also, the breed of the SEAL dog is a Belgian Malinois and this may bring delight to Belgian Malinois breeders, who have been hoping for a month to claim genetic ownership of the dog accompanying the SEAL team.Other revelations from the book included the first guesses about who was actually living in the Abbottabad compound, why US considered it a risk to tell Pakistan about the raid in advance and how Obama had to be persuaded to announce bin Laden's death before getting DNA evidence.On the compound, US security analysts, according to the preview, arrived at two conclusions: First, the courier was harboring a high-value target (HVT) in Abbottabad Compound One, or "AC1." Second, there was a strong probability that the HVT was Osama bin Laden, code named ‘Cakebread.’Though the case was said to be circumstantial, some questions also reportedly agitated the minds of the security analysts: Could the HVT have been al Qaeda's second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, or Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Omar? Could the compound have been shielding members of bin Laden's family, but not bin Laden himself? Could al-Kuwaiti have been harboring just some drug syndicate crime boss hiding from the law?On the risk in telling Pakistan about the raid in advance, US security analysts felt such would be a gamble. According to the review, the relationship between the US and Pakistan was not built on trust. “For years the CIA had been conducting attacks on targets in Pakistan using unmanned predator drones, with the agreement that the US would give the Pakistani government prior notice. After too many incidents where the targets had been tipped off, probably by components of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the US government changed the policy to notification "concurrent with" the drone attack,” it said.On why President Obama ultimately decided not to tell Pakistan, the book states, “Theoretically, the president (Obama) was told, the US could try to force Pakistani General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani to join the operation with the US, Kayani would be approached the morning of the attack, informed about the information on bin Laden and given twelve-to-twenty-four hours to join forces with the US, the president was told.“Pakistan would only be asked to cordon off the area. ... The president said it would be great if we could trust another country with this and proceed with the raid bilaterally. But, he then said, I don't think we can trust any other country”On the announcement of Obama’s death, “President Obama's instinct was to wait. Yes, this looked like it was a successful operation. But there was no need to rush out tonight to tell the world. Let's wait until we get that DNA evidence back. Let's tell the Pakistanis, make sure they understand our perspective, he said. Let's get all of our ducks in a row”.Mullen was told to call Kayani, the book adds, Panetta called ISI Chief Ahmad Shuja Pasha.The story is going to get out, the president's advisers said.The president didn't care. It wouldn't be official until it came from the White House, Obama reportedly said.But he was told “You can't contain this,” “This is the biggest story of the decade.”Obama was said to be calm and serene. He eventually was convinced. He would later make the announcement that night.
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