Sunday Times 2
Ex-Navy SEAL with inside story of bin Laden raid is outed
The Navy SEAL turned author who was there as Osama bin Laden was killed and promised to ‘set the record straight’ about the mission that led to his demise has been identified as a soldier who has since retired from service. The book’s publisher announced on Wednesday that Mark Owen’s ‘No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission That Killed Osama Bin Laden’ would tell the real story about the raid in Abottabad, Pakistan, in May 2011.
The book, to be published under the pseudonym ‘Mark Owen,’ is scheduled to be released on September 11 – the 11th anniversary of the devastating terror attacks in New York and Washington, DC.But the former serviceman’s attempts to remain anonymous were foiled on Thursday, when FoxNews.com identified him as Matt Bissonnette, 36, of Virginia Beach, Virginia, who retired shortly after the bin Laden mission.
Publisher Dutton, an imprint of Penguin Group, asked news organizations on Thursday to withhold his name. But that didn’t stop the Associated Press, which later confirmed the the FoxNews.com report through their own sources, and circulated the information through its subscribers. The revelation had alarm bells ringing in military circles. Pentagon spokesman Lt Col James Gregory told MailOnline that the release of a former special ops soldier’s identity can be worrisome.
He said: ‘We protect the names of our special ops personnel for security reasons.
Any time names are revealed, it’s a concern.’Lt Col Gregory also joined a chorus of U.S. agencies who claim they had no knowledge of the book before Wednesday, a possible violation of regulations that bar current and former troops from spilling military matters and national security issues.
Other departments, including the CIA, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and even the White House, were also caught off-guard. That could spell trouble for Bissonnette, who may be subject to federal charges if sensitive information appears in the book.
Lt Col Gregory said that since he is now a private citizen, the military could refer the investigation to the Department of Justice.
But any judicial action would hinge on the content of No Easy Day.
‘We don’t know what kind of details [are in the book], so we can’t make a determination over whether it’s classified or not,’ Lt Col Gregory said.
© Daily Mail, London
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