Former CIA deputy director Michael Morell told HuffPost Live on Tuesday that Seymour Hersh's recent report in the London Review of Books, which claims the Obama administration lied about the Osama bin Laden raid, is "all rubbish." Morell, who has a new book out titled The Great War of Our Time: The CIA's Fight Against Terrorism--From al Qa'ida to ISIS, disputed Hersh's claim that the US worked with the Pakistani government and intelligence officials in its pursuit of bin Ladin. President Obama says the US worked alone.
Morell told host Alyona Minkovski he was in the Situation Room when President Obama decided to not inform the Pakistanis that they were going into Abbottabad, where bin Laden was believed to be and was eventually assassinated.
"In the aftermath, the Pakistanis were furious with us ... because they were embarrassed," Morell said. "They were embarrassed that we had found them in Pakistan and they hadn't, and they were embarrassed that the United States military had flown hundreds of miles into Pakistani territory, put guys on the ground and they had no idea about it and they were able to do nothing about it."
Morell said he is "100 percent" confident the Pakistani government didn't know about the raid, but admitted the couldn't rule out the possibility that local intelligence officials or police in Abbottabad knew about bin Laden's whereabouts and were protecting him.
Related
Before You Go
