This bug is currently Closed: Unresolved.

Story on Navy SEALs' bin Laden raid with "helmet cams" untrue?

Reported by Mark Follman on Aug 4, 2011

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Bug Type:  Fabrication

In his report on the Abbottabad raid, CBS News' David Martin stated that "the 40 minutes it took to kill bin Laden and scoop his archives into garbage bags were all recorded by tiny helmet cameras worn by each of the 25 SEALs. Officials reviewing those videos are still reconstructing a more accurate version of what happened."

But according to an in-depth report by Nicholas Schmidle published in the New Yorker this week, "The SEALs were not wearing helmet cams, contrary to a widely cited report by CBS."

I don't have enough information to know whether the CBS News story is wrong; it provides essentially zero information about its sourcing. Schmidle's story is far more in-depth and more forthcoming about its sourcing. Especially given how central the helmet cam information was to the CBS story, it seems reasonable to ask them to corroborate it in light of the New Yorker report.

For more details, see this post:

http://markfollman.com/2011/08/03/getting-bin-laden/

In that post I also note several other discrepancies between the two stories:

• CBS reported that two Navy SEALs fired the shots that killed bin Laden; the New Yorker says one Navy SEAL fired the shots.

• CBS reported that 25 SEALs stormed bin Laden's compound; the New Yorker says it was 23 SEALs.

• CBS reported that the SEALs encountered bin Laden's daughters and one of his wives in the bedroom where they killed him; the New Yorker says the SEALs encountered two of bin Laden's wives there.

Response

Mark Follman has contacted CBS News and received the following response.

Mark Follman has not contacted CBS News