When the rumored whereabouts of Osama bin Laden are revealed, the CIA readies a team of seasoned U.S. Navy SEALs for the mission of a lifetime. Despite inconclusive evidence that bin Laden is inside the compound, and ignoring the possible ramifications of an unannounced attack on Pakistani soil, the Pentagon orders the attack. The SEAL Team bands together to complete their mission of justice in a riveting final showdown.
09 Mar Code Name: Geronimo (2012)
FUBAR
I suppose we need to separate this comment into the effectiveness of the movie, how accurately it shows what happened, and some views about the operation completely outside the film.
About the film. The script tries to humanise a few of the characters, primarily the guy who claims to have shot the target (and whose life was ruined because he has issues) and the CIA woman who doggedly pushed for the raid (or any action). But the filmmaking focuses on the technique of disembodied cameras, which combine a pseudo-documentary style with the presumed ever-present eye of the raid-masters in their monitor festooned rooms.
This fails. It fails to work on the merger — one is intended to close emotional distance and the other to grow it. This isn’t just a rookie mistake, it is the very same committee-type mashup that curses many special operations. Unlike the operators of the mission, the actors are not up to the job, I think and the material they are given is not from the best writers. So quite honestly this is a tedious film.
I was not involved in this operation, but I have been in others. You should know that there are three kinds of operations. Ones directed by the military that are very professional and usually successful. Ones that use Defense assets but are managed by the CIA. And those that are managed by CIA and other groups that use unofficial assets. We have the second type here. These fail often because so many conflicting goals are at play, and many decision-makers at the table do not have the skills and knowledge they need. That’s why Carter’s hostage rescue failed and oddly for the same reason this one almost did. The helos.
Because so many people have broken the law, their oaths, and honourable tradition to talk about this, up and down the line, we know more than we should, but only slices. You should know that a special operation is 95% behind the scenes. The folks on the ground are called ‘operators’. While being in this group is truly honourable, we don’t pick these guys because they are bright and indeed weed out those that are critical thinkers and situated reasoners. These guys (and now females) execute a plan, that’s all. All the magic of an operation is in the thousands of folks in a silent enterprise, some in the field. I do know a couple things in this case. One is that the penetration in ISI was and still is profound. These folks don’t blab, but most of what happened was behind the scenes.
The other is about the helicopters. Copters are easy to spot. Bad guys have escape plans. We thought the Russian-supplied air defence systems might work, or in any case raise the alarm. So a decision was made to use modified BlackHawks by folks that were not knowledgeable.
These were experiments that failed. Junk was added all over these craft. Some worked better than others. The Russian systems were better than expected and that knowledge was a valuable thing. But putting all that junk on made them virtually impossible to fly safely. It was luck that we suffered as little disruption as we did. They were pulled out of storage, placed there because they were unsafe.
The point is, that a mission as important as this one — even that can be argued — should never have all the fingers involved that it did. Ironically, before 9-11, these things were managed much, much better. in 2002 a rushed and incompetent bunch of politicians decided to fix the system by reorganising things, and here in 2025 they still have not gotten core functions back up to where they were.
I write this as Trump is early in his second term. In his first, he used (through Pompeo) the CIA in illegal ways that Nixon could only dream of. All guardrails are off now. Only a single minority Senator stands in the way.
Oh. I lived for fifty years in the physical community with these guys, back from the Frogmen days. I’ve never heard them say ‘Seal Team 6’, always — when appropriate — DevGru. The ‘six’ name is for muggles.
Posted in 2025
Ted’s Evaluation — 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.
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