A lot of people are wondering why Osama bin Laden's body was buried at sea so quickly, less than 24 hours after being shot.
Conspiracy theorists have already crossed "Birther" out with a magic marker and written in "Deather"; idiots like Brietbart are making moronic demands that "Every American has a right to walk right up to bin Laden’s corpse and view it."
Which is possibly the dumbest idea I've ever heard of.
Aside from the fact that people generally don't have a tendency to attend the funeral of mass murderers whom they despise (does Brietbart want to have him lay in state like a U.S. President or something?), it's not as if anyone would be able to positively ID his body in person anyway.
There's only a handful of people alive who would be able to do so, and most of them are in hiding/on the lam anyway. I don't think any of his buddies were planning on swinging by the viewing to check out the body.
However, those with some semblance of sanity and intelligence have been wondering why the body had to be disposed of so quickly--why the hurry, they say; why not keep the body on ice (figuratively if not literally) for a few days to allow various scientific/medical experts to...do what, exactly? I'm fairly certain that the CIA and White House had the most sophisticated equipment and top medical/forensics experts available to run whatever DNA tests/facial recognition software/etc etc are available. Presumably they had these resources ready to go the moment Obama gave the go order (or perhaps sooner, depending on the situation).
Is it conceivable that every one of those experts is lying or mistaken? Anything is conceivable, I suppose. The point is, keeping the body around for another couple of days didn't serve any purpose other than the possibility of some Rush/Brietbart-inspired idiots to attempt to break into whatever military base the body was brought into to try and...what? Steal the body? Poke it with a stick to see if it bled green blood?
So, while there was no good reason to keep the body hanging around, there were several good reason not to do so, one of which was already covered by Time:
After spending many years hunting down the world's most wanted man, why did the U.S. bury Osama bin Laden at sea within 24 hours of killing him?
The reason is bound up within Islamic practice and tradition. And that practice calls for the body of the deceased to be buried within 24 hours, according to a U.S. official, who spoke on Monday on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive national security matters.
"We are ensuring that it is handled in accordance with Islamic practice and tradition," confirmed the official. "This is something that we take very seriously. And so therefore, this is being handled in an appropriate manner."
I know that under Jewish law, the body must be disposed of one way or the other within 24-48 hours at most, and for a very good, if icky reason: No preservatives allowed. No formaldehyde. I'm assuming this is also the case under Islamic law. That leaves literally freezing the body, and I can't imagine that would have gone over too well.
Taking out bin Laden is already risking enraging a certain faction of the Muslim world; performing the burial ceremony in accordance with at least a reasonable interpretation of Islamic tradition reduced at least some of that risk.
As for why they buried it at sea, that was more of a pragmatic decision, as Time continues:
But the lingering question is, Why at sea? The official said that finding a country willing to accept the remains of the world's most wanted terrorist would have been difficult, so the decision was made to bury bin Laden at sea. Furthermore, one suspects that the U.S. would not have wanted there to be a grave site for fear of it turning into a place of worship for bin Laden's followers. There are rumors, however, that the U.S. asked Saudi Arabia to take the body (bin Laden was born there), but it allegedly refused.
Plus, again, as long as they did indeed do all the medical/DNA testing necessary beforehand, what good would holding onto for another couple of days do? Once word got out, they knew they'd have a massive 3-ring circus on their hands.
If you don't think that would be the case, just remember (if you're old enough) what happened when Ayatollah Khomeini died in 1989:
After eleven days in a hospital, Khomeini passed away at the age of 86. He was succeeded by Ali Khamenei. Iranians poured out into the cities and streets to mourn Khomeini's death in a "completely spontaneous and unorchestrated outpouring of grief."
Despite the hundred-degree heat, crushing mobs created an impassable sea of black for miles as they wailed, chanted and rhythmically beat themselves in anguish ... As the hours passed, fire trucks had to be brought in to spray water on the crowd to provide relief from the heat, while helicopters were flown in to ferry the eight killed and more than four hundred injured.
Two million people attended his funeral. Iranian officials aborted Khomeini's first funeral, after a large crowd stormed the funeral procession, nearly destroying Khomeini's wooden coffin in order to get a last glimpse of his body. At one point, Khomeini's body almost fell to the ground, as the crowd attempted to grab pieces of the death shroud. The second funeral was held under much tighter security. Khomeini's casket was made of steel, and heavily armed security personnel surrounded it. In accordance with Islamic tradition, the casket was only to carry the body to the burial site.
Now, of course, bin Laden wasn't beloved (and in fact was hated) by most of the Muslim world, but take the certain faction of Islamic extremists who do practically worship him and combine it with the Birther/Deather/teabagger nutjobs and our frenzied, out-of-control mass media, and I could easily see such an event turning into a similarly insane mess.
Giving out ANY hint as to where his body was prior to getting rid of it would have resulted in a clusterfuck of epic proportions.
I do, on the other hand, fully expect a new "Osama bin Laden Video" to pop up within the next week or so, featuring blurry, fuzzy video a guy who resembles bin Laden, claiming that he's still alive. Whether this video originates from al Queda (using one of the lookalikes they presumably have available for just such an occasion) or, far more likely, James O'Keefe, is anyone's guess.
Update: Holy shit; I swear to God I didn't see this story before posting this diary--h/t to Xanthippe2 for the link:
WASHINGTON - U.S. intelligence officials believe Osama bin Laden made a propaganda recording shortly before his death and expect that tape to surface soon.
It's unclear whether the tape is audio or video, but a U.S. official says that intelligence indicates it's already working its way through al-Qaida's media pipeline. The official said the timing was coincidental and there's no indication he knew U.S. forces were bearing down on him.
A new recording from bin Laden would provide a final word from the beyond grave for a terrorist who taunted the U.S. with recorded propaganda for years. It could also provide fodder to those who insist he is still alive.
OK, I never even thought about the possibility that he might've recorded another video (or a dozen of them, for all we know, scheduled to be released every few months; he could've taped 10 of 'em in one shot) before being killed. Yeesh; we're gonna be stuck listening to this sonofabitch forever even after his head was blown off, it appears...
Update x2: A couple of people (well, one person in particular) has pointed out (REPEATEDLY...as in, ad infinitum) that the "buried at sea in accordance w/Islamic tradition" rationale is a bit weak, since it usually only applies if the person dies while at sea, which bin Laden presumably didn't. However, it also applies if there's concern about the body being dug up & desecrated, which is obviously the case here.
In any event, I'm willing to concede the point that the "accordance w/Islamic law" bit is probably not the major reason; it could very well be just a way to cover themselves. I, however, don't see a problem with this at all, since the other half-dozens reasons I also mentioned in great detail all seem pretty damned reasonable.
Besides, what the hell else were they supposed to do with the body? Keep it in a meat locker for eternity? Saudi Arabia didn't want it, and as several folks have pointed out, any country that did want it would immediately be removed from consideration, since their reasons for wanting the corpse of the worlds' most wanted terrorist couldn't be wholesome ones.
So, it was either leave him rotting on the ground, cremate him, stick him in a freezer for the next century or dump him in the ocean. Seems to me they took as reasonable a path as they could.