Osama bin Laden's death in a ripped-from-a-spy-thriller helicopter raid and firefight gives a storied unit of US special operations forces bragging rights for what has become the most famous covert operation since the September 11, 2001 attacks launched on bin Laden's orders. The unit, called Navy SEAL Team Six, probably won't claim the credit publicly, however US officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, say units from SEAL Team Six dropped into bin Laden's high-walled compound in Pakistan early on Monday morning, sliding down ropes in the pre-dawn dark. The military won't confirm which unit carried out the attack. But the head of the Navy SEALs, sent an email congratulating his forces and warning them to keep their mouths shut. Made up of only a few hundred forces, the elite SEAL unit officially known as Naval Special Warfare Development Group is part of a special operations brotherhood that calls itself "the quiet professionals." SEAL Team Six raided targets outside war zones like Yemen and Somalia in the past three years, though the unit operates primarily in Afghanistan.
The unit is overseen by the Joint Special Operations Command, which oversees the US Army's Delta Force and other special units. JSOC's combined forces have been responsible for a quadrupling of counterterrorism raids that have targeted militants in record numbers over the past year in Afghanistan. Some 4 500 elite special operations forces and support units have been part of the surge of US forces there.