While the raid against Osama bin Laden’s hideout in Pakistan was a phenomenal success, a more substantial victory was the trove of intelligence gained from the devices and hard drives that the special operators gathered from bin Laden’s compound, said Marine Corps Maj. Gen. Richard Mills, former head of NATO’s Regional Command-Southwest in Afghanistan, Thursday. Once analyzed, that information will have a “tremendous impact” in the long run on dismantling the al Qaeda terrorist network and its supporters and sympathizers within the Taliban in Afghanistan, Mills told reporters in Washington, D.C. “If I were [Taliban leader] Mullah Omar, I’d certainly be worried,” said Mills. The information could shed a great deal of light on the support network for insurgents in southern Afghanistan, particularly in the restive Helmand province, as well as certain individuals in leadership roles and those facilitating the movement of supplies and weapons from Pakistan, Mills noted. He is currently commanding general of the First Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) and is waiting to move into his next assignment as head of Marine Corps Combat Development Command. President Obama has nominated him for a third star.
Amid NATO’s continued push to ramp up air defenses in Eastern Europe, Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall swung by seven allied countries to boost relations last week, including those on Russia’s and Ukraine’s doorstep.