CIA Spied on Compound Thought to House Bin Laden

The Washington Post has a fascinating story this morning with more details of the role played by our secret neighbors at the CIA in tracking down Osama Bin Laden.

The top story in The Washington Post this morning reveals how the CIA established a safe house in  Abbottabad, to spy on the compound thought to be Bin Laden's residence.

" The CIA maintained a safe house in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad for a small team of spies who conducted extensive surveillance over a period of months on the compound where Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. Special Operations forces this week, U.S. officials said," according to the Post story.

"The secret CIA facility was used as a base of operations for one of the most delicate human intelligence gathering missions in recent CIA history, one that relied on Pakistani informants and other sources to help assemble a “pattern of life” portrait of the occupants and daily activities at the fortified compound where bin Laden was found, the officials said," according to the Post.

"The effort was so extensive and costly that the CIA went to Congress in December to secure authority to reallocate tens of millions of dollars within assorted agency budgets to fund it, U.S. officials said,"  the Post reported.

"Most of that surveillance capability remained in place until the execution of the raid by U.S. Navy SEALs shortly after 1 a.m. in Pakistan. The agency’s safe house did not play a role in the raid and has since been shut down, in part because of concerns about the safety of CIA assets in the aftermath, but also because the agency’s work was considered finished, " the story said.

Here's the link to the complete Washington Post story.