Osama Bin Laden: The Jihad Warrior Died like a Material Coward

I remember it well, the gaping wound laid open in America on September 11, 2001. Unlike the horror of Pearl Harbor, the majority of those who were murdered on 9-11 were just average American civilians doing what they did every day. They were just going to work. They were just boarding planes for vacations, business trips and visits with their friends and families. It was just another day.

I also remember watching as the plane hit the second of the Twin Towers. I remember seeing my fellow Americans falling from open windows and feeling helpless as both towers collapsed to crush the firefighters who could not get the rest of them out fast enough. I will also never forget Osama bin Laden's many gloating videos and the images of his supporters taking to the streets to celebrate our dead and to mock our horrid grief.

In 1957, Osama bin Laden was born into a rich Saudi family. His faithful followers believed in him, that he was one of them and that his determination to kill more Americans was a just and holy cause. He had abandoned the evils of materialism to become a brave warrior of Allah. That he lived a humble life; skulking in caves with a mobile dialysis machine, eluding even the brightest of American intelligence efforts to find and capture him, bin Laden achieved an almost mystic status in the minds of his believers. Stories that he had abandoned his family wealth for a pauper's life gave him the street-cred necessary to convince his followers to resist and rebuke the ways of American infidels and to become martyrs in his profane jihad. After all, having indoor plumbing, the right to free speech and women who drive and wear fashionable clothing are egregious sins for which all Americans must die.

As his faithful begin to protest around the world, burning our flag and hurling their monotonous threats, I cannot help but feel that their anger has less to do with Osama bin Laden's death and more to do with their embarrassment that they were duped. How degrading it must be for his supporters to realize their Messiah was a fraud. How mortifying it must be to have it exposed to the world that the man who said they can't enjoy America's gifts to the world had a penchant for Coke, Pepsi, and an almost pathetic obsession with Whitney Houston. While Osama bin Laden lived a life of pampered luxury, they had been sacrificing themselves, their husbands, their wives and even their children. The humiliation must be profound.

For our loyal allies in Pakistan the fact that he had been hiding under their noses for at least five years, the need to answer a lot of awkward questions must surely be uncomfortable. That pictures of Osama's compound have come out alone must be cause for them to hang their heads in shame. Images of what is considered to be a "mansion" in Pakistan does not reflect well on their definition of a million-dollar high-life nor upon their infamous guest's taste in interior decorating.

Despite our hunger to hunt down and serve justice to those responsible for the pain of 9-11, we were forced for nearly a decade to content ourselves with appetizers; the capture of Abu Zubeida, Abdul Rahim al-Nashiri and Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, the killing of Abdul Aziz al-Muqrin, Khaled Ali Haj and Saudi Fahd al-Joweir. While these moments gave us pleasure they brought little lasting comfort. Our emptiness was too deep; our void, too profound. Until Osama bin Laden himself was as dead as every American who had been murdered by his command our ravenous appetite for vindication would never be properly sated.

On March 1^st, 2011 America's main course of vindication was served upon a magnificent platter. American Navy SEALs had raided Osama bin Laden's hiding place and blew his twisted brains out. It was a banquet fit for a starving nation, paid for with the lives of so many brave Americans.

Like us, the men and women of our military never forgot. They never gave up. For us, they volunteered to lay their lives on the line; leaving their families behind to seek out those who harmed us and to avenge our horrific loss. Dessert is already being served with a proverbial cherry on top. It is giving me great pleasure to watch his followers come unglued.

The invincible Osama bin Laden is dead. The man they believed to be a humble warrior, who had abandoned his wealth to lead their cause, died in a lavish compound like a spoiled little poltroon. In the kitchen battle of justice, Karma is the ultimate Iron Chef.

Osama Bin Laden was a coward. I am glad to know these creatures of pompous cruelty must deal with that. He was an arrogant little man who hid behind 12-foot walls, big words and misguided fools who sacrificed themselves for his lie. In the end, when faced with the consequences of his personal war, he did not go bravely as his followers insisted he would. When faced with his sentence of Karma for his crimes against mankind, the brave warrior of Al-Qaeda cowered in fear behind one of his wives and his children.

Despite the obvious signs of complicity in hiding the terrorist leader, Pakistan's president, Asif Ali Zardari, is upset that we didn't tell him about or plans to take bin Laden out. Sanctimonious members of the United Nations are harrumphing with predictable suggestions that the mission may have violated international law; whatever. Let's say we'll stop violating the air-space of their chaotic third-world countries to seek out and systematically kill the people responsible for the mass murder of thousands of Americans on 9-11 as soon as they pay their parking tickets and return all of the billions we've given them in humanitarian aid.

Osama Bin Laden is dead. Like a mass communion for wounded souls the taste of the words still rest sweet upon our tongues. As a nation, we have waited ten years for this right -- for this pursuit of happiness. How ignorant of them to believe that we had or would ever abandon our tenacity for vengeance. Where America is the first to defend the helpless, we are the last to give up when it comes to seeking justice against those who do us harm. Perhaps now these cowardly fanatics have a clearer understanding of our country's strength and resolve and a more acute level of respect for that American saying about Paybacks.

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