The hunt for Osama bin Laden: By the numbers

Nearly 10 years after September 11, the terrorist leader has been killed... but at what (human and financial) cost?

A 2001 Osama bin Laden wanted poster in New York: The U.S. military funneled $5.4 billion in aid to Pakistan over a six year period to help the hunt for the al-Qaeda leader.
(Image credit: REUTERS/Russell Boyce)

The successful raid on Osama bin Laden's Pakistani compound Sunday, and the subsequent killing of the terrorist leader, came nearly 10 years after the 9/11 attacks he engineered. Over those 10 years, the U.S. spent tens of billions on intelligence operations and aiding the Pakistani military. Here, a brief guide by the numbers:

2,819

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

20

Percent of Americans that knew someone injured or killed in the attacks

26

Days that had passed since 9/11 before the U.S. started bombing Afghanistan

Nearly $5.3 billion

Amount of aid the U.S. funneled to Pakistan in the 1980s during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, indirectly funding the rise of the Taliban

$5.4 billion

Amount of military aid the U.S. gave to Pakistan from 2002 to 2008 to help that country's military patrol the Afghan border where the Taliban and al Qaeda have been known to take shelter

70

Percent of that aid that was allegedly "misspent" on expenditures, such as a new house for a Pakistani general

1,000

Number of "terrorists" Pakistani officials claim to have killed between 2002 and 2008

Nearly 10

Number of years that Osama bin Laden eluded capture

Less than 40

Number of minutes U.S. special forces spent at bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, to complete the mission that killed him

At least 9

Number of planning meetings in which Obama participated prior to the raid that killed bin Laden

20 to 25

Number of Navy SEALs who carried out the raid mission

Casualties sustained by U.S. forces in the raid

3

Number of men, in addition to bin Laden, killed in the raid. One of the casualties was bin Laden's son.

1

Number of women used as a human shield and killed in the raid

$80 billion

Approximate cost of maintaining U.S. intelligence operations for one year

$40 billion

Approximate cost of doing so a decade ago. "Bin Laden and what happened on 9/11 contributed to an enormous increase in intelligence spending that would have to be measured in the many tens of billions of cumulative dollars by now," says Michael O'Hanlon at Marketplace.

99.9

Percent accuracy, according to officials, of a DNA test confirming that the man shot in Abbottabad on Sunday was indeed Osama bin Laden

Sources: New York, Newsweek, Guardian, Marketplace, TIME