>> rose: welcome to the program. tonight a conversation with admiral william mcraven, the former demand of u.s. special operations. he was the man in charge of the mission that led to the killing of osama bin laden. he is now the chancellor of the university of texas system. >> if you do not do something about the situation in syria and iraq now which is primarily being caused by i.s.i.s. but is the war in syria as well, it is assad, it is the russians coming in creating a barrier from which assad can continue to conduct his actions, all of that, if you don't tackle that problem, and the way you're going to have to address it is with american military might, along with our coalition partners, and any coalition partner that will join us, but the united states is going to have to take the lead. and a lot of people say why? you know, it's not necessarily our fight. i've heard that argument, you

know, a hundred times before. i've got it... it may not seem to be our fight, but i guarantee you it's our fight because it threatens our national interests abroad and here in the states. >> rose: admiral mcraven for the hour, next. >> rose: funding for "charlie rose" has been provided by: american express. >> rose: additional funding provided by: >> and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and information services worldwide. captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose: admiral william mcraven is here, retired from his post-as commander of u.s.

special operations last year after more than three and a half decades of military service. in that role he oversaw the expansion of america's most elite warriors across the globe. she best known for advising and directing the navy seale zeal raid that killed osama bin laden in 2011. chuck hagel said a full account of mcraven's career has yet to be written but will have to be heavily redacted. he is a war leader that generations and special operates from across the branches of all our services will strive to emulate in every way. he now confronts a new set of challenges as chancellor of the university of texas system and i am pleased to have him at this table. welcome. >> thanks, charlie. glad to be here. >> rose: what did chuck hagel mean? >> most of the mission wes conducted over 37 years were classified and normally if they're at top secret level you

obtain that classification for minimum of 25 years. so i think over time, as some of these missions come to light, and we unredact them, i think the american people will be pleased to see what the special operations community at large has done for them over certainly the many decades that i had the opportunity to be part of it. >> rose: you have told me more than once that every night special forces at the time of the mission to afghanistan to get osama bin laden were taking missions like that. >> yes. in fact, the night that we got bin laden, i think we conducted 11 missions in afghanistan. so, you know, in iraq or afghanistan, the profile was similar. i mean, the distances were longer. going into abad abad was 162 miles there, but the complexity of the mission we have done and both in iraq and afghanistan much more complex missions. the real credit in the bin laden raid goes, as i said before, to the president, his national

security team and the central intelligence agency and the national security agency and those in the intelligence agency that located the compound and the president making the tough decisions for us to go do the mission. i am very proud of my guys. i think they did a marvelous job, but this mission was something that we had been trained and, obviously, all of these seals were hand-picked to do the job and they had been on many missions before. i won't call it routine. nothing about it was routine, but it was not the hardest part of the bin laden raid. the hardest part was the decision by the president and the intel community -- >> rose: and the day the helicopters lifted off, they did not know if he was there. >> no, we did not. this was part of the intel buildup. we were trying to figure out whether or not -- >> rose: hadn't been confirmed? >> right. there were arguments on both sides as to whether or not it was bin laden. so we split it down the middle and thought it was a 50/50

chance. the president called me on friday. we had thought about doing the mission on saturday, but we had weather in a couple of the valleys so i elected to roll the mission 24 hours. friday he called me in afghanistan, said what do you think, i told him 50/50 and said we'll get him if he's there and if not we'll come home. >> rose: is that what you told him, that's what we do, ride a helicopter, go somewhere, get people and come back. >> if you look at the profile in afghanistan and to a lesser degree iraq, but afghanistan because of the distances, most of our missions were seals, delta operators, rangers, special forces, getting in

helicopters, going to the target, patrolling the target, taking care of business, getting on helicopters and coming back. so the profile for the bin laden raid wasn't a lot different, just the distances were further. >> rose: we remember and note how dangerous it is because we recently saw the loss of a member of delta force in the rescue of some hostages held by i.s.i.s. >> absolutely. i mean, every mission has its risks. i mean, the training missions we do are very realistic. so whenever you are training as a special operate around i'd say it's true in the infantry and the marine corps, the risk is always high and potential for loss of life is out there. in a combat situation where the enemy gets a vote and you can get into a gun fight, the risk rises exponegligencely but we're well trained and deal with the situations. >> rose: the enemy gets a vote. >> they're part of the calculations, that's right. >> rose: what remains to be told about that mission? >> not much. >> rose: that's the point i'm asking. >> absolutely.

you know, you've seen the recent article in the "times" magazine. >> rose: the "times" today or yesterday about the four lawyers looking at that operation. >> and certainly that's an aspect of the mission that is interesting. but in terms of the tactical aspects of the mission, there is nothing left to be told. the way it has been portrayed and provided in terms of the books that are out there and the movies are pretty close to reality. what i can tell you is we got approval to go do the mission. we got on the helicopters, made the transit through abad abad, raided the compound, got his remains, transported the body to the arabian gulf and buried him in accordance with islamic tradition and that's where he lays today. that's the story and nothing else. >> rose: when people raise these questions, what do you think? >> i'm baffled, absolutely.

some of the accusations are bizarre, and, you know, i don't even know where to take it. you know, when they talk about the seals were cutting off body parts and throwing them off helicopters, you begin to ask yourself who does he think these soldiers and seals are? this is not the way we treat anybody. there is sort of a moon landing conspiracy about the way he portrayed this. it was a straightforward mission authorized by the president of the united states and, again, unfortunately today, there really isn't anything left to tell about the mission but they continue to rehash it a lot. >> rose: but you were not happy those stories got out. >> you know, i wasn't happy but, frankly, i think in light of the kind of public interest, international interest, it was probably inevitable. >> rose: it was a mission that the c.i.a. directed, yes

sphnchts yes. >> rose: and you carried out the mission of the c.i.a. >> yes. >> rose: was there ever a moment you had a doubt? >> in terms of? >> rose: the success of the mission. when one helicopter was in trouble, did you say, oh, my god? >> it's always prude pt to have doubts. you need to make sure you don't come into any mission overly confident, we had plans a, b, c and d and, when the helicopter went down in the compound, we had a backup plan. i had another helicopter standing by not too far away. we had anticipated that this was a possibility. we had anticipated it for a different reason. we were concerned that because where the helicopter was coming in to do the fast roping, it was possible bin laden or an associate could come outside the third level and engage the helicopter. frankly, i talked to the pilot ahead of time and we knew even if the engagement occurred the helicopter could make it into

what we referred to as the animal pen which is where they landed and he was confident, even if he was taking fire, he could do that. so when i saw the helicopter struggle, again, i understood what was going on, i had a visual on it, listening to the radio communications. i wasn't overly concerned. i knew the helicopters were not crashing. it was a hard landing. i know the difference between a crash and a hard landing. we had a backup plan and we executed the backup plan. >> rose: were you surprised that the pakistanis didn't react? >> i was a little surprised, absolutely. i mean, we were in their e ability to understand ine had general what was going on, but i had kind of given the team about a 30-minute time frame on the ground. >> rose: you said to them, if you haven't accomplished the mission in 30 minutes -- >> right, get back on the helicopters and let's get out of here. it went longer because the

ground force manager identified the computer and hard drives and a lot of important material on the second floor, so as he relayed it back that there was important things they needed to get, i allowed the clock to continue. i think we were on the ground for about 34 about 48 minutes be lifted off and got everybody out of the compound. >> rose: what do you believe now about what the pakistanis knew about bin laden's presence? >> i think it's been said from the beginning and, to the best of my knowledge, the pakistanis had no knowledge of bin laden's presence there. >> rose: how can it be when it's that close to a military base. >> you have to ask the pakistanis. >> rose: you uh knew they did not know. >> they did not know. >> rose: that the national kurt service did not know. >> i absolutely believe that. >> rose: why do you believe that? >> we have pretty good intelligence, and there was nothing in the intelligence that

led us know that the pakistanis were there. >> rose: he was surprised to know they had been right there under their nose. >> they were. >> rose: the discussions were about options. what were the options? >> it's been raised in a lot of open source material. we had options. i'll leave it at that, there were other options, kinetic options. the problem with that option was evidence. if bin laden had been killed in a bombing raid, you know, how do you prove that? and then again, you could have those that want to keep his legacy alive for a very long time, so that would create problems. but probably more important than that, i know as the president deliberated about the bombings, there were women and children on the target and that was -- again, i think you would have to ask the president, but i think that would have been a tough call in light of the fact we had

the raid option. >> rose: he had to have confidence in you. >> he had confidence and it wasn't just me. we had a large special operations force but we had other military components of the raid that were in afghanistan and elsewhere and, of course, had great confidence in the c.i.a. >> rose: assess where you think the options are in syria for the united states in the battle against i.s.i.s. and other groups and the fact that the russians are there and some development in terms of assad's getting stronger. >> well, certainly the intervention of the russians complicated the mattered significantly. i applaud the president for now taking aggressive action at least from what i've seen and the text i've seen from secretary ash carter and charmen joe dunnford, you know, we could not be better served than having those two gentlemen where they are. ash carter is a tremendous

public service and no warrior like joe dunnford. so for the american people to recognize we have two to have the finest in the very senior positions in the military and the department of defense is terrific. so, you know, now we have to be able to device a strategy to go after i.s.i.s. that is just more than the word kinetic but more than just the drone strikes and airstrikes against the leadership. that is clearly a component of how you have to deal with i.s.i.s., but recognizing the i.s.i.s. that is in iraq, we'll need to partner with the iraqi soldiers and more than partner on the forward operating bases, we need to get out and have boots on the ground and be true partners with them as they begin to root out i.s.i.s. in iraq. >> rose: meaning they will be on the front lines fighting with them or providing other kinds of services? >> again, i will defer to the secretary and president and joe dunnford on that. but we absolutely need to be on the front lines with them.

this is a serious national security issue and, in order to deal with it, we are going to have to put young men and women at risk again and put boots on the ground. >> rose: boots on the ground. absolutely. and i think we need to put boots on the ground as far forward as we need to, again, in pip with partnership with the iraqis and our coalition, and if we need to go into syria and iraq to get i.s.i.s., we need to do that. >> rose: because guys that kind of threat. >> yes. >> rose: define the threat. i think it's multipronged but the part that concerns me is the effect i.s.i.s. has on the levant, the region at large. it's also al-nusra and a number of other bad actors in syria, but now as they've moved into iraq and you begin to pressurize lebanon, you begin to pressurize jordan and, so, as all that pressure builds as a result of i.s.i.s.'s action, it is a second and third-order effect that, if you do not deal wit in syria and in iraq, again, the pressure on lebanon and

jordan could cause the entire area to tumble so i. so it is not just the fact as safe haven from which i.s.i.s. could carry out strikes against the u.s. and u.s. interest, it is the impact i.s.i.s. will have on the region. and you already see how it is creeping into turkey and the other areas and libya as well, absolutely. >> rose: it seems to me you were saying, and i want to clearly understand it, because taking advantage of your experience in iraq and afghanistan as well, that we need to use military force that we have within our command to stop i.s.i.s. >> we do. >> rose: it's that serious. it is serious. it is absolutely that serious. you know, in my 37 years when i look back on the threats we have had to deal with, i see, you know, us in a very perilous situation right now, and i don't want to say it's an existential threat. i don't think it's an existential threat yet. but i am concerned as this

ideology begins to spread and you see more europeans and nor north africans and americans join i.s.i.s., as i.s.i.s. gains momentum beyond where they already are, it creates problems not just for the middle east but you see the surge of immigrants and refugees into europe. this is a major problem for the europeans. >> rose: and it destabilizes. a destabilizing problem, out the situation in syria and iraq now which is primarily being caus caused by i.s.i.s. bt is war in sirrias well, it is assad, it is the russians coming in and creating a barrier from which assad can continue to conduct his actions, all of that, if you don't tackle that problem and the way you're going to have to address it is with american military might along with our coalition partners and any coalition partner that will join us, but the united states is going to have to take the lead. and a lot of people say, why?

it's not necessarily our fight. i've heard that argument, you know, a hundred times before. i got it. it may not seem to be our fight, but i guarantee you, it's our fight because it threatens our national interests abroad and here in the states. >> rose: obviously, the president has no, ma'am reluctance about this fight. >> i understand. >> rose: because he came to office in 2008 saying i'm going to get us out of iraq and afghanistan. >> but situations change. >> rose: situations change because we witnessed the rise of i.s.i.s. >> right. >> rose: and they are not only engaged just in terrorist activities, they're engaged in taking and holding terrorist and building a caliphate, right? >> exactly. but what you see from i.s.i.s. is a level of barbarism that, you know, we didn't even see that much in iraq with al quaida. they are the worst of al quaida, when you book at al-baghdadi,

the former leader that came to take over i.s.i.s., they are barbarians. so you can't deal wit >> absolutely. >> rose: you're talking about an elevation of hostility to another level, yes? >> absolutely. >> rose: yeah. so, again, you know, the effect that i.s.i.s. can have if we allow this to go unchecked can create so much turmoil in the middle east that it will have a cascading effect, again, across europe, across norfolk nh africa and will come to roost. >> rose: is it necessary to do it now because we missed the opportunity earlier? >> it's necessary to do it now. it's hard to look back on missed

opportunities. it's hard to second guess any president and why cidn't we do it two, three, four years ago. circumstances change. but i will tell you, in bill mcraven's opinion, we need to do it now. >> rose: how many troops would you recommend on the ground? >> well, i mean, again, i haven't seen the latest intelligence. what you can tell you is we need to put enough troops in there to get the job done. so if you begin to marginalize it for overconcerns that we are investing too much of our national treasure -- >> rose: and it's mission -- invest what you need to invest to solve the problem now. >> rose: but you don't have some sense of what that would take? >> i don't in terms of pure numbers. >> rose: 200 now. well, again, i -- >> rose: 200 now. 200,000? there is a lot more than just intelligence. you need a strong infantry force, aviation, logistics.

we need to reinvest in the security of iraq to make sure that i.s.i.s. doesn't continue to move through. >> rose: are you speaking this bluntly because you've sat back and said this is going from bad to worse is this. >> it has clearly gone from bad to worse and i'm not speaking bluntly because i think that we're in a situation that we can't handle, i think we can handle it. but we need to move quickly. again, i applaud the president and secretary carter for making the decision to do that. it would be easy to go back and see why didn't we do this a couple of years ago. >> rose: but this is primarily in their mind now and correct me if i'm wrong, primarily about special forces now? >> absolutely and, of course, air power to provide the strikes you need whether they're the unmanned vehicle strikes or the strikes from aircraft carriers or from fixed-based airplanes. >> rose: you fought alongside iraqis, you fought alongside

afghans. >> right. >> rose: why has it been so difficult to build an effective fighting force? in both of those. >> yeah, i think it takes -- and it's a little bit different. i will tell you, in iraq, when you look at what we tried to do, which was really to pull the ethnic groups together, we tried to pull the kurds and sunnis and shias together to create these multi-ethnic battalions, brigades and really an army that represented what we hoped was the best of iraq, and we did that well in some areas. you know, the politics of iraq, i think, undermined that over time. but also with any of these units, you have to stay with them. i mean, there is this expectation, i think, that you train them for a couple of years and you can take the training wheels off and you can go home and they'll be just fine. i think we knew very early on that the iraqis in particular were not going to be just fine, that you really did need to partner with them when they were engaged in hard combat.

i think the afghans, you know, from what i've seen of the afghan army, they're a very capable army, we've done a great job there, i applaud the president for making the decision to continue to keep american troops partnered with the afghans. >> rose: would you like to see more? >> i would. >> rose: 10,000, 15,000? again, when you look back on some of the estimates that were done years ago and we were looking at 10 to 15 to 20,000, again, i'm not sure what the lay of the land looks like now terms of how we have those relationships. what i can tell you is we need to continue to stay engaged in afghanistan for the foreseeable future. if we don't, the effort we put into it may go the way of iraq. i think, again, the administration recognizes that and, so, i appreciate the fact that the president is keeping people there. >> rose: you've heard this before, we can't fight their

war. >> i understand that, but we can't turn a blind eye to the fact that their war is also part of our war. if we allow the taliban to come back into afghanistan, then once again -- >> rose: they're back! yeah, they are back. they never left. >> rose: exactly. parts of them never left. but if you can keep the pressure on the taliban, if you can keep the pressure on the small level of al quaida that remains, then you don't give them an opportunity to use that as a safe haven from which to continue to conduct strikes, but the way you do that is to continue to apply pressure. does that mean this war will be over in a year two, years, five years? probably not. i mean, i think this is a generational fight. the problem for the american people is, you know, are they committed to a generational fight. i think they need to be. i think we need to recognize that i.s.i.s., that the taliban, that the threat that is out there in terms of the terrorism, the insurgency, the instability that's out there, that this is a generational fight. we have the finest armed forces

in the world, probably the finest armed forces the world has ever seen. they are a volunteer force. they are some of the finest young men and women you will ever meet. they signed up in the days when we were at war. they know what they're getting into. again, you know, people talk about the millennials. they are this sen bcally's greatest generation -- they are this century's greatest generation. i saw it in iraq and in afghanistan. we're in good hands. these kids signed up because they know they have a mission to do. we need to let them and the leaders and the military do that mission and we can do it, but it's not going to be resolved in a year or two years. again, it's a generational fight. if we don't recognize that and we keep trying to fight it ton margins -- fight it on the margins, we may never get there. >> rose: that's exactly what we have been doing is fighting it on the margins. >> we have been fighting it on the margins. >> rose: it seems to me that

it's a recognition that we thought we could get away with this limited commitment, and then we realized that was not working, so we had larger commitment, and then we realized that wasn't working, and, so, we've got to re-think it. it seems to me there has been a rethinking of strategy almost every six months. so finally you see what ash carter had to say, recognizing that what they had been trying to do in syria had failed. >> right. >> rose: so let's re-think that. >> you know, and this is the nature of warfare, though. you know, sometimes the strategy has to adjust to the problem set. >> rose: do you think there is the national will on the part of the people who will pay the bills, offer their sons and daughters to do this? >> i think this is where, you know, the president and the national leadership needs to make the case to the american people because, attend of the day, it is up -- at the end of

the day, it is up to the american people. the american people has to decide whether or not this fight is worth, you know, their tax money, whether it's worth their sons and daughters. they have to make that decision. but i do think -- >> rose: you could make that case? >> i think i could make that case, absolutely. but it's really the responsibility, again, i think of the national leadership to make that case to the american people. y do we need to partner withria? the iraqis? why do we need to continue to put pressure in yemen and areas of north africa? why do we need to have this prolonged fight? >> rose: why do we need to leave 15,000, 20,000 troops in afghanistan for the long run? >> right, we need to explain to the american people why that's necessary. if you look at the number of troops we needed to leave in south korea to maintain the dmz, we have been there a long time.

bints a great strategy and kept the north koreans contained for long time. we're down to 25,000, 35,000 in europe now down from a couple hundred thousand in the hay day of the cold war. so eventually things will get to a state of normalcy, but not right away. so do we need to commit to afghanistan? i believe we do. do we need to commit for the long haul? i believe we do. is it in our national interests? absolutely. if we don't, afghanistan has to potential to go the way of iraq. >> rose: do you believe there is a developing perception that the united states is leaving a vacuum and that there are people who want to move into that vacuum like russia? >> i don't think it's a perception. i think it's a reality. as we move out, clearly the russians move in to dominate what's happening in syria. of course, they are being aggressive in iraq as well and, so, they are forming

partnerships with the iraqis and the iranians. so, clearly, the russians are coming in to kind of fill the void. now, that may or may not be a bad thing, and i think this is kind of high-level diplomacy and high-level vtrategy, but, at the end of the day, are they filling a vacuum? certainly they are. >> rose: that's a perception of american weakness or american inaction? >> it could be a little bit of both. i mean, you've seen he is a bully on the international front as he came into crimea, into ukraine. i think he has an expectation that he can move pretty freely without the international community and not just the united states but the international community pushing back on his actions. as long as the international community doesn't take actions to stop putin, he'll continue to move where he wants to move. i'm not an expert on russia but i am on bullies. i have been kind of fighting bullies my whole life, whether al quaida or taliban bullies, and i know if you allow bullies

there could be some kind of partnership in syria with russia? >> i think there can be a partnership, but it's going to have to be a true partnership. because if it's not, then at the end of the day, putin continues to move the chess pieces around the board the way he sees fit. and the only way you get a true partnership, i think, with the russians is strength. you have to show a willingness, you have to be strong. if you show that willingness, ys coalition and you will move in

the direction that he wants to move. so if we're going to have a partnership, it's going to have to be from the position of strength. >> rose: there are those who argue now at this stage it would be better if saddam was still in power and muammar gadhafi was still in power in terms because they were prepared to fight terrorism. >> yeah, i think -- >> rose: you know of the violence of their nature and how much punishment they were prepared to inflict on their own population in order to maintain control. >> right. i think it's easy to go back and look at dictators and strong men and say look at how they kept the country together. but if you look at how they did it and look at the hundreds of thousands of people saddam murdered, the kurds, his people, we're not better off with saddam hussein having been in power

orcorgadhafi having been in pow. >> rose: better off with a democratic process and a freely elected government. >> you're not going to create a jeffersonian democracy in iraq, but there are still democratic processes that can be in place so that the power rests in the hands of the people, and if you get elected officials, they need to understand at the end of the day they are responsible to the people. do they need to be strong? do you need to make sure you have an inclusive government? absolutely you do, but would we be better off if saddam and gadhafi were still there? absolutely not. >> rose: why did you leave the military? >> well, i spent 37 years there. >> rose: but no one was asking you to retire. >> well, it was my time. i had been three years at the u.s. special operations command. you have to move aside so that the next group of leaders can come up.

we've got a great leader now and joe is doing a magnificent job. but if you end up staying too long, then it effects -- the military in particular, there is clearly a domino effect behind the leaders that follow you. so it was time. i was incredibly pleased with the career i had. i was very fortunate. you know, when i joined the navy seals in 1977, usual lucky if you made lieutenant commander. my aspiration was to be a seal lieutenant commander. you didn't care about being admiral. all you dared about was having an opportunity to do your job as an operator. then as the military began to recognize the value of special operations in the mid '80s and as we established special operations command in '87 you

began to see a recognition and trajectory of special operations that took off and a number of us were fortunate to ride that wave and i was one of those guys. >> rose: do they know represent what in terms of america's fighting force? >> well, i think they represent -- i mean, the great thing about special operations is they come from all four services. so your army, navy, marine corps and civilianst at one time i had folks joining me after i took operations command saying now is the time to make special operations the fifth service. there is always been a discussion could special operations be their own fifth service. i said we're absolutely not doing that on my watch because the strength of the special forces is the culture you get from the army, navy, marine, air force, and they're great. when you bring that culture together, we are essentially raised joint and that is the strength of special operations. it's the fun part of special

operations. as a navy guy you get to understand how army green beret and rangers works, how tactical forcers and marine commandos work. it's a great environment. so i think special operations represents the strengths of all the services. but we can't do what the big service do. so this idea that somehow special operations are the end-all, be-all, they can solve all the problems, absolutely not the case. we can't stop people from things. u.s. special operations has a nice niche that we operate? >> rose: how did you find the niche? >> the balance between unconventional warfare, our ability to man and train and equip a guerilla force but also our ability to conduct direct action. so we have to operate in this human domain. this is about training our allies. this is about understanding how

populations and people work, but also on the hard side, the direct action side. these are the raids. we do both of those exceedingly well, most of what special operations do are training our foreign counterparts and that's the most rewarding work we do. when you look around the areas we've operated 70 years in asia and latin america, over in parts of africa, you see the good fingerprints of u.s. special operations everywhere, and that's a very rewarding part of our mission. >> rose: if someone said this is black ops stuff would you say proudly yes? >> black ops has a negative connotation. again, probably 75% of what we do is just training our allies, it's not classified. again, that's a very rewarding and most important things we do. the black ops piece of it is classified missions. but black ops indicates you're

off the grid, and that's as far from the truth as we come in. special operations we probably have more oversight than any other unit because most operations if they're outside the theater of the war, they are approved by the president of the united states. so you mentioned earlier before we started the taping about the four lawyers that were part of the decision to go get bin laden. >> rose: yes. let me tell you, we have lawyers within every unit of special operations to make sure that we're following the law of armed conflict, the rules of engagement. you know, it is really about the discipline and the integrity of the unit. what makes us good is the fact we're not cavalier, is that we rehearse and we rehearse and we rehearse and that's what makes you good. now, you have to be unconventional. you have to have imagination. but if you don't partner that imagination with rigid discipline and rehearsals on top of rehearsals, then you're never going to be able to pull off the

kind of imaginative op. this idea that you can be cavalier and a cowboy, you grab your gun, do a sophisticated mission -- >> rose: not the way it works. not the way it works. >> rose: speaking of bin laden, what was the expectation that you would take him out of there alive? >> when the issue came up, as we do with every mission, you know, we take a look at, again, the law of armed conflict and the rules of engagement. so our concern in the bin laden case -- and, frankly, it's been our concern in a lot of the raids we did, you saw a lot of the al quaida and taliban, they'd sleep in suicide vests. so we've had a number of cases where soldiers went into a building to get a high-valued target, and they cranked themselves off and blew themselves up and entire houses fell down as a result of the impact of the blast, and that was not unusual in iraq or afghanistan. so the potential bin laden was wearing a suicide vest we thought was medium to high. >> rose: did he think anybody

was coming? did he think anybody knew where he was? >> absolutely not. >> rose: exactly. because he would have moved? >> but we didn't know that. >> rose: right. but, again, you asked the question of did we know whether or not the pakistanis, one, knew that bin laden was there, were they going to tip bin laden off? we didn't know that. again, the intelligence has shown that is not the case, but going into the compound, we weren't certain of that. we also weren't certain whether the compound was rigged with explosives. the going-in premise was unless bin laden had his hands in the air and you absolutely can determine he doesn't have a suicide vest on, then you need to shoot him. >> rose: there is even controversy about who fired the fatal shot and all that. >> here's the issue about bin laden. you can imagine you just landed in the compound. guys wearing night vision goggles, it's dark, they've had to engage an individual on their

way up the stairwell, they've had to blow doors down because the doors were barricaded to the third floor, obviously the adrenaline is pumping, you're in night-vision goggles, constrained a little in your field of view and all of a sudden bin laden peaks his head around the corner, the first guy sees him, takes a few shots, moves into the room where bin laden is and women and children are being pushed at him, so he's got to make a split-second decision, do i engage bin laden or not? again, i can't tell you because i wasn't in the room, but my guess is, having seen this play out a number of times before, if, again, bin laden was not in a position where he was completely, you know, hands up and not a threat, then that decision was made and it was absolutely the right decision. >> rose: that was the likely it was a likely thing thatpen, was going to happen unless bin laden was in a position where he came out and said, i surrender.

make no mistake ability it, this was not a kill bin laden mission. >> rose: but he didn't have a chance to surrender, did he? did they say hands up and surrender? >> well, no, but the action was moving so fast that you don't want to give a guy an opportunity in a very complex and fast-moving mission to stop and hands up and all of a sudden he cranks himself off and kills everybody in the room. the operator doesn't have that kind of time. he has to make a split-second decision, are my hands up in the air, clearly not going to take action? his hands were not in the air and he was still a threat. >> rose: you were the leader of the people who went there. is there anything in your warrior heart that wanted to be there that night? >> well, i certainly wished i was a about 30 years younger at the time, you bet. >> rose: an opportunity of a lifetime. >> you know, it was -- i'm not sure i looked at it that way. a lot of people have asked me,

you know, what was i thinking at the time. you know, i looked at it as another mission. in fact, i had an opportunity, when i talked to the troops on friday, i talked to them again before the mission, but on friday, i actually related a story from the movie hoosiers. >> rose: gene hackman. at some point gene hackman is taking the small town boys to the big city in indianapolis and never played on a big court. he walks in, measurers the distance of the court and the height of the basket, it's the same. he tells his players, the court's the same. i relayed that to the guys. i said, guys, the court's the same. this is a mission you've done hundreds of times before. just go do your job and we're going to be just fine. again, they did that and did it magnificently. >> rose: but in terms of your career, the idea of warrior means what to you?

>> well, you know, i think it means a lot of different things, actually. i mean, i came in at a time when we had relative peaks. i came in in 1977 while we had desert shield and desert storm and i participated in that. we had panama, bosnia, kosovo. i didn't have a chance to participate in either one of these. but there was nothing quite like the action that occurred, you know, from 9/11-on. but as i watched, you know, my peer group, if you will, the folks that i grew up with and how we define warriors, i think first and foremost it was this sense that, you know, you were willing to be in the fight. regardless of what the fight was, regardless of where it was, you were prepared to sacrifice your life for your fellow seal and your country. that was the essence. when i first joined the seal

team, it was an adventure, a challenge. >> rose: physically fit. physically fit, to get through basic training. then it became an adventure, jumping out of submarines and airplanes and blowing stuff up. when i became offers of seal team 3, at that time and i was 15 years into my career, office profession, and i knew i had to act professionally at all times constantly. then 9/11 happened and it became a calling. so you see the warriors that go from the challenge to the adventure to the profession to the calling, and the real warriors of 9/11, to them, it was a calling. it was a calling to support the united states of america, to support their comrades in arms, and you see the real warrior spirit come out in the young men and the women when they recognize how important that calling is. >> rose: was leading hard? yo-- >> rose--it wasn't that hard.

>> rose: you had such passion. i was moving to another job at the chancellor of the university of texas system where what i loved most about the military, i look back and it wasn't about the bin laden raid, saddam hussein, captain phillips, i wasn't about all the missions that seemed to garn interest attention. it was about being around the young men and women in the military. it was about having an opportunity to change their lives for the better. that's what leadership is all about. that's what being in the military is all about. the other things just kind of circle around that. so when the opportunity to leave the university of texas system came up and i realized -- i mean, we teach 217,000 students across the university of texas system. we see 7 million patient visits a year at our health-related institutions. it's a phenomenal system, and

i'm honored enough to be part of it. you see what higher education can do. there is nothing that changes your life more than higher education. >> rose: how do you want to change higher education? >> well, the more higher education you can make available to the great men and women of texas and the world, the better off we're going to be. education changes everything. you can look at the statistics. they're pretty easy to cull out. your lifetime earnings with a bachelor's or masters or ph.d. or professional degree is exponentially higher than if you don't get a degree, even an associate's degree will make not only your earning power better but your quality of life better. that's the statistics. the reality of the matter is you become better people when you spend time around a diverse university environment, when you engage faculty members and other students, when you have a chance to talk to great clinicians that are trying to change the world,

these are experiences you can get in four, five, six years in a university that would take you lifetime outside a university environment. office journal i'm major at the university of texas. the great thing about journalism is you took a lot of electives because they wanted you to know a lot of things. i took many courses, and what i learned in the classroom wasn't near as important as what i learned in the environment of the campus. in dealing with the faculty, in having girlfriends, in living with roommates that didn't always get along, these are the things, again, you can learn in the comfort of a campus environment that then will make you a much better human, a much better citizen when you get out of higher education and move on into the real world, so to speak. >> rose: you made a names

commencement speech which got lots of attention. what were you trying to say there or what did you say there that summed up your attitude about life? >> well, there were a number of things that i wanted to bring out. you know, there was obviously the issue of, you know, sometimes life is guilt, bu -- e is difficult but if you start your day with a task completed, and this was kind of a make your bed, every person who's been in military basic training, the first thing they teach you is keep your uniform straight and learn how to make your bed. >> rose: that's how you start your day. >> that's how you start your day. you've done something you've accomplished something. it's small, but testify you do it right and take pride in it, you realize you can build on that throughout the course of the day. but the point of the commencement speech was the things i learned in the six months of seal training were life lessons that served me well throughout my life in the military and beyond.

you have to stand up to bullies. you have to recognize life isn't going to be fair. a lot of people want things to be fair. life is not fair, get over it. some people can't get over it and don't understand why life treats them a certain way. if you dwell on that too much, you will never continue to progress. so in our training, there were invariably drills where you looked perfect. you know, your uniform was perfect, everything looked great, and you had to hit the surf, roll around in the sand and become this sugar cookie, and some guys didn't understand this. i don't understand! i looked great! but they missed the point of it. the point was, i got it, some days you're going to look great and life just isn't going to treat you well. if you dwell on that too much, you're not going to get up the next day and try to look just as good. so there were a lot of those lessons. i think probably the most important one is you just can't quit. we talked about the brass bell in the speech and in coronado,

california, there is a brass bell. to leave training, you ring the bell three times and you're out. in 1977 when i went through it, no questions, you decided you wanted to quit, you had to ring the bell. there had to be an audible signal you were quitting. >> rose: you failed and you were giving up. >> that you were giving up. and it was a signal to the other trainees that somebody had given up and they were offering -- the bell was always there. the bell was always there whether in your mind or physically there, you can quit. go ahead and quit. go ahead and quit. you're not ever going to be a seal b it's okay. the bell's there. it's an easy way out. the point, is there are a lot of easy ways out in life. sometimes all you have to do is ring the bell and you get the easy way out. but if you want to accomplish something, you don't give up, you don't ever ring the bell. >> rose: were there a lot of people who didn't make it through seal training who went on to become very successful

human beings? >> of course, there were. but i think there was a lot of self-reflection. there are not all bad people that don't become seals. some weren't physically ready or mentally ready to suffer through the agony of seal training. didn't make them bad and i'm sure they went on to be successful, but i think they became successful because they reflected on the fact they gave up and they have a second chance and don't give up again is that was it the most important test for you at that point in your life, passing seal training? >> at that point in my life, absolutely. but likes every life, going forward you get challenged again and again. i've told th story before, i was fired from a seal team when i was 26 years old. i had the best job on the time. i was a team leader. for where i was in my career, it didn't get any better. then i was fired. again, you have to look back and say what did i do wrong?

you know, where could i have done things better? but that's the point in time when, every once in a while, you have to have someone who picks you up and dustous off and say, you're going to be okay, you just need to keep moving forward. that happened to be my wife. >> rose: good to have a strong support system, too, whether the seals or your family. >> absolutely. >> rose: so the university, where do you want to take it? >> well, one, it's a great university. when some people think about the university of texas, they think of the university of texas at austin. it is our flagship, it's one of the finest institutions in the world, but we have eight cam pulses around the university of texas system, and they are each remarkable in their own way. you know, what we want to be able to do is we want to take the strengths. so when you look at the the university of texas system, eight academic campuses and sks health-related institutions -- m.d. anderson. you know, you were talking earlier about one of our great

colleagues at m.d. anderson. >> rose: right. so we have nobel laureates at southwestern and around the enterprise, but what we have to do is be able to partner. one of the lessons i learned after 9/11, and i credit stan mcchrystal to a lot of this, is how we organize a joint special operations command. if you look at how the military has been historically, of course, it's had a hierarchical command structure. when stan came in to the joint special operations command, he realized we had to flatten the structure. we that did to rely on and trust everybody out and about because we had a global enterprise. you couldn't have command from top to the bottom every single day, so you had to rely on the strength of the individuals you put out there. but by collapsing the organization, by making it flatter and taking the strengths of all the individuals institutions who were out there, the army rangers, the navy seals, the aviators, the infantry guys, when you partner them and took advantage of the

strengths, the power was incredible, but it required collaboration. collaboration is not something that higher education and clinical care do as well as they could. now, there are areas where they collaborate well, but as an institution, i think they need to collaborate much better. we're going to do that. by collaborating, we'll make everybody stronger and take advantage of the great war going on at m.d. anderson, southwestern, u.t. tiler in san antonio, houston, austin, el paso, sanlt, the rio grande valley, san antonio. as we take advantage of the talent, the size, adversity and strength, we will be unstoppable in a good way. >> rose: you're proof you can go home again, aren't you? >> i am at that. >> rose: thank you for joining us. >> thank you, charlie. i appreciate it. >> rose: thank you for joining us for the hour. see you next time. for more about this program and earlier etc episodes, visit us online at pbs.org and charlierose.com.

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every single bite needed to be -- >> twinkies in there. it's like a great big hug. >> about as spicy as i can handle. my parents put chili powder in my baby food. >> french fries all over the table. >> a lot of chewing.