but we were never certain that that was bin laden in abbottabad.as only a couple of clicks from their military academy and half a click from the police station in the middle of a circumstance where you had to believe the pakistanis knew he was there. it was hard to believe they wouldn't know. so it was a really complicated situation. so the way the president and i would talk about it alone, we'd talk about it with a small group. toward the end of the fall when it was opened up to the secretary of state, to the homeland security, et cetera, there was a lot more discussion about trying to decide whether bin laden was there. but literally because of the phases of the moon, we got to a place where the president had 48 hours to make a decision to go or not go. these guys, these navy seals were incredible group of people. they had already done all the planning. they had built a replica of abbottabad. they practiced. and it came time to go or not go. and the president went around the room to i think there were 17 people around the table. national security