The Obama BBC interview

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13485946
Video

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-13473065
Transcript
Andrew Marr: could I start by going back to that extraordinary moment a fortnight ago when you know that you had got Bin Laden. This was not simply presumably another difficult decision. As an American, never mind as president, there was something personal about it.

President Barack Obama: Well, there is. If you have met with families who lost loved ones on 9/11 - if you think about what an extraordinary trauma it was for the country as a whole, the sacrifices that had been made by troops - not only from the United States but also from Great Britain and other members - in Afghanistan and you think that all traces back to this maniacal action by al-Qaeda. For us, to be able to say unequivocally that the mastermind behind that event had been removed was a powerful moment. And you could see it in the reactions here in the United States. And certainly, that's something that I felt very personally.

I also felt just great gratitude for the extraordinary performance of the team. Because any time you send any kind of men and women in uniform into battle your biggest concern is whether they're going to come back. And for them to have been able to perform this without casualties was extraordinary.


It could have gone worse. Part of the reason that I was able to take that calculated risk was an awareness number one of how well they prepared. How well we had under, we had staked out what the compound was like. It was set back from a large portion of the neighbourhood there. We felt that we could get in and out relatively quickly. But there is no doubt that that was as long a 40 minutes as I care to experience during my presidency.

Rec'd