05 Oct 08 CBS 60 Minutes report on Delta Force mission lead by “Dalton Fury” against Osama Bin Laden… pre-empted at 8:00pm by the Amazing Race!

Talk about annoying.

I was just watching a pretty fascinating story on 60 minutes with the commander of the Delta Force unit (about 50 top commandos) sent into the hills of Afghanistan via Tora Bora to hunt down and kill Osama Bin Laden. They had heavily disguised the Delta Force commander, who has just written a book about the mission under the pseudonym Dalton Fury, and had first time video of the mission, which was to approach the 14,000 foot summits in the Afghan mountains where Bin Laden was suspected to be holed up.

Previous strategies to approach by surprise from the top side of the 14K mountains and another one to litter the path through the mountains with air-dropped landmines by unknown sources higher up, either in Central Command or even higher (i.e. POTUS)…

Anyhow, they engaged the service of local Afghan militia men (ranging in age , according to the Delta Force Commander Fury from 14 to 80 and dressed in the usual garb…) … but these militia would leave at night!

So at one point, Dalton’s team of 50 men learns from CIA intelligence that Bin Laden is some 2KM (2000 meters) ahead of them. However they are only 50 in the Delta Force, no Afghan militia with them and the CIA intel reported that Bin Laden was protected by about 1000 hardened fighters.

Ultimately they decided not to play cowboy and go forward with just 50 men, and Dalton Fury (the Delta Force commander) regrets it to this day as he mentions in his book as he feels he somehow let down the American people by losing that chance at getting Bin Laden…

So, the interview is 2/3 of the way through the usual 15-20 minute duration and suddenly POOF… it switches to The Amazing Race. Obviously, our local simulcast broadcaster (CTV?) for CBS decided that The Amazing Race was a better show than 60 minutes.

Grrrrr.