When Leif Babin was training to become a US Navy SEAL officer, he didn't expect to spend so much time working out combat mission briefs in Powerpoint presentations, he explains in his new book "Extreme Ownership: How US Navy SEALs Lead and Win."

It was a common feeling, and the reason why in training sessions, he and other officers-in-training had a tendency to create briefs with the intention of impressing their instructors, as opposed to crafting plans that would actually be valuable to an entire team.

When Babin joined Task Unit Bruiser in 2006 as the officer in charge of Charlie Platoon, his commander and future co-author Jocko Willink told him to forget about Powerpoint. As part of a final exercise that would determine if they would be sent to fight in an incredibly dangerous part of Iraq (a desirable scenario for them), Babin and another platoon commander needed to create a mission brief that was more impressive than two other task units.

"The true test for a good brief is not whether the senior officers are impressed," Willink told them. "It's whether or not the troops that are going to execute the operation actually understand it. Everything else is bull—."

Babin and his fellow platoon leader stopped worrying about being impressive and focused on how to make their mission brief as clean and easy to follow as possible. They worked with their subordinates to ensure that if they had to put the brief into action, every member of the team would clearly understand the mission required of him.

The commanding officer in charge of judging the briefs determined Task Unit Bruiser had the most understandable and thus the best of the three, even if the others had more impressive-looking PowerPoint slides. It placed an emphasis on what Willink calls "Commander's Intent," which is when the team understands its commander's purpose and the mission's endstate so thoroughly that they can act without further guidance.

Task Unit Bruiser was sent to Ramadi, where it became the most highly decorated special operations unit of the Iraq War.

It was a valuable teaching experience for Babin. In "Extreme Ownership" he outlines the planning checklist that he used as platoon commander:

• Analyze the mission. Understand higher headquarters' mission, Commander's Intent, and endstate (the goal). Identify and state your own Commander's Intent and endstate for the specific mission.
• Identify personnel, assets, resources, and time available.
• Decentralize the planning process. Empower key leaders within the team to analyze possible courses of action.
• Determine a specific course of action. Lean toward selecting the simplest course of action.
• Empower key leaders to develop the plan for the selected course of action.
• Plan for likely contingencies through each phase of the operation.
• Mitigate risks that can be controlled as much as possible.
• Delegate portions of the plan and brief to key junior leaders. Stand back and be the tactical genius.
• Continually check and question the plan against emerging information to ensure it still fits the situation.
• Brief the plan to all participants and supporting assets. Emphasize Commander's Intent. Ask questions and engage in discussion and interaction with the team to ensure they understand.
• Conduct post-operational debrief after execution. Analyze lessons learned and implement them in future planning.

Babin writes that this checklist can be easily adapted to the business world, and it's what he and Willink have taught executives they've worked with through their leadership consulting firm Echelon Front since 2011.

"Implementing such a planning process will ensure the highest level of performance and give the team the greatest chance to accomplish the mission and win," Babin writes.

SEE ALSO: Why this retired Navy SEAL commander has 3 alarm clocks and wakes up at 4:30 a.m.

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NOW WATCH: Retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal on leadership and advice for his 20-year-old self

After going through his own Hell Week only a few years prior, Leif Babin found himself leading a new generation of US Navy SEAL candidates through their own struggles on a cold Southern California night in 2008.

Since returning from his duty as a platoon commander in the 2006 Battle of Ramadi in Iraq, he became a SEAL junior officer training instructor the next year and would take Hell Week shifts, as well.

The class he was observing had begun Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL Training (BUD/S) several weeks prior with around 200 candidates; after the first two of five-and-a-half days of Hell Week, approximately half quit. According to SOFREP, only about 25% of candidates make it through the week's intense trials of physical and mental endurance.

As Babin writes in his book "Extreme Ownership: How US Navy SEALs Lead and Win," co-authored with his former commander and current business partner Jocko Willink, the candidates were about to learn on this particular night perhaps the most profound lesson from BUD/S: "There are no bad teams — only bad leaders."

The SEALs candidates were grouped by height into boat crews of seven men and assigned to a WWII-relic inflatable boat that weighed more than 200 pounds. The most senior-ranking sailor became the boat crew leader responsible for receiving, transmitting, and overseeing the execution of the lead instructor's orders.

In one exercise, the instructors had the teams engage in a constant string of boat races, requiring the teams to carry their boats atop their heads to shore, paddle the boat to a specific marker, dump themselves out of the boat and get back in, and carry through a path to the endpoint back on land.

There was a clear pattern emerging as the races proceeded, Babin writes. Boat Crew II was almost guaranteed to come in first place in every race, and Boat Crew VI was almost guaranteed to come in last place.

Babin and the most experienced instructor in attendance, whom Babin calls Senior Chief, kept their eyes on the leader of Boat Crew VI, an inexperienced officer who was losing his cool in every race. His behavior was unacceptable for a SEAL.

Before the start of one race, Senior Chief announced that the leaders of Boat Crews II and VI would be swapping teams. Babin says he saw the way the struggling crew leader seemed elated while his superior seemed to process frustration into resolve.

Over the next hour of races, Boat Crew II performed well but never took first; Boat Crew VI won nearly every race.

"Gone was their cursing and frustration," Babin writes about Boat Crew VI. "And gone too was the constant scrutiny and individual attention they had received from the SEAL instructor staff. Had I not witnessed this amazing transformation, I might have doubted it."

It was a perfect training example of the principle of "Extreme Ownership," which Willink taught him as commander of Task Unit Bruiser when they were deployed in Ramadi. It's the simple idea that all responsibility for any success or failure ultimately rests on a leader.

Babin has taught the boat crew race story to companies he works with through his and Willink's leadership consulting firm Echelon Front. Babin explains the story's lesson further:

When Boat Crew VI was failing under their original leader, that leader didn't seem to think it was possible for them to perform any better, and he certainly didn't think they could win.

This negative attitude infected his entire boat crew. As is common in teams that are struggling, the original leader of Boat Crew VI almost certainly justified his team's poor performance with any number of excuses ... His attitude reflected victimization: life dealt him and his boat crew members a disadvantage, which justified poor performance ... [T]he leader and each member of Boat Crew VI focused not on the mission but themselves, their own exhaustion, misery, and individual pain and suffering.

When the leader of Boat Crew II took charge of Boat Crew VI ...[h]e didn't wait for others to solve his boat crew's problems. His realistic assessment, acknowledgment of failure, and ownership of the problem were key to developing a plan to improve performance and ultimately win. Most important of all, he believed winning was possible ... Rather than tolerate their bickering and infighting, he pulled the team together and focused their collective efforts on the single specific goal of winning the race.

He adds that Boat Crew II's repetition of success had allowed it to have an effective system of teamwork in place that gave it a fighting chance even its new leader poorly coordinated and communicated his plan.

As a side note, having his team switched and still suffer under his leadership taught the ineffective SEAL candidate a valuable lesson, and he adopted it quickly enough to survive Hell Week and become a SEAL.

What it all comes down to, Babin writes, is "whether or not your team succeeds or fails is all on you."

SEE ALSO: A former Navy SEAL officer reveals the 11-point checklist he used to prepare for combat

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NOW WATCH: Retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal on leadership and advice for his 20-year-old self

Jocko Willink retired from 20 years serving as a US Navy SEAL in 2010, but his morning routine is as intense as ever.

Willink is the former commander of Task Unit Bruiser, which became the most decorated special-operations unit in the Iraq War. In his new book, "Extreme Ownership: How US Navy SEALs Lead and Win," cowritten with his former platoon commander and current business partner Leif Babin, Willink writes that one of his guiding principles is "Discipline equals freedom," and that discipline begins every morning when his alarm goes off.

We asked Willink to break down his mornings for us. Here's how a typical day begins:

Wake up at 4:30 a.m.Three alarms are set— one electric, one battery-powered, and one windup — but he almost always only needs one. The two others are safeguards.

After a quick cleanup in the bathroom, take a photo of wristwatch to show his Twitter followers what time he's beginning the day. It's become both a way to hold himself accountable as well as inspire others to stick to their goals.

Grab his workout clothes, laid out the night before, and head to the gym in his garage for one of the following strength workouts, which lasts around an hour. The exercises can either be lower weight with high reps and little rest or heavy weight with low reps and lots of rest.

• Day 1: Pull ups, muscle ups, related exercises.
• Day 2: Overhead lifts, bench press, deadlifts, handstand push-ups, kettle-bell swings.
• Day 3: Ring dips, regular dips, push-ups.
• Day 4: Overhead squats, front squats, regular squats.

Spend anywhere from a few minutes (intense bursts) to a half hour (steady) for cardiovascular training. This could include sprints or a jog.

Finish workout around 6:00 a.m. Depending on the day, go out to hit the beach near his home near San Diego, California, to spend time swimming or surfing. If the weather is nice, he may also do his cardio on the beach.

Shower and start working for his leadership consulting firm, Echelon Front, any time after 6:00 a.m. He doesn't get hungry until around noon, and only has a snack, like a few handfuls of nuts, in the morning.

After work, Willink gets in two hours of jiujitsu training and heads to bed around 11:00 pm.

Willink said that he recognizes that everyone is different, and that not everyone would benefit from getting up at 4:00 a.m. for an intense workout. The key is that "you get up and move," whether that's jogging, weight lifting, or yoga.

The discipline comes in in setting a schedule and sticking to it so that your day begins with an energizing accomplishment, not a demoralizing stretch of time where you lie in bed and hit snooze on your alarm a few times. Every morning should start off with a predictable routine.

"And that's the way that you own it," he said. "Because once the day starts, well, then other people get to have a vote in what you're doing."

You can follow Willink and Babin on Twitter.

SEE ALSO: A retired Navy SEAL commander explains 12 traits all effective leaders must have

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NOW WATCH: Former Navy SEALs reveal what Hollywood gets wrong about the elite warriors

Former Navy SEALs and "Extreme Ownership" authors Jocko Willink and Leif Babin talk about ego and how it can ruin your chance at effective leadership. 

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In the early stages of the Iraq War, US Navy SEAL officer Jocko Willink needed to find a way to get his men to comply with new standards of collecting and cataloging evidence in the battlefield.

The typical behavior of ransacking a building, smashing furniture, and tearing down curtains to uncover hidden weapons or intel would no longer be acceptable.

Willink's assistant platoon commander drew up a plan in which the platoon would split up and each SEAL would be assigned a specific room to carefully inspect before logging results.

When he presented the plan to the platoon, they almost universally rejected it. To them, it felt like an overly cautious approach that was going to be too complex during the heat of battle and unnecessarily keep them in harm's way. Willink stepped in to tell his men that the adoption of a standard operating procedure would actually be perfectly suited for the chaos of a mission.

They ran a few test runs, and by the time they put it into action, they had lowered their evidence sweep from 45 minutes to under 20. It was proof to Willink that a principle he had applied to himself could be spread through the SEALs he was in charge of: Discipline equals freedom.

Willink would go on to command Task Unit Bruiser during the 2006 Battle of Ramadi, and his philosophy helped guide his unit to become the most decorated special-operations unit of the Iraq War. He tells the story of learning how this apparent paradox of liberation through structure applies to leadership in his new book, "Extreme Ownership: How US Navy SEALs Lead and Win," cowritten with one of his former platoon commanders and current business partner, Leif Babin.

"We had standard operating procedures for everything that we did, and the SEAL teams are not always like that — the military's not always like that," Willink told Business Insider.

There are basic procedures that all SEALs follow, but as the leader of two platoons, Willink and his unit established their own protocols for things like taking headcounts, entering and exiting vehicles, and communicating via radio.

"And what's interesting," he said, "is that the more strict we were with our standard operating procedures, the more freedom we actually had to operate faster and more efficiently because everyone knew what to do."

Willink said that he was inspired to take this approach as a new SEAL when he observed that the highest performers were those who had the most disciplined morning routines, waking up to prepare for the day's missions while others slept.

Willink retired from the SEALs in 2010 and started the management-consulting firm Echelon Front the next year with Babin as a way to bring their leadership knowledge to the corporate world. The idea of "discipline equals freedom" helps to avoid micromanagement.

"When individual members of the team are highly disciplined, they can be trusted, and therefore allowed to operate with very little oversight," Willink said. "When Leif and the other leaders of our task unit in Ramadi were working for me, I had complete trust in them. I knew they would act in a disciplined manner within the standards we had established — professionally, ethically, tactically, and strategically."

Willink said that when set correctly, parameters empower subordinates to make decisions quickly and confidently, without the need to check in.

For his unit, "that meant that they could operate without my input. They already knew what was expected, and they executed accordingly," he said. "They made decisions based on the disciplined structure we had, and that meant they could execute faster and with confidence. The disciplined structure we had allowed that freedom."

SEE ALSO: A retired Navy SEAL commander breaks down his morning fitness routine, which starts before dawn

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NOW WATCH: Navy SEALs explain how your ego can destroy everything

Former Navy SEALs and "Extreme Ownership" authors Jocko Willink and Leif Babin explain the concept of extreme ownership and why you must do it if you want to be a leader. 

You can follow Jocko and Leif on Twitter.

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Former Navy SEALs and "Extreme Ownership" authors Jocko Willink and Leif Babin explain how teamwork is crucial for survival in the battlefield and in business. 

You can follow Jocko and Leif on Twitter.

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Retired Navy SEAL and "Extreme Ownership" co-author Jocko Willink talk about using simplicity for effective leadership. 

You can follow Jocko on Twitter.

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When the stakes are high, only the best can get the job done. These are 5 of the most elite special forces around the world.

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There are a lot of puzzled expressions on people’s faces when it comes to the subject of the late Osama bin Laden and why the White House has not authorized the release of any pictures of the body. 

Photographs and video were released of Saddam Hussein’s hanging, as well as post-mortem pictures of his criminal sons, Uday and Qusay, after Delta Force took them out. 

Why not release a few pictures of Public Enemy #1 to prove that he is dead and show the world what happens when you take on the US of A?

Matt Bissonnette, one of the SEAL Team Six operators on the raid, partially outs the reason in his book, No Easy Day. The book reads, “In his death throes, he was still twitching and convulsing.

"Another assaulter and I trained our lasers on his chest and fired several rounds. The bullets tore into him, slamming his body into the floor until he was motionless," Bissonnette writes.

But this is perhaps the most measured and polite description that one could give of how operator after operator took turns dumping magazines-worth of ammunition into bin Laden’s body, two confidential sources within the community have told us. When all was said and done, UBL had over a hundred bullets in him, by the most conservative estimate.

But was it illegal? Under the Laws of Land Warfare, a soldier is fully authorized to put a few insurance rounds into his target after he goes down. Provided the enemy is not surrendering, it is morally, legally, and ethically appropriate to shoot the body a few times to ensure that he is really dead and no longer a threat. However, what happened on the Bin Laden raid is beyond excessive. The level of excess shown was not about making sure that Bin Laden was no longer a threat. The excess was pure self-indulgence.

You may not care if bin Laden got some extra holes punched in him, few of us do, but what should concern you is a trend within certain special operations units to engage in this type of self-indulgent, and ultimately criminal, behavior. Gone unchecked, these actions get worse over time.

The real issue is not that bin Laden was turned into Swiss cheese, but rather that this type of behavior has become a Standard Operating Procedure in this unit. Of course, these attitudes and behaviors do not come out of nowhere. Endless back-to-back combat deployments, PTSD, broken families, and war itself all plays into it.

Now you know the real reason why the Obama administration has not released pictures of Osama bin Laden’s corpse. To do so would show the world a body filled with a ridiculous number of gunshot wounds. 

The picture itself would likely cause an international scandal, and investigations would be conducted which could uncover other operations, activities which many will do anything to keep buried.

If you enjoyed this article please consider becoming a member of the SOFREP community, and support our all military veteran writing team. News & Analysis from Military & Special Operations veterans. Click here for more info.

SEE ALSO: Al Qaeda releases insider's account of 9/11 plot

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NOW WATCH: This is the US military's biggest weakness

Jesse Itzler felt he was in a rut. So he asked Navy SEAL David Goggins to live with him for 31 days, during which Jesse would do anything David told him to do.

Jesse would later write "Living With A Seal" documenting the grueling experience of getting whipped into shape by one of the toughest men on the planet. They ran through snow storms, jumped into a frozen lake, and did lots and lots of push-ups. 

The adopted the philosophy "if it doesn't suck, we don't do it." David and Jesse explain in order to get better you need to constantly take yourself out of your comfort zone, or do something that sucks every day.

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Do former members of the spec ops community have a right to discuss their service and, if so, where is the line drawn concerning when, where, or how they do so?Do former members of the spec ops community have a right to discuss their service and, if so, where is the line drawn concerning when, where, or how they do so?Do former members of the spec ops community have a right to discuss their service and, if so, where is the line drawn concerning when, where, or how they do so?Do former members of the spec ops community have a right to discuss their service and, if so, where is the line drawn concerning when, where, or how they do so?Do former members of the spec ops community have a right to discuss their service and, if so, where is the line drawn concerning when, where, or how they do so?

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NOW WATCH: The easiest way to clear out a ton of space on your iPhone superfast

Jefferies has hired Goldman Sachs managing director and former Navy SEAL Joseph V. Femenia to join its distressed-debt-trading team.

He's joining as a senior trader and manager in the high-yield group, according to a person familiar with the hire.

Bloomberg News first reported the hire.

Femenia, 39, graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1998. He served in the US Navy until July 2005, serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. Afterward, he earned his MBA from Columbia University.

He began his career at Goldman Sachs as a vice president in distressed-debt trading. He was made a managing director in November 2013.

It's been a challenging environment for distressed trading across Wall Street. Jefferies was one the firms that took a big hit in distressed trading in 2015, especially during the period of volatility in August.

Shortly afterward, CEO Rich Handler sent out a motivational memo to clients and employees addressing the trading desk's pain.

"We don't like this at all, but we are in the business of providing liquidity and capital to our clients. Generally, when we pick the right clients to support, they remember who was there for them in challenging times and are fair partners over the long term — and we all know it is a very long race, indeed,"he wrote.

In the bank's third-quarter earnings release, Jefferies revealed that it had losses totaling $90 million over the previous nine months across more than 25 distressed-energy positions.

Jefferies' 'tribe'

Back in January, Jefferies held an off-site leadership program where executives were addressed by Clint Bruce, a retired US Navy SEAL officer and a former NFL player.

In a memo to employees, CEO Rich Handler wrote that during Bruce's talk, they were taught the importance of thinking like a tribe as opposed to a team.

"A team is a collection of people all working for a common goal. A tribe is a collection of people who know why they are together, are passionate about each other, bleed for a unified common cause and trust each other implicitly," Handler wrote.

Welcome to the tribe, Femenia.

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NOW WATCH: A Navy SEAL told us why we should ‘do something that sucks’ every day

An ex-U.S. Navy SEAL who has said he fired the shot that killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was arrested in Montana early on Friday on suspicion of driving under the influence, a police official said.

Rob O'Neill, 39, appeared inebriated when he was found in the driver's seat of a car with the engine running outside a convenience store in Butte in western Montana, said Undersheriff George Skuletich of the Butte-Silver Bow Law Enforcement Department.

He declined to take a breathalyzer test and was arrested for driving under the influence - his first offense of that kind - and booked into jail before he was released on bail of $685, Skuletich said.

O'Neill, who grew up in Montana and listed Dallas, Texas, as his current home, said in a statement that he had taken a "prescribed sleep aid" because of his "longstanding, severe insomnia."

"While the timing was bad and I highly regret this decision, I am innocent of the charge and have entered a plea of not guilty. I am confident I will soon be cleared of this matter," he said.

O'Neill was scheduled to celebrate his 40th birthday on Saturday at a concert hall in Butte.

Although O'Neill was not seen driving the car, under Montana law a person found drunk behind the wheel can be arrested for driving under the influence even if the vehicle was not moving at the time, Skuletich noted.

O'Neill gained public attention when he told The Washington Post in 2014 that he fired the fatal shot that struck bin Laden in the forehead during the 2011 Navy Seal commando raid on the al Qaeda leader's compound in Pakistan.

The Post said O'Neill acknowledged shots were fired at bin Laden by at least two other SEAL team members, including Matt Bissonnette, who wrote a 2012 book about the raid entitled "No Easy Day."

Fox News Channel, which hired O'Neill as a network contributor, has profiled him in a television documentary titled: "The Man Who Killed Usama bin Laden."

Last year, a supporter of Islamic State militants issued a threat against O'Neill on Twitter.

The U.S. government has never officially confirmed who fired the shot that killed bin Laden.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; editing by Sara Catania, Paul Simao and G Crosse)

SEE ALSO: Jefferies just hired a Navy SEAL from Goldman Sachs to join a desk that's had a brutal time

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NOW WATCH: The easiest way to clear out a ton of space on your iPhone superfast

There are a lot of puzzled expressions on people's faces when it comes to the subject of Osama Bin Laden and why the White House has not authorized the release of any pictures of his body.

Photographs and video were released of Saddam Hussein's hanging, as were post-mortem pictures of his criminal sons, Uday and Qusay, after Delta Force took them out.

Why not release a few pictures of Public Enemy No. 1 to prove that he is dead and show the world what happens when you take on the US?

Matt Bissonnette, one of the SEAL Team Six operators on the raid, partially outs the reason in his book, "No Easy Day." The book reads, "In his death throes, he was still twitching and convulsing."

"Another assaulter and I trained our lasers on his chest and fired several rounds," Bissonnette wrote. "The bullets tore into him, slamming his body into the floor until he was motionless."But this is perhaps the most measured and polite description that one could give of how operator after operator took turns dumping magazines' worth of ammunition into bin Laden's body, two confidential sources within the community have told us. When all was said and done, UBL had over a hundred bullets in him, by the most conservative estimate.

But was it illegal? Under the Laws of Land Warfare, a soldier is fully authorized to put a few insurance rounds into his target after he goes down. Provided the enemy is not surrendering, it is morally, legally, and ethically appropriate to shoot the body a few times to ensure that he is really dead and no longer a threat. What happened on the bin Laden raid, however, is beyond excessive. The level of excess shown was not about making sure that bin Laden was no longer a threat. The excess was pure self-indulgence.

You may not care whether bin Laden got some extra holes punched in him — few of us do, but what should concern you is a trend within certain special-operations units to engage in this type of self-indulgent, and ultimately criminal, behavior. Gone unchecked, these actions get worse over time.

The real issue is not that bin Laden was turned into Swiss cheese, but rather that this type of behavior has become a Standard Operating Procedure in this unit. Of course, these attitudes and behaviors do not come out of nowhere. Endless back-to-back combat deployments, PTSD, broken families, and war itself all play into it.

Now you know the real reason that the Obama administration has not released pictures of Osama Bin Laden's corpse. To do so would show the world a body filled with a ridiculous number of gunshot wounds.

The picture itself would most likely cause an international scandal, and investigations would be conducted that could uncover other operations, activities that many will do anything to keep buried.

If you enjoyed this article please consider becoming a member of the SOFREP community, and support our all military veteran writing team. News & Analysis from Military & Special Operations veterans. Click here for more info.

SEE ALSO: 18 things Navy SEALs won't leave home without

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Navy SEAL shows how they're trained to resist interrogations

In his memoir Worthy Fights: A Memoir of Leadership in War and Peace, former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta describes the stealth 2011 assault on Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan, which happened five years ago on Sunday.

Panetta had a unique vantage point on the raid, which he watched remotely from the CIA's headquarters in Langley, Virginia. 

One of the first hiccups was the accidental crash landing of one of two SEAL helicopters as they arrived at the compound at approximately 12:30 a.m. local time (3:30 p.m.  EST). The SEALS transitioned to a backup helicopter and, as we all know, they were able to carry out the rest of the mission. The disabled chopper, which lay in an animal pen, was later blown up after the successful capture of Bin Laden. 

According to Panetta, the following is what happened once the SEALs entered Bin Laden's home:

Between the second and third floors, a bearded young man whom the assaulters recognized as Khalid bin Laden, bin Laden's son, was shot and killed. As the SEALs moved to the third floor, a tall, bearded man poked his head out of a doorway. A member of our team, recognizing him instantly, shot at him and missed.

The man disappeared back into the room, and an AK-47 was visible in the doorjamb. Team members moved towards the door.

As they moved inside the room, two young girls and an adult woman rushed the SEALs. Our operator grabbed the girls and shoved them to the side as they screamed in fear. One woman shouted at the man upstairs, calling him "sheikh."

Our team members saw the bearded man and shot him twice, once above the left eye and once in the chest. A woman in the room, whom we later learned was bin Laden's third wife, was shot in the leg, but not seriously wounded.

All of this took about 15 minutes. The time in Pakistan was approximately 1 a.m. local time (3:51 p.m. EST) when Navy Admiral McRaven Commander of SEAL Team 6 relayed word to the remote security team that there was a preliminary call of "Geronimo," which was the code word for the successful killing or capture of Bin Laden.

According to Panetta, the news the SEALs had taken out the world's most wanted man wasn't followed by "high-fiving" or "triumphant whoops."

"Our men were still deep in Pakistan, surrounded by danger, a long way from home and the situation on the ground was growing more tense and complicated by the minute. The explosions and gunfire from the compound had begun to draw the attention of our neighbors, and they came into the street, some venturing toward our forces," Panetta wrote. 

Once all the SEALs boarded the Chinook helicopter with bin Laden's corpse, they began taking DNA samples to confirm his identity while en route to Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

At this point, the mission was three hours in and the SEALs now faced the critical and grave task of making sure they did in fact kill Bin Laden. 

Panetta revealed everything didn't exactly go smoothly as they attempted to confirm they killed the Al Qaeda leader:

A team member took photographs of his face, immediately subjecting them to photo authentication. Others tried to measure the corpse, but no one had thought to bring along a tape measure—proof that no matter how much anyone plans, some thing is always forgotten. Instead a member of the team who was just over 6-feet tall lay down beside the body and determined that it was a few inches taller than he.

All that took less than half an hour, and at 6:20 p.m. McRaven declared that there was a "high probability" that it was Bin Laden. The DNA samples from the corpse later would establish beyond any doubt that we had in fact killed Osama bin Laden. 

Panetta subsequently packed up his team and drove to the White House to meet the rest of President Obama's security administration. He entered the Situation Room where the president said, "Great job. Everyone at the CIA who worked on this deserves the nation's thanks."

Obama then began discussing the logistics of announcing the mission to the world.

Turning to Panetta, Obama reportedly said, "Today, anything you say I'm prone to agree with. But we have to get this right. I want us to have thought through everything."

Meanwhile, bin Laden's body was was prepared according to Muslim tradition and was placed in a heavy black bag along with 300-pounds of iron chains to ensure the body would sink after it was dropped into the ocean.

Shortly after 11:30 p.m., President Obama addressed the nation and announced the death of Osama bin Laden. 

Here is President Obama's full speech:

SEE ALSO: The real reason why photos of bin Laden's body won't ever be shown

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NOW WATCH: We went inside a secret basement under Grand Central that was one of the biggest World War II targets

Former Navy SEAL sniper Brandon Webb completed one of the military's hardest training programs in order to become a SEAL. Many of us have heard of 'Hell Week' and how brutal the experience can be, but Webb describes a different phase of his training that proved to be even more challenging. 

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If you are between 18 and 28, famous billionaire venture capitalist Tim Draper has a plan to turn you into the "next Steve Jobs."

That's why he launched a school for young, would-be entrepreneurs called Draper University of Heroes, he tells Business Insider, which he turned into a reality TV show last year.

The show, "Startup U," failed to attract an audience, was dropped from prime time, and there's no word yet if ABC will renew it or not.

But even if students won't appear on TV, Draper has a new plan for the school. He just added a new nine-month program to the curriculum, starting in the fall, which he views as an alternative to a master's degree.

This is in addition to the school's classic two months of "hero training" offered since it launched three years ago.

There's a reason he calls it hero training. Before you can become the next Steve Jobs, you have to learn to be tough. Navy SEAL tough.

Days of survival training

Hero training includes "four days of survival training with military teams. We have Navy SEAL special forces and Army Rangers that take them to real survival training," Draper says.

Once students have spent those days foraging for food and shelter in the wilderness, the next step is city survival training, challenges that sound like what Donald Trump gave to contestants on his reality show, "The Apprentice."

"There's another couple of days in the two months of hero training that's Urban Survival training," Draper says. Students have to go out and "sell something embarrassing, or go to San Francisco and come back with a job offer, on paper, in 24 hours."

That job offer gives them the confidence that they can always quickly get a position, he says.

As Draper says, "How to create a Steve Jobs? It's a way of thinking." The school admits people "that have that spark and we create an environment that ignites that spark."

$12,000 to $40,000

Once the students have learned how to survive, they are ready to learn about the tech industry — Draper U-style. The nine-month program will include learning about the newest, buzziest technologies.

Although every class has a different curriculum, Draper says, students might explore Bitcoin — which Draper loves — learn design, and use the newest programming languages to build an app, or maybe a robot.

They'll also draft a business plan, turn that plan into a pitch deck, and turn the pitch deck into a two-minute presentation and pitch it to "between 30 and 50 VCs," including himself, he says.

He's dedicated a $1 million fund to invest seed money in startup ideas from the class, too, he says.

But it's not a scholarship program. The two-month hero training costs $12,000. The full nine-month program costs $40,000, Draper tells us.

Draper calls it an alternative to traditional school. That's important: This is not an accredited school. Students who finish the program do not earn an accredited degree.

Just to compare, many accredited universities charge about $40,000 to earn a bona fide master's degree.

Draper defends his school

Draper U has been controversial in its three years. While some students have posted glowing reviews of it on Yelp, some have given it bad reviews.

Draper says, "We definitely get mixed reviews. Our training is not for everybody."

And The Verge's Russell Brandom once called the school a BA in BS.

But Draper points to the alumni success stories as proof of the school's value. Draper U has had over 500 alumni from 53 countries who have created 200 startups and landed a total of $22 million in funding, he says.

He points to businesses like biomedical startup nVision and conference-tech firm Loopd as examples of alumni startups that got funding.

Not that Draper is worried about controversy.

He has come up with a plan to turn California into six states, offered to make a large charitable donation if people watched his reality TV show, and bought a huge stash of Bitcoin auctioned by the government after seizing black-market site Silk Road and is fond of making large public bets.

SEE ALSO: When Zenefits banned vacations for employees, COO David Sacks went to the Caribbean

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