Burial At Sea
by digby
I assumed that the reason they buried bin Laden at sea was because Muslim tradition requires that they carry out the funeral within 24 hours. Later it was reported they didn’t want to leave a grave site as a memorial. But it turns out that historically this has always been a thorny issue and it’s something the US had dealt with before in the GWOT:
The sea burial of Bin Laden’s body—probably in a heavy metal casket with holes drilled in the top and bottom—is a twist on a longstanding practice. Governments hate to see a nemesis’ burial place become a focal point for resistance. After the Nuremburg trials, the Allied authorities cremated the remains of Hermann Göring—who committed suicide prior to his scheduled hanging—and his nine executed compatriots. Their ashes were spread in the Conwentzbach River, a minor tributary that flows into the Isar, so that their graves wouldn’t become a place of worship for Nazi sympathizers. While the U.S. government might have preferred to cremate Bin Laden’s remains prior to disposal, Muslim tradition forbids cremation because it’s inconsistent with the resurrection of the body. (The Vatican placed the same prohibition on Catholics between 1886 and 1963.) Osama Bin Laden should consider himself lucky compared to Adolf Hitler, whose death was made public 66 years to the day before Bin Laden’s. (Hitler actually committed suicide the day before the announcement.)
After the Führer shot himself, his subordinates cremated his remains—although not effectively—and buried them in the garden of the Reich Chancellery. Days later, Soviet soldiers disinterred the body and moved it to a different gravesite outside of Berlin proper. Over the next quarter-century, Hitler’s remains were dug up and reburied several times. In 1970, Soviet premier Yuri Andropov ordered a KGB officer named Vladimir Gumenyuk to pick a secret final resting place for Hitler, so that his grave wouldn’t become a shrine to neo-Nazis. To this day, Gumenyuk refuses to reveal its location.
Not all U.S. enemies wind up in a watery grave after assassination or execution. Saddam Hussein was treated to traditional Islamic burial rites and interred in a compound he had built for himself near his birthplace. It’s not clear, however, whether the Bush administration or the Iraqi government chose Hussein’s final resting place. When detainees die at Guantanamo Bay, either through suicide or natural causes, the Pentagon repatriates the remains to their home countries, where the funerals often become scenes of anti-American protest.
There’s more at the link.
Short of indulging the macabre fantasies of the wingnuts who want to spit on his naked corpse, there was little hope that they would be able to keep the conspiracy theories from fermenting anyway, so doing it quickly this way was probably for the best. It’s not the sort of thing one normally thinks about but obviously it’s been a big political issue for conquering armies for some time. Who knew?
Update: Apparently I’ve now become a dupe and a lackey (again) for my Lord on High Obama because I wrote this. To be honest, I don’t really give a shit what they did with the body as long as it isn’t used as a urinal for right wingers who want to demonstrate what manly men they are. Whatever. If people think it should have been “properly buried” in a Muslim ceremony, that’s fine. I don’t believe in all that folderol anyway. I was simply unaware of the complications of such a decision and thought it was interesting.
Now I’ll go back to drooling over my Obama poster and dreaming of the day when we’ll be married just like Wills and Kate. You boys can make all the big decisions about how to handle all the dead bodies. Enjoy.
.