Behind the Osama bin Laden Red X TIME Cover
When Osama bin Laden was killed on May 2, 2011, it was the culmination of a decade of hunting for the man behind the horrific terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. To many, bin Laden's death offered "a relief to find that America can still fix a bull's-eye on a difficult goal, stick with it year after frustrating year and succeed when almost no one expects it," as David Von Drehle put it in a special issue of TIME published shortly afterward. For the cover of that issue TIME went with a concept that had only been used three other times in the magazine's history the red X. The first was in 1945, for Adolf Hitler another X'ed-out cover that year marked the end of World War II with the crossing out of Japan's rising sun, but in that case the X was black the second in 2003, for Saddam Hussein, and the third in 2006, for Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi. Each time, the X symbolized the end of a long struggle against a formidable enemy. MORE How TIME Secured Its First Interview with Osama bin Laden, In the special note in the issue, TIME's then-editor Richard Stengel explained the thinking that had gone into the choice, Read the cover story, here on TIME.com How the U.S. Finally Got Its Man