Reports of the operation to find al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden paint a picture of high tension, with White House officials watching the operation unfold on a live video feed.
At the climax at the end of a 40-minute firefight, one of the soldiers uttered the words "Geronimo EKIA", meaning a man visually identified as the target of the operation - Bin Laden - had been killed in action, officials said.
A high-risk operation given the green light by President Barack Obama in what his counter-terrorism adviser, John Brennan, termed "one of the gutsiest calls by any president in recent memory" had achieved its aim, the death of Washington's most wanted man.
The raid beginsThe operation took place at a fortified compound on the outskirts of Abbottabad in north-west Pakistan, about 100km (62 miles) from the capital, Islamabad.
The raid happened at some time between 0000 and 0130 local time on Monday morning (1900-2030 GMT on Sunday), residents told the BBC.
At least two US helicopters, believed to have taken off from US air bases at either Jalalabad or Bagram in Afghanistan, or the Ghazi air base in Pakistan, were seen flying low over the area, causing panic among some residents.
They describe hearing three explosions several minutes apart, followed by a huge explosion that shook their houses. Most residents said they then also heard gunshots, but that the firing was brief, just a couple of minutes.
As the explosions started, they say, the lights in the area went off, going on and then off again shortly afterwards.
One report quotes some residents as saying they were commanded in Pashto - not the common language of the area - to turn their lights off, but this is unconfirmed.
It is believed that people inside the compound fired at the helicopters.
CIA director Leon Panetta said "25 people went on the ground" from two Blackhawk helicopters.
When one helicopter developed "problems", Mr Panetta said the plans changed and both helicopters set down rather than drop troops on the roof of the compound.
The US special forces, said to be from the elite Navy Seals Team Six, then breached "three or four walls" to get in the compound.
Rather than let the disabled helicopter fall into the wrong hands, the commandos blew it up.
One report of the operation emerged in real-time: Sohaib Athar, an IT consultant living in Abbottabad, posted on Twitter at about 0100 (2100 GMT) that a helicopter was hovering above the city.
He continued tweeting as the operation unfolded before eventually realising: "Uh oh, now I'm the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid without knowing it."
The compoundThe target of the operation was the compound, which had at its centre a large, three-storey building with concrete high walls up to 5.5m (18ft) high, barbed wire and CCTV cameras - and few windows.
The compound is in a residential district called Bilal Town, home to a number of retired military officers.
It is just 1km from the Pakistan Military Academy, an elite military training centre described as Pakistan's equivalent to Britain's Sandhurst or the West Point academy in the US.
Pakistan's army chief is a regular visitor to the academy, where he attends graduation parades, and it is likely the area would have had a constant and significant military presence and checkpoints.
The compound - valued at about $1m (£600,000) - had two security gates but no phone or internet lines running into the building.
Its occupants were so concerned about security that they were reported to burn their rubbish rather than leave it out for collection as other residents in the area did.
The Navy Seals team that conducted the operation had rehearsed at training facilities on both US coasts, where replicas of the compound were built.
Death of Bin LadenPresident Obama and his security team watched the operation in real time from the White House.
CIA officials had turned a windowless seventh-floor conference room at Langley, Virginia, into a command centre for the operation, from where Leon Panetta passed on details to the president and his advisers.
President Obama and his security team watched the operation in real time from the White House"We have a visual on Geronimo," Mr Panetta said after the troops entered the compound, according to the New York Times.
Minutes later, he told them: "Geronimo EKIA [Enemy Killed In Action]."
President Obama added: "We got him."
US officials described the operation as a "surgical raid" and said that as well as Bin Laden, three adult males - thought to comprise Bin Laden's trusted courier, his brother and Bin Laden's adult son, Khaled - were killed.
A woman was also killed in crossfire on the first floor of the building.
The al-Qaeda leader was in his bedroom when he was shot, once in the head and once in the chest.
Footage purporting to be of the bedroom appears to show a round gaping hole in the wall, suggesting US forces blasted their way into the building.
Mr Brennan told reporters: "The concern was that Bin Laden would oppose any type of capture operation. Indeed, he did. It was a firefight. He, therefore, was killed in that firefight, and that's when the remains were removed."
But White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Tuesday that Bin Laden had not participated in a firefight, blaming the "fog of war" for any misinformation.
He said: "A woman... Bin Laden's wife, rushed the US assaulter and was shot in the leg but not killed. Bin Laden was then shot and killed. He was not armed."
The woman shot in the leg was believed to be Bin Laden's fourth wife, Amal al-Ahmed Sadah from Yemen, Mr Carney said.
Mr Panetta said that, as far as he was aware, Bin Laden did not shoot nor did he communicate, although Mr Panetta said he was "still getting feedback from the Seals".
Mr Panetta said the Seals had "full authority to kill Bin Laden".
He told PBS Newshour: "Obviously, under the rules of engagement, if he had in fact thrown up his hands, surrendered and didn't appear to be representing any kind of threat, then they were to capture him. But they had full authority to kill him."
The team left the compound carrying documents, hard drives and DVDs which it is hoped could yield further valuable intelligence data, officials said.
Both US and Pakistani officials assert Pakistan was kept in the dark about the operation and reports suggest the tension lingered as the US team made a high-speed dash to Afghanistan.
A suspicious Pakistani air force started scrambling jets, Mr Brennan said, leading to last-minute worries the US team could still be in danger.
According to an official from Pakistan's main intelligence agency, the ISI, there were 17 or 18 people in the compound at the time of the attack. US officials say that apart from Bin Laden's wife, his daughter and eight to nine other children, who were not apparently Bin Laden's, survived.
The ISI and US officials contradict each other as to whether a detainee was taken away alive.
A senior US intelligence official told reporters at a Department of Defense briefing that Bin Laden's body was identified visually at the scene by operatives, by name by a woman at the scene believed to be his wife, by CIA specialists using photos and finally later on Monday by experts who found "virtually a 100% DNA match of the body against DNA of several Bin Laden family members".
Bin Laden's body was flown to Afghanistan and later to the US aircraft carrier, the Carl Vinson, in the north Arabian Sea.
Mr Carney said the body was prepared for burial "in conformance with Islamic precepts and practice", then placed in a weighted bag and dropped into the water from the vessel's deck. Officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine.
The US has still to decide whether to release photographs of Bin Laden's body or video footage of the burial.
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