Navy SEAL who shot Osama bin Laden in the face opens up about pulling the trigger

Former Navy SEAL Robert O'Neill on Wednesday discussed in detail the moment he shot and killed Osama bin Laden, the evil mastermind behind 9/11.

In an interview with Piers Morgan on "Good Morning Britain," O'Neill detailed his fears that he and his SEAL team would not see home again following the mission in May 2011 to eliminate bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan — a mission 10 years in the making.

"We were honored, but we were very serious because we knew it was probably going to be a one-way mission," O'Neill said about the group of SEALs deployed to take out bin Laden. "I personally didn't think we were going to come back."

O'Neill prepared heavily for the mission and told Morgan that he had written letters to his daughters in the event he didn't make it out alive.

The former SEAL detailed a helicopter trip to bin Laden's compound and the team's entry of the premises. O'Neill revealed that several "threats" had to be eliminated as he and his team swept the house, but was advised by a woman in the compound that wherever they found bin Laden's son, bin Laden would be on the floor above without question.

O'Neill was the one who found bin Laden on one of the upper levels of the structure.

"Standing there three feet in front of me with his hands on his wife was Osama bin laden," O'Neill said. "He was pushing his wife sort of toward us."

He revealed that his military instincts took over at that point and that he disposed of bin Laden the way you would any suicide bomber.

"I took care of him the way you would take care of a suicide bomber," he said, and revealed that he shot at the notorious terrorist over the shoulder of bin Laden's wife. "I shot him in the face twice and once more when he fell down because you need to make sure that threat is eliminated."

O'Neill said that it took a moment for it to sink in that he had just killed bin Laden.

"One of my guys said, 'Hey are you OK?' and I said, 'Yeah, what do we do now?' "

The tactical team then swept the compound for intel that would give the U.S. government more insight into the terror attacks and returned to the helicopter.

"The flight back after we put bin Laden's body in one of the helicopters," O'Neill said about the flight, "we knew at that moment that if we can make it 90 minutes on this helicopter we have 50 more years of life."