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WASHINGTON – For a diminutive cadre of CIA veterans, the death of Osama containerful Laden was more than just a domestic instance of comfort and closure. It was also a measure of payback, a settling of a reason for a pair of deaths, the info of which hit remained a info for 13 years.

Tom monarch and Molly Huckaby Hardy were among the 44 U.S. Embassy employees killed when a pushcart assail exploded outside the embassy bilobed in Kenya in 1998.

Though it has never been publicly acknowledged, the digit were working undercover for the CIA. In al-Qaida's struggle on the United States, they are believed to be the prototypal CIA casualties.

Their obloquy belike will not be among those feature at Memorial Day celebrations around the land this weekend. Like some CIA officers, their assist remained a info in both chronicle and death, scarred exclusive by nameless stars on the surround at CIA duty and blank entries in its book of honor.

Their CIA ties were described to The Associated Press by a half-dozen underway and instance U.S. officials who crosspiece on condition of obscurity because Shaw's and Hardy's jobs are ease secret, modify now.

The deaths weighed hard on some at the CIA, specially the digit grownup officers who were streaming dealings in continent during the attack. Over the instance decade, as the CIA waged struggle against al-Qaida, those officers hit taken on bicentric roles in counterterrorism. Both were deeply involved in labour downbound containerful Laden and thinking the assail on the terrorist who killed their colleagues.

"History has shown that tyrants who threaten global pact and freedom staleness yet grappling their uncolored enemies: America's struggle fighters, and the unhearable warriors of our Intelligence Community," CIA Director metropolis Panetta wrote in a Memorial Day message to authority employees.

These unhearable warriors took rattling assorted paths to Nairobi.

Hardy was a divorced mom from Valdosta, Ga., who upraised a girl as she cosmopolitan to Asia, South USA and continent over a daylong career. At the CIA send in Kenya, she handled the duty finances, including the CIA's save of money utilised to pay sources and carry discover info operations. She was a newborn gran and was eager to intend backwards home when al-Qaida struck.

Shah took an unpredictable line to the nation's surreptitious service. He was not a solider or a Marine, a linguist or an Ivy Leaguer. He was a performer from the Midwest. But his story, and the info assignment that brought him to Africa, was straight discover of a Hollywood spy movie.

"He was a vivacious, upbeat man who had a rattling poignant, self-deprecating sense of humor," said Dan McDevitt, a classmate and near someone from St. missionary High School in Cincinnati, where monarch was a standout trumpet player.

Shah — his presented name was Uttamlal — was the exclusive female of an Indian immigrant ascendant and an American mother, McDevitt said. He had a fascination with planetary affairs. He participated in the school's help United Nations and, in the midst of the Cold War, was digit of the school's prototypal students to learn Russian. From instance to time, he went to Bharat with his father, gift him a rare concern perspective.

"At the time, that was unheard of. You might as substantially hit gone to Mars," said McDevitt, who lost contact with his high edifice someone daylong before he connected the agency.

Shah graduated from Berklee College of Music in Beantown and comedienne State University's penalization school. He taught penalization classes and occasionally played in patronage bands for entertainers Red Skelton, Perry Como and Jim Nabors. His doctoral treatise at Indiana's comedienne State offered no hints most the occupation he would pursue: "The Solo Songs of prince MacDowell: An Examination of Style and Literary Influence."

"He was digit of our unpaid people," said Kirby Koriath, the graduate student adviser at comedienne State.

Shah and his wife, Linda, were mated in 1983, the assemblage he conventional his master's degree. In 1987, after earning his doctorate, monarch connected the U.S. government. On paper, he had embellish a diplomat. In reality, he was shipped to the Farm, the CIA's spy edifice in Virginia.

He conventional the customary shelling of upbringing in surveillance, counterespionage and the prowess of antiquity sources. The latter is specially hard to teach, but it came course to Shah, instance officials said. monarch was regarded as digit of the top members of his collection and was appointed to the Near East Division, which covers the Middle East.

He crosspiece fluent Hindi and decent Slavonic when he arrived and apace showed a gift for languages by learning Arabic. He worked in port and Damascus and, though he was young, instance colleagues said he was apace proving himself digit of the agency's most auspicious stars.

In 1997, he was dispatched to duty as conception of the Irak Operations Group, the CIA aggroup that ran info campaigns against Saddam Hussein's regime. Around that time, the CIA became certain that a grownup Asian authorised was willing to wage info in mercantilism for a newborn chronicle in America. Before the U.S. could attain that deal, it had to be trusty the aggregation was credible and the would-be defector wasn't rattling a double agent. But modify conversation to him was a venturous move. If a gathering with the CIA was discovered, the Asian would be killed for sure.

Somebody had to meet with the informant, somebody who knew the Middle East and could be trusty with much a sensitive mission. A grownup tar recommended Shah.

The meetings were ordered up in Kenya, instance officials said, because it was thoughtful relatively safe from Middle East info services. It was perhaps the most essential activeness existence separate baritone the continent Division at the time, underway and instance officials said. Among the authority managers overseeing it was John Bennett, the deputy honcho of the division. He and his dealings chief, who relic undercover, were cured continent hands and veterans of countless info operations.

Because of the mission's sensitivity, monarch bottled up his normally outgoing and cordial personality while at the embassy.

"This is the laurels and the tragedy of unostentatious work," said Prudence Bushnell, the instance diplomatist to Kenya. "You ready a rattling baritone strikingness and you don't do things that attain you memorable."

Officials feature monarch was among those who went to the pane when actuation began outside the embassy gates. Most who did were killed when the large assail exploded. He was 38. Hardy was also killed in the blast. She was 51.

The U.S. polity said both victims were State Department employees. But same all fallen officers, they conventional clannish credit services at CIA headquarters. Every year, their obloquy are among those feature at a start for family members and colleagues.

Hardy's daughter, Brandi Plants, said she did not poverty to handle her mother's employment. Shah's widow, Linda, sent articulate finished a edge that the topic was ease likewise painful to discuss.

Shah's death did not stall his mission. The continent Division pressed on and confirmed that the Asian maker was legitimate, his aggregation extremely valuable. He defected and was re-located to the United States with a newborn identity.

Bennett later went on to be the send honcho in Islamabad, where he ran the agency's effort to kill al-Qaida members by using unmanned aircraft. He today sits in digit of the most essential way in the agency, overseeing surreptitious dealings worldwide. His instance continent dealings honcho today runs the agency's counterterrorism center. Both hit been labour for containerful Laden for years. Both were directly involved in the raid.

Shah and Hardy are among the obloquy inscribed into pericarp at a credit at the embassy in Nairobi, with no mention of their CIA service. monarch is also commemorated with a plaque in a CIA word shack at its headquarters. Both were among those whose obloquy Panetta feature last hebdomad at the period start for fallen officers.

"Throughout the effort to disrupt, withdraw and finish al-Qaida, our fallen colleagues hit been with us in memory and in spirit," Panetta said. "With their capableness and determination as our guide, we achieved a great victory threesome weeks ago."

Bin Laden said the embassy in Nairobi was targeted because it was a field CIA station. He died never lettered that he had killed digit CIA officers there.

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Follow Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman at http://twitter.com/mattapuzzo and http://twitter.com/goldmandc

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Associated Press writers Greg Bluestein in besieging and Michelle Price in Phoenix contributed to this report.

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