3 shots. 3 kills. How SEALs carried out rescue.

From wire reports

WASHINGTON

The hard part was not the distance, 75 feet, an easy range for an experienced sniper.

Far more difficult were all the moving parts: the bobbing lifeboat, the rolling ship, hitting three targets simultaneously in darkness - and all without harming the hostage, Capt. Richard Phillips.

They waited as a series of seemingly insignificant moves - from extending the pirates a rope to bringing an injured brigand on board - improved their odds.

Three SEAL snipers aimed from the fantail of the Norfolk-based destroyer Bainbridge and picked off three Somali pirates holding Phillips in a small lifeboat that was being towed about 75 feet behind the destroyer.

"Bringing them in closer gave them a smoother ride," said a senior U.S. military official, describing internal deliberations on condition of anonymity. "Also if we had to take kinetic action - as we did in this case - the shot would have greater potential for success."

Several dozen members of the SEALs had secretly boarded the Bainbridge on Saturday, having flown to the area, parachuted into the ocean and then climbed aboard inflatable boats they had dropped into the sea. The Navy would not say where they were based or whether they were part of even more elite, clandestine military units that have historically been used for hostage rescues. About half of the Navy's 2,500 SEALs are based at Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base and Dam Neck Annex in Virginia Beach.

The SEALs set up operations on the Bainbridge, which had been communicating with the four pirates via radio and had used smaller boats to make deliveries of food and water to their lifeboat. Yet the pirates were growing increasingly agitated, officials said. At one point Saturday, the pirates opened fire on one of the smaller U.S. Navy craft that approached.

As the seas grew rougher, the Bainbridge offered to tow the lifeboat to calmer waters, and the pirates agreed, linking up the lifeboat to the destroyer with a towing cable that left 75 to 80 feet between the two vessels. Phillips at the time was tied up in the lifeboat, having been bound - and occasionally beaten - by the pirates ever since he had attempted to escape by jumping into the water on Friday, the officials said.

Philli ps' escape attempt had presented an early rescue opportunity for the military. Although a military special operations team had been mobilized, it had not yet arrived, and the Navy had no way to capitalize on Phillips' gumption.

Meanwhile, one of the pirates, estimated to be between 16 and 20 years old, asked to come aboard the Bainbridge to make a phone call. He had been stabbed in the hand during an altercation with the crew of the Maersk Alabama and needed medical care.

"He effectively gave himself up," a senior military official said. The Navy then allowed that pirate to speak with the others in hopes that he could persuade them to give up.

The three other pirates, however, showed signs of growing irritation, as the Bainbridge, 18 miles from shore, towed the lifeboat further out to sea, the senior military official said. "They had no promise of money, clearly no passage. The one ticket they had was the captain," said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter on the record.

"In the last discussion, they said, 'If we don't get what we want, we will kill the captain,' " the official said.

Soon afterward, two pirates moved to one of the hatches of the lifeboat and stuck their heads out. The third pirate advanced toward the captain and pointed his AK-47 straight at Phillips' back, the rifle touching it or inches away, the official said.

U.S. military observers thought that Phillips was about to be shot. SEAL snipers, who were positioned on a deck at the stern of the Bainbridge, an area known as the fantail, had the three pirates in their sights.

"As soon as the snipers had a clear shot at the guy who had the rifle, they shot him and the other two in the hatches," the senior military official said.

Three pirates were dead or rapidly dying. They were age 17 to 19, officials said.

A member of the special operations team slid down the tow line into the water and climbed aboard the lifeboat. Phillips was then put in a small craft and taken to the Bainbridge.

A former member of the SEALs said the events unfolded as a classic hostage rescue operation and that SEAL snipers trained daily, and under all conditions, to maintain precision skills.

"Training from a moving platform is something they do all the time," said the former member, Harry Humphries, who is now a security consultant and actor. "That's a classic problem at sea."

 The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and The Associated Press contributed to this report.