The Targeter
Page 31
2. The Office of Special Plans: Jeffrey T. Richelson, ed., “Special Plans and Double Meanings: Controversies over Deception, Intelligence, and Policy Counterterrorism,” National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book 456, February 20, 2014, http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAE BB456/.
3. roughly a dozen personnel: Ibid.
4. the fifth floor of the Pentagon: Richard Sale, “Exclusive: DIA Targets DOD Unit,” United Press International, July 30, 2004.
5. “Feith-based intelligence”: Robert Dreyfuss and Jason Vest, “The Lie Factory,” Mother Jones, January/February 2004.
6. “Has somebody thought of this?”: Department of Defense Press Briefing: Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and General Richard B. Myers, Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, October 24, 2002, http://fas.org/irp/news/2002/10/dod102502.html.
7. “purposefully aggressive… connections”: Iraq and al-Qa‘ida: Interpreting a Murky Relationship, June 21, 2002, https://fas.org/irp/congress/2005_cr/CIAreport.062102.pdf.
8. an uncoordinated product: Select Committee on Intelligence, United States Senate, “Iraq’s Links to Terrorism,” part XII of “Report on the U.S. Intelligence Committee’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq,” July 7, 2004, National Security Archive, George Washington University, http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB129/part12-terrorism.pdf.
9. visiting Agency headquarters themselves: Peter Baker, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House (New York: Doubleday, 2013).
10. “unprecedented”: Ray McGovern, “Cheney, Forgery, and the CIA,” Counterpunch, June 27, 2003.
11. “highly unusual”: Craig Unger, The Fall of the House of Bush: The Untold Story of How a Band of True Believers Seized the Executive Branch, Started the Iraq War, and Still Imperils America’s Future (New York: Scribner, 2007).
12. “link between Iraq developing weapons”: “President Bush Outlines Iraqi Threat: Remarks by the President on Iraq,” Office of the White House Press Secretary, October 7, 2002, http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2002/10/20021007-8.html.
13. “American civilians… live and work”: Ibid.
14. “intelligence operative to deliver it”: Ibid.
15. “planning for chemical and biological attacks”: Ibid.
16. burn bags: Roger Girdwood, “Burn Bags,” Studies in Intelligence (Summer 1989), https://research.archives.gov/id/7283291.
Chapter 3
1. “Declaration of War”: “Declaration of War by Osama bin Laden, 1996,” PBS NewsHour, August 23, 1996, http://www.pbs.org/news hour/updates/military/jan-june98/fatwa_1998.html.
2. “no more important duty”: Ibid.
3. February of 1998: “Al Qaeda’s Second Fatwa,” PBS NewsHour, February 23, 1998, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/military-jan-june98/fatwa_1998/.
4. “The ruling to kill the Americans”: Ibid.
5. the bombing of two US embassies: “FBI Executive Summary: Bombings of the Embassies of the United States of America at Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania,” Frontline, November 18, 1998, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/binladen/bombings/summary.html.
6. the sixteen-week-long CAP: “A Major Agency Success Celebrated 100 Times Over: CIA’s Career Analyst Program,” CIA Featured Story Archive, October 30, 2008, https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2008-featured-story-archive/a-major-agency-success.html.
7. Sherman Kent School for Intelligence Analysis: “Training Resources,” Offices of CIA, April 25, 2007, https://www.cia.gov/offices-of-cia/intelligence-analysis/training-resources.html.
8. “the basic thinking, writing, and briefing skills”: Ibid.
9. “Fundamentals of Denial and Deception”: Bob Drogin, “School for New Brand of Spooks,” Los Angeles Times, July 21, 2000.
10. special blue name badges: Ibid.
11. computers labeled TOP SECRET: Ibid.
12. writing style demanded of analysts: Bill Welch, ed., The Analyst’s Style Manual (Erie, PA: Mercyhurst College Institute for Intelligence Studies Press, 2008), https://www.ncirc.gov/documents%5Cpublic %5CAnalysts_Style_Manual.pdf.
13. BLUF: Ibid.
14. two years before I attended: “A Look Back… Sherman Kent: The Father of Intelligence,” CIA Featured Story Archive, May 6, 2010, https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2010-featured-story-archive/sherman-kent-the-father-of-intelligence.html.
15. as far back as 1953: “Studies in Intelligence Celebrates 60th Birthday,” CIA Featured Story Archive, September 23, 2015, https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2015-featured-story-archive/studies-in-intelligence-celebrates-60th-birthday.html.
16. “have a nice day”: Tim Weiner, “Naivete at the CIA: Every Nation’s Just Another U.S.,” New York Times, June 7, 1998.
17. was shot down: “Genocide in Rwanda,” United Human Rights Council, http://www.unitedhumanrights.org/genocide/genocide_in_rwanda.
18. whom they blamed for the attack: Ibid.
19. eight hundred thousand… were slaughtered: Ibid.
20. “years after the fact”: “Vice President Cheney Addresses New CIA Analysts,” CIA Press Release Archive, November 8, 2002, https://www.cia.gov/news-information/press-releases-statements/press-release-archive-2002/pr11082002.html.
21. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi arrived in Iraq: “How ISIS Spread in the Middle East and How to Stop It,” The Atlantic, October 29, 2015, https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/10/how-isis-started-syria-iraq/412042/.
22. the al-Masoum neighborhood of Zarqa’s “old town”: Mohammad Ahmad, “Al-Zarqawi’s Legacy Haunts the al-Khalayleh Clan,” Terrorism Focus 3, no. 23 (June 13, 2006).
23. October of 1966: Mary Anne Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” The Atlantic, July/August 2006.
24. Ahmad Fadil al-Nazal al-Khalayleh: Ibid.
25. one of ten children: Ahmad, “Al-Zarqawi’s Legacy.”
26. third-largest city: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
27. population of some 850,000: Ibid.
28. “Chicago of the Middle East”: Loretta Napoleoni, “Profile of a Killer,” Foreign Policy, October 20, 2009.
29. a farmer and herbal medicine salesman: Ahmad, “Al-Zarqawi’s Legacy.”
30. dropped out of high school at the age of seventeen: Jeffrey Gettleman, “Zarqawi’s Journey: From Dropout to Prisoner to an Insurgent Leader in Iraq,” New York Times, July 13, 2004.
31. the nearby Palestinian refugee camp: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
32. Fadil died the year after Khalayleh dropped out: Ahmad, “Al-Zarqawi’s Legacy.”
33. a drunk and a thug: Gary Gambill, “Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi: A Biographical Sketch,” Terrorism Monitor 2, no. 24 (December 15, 2004).
34. in the garbage-strewn Masoum cemetery: Ahmad, “Al-Zarqawi’s Legacy.”
35. two-story concrete-block family home: Gettleman, “Zarqawi’s Journey.”
36. He raped local women to assert his dominance: Stanley McChrystal, My Share of the Task: A Memoir (New York: Portfolio, 2013).
37. the green man: Jeffrey Gettleman, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi Lived a Brief, Shadowy Life Replete with Contradictions,” New York Times, June 9, 2006.
38. arrested for drug possession and sexual assault: McChrystal, My Share of the Task.
39. more foreign fighters: David Kenner, “The Men Who Love the Islamic State,” Foreign Policy, February 4, 2015.
40. the hometown of Mohammed Salameh: Kim Murphy, “Bomb Suspect’s Family Is Confused but Hopeful,” Los Angeles Times, March 12, 1993.
41. led Khalayleh to Zarqa’s Al Hussein bin Ali mosque: “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” The Independent, June 8, 2006, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/abu-musab-al-zarqawi-481622.html.
42. burn his tattoos: Stanley McChrystal with Tantum Collins, David Silverman, and Chris Fussell, Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World (New York: Portfolio, 2015).
43. Kh
alayleh himself headed off to fight: Napoleoni, “Profile of a Killer.”
44. stopping first in Peshawar, Pakistan: “Key Events in the Life of al-Zarqawi,” New York Times, June 8, 2006, https://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/world/08timeline-zarqawi.html.
45. then traveling on to Afghanistan: Loretta Napoleoni, Insurgent Iraq: Al Zarqawi and the New Generation (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2005).
46. arrived in Herat: “Key Events in the Life of al-Zarqawi.”
47. a roving reporter… for…Al Bunyan al Marsus: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
48. soon become his spiritual leader: Ibid.
49. seven years Khalayleh’s elder: Adrian Levy and Catherine Scott-Clark, Deception: Pakistan, the United States, and the Secret Trade in Nuclear Weapons (New York: Walker & Company, 2007).
50. had lived for a time in the Palestinian refugee camp: Nibras Kazimi, “A Virulent Ideology in Mutation: Zarqawi Upstages Maqdisi,” Current Trends in Islamist Ideology 2 (September 12, 2005): 59–73.
51. Zarqawi and a handful of other mujahideen fighters: Joby Warrick, Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS (New York: Anchor Books, 2016).
52. reprimanding women: Urs Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi: From Green Man to Guru,” SignAndSight.com, September 11, 2005, http://www.signandsight.com/features/449.html.
53. “It was not easy with him”: Ibid.
54. form a militant group: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
55. stashing weapons in his basement: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
56. “He never struck me as intelligent”: Gettleman, “Zarqawi’s Journey.”
57. sentenced to fifteen years in prison: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
58. bench-pressing buckets of rocks: Gettleman, “Zarqawi’s Journey.”
59. doled out prison chores to other inmates: Ibid.
60. caught him reading Crime and Punishment: Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.”
61. “like a child wrote it”: Gettleman, “Zarqawi’s Journey.”
62. covered the ward’s TV sets with black cloth: Ibid.
63. intermediary between the guards and the inmates: Ibid.
64. personally bathed an inmate: Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.”
65. “He was tough, difficult to deal with”: Napoleoni, Insurgent Iraq.
66. “others would follow suit”: Ibid.
67. “al-Gharib”—the stranger: Lawrence Joffe, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” The Guardian, June 8, 2006.
68. King Abdullah II granted a royal pardon: Gambill, “Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi.”
69. a book by Jordanian journalist Fuad Hussein: Brian Fishman, “Revising the History of al-Qa‘ida’s Original Meeting with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” CTC Sentinel 9, no. 10 (October 2016).
70. “We were therefore very pleased”: Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.”
71. Zarqawi was sitting in a safe house in Kandahar: Ibid.
72. infiltrated Zarqawi’s prison network: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
73. some in al Qaida, including Adl: Fishman, “Revising the History.”
74. “poor rhetorical skills”: Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.”
75. With Adl’s encouragement: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
76. Bin Laden authorized $5,000 in seed money: Ibid.
77. a training base outside Herat: Ibid.
78. “coordination and cooperation… common goals”: Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.”
79. “senior associate and collaborator”: George Tenet, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA (New York: HarperCollins, 2007).
80. with a dozen or so followers: Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life.”
81. his new group’s name, al-Tawhid wal-Jihad: Jean-Charles Brisard, Zarqawi: The New Face of al Qaeda (New York: Other Press, 2005).
Chapter 4
1. “eviscerated on an editorial page”: Martin Petersen, “What I Learned in 40 Years of Doing Intelligence Analysis for US Foreign Policymakers,” Studies in Intelligence 55, no. 1 (March 29, 2011), https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol.-55-no.-1/what-i-learned-in-40-years-of-doing-intelligence-analysis-for-us-foreign-policymakers.html.
2. Ismail Khan and some five thousand of his militiamen: Ibid.
3. Zarqawi was in Iran: Mary Anne Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” The Atlantic, July/August 2006.
4. he settled in the northern mountain town of Khurmal: David S. Cloud, “Long in U.S. Sights, a Young Terrorist Builds Grim Résumé,” Wall Street Journal, February 10, 2004.
5. he paid two men to gun down an unlikely victim: Matthew Levitt, “Zarqawi’s Jordanian Agenda,” Terrorism Monitor 2, no. 24 (December 15, 2004).
6. October 28, 2002: Neil MacFarquhar, “American Envoy Killed in Jordan,” New York Times, October 29, 2002.
7. limestone villa in Abdoun: Michael Matza, “Diplomat from U.S. Shot Dead in Jordan,” Philadelphia Inquirer, October 29, 2002.
8. Around 7:15 a.m. that October day: MacFarquhar, “American Envoy Killed.”
9. Libyan national Salem bin Suweid: Reuters, “Jordan Hangs 2 for Killing U.S. Diplomat,” March 12, 2006.
10. shot eight times in the head, chest, and abdomen: MacFarquhar, “American Envoy Killed.”
11. a getaway rental car driven by Jordanian Yasser Freihat: Associated Press, “Jordan Executes 2 Militants for Slaying of U.S. Diplomat,” March 11, 2006.
12. handed him the gun: Jean-Charles Brisard and Damien Martinez, Zarqawi: The New Face of al-Qaeda (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2005).
13. sentenced to death in absentia: Los Angeles Times Wire Reports, “Court Sentences Zarqawi to Death in Absentia,” December 19, 2005.
14. menace who should be taken out of the picture: Jarrett Murphy, “Birthday Gift to Wanted Terrorist,” CBS News, October 31, 2003.
15. “an associate… of Osama bin Laden”: “Transcript of Powell’s U.N. Presentation Part 9: Ties to al Qaeda,” CNN, February 6, 2003, http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/02/05/sprj.irq.powell.transcript.09/index.html?iref=mpstoryview.
16. “many of its leaders are known to be in Baghdad”: “Bush: ‘All the World Can Rise to This Moment,’” CNN, February 6, 2003, http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/02/06/sprj.irq.bush.transcript/.
17. killing some five thousand civilians: “1988: Thousands Die in Halabja Gas Attack,” BBC, http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/16/newsid_4304000/4304853.stm.
18. consolidated their power: Stanford University, “Mapping Militant Organizations: Ansar al-Islam,” http://web.stanford.edu/group/mapping militants/cgi-bin/groups/view/13.
19. he aligned his forces with theirs: Ibid.
20. “but well considered”: Urs Gehriger, “Abu Musab al-Zarqawi: From Green Man to Guru,” SignAndSight.com, September 11, 2005, http://www.signandsight.com/features/449.html.
21. son of a wealthy factory owner: Karl Vick, “A Bomb-Builder, ‘Out of the Shadows,’” Washington Post, February 20, 2006.
22. Saqa had affiliated himself with Zarqawi: Mustafa Hamid and Leah Farrall, The Arabs at War in Afghanistan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016).
23. an experienced facilitator: Ibid.
24. Saqa and Zarqawi were sentenced… fifteen years in prison: Associated Press, “Alleged al-Qaeda Aide Said to Fake Death,” January 1, 2006.
25. Algeria, Morocco, Pakistan, Libya, and two dozen other countries: George Tenet, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA (New York: HarperCollins, 2007).
26. such as cyanide gas and aerosolized ricin: Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, “Al Qaeda’s Pursuit of Weapons of Mass Destruction,” Foreign Policy, January 25, 2010.
27. CIA knew exactly where Zarqawi was: Mike Tucker and Charles Faddis, Operation Hotel California: The Clandestine War Inside Iraq (Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2009); Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2004.
28. A small team of Agency operatives: Tucker and Faddis
, Operation Hotel California.
29. they found Zarqawi’s new home: Ibid.
30. testing of those contact toxins: Ibid.
31. tinker with blocks of cyanide salt: Ibid.; Jim Miklaszewski, “Avoiding Attacking Suspected Terrorist Mastermind,” NBC News, March 2, 2004.
32. tried the same with ricin: Ibid.
33. animals had become unwitting subjects: Tucker and Faddis, Operation Hotel California.
34. torturing of a donkey and other animals: Ibid.
35. “chemical and biological weapons”: “Interview with Douglas Feith. Jonathan Holmes interviews Douglas Feith, the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy,” ABC 4Corners, February 21, 2003.
36. “chemical and biological weapons techniques”: Condoleezza Rice, interview with Bob Schieffer, CBS News, and Tom Friedman, New York Times, on Face the Nation, March 9, 2003, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ftn-3-9-03/.
37. “producing these toxins”: Greg Miller, “Ongoing Iraqi Camp Questioned,” Los Angeles Times, February 7, 2003.
38. “in the National Security Council”: Miklaszewski, “Avoiding Attacking Suspected Terrorist.”
39. “a prime suspect in that regard”: Rudi Williams, “Cheney Says U.S. in Final Stages of Diplomacy with Iraq,” American Forces Press Service, March 16, 2003.
40. “greeted as liberators”: Meet the Press, September 14, 2003, http://www.nbcnews.com/id/3080244/ns/meet_the_press/t/transcript-sept/#.VlCXr8qPyaw.
Chapter 5
1. 150,000 US troops in Iraq at the time: Associated Press, “U.S. Troops at Lowest Level in Iraq Since 2003 Invasion,” February 16, 2010.
2. my new home: Charles Duelfer, Hide and Seek: The Search for Truth in Iraq (New York: PublicAffairs, 2009).
3. 7.5 million passengers a year: Ibid.
4. six square miles of airport grounds: Ibid.
5. “Any war that Saddam survived was a victory”: Rebecca Santana, “U.S. Troops in Iraq Leaving Saddam Palaces,” Associated Press, June 12, 2011.
6. chose the publicly released photo: Terry McDermott and Josh Meyer, The Hunt for KSM: Inside the Pursuit and Takedown of the Real 9/11 Mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (New York: Little, Brown, 2012).