Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for Bin Laden--From 9/11 to Abbottabad (41 page)

  
70
about two thousand American troops:
Drew Brown, “U.S. Lost Its Best Chance to Decimate al-Qaida in Tora Bora,” Knight-Ridder Washington Bureau, October 14, 2002; U.S. Special Operations Command History, p. 98, which describes a reinforced company of the Tenth Mountain being at Bagram and Mazar-e-Sharif. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee report, on page 17, explains that it was the Fifteenth and Twenty-sixth Marine Expeditionary Units; foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Tora_Bora_Report.pdf.

  
71
less than a week:
Peter Krause, “The Last Good Chance: A Reassessment of U.S. Operations at Tora Bora,”
Security Studies
17, no. 4 (October 2008): 657; Stanley McChrystal interview.

  
72
logistically difficult:
Donald P. Wright, James R. Bird, Steven E. Clay, Peter W. Connors, Lieutenant Colonel Scott C. Farquhar, Lynn Chandler Garcia, and Dennis Van Wey,
A Different Kind of War: The United States Army in Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF), October 2001–September 2005
(Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2005), p. 128.

  
73
President Bush was never asked:
Condoleezza Rice,
No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Time in Washington
(New York: Crown Publishers,
2011), p. 119. In former vice president Dick Cheney’s lengthy autobiography,
In My Time: A Personal and Political Memoir
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 2011), there is no discussion at all of Tora Bora.

  
74
Bush confirms:
Bush,
Decision Points
, p. 202.

  
75
only some three hundred:
Henry A. Crumpton, speech at CSIS Smart Power Series, Washington, DC, January 14, 2008,
csis.org/files/media/csis/press/080114_smart_crumpton.pdf
.

  
76
a group of more than two dozen:
This group of bodyguards came to be known as the “dirty thirty.” See, for instance, JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Muazhamza al-Alawi, ISN US9YM-000028DP, March 14, 2008.

  
77
one of bin Laden’s sons:
“Moroccan Security Source Views Danger of Moroccans Released from Guantánamo,”
Asharq Al-Awsat
, August 20, 2004.

  
78
Bin Laden went to say good-bye:
“Al-Qaida Head Recalls ‘Human Side’ of Bin Laden,” Associated Press, November 15, 2011,
www.cbsnews.com/8301-501713_162-57325424/al-qaida-head-recalls-human-side-of-bin-laden/
.

  
79
Accompanied by some of his guards:
“Moroccan Security Source Views Danger of Moroccans Released from Guantánamo.”

  
80
a final testament:
Osama bin Laden, “The Will of One Seeking the Support of Allah Almighty, Usama Bin Laden,”
Al-Majallah
(a Saudi magazine), December 14, 2001,
www.fas.org/irp/world/para/ubl-fbis.pdf
, p. 222.

  
81
to rest:
JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Awal Gul, ISN US9AF-000782DP, February 15, 2008.

  
82
went by horse:
Ibid.

  
83
bin Laden released a video:
Osama bin Laden videotape, Al Jazeera, December 27, 2001.

  
84
bemoaning the fate:
Muhammad al-Shafey, “A Site Close to al-Qaeda Posts a Poem by bin Laden in Which He Responds to His Son Hamzah,”
Asharq Al-Awsat
, June 16, 2002.

  
85
Bush was incensed:
Author interview with U.S. intelligence official.

  
86
“wild claim”:
“Candidates Bid for Voter Turnout,”
CNN.com
, October 26, 2004,
articles.cnn.com/2004-10-25/politics/election.main_1_tora-bora-bin-afghan-forces?_s=PM:ALLPOLITICS
.

  
87
“absolute garbage”:
“Richard B. Cheney Delivers Remarks at a Town Hall Meeting,”
CQ Transcriptions
, October 19, 2004.

    
1
The group’s bylaws:
Translated by West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center, April 18, 2002, AFGP-2002-600849,
www.ctc.usma.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/AFGP-2002-600849-Trans.pdf
.

    
2
“I was very upset”:
Sebastian Rotella, “Al Qaeda Crosses the Ts in Terrorist,”
Los Angeles Times
, April 16, 2008,
articles.latimes.com/2008/apr/16/world/fg-qaedaculture16
.

    
3
splurged on an expensive fax machine:
Cullison, “Inside Al-Qaeda’s Hard Drive.”

    
4
a letter to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed:
Letter from Abd al-Halim Adl to “Mukhtar,” translation from Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, Harmony Program,
www.ctc.usma.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Al-Adl-Letter_Translation.pdf
.

    
5
Abu Musab al-Suri:
Abu Musab al-Suri’s real name is Mustafa Setmariam Nasar.

    
6
“We are passing through”:
Jim Lacey,
A Terrorist’s Call to Global Jihad: Deciphering Abu Musab Al-Suri’s Islamic Jihad Manifesto
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2008), pp. 29 and 40.

    
7
Suri wrote that:
Ibid., p. 100.

    
8
“America destroyed”:
Abu Musab al-Suri, “The Call to Global Islamic Resistance,” published on jihadist websites, 2004.

    
9
“Targeting America”:
“Document Contains Al-Qaeda Review of the 9/11 Attacks on the United States One Year Later,” undated (circa September 2002), AQ-SHPD-D-001-285, The Conflict Records Research Center, National Defense University,
www.ndu.edu/inss/docUploaded/AQ-SHPD-D-001-285.pdf
.

  
10
“The giant American media”:
Ibid.

  
11
“Our ultimate objective”:
Fu’ad Husayn, “Al-Zarqawi: The Second al-Qa’ida Generation,” Al-Quds Al-Arabi, May 21–22, 2005. Husayn is a Jordanian journalist who received information from three people close to al-Zarqawi, including Saif al-Adel.

  
12
Greystone:
“Dana Priest: Top Secret America ‘Is Here to Stay,’ ” PBS
Frontline
, September 6, 2011,
www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/iraq-war-on-terror/topsecretamerica/dana-priest-top-secret-america-is-here-to-stay/
.

  
13
dozens of whom:
Peter Bergen and Katherine Tiedemann, “Disappearing Act: Rendition by the Numbers,”
Mother Jones
, March 3, 2008,
motherjones.com/politics/2008/03/disappearing-act-rendition-numbers
.

  
14
“The consensus of the experts”:
“John Rizzo: The Lawyer Who Approved CIA’s Most Controversial Programs,” PBS
Frontline
, September 6, 2011,
www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/iraq-war-on-terror/topsecretamerica/john-rizzo-the-lawyer-who-approved-cias-most-controversial-programs/
.

  
15
when the CIA discovered:
Douglas A. Frantz, “Nuclear Secrets: Pakistan Frees 2 Scientists Linked to Bin Laden Network,”
New York Times
, December 17, 2001,
www.nytimes.com/2001/12/17/world/nation-challenged-nuclear-secrets-pakistan-frees-2-scientists-linked-bin-laden.html
.

  
16
six weeks after 9/11:
Richard Myers,
Eyes on the Horizon: Serving on the Front Lines of National Security
(New York: Threshold Editions, 2009), p. 193.

  
17
drawer of his desk:
Dave Montgomery, “For Bush, Getting Bin Laden Was ‘Unfinished Business,’ ”
McClatchy Newspapers
, May 2, 2011,
www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/05/02/113562/for-bush-getting-bin-laden-was.html
.

  
18
in the form of a pyramid:
Ari Fleischer interview.

  
19
call on his cell:
Ahmed Zaidan, interview by author, Islamabad, Pakistan, July 15, 2011.

  
20
On the tape:
“Bin Laden’s Message,” Al Jazeera, November 12, 2002, translated by BBC Monitoring,
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2455845.stm
.

  
21
Chitral … length of time it seemed to take:
Author interview with U.S. military intelligence official, 2006.

  
22
living in Karachi:
JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Abdul Rabbani Abu Rahman, ISN US9PK-001460DP, June 9, 2008.

  
23
Adel authorized:
Author interviews with senior Saudi counterterrorism officials, 2009.

  
24
laid out in detail:
This interview formed the basis for Yosri Fouda and Nick Fielding,
Masterminds of Terror: The Truth Behind the Most Devastating Terrorist Attack the World Has Ever Seen
(New York: Arcade Publishing, 2003).

  
25
twenty packages of passports:
See JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Abdul Rabbani Abu Rahman.

  
26
routinely handling:
See JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Ammar al-Baluchi, ISN USSPK 010018D, December 8, 2006.

  
27
KSM planned a second wave:
JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Khalid Shaykh Muhammad, ISN US9KU-010024DP, December 8, 2006.

  
28
“I am with KSM”:
Scott Shane, “Inside a 9/11 Mastermind’s Interrogation,”
New York Times
, June 22, 2008,
www.nytimes.com/2008/06/22/washington/22ksm.html
.

  
29
addressed to family members in Iran:
Asad Munir, interview by author, Islamabad, Pakistan, July 19, 2011.

  
30
20-gigabyte hard drive:
JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment for Ibrahim Sulayman Muhammad Arbaysh, ISN US9SA-000192D, November 30, 2005.

  
31
passport photos of operatives:
U.S. Department of Defense, Verbatim Transcript of Combatant Status Review Trial, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, March 10, 2007,
www.defenselink.mil/news/transcript_ISN10024.pdf
.

  
32
called for attacks against Western countries:
“Robertson: Purported Bin Laden Tapes a ‘Two Pronged Attack,’ ”
CNN.com
, October 20, 2003,
www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/10/18/otsc.robertson/
.

  
33
British consulate in Turkey:
“Istanbul Rocked by Double Bombing,” BBC News, November 20, 2003,
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3222608.stm
.

  
34
on their way to work in Madrid:
“Madrid Train Attacks,” BBC News,
news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/guides/457000/457031/html/
.

  
35
“If that were true”:
Gilles Kepel, Jean-Pierre Milelli, and Pascale Ghazaleh, trans.,
Al Qaeda in Its Own Words
(Boston: President and Fellows of Harvard College, 2008), pp. 71 and 75.

  
36
called for attacks on Saudi oil facilities:
Craig Whitlock and Susan Glasser, “On Tape, Bin Laden Tries New Approach,”
Washington Post
, December 17, 2004,
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3927-2004Dec16.html
.

  
37
rash of attacks:
Joel Roberts, “Al Qaeda Threatens More Oil Attacks,” CBS News, February 25, 2006,
www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/27/world/main1346541_page2.shtml
.

  
38
few al-Qaeda operatives threw away:
Interview with General Michael Hayden by Tresha Mabile for
National Geographic’s Last Days of Osama bin Laden
, September 6, 2011.

  
39
newly emerging geolocation technologies:
Robert Dannenberg, interview by author, New York, December 17, 2009.

  
40
Swiss cell phone SIM cards:
Don Van Natta Jr. and Desmond Butler, “How Tiny Swiss Cellphone Chips Helped Track Global Terror Web,”
New York Times
, March 4, 2004,
www.nytimes.com/2004/03/04/world/how-tiny-swiss-cellphone-chips-helped-track-global-terror-web.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
.

  
41
Silicon Valley outfit:
Ashlee Vance and Brad Stone, “Palantir, the War on Terror’s Secret Weapon,”
Bloomberg BusinessWeek
, November 22, 2011,
www.businessweek.com/magazine/palantir-the-vanguard-of-cyberterror-security-11222011.html
.

  
42
“targeter”:
Joby Warrick,
The Triple Agent: The al-Qaeda Mole Who Infiltrated the CIA
(New York: Doubleday, 2011), pp. 106 and 68.

  
43
“digital exhaust”:
Phil Mudd, interview by author, Washington, DC, June 2, 2011.

  
44
mushroomed from 340 to 1,500:
Ronald Kessler,
The CIA at War: Inside the Secret Campaign Against Terror
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2003), p. 263.

  
45
two serious assassination attempts:
Salman Masood, “Pakistani Leader Escapes Attempt at Assassination,”
New York Times
, December 26, 2003,
www.nytimes.com/2003/12/26/world/pakistani-leader-escapes-attempt-at-assassination.html
.

  
46
“We had so much trust”:
Asad Munir interview.

  
47
handed over 369 suspected militants:
Pervez Musharraf,
In the Line of Fire: A Memoir
(New York: Free Press, 2008), p. 237.