The Convenient Terrorist: Two Whistleblowers' Stories of Torture, Terror, Secret Wars, and CIA Lies
160
The Convenient Terrorist: Two Whistleblowers' Stories of Torture, Terror, Secret Wars, and CIA Lies
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Overview
The Convenient Terrorist is the definitive inside account of the capture, torture, and detention of Abu Zubaydah, the first “high-value target” captured by the CIA after 9/11. But was Abu Zubaydah, who is still being indefinitely held by the United States under shadowy circumstances, the blue-ribbon capture that the Bush White House claimed he was? Authors John Kiriakou, who led the capture of Zubaydah, and Joseph Hickman, who took custody of him at Guantanamo, draw a far more complex and intriguing portrait of the al-Qaeda “mastermind” who became a symbol of torture and the “dark side” of US security. From a one-time American collaborator to a poster boy for waterboarding, Abu Zubaydah became a “convenient terrorist”—a way for US authorities to sell their “War on Terror” to the American people.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781510711624 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Hot Books |
| Publication date: | 06/27/2017 |
| Pages: | 160 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d) |
About the Author
Joseph Hickman spent most of his life in the military, first as a Marine, then as a soldier in both the Army and the National Guard. He has deployed on several military operations throughout the world, sometimes attached to foreign militaries. The recipient of more than twenty commendations and awards, he was awarded the Army Achievement Medal and the Army Commendation Medal while he was stationed with the 629th Military Intelligence Battalion in Guantanamo Bay. He is currently working as freelance journalist covering national security issues, and corporate fraud. He is also an independent researcher, and Senior Research Fellow at Seton Hall Law School’s Center for Policy and Research. His revelations about the abuse of prisoners at Gitmo resulted in a National Magazine Award–winning story in Harper’s magazine and a 2015 book, Murder at Camp Delta. He has also written for Newsweek, TIME, VICE News, and Al-Jazeera America.
David Talbot is the New York Times bestselling author of Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years and The Devil’s Chessboard. He is the founder and former editor-in-chief of Salon and has written for the New Yorker, Rolling Stone, and Time. He lives in San Francisco.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Takedown
The CIA had been looking for Abu Zubaydah for a long time.
Yet for a person occupying the upper echelons of its list of most-wanted terrorists, he remained mysterious. The Agency knew very little about his particulars. Perhaps the only thing they were sure of was that Abu Zubaydah was the third highest-ranking man in Al Qaeda, the infamous international terrorist organization that had slaughtered more than 3,000 American citizens only a few months before. In the CIA's hasty list-making that had followed, Zubaydah was ranked only behind Al Qaeda deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri and Osama bin Laden himself.
By late February 2002 — after several delays and missteps — the CIA was finally hot on Abu Zubaydah's trail. And John Kiriakou was there.
Kiriakou had arrived in Pakistan only a month earlier as the CIA's chief of counterterrorism operations. The work was hard and the hours were brutal, and not just for him. It wasn't unusual for all employees in the CIA's Pakistan office to work sixteen- or eighteen-hour days, six or seven days a week. The Pakistani weekend is Friday and Saturday. On a normal week, a CIA operative in-country might allow himself the luxury of sleeping in until 8:00 a.m. on a Saturday before going to the office to start yet another day. Kiriakou was enjoying this rare additional snooze time when his phone rang. It was the senior CIA officer in Pakistan. All he said was: "John, get in here as soon as you can. Something very important has come up."
By the time Kiriakou arrived at the office, the chief had already convened a meeting. The chief's deputy, a collection of CIA officers and FBI agents, and the chief himself sat around a large conference room table.
"Abu Zubaydah is somewhere in Pakistan," the chief announced. "The number three guy. And it's our job to catch him."
Headquarters had sent a cable to the CIA office in Islamabad several hours prior, announcing that Abu Zubaydah's presence in the area had been confirmed. However, when you really got down to the details, they didn't have much more. It turned out that — beyond this single cable — there wasn't anything to go on. The intelligence from HQ indicated that he could be in Faisalabad — Pakistan's third-largest city with a population of over four million — but there was also reason to believe he could also be in in nearby Lahore, or in Peshawar (where he had previously run a safe house for Al Qaeda operatives), or even in Karachi, the second-largest city in the world and a place where Al Qaeda fighters had been successfully "blending into the crowd" for years.
And that was precisely the problem. Pakistan is the size of Texas and has two-thirds the population of the United States. To just say, "He's in Pakistan. Find him" demands something almost impossible. The CIA team in-country had little manpower, an unspecified budget, and — despite this — a deadline of yesterday. In an attempt to be supportive, CIA Headquarters had cabled the office in Islamabad daily with "leads" that were meant to be helpful, but often provided conflicting or useless information. They did little more than waste the agents' time.
With only a small group of CIA officers, Kiriakou was tasked with both sifting through these Headquarters leads and developing independent ones. His early efforts had proved utterly useless, and involved guesses so off-base they turned out to be almost comical. One memorable instance had involved a wild goose chase that ended in a raid on a local police station, and another had found him investigating a maternity hospital. However, as the CIA would later learn, Abu Zubaydah's movements during this period were purposeful. He was indeed hiding. He was very aware that the United States was looking for him. If Kiriakou had been feeling around for a needle in a haystack, it was because that was exactly what Abu Zubaydah wanted him to do.
Excerpts from Abu Zubaydah's own diary, later recovered by the CIA, reveal a wariness during this time.
"February 8, 2002: I am now in Lahore since two days ago. We are now in a temporary house with the Pakistani brothers."
"February 9, 2002: News came from Karachi that the Pakistani Police raided one of the houses which had a number of our brothers in it, and it arrested 20 brothers. Two hours later, a group of Americans came and photographed the location, or they photographed themselves with their weapons, at the location, like Rambo."
"February 10, 2002: We moved to another house, or more precisely, two houses, and divided ourselves in it. This is also temporary. And in order to arrange our matters and split from our Pakistani brothers, rather the Arabs, too, in another house, completely independent and isolated. We will stay this way, unsettled. We cannot start any (new) program."
"February 10, 2002: The Pakistani newspapers are saying that I am in Peshawar, trying to reorganize Al Qaeda, for war against the Americans."
Only once did the small CIA team in-country come close to Abu Zubaydah, and only after patrolling the streets of Pakistan's major cities all night long for an entire week. The device they'd used — the details of which remain classified — had picked up Abu Zubaydah's trail in Faisalabad, but for only a few seconds. Rushing to his location, the CIA had, alas, found nothing. He had slipped away once more, and his trackers had no idea where to go next. A blip and he was gone.
But still, a blip.
After this initial period of struggle and frustration — with missives from Headquarters continuing to come in (and continuing to be completely useless) — Kiriakou asked the CIA's Counterterrorism Center for help. He received a top CIA targeting officer, who arrived in Islamabad a few days later and immediately began poring over the thousands of pieces of data the Agency had amassed relating to Abu Zubaydah as his constantly changing location.
This "targeteer"— as the agent was known — began by taping a huge roll of paper — the size of a small American-style billboard — to the wall of a CIA conference room, and putting Abu Zubaydah's name in the center. From that, like spokes of a wheel, were radiated out the names of people known to be associated with Abu Zubaydah, their addresses, and all other identifying data that had been collected. Every time something new was uncovered, up it went on the board. After a week or two, the thing looked like a strange work of postmodern art — a spider's web of data that pointed to fourteen specific sites, each one a potential location for Abu Zubaydah (and possibly for his cohorts).
They began to formulate a plan for hitting these sites. The first obstacle was that the CIA had never before carried out more than two raids in a single night in Pakistan. Fourteen simultaneous raids would be unprecedented, and would require a much larger team. Still, Kiriakou knew that it was the approach that offered the best chance of success. It was what needed to be done. So he made his pitch.
Kiriakou began by requesting that Headquarters provide a team of several dozen agents — half CIA and half FBI — along with weapons, communications gear, night vision equipment, battering rams, and other tools of the trade. He also asked for a budget of several million dollars for "incidentals," including safe houses, rental cars, food, water, and hotels to house this new and expanded team.
Because of Abu Zubaydah's prominence and priority, Kiriakou got what he wanted, and quickly. Langley chartered a plane, and forty-eight hours later an expanded team arrived with new manpower, money, and equipment. They set up a base in a local hotel, renting out an entire floor. Because of the sheer size and scope of what was happening, maintaining a low profile was impossible. In addition to the DO NOT DISTURB signs placed on every door on the entire floor, the sight of men who were obviously Americans bringing dolly-loads of crates containing electronic equipment, weapons, and ammunition raised the eyebrows of the hotel's Pakistani security guards. The guards demanded to see what the crates contained. A fistfight nearly broke out between one of the local guards and a newly arrived CIA officer. The tension was only dispelled when Kiriakou arrived on the scene and told the guard that the hotel manager, a British national, had approved of all the equipment. Of course, no such approval had been given. However that, and the discreet passage of 100 rupees to each guard, nipped further problems in the bud.
As soon as the joint team was fully ensconced in the hotel, Kiriakou and an Arab-American CIA officer called Amir set out to find private houses in both Lahore and Faisalabad that would be suitable for setting up more secure field operations. Both officers had a working acquaintance with Lahore, and had already been in the city for several weeks. They also maintained a liaison relationship with the relevant Pakistani military authorities assigned to work on the case. Major Khalid, a Pakistani military official who had been assigned to show them the town, recommended a neighborhood popular with retired senior military officers. The houses in this neighborhood were huge and the properties spacious. Such homes would provide the privacy that would be necessary both for operations and for when the targets were captured.
The house they finally selected was enormous — it had nearly a dozen bedrooms, which would be perfect for initial interrogations. It was also isolated. Another plus. Pakistani cities generally have no street signs, which can make it hard to know where you are at any given time. When one gives or receives directions, they are usually something along the lines of, "Make a left at the Pepsi billboard. Make a right at the orphanage. Go straight past the vegetable market, then bear left at the shoe store." The Lahore safe house was not only isolated, it was down a web of unmarked streets with very few landmarks. Finding it would be a challenge. Which was exactly what the team wanted. But it was also immediately a problem.
After renting the place fully furnished, Kiriakou and Amir went back to the hotel to begin transferring the equipment to the new digs. They had rented a couple of large passenger vans and believed that three trips between the hotel and safe house ought to do the trick. They headed back to the hotel just as the sun set, but no sooner had they loaded the vans then realized that they couldn't recall how to get back to the safe house, especially in the dark.
Kiriakou was able to remember that when he'd come out of the front door of the house for the first time, he'd seen a McDonald's restaurant in the distance. Thus, he suggested to Amir that they go to the McDonald's near the hotel — a different McDonald's — and ask for directions. Once there, they ordered some food and asked how to get to the McDonald's in the safe house neighborhood. The employees either didn't speak English or had no idea where any other McDonald's happened to be. Kiriakou asked to speak to the manager. Did he know where the other McDonald's might be? The manager looked at Kiriakou with a blank stare. He was from Multan, not Lahore, he said, and could barely make his way from his own apartment to the McDonald's where he worked. He did think he could help, though. He handed Kiriakou a placemat that went with kids' meals. It had cartoon characters on it, but also showed, very generally, the locations of other McDonald's restaurants in the city. He handed it over with a smile and Kiriakou gladly accepted it, realizing that — for the time, at least — it might be the only way back to the safe house. After two more hours of driving around the unnamed streets of that city of so many millions, using a fast food placemat as a map, they found it. In another hour, they had backtracked to the hotel and carefully documented every step of the way. Kiriakou resolved that there would be no getting lost again.
Faisalabad was next. Neither Kiriakou nor Amir had ever been to Faisalabad before. In fact, neither had even heard of the city until arriving in Pakistan, despite the fact that it had nine million residents. The two drove to Faisalabad while the rest of the team remained at the hotel. As before, the first order of business would be to buy or rent a house from which to launch the raids, house the officers and equipment, and, eventually, do initial interrogations once they had prisoners in custody.
Faisalabad was a dark and rough place. Most structures seemed to be made of hardened mud or cheap concrete block. Not a single building in the city was more than ten stories. And the city was utterly impoverished. Kiriakou had the impression the entire place smelled of rotting garbage. Children swam in open sewers along the sides of the dirt roads. People traveled in overcrowded buses, on scooters, in trucks, on donkeys, rickshaws, or camels. It seemed they would hop onto anything that moved.
This time, Kiriakou and Amir went with the easy route. They hired a real estate agent who took them to a half dozen large, mostly upper-class homes around the city until they finally found a suitable place located along a putrid canal. The stench was overpowering, but the house was big enough to handle everything the team would need.
Once a winner had been selected, still accompanied by the real estate agent, Kiriakou and Amir walked up to the roof terrace and checked their GPS units to see how many satellites they were able to catch and how strong the cell phone signals were.
Smiling, Kiriakou turned to the real estate agent and said, "We'll take it. Will you accept cash?"
Taken aback, the real estate agent stammered, "Sir, do you mind if I ask you a question? What do you do for a living?"
Kiriakou had been too exhausted to formulate a cover story for use with civilians. He stood there with a blank look on his face until Amir jumped in.
"We're textile barons," Amir said. "We bought a textile factory just outside of town."
The realtor lit up.
"Wonderful, sir! Wonderful! Faisalabad is the Birmingham of Pakistan. So many Pakistanis work in textiles. Thank you for bringing jobs to our country!"
Kiriakou was relieved this had worked, and made a promise to himself to get a story straight before going out again.
Another issue with which Kiriakou and Amir had to deal was the fact that CIA Headquarters had not authorized them to disclose the target's name to Pakistani intelligence. This was because the CIA believed that the Pakistanis were likely to either leak the information to the press or, worse, intentionally tip off Al Qaeda or Abu Zubaydah himself and foil the operation. Thus, CIA officers opted to refer to Abu Zubaydah only as "the big fish," which later became "Mr. Fish." The CIA leadership in-country thought this was ridiculous. The Pakistanis, after all, were willing to shed blood in the operation, and had time and again proven their willingness to help. Kiriakou thought it was downright disrespectful for the CIA to ask them to put their lives on the line, and then turn around and tell them they weren't trustworthy enough to know the identity of the target.
So with the senior officer's support, Kiriakou and Amir decided to go against policy and tell their Pakistani counterpart, Major Khalid, and his top officers that it was Abu Zubaydah in the crosshairs. The Pakistanis kept the secret.
The day before the raids, Kiriakou, Amir, and Major Khalid decided to personally drive by each one of the fourteen target sites to assess safety. Questions needed to be answered. Was there easy ingress and egress at each site? Were there any indicators that it could be a setup? Were there adequate escape routes in case the raid fell apart? Were the streets wide enough to get the necessary vehicles through? Was there a risk of crossfire?
Most of the targets were going to be located in one- or two-room mud huts with thatched or corrugated tin roofs. One location turned out to be a shish kabob stand with a payphone. The team scratched that site off the target list. (Obviously, there were Al Qaeda fighters hiding in the neighborhood and using the payphone for their communications, but little could be done. They could not raid all the surrounding blocks.)
In the middle of this review of the sites, Kiriakou's cell phone rang. It was the targeting officer calling from Islamabad. A "friendly intelligence service" had called, he said.
"They got a walk-in this morning who said that a big group of Arabs from Afghanistan was hiding in a big, brightly painted house in Faisalabad," the officer said.
A walk-in was a person who literally just walked into a foreign Embassy and said he had intelligence he to pass along (usually in exchange for money).
Kiriakou asked if the team could talk directly to the walk-in.
"No, they refuse to do that," the officer said. "No face-to-face."
Kiriakou wondered aloud if the "walk-in" might actually be a telephone intercept. Why would a supposedly friendly intelligence service deny the CIA access to a source? It didn't make sense.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Convenient Terrorist"
by .
Copyright © 2017 Joseph Hickman & John Kiriakou.
Excerpted by permission of Skyhorse Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Cast of Characters vii
Author's Note ix
Introduction xiii
Foreword xvii
Chapter 1 The Takedown 1
Chapter 2 Born Without a Country 25
Chapter 3 The Tine Meaning of Jihad 31
Chapter 4 Life as a Jihadist 35
Chapter 5 The Peshawar Seven 43
Chapter 6 The Millennium Bomb Plot 59
Chapter 7 Will the Real Abu Zubaydah Please Stand Up? 69
Chapter 8 The Dead Pool 79
Chapter 9 The Road to Torture 83
Chapter 10 Life in Guantanamo 111
Endnotes 121
What People are Saying About This
"The riveting story of the man in the center of a historic crisis that cost America her moral authority and her claims to exceptionalism. A courageous spy's heartbreaking dissection of the milestone incident that marked devolution of American idealism."—Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., NY Times bestselling author of Framed
“Who is Ali Zubaydah? What did he really have do with 9/11? Who did the Bush regime take so much bureaucratic trouble just to torture him, and then keep torturing him? And why has he been locked up at Guantanamo, incommunicado, for over 15 years?
Such are the questions posed by this disturbing book, which should enlighten anyone who thinks that "1984" did not arrive in the United States until the Age of Trump.”—Mark Crispin Miller, bestselling author of Fooled Again and The Bush Dyslexicon
“A fascinating and important history well told.”— Oliver Stone
“The Convenient Terrorist depicts the dark story behind the capture of Abu Zubaydah and the broader issue of American values sacrificed in the War on Terror. It is a must-read for anyone trying to understand our post 911 world and the murky forces at play shaping it and the lives of us all.”— J. Malcolm Garcia, author of The Khaarijee: A Chronicle of Friendship and War in Kabul and What Wars Leave Behind: The Faceless and the Forgotten
“In The Convenient Terrorist, Joseph Hickman and John Kiriakou provide a fascinating insider's account of the policies that defined George W. Bush's war-on-terror — as well as a reminder of their ongoing human toll. For anyone looking to understand this toll and its complexities, there is no better place to start than the story of Abu Zubaydah's career, arrest, torture, and 15 years of confinement without due process.”—Alexander Zaitchik, author of The Gilded Rage: A Wild Ride Through Donald Trump’s America
“Welcome to the Dark Side of America’s “War on Terror.” Aside from the fact that it is impossible to fight a war against an abstract noun like “terror,” just consider this: If you waterboard a person long enough, they will confess to anything. “Enhanced interrogation” is nothing more than torture – and America is supposed to stand for something better than that. The well-qualified authors of this book do a great job of exposing this fiasco, an international embarrassment of American foreign policy.”—David Wayne, NY Times bestselling author of Hit List: An In-Depth Investigation into the Mysterious Deaths of Witnesses to the JFK Assassination
“News headlines haven't done justice to the story of Abu Zubaydah. The Convenient Terrorist makes clear he’s not one of the good guys. But the authors also show Zubaydah didn’t deserve the torture he’s suffered at the hands of the American government, and deserves a fair trial after 15 years in American custody. This book goes beyond the scattered news reports about Zubaydah, and will help you better understand the US war on terror.”—Bill Sanderson, author of Bulletins from Dallas: Reporting the JFK Assassination
“After you read this book, you will never look at Homeland the same way again.”
—Gregg Stebben, author of White House Confidential
“The Convenient Terrorist is a unique, compelling, first-hand account by Joseph Hickman and John Kiriakou who lived the life of Abu Zubaydah to the hilt. Fortified by tenacious research and intimate involvement in black side of this case, no other authors could come close to telling this roller coaster ride through America’s War on Terror and the major role Abu Zubaydah has played in this war. This book pulls no punches and exhibits total courage. The “water boarding” section reminded me of what I have come to hate in a lifetime in the criminal law: confession by torture. Not only is it beyond the boundaries of human decency but, worse yet, it more likely than not produces a false confession, a serious danger to those inflicting the torture. Every sentence in The Convenient Terrorist is packed with corroborated facts than add up to aiming a spotlight at the War on Terror. It is an essential read.”
—William Martin, editor of The Crime of the Century
“Who is Abu Zubaydah? A monster? A ‘high value detainee’ indefinitely imprisoned in Gitmo without charge? Or collateral damage in an undeclared but unending war—a human being transformed into moral dark matter by uncomprehending national leaders and their unquestioning agents? A former CIA officer and one of Zubaydah’s original captors, John Kiriakou served thirty months in federal prison during 2013-2015 essentially for revealing that Zubaydah was tortured. Together with coauthor Joseph Hickman, he now reveals all the inconvenient truth behind the captivity of this ‘convenient terrorist.’ It is a story for our time, and I know three American presidents who will not want you to read it.”—Alan Axelrod, author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to American History and Patton on Leadership
“This book describes the horrific, prolonged and illegal torture by the CIA and the Department of Defense of Abu Zubayadah at Guantánamo. Coauthor John Kiriakou was imprisoned for blowing the whistle on this. Bush, Cheney, and their complicit underlings should have served time instead. They didn't and now Trump wants to use torture again. Read this book. And stop him.”—Michael Steven Smith, cohost of Law and Disorder and coauthor of How the CIA Killed Che
“The Convenient Terrorist will grab you from the very start. It reads like a spy novel but has the benefit of being all too real. Told by John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer who blew the whistle on CIA torture, and by Joseph Hickman who worked in military intelligence on Guantanamo Bay, it is the story of CIA ineptitude, cruelty, cover-up, and terrible blowback. It is the tale of a rogue agency which has compromised our safety and security while in the process shredding our Constitution and the international laws that should govern us. This book will make you wonder what this War on Terror is all about and question the bizarre methods being used to wage it. This is a book of conscience and courage, and is a must-read for every American.”—Dan Kovalik, author of The Plot to Scapegoat Russia
Praise for John Kiriakou and Joseph Hickman's previous work:
"Kiriakou cracks open the CIA’s vault, revealing an unusually human inside account of what goes on inside. A vivid picture of the tradeoffs facing America in the post 9/11 world."―Jane Mayer, staff writer, The New Yorker and author of Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right and The Dark Side: How the War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals
“Doing Time Like a Spy is an unusual and outstanding book: part prison memoir, part CIA tradecraft instruction manual. If you ever wondered how a seasoned CIA case officer operates, or how he might use his covert skills to survive an experience as brutal as prison, this is your book. In fact, it contains so much valuable information and so many insights the Agency ought to issue it to new recruits. But of course, its author is John Kiriakou, who blew the whistle on torture, and if the powers that be were vindictive enough to imprison him for that, it’s a safe bet they’ll be spiteful enough to try to keep young recruits from reading him. Go around the censors―you’ll be glad you did.”
―Barry Eisler, Former CIA Officer and bestselling author of The God's Eye View
"The true life story of a US spy on the frontlines of the war on terror, and what that meant for both his personal and professional life. Doing Time Like A Spy is a gripping page turner that reads better than fiction. A great read about the murky world of American espionage."―Peter Bergen, author of Holy War, Inc. and Inside the Secret World of Osama bin Laden
"The Obama Administration and the US Government set out to make an example of John Kiriakou. They succeeded beyond the wildest dreams. John is a shining example of courage, principal, and the America we are struggling to preserve. This guy took a bullet for all of us. We are forever in his debt."―Marc Ash, publisher, Reader Supported News
"John Kiriakou has done things the hard way, standing up to federal authority for years. The CIA couldn't silence him when, after fifteen years as an analyst and operations officer, he said the CIA was torturing its prisoners, an act of heroism that cost him two years of his freedom. The Bureau of Prisons couldn't silence him when, wrongly-confined, he exposed waste, fraud, abuse, and illegality in the prison system in a series of blogs that put him under constant threat of solitary confinement. And he did it all without losing his sense of humor. Doing Time Like a Spy is a must read."―Daniel Ellsberg, Whistleblower and author of Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers
"With a touch of humor and more than a bit of irony, Kiriakou sheds light on the sad reality that his CIA training amply prepared him to thrive in a US prison. What should outrage the rest of us is that Kiriakou was in prison at all! In fact, Kiriakou's gentleness is on full display in this book―which makes his circumstances more understandable and outrageous at the same time. And it causes me to ask, "How can we ever call it a 'Justice' system when an act of conscience that exposes US state crimes is punished and not those who authorized the crimes?"―Congresswomen Cynthia McKinney
"Sgt. Joe Hickman has written a terrific, riveting, and deeply disturbing book. I am shocked by what he reveals. Governments have always tended to suppress embarrassing facts; as the French general staff explained to investigator Col. Picquart during the Dreyfus Affair: "what importance is the innocence of one Jew compared to the reputation of the French Army?" But like Col. Picquart, Sgt. Hickman is compelled by an inner moral code to pursue truth and justice, regardless of the cost to himself. Our country badly needs such men. The truth always matters." (Thomas Wilner, Counsel of record for Guantanamo detainees before the U.S. Supreme Court in Rasul v. Bush and in Boumediene v. Bush)
“Disturbing account of abuse and secrecy at the Guantanamo Bay military prison, tied to the deaths of three detainess . . . [Murder at Camp Delta is] a plainly told, unsettling corrective to the many jingoistic accounts of post-9/11 military action.” (Kirkus)
“[A] disturbing account of the mysterious deaths of three Arab prisoners at Guantanamo Bay in 2006…. [Hickman] makes his case with compelling clarity and strength of character.” (Publishers Weekly)
“If the Seton Hall report on Camp Delta was a seed, and Horton’s article for Harper’s a sapling, then Murder at Camp Delta is the tree in full bloom, its branches reaching into the spooky shadows of the national security apparatus.” (Newsweek)
"Compelling... It's clear from his version of ... that there’s still plenty we don’t know about Guantanamo, a prison in which horrifying acts were carried out in the name of every American citizen." (San Francisco Chronicle)