The Way of the Knife (49 page)

The cable carried a simple message: Ignore Blair’s directive:
The account of the conversation between Blair and Panetta comes from two officials in Panetta’s office at the CIA.

covert-action programs usually:
Author interview with Dennis Blair.

“the development of stable”:
A full list of the Blair/Gates principles was obtained by the author. The list was first published in the endnotes of
Obama’s Wars
by Bob Woodward.

Leon Panetta and Deputy National Security Advisor:
Author interview with Dennis Blair.

a secret war that most believed:
Details of the Jones Memo comes from two former senior Obama administration officials.

the CIA couldn’t get legal approval to kill him:
Author interview with former Pakistani government official.

“said more Hail Marys”:
Leon Panetta, unpublished interview with
The New York Times
.

“Can you tell me”:
Author interview with former senior Obama administration official.

“The CIA gets what it wants”:
Daniel Klaidman,
Kill or Capture
, 121.

since he assumed control:
Petraeus had sought advice from Edmund Hull, the former American ambassador to Yemen. Hull had been following the growth of militancy in the country for several years, and was angry that after counterterrorism successes in the years immediately after the September 11 attacks the country seemed to be sliding into chaos. He told Petraeus that if Yemen continued to be ignored it could become another Afghanistan, a safe haven for attacks in other countries; the assassination attempt on Prince bin Nayef’s life months later made the prediction seem eerily prescient.

before it could successfully:
Author interview with former American special-operations commander involved in the discussions about military operations in Yemen.

with John Brennan serving:
Ibid.

“Beware of taking the side of America!”:
Scott Shane with Mark Mazzetti and Robert Worth, “Secret Assault on Terrorism Widens on Two Continents,”
The New York Times
(August 14, 2010).

from $67 million to $105 million:
Cable from U.S. embassy in Sana’a to the State Department, “General Petraeus Meeting with President Saleh on Security Assistance, AQAP Strikes,” January 4, 2010. The account of the meeting comes entirely from this cable.

his message was clear:
Text of Blair’s remarks at the Willard hotel available at dni.gov/speeches/20100406_5_speech.pdf.

CHAPTER 13: THE SCRAMBLE FOR AFRICA

a violation of a UN arms embargo:
Cable from U.S. embassy to State Department headquarters, “Whither the M/V Faina’s Tanks?” October 2, 2008. The cable described the route by which the arms got to Southern Sudan. After the arms arrived in Mombasa, they were sent via rail lines to Uganda, and then on to Southern Sudan.

so the
Faina’s
crew:
Harun Maruf interview with Michele Ballarin for
Voice of America
(August 2, 2010).

“. . . she is only giving them false hope”:
“Ukraine Ship Owners Object to U.S. Woman’s Role in Pirate Talks,”
Russian News Room
, December 19, 2008.

“become an intermediary”:
Cable from U.S. embassy in Ukraine to State Department headquarters, “Faina: Letter from Foreign Minister Ohryzko,” February 5, 2009.

“to facilitate the exclusion”:
Ibid.

“without fingerprint, footprint or flag”:
Gulf Security Group letter to Central Intelligence Agency, August 17, 2007. Copy of letter obtained by author.

a law that prohibits:
Letter from John L. McPherson to Michele Ballarin, August 27, 2007. Copy of letter obtained by author.

at the headquarters of:
The description of Ballarin’s meeting at CTTSO comes from a military official involved in counterterrorism programs who attended the meeting.

a more coveted AK-47 could be purchased:
Peter J Pham, “Somali Instability Still Poses Threat Even After Successful Strike on Nabhan,”
World Defense Review
(September 17, 2009).

to hound him and go after his money:
Robert Young Pelton, “An American Commando in Exile,”
Men’s Journal
(December 2010).

a counterpiracy force:
Prince’s involvement in the counterpiracy militia in Puntland is documented in two reports by the United Nations Monitoring Group for Somalia and Eritrea.

a new militia would carry out raids:
Information about the Puntland militia comes from three people directly involved in the operations. Separately, the United Nations Monitoring Group did an extensive investigation into both Saracen and Sterling, and confirmed the two companies’ ties to Erik Prince and the UAE.

insisting that each military operation:
JSOC’s proposals to strike the al Shabaab camps were confirmed by one retired senior military officer and a former top civilian in the Obama administration. Details about discussions inside the Obama administration over the costs and benefits of striking the camps can be found in Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker,
Counterstrike: The Untold Story of America’s Secret Campaign Against Al Qaeda
(New York: Times Books, 2011). According to the book, most officials believed that hitting the camps wouldn’t be worth the possible benefit of killing a small number of senior al Shabaab leaders.

First prize was an AK-47:
“Kids Awarded Guns in Somali Recruitment Game,”
Der Spiegel
(September 26, 2011).

“old woman Hillary Clinton”:
SITE Intelligence Group, “Shabaab Official Offers Rewards for Information on Obama, Clinton,” June 9, 2011.

take him somewhere for interrogation:
Daniel Klaidman,
Kill or Capture: The War on Terror and the Soul of the Obama Presidency
(New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012): 123–124 details the first discussions of the various options presented by Admiral William McRaven. The video teleconference and the options discussed by McRaven were confirmed independently by American government officials.

Somali pirates were currently holding:
The crew of the
Faina
was released just days after the Ukrainian minister sent the letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, but there is no evidence that Ballarin’s involvement in the discussions led to the pirates releasing the crew. The pirates ended up pocketing more than $3 million in ransom money from the ship’s owners. The interview in which she discussed “unwinding” all of the hostage cases appeared in an article on Military.com on November 25, 2008. It is difficult to discern how much, if any, money Ballarin made from being involved in the negotiations.

failed to deliver:
Author interview with eight different former employees of Ballarin’s companies.

“It’s not the way forward”:
Voice of America
interview with Michele Ballarin.

All they needed, she said:
The story that follows comes from an author interview with Michele Ballarin. Her story was corroborated by a former American official who knew about her efforts to get the Pentagon to embrace the plan to use Somali hit men to kill the al Shabaab operatives.

“It is forbidden to make graves into shrines”:
BBC World Service, “Somali Rage at Grave Destruction,” June 8, 2009.

the age’s defining struggle of good versus evil:
Author interview with Michele Ballarin.

It was a game of catch-up:
“Hundreds of intelligence analysts” comes from a former senior American intelligence official with direct knowledge about the movements of analysts within the intelligence community after the beginning of the Arab Spring.

thanking the Libyan spymaster:
Ben Wedeman, “Documents Shed Light on CIA, Gadhafi Spy Ties,” CNN.com, September 3, 2011.

“encompass the majority of the Islamic world”:
Letter from Osama bin Laden to Atiyah Abd al-Rahman dated April 26, 2011. Text of letter released by Combating Terrorism Center at West Point.

CHAPTER 14: THE UNRAVELING

checking that it had not been:
Description of conditions comes from an American official with knowledge of Davis’s circumstances in prison.

named for the gap:
Matthew Teague, “Black Ops and Blood Money,”
Men’s Journal
(June 1, 2011), and Mark Mazzetti, et al., “American Held in Pakistan Worked with CIA,”
The New York Times
(February 21, 2011).

earning upward of:
Information about Davis’s CIA salary comes from documents released by Pakistan’s Foreign Office after Davis was arrested.

using an allied organization:
Background on the operations of Lashkar-e-Taiba comes from an interview with C. Christine Fair of Georgetown University, an expert on the group.

Pakistan’s pro-American ambassador:
The system of American visas for Pakistan was described by an American official in Islamabad with direct knowledge of the process.

even the U.S. embassy in Pakistan:
Ibid.

the hundreds of thousands who had come:
For the best account of the 1979 embassy burning see Steve Coll,
Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001.

the new chief did not come to Pakistan:
The CIA station chief in Islamabad remains undercover.

he was skeptical about the long-term value:
The dynamics between the CIA station chief in Islamabad and Ambassador Cameron Munter were described by five American officials. Much of the account of the fights between the two men, and the broader description of the deliberations over the Raymond Davis episode, come from these officials.

“then they are not subject to”:
Press conference of President Barack Obama, February 15, 2011.

The United States had just lost its chance:
Details of the meeting between Panetta and Pasha come from two Pakistani officials and from the contents of an internal memorandum of the private intelligence firm Stratfor, made public by WikiLeaks. The memorandum is available at http://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/1664671_re-alpha-insight-afghanistan-pakistan-isi-chief-not-for.html.