“Where are they now?”
He shrugged. “Some of them lived in New Oja. But they are gone now.”
New Oja was an enclave especially built by Saddam for his most important relatives in Tikrit. It gave a new meaning to the term “gated community.” They had been concentrated there to be more easily watched over and couldn’t move away without the dictator’s permission. The neighborhood had been hit numerous times by U.S. forces since the invasion. It was unlikely that a High Value Target would still be there.
I was more interested in that cluster of Al-Muslit brothers who had served as bodyguards. I made a mental note of them with no idea whether I’d ever hear their names again. But I soon had another priority. A former housekeeper for Saddam had been rolled up and delivered to the guesthouse for questioning.
The guy turned out to be one of the most interesting subjects I would interrogate during my tour of duty in Iraq. It wasn’t because he had any vital information about the insurgency or the locations of HVTs. Instead, he spent hours providing us with the most minute details on the daily life of the dictator.
His name was Tashin and, as Saddam’s personal servant, his primary responsibility was serving meals. Saddam would normally eat twice a day, at two in the afternoon and seven or eight in the evening. His favorite food by far was a fish called mazgoof. Caught in the Tigris River, it was packed with salt and roasted over an open fire. Saddam couldn’t get enough of it. It was all more raw data for the memory banks: Saddam liked mazgoof. Maybe these bits and pieces would come in handy one day.
Eventually I was able to turn the talk about Saddam’s dining habits toward those who were in proximity to him on a daily basis. During Tashin’s interrogations, one name in particular stood out: Muhammad Haddoushi. Aside from being able to make world class mazgoof, Haddoushi was known as one of Saddam’s closest friends. In fact, he was even called “Little Saddam.” That caught my attention. For a man who seemed to trust no one outside his immediate family circle, a real friend was a rare thing. I wanted to know more about this guy.
It didn’t take long. Shortly after my session with Saddam’s servant Tashin, I sat in on an interrogation conducted by two visiting intelligence analysts, Ray and Christy. It was an opportunity for me to watch someone else in action. I was hoping to pick up some tips from professionals who, I assumed, knew more than I did. It turned out to be instructive, although not exactly the way I’d thought it would.
The detainee was a short, round-faced former bodyguard named Taha. He was obviously nervous, sweating profusely. The two analysts did nothing to set him at ease or encourage him to open up.
“We know a lot about you, Taha,” Ray began in an even, measured voice. “And you are in big trouble.”
That would not have been my approach. The point was to find out what the prisoner knew, not tell them how much you knew. From my viewpoint, Christy wasn’t helping the process by interjecting stray facts about Taha’s family connections. Her knowledge of his family tree was impressive, but I couldn’t see the point in revealing it. It was one thing for a prisoner to think that you knew every detail of his life. It was another thing to actually tell a prisoner what you knew. That would enable him to anticipate which areas he could or could not lie to you about.
It wasn’t long before the analyst’s all-knowing approach backfired. After an evasive answer from the former bodyguard, Ray accused him of being a liar. “I have told you everything,” Taha declared and turned to Christy. “Ask her. She knows all the answers already.” After that the session went downhill fast. I came to the conclusion that, when it came to interrogation techniques, I’d stick to my own approach.
After the analysts had finished, I stayed behind to ask Taha a few questions. I started with a rundown of his family and he revealed that two of his brothers, Farris and Nasir, had worked as Saddam’s bodyguards. I made a note of the names, adding them to my mental tally of Hamaya.
I focused next on Muhammad Haddoushi, the expert mazgoof cook and Saddam’s closest friend. I wanted to see if this bodyguard would confirm what Tashin, Saddam’s servant, had been telling me.
Taha not only knew exactly who Haddoushi was, he added other interesting details. Although he was not a military or government man, Haddoushi had been a major player in Tikrit before the war. He had overseen all of Saddam’s homes and palaces and had maintained a large entourage of his own trusted friends and advisers.
I wanted more names. Turning up the pressure, I asked him whom else he knew who had been connected to Haddoushi. “He had a driver whose brother was arrested,” Taha recalled. “The driver’s brother was a servant of Saddam, whose name was Tashin.”
I sat straight up. Jeff and I had previously spent hours with Saddam’s personal servant Tashin, some of it talking specifically about Haddoushi. Somehow he had neglected to provide this tidbit of information. Tashin, the servant of Saddam, had a brother who was Haddoushi’s driver. As I said earlier, it didn’t surprise or concern me when prisoners lied to me. Figuring out the information they were trying to conceal behind the lie was what mattered.
I told Jeff what I’d learned and we had Tashin brought back to the guesthouse. “Your fucking brother was Muhammad Haddoushi’s driver,” Jeff informed him. “We talked about Little Saddam for hours and you didn’t mention it?”
I sat staring at him as he progressively grew more nervous. Tashin swallowed hard. He was having trouble talking.
“Where is your brother now?” I asked.
“At home.”
“You’re going to take us to him.”
“Of course. He will be happy to help,” Tashin replied weakly.
“Oh, I’m sure he’s going to be thrilled to see us,” I said dryly.
The next night we raided the house of Tashin’s brother and picked him up. He was tall for an Iraqi, over six feet and well groomed with a neat beard and white clothing that contrasted with his dark skin. Back at the guesthouse, he seemed only too willing to tell us anything we wanted to know about the man he once worked for.
He confirmed that Muhammad Haddoushi’s nephew had been shot in the raid that had taken out Saddam’s sons, Uday and Qusay. Haddoushi himself had almost been killed in a raid a few days later but had managed to escape.
“Where is he now?” I asked.
“Maybe at one of his houses,” the driver suggested.
“How many houses does he have?”
“Eight all together. And he is building another.”
I thought for a moment. It didn’t seem likely that Haddoushi would be hiding in one of his own places. “Anywhere else he might be?” I asked. “A friend’s house, maybe?”
The driver nodded. There was one man Haddoushi was closer to than all the rest—Salam Shaban. It was one of the same names Taha had given me hours earlier.
I returned to the main house and, tracking down Rich, passed on what I had learned over the course of several interrogations. By the next morning Rich, using a military version of Google Earth called Falcon View, had located the house of Shaban on overhead imagery, based on a sketch from Tashin’s brother. The team was in the final planning stages of a hit for that evening; they would soon be launching a round up of all the Haddoushi homes the driver had identified for us as well.
I had no idea where all this was heading. But it was starting to get fun.
Chapter 6
ROUNDUP
The fact that I had been involved in interrogations that were about to lead to significant raids was good news. I had moved a few steps closer to proving my worth to the task force. At least I hoped so. But I still worried about being sent back to Baghdad.