Chapter 10
BABY RADMAN
I barely had time to catch my breath after the chain of events that had gone down in the last twenty-four hours. Two top Al-Muslits had been captured on the same day. That was the good news. But along with it came the reality that Farris Yasin was no closer to breaking than when he’d first been brought in. And Radman was now hundreds of miles away in the BIAP prison. It was frustrating to be so close to unraveling the insurgent web and yet not be able to close it out. I was still dealing with circumstances beyond my control.
But the pace was definitely picking up and I needed to stay one step ahead of it. When Kelly told me that Izzecki, the kid who had turned in Farris Yasin, was back to collect his reward, I had them bring him out to the guesthouse. I was determined to pinpoint the connection between the two of them. My hope was that something Izzecki might tell me could prove helpful in getting Farris to finally talk.
I began the way I usually did, by asking him about his family. Those links were often the most important in establishing where loyalties lay and secrets might be hidden. But there was nothing in what he told me that I could tie in with the men I was after. At least not initially.
“Tell me about your father,” I prompted him.
“He was in the army for five years,” Izzecki replied. “Now he has a store. A food market in our village.”
“What village?”
“Al-Alam.”
“Does the rest of your family live in Al-Alam?”
“My grandfather does.”
“Where is your grandfather now?”
“He is here. He drove me to get my money.”
“Does your grandfather have other sons?”
“I have two uncles. The youngest is named Muhammad. The oldest is Qasar.”
I paused for a moment, but the gears in my head kept turning. Izzecki had an uncle named Qasar. In Arabic culture, when a man has a son, the word “Abu” is added to his name. That made Izzecki’s grandfather Abu Qasar. Abu Qasar was one of the two friends of Farris Yasin, whom Ahmed had told me about.
Suddenly it all made sense. The old man knew that we were looking for him in connection with a wanted insurgent leader. I had given the Three Amigos specific instructions to bring him in. So he’d sent his grandson to turn in Farris Yasin instead and keep himself out of trouble. As the old saying goes, with friends like that, who needs enemies? Now I understood why Izzecki had been so sketchy on the details of Farris’s life and family. All he knew was what his grandfather, Abu Qasar, had instructed him to say: go to the Americans and tell them where Farris Yasin is hiding.
I called in the old man and spent a few hours trying to find out what else he might know about his supposed best buddy. I was particularly interested in the whereabouts of Farris’s other best friend, Shakir. But Abu Qasar pleaded ignorance and there wasn’t much point in trying to prove otherwise. The only reason I’d been interested in Abu Qasar and Shakir in the first place was because of what they might have told me about Farris Yasin. Now that he was in custody, his two friends were off the hook. All I’d really wanted to figure out was how Izzecki had known of Farris’s whereabouts. I had still been trying to sort out how I could have blown the hit that brought him in. Now I had my answer.
But there was another lesson to be learned from the Izzecki incident. Otherwise innocent individuals could provide as much valuable information as the guiltiest insurgent. Abu Qasar had known exactly where we could find Farris Yasin. All it took was some indirect pressure to crack him. The problem came in trying to apply that pressure. There was no way I could convince Kelly or Bam Bam to go after targets just because they were a friend or associate of a bad guy. We weren’t supposed to be in the guilt by association business. But that’s where the information was. It was becoming clear to me that Farris Yasin was never going to reveal the extent of his own or his cousin’s involvement in the insurgency. Those blood ties just ran too deep. But it was amazing what otherwise upstanding citizens can tell you if you provide the right incentive.
The obstacles I was facing in trying to expose the Al-Muslit’s leadership of the Tikrit insurgency got a lot higher when news came from BIAP that Radman Ibrahim had died of a massive heart attack while in custody.
This was a major setback. I had focused a lot of energy and attention on Radman, based on my belief that he was a senior member of the Al-Muslit brotherhood. Now he was gone and with him a vital link in the chain of command. I’d never had a chance to interrogate him and, with Farris Yasin still refusing to cooperate, I was facing a dead end. Kelly and Bam Bam, as well as the rest of the team, were willing to hang in as long as I could show I was making progress. But after Radman’s death, I was running out of viable options. I didn’t know how much longer I could maintain their confidence.
Grasping at straws, I asked Kelly to arrange for Radman’s son to be brought back from Baghdad. He had been captured along with his father, but the task force command was getting ready to cut him loose. He was only eighteen years old and had watched his own father die in an American jail cell. The Baghdad brass just wanted to wash their hands of the whole situation. “I think we can get him up here,” Kelly told me, “but we’re going to have to release him pretty soon.”
“I’ll take him for as long as I can get him,” I replied. I figured I’d have maybe thirty-six hours and I wanted to make the most of it.
Radman’s son arrived that night. His name was Awad, but I always thought of him as “Baby Radman.” He was obviously scared and traumatized by what he’d been through. For me, his state of mind was a definite advantage. I could use his fear to get him talking. For that reason I came at him hard right from the beginning. After a couple of hours, I was pretty sure he wasn’t actively involved in the insurgency. But that didn’t mean he had nothing to tell me. Izzecki and his grandfather had taught me that.
My tactic with Baby Radman was to accuse him over and over of knowing about his father’s role in the insurgency. The one key fact I was able to exploit was his admission that his dad was hiding from coalition forces. You don’t hide if you’ve got nothing to hide. But that only got me so far. Guilty or innocent, Radman was dead. Whatever his son did or didn’t know about his activities was irrelevant. It was what he might know about the rest of his family that interested me.
“How often did your father meet with his brother, Muhammad Ibrahim?” I asked. With Farris Yasin and Radman effectively out of the picture, my attention had naturally turned to the other important member of the Al- Muslit bodyguard fraternity. Over the course of dozens of interrogations and source meetings I had heard the name Muhammad Ibrahim come up on a constant basis. He was the only remaining brother with the power and influence to hold the operation together.
“Muhammad never came to our house.”
“Don’t lie to me!” I shouted. “I know your father saw his brother many times. How many times?”
“My father used to go to Baghdad,” Baby Radman answered with a whimper. “Perhaps they met there.”
“Perhaps?” I repeated the word contemptuously. “We’re not playing a guessing game here, asshole.”
“Muhammad Ibrahim has friends. Ask them.”
This was interesting. “What friends?” I asked. “What are their names?”
Baby Radman seemed relived to be off the subject of his father. “His driver,” he told me. “Basim Latif.”
I didn’t recognize the name. “That’s his driver,” I said. “We’re talking about his friends.”
“A business partner. Abu Drees.”
“Drivers. Business partners. What about his friends? That’s what I want to know.” I was actually getting what I wanted, but it was important to keep the kid off guard.
“Those are his friends,” he insisted. “They are always together.”
I had a problem here. I knew that as soon as Baby Radman was released he would report to his family everything he’d been asked. It was critical that he not know exactly which particular individuals I was interested in. I had never heard of Basim Latif or Abu Drees before. But they were coming up fast on my most wanted list. I just needed to make sure Baby Radman didn’t realize that.
