I waited for him to respond. He just glared at me.
“You have one way out,” I said, standing up and signaling to John that the interrogation was over. “You know what that way is. When you are back in your cell, think hard. Think about your family. Think about your country. Then, when you change your mind and decide to take me to Saddam, I want you to bang on your cell door. Do it as loud as you can, otherwise I’m not going to hear you. And if I don’t hear you, you will never leave that room a free man. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
“Yes, but—”
“Shut up!” I shouted. “There is only thing I want to hear from you: the location of Saddam. Otherwise, don’t say anything.” I turned to leave, then stopped and faced him again. “Just bang on the cell door, Muhammad. That’s all you have to do.”
I left, slamming the wooden door on my way out.
At a little before 0700, I found Lee back at the prison.
“I need to get an analyst to let someone know that we had actually caught Muhammad Ibrahim in that raid,” I told him. “I also need to give Kelly a call in Tikrit.”
“Make it quick,” Lee said. “We’re supposed to be there already.”
I hurried to the TOC—the Tactical Operations Center—and found the only analyst on duty. I gave him as much information as I could, as quickly as possible, then I e-mailed Kelly. He needed to know that we had Muhammad Ibrahim and that, so far, he hadn’t given Saddam up. By the time I finished it was 0710. I was running late. Lee was already waiting in a truck outside the prison. It was only then that I realized that I didn’t have my gear.
“Lee, I haven’t packed yet. Give me a couple of minutes.”
“Get in,” he said. “I’ll drive you over there. We’ve got to make sure we’re on the admiral’s plane.”
We took off for my tent, raising a cloud of dust behind us. For the first time since I had gotten news of the raid I had a chance to catch my breath. The satisfaction of having finally confronted Muhammad Ibrahim was mixed with the regret of not having gotten him to talk. It would be up to someone else now to finish the job.
“So,” Lee said as we bounced along toward the airstrip, “you got your guy.”
“Yeah,” I replied. “I’ve been looking for that son-of-a-bitch for three months.”
“What did you do to him, Eric?”
I turned to Lee. “What do you mean? I didn’t do anything to him.”
“Well, something happened. I heard him in there while you were at the TOC. He’s beating the shit out of that cell door.”
Lee wasn’t even done talking by the time I threw open the truck door. “I’ve got to get back to the prison!” I shouted. “He wants to give it up. Can you hold the plane?”
Lee didn’t even blink. “Go!” he said. “Hurry!”
I jumped out. I don’t think I realized we were still moving. My boots hit the ground and I tumbled head over heels and in the dirt. I did a combat roll, trying to recover, and leapt to my feet. I looked around, hoping nobody had witnessed my dumb move, and then started sprinting for all I was worth. I raced the quarter mile back to the prison. At the main entrance a guard stopped me. “Hold up,” he said. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“I’m an interrogator,” I told him, trying to catch my breath. “I need to get in there and talk to someone right now.”
“Are you cleared to work here?” he asked, looking at me suspiciously.
“Yes,” I replied. “I’ve been with the task force since July.” I gave him my name and he started methodically checking through a stack of papers.
“Sorry,” he said at last. “I don’t see your name here.”
“Look,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I really don’t have time for this…”
“I’m not supposed to—”
“I need to get in there,
I hunted down John in the break room. “Muhammad Ibrahim is banging on the cell door, John,” I told him. “You know what that means.”
He leapt up and together we ran down the hallway to where a group of guards had gathered outside the prisoner’s cell. As we approached, we heard the unmistakable sound of a fist hammering on the door. The noise was deafening.
“I don’t know what the hell got into that crazy bastard,” one of the guards said as we rushed up. “All of sudden he just started screaming and pounding. We can’t get him to shut up. He’s been going at it for ten minutes.”
“It’s okay,” I replied. “Let’s get him out of here and back into the interrogation room.”
A few minutes later Muhammad Ibrahim was sitting in front of me again. I pulled off his hood and saw his angry red eyes.
“Why am I being treated like this?” he demanded. “I have only done what you told me to do.”
I nodded, trying to calm him down. “Right,” I said. “You banged on the cell door, just like I told you. So where is he? Where is Saddam?”
“I want to talk to Paul Bremer,” he said. His whole demeanor had changed. A half hour ago, he was facing the prospect of a lifetime in prison for him and his family. Now suddenly, with the prospect of freedom, he was back in charge. But there was no way I’d be able to get him to the civilian head of the provisional government.
“Listen to me, asshole,” I said. “There is no Paul Bremer on this deal. It’s just you and me. Who do you think had your family arrested? Who do you think found out about your friends Basim and Abu Drees and Thamir Al-Asi? It was me, the interrogator in the blue shirt. I’m the one you cut the deal with. Paul Bremer doesn’t know who you are and doesn’t care. I’m the only one who can help you. So let’s cut the shit.”
“I need this to be official before I say anything,” the prisoner said, trying to stare me down. “I need it written out and signed by the commanding general of this post. He is the man I want to talk to. Right now.”
“What is your deal?” I asked. “What do you want?”
“I want me and everyone in my family released and protected.”
“That’s forty people,” I replied. “We’d have to know where they are at all times.” The negotiation had begun. He was bargaining from a position of strength now. Both of us understood that he had something I wanted. By banging on the cell door he had acknowledged that he knew where Saddam was. We also both understood that he was starting the bartering by making a lot of unreasonable demands to see exactly what he could gain.
“We can all live in the same neighborhood,” he said. “Your soldiers can guard us there.”
I pretended to think it over. There wasn’t a chance any of this was actually going to happen, but I had to keep the process moving forward. “Done,” I said finally. “But that’s after we get Saddam.”
“Then bring me to the general,” he countered.
This was getting me nowhere. “Look, Muhammad,” I said. “I’m the only one who knows who you really are. No one is going to believe you unless I convince them that you’re telling the truth. I’m the one you have to deal with.”
“I want to talk to the commanding officer.”
We were quickly reaching a dead end. I had to regain the momentum. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll try to get a senior officer in here.”
“He must have authority to sign the agreement,” Muhammad Ibrahim insisted. “We must develop a plan.” Suddenly he wanted to be in charge of the mission to capture Saddam. He had been an important man for so long he couldn’t get used to the idea that he’d be turning over his most valuable piece of information to a guy twenty years his junior. But the bottom line was that he was ready to give it up, and I had to keep him focused on that.
Leaving the prisoner with John and a guard, I rushed down the hallway to the entrance. Lee had come back and was waiting at the guard desk.
“Muhammad Ibrahim is ready to talk,” I told him. “But I’ve got to find someone who’s got the authority to sign off on a deal.”
“Admiral McCraven is waiting at the flight line,” Lee reminded me. “But the J-3 is still around.” That would do: the J-3 was the second in command at the base, a colonel.
“Where can I find him?” I asked. “I need a full bird for this.”
“He is usually asleep right now,” Lee replied. “The guy works twenty-hour days.”
