The Black Banners_ 9_11 and the War Against Al-Qaeda - Ali H. Soufan [121]
“Everyone in my neighborhood knows that I don’t have a truck and a boat,” Quso continued. “If I am seen after the explosion driving a truck with a boat trailer, it will attract suspicion. I’ll be picked up.”
“If you don’t pick it up,” Badawi replied, “then all of Burayqah will be under suspicion.”
“It’s too dangerous, I can’t. I’m coming to Sanaa tonight.” And Quso hung up.
Quso headed toward Badawi’s house to get the three bags. En route, he bumped into his friend Yasser al-Shini, another al-Qaeda operative, who said he’d help him. The two picked up the bags: a green bag, a briefcase, and a leather purse. Quso asked Shini to close the safe house and warn all the other brothers to leave Aden. Next Quso went to pick up his friend Mohammed al-Durrama, who had told Quso he would leave for Sanaa with him.
The three headed toward Quso’s house so that he could get some personal items. On their way, Quso received a fourth page from Badawi, checking on the status of the bags. Quso told him that he had the bags with him but that, rather than dropping them at Badawi’s in-laws’, it would be easier for him to drop them somewhere closer, so that he and Durrama could head to Sanaa sooner. Badawi was insistent that they drop the bags at the in-laws’.
Quso did so, and then he and Durrama headed toward Sanaa. As they passed over the al-Burayqah bridge, Quso saw that the truck and trailer were still parked under it. They arrived in Sanaa after midnight and called the al-Amir Institute, and Badawi instructed a guard to let them in.
A few days later, Quso said, security forces came and picked up Badawi. Quso remained in Sanaa until the following week, evading the authorities. He called his parents in Aden, only to find that his father had been taken into custody. Realizing that the noose was tightening around him and that his family was paying the consequences, he went back to Aden and surrendered himself to the PSO.
I was never convinced that Quso had in fact overslept. When the PSO went to Quso’s sister’s house, they found the camera where he said he had put it, but only one tape was found. There should have been two—the practice tape and the spare tape. Quso couldn’t explain what had happened to the second tape.
Acting on a hunch, I asked him, “So who videotaped the operation, then, if you didn’t?”
“Maybe the jinn did it,” he replied, smiling. No sooner had he invoked the “genie” than Naji, the head of President Saleh’s security team, terminated the interrogation, citing Quso’s need for rest.
The moment was lost. In interrogations you often have one moment where a suspect makes a slip, and only if you seize on it immediately can you pursue it. If you don’t, he has a chance to reorganize his story and cover up.
Throughout our interrogations of Quso, Ansi paid extra close attention to what we were asking and what he was answering. He seemed to have more of a personal interest in the Quso interrogation than in Badawi’s or any others’. Often when Quso was in a tight spot and trapped by our questioning, Ansi would call for a break in the interrogation.
One day, after we had finished questioning Quso, Ansi asked me to take a ride with him in his car. I hesitated, as we had strict security procedures and were never to travel without the FBI SWAT agents responsible for our protection, but I didn’t want to insult Ansi by saying I didn’t trust him. Perhaps he had something important to tell me, I reasoned. I got into his car, and from the side mirror I saw a worried-looking Carlos Fernandez in the FBI convoy following