The Black Banners_ 9_11 and the War Against Al-Qaeda - Ali H. Soufan [195]
Other CTC officials and local CIA officers also began to develop doubts, and their original openness to trying Boris’s techniques was replaced by growing skepticism. They had limited or no interrogation experience and didn’t know anything about Abu Zubaydah, so at first didn’t know better. Boris had seemed to know what he was talking about.
But then they saw that Boris’s experiments were evolving into a risky situation with possible legal ramifications. They also began to realize that while Boris came across as being full of confidence, in reality he was just experimenting. His experience was limited to the classroom. He’d never been involved in an actual interrogation of a terrorist before. [1 word redacted] led the effort to put [3 words redacted] back in control of the interrogation.
Boris dismissed any questions about what he was doing. He tried to rally his supporters and explain away his failure by saying that in fact a twenty-four-hour period of sleep deprivation wasn’t enough. “A minimum of forty-eight hours is really needed for sleep deprivation to be successful,” he announced.
Shortly after the initial CTC contingent had arrived with Boris, a team of CIA analysts, mostly young, had followed. They were unfortunately very receptive to the arguments Boris made, as they believed that Abu Zubaydah was the number three or four in al-Qaeda and therefore wasn’t cooperating. Almost all of them admired Boris and seemed convinced that [1 word redacted] were failing with Abu Zubaydah. Some of the young analysts believed that talk was boring and that [1 word redacted] needed to be tough. Boris sent a request to CIA headquarters asking for permission to try a longer period of sleep deprivation.
CIA headquarters wasn’t being challenged only by [1 word redacted] vocal minority at the location. After a few days [4 words redacted], there were inquiries from other parts of the U.S. intelligence community asking why, all of sudden, [2 words redacted] was being transmitted. The result of all this push-back and questioning was that CIA headquarters authorized [3 words redacted] to reengage with Abu Zubaydah. Although Boris was not called off the case, this was an admission that his experiments weren’t working; it was also breaking Boris’s cardinal rule that only one person would deal with Abu Zubaydah—his “god.” Boris was unhappy, but he had no choice—for once CIA headquarters was taking [1 word redacted] side.
Before speaking to Abu Zubayah, [1 word redacted] had a condition that [1 word redacted] made clear to [1 word redacted]. “We won’t go in while he’s naked, or while Boris is playing any of his games.” He told [1 word redacted] to do whatever [1 word redacted] wanted. [28 words redacted]. [1 word redacted] knew that given his cultural and religious taboos regarding nudity, [1 word redacted] action was appreciated. [8 words redacted]
[19 words redacted] While [1 word redacted] understood and agreed with his sentiments, [1 word redacted] couldn’t tell him. Abu Zubaydah would then know that [1 word redacted] side was dysfunctional, and he would clam up altogether, even with [1 word redacted].
[57 words redacted]
Frank, the CTC polygrapher, worked with [3 words redacted] when [1 word redacted] went back in. He was a trained interrogator and shared [1 word redacted] views. [1 word redacted] took turns with Abu Zubaydah.
Frank’s technique in working with Abu Zubaydah was to focus on convincing him that it was in his interest to cooperate. He would tell him, [25 words redacted]
[71 words redacted]
When one of the [3 words redacted] was in the interrogation room, the others were in an adjacent room watching on a closed circuit television (CCTV) screen. Boris and CIA analysts monitoring and supporting the interrogations were in the room, too, and [1 word redacted] quickly learned