The Looming Tower - Lawrence Wright [157]
Gaudin couldn’t sleep that night, he was so troubled by an improbable thought that played in his mind. The next morning when the investigation resumed, Gaudin asked the lead interrogator if he could ask a couple of questions. “I spent six years in the army,” he told bin Rasheed. He said that he had gone through specialized training in counterinterrogation techniques at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center. It had been a brutal experience. Soldiers learned what to expect if they were ever taken prisoner. They were beaten and intimidated; they were also coached on how to tell a convincing cover story. “I think you got the same training,” Gaudin asserted. “Now, if you remember your instruction, when you lie you must tell a single logical story. But you made a mistake. You said one thing that was illogical.”
Instead of laughing in disbelief, bin Rasheed pulled his chair closer. “Where was I illogical?” he asked.
“Here’s where your story falls apart,” said Gaudin, who was staring pointedly at bin Rasheed’s shoes, which were scuffed and filthy like Gaudin’s own. “You got cuts on both hands, but there’s not a drop of blood on your green denim pants. In fact, you’re perfectly clean.”
“Arab men are much cleaner than American men,” bin Rasheed responded.
“I’ll give you that,” said Gaudin, still staring at his shoes. “And maybe you’ve got a magic soap that gets the blood out of your clothes.”
“Yes.”
“You’ve got a gash on your back as well. I suppose there was some way a piece of glass fell from a building and went down your shirt without tearing it.”
“Anything is possible,” said bin Rasheed.
“I’ll give you that, too. Then you wash your bloody shirt with your magic soap and it looks like new. But there are two things you don’t wash.”
Bin Rasheed followed Gaudin’s stare. “Of course, I don’t wash my shoes!”
“No,” said Gaudin, leaning forward and putting his hand on bin Rasheed’s knee. “But I said there were two things you don’t wash, and here’s where you forgot your training.” Gaudin stood up and put his hands on his belt, which was worn and faded. “You don’t wash a belt! Look at yours. It’s pristine! Stand up and take it off!”
Bin Rasheed stood up like a soldier obeying an order. As soon as he undid his belt, everyone in the room noticed the price tag.
Although bin Rasheed quickly recovered his poise, the interrogation now moved to a different level. Gaudin brought in John Anticev, one of the original members of the I-49 squad. Anticev has a calm manner, but his blue eyes are as vivid as searchlights. He began by politely asking if bin Rasheed had had a chance to pray. This led to a discussion of Sayyid Qutb, Abdullah Azzam, and the blind sheikh. Bin Rasheed relaxed. He seemed to relish the opportunity to lecture a Westerner about the importance of these men. They chatted until late in the evening.
“There’s one other person we haven’t talked about,” Anticev observed. “Osama bin Laden.”
Bin Rasheed’s eyes narrowed and he stopped talking. A small smile appeared on his face.
Anticev, who had been listening like a captivated student, suddenly thrust a pen and paper into bin Rasheed’s hand. “Write down the first telephone number you called after the bombing!”
Once again, bin Rasheed obeyed the order. He wrote “967-1-200578,” a number in Yemen. It belonged to a jihadi named Ahmed al-Hada. Bin Rasheed had called the number both before and after the bombing—as had Osama bin Laden, investigators quickly learned. This Yemeni telephone number would prove to be one of the most important pieces of information the FBI would ever discover, allowing investigators to map the links of the al-Qaeda network all across the globe.
After giving up the number, bin Rasheed stopped cooperating. Gaudin and other agents decided to leave him alone, hoping he would think