“Stay with that car,” J.C. said.
As the cameras followed the car weaving through the residential streets, J.C. read the report over again. As he turned to the section about Abd al-Rahman’s family, the sedan returned to the house. The passenger went back into the house, while the driver stayed in the car idling out front. Five figures reemerged from the house a few minutes later—two adults and three smaller figures. To lay eyes, it would have been hard to tell that the second figure was a woman. But her distinctive movements and size were visible to the Green intel team with years of watching aerial surveillance. Three young children trailed them, one small enough to be picked up by the man. The man, woman, and children got into the car.
The sedan drove to a nearby market, busy now as midday approached. The man on the passenger side stepped out of the car. The driver popped out as well. While the scene was mute on the screen, J.C. and his team could read their exchange as the passenger told the driver to get back in the car. The passenger turned toward the bazaar, stopped at a few stalls, and eventually returned to the sedan, which wound its way to another house. What now appeared to be a family got out of the car and walked into the house, the driver shutting their doors behind them. J.C. watched and knew he had to cancel the planned surveillance for that day. As if on script, these six people on the screen matched the description and movements described in the detainee report in his hands. Suspicious, J.C. pulled up the database that plotted all the known areas of interest. The second house the sedan ended at was tagged as one of the five known locations used by the Abu Ayyub al-Masri’s courier network. It made sense—al-Masri functioned as a sort of real estate agent for the network.
J.C. called his boss, M.S., who was at Balad, and described what he was seeing and how it matched the detainee report. J.C. was skeptical as to whether Mubassir’s report was trustworthy—and had good reason to be. M.S.’s experience had told her to put great stock in the intuition of colleagues, so she arranged for her, J.C., and the interrogators to discuss this at more length in a series of VTCs. The interrogators—Amy, Jack, and Paul—laid out why they thought this report from Mubassir was worth betting on. As they did, J.C. was convinced. It was now up to him and M.S. to convince the task force leadership.
“All right,” said M.S., “let me get the boss, and let’s do a VTC.” They would propose to the task force leadership that J.C. and his team watch Abd al-Rahman—or the person they thought was Abd al-Rahman—constantly. Approval would not be automatic. Diverting limited ISR assets to concentrate on any target was a decision with significant operational implications for our ability to maintain pressure on Zarqawi’s entire network.
M.S. and Scott Miller, the commander of Green in charge of TF 16, videoconferenced in J.C. and Joe, the commander of the squadron about to rotate out, both of whom were in Baghdad.
“Here’re the facts,” J.C. began, being sure not to mix what he thought with what he knew: Although the man, woman, children, and driver matched what Mubassir was saying, it wasn’t a sure thing that the guy being driven around was Abd al-Rahman or that, if he was, he met weekly with Zarqawi. But, he said, if this panned out, it would be the closest we had been to Zarqawi yet. The two colonels and the major listened patiently to this sergeant first class, who had been eating, living, sleeping, breathing Zarqawi and the Al Qaeda in Iraq network for the past two years. He was credible for his reservoirs of knowledge and for his straightforward reputation.
To monitor Abd al-Rahman, they would need to watch him constantly, twenty-four hours a day, in a busy city. J.C. asked to control at least three ISR assets at all times. He wanted two to stay with Abd al-Rahman and a third to follow anyone with whom he met. This would require using up the bulk of the task force’s valuable ISR, pulling orbits away from the other TF 16 teams spread throughout Iraq to be solely under J.C.’s control.
“All right, we’ll do it, J.,” said Scott.