bin Laden had tied his own fate: To determine when this shift in focus occurred, Thomas Hegghammer examined Islamist Web forums and estimated the jump in interest occurred between April and September 2004. From that point on, Iraq dominated the concerns of the global jihadist movement. (Thomas Hegghammer, “Global Jihadism After the Iraq War,” Middle East Journal (Winter 2006), 20–21.
CHAPTER 11: OUT WEST
by the sandwich bar: Elliott D. Woods, “A Few Unforeseen Things,” Virginia Quarterly Review, Fall 2008, 6–31.
bowing forward in silence: “Lion in the Village” (transcript), Anderson Cooper 360, CNN, March 1, 2007.
past noon, he ignited: Ibid.
Saudi medical student: Friends of the twenty-year-old Saudi medical student reported that insurgents in Iraq had contacted the man’s father, informing him that his son, who had withdrawn his tuition money and left his studies in Sudan for the jihad, had martyred himself in Iraq. Associated Press, “Report: Mess-Hall Bomber Was Saudi Student,” MSNBC website, January 3, 2005. The New Republic, examining the 430 martyr biographies in the jihadist text The Martyrs of the Land of the Two Rivers, found a description of al-Ghamidi: “And Ahmad Said Ahmad Al Ghamidi, also of Saudi Arabia, was studying medicine at Khartoum University when he broke off his studies and used his tuition money to go to Iraq.” Husain Haqqani and Daniel Kimmage, “Suicidology,” New Republic, October 3, 2005, 14.
“Caravan of Martyrs”: Thomas Hegghammer, “Saudi Militants in Iraq: Backgrounds and Recruitment Patterns,” Norwegian Defense Research Establishment, February 5, 2007, 8.
restoring the caliphate there: “[T]he recruitment message relies not primarily on complex theological arguments, but on simple, visceral appeals to people’s sense of solidarity and altruism.” Thomas Hegghammer, “The Rise of Muslim Foreign Fighters: Islam and the Globalization of Jihad,” International Security (Winter 2010–11), 90.
three dozen agencies: Interviews with JIATF members.
between 12,000 and 20,000 men: John F. Burns, “Iraq’s Ho Chi Minh Trail,” New York Times, June 5, 2005.
with that stated intention: This is based on what became known as the “Sinjar records,” which indicated that 56 percent of foreign fighters were recruited to be, or joined with the intention of becoming, suicide bombers, while 42 percent came or were tasked to be fighters. Joseph Felter and Brian Fishman, Al-Qai’da’s Foreign Fighters in Iraq: A First Look at the Sinjar Records (Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, January 2, 2007), 18. Interviews with a number of task force members indicated that some of the foreign fighters picked up had been recruited to fight but upon arrival to Iraq were assigned martyrdom missions (at times against their desire). But interviews also indicated that there was likely similar cross-assignment, where the more talented recruits who came with a desire to be suicide bombers were diverted to positions that would keep them alive.
see a template emerge: The path of recruitment and of the “ratline” is based upon my memory, as well as interviews with task force members involved in both intelligence and operations.
if not thousands, of dollars: Joseph Felter and Brian Fishman, “Becoming a Foreign Fighter: A Second Look at the Sinjar Records,” in Bombers, Bank Accounts, and Bleedout: Al Qa’ida’s Road in and out of Iraq, ed. Brian Fishman (Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, July 2008), 53.
they had been treated: Felter and Fishman, Al-Qai’da’s Foreign Fighters, 25.
how strong their relationships were: Translated versions of the filled-out questionnaires were released as part of the Sinjar records, and an English version is available on the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point website.