Former FBI Agent: 'We Did Exactly What Al-Qaida Wanted Us to Do'

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http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,785558,00.html

Interview with Former FBI Agent Ali Soufan

09/11/2011

Former FBI agent Ali Soufan successfully interrogated captured Islamist terrorists after 9/11 without resorting to "enhanced' techniques. In a SPIEGEL interview, he revealed how he got jihadists to talk using tea and trucker magazines and explained how 9/11 could have been prevented.

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<snip>Soufan: Every interrogation is different. You have to get them out of their comfort zone. Even if conditions are harsh, it can still be a comfort zone. Because you behave like they expect the enemy to behave. You have to confuse them. I interrogated bin Laden's driver, Salim Hamdan, in Guantanamo. Another American before me had promised him that he could make a phone call to his wife. But he never could. When we came, he said to us: "All of you Americans, you are lying." And we found out that indeed they did not fulfill the promise they made. I said to him, "OK, we messed up. Sorry, I apologize." And I gave him the phone.

SPIEGEL: Did your method work?

Soufan: He couldn't believe it. But after he made the phone call and he heard his wife's voice, he kneeled and started crying and thanked God. We took him back, we gave him some water, tea. For about 20 minutes he didn't say a word. And then he started asking me about Yemen and then said: "OK, what do you want to know?"

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