Father of Money

by Jason Whiteley

  Like most interpreters, Ali never liked to talk long when he was outside the FOB. Speaking English was akin to wearing an American flag, and it would quickly get you killed. So, I never asked any questions of him on the phone, although I had some now.

  Imam Sa’ad was a name I knew well from our targeting meetings. He was quite high in the Sadr organization and had allegedly been instrumental in some of the more successful attacks against Americans in April. The Husseinya that he was building was supposedly little more than a weapons depot for Mahdi militia members to stockpile guns during periods of nonviolence. The fact that Said Mallek knew him did not surprise me, but the fact that Imam Sa’ad would meet me did. The situation changed fast here, but it had really been only a couple of months since the Shi’a intifada and only a few weeks since the standoff at the other Sadr mosque.

  That night I slept well, lulled to sleep by the steady thump of explosions, while thinking about how this was all coming together. I really felt that we were on the verge of a breakthrough that would carry us through the next nine months. My boss loved the payment plan. The money never touches American hands, the Iraqis take care of Iraqis, and everyone is better off. Because I had built a relationship with the Shi’a, I had an invitation to sit down with one of the most powerful militants whom not even my boss or his boss had been able to track down in the last month. Imam Sa’ad was a legend, and my boss was more than a little surprised that we were meeting, but he understood the personal nature of Iraq. I was in the street and in the meetings. People knew me and had begun to trust me. Most important, my boss trusted me and gave me permission to agree to whatever seemed reasonable.

  Back on the street the following day, I felt strangely flat. The whole process of waking up to the call to prayer, having breakfast while listening to the reports from the previous night, taking a shower, getting dressed, and going out on patrol was beginning to feel more and more mundane. The heart-pounding moments of unease whenever I entered the highway or chambered the first round were gone. My comments in the Humvee, and those of my soldiers, were markedly more ordinary. We talked about the weather, sports, and traffic, as if we were suburban commuters. We had not lost our edge, but we had just become comfortable where we were. In many ways, I welcomed the change. When you see everything as extraordinary, it is difficult to spot anything that’s out of place. When everything is normal, however, even if normal means chaos, it becomes almost instinctive to notice when something is amiss.

  Unfortunately, this new mosque was in a part of the sector we rarely visited, but something about the neighborhood did seem wrong. There was no one in the street—no kids, no vendors, no one. My throat tightened as we drove toward the half-built mosque. These were the classic ambush indicators. Had we just been lured into a kill zone?

  The thought had crossed my mind before we left and bothered me so much that I had checked to ensure that another patrol would be nearby if anything happened. Just as I was about to radio them, a convoy of Humvees darted across the distant intersection. The symbols on their side clearly showed that they were from our unit. I was immediately relieved. Not only was it nice to have company, but it also explained why the neighborhood was quiet. This was a mixed Sunni-Shi’a area, and in these types of areas the population was often more reclusive around military patrols.

  As we came closer to the mosque, I could see Ali’s white Mercedes parked out back and a few figures lurking along the wall. This was our spot. I left the soldiers in the Humvee, except for two who were to escort me into the mosque and then stand guard outside the meeting room. I dropped my body armor and my helmet on the hood of the Humvee, along with my rifle. I discreetly slid my pistol down the back of my waistband and dropped a flash grenade into my pocket. I wanted to show that I respected the mosque by not appearing to bring weapons inside. At the same time, there was no need to be crazy. Worst-case scenario, I could probably protect myself and cause enough of a distraction to get out.

  I walked through the gate and took in the measure of the assembled group. The men here were different from the ones in the street—it was obvious in the way they held themselves as I approached. They seemed more shrewd and calculating than most, not exhibiting the reflexive, greedy, grabby glad-handing that went on at the council meetings. Even when they smiled, it seemed to mask a deeper sentiment. Imam Sa’ad, in particular, emanated an indifference that came from broad experience or hidden leverage or both.

  We walked into a huge room, filled with threadbare carpets and gilded curios, and took a seat on the carpet. Over steaming cups of tea, with our respective bodyguards eyeing each other through black sunglasses in the corridor outside, we outlined a strategy of armed security patrols and sanctioned aggression to exert our collective influence in Sunni territory. After licensing a certain number of individuals to travel with weapons in their cars and stand guard around their neighborhoods, we shared information on possible Sunni insurgents and mapped out plans to kill them or force them into another region. Ironically, this was similar to the strategy employed by Saddam, moving Sunni tribes into Shi’a areas to coerce them and to kill them arbitrarily. The most famous example of this policy was the creation of the Triangle of Death, a Sunni enclave along the Shi’a pilgrimage route where Shi’a were robbed and killed as a method of population control.

  There were smiles all around as someone joked about how similar our plan was to Saddam’s but that this time the Shi’a would win. For my part, I had no real interest in the latent sectarian animosity. I just wanted to achieve some measure of balance and security, and this seemed like a way to expand a pro-American presence into a very hostile region. Imam Sa’ad had spoken little, although he seemed to consider points that I had not even remotely thought about. It appeared that he had done this type of negotiation before. Perhaps he had bargained for some form of power sharing with representatives of the Shi’a clergy from Iran, where he had been educated, or maybe more recently with his own countrymen as the followers of Muqtada Sadr fragmented into smaller groups and leaders fought for power. The meeting simply ended with a general understanding. There were no documents or handshakes or celebrations.

  So the strategy session with my new Shi’a colleagues, my most ambitious initiative ever, laid out a plan that seemed destined for success. Yet I still did not know much about Imam Sa’ad, and he seemed as indifferent to me as death itself. The glimpses of people scurrying along rooftops as we left the neighborhood confirmed what I had suspected. Imam Sa’ad commanded more than respect around here; he commanded an army that was shadowing us. Unknown to the men on the rooftops, we would soon be working together. All I needed was to take this plan to the council for community approval. I would pitch the plan in three phases. First, build the security force. Second, start the mass labor projects. Third, organize the weapons buyback. As I thought about it, the plan came together in perfect harmony. We would almost literally replace weapons with shovels, then arm a force we controlled to protect the community. We had started our own government system. The council would implement this and be rewarded for it. It was a no-brainer.

  Seven

  MONEY BY THE BARREL

  “NO WAY!” RAISING HIS considerable girth to pound on the table in the direction of the Shi’a delegates, the Sunni imam, Imam Mahmoud, usually quite calm, reacted more violently than I ever imagined.

  “You know that violence against Sunni people is happening every day. Now you want us to turn in our guns and be lorded over by an army of Shi’a?” The cleric’s English was at its best, pointedly and condescendingly pronouncing “Shi’a” as if it were a disease.

  Of course, the obvious point, not made by anyone at the table, was that the Shi’a had lived this way for years, being abused and intimidated by a well-armed Sunni minority who kept them so tightly underfoot that they had no chance to even practice their religion openly. It was a point that did not need to be made in this hour of triumph. The Shi’a silently acknowledged this outburst, by keeping their eyes low and the
ir fingers flicking through prayer beads. Perhaps they even understood the imam’s frustration to a degree.

  In order to keep the agenda moving, I began to outline some additional details. The sheiks or the council members would collect a supervisory fee for work done in and around their areas. This made the imam sit back down.

  The conversation stayed on money. They wanted the price list for the weapons and wanted to know whether they could collect a finder’s fee for large shipments. I didn’t see why not. The conversation had started tensely, but it was no longer Sunni versus Shi’a—it was all about greed. By the end of the meeting, people could barely wait to start scrounging up weapons to sell and help people to go to work.

  I thought it was a huge success. I stayed behind to talk with Said Mallek about the security force and to follow up with him on Imam Sa’ad. Heydar, another council member from Abu Discher, stayed behind to join the discussion as well. The two of them whispered back and forth with Ali. From their averted glances and nods, I could tell they were negotiating.

  “Heydar wants to know the price for five hundred rocket-propelled grenades and three hundred grenade launchers.”

  That was a pretty large amount, especially from mild-mannered Heydar.

  “He also wants you to pick them up and deliver them to a guy he knows.”

  This was a cryptic, but not wholly unanticipated, request. The Iraqis were sensitive to scenarios where they could be recorded or exposed by the U.S. Army. Selling weapons back to the army would undoubtedly place their names on a list of some sort. Although we offered the buyback on an amnesty basis, the army planned to clandestinely film it in order to learn more about the people who had access to large amounts of weapons. I was getting an education right now.

  Ali went on to translate that since the fighting on the first day of our arrival, Heydar had been responsible for hiding all of the weapons for the neighborhood. Heydar, the elderly Santa-bearded council member, the guy who was always warm to me, was keeping the neighborhood’s illicit arms supply. He could see the expression on my face and gave me a wink.

  Ali continued that Heydar also arranged for weapons to be brought in from other areas, especially in the Kurdish-controlled area, where the violence was minimal and the prices were low. They were brought in by truck, in an operation owned by a shadowy arms dealer called “Q.”

  Ali added, “Heydar wants you to meet Q and sell these weapons. Then bring him the money.”

  Another wink from Heydar. He was enjoying this. He also seemed to be following the English part of the conversation pretty well for someone who claimed not to speak English.

  “No problem,” I replied, “but I want to know more about the night of the ambush. Who all was involved that I know?”

  Without an interpreter and smirking like a child caught stealing cookies, Said Mallek said the words that I had long suspected, “All of us.”

  Well, at least it was in the open now. The Shi’a members of the council were also Mahdi Army members—followers of Muqtada Al-Sadr. Some in the U.S. Army continued to consider affiliation with Sadr’s followers as a stand-alone offense. They routinely incarcerated and detained Iraqis for this show of allegiance. Yet I took the view that this group, though violent, had recently begun to act inside the political process. Membership alone was insufficient reason to detain someone. The way that our cooperation was developing, I thought we were co-opting them more and more. We might as well let them preserve their leadership structure because an organization is easier to control than a thousand different people.

  That had been one of the defining characteristics of the Shi’a-Sunni demarcation in our meetings. All of the Shi’a imams attended a central religious school and had a fairly unified chain of authority, going all the way to the ayatollahs, most of whom were in Iran. I considered this analogous to the Catholic Church and its hierarchy, leading back to the pope. If you could get a view from the Shi’a collectively, it was more or less a binding commitment on them all.

  The Sunni lacked this organization entirely. Any person could open a Sunni mosque, which I called the Protestant approach. The more secular Sunni and the religious Sunni who followed autonomous mosques were both nearly ungovernable. Their collective leader had been Saddam and the Ba’ath Party. With those two societal pillars gone, there simply had not been enough time to coalesce the Sunni spirit around a central organization. Al Qaeda in Iraq, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Ja’ish Al-Sunna represented three growing Sunni insurgencies that tried desperately to catalyze some unification among them, but so far these remained highly confederated.

  For this reason, I preferred the Shi’a, and our current arrangement suited me well. I would meet this arms dealer Q and make the sale, hoping that this would lead to another level of cooperation and understanding. At the very least, I would keep learning about this Mahdi Army organization and file all of that in our records.

  Through Heydar, I arranged to meet Q at a mosque on the day of the weapons buyback program. Heydar would arrange everything and meet us there, so everyone was comfortable. The program was in two days, and we seemed set.

  The next two items for Said Mallek were all about manpower. I needed a list of laborers, at least a thousand. A couple hundred were to work as guards, who would receive weapons, radios, and ammunition from me. They would answer to me, and they would be assigned to the places that I instructed. The army would fortify their positions, as required, and I would personally see to their operation. In short, I was asking for a roster of soldiers to command.

  The laborers, I left to Said Mallek. I told him more specifically about the plan and requested that he be in charge of commencing the project. He agreed. The road running from the project site to his house divided formerly Sunni territory from Shi’a territory. I proposed an annexation of this land, essentially turning a Sunni area into a Shi’a area and extending Said Mallek’s personal authority well beyond its present borders.

  With everyone happy and agreeing, I left for the FOB, and Said Mallek and Heydar went off to start their planning. The details were coming together nicely, and I was pleased with the level of trust I seemed to be accumulating from these guys. All jokes about my honorary membership in the Mahdi Army aside, I was collecting information at an astonishing rate. A few months ago, we did not know anything about this organization, The magic intelligence reports from the Green Zone were laughably vague, often warning in dire terms that an “Arab male of average height, driving a white, or maybe dark-colored, car is moving weapons into the neighborhood tonight or maybe tomorrow.” In the context of the recent contracts, my persistence, and this weapons buyback program, I knew I was starting to understand the hierarchy of the Mahdi Army and would learn the identity of their main weapon supplier. Like an idiot, I brought this up during the battalion’s strategy meeting that night.

  “We need to pick up this Q,” said the person responsible for assigning targets or people to be detained. He added, “And Heydar.”

  “No way.” My response was hostile to the very idea of betraying this meet-up. Sure, we might get Q, but Q is part of a larger organization. Wouldn’t it be better to connect with Q and learn about where he gets his weapons from? With all of the talk about weapons coming from Iran or Saudi Arabia, we still had no real person to confirm how that happened. Q could do that. He could explain how Chinese grenades manufactured a week earlier could be found in our sector. He would be more valuable over tea than behind bars. Our detention facilities, even after the Abu Ghraib photos came out, did not scare anyone.

  Suddenly, I came up with a great idea. Pick up Heydar. Arrest him for being involved with the Mahdi Army. We could send a unit to do it tonight, and in the morning I would personally let him out. It would create the impression that I was on his side more than on the U.S. Army’s, and it might well prompt some additional information from him. At the very least, it would soothe his worries and those of Q that I was a trustworthy guy.

  The manipulation would have been unseemly
a few months back when we thought that transparency and honesty were the key values to rebuilding this society. Now everyone at the table knew that this was a different place. Here, personal allegiance and manipulation were expected. Not even a half hour after the meeting, a group of soldiers burst through Heydar’s door, put him in handcuffs, and carted him over to our detention facility. As soon as he arrived, my phone rang.

  Said Mallek said, “Heydar is in your jail.”

  Perfect, I thought. I expressed all of the proper outrage to make my disbelief sound genuine. Not even Ali or the interpreters had known of this plan, so my surprise seemed genuine to all of the Iraqis. I went upstairs for a hot shower and a few Sopranos episodes, reveling in my own trickery.

  The next morning before breakfast, I went to see Heydar. The poor guy looked quite disheveled in his orange prison jumpsuit, with his uncombed hair and beard matted from sleeping on the floor. More important, he looked genuinely happy to see me, kissing me firmly on both cheeks when I arrived. I signed him out of the detention facilities and walked him to the front gate. The entire way he was jovial and happy, but he donned his mask of indifference as soon as we were in sight of the road. Our collaboration and friendship were liabilities to him out there beyond the wall, just as my relationship with him could become a liability to me inside the walls. I had taken a stand against having him detained for real. If he turned out to be involved in a future attack that harmed Americans, I would feel that responsibility. I didn’t linger on those thoughts, however, because I believed what we were doing made us all safer, but it was interesting to note from his body language that he must have felt the same way. If anything bad should befall his organization, to which he had given me a glimpse, he would be responsible. As he left, I got the feeling that we each understood our risks.

  Ali called a couple of hours later to inform me that the meeting with Q had been moved up to today and would be at the DAC, not at the mosque. There had been some internal discord over going through with the sale after Heydar had been arrested. My ability to secure his release kept the sale on, but Q wanted it done faster and at the DAC, where presumably he felt safer. I am sure there was more to the story. Probably more hard-line elements did not want the sale to happen at all, or there was an argument over how to share the money. In any event, I had an hour to get ready for my first meeting with an arms dealer.