Worthy Fights: A Memoir of Leadership in War and Peace

by Leon Panetta

  Now, we had reason to worry that one of the TTP’s leaders had a “dirty bomb.” If so, no one doubted whether he would use it. I warned Pasha that our intelligence analysts were divided about how seriously to regard this threat, but that some considered it realistic. Pasha agreed to treat the matter with vigilance. Meanwhile, I alerted our military and other forces of the possible menace.

  Those pursuing this terrorist were aided by a few factors: Although he did not court publicity in the manner of some of his compatriots, his public declaration of jihad against the United States meant that U.S. officials had a good sense of his appearance, as well as his curious habit of wearing a distinctive cap. In addition, he suffered from an illness that apparently produced pain in his back and legs; he treated those pains with regular massages.

  A few days later, someone matching his description was staying at the home of his father-in-law. There were other people in the house, however, making it a complicated operation to capture or kill the terrorist without harming others. If his identity could be established, it would be difficult to let him get away, given his record, threats, and possible capacity. A man wearing the hat he often wore appeared on the roof, accompanied by another person—it appeared to be his doctor—who massaged his legs. I was at the White House attending a meeting of the National Security Council while that was unfolding. A call came in during the meeting about the sighting of our target on the roof and I, along with my staff, asked some critical questions.

  What were the odds that this was the right man? Answer: 70 to 80 percent.

  What about others in the house? Would the building collapse if it was hit, killing innocents? The answer: There were others inside, but the mission, according to the operators, could be accomplished without killing noncombatants.

  Sometimes it takes weeks to know whether an operation has been successful. Not this time. After a day or two of confusion, press reports confirmed that he was dead. His wife had been killed in the operation as well.

  Despite the death of the terrorist’s wife, the president was pleased at the demise of this dangerous man. On the next Saturday, Jeremy received a call from the White House Situation Room operator, saying that the president wanted to thank the officer who helped track the terrorist. “Where can the president reach him?” the operator asked. “First,” Jeremy said, “it is a her, not a him. Second, here is the phone number in her car; she’s driving.” The officer later told us that when the call came in, she nearly drove off the side of the road.

  There was, however, another consequence of our work during those months. Al Qaeda, recognizing that its strongholds in Afghanistan and Pakistan were becoming increasingly insecure, began searching for redoubts in other parts of the world. Our mission, hard enough to fulfill in South Asia, with its rugged terrain and mystifying allegiances, was about to become much, much more complicated.

  ELEVEN

  “Disrupt, Dismantle, Defeat”

  The war against Al Qaeda was—still is—waged around the world, in airports, Arabian deserts, the heart of Manhattan, Afghan mountain ranges, and the Horn of Africa. But during my time at the CIA, the strategy for that war was plotted every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoon in a conference room in suburban Virginia. There, at 4:30 p.m., a dozen or so of the CIA’s most accomplished officials, analysts, and operators gathered for the “CT-ME” (short for Counter-Terrorism and Middle East) update. Three times a week, month after month, those men and women filed in, took their seats around a cherry table, opened their binders, produced their notes, and conducted a war.

  The meeting’s agenda was set by Roger,* the director of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, or CTC.1 Roger was a veteran of CIA activities in North Africa and Iraq, a cerebral student of Islamic ideology. Nobody had done more to understand, analyze, chase, and eliminate Al Qaeda. As CTC director, he commanded the largest office at CIA and had the biggest budget. As the name implied, the Counterterrorism Center was the heart of the agency’s counterterrorism effort, fusing together operators and analysts who directed our worldwide campaign against Al Qaeda.

  Stephen Kappes and Michael Morell often reminded me that when they began their careers at the agency three decades earlier, operators and analysts didn’t mix. They ate in separate cafeterias; that’s how distrusted the analysts of the Directorate of Intelligence were by the old hands of the Directorate of Operations. Today, operators and analysts not only talk and eat together, but they collaborate, work side by side, and even serve in the field together. Both sets of officers were represented at the CT-ME update.

  The update provided an opportunity for Roger’s officers, together with those in the Near East Division and the respective analytic offices, to brief me on important developments from Marrakesh to Bangladesh. We made resource and budget decisions about the footprint of the CIA in Iraq and Afghanistan—where we should open new bases; how we should coordinate with the intelligence services of allies; how we should analyze unfolding developments in the context of the broader effort against Al Qaeda. We discussed the analysis that would be presented to the president during his wide-ranging review of the Afghanistan war during 2009. And we reviewed reports from our officers’ meetings with sensitive assets who were working to penetrate the plots against America.

  The last item on the agenda was always the same: operations along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and elsewhere—the operations about which so much has been written. The effort was led by Emma,* who knew the back alleys of Waziristan better than I knew Monterey. With her flat, professional affect, she carefully walked me through the detail of every proposed operation. I studied maps and videos and reports from the field, information from other agencies, and our best assessments of where Al Qaeda and its associated militants—the Haqqanis, the Taliban, Commander Nazir—might try to move their hideouts. The meeting often ended with an apology from Roger: “Sir, we may have to call you late tonight for approval to go forward; I apologize for the hour.”

  Though the format of that meeting was predictable, the contours of the conversation were ever-changing, as we responded to an evolving, metastasizing enemy, whose bases of operations shifted in response to our work and larger geopolitics, ever in search of chaos to exploit.

  In the years since 9/11, Al Qaeda had morphed. U.S. forces chased bin Laden and his henchmen out of Afghanistan in the fall of 2001. Bin Laden himself slipped into the ungoverned spaces in western Pakistan, and Al Qaeda’s leadership followed. For several years, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) in Pakistan became Al Qaeda’s safe haven. Situated west of the Indus River and east of the Durand Line, the FATA was the badlands of Pakistan. Barely governed by Pakistan’s central government in Islamabad, the Tribal Areas, particularly North and South Waziristan, and the villages of Miram Shah and Mir Ali, provided protection for Al Qaeda to regroup and restart its campaigns against the West and Western values.

  In 2006, Al Qaeda senior leaders operating from the FATA planned and nearly pulled off a spectacular terrorist plot. Directed by Rashid Rauf, a British Kashmiri born in Pakistan but raised in Birmingham,2 the plot sent operatives to Europe to hijack ten airliners bound for the United States and explode them in midair with an ingenious liquid bomb hidden in soft drinks and Gatorade bottles. If you ever cursed an airport security guard for preventing you from taking your water onto an airplane, you can thank Rashid Rauf. Intelligence cooperation between the CIA and the British stymied the plot. British authorities were able to sneak into the bomb factory in Britain, record the activities, and arrest the ringleaders. Pakistani authorities arrested Rashid Rauf, but in December 2007 he mysteriously escaped from a Pakistani prison. Free again to go about his work, he began to develop cunning and diabolical new plots against the West. As was the case before his arrest, he operated from the ungoverned areas of Pakistan, beyond the reach—at the time—of American power.

  That’s because until mid-2008 the Bush administration had a policy not
to conduct unilateral counterterrorism operations inside Pakistan unless the Pakistanis granted permission. And they never granted permission. The Bush administration acquiesced, reluctant to push the Pakistani government too hard given that country’s strategic importance to the region. That’s understandable in some respects, but one consequence was that by 2007 the efforts to dismantle Al Qaeda were largely stalled. American officials referred to 2007 as “0 for ’07.” We had driven Al Qaeda from its haven in Afghanistan, only to have it set up shop again just across the border.

  Granted effective protection, the militants grew bolder. They started streaming across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border to attack our forces, and their enemies grew to include not just Americans but Pakistanis as well. Finally, in July 2008, the Bush administration lifted the restrictions on unilateral operations in the FATA. By then, many plots were under way. The 2008 bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad was one such attack; both Americans and Pakistanis died in that blast, reminding our countries of our common interest in combating these terrorists.

  The 2008 policy change paid off. The question in the spring of 2009 was whether the United States would continue or whether we would scale back. My instinct was to push forward.

  • • •

  The visitor in my office in the summer of 2009 wore a long white robe with gold trim, comfortable thick-soled sandals, and a black braid rope around his head to hold in place a long white ghutra.

  His Highness Prince Muhammad bin Nayef was the head of Saudi Arabia’s internal intelligence service, known as Mabahith. He was also the son of the interior minister and a nephew of the king. In the complex world of Saudi royalty, the betting money was that Prince Nayef, his father, would ascend to be crown prince and Muhammad bin Nayef, or MBN, as the son was universally called by U.S. officials, would become interior minister. There were even those who suggested he could become king. Of the next generation, he was among the smartest and most accomplished.

  His prominence and effectiveness made him a threat to many. Bin Nayef had been the victim of repeated assassination attempts—terrorists planted a car bomb outside his offices in Riyadh, others fired a missile at his plane. In the summer of 2009, a third attempt was made, this time by a terrorist claiming to be giving himself up and submitting to Saudi Arabia’s fascinating repatriation program, under which extremists could seek and receive forgiveness in return for renouncing violence and pledging loyalty to the regime. Bin Nayef’s administration of that program had been far more successful than the efforts of other governments, where hard-line tactics had created deep animosity and helped cultivate new generations of terrorists. By contrast, bin Nayef had largely driven Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula out of Saudi Arabia.3

  In our initial meeting, bin Nayef recounted for me his latest near-death experience, just a few weeks earlier. It began as part of his repatriation program and involved a potentially significant surrender. Abdullah al-Asiri, a scruffy young terrorist who was among Saudi Arabia’s most wanted enemies, sent word that he was prepared to turn himself in and renounce his attacks on his country. Bin Nayef welcomed the news, and agreed to accept Asiri’s surrender personally.

  Asiri arrived on schedule for their meeting, and bin Nayef greeted him politely, leading him to a set of pillows on the floor, where the two sat, their shoulders nearly touching. As they did, Asiri began to shake and cry. Then he reached under his robe, briefly alarming bin Nayef. But instead of drawing out a weapon, he emerged with a cell phone, saying that he wanted to call his family and tell them that he was turning himself in. The sight of the cell phone was a relief, bin Nayef told me. But then, before he could fully process Asiri’s actions, a huge explosion ripped through the room.

  It blew a crater in the reception area, but apparently because the force of the charge faced downward, it left bin Nayef with only a few cuts to his hands and other minor injuries. The bomber was blown into nearly a hundred pieces; bin Nayef did not spend so much as a night in the hospital. Asiri had hidden the bomb in his rectum and detonated it with his phone.

  The attempt on bin Nayef’s life had its roots in Yemen, and that’s what he had come to discuss with me. As effective as bin Nayef had been at diminishing Al Qaeda’s presence in his country, he was stymied by the problem of how to attack it across the border in Yemen. In fact, Asiri’s older brother, working in Yemen, had built the bomb that vaporized his brother and left the prince standing; the brother, Ibrahim al-Asiri, was still at work in Yemen even after he reduced Abdullah to scraps. And behind him was an even more sinister force: Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born cleric turned terrorist leader.

  A native of New Mexico, educated at Colorado State University, Awlaki was a powerful radicalizer of young men. He had served as an imam at mosques in San Diego and Falls Church, Virginia, both of which were visited by the 9/11 attackers, and was among the first Al Qaeda propagandists to make creative use of the Internet, exhorting his listeners to violent jihad and distributing his message internationally. Even after he left the United States, first for England and later Yemen, distance did not deter him from encouraging others in their hatred toward America. He ran a Web site where he posted frequent sermons; it included a tab, “Contact the Sheikh,” through which readers could pose questions to him.4 Beginning in late 2008, he received his first of many e-mails from U.S. Army major Nidal Malik Hasan. Although Awlaki was guarded in his responses, Hasan’s decision to contact him reflected his growing renown. On November 5, 2009, three months after Abdullah al-Asiri nearly killed Prince bin Nayef, Major Hasan leaped atop a desk at Fort Hood, shouted, “Allahu Akbar!” and opened fire on those inside the Soldier Readiness Center. Thirteen people died and forty-two more were injured. As with the attack on Prince bin Nayef, this tragedy connected back to Yemen.

  The Yemeni government wanted these terrorists out, but Al Qaeda effectively established tribal areas of its own, settling in beyond the reach of that country’s limited government, which lacked the technical and human resources to eject a hardened bunch of criminals from their encampments. If we were going to dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda, we needed to conquer it not just in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but in Yemen as well. Bin Nayef made that case to me in 2009. He was right.

  • • •

  Nor was Yemen the only new destination for this spreading threat. In Somalia, a small government held court in Mogadishu, but it controlled almost nothing outside the city and even struggled to manage some of the city itself. That gave yet another nascent terror group with aspirations of mayhem an opportunity to seize power, land, and control.

  Known as Al Shabaab (“the Youth”), it was an outgrowth of a system of sharia courts that took root in Somalia during the chaotic attempts to unite that country’s rival clans and warlords in the late 1990s. The courts imposed a semblance of order in areas otherwise reduced to anarchy—any law being better than none. But the courts lacked the ability to compel obedience, so to enforce their orders they created their own militias.5 Of those, Al Shabaab was among the most radical, and it solidified its standing among the Somali people during the 2006 Ethiopian invasion of the country, when Al Shabaab fighters waged an insurgency that harassed and distracted the Ethiopians and their surrogates. In time, the Ethiopian forces crushed the constellation of sharia courts that had founded Al Shabaab, but the group itself survived, and more radical elements within the organization took control. Beginning in 2008, Al Shabaab turned on the Somali government itself, transforming the group from a defender of that country into an outpost of Al Qaeda. From that point on, Al Shabaab became a focal point for violence in the region, launching terrorist attacks inside and outside Somalia, offering haven to foreign fighters, and—of particular concern—attempting to lure young Somali expatriates, including those who had settled in the United States—back to its camps for training in the global war against the West.

  The Somalia affiliate, dubbed Al Qaeda in East Africa, had ties back to the cell that had bombed two
American embassies in August 1998, in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, killing more than two hundred people. In September 2009, acting on an intelligence tip, U.S. special operations officers swooped down into a lawless section of Somalia via helicopter and killed Saleh Nabhan, a member of the FBI’s most wanted list.

  Confronted with these expanding threats into new areas, those of us responsible for our national security had to disrupt terrorist plots in multiple countries. In some places the military took the lead while in others, the CIA was out front. I wanted us to work together better. I directed our NCS leadership, together with the associate director of the CIA for military affairs, General Welsh, to strengthen cooperation between the CIA and special operations forces. Together, we would confront Al Qaeda wherever we found it.

  • • •

  And then there was the United States itself. During one of my first intelligence briefings during the transition, I had been told that the FBI’s assessment was that there were no Al Qaeda cells operating in the country. But both FBI director Bob Mueller and Mike Leiter, the head of the National Counterterrorism Center, warned me that we didn’t know what we didn’t know—and that we should assume that Al Qaeda was trying to recruit operatives who could operate in the West.

  At a regular CT-ME update in the summer of 2009, I received a briefing about one of Rashid Rauf’s operatives who had made it into the United States and was embarked on a potentially devastating mission. Najibullah Zazi was a twenty-four-year-old Afghan who immigrated to the United States with his family when he was fourteen. His father became a U.S. citizen and found work in New York. Zazi lived for ten years in Flushing, Queens, and at some point became sufficiently radicalized to take up arms against his adopted country. He traveled to Pakistan and was provided explosives training in 2008. In 2009, his Al Qaeda masters, including operations chief Saleh al-Somali, directed him to bomb the New York City subway system, providing him with a special explosives recipe.