The Interrogator

This is a confession from a senior CIA operative, Glenn Carle, who led the interrogation against one of the most high profile CIA catches of the last decade, a senior Al Qa'ida man who was thought to hold the key to finding Bin laden. Carle's journey is a tale of international intrigue, deceit and betrayal - it is also an extraordinary and intimate portrait of our war on terror. Carle had years of training and experience leading up to this encounter. He had been all around the world, under many guises. Brilliant at languages, this was his apotheosis as a career spook in the Directorate of Operations. But as the interrogation begins and he builds a rapport with his subject, a feeling begins to gnaw at him slightly. The man he is interrogating isn't who he is alleged to be; he is low level at best. But while this dawns on Carle and as his skepticism grows, his superiors continue to insist that they have the right man and the interrogation must continue. There comes a point when Carle can only go so far with the suspect. He can pry no information from him. He needs to be released. But how do you release a man who has been secretly renditioned, who is a ghost? CIA superiors continue to insist that Carle's suspect is the genuine article. So the suspect is plucked from his interrogation environment and spirited away to one of the CIA notorious black sites where he is subjected to 'enhanced interrogation techniques.' And our skeptical CIA man is also spirited away, to the same black site, where he will continue the interrogation...Initially enthusiastic about his role in the CIA's efforts to gather intelligence, Carle eventually began to question the policies and their implementation of the War on Terrorism because of his involvement in this high level interrogation. He was forced to grapple with the most difficult question a patriot can face: what do you do when your government tells you to do something morally abhorrent? Carle's journey is a tale of international intrigue, deceit and betrayal - it is also an extraordinary and intimate portrait of our war on terror, a work that deserves comparison with the work of Graham Greene and Don DeLillo.

About the Author :
Glenn Carle, a member of the CIA's Clandestine Service for 23 years, retired in March 2007 as Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Transnational Threats. He lives in Washington, DC

Review :
The Longest War: The Enduring Conflict between America and al-Qaeda "Glenn Carle writes with great verve and lyricism about a decidedly unlyrical moment in the history of the U.S. intelligence community; the decision after 9/11 to take the gloves off when it cane to the detention and interrogation of al Qaeda suspects. As Carle witnesses, the U.S. government's assumptions about how important those suspects were was sometimes way off base, while their treatment at the hands of American officials often did not measure up to the high ethical standards the United States wishes to uphold as a country. Carle tells the story from inside the CIA's "war on terror" and he does it with great honesty and realism; he has the eye of the novelist and the analytical skills of the senior CIA officer he was. That makes "The Interrogator" an engrossing read, and also an important book." David Ignatius, columnist for The Washington Post and author of Body of Lies Glenn Carle's "The Interrogator" is a remarkable memoir--for its searing personal honesty, for its portrait of the amoral secret bureaucracy of the CIA, and most of all for its revelation of how a decent American became part of a process that we can only call torture."Gilles Kepel, Professor, Institute of Political Studies, Paris, author of Beyond Terror and Charles McCarry "This haunted, powerful book may well be the best and most truthful firsthand account of life inside the CIA ever published." Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame Wilson "Glenn Carle's book "The Interrogator" is a disturbing tale of the extremes to which the Bush administration was prepared to go in its Global War on Terror. Faceless bureaucrats sacrificed the core values that made the United States a great country, while ignoring the counsel of experts on the ground. This is a damning story and a nation of laws would demand an investigation into whether crimes were committed. We fear that we are no longer that nation..." Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell "In "The Interrogator," Glenn Carle has done more than simply lift a part of the curtain behind which are lurking despicable men such as John Yoo and Douglas Feith, he has turned the stage lights on those who stand out front and continue to receive rave reviews from the rabid right wing, men such as Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. But most of all, Carle's moving and emotional story--in spite of CIA redactions to the text--has exposed us all, from the CIA officers who turned a blind eye, to the cabinet members who should have known better, to the American people themselves because they allowed such people to corrupt our nation. I know; I was one of them." John H. Hedley, former Chairman of CIA's Publications Review Board "Glenn Carle shares his personal experience and soul-searching reflection on rendition, detention, and interrogation in the Global War on Terrorism. It is a cathartic effort that recounts an intensely emotional journey. Carle weighs what he sees as the corrosive effect of this experience on him, his Agency, and his country. Ultimately the detainee interrogated may not have suffered most; perhaps it was the interrogator himself." Peter Bergen, author of "The Longest War: The Enduring Conflict between America and al-Qaeda"