The Interrogators: Inside the Secret War Against al Qaeda

Rating:
Summary: Interesting insight into military interrogation
Review:
This book gives a lot of great insight into our military operations in Afghanistan and the challenges our troops face. These are guys, called back into active duty from the humdrum of every day life, who speak Arabic and Farsi with a Berlin's guide in one hand, going up against the most hardened prisoners in the world. They are stretched to the breaking point, exposed to the elements, working 16 hours a day, and learning on the fly how to interrogate in the strange new world of borderless conflicts and international jihad while juggling the latest spin on the geneva conventions.

The writing was crisp and the action flowed smoothly. I felt the CIA bashing was a little overboard at times (gee, there hasn't been any bad blood between the Pentagon and the CIA lately, has there???) but otherwise this was an objective and informative first hand glimpse into the early days of the war on terror.



Rating:
Summary: Face to Face with al Qaeda
Review: "The Interrogators" recounts author Chris Mackey's time spent as an interrogator at a U.S. Army prison facility in Afghanistan in the days right after 9/11. His job was to interview captured Arabs and try to determine which ones could give valuable intelligence information. What was really interesting to me, though, was the author's descriptions of the war in Afghanistan and the methods used to interrogate the prisoners. The beginning of the book describes the training that Mackey received in the Army's language school, and also touched on some of his training in interrogation methods.

While other Amazon reviewers have commented negatively on this book for its lack of military detail, I enjoyed this book for the fact it isn't full of military acronyms and jargon like several other books I've read written on the war on terror. To me, this book almost read like a fictional spy thriller. I can recommend this book to other concerned citizens who are interested in learning more about how the US gathered intelligence on the war on terror. I'm glad that I read it.

Rating:
Summary: A wonderful first-hand account
Review: First, I have no experience in military intelligence. My expereince was just a typical infantry ground pounder. Having said that, I found I could relate to a lot of what Mr. Mackey says based on my own experiences. His version also jibes with stories I've heard from others who were in similar situations.

I think this book is a good marker and historical reference for anyone interestest in military operations while in a war zone. Mackey and Miller have provided us with an important first-hand account of interactions with POW's. 'The Interrogators' balances the politcally charged reporting we get on a daily basis from agenda-driven media. Before you can make a judgement on America's behavior in the war on terror, listen to this story.

Richard Jones

Rating:
Summary: A little disappointing.
Review: I expected this to be a facinating book that would teach me about how the terrorists think and that it would detail the great psycological struggles that must go on between the interrogators and the men who are incarcerated for year after year in the prisons in Afghanistan. Clearly it could have been that, but for whatever reason the authors chose to not include more than superficial details of their interractions with the al-Qaeda and Taliban operatives they must have encountered. Obviously many details would need to be kept secret, but I beleive the real human story of these interrogations remains to be told. Hopefully we will get the chance to read that one day.

Rating:
Summary: A fascinating read but . . .
Review: I just find myself wondering about the wisdom of writing a book that describes in exquisite detail the "American style" of extracting information during interogations.

It comes down to this: the stories and methods that the author describes are fascinating to the casual reader. But I can't help but wonder if they have been fascinating to members of al-Qaeda.

Rating:
Summary: The New Front Line
Review: I thought this was a great book. It covered two areas I have not seen reported much, the war in Afghanistan and the methods the U.S. military uses to interrogate prisoners. The book is written by an Army reserve NCO who is called up from his accounting job right after 9/11 to help out in Afghanistan. The book held my interest on every page. I would agree with another reviewer here that the start of the book, when the author is describing his training, was a bit slow, but interesting none the less. The author takes us through his training, the call up period and then his time at two separate bases in Afghanistan. The book was wonderfully detailed and had the right mix of day to day descriptions with the tense and exciting interviews with the prisoners.

I think a good amount of credit needs to go to the professional author that helped out with the book because the two of them do such a good job as describing what are basically discussions. They made the interrogation process as exciting as a foot soldier would make combat, or at least close. I bought the book to read about the interrogations, but what was a nice bonus was the detail the author gave us about life on these forward bases and the details he provided about life in Afghanistan. The bases the author was stationed at were old Russian bases that were completely run down and it was a long time before they were brought up past basic camping like amenities. Couple the roughing it life style with the extremes in weather and the 18 hour works days they were putting in did not seem the worst of their issues.

What surprised me was just how many low level, know nothing dunces these guys had to interrogate. In hind sight I must have had the view that only the top guys get caught, but the reality is that an army, any army is made up of a lot of indians and very few chiefs. It was a credit to the military interrogators that they would spend so much energy on nobody's with no information and have it not effect their moral. The excitement level of the book did pick up when the author was covering the interrogations of important people. Unfortunately for the reader, it did seem like the really top dogs were hurried off to Cuba. The book ended with an interesting review of the authors take on the Abu Ghaib prison scandal and the illegal methods that were used. Overall I enjoyed this book a great deal. It is very readable and the pages just melt away in time, you get that absorbed in the book. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the topic.

Rating:
Summary: A Nice Start to the Story...
Review: Most Americans, when they think of "interrogation", think of the extreme. They think of hanging people up by their thumbs, vicious beatings, and steel eyed thugs taking out their frustration in dimly lit concrete rooms. The truth is so much more complex, so much more psychological. A good example of this is the story of The Interrogators, the Army interrogation units that went to Afghanistan early in the war against the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Told by one of their members, the story is exciting and also very insightful. One great thing the book offers is a never seen before look into the ins and outs of Army interrogation procedure. To anyone interested in these nuts and bolts, this is a magnificent read. Author Chris Mackey paints a picture of confusion, mismanagement, and stunning bravery on the part of the members of the armed services. Their prisoners, a motley mix of Muslim fighters from all over the world, proved to be a challenge for American soldiers unskilled in the art of interrogation in the midst of an insurgency.

The author was hardly a well honed special forces or CIA interrogation expert. He was a member of the army reserve who had completed instruction at Army interrogation school and also learned Arabic. He went to school in the late 1980's, in a time when the U.S. Army was preparing to take on a massive Red Army invasion of Europe. The instruction was totally different from what Mackey would be faced with in Afghanistan. Still, this, to me, was the best part of the book. For those of us not fortunate enough to have attended intelligence school, this is the next best thing. The methods, the rules and the many intricate characteristics in breaking the will of a man makes for fascinating reading. What people do wrong, what they do write, it is such a fine line that one is surprised that anyone passes the school. Mackey adds an appendix section that makes for great reading concerning the 16 standard tacts taken by interrogation units in the field.

Mackey was in Great Britain when the towers were hit. I was touched by his recollection of the friendliness shown to him by his English neighbors. Anyway, he and his unit are quickly tapped to go to Afghanistan in order to process the dozens of new captives brought in by the blitzkrieg like assault on Taliban Afghanistan. The initial effort to get them there and task them was unwieldy and scattered at best. The area around Khandahar airport was still rife with fighters of all stripes, so the atmosphere was relatively tenuous. You feel for Mackey and his men, as the living conditions for the soldiers are rustic at best. The climate of Afghanistan was hardly forgiving, giving the whole experience an added sense of hardship. Slowly though, even under the most egregious of conditions, the process of moving the prisoners and effectively interrogating them begins to form in an orderly manner. Still, the fact that Americans were not allowed to physically do anything to their prisoners was a constant drawback. It is interesting to see how abhorrent physical abuse is to US Army military intelligence, you might as well shoot the prisoners. Eventually though, the Army began to take steps that danced around the line between physical abuse and discomfort. It was really fascinating to read the different opinions on the actual effectiveness of these methods, too often simplified in more popular media.

While The Interrogators is an interest study of military intelligence of late, I felt like I was reading the first, and the least detailed book that would be released on the subject. The book has some good stories and even better insight, but it still felt hopelessly thin at many points throughout. Still if you want a better understanding of what military intelligence people have done of late, this is probably as good as place as any.

Rating:
Summary: Nice overview
Review: The author has captured the tireless and sometimes thankless nature of what it is like to be a 97E. He illustrates that most of the brain power of interrogators in the military resided (at that time) in the NG/Reserves. The hilarious decryptions of the OGA are right on target. The Army will never get the MI branch right until it starts treating its MI soldiers as professionals and not as a necessary evil.

Rating:
Summary: To shed a little light.
Review: This book was given to me, and thank goodness, I did not pay for this. The writing is basic at best, it would seem that the meat of the story could have been covered in a couple of 7th page newspaper articles, and then there was a lot of self serving blah blah blah put into it by the author. I would hazard a guess that the positive reviews of this book are solicited by the publisher or author. It is interesting to see that 'insiders' do not see the blaring mistakes in the book. It would seem that after Vietnam everyone had been either a SEAL or Special Forces, now the new claim is to be Military Intelligence. Also, some of the stories I hope will lead to an investigation into this units practices while conducting the mission. This just shows that once a gain the wrong people were sent to the wrong job. This is also a testament that the perishable skills are not trained to ensure there are competent people performing them. I feel sorry for the true professionals that may be caught up in this book, as their efforts should not be slighted by this dribble.

If you are interested in reading this book, ask your library to order, so that you do not feel that you were cheated. Look for other books if you are interested in this area, and wait for others to be published, which they may never be. For among the true professional of the trade - "we do not tell our secrets, for doing so will result in deaths."


Rating:
Summary: The Interrogators: Inside the Secret War Against al Qaeda
Review: Wonderful book. It started out a little slow, but once it gets into the "meat" of the story, I found it hard to put down. Being a Vet myself I empathized with the people in the story. Trying to balance a passion to "finish the job" with the unrelenting desire to return home. "Sgt Mackey" does a fantastic job of bringing us into "His World" in Afghanistan and the trials and tribulations which they dealt with on a daily basis. Granted this is but one mans "story", but it is quite revealing. I read some reviews that accused "Sgt Mackey" Of "giving away secrets to Al Qeada".. I beg to differ... That reader ("Miskarovka") apparently missed the part of the story where the Warriors of task force hatchet found training manuals for Al Qeada terrorists listing the commonly used methods of interrogation, and how to resist. Everything that was in the book was already common knowledge amongst Al Qeada.
I especially felt for "Sgt Mackey" at the end of the story. After all the work from scratch, and building something viable, some ego hungry command officer, who hasn't even been in country, trashes it all
A fantastic read for prior military looking for some insight into the "new warriors". I learned quite a bit about human nature in the book. A heart felt thanks goes out to "Sgt Mackey" Mr. Miller, and Their comrades in arms... a job well done!