tv CNN Special Report CNN January 12, 2015 6:00pm-7:01pm PST
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fighting against them. we will never give up. >> wow. what a day. we'll see you again at 11:00 p.m. eastern. inside al qaeda for the cia inside al qaeda for the cia starts now. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com for half a decade he said he moved back and forth between two worlds, and two identities. when one misplaced sentence could have cost him his life. >> you don't know what angle he's playing. >> traveling between atheism, english and arabic. >> one minute he's 007, on the other side he's now parted part of the militant circle. being an agent for western intelligence and a sworn member
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of al qaeda. storm said he was a double agent, so trusted by al qaeda, terror leaders, he even fixed up one with a blond european wife. a unique powerful weapon in the war on terror, who says he got results. >> i have been responsible of 30 kills. >> 30 terrorists killed. >> in a race against time, trying to bring down the most dangerous terrorists before they can launch their next attack. double agent inside al qaeda for the c.i.a. driving deep in yemen's lawless sou south. storm is at the wheel. on a spy mission for the cia. he's hoping this video may help
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lead his spy masters to the hideout of one of the world's most dangerous terrorists. >> he can follow my mobile phone, the satellites, and whether i'm standing still or not moving around. >> the cia will get the video, storm says, only if he survives the mission. the stakes could not be higher. >> if it were leaked, that i was a spy, there was no way i could get out from that place, because i'm there by myself. i will get executed. in the worst possible way, either slashing your throat, behead you, or shoot you, hanging you up, crucify you. >> storm's target, one of the united states' most wanted al qaeda leaders. american-born cleric anwar al wa ki. >> we're not americans just for
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being americans. we are against evil. america as a whole has turned into a nation of evil. awlaki has like-minded followers. there is a great concern he is inspiring, even helping them to plan and launch terror attacks inside the united states. >> we will fight back, and incite others to do the same. >> it's late october 2008. the cia is desperate to find al qaeda leaders like awlaki. and storm is exactly what the cia needs. >> i had these different names. i had different personalities. i was storm, abu oh sama, polar bear.
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some kind of schizophrenic lifestyle. >> and he has made important surprising connections with al qaeda leaders. according to counterterrorism expert magnus. >> some extent, he had been to the many places, met all the right people. he's almost a forrest gump of radical islamism. i don't think there are many people like him that have all those different dimensions. he was the real deal. >> the real deal. a larger-than-life personality. who reveals his journey from jihad to james bond in this book "agent storm: my life inside al qaeda and the cia, ". coauthored with cnn contributors. coming up, how storm goes from boxer to holy warrior. >> i was invited by osama bin laden to join up with him in
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afghanistan. thanks for the ride around norfolk! and i just wanted to say, geico is proud to have served the military for over 75 years! roger that. captain's waiting to give you a tour of the wisconsin now. could've parked a little bit closer... it's gonna be dark by the time i get there. geico. proudly serving the military for over 75 years. for fastidious librarian emily skinner, each day was fueled by thorough preparation for events to come. well somewhere along the way, emily went right on living. but you see, with the help of her raymond james financial advisor, she had planned for every eventuality. ...which meant she continued to have the means to live on... ...even at the ripe old age of 187.
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... please leave a message and i'll get back to you... ... just as soon as i'm available. thank you for your patience at this busy time. join us for stargazing with discovery at sea. enjoy cruises from four ninety-nine during our 50th anniversary sale. call your travel consultant or 1-800-princess. princess cruises. come back new.
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mort n storm's path to the cia begins here, in denmark. >> i could play in the countryside, play in the forest, at the beach. there was plenty of facilities for sport. that's what i did. >> age 7, typical boy, loves laser tag. but behind the smile there's trouble. >> i grew up with no dad. >> how did that affect you? >> it affected me emotionally. you feel frustrated and angry. >> seemingly hard-working, selling vegetables at market age 13. but he's already committing armed robbery. >> armed robbery? >> armed robbery. >> what was going through your head? >> adrenaline. excitement. >> adrenaline and anger become morton storm's trademarks.
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by his early teens he was a boxer. >> boxer was a way for me to get out my aggressions. >> your fighting wasn't limited to the ring, though. >> it wasn't limited to the ring. >> this man is younger. >> the first time i met him, he was kind of a crazy person. he talked a lot. >> what was he talking about? >> fights, brawls that he's been into. >> i would go to the clubs with him. we were good friends. they were hated because they looked different. and i felt the need to stand up for them. i would put down big size men with one punch. >> at age 19, he joins a notorious biker gang. storm says he was their toughest enforcer, raw muscle. boxing, biking with the
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banditos, armed robbery, whatever storm is doing, he's doing it to the max. hess life is descending into criminality, and chaos. he comes here, his local library, drawn to the tiny religion section. he sees a book, the life of the prophet muhammad. >> it is the moment when his life changes forever. he pulls the book from the shelf, finds somewhere to sit down, begins reading. six hours, hundreds of pages. within weeks he is converting to islam. >> it spoke to me. that book, this is the truth. i found the truth. >> he takes the name murad storm. travels to yemen. attends a seminary, learns arabic.
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and the strict uncompromising interpretation of islam. >> i thought everyone else was wrong. >> black and white, you have the truth, they're wrong. >> that's right. >> and those who are wrong, storm believes, are the enemy. all he can think about is training for jihad. storm is white, and european. traits that might help a terrorist living in the west avoid detection. he said he soon catches the eye of al qaeda's leader. >> i was invited by osama bin laden to join up with him in the training camps, in afghanistan. >> storm won't make it to afghanistan. but he names his son oh sama in honor of bin laden. >> he was a person who dared to challenge america. >> the next time the chief sees him in denmark, storm is a different man. >> the things that he was saying
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were so strange, that some of the imams, they couldn't cope with it, the stuff he was saying. so he was hanging out on the street, and preaching a lot. >> preaching what? >> she was preaching actually jihad. >> that's him, smiling, in 2005. part of a radical islamist demonstration and flag burning, outside the american embassy in london. storm is hungry for real action, the jihad. >> he's been in a very high core. >> he sees his opportunity when the chief now a journalist says he wants to shoot a film about muha ja dean. >> what he gave me in yemen was very unique. it was crazy, you know, some of the persons he introduced me to. >> including the radical cleric
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anwar awlaki. >> jihad against america is binding upon myself. >> he talked a lot about jihad, for example. and again, storm was being talked down by anwar awlaki. >> talked down from an extreme view? >> yes. awlaki was telling storm to chill out. >> yet storm won't be calmed. he decides to join jihadists in somalia. >> and i had to join them. i had to join. it was according to my religious belief. >> he returns to denmark where he says he gathers military supplies, preparing himself for war. >> i said good-bye to my children, to my family. >> then at the last minute, a phone call from somalia. >> we lost the airport. >> in mogadishu? >> in mogadishu. he said, you can't come, it's too dangerous for you. >> what's in your mind then? >> it's the allah's will that i
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don't go. and i'm so deeply disappointed, and devastated. i felt betrayed, you know. >> betrayed by his god, unable to fight for his religion, he said. just as fast islam had taken hold, doubt and questions enter. >> i sat down in front of a laptop and i type. and i'm daring to ask this question that, that i have to enter. i saw plenty of websites talking about contradictions. it took some time to research them. but once i concluded that they were generally contradictions, that's when it totally put away my faith. >> that's when you stopped being a muslim? >> that's what i stopped being a muslim in my heart, in my belief. >> years of radical brainwashing stripped away in seconds. and storm makes a stunning decision to switch sides. >> i told them, guys, i'm not
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longer muslim, i want to fight the war on terror. >> the question now, would anyone believe him. ♪ ♪ ♪ you're only young once. unless you have a subaru. (announcer) the subaru xv crosstrek. symmetrical all-wheel drive plus 34 mpg. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. [ male announcer ] you wouldn't ignore signs of damage in your home. are you sure you're not ignoring them in your body? even if you're treating your crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis, an occasional flare may be a sign of damaging inflammation. and if you ignore the signs, the more debilitating your symptoms could become.
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danish intelligence agents. they meet immediately. the first order of business, room service. and storm orders what no devout muslim would eat or drink. >> i told him i want something with pork and bacon in it. and i want the beer. >> beer and bacon for a muslim. >> they couldn't believe it. they could not believe their own ears. i told them, guys, i'm not longer muslim, i decided i want to fight the war on terror. and i told them that this is going to be great. >> storm is a spy master's dream. >> here you have someone who has so many different personas, able to switch through the different personas in such rapid successi succession. >> and he appears to have connections at the top levels of al qaeda. >> there was no doubt he was very well to be an agent and the resources. they really want to get access
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to them. >> danish intelligence wastes no time, and sets him up as an operative, giving him a cell phone, and about $2,000 a month. >> i said, yeah, that would pay my bills. and i was happy about it. it wasn't for the money. >> according to storm, his early missions are successful. in lebanon, predicting a jihadi uprising. in denmark, helping identify terror suspects. he quickly becomes a double agent in demand with other western agencies, including the british. >> he was coming up with ideas for them. and he was -- in terms of being able to improvise, being able to stay in character, he was perfect. >> storm says he's now on the cia's radar. they meet inside a hotel in copenhagen. >> so the british want to use morton storm. then the cia come on the scene.
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is this heard of before in the spy world like this? >> no, i think it's very unusual, for everyone to sort of almost feed off morton. i think that's quite unusual. >> storm says the cia and the british exploit his terrorist links, sending him on trips to kenya to meet african jihadists. this is one of the places they used to meet. nondescript hotel tucked away inside. next door to kenya's largest mosque. storm explains he delivered a blackberry destined for an al qaeda operative wanted for his suspected role in the u.s. embassy bombing that killed 224 people. three months later, that terrorist was dead. storm says because of him. but his most important mission is yet to come. in yemen.
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>> there was just the time al awlaki became an important person for the cia. >> for the cia? >> for the cia. >> anwar al awlaki. awlaki's been inspiring terrorist attacks around the world. the 2005 suicide bombings, a london train and a double-decker bus, leaving 52 dead. >> the threat level to the uk has been raised to critical. >> one to blow up planes flying to the united states, the other to blow up buildings in canada. and in 2008, a deadly attack on the u.s. embassy in yemen. and storm says, he can provide the cia something no one else can. access to awlaki himself.
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he tells us the cia sent him on this dangerous spy mission. october 2008, a month after the embassy attack. to see awlaki, now hiding in a remote part of yemen. >> he's worried about security, but he's also worried about people following me. >> the mission, give awlaki a laptop, night vision goggles he requested. some secretly implanted with spy software. then, storm says, he gives awlaki one more cia gift. $5,000 cash. >> he looked at me, and he tapped his chest, and he said, can we buy bullets and weapons? i said, yeah, of course you can. my handler, my cia handler in
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denmark said, you just passed it. if i say no, he knew, anwar, that he knew this money was from intelligence, and he knew you're not allowed to sponsor, or to pay for weapons and bullets. >> storm is loving his 007 life. but as he drives away from this meeting with awlaki, he is worried. >> the tables have turned. >> awlaki has grown more violent and the world should be afraid. >> anwar was wearing a green military camouflage jacket. he had a ceremonial dagger and revolver, and a rifle slung over his shoulder. i tried not to look surprised. the preacher had become a fighter. >> he stays in touch with the radical cleric. they share an e-mail account, messages written, saved as
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drafts, read, but never sent. avoiding awlaki wrongly believes spy agencies reading them. storm says the next visit, awlaki is even more paranoid and tells him to tighten security. >> when i met anwar back in 2009, he instructed me to use a messaging system rendered to create the secure online communication between terrorists all over the world. >> the message can be unscrambled and read. only by the person to whom the sender has given a code to unlock it. jihadi spy craft soon to be vital in storm's most important mission yet. awlaki is fast rising up the cia's most wanted list. and storm believes he has the perfect plan to trap him.
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muslims were moving around the world. >> this is the voice of american-born cleric anwar al awlaki, an audio obtained exclusively by cnn. >> the majority of our people around this are disbelievers. >> he's talking to wealthy muslim donors, hoping they will give money to support al qaeda. but this call is much more than what it means. this is spy craft in action. morton storm said he's arranged this call to demonstrate allegiance to awlaki and the militants. what awlaki doesn't know is that storm is a double agent working for the other side, the danish, british and american spies. >> you should support the islamic causes. >> it's clear to the west that awlaki is a growing danger.
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infecting the minds of muslims everywhere. just months after the sky craft, he goes on a shooting rampage in ft. hood, texas. hassan kills 13 fellow soldiers, and calls awlaki his inspiration. they've exchanged e-mails. the cleric turned terror leader takes credit. his website reads, nadal hassan is a hero. >> we all knew that he had to be killed. >> everyone knew it very clearly. >> yes. >> just one month later -- >> breaking news -- >> -- awlaki sends the so-called underpants bomber to blow up northwest flight 453 as it lands in detroit on christmas day in 2009. >> a passenger tried to detonate some kind of explosive.
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>> the plot is foiled. but cia agents now know there is no time to lose. anwar al awlaki is waging a bloody war against american. more than ever, storm says, the cia is realizing they need him. >> america as a whole has turned into a nation of evil. >> awlaki must be eliminated. but storm says his bosses from american, british and danish intelligence agencies disagree about how to take out awlaki. controlling the plan means controlling storm. in a bizarre courtship, the spy agent has lavish attention on storm trying to win his loyalty. first up, the danish. wooing storm on behalf of the cia. >> we went to iceland, up to the blue lagoon, and we spent some time up there. >> you were kind of chilling out quite literally up there, right? >> yeah.
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>> danish agents break all the rules, taking happy snaps with him. not to be outdone, the british take storm to sweden. >> they booked four days. we had extraordinarily good team building. we went dog sledding. we went snow scootering. i stayed in a very expensive room inside the hotel. >> storm says he ultimately chooses to work with the cia, which supports his plan to locate and assassinate awlaki, by using an unsuspecting woman as bait. unbelievably, awlaki has asked storm to play matchmaker and find him a european blond to be his third wife. storm's search leads him to
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irenea from croatia, who now calls herself aileena. they chat on facebook. >> the european plan is exactly what i wanted. she asked me about awlaki, if he could help her to get married. >> awlaki's mujahadin secrets encrypted to storm shows he's hooked. so far i'm interested. please update me on the sister situation. if you could try to speed up her travel into yemen. to storm, awlaki and alena exchange encrypted details. they agree to marry. the cia sends him to austria with a rendezvous with alena. they will meet at the bus station. it's storm's most important spy mission so far. he can't afford any mistakes. but almost immediately he's disobeying the cia.
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according to storm, the american agents had a very specific plan, walk past this bakery. take alena to a specific cafe that they have under surveillance. they want the first meeting with alena here in this cafe, realizing it is selling beer, no place for devout muslim, storm without checking with his handlers changes the plan. he brings alena to a nearby mcdonald's, shows her awlaki's notes on his computer. but the cia agents are angry. storm says they think he has gone rogue. >> i improvised for myself. i took control. >> aren't they supposed to be running you rather than you running them? >> in the ideal world, probably, yes. >> the cia can't be picky. to locate and eliminate awlaki, they need storm. and they are willing to pay.
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if his plan works. you get a quarter of a million dollars from the cia when alena crosses into yemen. >> that's correct. >> after seven weeks, storm is sent back to vienna for another meeting with alena. another step in the match-making. he shows her this video from awlaki. >> this recording is done specifically for sister alena. the brother who is carrying this recording is a truthworthy brother. >> what's her reaction when she's watching that video. >> she's full of joy and tears. you really do know him, she says? you do really know him? >> then storm has her on a video for awlaki in return. >> my brother, it's me, alena. and i just want to tell you that right now i feel nervous. >> awlaki wants a blond european
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wife. the plan has to work. storm convinces her to break muslim taboo and take off her head scarf. >> this is me without the head scarf. so you can see my hair, i hope. >> coming up -- >> james bond. 007. clink clink. it just opened up. >> agent storm's biggest pay day yet. but all does not go as planned. >> the americans refused to speak to me for six months. these ally bank ira cds really do sound like a sure thing, but i'm a bit skeptical of sure things. why's that? look what daddy's got... ahhhhhhhhhh!!!!! growth you can count on from the bank where no branches equals great rates.
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morton storm said it is his plan backed by the cia. >> it's unbelievable that he has been able to be so trusted by one of the world's most hunted terrorist leaders, that he would even become a matchmaker. >> if all goes as planned, the unwitting bride-to-be will travel with a suitcase that has a hidden tracking device. storm's mission notes, finalizing plans to get her to yemen. vienna, meets at mcdonald's, 10:00 a.m. she needs a visa at the embassy. buy the plane ticket and secret e-mail accounts to keep in touch. $3,000 cash sanctioned by the cia. if she gets to yemen, the cia promises storm $250,000. he knows it could cost the blond her life.
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how do you reconcile that? >> she's an innocent. but she wasn't according to -- he was taking time bombs, running around europe. she was already convinced about what she wanted to do. if we can use her to get close to al awlaki to hit him, that's the way it goes. >> awlaki's encrypted e-mail to storm dictates she bring one carry-on bag, one medium suitcase. storm says he picks a gray samsonite, passes the measurements to the cia, which hides the tracking device in the handle. as she arrives at the vienna airport for her flight, the attractive blond has no idea what she is carrying. alena is getting on her plane for yemen. storm is hundreds of miles away in denmark. the honey trap plot with the blond is finally in play.
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if the plan works, they will find one of the world's most wanted terrorists. storm tells us inside this seaside villa with his danish and cia handlers, it's serious. eyes on laptops and blackberries. they are tracking every step of alena's travel to yemen. the atmosphere is electric, but hanging over the operation, questions. what happens if the european blond dies. collateral damage. alena makes it to yemen. storm recalls receiving a text message from one of his danish handlers. >> saying congratulations, brother, you just became very rich. >> soon he is in yet another meeting with intelligence agents. one from the cia is anxious for
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storm to open the briefcase they brought with them. >> and he looked at me with a massive smile on his face. what do you think the call is? i think -- i have no clue. i didn't even think there was three numbers on each side. come on, come on, he said, think about it. i said, i don't know. i have no clue. he said, 007. >> james bond. >> james bond. it's 007, he said. and clink clink clink. and click, it opened up. >> so happy with the cash, he took this photo of the $250,000 inside. then this, an encrypted message from awlaki, an update. it's about alena. we got married. awlaki ironically adding, she turned out better than i expected. and better than you described.
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>> she was a very pretty girl. >> and he was happy. >> he was extremely happy, yeah. >> but there's also an e-mail from alena. a bombshell. security-conscious awlaki had told alena to dump the suitcase before they meet. leaving behind it and the tracking device. cnn contacted alena's family who declined to comment. storm says the cia is furious his plan failed. >> the americans refused to speak to me for six months. >> no u.s. official here in denmark, or anywhere else, has ever acknowledged storm's claims of a role with the cia. the cia itself declined our request for a comment. the cia keeps storm sidelined, even as awlaki's killer crusade continues. sophisticated printer bombs like
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this. on cargo planes headed to the usa. luckily, they're intercepted before they explode. storm says he gets a text message from the cia, which says, they've lost all track of awlaki. they are desperate and want storm's help again. >> one of my handlers, he told me that there will be a bounty for this one. and i will get rewarded with 5 mmds. >> $5 million? >> yes. you will get paid $5 million for this. >> next, awlaki eliminated. >> the man known as one of the top terrorist recruiters in the world has been killed. >> and storm in the crosshairs of jihadists. [ male announcer ] it's a warning.
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intelligence agencies are desperate to stop him. mortem storm says he's tried but failed before to help locate the radical cleric. now he tells of a new plan, one in which an unsuspecting yemen courier is handed storm's thumb drive to take to al awlaki, an exchange that's under surveillance according to storm. >> i informed the americans who then sent people over there to watch it. >> what happens next is unclear. then three weeks later. >> we begin with the biggest blow to al qaeda since the killing of osama bin laden. >> one of the top terrorist recruiters in the world. >> al awlaki is dead. >> his death could mean a $5 million cia bounty for storm. soon he says he receives a text message.
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it's from a danish agent saying "i'm so sorry but it wasn't us." the cia says the death is not storm's work. >> i thought it wasn't meant to happen. they said, i'm so sorry about it. i said, don't worry about it. just tell the americans big brother congratulations. >> two days later he learns more when he picks up a copy of the british newspaper "the telegraph." sprawled across the front page, how america finally caught up with anwar al awlaki. the capture of an errand runner was the key breakthrough that led to the al qaeda leader's death. >> i froze when i read it. i was like, i had that ice in my stomach. i said that's my mission. the dates, the time period that he was arrested. young courier matches the young courier that i met.
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>> storm believes he was key in leading the cia to al awlaki. he feels cheated and he lets intelligence agencies know he is furious. according to storm, they set up a meeting at the hotel in denmark. inside the lobby storm says he starts secretly recording as danish agents approach. >> i put my iphone in my pocket and i recorded the conversation. >> then inside a private room, storm says he continues recording as he comes face to face with a man he says is cia agent michael. >> either you trust us or you don't. in this case, i guess you don't. >> we had our team. we had our project going forward, of which you played the highest role. okay the president of the united
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states, he knows about your work. >> the cia's attempt to placate storm fails. tempers are rising. >> i'm not sure why you think we would [ bleep ] you over. why would you think that? >> first of all, it's about honor, as well. >> so now we don't have any honor? >> no, no, if you ask me, i want to answer. >> i went to yemen again. i established the contact with anwar. and i was the only one, anwar, he trusted to deliver or give him anything. i even sent anwar a wife. did any of your agents manage to send him a wife? >> cnn has not authenticated the recordings. the meeting ends when michael leaves without saying good-bye. storm believes his spying career is over. >> that must have been an incredibly hard moment. >> yes, it was hard because i like these people quite a lot.
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and why i did it -- >> three years later this is still hard. >> it's very hard. >> the blowup here is a turning point. trust between mortem and the cia if it ever existed will never be the same again. the very next day a defiant mortem storm pulls into this roadway rest stop near copenhagen. he's bitter and has arranged to meet a newspaper reporter at sunset. >> he said we'll take a mobile phone and put it in your car. >> storm doesn't want to be recorded.
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he's still thinking like a spy, yet he's about to blow his cover. >> i showed him my passports. he looked at them. i told him this is what happened. >> storm wants him to tell the world that the cia is double crossing him. >> he was angry and he was upset and maybe he also was a little nervous because it was the very first time that he'd tell anybody he's been living a double life. >> he warns storm that going public has consequences. >> i tell him it can be dangerous for him and it will change his life for good. the last thing i say to him is go home, think about this. >> he does, and decides he's not ready to reveal his spy story to the world. soon he gets this e-mail from al awlaki's blond bride turned widow. she writes, i want to do a
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martyrdom operation and join her husband in paradise. she asks if storm can check, am i on the cia wanted list or no-fly list. a counterterrorism official has told cnn that a threat bulletin was issued warning that she could be dangerous. many months later storm contacts ellegard again. this time they jump on the story and it becomes a sensation in denmark. storm becomes a marked man. jihadists in syria release this video. faces of the enemies lined up on a wall including a photo of mortem storm. >> going public i knew that
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groups like agnewsra and those jihadists and like-minded people in europe would like to see me dead. >> the american, british and danish spy agencies all decline cnn's request for comment on mortem storm. to date storm's story and his value to those agencies has never been publicly contradicted. >> my agenda was to save people's life. and now i've done so. so i was a bad spy able of creating good results. >> multiple identities, shifting loyalties, a life of extremes. from radical islam to top level secret agent. now mortem storm has emerged from the shadows taking his chances in the spotlight. left with what he says a few allies, but plenty of deadly
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enemies. >> this is cnn tonight. i'm don lemon. tonight breaking news, the world on high alert. the french prime minister warning the country must remain vigilant. one report claiming six suspects may still be on the loose. 18,000 soldiers and police deployed across the country. officials say sleeper cells may have been activated. u.s. intelligence agents reviewing frame by frame, new video of shooting suspect, amedy coulibaly. we'll ask a former jihadists what clues he sees on the video. cnn has obtained video of the
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