or accept torture. truly, that's their thing. your point on what we've done to ourselves with respect to foreign societies is important and easier to grasp than mine which is trying to get us to be aware of our assumptions, but certainly it would be, others said before me that the photos of what we did and nothing hideous like that happened to my gentleman, and the cia didn't do those things. nonetheless, the effects are disastrous for america's reputation and standing in the world, and one would hope we realize it's not for all of the spectacular qualities of our

armed forces, it's not they who win hearts and minds which is the ultimate objective, frankly. i don't want to sound like an officer in the vietnam war, but we undermind ourselves for a decade. in no way a pass vies, and -- pass and i embrace policy, and there's people to impose upon vigorously. >> okay. with that, help me thank

this is live coverage from the eleventh annual national book festival. here on our set joining us is the author of this brand new book "the black banners: the inside story of 9/11 and the war against al-qaeda". ali soufan, how did you joined the fbi? >> i wasn't one of these guys who always dreamed of being an fbi agent for working with the government. when somebody in college suggested that, and administrator in my university suggested that, i thought it is a silly idea. it is like telling me to work in a circus or something. but i thought it was a big challenge. a lot of people in college especially my fraternity started to make bets if i can make it

through the process of being an fbi agent. i thought that was interesting. by the time i graduated from graduate school i finished my graduate work, the fbi offered me a job and ended up in virginia in the new agent club. >> how many years did you serve? >> guest: i served eight or nine years. >> host: you were born in beirut. how did you get to the united states? >> guest: my family immigrated with the war in lebanon and everything so i grew up in pennsylvania and went to school in pennsylvania. my first real job after graduate school was fbi stationed in new york. i moved to new york in 1997 and continued to live in new york throughout my fbi career and after my fbi career i still live in new york. >> host: what years did you

serve? >> guest: 1997-2005. >> host: what did you work on? >> guest: i focused on terrorism. discussed many of the missions are was involved in and cases that i worked on in the book. the focus of the great majority of my career was bin laden and al qaeda. >> host: do you speak arabic? >> guest: yes. >> host: where were you on 9/11? >> guest: i was not in the united states. i was working on investigating the uss cole attack in yemen. we received a phone call from headquarters asking myself and my partner to stay in yemen and follow up on some leads concerning 9/11. that was september 12th. i was really shocked. why do we need to stay in yemen? did we miss anything during our investigation of the uss cole?

that caused this event to take place in the united states? later on, later that day i was handed a file and in that file i was surprised to see the information we had been looking for all over the place overseas where we have teams in different areas overseas trying to find people who are connected to the uss cole attack two of the people in the united states and not only that but the plane that had the pentagon. that was a game changer. >> host: who had that information? >> guest: the cia. >> host: did the fbi and cia work well together? >> guest: absolutely. we worked together on al qaeda and different counterintelligence stuff and terrorism. i discussed in the book a lot of

joint operations we did in fbi and cia in jordan and albania and other countries around the world. i thought the operational relationship on the front line was great at the time. >> host: why was in that file shared with you? >> guest: i am still looking for that answer. we heard the 9/11 commission coming up with a theory that people did not connect the dots. we heard a chinese wall theory between criminal agent and intelligence agent. if you look at what the cia inspector general reports regarding 9/11 it said that if the cia pass the information on a timely basis to the fbi and

the state department and immigration and naturalization or at least if they put the two hijackers on a no-fly list 9/11 could have been stopped. the same conclusion came by the 9/11 commission. the 9/11 commission report said if the central intelligence agency passed this information to the fbi team investigating the uss cole attack, a lot of things could have happened early on that might change what took place on september 11th and caused 2,977 people to parish. >> host: much of your book looks like this. why is that? >> guest: there is a small portion of the book, 2% of the

total book that is redacted. the book went to publication review with the fbi and after three months of this process the fbi approved the book without one single redaction and suddenly i found out the book is going through another full-blown prepublication review by the central intelligence agency. something i still don't know why because i wasn't an employee of the cia nor do i have a contractual agreements with them. however, after the pier publication review that is what we have. we have some rejections. those reactions do not hamper in any way the message of the book. people still get the point, get the message. the book made it to the top ten new york time best seller list and is no. 3 according to the

washington post. you can understand the book with the redaction and obviously people are buying the book anyway. >> host: you put this book in the front of the book dated august 23rd, 2011. what is this note? >> guest: this note telling the reader what i experienced in the prepublication review process and how the book was reviewed by the fbi and was not fully approved by the cia for publication. i need to respect the reader in explaining these things to them. >> host: you say much of the information that got redacted is public information already or from a senate hearing. >> guest: readers can make their mind. a section where i am talking to senator graham. this was taken from senate.gov.

you can google my name and senate hearing and you will find the video tape on youtube. data exchange between me and senator gramm has been redacted. portions of the 9/11 commission have been redacted. declassified documents of the cia itself, my statement that was broadcast on public television has been redacted. for the most part of the reductions are not only information that is publicly available but information that has been declassified and authorized to be publicly available by the united states government. >> host: >> host: did they ever explain? >> guest: they said in the process of negotiating and trying to understand why.

>> host: one time you testified in 2009 you were behind a screen. we have a shot of that we will show our viewers. was that your choice or the senate's choice? >> guest: mostly both. i did a lot of work in my career in the fbi. i did undercover work. at that time we fought for security reasons it is better not to show my face. >> host: ali soufan is our guest. "the black banners: the inside story of 9/11 and the war against al-qaeda" is the book. phone-number are on the screen as is the twitter and e-mail address. first call for ali soufan from troy, alabama. you are on booktv. >> caller: thank you. i am looking forward to reading your book but i will wait until the paperback so there will be

less lines in it. did you find anywhere in your research a justification for going to war in iraq? >> guest: no. i talk about this a lot in my book. believe me. you can get a lot of facts about what happened in the war against al qaeda. even with these reductions. actually what i discussed in the book, i discussed there was a lot of pressure with evidence linking saddam hussein and al qaeda to each other and linking saddam hussein and al qaeda to a wm d program. the fbi could not give that evidence because it did not exist. the evidence came later from al

qaeda associates. not al qaeda member but an individual who associated himself with the organization. after torture he admitted that al qaeda and osama bin laden were working together. after we went to iraq and found out he was lying they came back to him and asked why he provided that lie that ended up in the security council where secretary colin powell mentioned it in his speech to justify the war in iraq. he said you were torturing me and i gave you what you needed to hear. so i discuss these things in detail and all this stuff has already been declassified by the united states government. the story of the link to the iraq war, the falls link to the iraq war has been declassified by the senate armed services committee for example.

>> host: maine, you are on booktv. ali soufan is our guest. >> caller: good afternoon. i look forward to reading your book. could you discuss if you know anything about it, the fbi agents in minneapolis who were trying to tell a man named mallseat who dismissed the warnings? >> guest: this came up in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 but if you look at the issue of mr. masawi he said he wants to know how to the part but not how to land. he did not want to learn how to land. immediately he was arrested on immigration charges. later on, there was some

allegation regarding his laptop and the fbi did not look at his laptop on of timely basis. there is a lot of concern regarding this. even if they looked before 9/11 into his laptop there's no evidence on the laptop that could have stopped 9/11. he was part of a different cell not connected to the one that carried out the 9/11 attack and we have a lot of evidence that shows the leadership of al qaeda did not even want him to know about the other operatives in the united states who were planning the attacks on 9/11. >> host: what was your interaction with abu zabaida? >> guest: i was the first american to be there at the

undisclosed location. the relationship, the interrogation was good from the beginning. the first question i asked was what is your name? gillick that me and gave me a false name. looked me in the eye and gave me a fake name. whatever i call you honey? he was shocked. he had that look on his face like my game is up. sunni was the name his mother nicknamed him as a child. he figured out of this guy knows what my mommy knows now everything about me. and started providing us -- we were shocked about actionable intelligence. the information he provided to us early on in the first hour of our interrogation how to save his life because when we send the information to washington people in washington realized

this individual has a lot of valuable intelligence that can save lives. that is why they send the doctor from here to oversee the treatment. >> host: did you ever use enhanced interrogation techniques? >> guest: i discuss a lot of that in my statement to the senate and in the book. i discuss a lot of examples how regular interrogation helps save lives. i talk about bin laden's personal driver and propaganda secretary who we had no idea who we was. the senate considered his interview one of the best interrogation in the war on terrorism and how we got the information we got that was essential for the war planning

in afghanistan. i discuss a lot of these things but as far as interrogation techniques i agree with the inspector general report. i agree from firsthand experience that we cannot verify one single plot has been disrupted. that is not me saying that the cia chief. >> host: any response to former vice president dick cheney's new book in my time, talking about how he would use the same techniques? >> with all respect to vice president cheney, he is a public servant who did lot of things over his years but he wasn't there. i was there. we got colleen sheikh mohammad as the mastermind but identified him as the mastermind of 9/11 in april of 2002. water boarding did not start

until august of 2002. he was in custody in may of 2002. water boarding did not start until august of 2002. we can go through these alleged claims of the success of enhanced interrogation that i discuss in detail. the timeline doesn't make sense. there are a lot of politicians who are part of this program or invested a lot in the program and people who agree strongly about the program and believe -- we know from the stephen bradbury memo from the office of legal counsel, these declassified documents happened recently because the memos in the office of professional responsibility or review of it we know they went back to him and they said the efficacy document about water boarding says he was arrested in 2003.

it can justify the time line. but he was arrested in 2002. why not check your facts? he said my daughter is not to check facts but to believe what i am being briefed. a lot of other people in washington believe what they were briefed and that created the myth about the alleged efficacy of water boarding. >> host: california at the dismal you are on booktv with ali soufan. >> caller: you said you participated in the uss cole investigation in yemen. i understand there was quite a fishing contest between john o'neill leader still head of the investigation and the ambassador to that country. given the fact that you might talk about that, given the fact

that distressing your investigation, do you think in retrospect you got enough actionable intelligence on principle in the planning for the planes plot, the fbi might have been able to break that case before it occurred? >> guest: you ask a very good question but i have to separate it into a different issue is this the first issue is the john o'neill -- the u.s. ambassador to yemen at the time and the issue of intelligence that could have stopped the attack. we got all the information we could get from yemen. one of the people who participated in the uss cole attack admitted he delivered $36,000 to southeast asia to operatives over there. that information went to the

other intelligence agencies and we ask if anyone knew anything about it. we sent requests about information in november of 2002 -- november of 2001, june of 2002 and so forth. unfortunately we did not get back any answers until sept. 12, 2001 and was too late. as for the relationship with john o'neill it hindered the investigation a little bit. but i don't make the claim it could have prevented the attack on 9/11 or provide additional information from that country that could have stopped the attack. the information that could have stopped the attack was in the united states. wasn't in yemen. >> host: who was john o'neill and what was your relationship with him? >> guest: he was a legend.

he was really high up in the fbi. when i met him he was a special agent in charge of national security handling terrorism and counterintelligence for the new york office, biggest fbi office in the nation. john was an interesting character. he is still considered a legend. you could make movies on him. very hard worker day and night. his life was connected to the fbi. i was so lucky that john saw something in the early on and took me under his wing. i learned a lot from him. one first things i learned from him that there is big danger from a person named osama bin laden and al qaeda and eventually they will hit at

home. unfortunately john live the tragic life. he retired week before the world trade center attack. no one was listening to him about the dangers of al qaeda and he took a job as head of security for the world trade center. he died on he died on september >> host: "the black banners: the inside story of 9/11 and the war against al-qaeda". atlanta, you're on with ali soufan. >> caller: i value your opinions very much. i would like you to weigh in, the book you just put out. i know you always come up with pragmatic things. what would actually happen if

president obama won the election by 50% of the vote and john mccain won by 46,000 -- 46% of the vote. what if the ones that voted for john mccain did the same thing they're doing in libya to rebel against the government? would president obama and the united states military have to shut these riots down? gadhafi called them terrorists. these uprisings, they would not just overthrow the government but what would happen if this happened in the united states? people have been killed for protests. >> guest: thankfully we are living in the united states and we have a constitution. we have democracy.

we have separation of powers. we have a peaceful transformation of government. we are not living in a place like libya. we have the freedom to demonstrate freely. we are blessed that we are living in the greatest country in the world. >> host: what are the black banners? >> guest: the black banners. i wanted to name the book the black banners because it shows what we know about al qaeda or how little we know about al qaeda. the black banners is from the prophet of islam, the prophet mohammad. the accuracy is still out there but there's an alleged had read that at the end of time the black banners will be victorious and won't be defeated. osama bin laden when he issued

the 1996 declaration of jihad against the united states signed it from afghanistan, the region that allegedly the profit spoke about is a region in central asia between afghanistan and pakistan and a little bit of iran and so forth. al qaeda believes or bin laden believed al qaeda and the islamic mujahedin are the black banners which is interesting because it shows there's a counterculture not from mainstream islam but on the fringes of islamic extremism that al qaeda created for itself and try to sell themselves that the final battle between good and evil is between al qaeda. >> host: that ends in jerusalem.

one of your interrogation quoted that. >> guest: many of them mentioned the black banners. many mentioned the end of time epic battle that was going to happen between islam and the enemies of islam. many al qaeda members believe they are part of that epic battle. is a cult more than anything else. >> host: west virginia, ali soufan is the guest. >> caller: please comment on your views and the fbi's views regarding -- if there were any adverse effects on the intelligence community. >> host: i couldn't quite understand that. >> caller: could you please comment on the outing of valerie

plane and did that have any adverse effects on the fbi community? >> guest: absolutely. she was an example of a professional hard-working intelligence officer who got stuck with -- in the middle of the political game of washington. unfortunately they burned her as an individual because of politics. every person in the cia and the fbi or any other intelligence agency thinks very deeply about this. shows how politics and national security became inseparable and that is a dangerous move. >> host: are there enough arab americans in the fbi and the cia? >> guest: we need more not only

out of america but also pakistani americans. afghan americans. iranian americans. muslim americans in general. the muslims are different culture. the culture in pakistan is different from the culture in iran and the arab culture. there's not one arab people but arab peoples. the culture is different from north africa and the arabian peninsula. not only the language but we need to understand the cultural context of what is happening. today al qaeda is a different organization than it used to be on september 11th. i talk about how the organization evolve prior to september 11th from the 80s to the soviet jihad. until the first gulf war when bin laden moved to sudan it was a different organization that bin laden and al qaeda moved and

created a different structure of al qaeda network. today al qaeda is different after 9/11. is not the chief operator anymore. it is more the chief motivator. you have many networks working around the world. you have al qaeda mostly in algeria -- that region. we have started seeing connections between them and nigeria. we have al qaeda in iraq working on the sectarian divide between sunni and shiite to get funding to make itself relevant. you have al qaeda in the arabian peninsula which is very different than both other kinds working on the tribal divisions. the saudi and yemeni wins. we have the relationship being

established between certain entities and we saw a terrorist attacks away from somalia and you gone the supported by the al qaeda network so in order to fight these threats you need to understand the cultural context and political environment and the geopolitical context for how this al qaeda in that specific region operates. to do that it is good to have people who know the language and culture and so forth. the greatest thing about america is a melting pot. we have people who are willing and anxious to serve their country. >> host: why did you leave the fbi? >> guest: as you see from the book, i did a lot during my

career. you can lead or be led or get out of the way. i thought it was better to get out of the way. >> host: the book is the black banners:the inside story of 9/11 and the war against al qaeda. ali soufan, former fbi