2006, a friend and mentor and those connections we had became interesting to the cia and other western intelligence services. he began the campaign of terrorism in the west inspiring lone wolf attacks. he was behind the underware b b bombing and others. -- underwear -- it was about the betrayal that was necessary were our security. morten, introduce yourself, buddy. >> hi, guys. thank you very much for coming. thank you for the international spy museum, maxed out, paul and tim you guys are super stars.

sorry for all of the trouble i have given you for two years. i want to say thank you for the management, the whole team and anyone involved in this. thank you so much. and what can i say? i never imagined to be in a position where i can sit and talk to an audience. i am delighted. i hope once you leave the room you will have information that benefits you and an understanding into how radical islamics think and also a chance for everyone to learn about life. thank you. >> thank you, morten. and tim, if we can go to the

first -- >> my life is in danger. people around me obviously have been taking very good care of my safety for me and my family. i want to also thank gavin from eden intelligence. he is here and he is sitting next to me. there are good people around me who are taking care of me. thank you so much. >> what we are going to do is play a video and just to set the scene here. this is may 2005. this is grove square in london outside the u.s. embassy. there has been controversy because there is talk about the koran being decimated and there is angry in the street. he came down with a pro-al-qaeda

support that is very radical. you will see morten appear on screen on the right-hand side of the video. [inaudible video playing]

>> kill, kill, the usa, the crowd is chanting as they burn the american flag. how did you get to this point? how did you grow so angry? >> i am laughing but shaking my head in the disbelief that i did this. what drove me to that stage was frustrati frustration.

as a devoted muslim, i looked at the world differently and the muslim countries led me and these people to hate the west and the western views and the western democracy on where it lies. what you saw there was sincerity from my heart. i am looking at these people and at that time it was empty barrels but many are active now and fighting in syria. >> many in the video are fighting with isis in syria and iraq and perhaps involved with atrocities there and the mindset carried them in that trajectory. your story ended up differently obviously. let's go back in your story. you group in denmark, right?

you had a troubled childhood, got involved in biker gangs. tell us how you discovered islam. what happened there? >> i felt that i was a young troubled young man with no direction in my life. i didn't have parents to guide me throughout difficult times or good times. so the only thing i felt a necessity to was to belong to something. and the motorcycle club was one of the reasons or things you can belong to. i then later discovered that it wasn't what i wanted to do with my life. i was -- i started to question life as if there wasn't life after death. and i went into -- i had a lot of muslim friends and went into the danish library in my town where i picked up the life story of the profit mohammed.

i wanted to know about the culture and religion of many of my friends. but that book attracted me so much. it was so appealing to me. it just spoke to me. and i could not let it out. i could not let it go. each page i read i needed to complete another one. i ended up staying from the morning to the time they closed in the late afternoon. when i left i was a different person from the time when i entered. >> and soon after that you end up in the top left hand corner of the screen there. you will see the centers of learning in the arab world right there. tell us about your experience in yemen as a muslim convert, you converted and decided to embark

to yemen. tell us about that experience and the islam that you were being taught there. >> that is right. when i converted to islam, i was considering that all muslims have differences, but we were all muslims so it wasn't a big deal. then i went to yemen and studied there and in it the most intense institution on earth. we had people living here that were disconnected from the big towns. i was living among 2, 000 students studying the koran, learning arabic and i founded

what was to be the fundamentalist version of the religion. >> you guys were right you preached and everybody else was wrong. you came back to london in 2000 or just before and were part of what was then called the london scene that was a growing radical, culdren there where you met the shoe bomber and others. men going toward the more jihad mindset. what made them go more towards that mindset, morten? >> throughout the studies we

came to the conclusion the jihadist is one of the most noble acts you can do as a muslim. if you die in fighting or having the intention while dying you die as a martyr. so the obligation was clear: something must be done. and considering the islam countries were all occupied either directly or indirectly by the western regimes who didn't honor the jihad. this was particularly when it came to jihad. >> tim, how far did events elsewhere in the late '90s and early 2000s inflame your passions? where were those events? and the people you were with -- did you find there was a pattern

to their backgrounds? to the sort of people they were? >> yes. for the first question as for the conflict zones at that time we had somalia, jihad versus the christians and there was a little bit going on. just a few years before many friends went to bosnia to fight as well. so the jihad was real. so to most of them there was no motive. those people who drove them to afghanistan and other places -- did i answer the question? >> the sort of people you met what were they like? >> obviously i met and came

across interesting people. some of whom have met bin laden in person. some were going from yemen to afghanistan to meet up with the training camps. one of my friends was a body guard for a high up figure. and when i went to europe i met people at mosques and all over the united kingdom i met people who were common muslims. at that time, the most radical groups were running the show for the jihadist societies. >> and just prior to 9/11 he

returns to yemen and meets people with close ties to al-qaeda. he is in a barber shop on the day of 9/11 and sees the images of the towers coming down. describe the events of that day and the mosque you went to and what happened next. describe the atmosphere with the people you were with that day. >> is there a picture up there? >> we don't have. describe it. >> what happened was i came back to yemen for my second time and at that time i had an invitation from bin laden two months before and he invited me to go over but i had tho bring my wife and she was pregnant with my first son

and i didn't want to leave her or bring her. so i declined coming to afghanistan. and a few months later we had 9/11. i was standing in the barber shop with a friend of mine. the friend had been to new york and we saw one tower falling and he said i have been there. i have been to that place. and i said wow. and then suddenly there was another terrorist. i turned on the radio and america was under attack as rightly stated. we went to the mosque to hear what was going on. this mosque was run by a permanent scholar who was a very political man and still is. i remember he was saying that by

the grace of allah america has been attacked and we expect 50,000 people to be killed and we should all give gratitude to allah. the whole mosque did that. >> quite extraordinary to hear that here in the united states. you were swept up in that atmosphere there and then in the weeks that followed obviously there was a plan for the united states to go into afghanistan and george w. bush made a speech that had a particular affect on you. can you describe that? >> yes, so i never saw the people jumping out of the buildings and all of that. we didn't have tv. we considered the tv to be forbidden so i could only hear what i heard on the radio. i remember bin laden saying it

wasn't me. i didn't do it. but this is a permisiable way of lying. so i just didn't know that. what happened was the bush administration said this is a crusade against the evil. and he was talk about the taliban and al-qaeda. he said you are with us or you are with the terrorist. so george w. bush didn't leave space for anyone to be in between. and for a devout muslim there was no option. even though i might have disagr disagr disagreed, which i didn't, but i

could not align myself with disbelievers. so there was no choice. but we chose to be on the side with moral support and al-qaeda. >> and just a couple years later you are here in london and protesting, when you turned up to the demonstration you thought the plan was going to be and storm the united states embassy. but there was frustration with some of the leaders that they were talking the talk. you wanted to walk the walk eventually. you in 2006 travelled to yemen where you met with an american cleric who had been interviewed by the fbi and the united states and was mentioned in the 9/11 reports and was living and teaching back in yemen's capital. tell us about pemeeting him and

what he was like. >> i went back to yemen in 2006 with my son with intention of making permanent immigration to the muslim land. as you can see on the radio, my attitude to the west was deep and i understood there was no way i could live in the west. so my only option was to migrate where the muslims were and that was yemen. i was introduced to australia muslim and invited to go up to this house and each lunch and th then i was not that much aware of him because i needed to take all of my lectures in arabic. once he started talking and i was talking he had this noble

way of talking and was very calm. he thought about it, he considered things before he said them and when he said something he referenced the koran and everything he said made sense. it was like wow, then i was quite surprised. we then suggested that we should do weekly study circles where he obviously had to deliver the lectures and they were planned from that meeting. >> i am sorry. you had study circles and many of the study circle session were in your house. some of iraqi's most famous youtube hits and video tapes are actually first given in your house in a small study circle of a dozen or so westerners, many who gravitated toward leadership

roles in al-qaeda affiliates around the world. you have this front row seat and became close to him and he became like a mentor figure to you. and tell us about that a little bit. >> it was all over the muslims in the world. in indonesia and africa even. that is how far he reached from that point and active world leaders. among the prominent guides of today, who is an american convert on the fbi's most-wanted list now, and he is in somalia

now. in that group we had many prominent figures. a danish convert who went to somalia and cut the head off of a somalia prisoner. and they were killed in syria for a year and a half. so there were people that were sincere. >> what was the most attraction of him to all of you? what made his method resinate? what was it about him that drew this following in yeman and obviously around the world? -- yemen -- >> i think the west muslims saw him as the english speaking bin laden. i think that is the way they started to see he wasn't a show off. he didn't do it for collateral.

so he was a much more devoted -- he didn't have a really bad reputation of being in the other sects so he could not do that character assassination of him. just after 9/11 he gave this famous interview in which he reputated 9/11 on behalf of muslims when he was close to here. what do you think changed him over the following years? was it a personal animosity toward the united states? a philosophical inevitablely given the circumstances and invasion of iraq. what changed him so much in such a short time? >> it was both of them. he had a score to settle with

the american government and believed he was wrongly accused of being tricked into this. he hated americans and the american government. secondally, something that was supposed to happen anyway. and that was because of religious studies. he became more religious and devout and engaged and he was focused on the growing. in reality, the obligation of the establishment of the islamic army down in the south of yemen, which according to record, there would be an army of 10,000 soldiers from the south of yemen and that islamic army will take over the world so he believed what he was engaged in at that time was a divine cause that was

ordained to him. >> the next thing that you did after this is you want to go and fight in somalia and participate in some way in the jihad. you go back to denmark, you want to raise money to do this. you see many friends in yemen who are migrating to the jihad in somalia and other places and you want to do the same thing. talk about that a bit and talk about what happened next. >> yeah. so at that time in 2006, the islamic union were taking over somalia rapidly. they were kicking out the corrupted tribeal leaders and started to rule somalia with

their law. there was a system in somalia for the first time in 16 years and that was a huge sign for us and our new islamic state. for every muslim that believed that we should live amongst muslims and we will be sinful by living among the sinners this was an obligation. many of my friends travelled directly. one of them got permission from the american embassy to go from yemen to somalia. he left over there and i stored his furniture and departed. i didn't have money to buy a house in somalia so i worked for a brick laying company. >> you are about to go, you

bought the ticket, one-way ticket to go fight in somalia, you have on official invite. we have the record of that. you are about to go and you gate phone call. tell us about the phone call and the implication of the phone call for the rest of your life. >> by that time i was so excited about going to somalia. it was the key to paradise for me. whatever happened over there was the way it was. if it was supposed to happen; fighting, i would accept that. i said good bye to my children, family and friends and went to the store to buy clothes for friends on the phone and just before that i had a phone call from the danish muslim who said

everything is cool here. i just cut the head of one guy. everybody was so excited about it. they were engaged and excited. i came out of the shop and on the way back i had the second phone call and that was from this year. he told me you cannot come. we left the airport. we just lost the airport. don't travel. stay where you are. you will get arrested. and i just couldn't believe it. i was in disbelief. i could not believe there was no way to reach the land of jihad. it was a blow. i felt i was let down by that. >> you felt led down but you were about to go and participate in jihad which was something you were working toward for many years and all of a sudden the

ethopians have taken the airport and you are deflated. you go home with all of the equipment you wanted bring to the group. you threw it in the bedroom, went to the computer, and what did you do on the computer? >> i did something naughty which was i challenged my faith. i guess i had some issues before and i identify now when i look back at it i see what triggered that. anyway, i thought why is it that allah would prevent me from doing something he orders and commands us to do in the koran? why don't he like me when i do everything i can to please him. i am doing everything.

and i just couldn't figure it out. i know one of the things i have used as a tool to spread islam in europe is particularly the united kingdom in the speakers corner and it would be one of the debates over christians. i would use the two contradictions in the bible. i questioned myself this time and the contradictions in the koran. i was trying to push myself again. and for that i suddenly discovered thousands of websites with loads of contradictions and that was from the biggest surprise because if there was any contradiction in this book it would not be for me. it would be from allah so the koran wasn't manmade. i researched the contradictions and i found out they were

generating and for that reason i suddenly looked at the whole world differently. >> you can give up your faith and maybe your friends but why would you necessarily then have to go approach the danish intelligence service? why couldn't you fade into the background? what made you turn around and start working for western intelligence? >> so what happened here was i had a few people of whom were danish nationals. one was the cartoonist that drew the prophet mohammed. the one that triggered the crisis in the world. the second one was a danish politician who is now working in

america in a think tank in washington. so these people were people representing and promoting democracy and i could not accept that. now, i didn't look at them at this very moment. when i decided not to be a muslim anymore, i realized how diluted i was. i could see the same reasons these people were promoting democracy and freedom of speech, i have now chosen not to be a muslim for that very reason i had to be killed. for that very same reason, i needed to be killed. i then realized how evil that agility is and how much difference i can do if i don't say anything and i could continue to fight them. i knew i was in another dilemma

because i have kids and if i told them i was not muslim i would no longer see them. so i went to the danish intelligence and asked for a meeting with them. >> and why don't you take a glass of water. i will setup the meeting. it was within early 2007 and they could not believe it when you called up. one of the top targets of danish intelligence, one of the people on their radar screen, somebody who was in yemen and suspected of associated with al-qaeda types over there. he is calling them up and wants and meeting. this was very exciting for danish intelligence.

describe the scene in the hotel room when you have two handlers coming in and trying to recruit you. describe it. >> one of the tricks is to be kind and show understanding and toleran tolerance. so these two operation agents method me at the radison hotel in the kings suite on the top floor. they were trying to flatter me.

would you like fish or vegetarian food because there is no halal here. i looked at them and said i want something with pork or bacon and i want to have a beer. they were like -- they looked and were like what? i said i want bake skwn -- bacon and beer. i am not a muslim anymore. i want to join you and fight the terrorist. and he stood up and he said i can tell you one thing. there they still not convinced until the food arrived and saw me eating the bacon and drinking that and i said cheers then they knew i was on their side. >> this was the beginning as your career as a double agent.

someone on the al-qaeda side secretly working for western intelligence. a career that involved disrupting a few terrorist plots in the uk, a friendship with the guy in the red cap there -- the mastermind of the westgate mall attack. all sorts of other missions and operations that we lay out in the book. you were going from yemen, to kenya, to indonesia and all around the world for debriefings. an incredible helter-skelter life for both the cia and also mi6, danish intelligence doing one for one agency and another for another agency and that is laid out in the book. from the american's point of view, over time one of their top targets became someone they were worried and interested in that was cropping up in the terrorism

investigations in the west. the london bombings and other plots and attempts seem to be inspired by this guy. so in the bottom of the slide we have you driving in october 2008 in yemen and you are delivering supplies here. tell us about that and the internations you had with him. >> i was going to deliver night vision camera, solar panels and he was asked to send money as well. at that time, was it -- i don't remember the date. >> october of 2008. >> yeah.

so here we at that moment thrix cia was so interested and became more intense in the surveillance. >> you delivered $5,000 from the cia. how did he respond? >> it was that intense. this was 2008. it was even that intense that i remember before traveling to that mission the british government gave me a laptop. when i got in copenhagen the danish authorities took it away and gave me the cia laptop.

that was how important it was to be able to lead that mission. what i can say is the money was something he and i were looking forward and collecting money from muslims in europe. but when i paid him the money that was the only test that he had evdone to me. he was sitting in the restaurant there. do you want to say something? >> no, go ahead. >> so the delivering this equipment to him and reach the place took 15 hours driving. i had to tell the police i was taking care of myself and going to see a family member. there was all kinds of

obstacles. when i reached him, i saw him as a changed person because he could no longer meet up in any of the areas before. this time he was wearing a military jacket and was more looking like bin laden. and he had a body guard. when i saw him with the guns i was a bit worried because we had to go to sit under a tree in the desert so i could show him how to use the satellite and laptop and i was a bit worried because i didn't know, maybe it was over there. >> what led you to think this is

a guy that needs to be killed and taken out? what changed your view from someone that needs to be detained to someone that deserved to be killed even though he is an american citizen. >> there is no difference in american national or danish or arab national. if they are terrorist, they are terrorist. it doesn't matter their nati nationality. so the my conformation he had to be taken out and not having to reach the court and justice of cour courts, happened when they first came under attack and before that i was hoping that somehow he could get arrested. but it was naive to think so.

>> we just put up on the screen pictures of very attractive blond lady. he was she involved? >> yes, so after my last meeting in 2009, during that meeting, he hendered and told me he liked to get married to a western convert if i knew anyone. i said i would try to see if i can find anyone. i never imagined i would find anyone. but when i returned from the meeting, after the attempt where they learned he was behind the operation, and i understood that he was troubled. he was getting there.

>> one thing led to another and you managed to get her to yeman and she had this suit case. but al-qaeda was smarter than that. she had to take everything out and there was a detection device and that scheme didn't work. but you got paid for your efforts. the briefcase in the middle is real money morten received. a total of $250,000 and that was the high water mark. you did come back later on and work for them again.

what went wrong? >> what went wrong was it joe didn't happen. he took the suitcase and passed through the passport control in yemen and there was an agreement between the danish government and cia that if she does pass, she must pay the $250,000 and that was the deal that the americans unearthed and later she left her passport even where she was staying. the americans cut off communication with me after six months. she asked me if i wanted to join

her and track her down. i went to yemen and by the way during the meeting the danish government told me americans will pay you $5 million if you are the reason to track them down. you get $5 million. >> you went back to yemen in the spring of 2011 and you established a mode of communication with him and every time you would meet a courier you would let the cia know where the meeting was going to take place so they could start tracking this thing. the was a sequence of meeting with couriers picking up supplies from you and eventually there is a final pickup and just a few weeks later he is killed in a drone strike. originally you didn't thing it was your operation -- think --

because you didn't hear anything back to confirm that. but reports in the western media and officials briefing a courier who was very much the same as the person you met in terms of their description in terms of how young and their look was the key person that led the drone there. so you then, you know, all of a sudden thought my goodness and this is my operation. there was a moment a week after he was killed in a hotel on the danish riveria where you confront your cia handler. we will play a little bit from the tape if we can.

>> the cia have just launched their counter propaganda operation by disabling the power here. imm imm immaculet timing. >> i will going to the post and you can call me when you are ready. anyone have any questions about the accounts of it is rare you

hear a cia officer talking to a source and informant and it come out in public. ... >>

the. >>d/ #ç [laughter] [inaudible]

>> we will wrap this up here. >> i still see the kingdom. i feel that i mean this5@wh is

difficult to for me and my life. >> we have to say he kept on working intelligence one year all the way to the tribal areas. to be the leader of al qaeda and a significant opportunity through the contacts and who they are concerned about. we can't talk about that with q&a and we would like to talk about questioning you could ask anything you would like about his radical days or career as a double agent. thank you very much.

>> that is very nice.bbit÷ >> first-aid quick round of applause for our speaker. [applause] we have run a little long but we have time for questions i will exert my prerogative to ask the first there is more to this story than we have time but it is a fairly remarkable story but can you talk about the documentation what you believe aside from his word what do you have to show this is true? vitter is a remarkable about of audiovisual material emails and gigabytes between the terrorist contacts with the danish intelligence handlers.

money transfer recordsko6uñ and the list goes on and it sticks together with the narrative. that gave great confidence to corroborate what he is saying and just to give one example, just go forward one slide where uc awlaki play 20 seconds of that and i will say why this is so important. well that this is a video. to where he is proposing.

here we go. >> so that is a marriage proposal from awlaki to hisue# croatian. how did morten have that in his possession and it never kimmel before? things like that that to

how wonder if he has the replies from what we could place you. it is the absolute wealth of corroboratingo;iq detail but we try to lay it out as much as possible there is the appendix and the cover photo section. there is the documentary where you will see that play out as well. so that gave confidence. we have a microphone coming to you. >> what does the ncaa think? >> anyone here to comment from the cia? [laughter] >> they have not commented on the record on this storyjnhr. >> when you describe the reason you did not go to afghanistan because your wife was pregnant you do not

want to travel or these but then you went to somalia"yy7>vpd left your family. i am curious what role did your wife and kids play in either preventing new from going or from leaving? >> my wife at that time was from morocco. i did not want to leave them nor did i want to take them. because some people do get arrested over there. and by the way jihad was not obligatory it was the choice. but then it you had to do it.

and even in somalia so you need to do it with everything you can do. >> but your son was thinking highly of you because you went down the religious union. >> of course. you are respected for being your own warrior. -- if you don't you cannot reach that level. said that is something very severe.

various huge. >> there is of 80 here. -- arg6

>>

>> there are programs that could be created. but what i think we should do is also looking at these others. to become an example to others so they don't preach hatred and the danger. to reach out to give the youngsters some kind of hope to make them feel welcome in a society.

but over in iraq and syria to prevent them from coming back to those countries against humanity. >> thanks for your presentation and your work of course. i am curious that you were going undercover in silence because of your wife and children? eventually they must have find out? >> we don't talk about the families of because of security considerations. we don't want to get into that too much. >> can you talk about the cost of walking away from your family because part of walking away is walking away

>> can you repeat that? you cut out. >> when you talk about disengaging from the terrorist group that involves walking away from your family? -- he cannot hear. >> way new disengage from the terrorist group is there also that part you have to walk away from your family as part of the bargain? >> to walk away from these people to realize how evil it is the same reason i want to leave is long.

so for me it was very easy but difficult to know that if my children do i may not be able to ever see them. and with that example i knew that. [inaudible] so i've lost everything. everything. but in the and there would not change if i had the choice i am happy. >> but what mental toll did that double life take on new? six years or more not only

deceive your family but playable wherever you went that was not you. did that become incredibly tough mentally or e emotionally? >> yes. to the extent you did not know who was the enemy, one day you were one minute then i am under cover. then i am a husband with a family. it was too easy to go into that role. i did that 10 years. but i had been away for so long. for me it was very stressful.

they gave me part of my ptsd. absolutely. >> you mentioned after 9/11 jihad was obligatory but i assume this means because of the u.s. occupation of afghanistan? but now they have declared that caliphate. to wage jihad. >> after 9/11 it is very different. the floor and 11 it was not

obligated because you could choose to fight against the christians are so on. but 9/11 invasion of iraq and afghanistan became obligatory for every muslim. so it doesn't mean defensive. we believe you are sinful or other world stage of their intentions or if you sponsor financially or call into it

by encouraging others or inviting other muslims. and then what we see today is isis and most of them have occurred. it is something that has to be done by any means necessary. otherwise it will bite us. these people, a isis those to study intensively, these people have declared

encouraging even to say you must make allegiance obviously that is a strong message. but almost 17 years and was engaged and i have never seen anything like isis. never. >> now we have the last question. have a question relative to your discussion of awlaki that had various interfaces with three of the hijackers involved with 9/11 did he make mention of his knowledge before 9/11 that it would happen or what he had known after 9/11? >> no sir. he never mentioned that he never accused of meeting them.

but i remember awlaki saying syria and lebanon and jordan and then you think why would she hogchoker? you can barely even mention it is secrecy would be arrested. but after today it is all over. it is something it is predicted to be religiously motivated. >> it is approaching 1:00 in

the morning where you are. thank you for bearing with us. just to give you a sense of how we close the cost that morten had to bear while on the cutting edge of counterterrorism operation of various leaders of al qaeda what you are about to see was filmed august 2013 what you will hear is the message to morten. ♪$5

of various leaders of al ♪ ♪ >> [inaudible]

>> i don't think so. thank you so much. we appreciated. and for those that came here for coming along. downstairs there will be a reception.li downstairs to look at a small percentage but numerically quite a few artifacts from morten life of the jihadist world and espionage. and also we did not get a chance to play the video of awlaki wife responding to the proposaly3 but that is in the lobby as well and i am told that for those who try to buy the book there was the problem up here but the bookstore downstairs is open for those who want to you

get the book can get it by assuming you could get at least two of three authors could sign that.

the fine against insurgents in fallujah in 2007 and rightabout that day in their books "fallujah redux" they talk about their experience and the rise of isis politics & prose in washington d.c.. this is one of our. [inaudible conversations] >> good afternoon. i am:owner of politics & prose in behalf of the entire staff, thinks for coming alex on this lovely afternoon. now is a good time to turn

off your cellphone. when make it to the q&a session because we are being filmed%g, we would appreciate it if you would find your way to this microphone to the table to pick up your question. at the end normally we ask the audience to fold up their chairs but you don't have to because we have another event this evening.c: on this anniversary of 9/11 it is fitting that we should be gathering here for a book that involves our military and look back at an important part of a long-term fight in which the u.s. armed forces have been engaged. iraq war of course, was not necessitated by a september 11 the tax --

attacks. it was the choice but fought with the purpose, in part to keep america safe and its lessons about balancing force and diplomacy and relying on indigenous forces they remain very relevant today. especially as we prepare to read engage in iraq to go after another enemy with a group that calls itself the islamic states. brigadier-general mullen and daniel green served in the entire province -- and our province but the book that they co-authored "fallujah redux" talks about a critical point called the

awakening when the tribes joined the battle with al qaeda of the divorces this is dan and that is bill. [laughter] by the way. dan is a reserve officer and served as a tribal and political engagement officer for a naval special warfare unit. in fallujah 2007. he also has done duty in afghanistan as a military officer and as the civilian. his first book three years-f ago was was one year with the passion -- passion. also having a degree from george washington university

focusing on counter terrorism and insurgency operations. dan is a regular here at politics & prose and we're grateful for that. and being a marine 28 years now currently with the combat development command in quantico spending two years in fallujah as the operations officer and then as the infantry battalion commander through most of 2007. fallujah has significance in the history of the iraq war to be, the center of the insurgent activity and the scene of the biggest

setbacksqq for u.s. forces retook the city in late 2004 by groups continue to operate. in 2006 president bush decided to surge troops into iraq and the local tribes also moved to reject al qaeda officiated fighters in may could we coordinate through the local tribes with the classification campaign of u.s. and iraqi security forces. backward nation has become undone in the wake of the u.s. withdrawal and sectarian misrule by the maliki government and fallujah is now occupied by the islamic state fighters. although much has been written about anbar offering the perspective of those to serve there.

in their book they hold fallujah up as an example0of what could be achieved of leadership and perseverance. the story of the major military battles the of the more complex and diplomatic moves that did for a time bring peace to that area. and with all the remarks are personal and do not represent those of his command or the u.s. marine corps or armed forces. please welcome predator

general mullen and daniel green. [applause] >> i that i would begin with why we wanted to write this book we remember war is called that is important but but when it comes to the city of fallujah it is iconic status but when itk was one in 2007 victory was not a thunderclap but for that reason it was not cover that much by the media and not very many books written. it is more important to have you finished in our use start. one of the primary reasons is what we felt that the time as the final chapter and to learn about

counterinsurgency and it was up process to have an understanding of what was required to bring understanding to fallujah. we want to write the book to capture the moment and maybe some day future units would have a similar task maybe they would read them a more. that is partly why we want to collaborate.cf also a touche showcase that success there were approximately 750 incidents

with sniper attacks you name it and by applying a counter insurgency approach to partner with those tribes we could slowly squeezed al qaeda to push them out of the area that six months later rehab less than 80 incidents taking place. you want to put on paper so future generations have the chance and one thing we are keent÷ on is it is not the two of us that got a right but we benefited from those prior to our arrival. , but to take a fantasia of

that. eventually we did achieve success so we will talk about what fallujah was like to share the perspective. >>. >> and one of the things going on in the military right now is the bifurcation of the matter what happens is the only answer to solving problems/m because in many cases the use of force is not the appropriate

answer sometimes it is the blanket over the fire to settle down. then we can do something different. and those within the military like putting a of a glass cage surrounded. then we will do to the best of our ability. but coming into fallujah itself when i was on the joint staff that is when the first fell happen in april. less than a month before

before incident we also went in with the attitude that we go in and smile you will not live up to that reputation but unfortunately the marine commanders themselves said we should not do retribution to the city but went it turned over to the fallujah brigade. then the decision was made we need to sort this out. of december 2004 that is a and redid the site survey we

needed to inherit the entire area. so essentially we had to clean things up and keep the insurgents out. but the hardest part is with the iraqis we cannot sort out who is to the on the key people who can are the police of the they have been established by the government at that time. that is difficult. and with the unprofessional group of folks but they are cut out for us the difficult process so long deployment to keep things quiet.

and when we returned home still keeping a close eye on fallujah because i knew i would be coming back. men to have that drumbeat let's leave and we had the intelligence officer that we could never take it back. dealing as long as possible. and training young marines. >> but the biggest thing is to focus your have a job to do.%h

but to get back into this city things were worse. but they played that game of walkable especially after the first month to say we have to do something different. that is what this book is about. radically different. day want to pick up from there? >> the key lessons that we learned is we will always win engagement against the enemy. what is so whole strategy? who will take the place to prevent that from coming back? and then you had people who

frankly who had cleared numerous bally's

>> >> the most important piece to didn't? we have 100 per precinct we had the eyeballs watching. living there in that neighborhood and reporting. and insurgents could not deal with it. under the strong reaction the majority left to go somewhere else. something that had not

happened before. this was a product to be in the right place data right time. different things came together to help us during that period to help things calmed down. talk to the former police chief was terrified and would not go outside from police station headquarters you cannot leave that way. then brigade commander was in charge of the iraqi forces was selling weapons. and the guy that takeover

and for the second time of fallujah a lot of people thought there is a level of corruption and also to think he is working with the insurgents. and then somebody else took over. city council may have elected and appointed but between the three of them for the brigade commander. >> for a long time the insurgency had the al qaeda branch and the national and surgeons frequently worked with saddam hussein and

security forces of iraq and with those networks they knew how to develop over time but they like the girls to go to school. the brutality of the al qaeda start to cut into the corruption of different smuggling groups so eventually the split developed they may be number two or three from our perspective so we finally had a local partner to work with the that was the process that we had with

several local partners many had blood on their hands so we will just set that aside to allow the discussion and al qaeda has a political program this proficient that sounds legitimate. he wears of rope he must be legitimate but if you start noticing the city council meetings no one would stand up for get into the conversation.

[laughter] so to notice these little things so when he enters the room he knows a security detail is right before him. so few were not sure that they talk people listen then they stop talking there is a serenity that comes with power. so we had a sheik in town and there were several thousand members he had control of an area that was 70 square miles a mixture of farmland and he could control that area. but the engagement is working with the tribes. but from america as prospective tribes are

anti-modern but it took awhile to see the social institution was to culture so we had a robust tribal in engagement program. thank you. and to work with the tribal leaders to help them recruit to be part of the of local protective force to raise those police forces. >> with regards to classification of the insurgents and the more islamic history next -- extremist insurgents i bring that up is important what is currently happening with

isis. don't take their cigarettes a way. bad is bad but your daughter is now my wife. the locals have no say. they were killing people. the people of fallujah and the national insurgents' thought we know the u.s. military is leaving very professional buddies al qaeda people have to go we cannot live with them. so we may see a similar type of thank they have definitely over reached that we don't do that. that is pretty bad.

so at some point the people will turn on them with the government that they could actually trust now that the prime minister stood down the in the city westering the iraqi military when there is nobody there anymore to be a force prime minister maliki took direct steps to push the sunii of the military that is why they did not trust them. that is the interesting dynamic. >> one of the reasons

fallujah switched you have the tribesmen so they have the firepower. the police have the presence they have the manpower but not the fire power so one would bolster the other so that resiliency was crucial but in the political side it was important so to understand the shadow government to use that placement to understand that margins due generally support of mayor. he had no budget whatsoever. so one of the things that i try to do was provide temporary money to provide

funds and the even had my parents mailboxes of school supplies. but in return a crucial missing piece of legitimacy. he was very proactive. one thing that was very useful is we had an attack that killed a prominent leader at a funeral procession the next day. that car bomb changed things so the mayor imposed a vehicle p.m. so over nine of the vehicles were allowed in the city the whole city was fenced off for the marine corps you could only enter addis small number of the

entry points every some person in the city had the identification card. every house had a number on the map there was control. it was very important but to impose that vehicle and then to set up a series of buses you could imaginepx people would revolt but the iraqis surrendered they knew that was part of the strategy. >> the amazing part was the heat was just unbelievable in the summer it gets 130 degrees. so they told us with that car bombing it was horrific. of lots of people were killed because with their practices they take them into the house as fast as possible. it was horrific.

the mayor saidãhe would impose the vehicle began -- day and, i good luck with that i did not see it working. but it did. their radio from stopping people of driving that did not get the word was to shoot at them there was a lot of shooting going on to get them to stop driving around but they did it. and from the time this was in place they were walking in at 130-degree heat. . .

then you have a police captain move out there with 20 or 30 iraqi police to set up a new precinct. then you add to that a

neighborhood watch. for example of funny stories we have neighborhood watch. it would be one man from every household and work a letter commanding people to do this. they have special shirts and hats made up for them. one of the shirts in the neighborhood watch in arabic were three-inch letters which somehow he mistranslated. it went from three-inch tall letters to three-inch wide letters. it was just little things like that but essentially what you are doing is employment so all these militaries are getting a job there is an honor wearing the uniform because the the insurgency has so overreach that it's no longer considered cool to be with the insurgency. it's now considered to be better with the police force. we do one neighborhood at a time and eventually had to squeeze out cut out of the city so they started working in rural areas. >> one of the key aspects of getting the police to go out

there is we had marines and we have the police and as long as we were there we could prevent the iraqi army and police from fighting which was a consistent problem and we could give them the confidence that if somebody tried to blow up that precinct or attack the precinct we were there to help defend it. that gave them a lot of confidence in many cases the only reason they would stay there is because we were there with them. he was getting off with a forward operating bases and getting in a mixing them at these people. a lot more foot patrol instead of vehicle patrol. the barriers we have put around weren't -- he could walk through them which was fine. you just could not drive a car through them. we set up these precincts with two checkpoints that people had to stop. they were manned with the police supervising them so they could check to see was coming into the neighborhood. this gave them a sense of ownership and they really liked it. again all of these things you think about in the american context i can imagine doing that in america. i can't begin to imagine that.

>> the thing i also wanted to add is why did it take so long to do this? why is the resting place of our military institutions in combat and conventional warfare. across the spectrum not just the marines but the army in the state department and usaid they were all generally designed to fight nationstates and work with capitals and national governance. the problem said of al qaeda's insurgencies has aspects of that but it's predominantly outside the capitol. it's frequently tribal not formal institutions. it's often a very dangerous area so force protection concerns of u.s. personnel frequently trumps accomplishing a mission sometimes. the problem is the exact opposite frequently and how we are organized for success. part of this is to capture in book form that there's a differ way of doing this and it's not always about killing people and

breaking things. it's about their own defense and empowering them at the local level. these aren't things you typically hear from earnings were naval officers. it's very different from a career path. we wanted to capture that at least at one point. again the bison publishing is towards combat. there are plenty of books written by junior officers directing -- directly involved with the combat. that's not how you win wars at the end of the day. as part of the solution but not the fundamental insurance. >> going back to my comments at the beginning there are a lot of folks in the military that think of you can do the high-end type or you can do anything else. you can adjust and one of my favorite quotes is if only two of you know how to use a hammer it's amazing what can look like nails. frankly i think that's why it took us as long as it did because there were a lot of units over there. the only tool they wanted to use was a hammer because everything else was too slow and too frustrating. it wasn't real combat but how do

you win? you don't when by depopulating the area. that's not peace. you win by getting people to decide okay we have had enough of this. we are going to get involved. we are going to take her neighbors back and calm everyone down. we are going to get the military out of the neighbors. one of the problems we had when i got there was the iraqi army had given space in the city that they were in charge of. it just happened a month before we arrived. how do you tell them now we have a plan to get you out of the city and we will put the police in your place? they didn't trust the police at all. that was and what they wanted to hear. the way explained it to them was like look the role of the iraqi military is to defend iraq. it's not to keep control of the cities. the final result in the city was police in charge of the city and false -- enforcing the rule of law in that city. that's it. we don't vote along here in the iraqi military doesn't belong

here. we have to give them the confidence that they can take control. as dan brought up earlier to place his outgunned. they were terrified to go in the city. we were worried every time they win out because they would shoot at anything and everything and many times at us, not purposely but if they get hit by an ied or someone shot an rpg at them or someone shot at them we call it the death blossom. it's murphy's rule of conduct when in doubt empty the magazine. the biggest piece is how do you get to be more professional and get them more focused on the job which is to protect and serve, which is not a concept they believe in. >> i will talk a little bit about isis and what the possible strategy might look like going forward. the president gave remarks last evening. there were a lot of things we try to learn from our experience in anbar province and the volusia pacification. one of the key elements is you have to have the army for police

and tribes working together in concert. that's only the service of their broader political strategy which is to say how do you convince the sunni-arab who really doesn't like isis but is in an alliance of convenience now to turn against isis and work with the government that has not been made up of people from his religious background or his part of the country. you have to have a compelling political strategy. when you're fighting an insurgency it's not just about military arms, it's famously 20% of the solution. 80% is having a political strategy and political rationale that defeat the insurgency's political program and that involves a listing the community not only in its own governance but its own defense. i like to use hillary clinton's -- clinton's quote it takes a village. you will be relentlessly clearing and trying to hold all the time and you will lose people unnecessarily for strategy then and won't succeed.

>> the best thing to do would be to open up for questions for any questions you may have. [applause] >> thank you. could you use the microphone please? >> how prevalent are the views you are talking about today and how prevalent is dealing with insurgencies in the military right now. what is the status of fallujah right now? >> the status of fallujah right now is that is under isis control but we have control in the majority of the people are like well they don't trust the government, the previous government i guess you could say now so how much control do they really have i'm not sure. i suspect things i'm seeing and reading at a certain point as soon as you say okay you guys are out of here and they will

make it happen like they did before but they will need someone to help them. as far as the prevalence of abuse in the military it's very much a mix. you have a lot of people argui arguing. the counterinsurgency stuff is not real, we don't do that. we are going to focus on training with our weapons. we are going to focus on the good war. haven't seen any of those breakout anytime recently. if you watch the news, i talked to the other marines and the younger marines, that's what they join for. they want to go do something a lot of them are frustrated because iraq and afghanistan, the piece isn't exactly breaking out. may not be the big war that you saw on tv or in the movies but when you look at the course of history especially the united states the majority of the things we have done have been these types of operations. they haven't been the big ones and a lot of people just don't understand that. it goes back do we have to do what we are told to do not what we think we ought to do. thank you.

>> you mentioned that and correct me if i'm wrong that former leaders of the baath party were active in the insurgency at the time. do we know with the current situation with isis is similar like the group headed by former vice president -- are they active in isis? that's one question and the other one is how do you expect fallujah to be taken back the iraqi forces? is it going to be similar to what happened recently by the americans bombing the area and the iraqi and control the city? after all you have difficulty, the american army in getting the

city in 2007. how will the iraqi army be able to win fallujah again after almost nine months? >> the reason isis was so, it's so easy for isis to takeover was in part because there's an alliance taking place of convenience right now between former baptists some tribal leaders colluding with isis in part for the internal politics of pressuring the maliki government and trying to either reform or create their own separate enclave. i think that's been pretty clear. isis had a very smart ground game of political engagement. before we saw them on our radar screen militarily rest assured they were reaching out to different tribal leaders and networks of former baptists to facilitate their return. i think that's what happened here. i think eventually likely experience in our own tours that

alliance will start to fray as a reality of isis control. i don't know exactly how iraqi's will pacify these areas. i don't think he will be frankly as sophisticated and sensitive to civilian casualties as we were when they were there. >> i would like to add that i don't think it's going to be real violent either. a lot of the things we saw it looks like somebody has success they want to be on that team. when things start going south on them they melt away. i think what's going to happen is if you get the national unity government going in the center and they start the polling the military back together and bringing back the kurds into the military like i said eyes i says they are overstaying their welcome. declaring caliphate.

you don't do things like that exceed if you expect to have a long life. what i think is going to happen is the tide is going to turn and it will probably turn quickly because when you think about it they are fighting in lebanon, fighting in syria and iraq. they have a lot of people working against them and i don't think they will last very long. as soon as the tide starts to turn i think the folks putting flags down in downtown fallujah will take the flight down and leave as quickly as possible. it's just my personal view. >> there are so many dynamics. one of the huge dynamics is the military comes in and is unable to speak the language of the street and needs translators. from past experience translators really don't say the right thing and you have alluded to some of the problems that creep up but in reality the dynamic involves poverty and good governance.

it needs no screwing around with corruption and security, proper security and then there's the other problem with drugs and of course oil. the huge problem is the suicide killer and how to deal with th that. i wonder -- i know a little bit about what general pershing did in the philippines and i wondered if he would be bold enough to say what he did, how to deal with fanatic killers. >> the approach he used in the philippines? probably not acceptable. >> since we are going out to the internet pershing is sensibly -- essentially took the bodies of fanatics and have been dumped in a common grave, contaminated them with blood and dumped. >> i wouldn't go into that level of detail but that's essentially it. >> unfortunately the media has made a mess too by taking things out of prort