BKMT READING GUIDES
The Interrogators : Task Force 500 and America's Secret War Against Al Qaeda
by Greg Miller, Chris Mackey
Paperback : 528 pages
0 club reading this now
0 members have read this book
Introduction
In a narrative that reads like a spy thriller, Chris Mackey takes us inside a small team of American military interrogators confronting an enemy unlike any other they had ever seen--in a war not of missiles and tanks, but of sleeper cells and suicide bombers. Mackey reveals how his team managed to crack some of the hardest cases they encountered, creating highly sophisticated ruses and elaborate trickery to bluff, worry, and confuse their opponents into yielding up precious information. He tells as well of mistakes made: blown interrogations, abuses against prisoners, and failures of American intelligence. THE INTERROGATORS is a riveting memoir that lifts the curtain for the first time on the hidden backstage of America’s war against terrorism.
Excerpt
TRAININGMost students slipped quite naturally out of their school uniforms at Immaculate High School in Danbury, Connecticut, and into the country’s better universities. I slipped out of my uniform and into army fatigues. I was seventeen when I enlisted in 1989, and it came as a surprise to all of my friends but one, Sean McGinty, who enlisted with me. We suffered from a debilitating condition: too many siblings. Our working-class parents—my father was a telephone line repairman, McGinty’s an accountant—had made it clear some time earlier that we were going to have to pay our own way through college. And so we decided to enlist together, jokingly trying to be the first to complete the army oath so as to be “senior” to the other in our new military lives. McGinty skipped a phrase or two, arriving at the “so help me God” line first. I would argue for years that he had invalidated his oath by jumping ahead, but that was a debate I would never win. ... view entire excerpt...
Discussion Questions
No discussion questions at this time.Book Club Recommendations
Recommended to book clubs by 1 of 1 members.
Book Club HQ to over 88,000+ book clubs and ready to welcome yours.
Get free weekly updates on top club picks, book giveaways, author events and more