Jeremy Scahill - Dirty Wars

342 “naming of a newborn child”:Ibid.

342 “I want the killers brought to justice”:Ibid.

342 General McChrystal had decided:Richard A. Oppel Jr. and Rod Norland, “U.S. Is Reining in Special Operations Forces in Afghanistan,” New York Times, March 15, 2010.

342 “ever know how they died”:Ibid.

342 “burn ourselves to death”:Ibid.

343 “joint force firing at the men”:“Gardez Investigation Concludes,” International Security Assistance Force—Afghanistan (ISAF), April 4, 2010, accessed December 12, 2012, www.isaf.nato.int/article/isaf-releases/gardez-investigation-concludes.html.

344 “soldiers dug bullets out”:Starkey, “US Special Forces ‘Tried to Cover Up’ Botched Khataba Raid.”

344 “There was a mess”:Oppel Jr. and Wafa, “Afghan Investigators Say U.S. Troops Tried to Cover Up Evidence in Botched Raid.”

344 “simply is no evidence”:Ibid.

344 “operational control”:Gareth Porter and Ahmad Walid Fazly, “U.S.: McChrystal’s Special Ops Probe Excluded Key Eyewitnesses,” Inter Press Service News Agency, July 6, 2010.

344 “no evidence of a cover-up”:Ibid.

344 personally travel:Author interviews, Sharabuddin family members, October 2010.

345 “When people come to your gate”:Jerome Starkey, “US Army Chief Begs Afghans to Forgive,” Times (London), April 12, 2010.

345 “an ancient Afghan ritual”:Author interview, Jerome Starkey, October 2010.

345 “Sir, you and I are very different, this awful tragedy”:Jerome Starkey, “US Army Chief Begs Afghans to Forgive.”

345 Almost $30,000:Julius Kavendish, “US Special Forces Apologise for Botched Night Raid,” Independent (UK), April 9, 2010.

346 accepted McRaven’s apology:Nick Shifrin and Aleem Agha, “U.S. Vice Admiral Apologizes for Afghan Deaths,” ABCNews.go.com, April 8, 2010.

347 “those damn acts of war”:Author interview, General Hugh Shelton (Ret.), March 2011.

347 “scold you in the morning”:Hastings, The Operators , p. 175.

347 75 percent increase:Phil Stewart, “Civilian Casualties Rising in Afghanistan,” Reuters, May 12, 2010.

347 “In the nine-plus months”:Justin Elliott, “Gen. McChrystal: We’ve Shot ‘An Amazing Number of People’ Who Were Not Threats,” TPMMuckraker, April 2, 2010.

348 1,000 night raids a month:Gareth Porter, “New Light Shed on US’s Night Raids,” Asia Times Online, September 27, 2010.

348 “automatically categorized, as insurgents”:Gareth Porter, “True Believer: Petraeus and the Mythology of Afghanistan,” Truthout , December 20, 2012.

348 “encouraging the people, hatred against Americans”:Author interview, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, October 2010. All quotations attributed to Mullah Zaeef come from the author’s interview, unless otherwise noted.

348 since 2005:“Mullah Zaeef Freed from Guantanamo,” Dawn.com, September 12, 2005.

348 longest-running war:Thomas Nagorski, “Editor’s Notebook: Afghan War Now Country’s Longest,” ABCNews.go.com, June 7, 2010.

348 passed the 1,000 mark:James Dao and Andrew W. Lehren, “Grim Milestone: 1,000 Americans Dead,” New York Times, May 18, 2010.

348 more than 900:Gareth Porter, “Petraeus Spin on IED War Belied by Soaring Casualties,” Inter Press Service News Agency, September 9, 2010.

349 “remarkable career in uniform”:Transcript, “Statement by the President in the Rose Garden,” June 23, 2010.

349 pace of night raids increased:Gareth Porter, “True Believer: Petraeus and the Mythology of Afghanistan,” Truthout , December 20, 2012.

349 air strikes resumed:Julian E. Barnes, “Petraeus Resets Afghan Airstrike Rules,” Wall Street Journal , August 1, 2010.

349 civilian death toll mounted:David S. Cloud, “Afghan Civilian Deaths Caused by Allied Forces Rise,” Los Angeles Times , November 2, 2010.

350 “There’s no daylight”:Author interview, Hunter (pseudonym), August 2010. All quotations and information attributed to Hunter come from the author’s interview.

351 at least three entities:Dana Priest and William M. Arkin, Top Secret America: The Rise of the New American Security State (New York: Little, Brown, 2012), p. 204.

351 “parallel, more cloistered process”:Jo Becker and Scott Shane, “Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will,” New York Times , May 29, 2012.

351 little oversight:Priest and Arkin, Top Secret America , p. 205.

351 “more complex and risky strikes”:Becker and Shane, “Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will.”

351 At least twice a month:Priest and Arkin, Top Secret America, p. 209.

351 “was really more than one”:Ibid., p. 207.

351 personally signing off:President Obama would not necessarily sign off on every operation right before it happened, but he would sometimes approve the concepts of operations in advance. See Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker, Counterstrike: The Untold Story of America’s Secret Campaign Against al Qaeda (New York: Times Books, 2011), p. 235: “Cognizant that some high-profile terrorist might pop up only briefly and then vanish, [Secretary of Defense Robert] Gates created a system where options for potential types of missions were discussed with the president in advance so that the commander in chief could delegate authority beforehand to strike fleeting targets.”

351 “secret ‘nominations’ process”:Becker and Shane, “Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will.”

352 “groomed”:Author interview, JSOC sources, June 2012.

352 Terrorist Attack Disruption Strikes:Becker and Shane, “Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will.”

352 “conducting the most aggressive”:Daniel Klaidman, Kill or Capture: The War on Terror and the Soul of the Obama Presidency (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012), p. 121.

353 “If John Brennan is the last guy”:Becker and Shane, “Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will.”

353 “Their policy is to take out”:Ibid.

353 “the politically advantageous thing”:Ibid.

354 “perhaps the most remarkable surprise”:Jack Goldsmith, Power and Constraint: The Accountable Presidency After 9/11 (New York: W. W. Norton, 2012), Introduction, p. x.

354 refused to release its findings:Catherine Herridge, “Obama Administration Pressed for Accountability After Americans Killed in Anti-Terror Airstrikes,” FoxNews.com, October 25, 2011.

354 “This is an easy one”:Becker and Shane, “Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will.”

354 This program rests on the personal legitimacy”:Ibid.