Enemies Within: Inside the NYPD's Secret Spying Unit and Bin Laden's Final Plot Against America

Apuzzo, Matt

ISBN 10 : 1482944707 ISBN 13 : 9781482944709

Editeur : Blackstone Pub, 2013

Synopsis

Reveal the strengths and weaknesses of the nation's counterterrorism measures by tracing New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly's antiterrorist plan for the city, and concludes that the nation has yet to develop effective strategies.

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Enemies Within PROLOGUE

AURORA, COLORADO

Sunday, September 6, 2009

The bomber handled the chemicals carefully, just as they’d taught him. No need to rush anything and blow off his hand, or worse. A few years earlier, a curious college student in Texas had tried the same thing in his kitchen. A 911 dispatcher listened to him die howling, begging for help as flames engulfed his body.

Mix hydrogen peroxide and acetone, and nothing happens. The chemicals swirl around next to each other. In the presence of acid, though, they form the basis for a powerful explosion. The bomber’s acid of choice was muriatic acid, which he bought at a Lowe’s. Muriatic acid is used to treat swimming pools and clean concrete. But when it’s poured slowly into a mixture of hydrogen peroxide and acetone, clumps of white crystals appear. It looks like sugar, but it is as explosive as it is unstable.

The bomber used the Homestead Studio Suites kitchenette as his lab. He’d tried working in his aunt’s garage, but when she saw all the chemicals, she and her husband got suspicious and made him pour them down the drain. Nobody would bother him here. Unable to pay their rent, many residents had recently been kicked out of their apartments. Cats slept in windows. Children played in the parking lot alongside cars packed with furniture and clothes.

Forty dollars cash for a night in room 207. The bedspread was rough, and only the whir of the refrigerator drowned out the pulse of the highway. But he was not there to rest. He chose the motel because of its kitchen. It was a simple setup: builder-grade cabinets, a dingy white laminate countertop, and, most importantly, a stainless-steel, two-burner electric stove.

He had everything he needed. For weeks he’d been visiting beauty supply stores, filling his carts with hydrogen peroxide and nail polish remover. At the Beauty Supply Warehouse, among the rows of wigs, braids, and extensions, the manager knew him as Jerry. He said his girlfriend owned hair salons. There was no reason to doubt him.

On pharmacy shelves, in the little brown plastic bottles, hydrogen peroxide is a disinfectant, a sting-free way to clean scrapes. Beauty salons use a more concentrated version to bleach hair or activate hair dyes. At even higher concentrations, it burns the skin. It is not flammable on its own, but when it reacts with other chemicals, it quickly releases oxygen, creating an environment ripe for explosions. At its highest concentrations, hydrogen peroxide can be rocket fuel. Even with a cheap stove, it’s easy to simmer water out of hydrogen peroxide, leaving behind something more potent. It takes time, and he had plenty of that.

He added the muriatic acid and watched as the chemicals crystallized. The crystals are known as triacetone triperoxide, or TATP. A spark, electrical current, even a bit of friction can set off an explosion. If there’s too much acid, or the balance of acetone and hydrogen peroxide isn’t quite right, the reaction will speed out of control and trigger a chemical blast.

This was the moment when things often went wrong in basement laboratories, but he had done this before. A year earlier, he made his first batch under the watchful eye of his mentor. Then, a week ago, he made a practice sample in this same hotel. He took the finished product to an out-of-the-way spot, ignited it with a strand of Christmas tree lights and a battery, and watched it explode.

The white crystal compound had been popular among Palestinian terrorists. It was cheap and powerful, but its instability earned it the nickname “Mother of Satan.” Once, an amateur bomb maker in the Mojave Desert had walked under a stretch of power lines. The electrical charge in the air was enough to detonate his TATP blasting caps and send paramedics rushing to his aid. Now most professional terrorists preferred to use it in only the smallest of quantities as the detonator for a bigger bomb. Even the average suicide bomber didn’t want to carry around large amounts.

The volatile reaction was precisely the reason that all but the tiniest containers of liquids were banned on airplanes. A terrorist who boarded with a large shampoo bottle full of the right chemicals could conceivably create TATP in midair. It was unlikely, but the US government concluded that it was too risky to chance. One tablespoon of crystals was enough to blow through a cinder block. One cup could rip open the hull of an airplane.

The young bomber wanted to cook up two pounds.

When he was done mixing, he rinsed the crystals with baking soda and water to make his creation more stable. He placed the finished product in a wide-rimmed glass jar about the size of a coffee tin and inspected his work. There would be enough for three detonators. Three detonators inside three backpacks filled with a flammable mixture and ball bearings—the same type of weapon that left 52 dead in London in 2005.

There was more work to be done. He had to finish the main charge, a mixture of flour and cooking oil. Concealed in a backpack and ignited by the TATP, these household ingredients would create a massive dust explosion and fireball. That could come later. The hardest part was complete.

He was ready for New York.

Revue de presse

"Apuzzo & Goldman are the new Woodward and Bernstein." (Spencer Ackerman, national security editor, The Guardian)

"Two of America's best reporters pull back the curtain to reveal how New York really works. In the process, they also raise troubling questions about the price that America has paid, particularly in its moral standing, in prosecuting the war on terror. They ask the hardest question of them all. They ask Americans to look in the mirror." (James Risen, author of State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration)

"The authors use their investigative know-how like skilled surgeons, utilizing their scalpel to expose a malignant growth in the heart of the NYPD." (Frank Serpico)

"Enemies Within combines the quick-paced storytelling of a mystery novel with the intellectual altitude of intelligence experts. It offers insights into the methods that work the best against would-be terrorists, as well as those that are not only a waste of money and time, but abuse the nature of our democracy. A great, informative read." (Dana Priest, investigative reporter, The Washington Post and author of Top Secret America: The Rise of the Nation)

"Despite all the hype around NSA's secret Prism surveillance program, Apuzzo and Goldman show how the Zazi case really got made. This book is both a thriller and a hard-hitting expose of the NYPD Intel unit set up after 9/11. While the American people have shown some willingness to give up privacy for the hope of greater security, the reader can be the judge of whether the shocking excesses of this unit are justified by its results." (Vicki Divoll, former general counsel of the Senate Intelligence Committee and former assistant general counsel of the Central Intelligence Agency)

"Like too many stories about the post-9/11 fight against terrorism, this is a tale in which American boldness, cunning, and ingenuity are frequently undermined by American arrogance, recklessness, and narrow-mindedness. Apuzzo and Goldman’s revelatory investigation casts a troubling light on the NYPD and reverberates far beyond New York City, exposing the risks of waging an ill-defined 'war on terror.'" (Justin Vogt, senior editor, Foreign Affairs)

"Enemies Within is a deeply reported and well written account of the NYPD's aggressive efforts to monitor the Muslim-American community and the most threatening al-Qaeda plot since 9/11---the plot to bomb the New York City subway system in 2009-- a plot that NYPD's surveillance efforts did not detect." (Peter Bergen author of Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for Bin Laden, from 9/11 to Abbottabad)

“Two tales tell us a great deal—not all of it flattering—about the ways in which law
enforcement has kept the city safe. . . . Assiduous reporting.” (The Wall Street Journal)

"A fascinating new book." (The Economist)

“If you're a citizen, you need to read Enemies Within . . . . The authors have a story worthy of a thriller. The book is peopled with spies, terrorists and decorated war heroes. . . . Apuzzo and Goldman have sounded an alarm.” (Associated Press)

“While Apuzzo and Goldman show their veteran reportorial skills in exposing the details of the NYPD’s surveillance program, they also expertly craft the drama of the unfolding terrorist plot and the race by government agencies to foil it. . . . A fast-paced, informative investigation into the ever-messy arena of privacy versus security.” (Kirkus Reviews)

"It is no stretch to say that the season's most anticipated book of investigative journalism is Enemies Within" (The Atlantic Wire)

Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman chronicle how the quest for safety led to something far darker....Did the Snowden leaks trouble you? You ain't seen nothing yet. (Dan Bigman, business news managing editor Forbes)

“A deep, jaw-dropping dive . . . No book better sums up the state of post-9/11 fear.” (National Journal)

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Blackstone Pub
• Date d'édition: 2013
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1482944707
• ISBN 13: 9781482944709
• Reliure: MP3 CD
• Coordonnées du fabricant: NAXOS Deutschland Musik & Video Vertriebs-GmbH; info@naxos.de; ; Gruber Straße 46b; Poing; Bayern; 85586; Allemagne