MISSION: BLACK LIST #1

Detailed, sometimes dramatic recounting of the planning and implementation of the mission to capture Saddam Hussein, by a soldier who played a leading role.

Army Staff Sgt. Maddox was awarded a Bronze Star for his work devising the methodology used to search for Hussein and interrogate his friends, relatives and bodyguards. His description of these procedures is often so vivid that readers feel they were in the room. While some members of the military used torture to attempt to get information out of Iraqis, Maddox claims he wasn’t one of them. He favored “grinding interrogation,” which sometimes did no good but on other occasions resulted in useful information. His solid narrative reads at times like a detective story, and even though the outcome in this case is known, the twists and turns make for an engaging book. Maddox spent four years assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency doing routine work, with no opportunities to interrogate prisoners, before he finally got his chance to shine in July 2003. He devoted four and a half months to pursuing information about Hussein’s whereabouts, an effort replete with false starts, resistance from violent prisoners and plenty of stonewalling. The description of what Maddox was thinking during his interview with Muhammad Ibrahim Omar Al-Musslit, the subordinate who disclosed Hussein’s whereabouts, strikes a typical note: “I had pushed him into this corner. It was strictly between him and me. Anyone else would have to start all over again. And by then it might be too late.” The prose is evocative but never flowery; experienced ghostwriter Seay (In Justice: Inside the Scandal That Rocked the Bush Administration, 2008, etc.) captures the voice of a soldier with energetic clarity.

Solid recounting of an important event, and a valuable primer for those wanting to learn how to obtain information from reluctant subjects.