All rights reserved.

No part of this material may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
photocopying or otherwise, without prior written permission of Palgrave Macmillan.

C hap t e r Th r e e

Cyb er S py

I
n November 2002, as the Bush administration was pushing hard
for intervention in Iraq, I remember watching U.S. Secretary of
State Colin Powell testify before the United Nations, making
the case for military intervention and incursion. As I sat watching
Secretary Powell’s UN testimony, I was aghast—failing to understand
the logic for the administration’s position on Iraq as well as the im-
pending immediacy for action against the Saddam Hussein regime. I
clearly remember thinking, “What the hell? We’re not even done in
Afghanistan.” The allegations about Iraq’s WMD program laid the
groundwork for a military cause much larger and more significant
than what we had witnessed with the invasion of Afghanistan. At each
stage leading up to the Iraqi conflict, I would simply ask “Why?” The
reasoning for the U.S. and a coalition of international forces invading
Iraq never added up to me.
Right after 9/11, I was incredibly frustrated, wondering why we
weren’t doing anything. But the quagmire we went on to create in Iraq
was a shameful reaction. I’m not a Democrat, and I’m not Republican.

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All rights reserved. No part of this material may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
photocopying or otherwise, without prior written permission of Palgrave Macmillan.

32 T h e U n e x p e ct e d Pat r i o t

I will support the military and I support the troops because they’re the
ones being sent to the front lines to fight. The Kurds, the Shiites, and
the Sunnis have never gotten along. How can we in the West impose
our version of what we believe is democracy on a society whose culture
is not designed for it? With all of the knowledge, experience, and un-
derstanding I have gained since 9/11, it’s clear to me that the clash of
cultures and civilizations that has been waxing and waning for centu-
ries will not be resolved in my lifetime—and certainly not by American
military force.
In the terrorist forums and on their sites, I’m only pretending to
be anti-American, anti-Western, anti-Zionist, but frankly, when we in-
vaded Iraq, I believe we gave the people of Iraq every reason in the
world to hate us. By occupying Muslim lands, we legitimized all of their
decades-old complaints. The war in Iraq will always be a mistake, and I
don’t think there is anything that we can do to make it right. What we
can and should do is step back and acknowledge the important differ-
ences between the U.S. and Iraqi worlds, develop respect for their cul-
ture, and work to find common ground so we can diminish and defeat
the terrorism that is a threat to both of our societies.
At first, in the forums, I was feeling my way around gingerly. Now
I know the tribes and their nuances so well that I could probably whip
out a new identity within ten minutes.
When I need to post pictures of my guys (my online personas), I
collect different photographs of individuals who are Arab-looking, if
not ethnically Middle Eastern. If I need to change things, I can pho-
toshop them. Today I get some of them from Arabic groups on social
networking sites such as Facebook. Of course, in these cases, I have to
manipulate the photo somewhat. Sometimes I’ll blur the face a little. I
would never pick a picture that was planted all over the place. I even
find a lot of pictures in local blogs in that part of the world. And I get

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All rights reserved. No part of this material may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
photocopying or otherwise, without prior written permission of Palgrave Macmillan.

Cy b e r S py 33

many from travel sites and travel blogs. Sometimes it’s just Mustafa
from the local falafel shop.
When we went to war in Iraq, I had never paid attention to what
kind of planes, ammunition, or helicopters our country had. I didn’t
even know what a Black Hawk was. But once I started learning about
it, I found myself loving the whole culture. My favorite of the military
planes was the A-10 Warthog Tankbuster, known as a tank killer, one
of the planes that had served the Air Force well back in the first Gulf
War. The Tankbuster has one of the largest, heaviest, and most pow-
erful guns in the U.S. air fleet. The gun is a GAU-8/A Avenger with a
30mm, seven-barrel Gatling gun capable of delivering four thousand
shots per minute. I loved the thought of the Tankbuster flying over the
skies of Afghanistan and Iraq, taking out Taliban and al-Qaeda fight-
ers and Iraqi insurgents.
At the start of the Afghan war, there were several descriptions
of the different bombs in the U.S. military arsenal. My favorite was
the mammoth Daisy Cutter, which is the fifteen-thousand-pound con-
ventional bomb usually delivered by a C-130 transport. I remember
watching one of the videos released by the Pentagon of the Daisy Cut-
ter after it was dropped over Afghanistan following a reported bin
Laden sighting. The bomb’s deployment and detonation was an awe-
some show of force, and the level of destruction revealed in its after-
math should have been enough to demonstrate the mighty power of
the U.S. military to al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
People can’t believe it when I tell them I’ve never been to Pakistan
or Afghanistan. It’s thanks to the Internet that I’ve taught myself so
much about these countries’ cultures, and I can design my online per-
sonas so that they are as realistic as any flesh and blood individual.
Of course, the wonderful democracy of the Internet also comes with
a dark side. It was a boon to the terrorist groups and their supporters

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photocopying or otherwise, without prior written permission of Palgrave Macmillan.

34 T h e U n e x p e ct e d Pat r i o t

well in advance of 9/11. They have used the Internet to master and ad-
vance their objectives far more efficiently and effectively than have the
governments of the U.S. and most other countries. I learned this from my
targets early on. By following their lead, I honed my own proficiency with
the Internet and all of its vast resources—ultimately using what they had
taught me against them.

A computer screen, shining out through the dark of

night, makes me feel safe. With my fingers on the keyboard, I am in
control, selecting words and concepts, erasing those I don’t want. It’s
perfect until I move the mouse arrow to the tiny box labeled “send.”
Suddenly, it’s not so safe.
Once I click send in an email, I’ve opened a door. Even when I
have checked and rechecked the content and context of my message,
and the security sending protocols I put into place before any email
message is ever sent out, I always hesitate. I have to stay vigilant, lest
I set myself up for failure. If I have garbled the syntax or somehow
miscalculated the meaning of a scripture from the Koran, I may scare
my mark or invite questions about who I am.
In late October of 2003, on the cusp of autumn, the air is cold
and tight and the wind can be harsh, always signaling the preamble
to winter in northwestern Montana. Conrad rests in a valley, which
thankfully provides some protection for the fierce Montana winds
that blow through the prairie. Still, I can hear the tiny pings of wet,
icy snowflakes on the windowpane already.
My early-morning routine is becoming comfortably familiar. I
wake up at my usual time, 4:00, and quietly pad down to the com-
puter, popping open a Diet Coke and logging on. This morning,
I’m greeted by one of my favorite Todd Rundgren songs, “Hello,
It’s Me.”

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