The final program from book tvs campaigns issue block on form policy is with the Washington Post joby warrick who discusses his Pulitzer Prize winning book, black flags, the rise of isis from last weekends National Book festival. [inaudible] hello everybody. My name is marty and i am thetha direct executive editor of the Washington Post. The Washington Post has been a charter sponsor of the National Book festival since the beginning and were happy to do it again this year. I the library of congress has been the festivals host since the festival began 16 years ago. Rs we think the chairman of the festival, and that many National Book festival sponsors who made the event possible this year. You can make a donation to the festival by checking the information in your program. Therell be time for questions after we are done and this isaf being filmed as well. You should know that. So, to her our speaker, the Washington Post has gratified to have some of the finest National Security reporters of the country. A stand standout among them is a joby warwick. Is when you read black flags, the rights of isis isis youll see why. Theres a seriousness of purpose, the relentless reporting and how he embraces nuance while never losing his wing complexity. There is his eye for revelatory detail and his talent for committing your attention with the finest techniques of storytelling. This is such a good story that hbo has a movie in development. And with Bradley Cooper as executive producer. Were hoping it will be may. He ms this is, as the New York Times wrote in its review a gripping book of novelistic energy in the most revealing portrait yet of abu was sad i as our country aims to destroy isis and as isis seeks to metastasize beyond irau and syria there cannot be a more urgent and timely treatment of the subject. As isis and Terrorism Takes Center Stage in a president ial race this book offers a refuge in actual facts. Imagine that. In an absorbing history of ouros times and a sober assessment of failures across the politicall and governmental landscape, for good reason black flags was offered the nonfiction Pulitzer Prize. It reveals the long arc of todays most dangerous extremist threats. All of us at the post were enormously proud when the Pulitzer Board recognize the excellence of jobys work. It is not, by the way the first time they had done so. The price for black flags was jobys second pulitzer pre untran. Hes previously previously one in 1996 about articles on the environmental of the hog farming industry written with two colleagues at the newspaper and colic. In the two decades since that book, since that were, joby hasy been a church colic at the post. He is as soft spoken and gracious as he is diligent, determined, and dedicated. So not just the superb reporter, but also a wonderful human being. It is a real pleasure and honor to introduce a joby warwick. [applause]it i thank you for that. It is a pleasure to be with you and an honor to be introduced by my boss. I have been with the post is marty set for 20 years. Ive worked with for some legendary editors from the bradleys family and i can tell you the post has never been in better hands than it is right now. The fact that we, here in washington, i know you must get mad at us at least once per day. That is is part of our job too. E but the fact that we have a quality newspaper of the caliber of the Washington Post and it continues to be so ambitious, so energetic, and just so committed to his mission is a reflection of the people at the top. I feel privileged work for marty and i think you should all be gratefu to be in a town and in a country that has editors like marty. Thank. Thank you again for those words, marty. [applause] book festivals and i have done my paper book tour now so im used to this. C is imp they typically authors will tell charming in adult and funny stories but i wrote a book about isis. The material does not really lend itself to funny, witty stories. But the topic is important, i think you all know that and that is why youre here. When i do travel the country people are confused about this organization. Id they are afraid and of course there part afraid. I think our political leaders are confused right now based on the rhetoric of the campaign trail. My purpose in doing this book was to bring clarity. That is what i think my special gift as a journalist. I helped to take complicated stories and make people understand what they are are about. Pl thats what i do in the book and thats what im going to try tob do briefly today. I will show pictures. We will start with a video, photo montage which is boiling down the history of isis to three minutes. This is a summary, after this is over well talk about characters behind isis. This is. This is my video introduction. It it is isis so it is dark, buttnn its nothing its a preview of our discussion today i hope you can all read subtitles. [inaudible] [inaudible] [speaking in native language] [inaudible] [inaudible] [speaking in native language] [speaking in native language] so, my book black plague is a story of origin. It is a character sketch digging into histories of the men behind isis. Im going to talk about five personalities today starting with it zarqawi, theobe most innovative and continuinger on summa the others who so we start with him the godfather and the founder because he really pioneered all of the task dicks we see isis using today including the beheadings of mens he was an original and dispensable force. Isis could not exist without him. And in a strange way as you can see, Abu Musab Alzarqawi could not have existed without us. So lets understand him as a way to get into our topic. Vi every terrace starts out life as a kid, cute little kid. Here he is in 1968 with his mom. The thing is he was not a cute kid, he was a bad scene from the beginning, he was in trouble from the time of middle school on. Not just tom sorry mischief but cutting kids with razors, using drugs, he drank, he was a violent, vicious, he drank, he was a violent, vicious and was in it for trouble. By the time he is a teenager,en anything but a religious guy, extensive criminal record, then he gets a bit of a religious conviction and then even more importantly like many other men in his region he decides in the late 1990s to go fight jihad which means its in this the beginning of the organism organization that were familiar with today. He he joined the army and gets involved in the civil war and the silk violent young man and hes good at one thing which is killing people and its the running at the likes of bin laden. Then the war and its pretty much that way for zarqawi and friends. They dont have anything to do and they want to try to keep this going so they start to look for ways that they can build their own little jihadist sell. Theyre wondering what they can do it peaceful jordan and they start attacking and go after bars and liquor store and get the idea of attacking part of. So they send a guy into a porno house with a bomb and blow the place up. The key goes goes in and gets engrossed in the movie and forgets all about them bomb which then blows up at his feetd he loses both of his legs and nobody gets hurt but these are the kind of knuckleheads we were dealing within the 19 nineties. The jordanians. The jordanians get tired of these guys, this is a problem for them so they lock them up, they they lock up zarqawi and his followers. So these guys are trying to be contained and corralled in prison. Ent, z but in jail they end up being corralled together because jordanians are afraid that if there is a general population they would start to affect other people so they are by themselves, about 50 and one cell. This becomes edgy hottie university where the egg each other on and share ideology and talk about tactics. It turns out to be not a good thing. Out of this environment zarqawi emergence as a very charismatic leader. Heres where he gets a couple of incredible breaks. His most recent its to prison for 15 years and 2009 he spent all those years in jail, we never wouldve heard of them. In 1999 something happen. Ad5 im the king of jordan dies. There is a tradition of amnesty in jordan, if the king dies theres a general amnesty for political prisoners. So Parliament Comes up with a list of people to be pardoned. The tribes come up with theirabb own list and then about 2000 people and up getting freed. Among them is it zarqawis entire band and out they go ten years ahead of schedule. So he goes off to the place where he really loves the most, withh afghanistan and tries to unite with osama bin laden, his hero. It turns out that bin ladenden a wants nothing to do with him. Thd even for bin laden, the mastermind of 9 11 this young kid, this, this hothead who doesnt know much about islam,n. Hes not very smart, his very violent and crude, he is too bad even for al qaeda. They reject him, kick him a, sent him off to the other end of afghanistan to start his own little thing. Often goes and once again if he had stayed out there we never wouldve heard of zarqawi everml again. De but then the second miracle happens for him. In february 2003, the United States is getting ready to invade iraq. Were trying to make our case to the un and other people around the world as to why we want toy do this. One is a weapons this. One is a weapons of mass destruction, the other was the possibility that al qaeda could collaborate with this terrible iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein if theres some sort of collusion between the two they could be more dangerous. This is is theu. Pitch we make to the un. If mr. Powell is making this speech to the seaside is the prime example of the problem but our friend zarqawi. So just based on circumstantial evidence he seems to be the right guy, hes in iraq at the time, living in the border area between iraq and iran. Hes had contact with al qaeda in the past and weve seen a perfect a poster child for thepr problem that the u. S. Is describing. So this is the case that is me. It turns out entirely untrue theres no truth to the connection to al qaeda. He wasnt in al qaeda or working with Saddam Husseins government. That one poster made him a celebrity overnight. Suddenly he is receiving money, support, support, and recruits from around the world. He becomes an overnight celebrity in the jihadist community. He has a vision to fight a superpower and its going to be the United States and in iraq. They move themselves to baghdad. In 2320 for the americans. Lonels when he gets there he built alliances. He is a crazy guy who wants to start a terrorist movement. He has all the kinds of allies because the iraqi army has been disbanded. All the kernels, generals a major still have jobs anymore. Jobs anymorea theyre looking to fight back. O he has everybody who was a professional who is the pockets. Everybody everybody looking for leadership and he moves into this new surgeon see as we see it unfolding a 2003. He has a good helper strategy and goes out looking for important targets. He goes after the un headquarters and kills the leader of the un mission in iraq. He goes after ngos and other groups that would help the United States and give us the cover of legitimacy and drives them home. Then, more importantly he goes through the sunni shia divide. Cu they have been living togetheron reasonably well for decades but zarqawi decides to start a civil war. He blows at their most important mosca, kills their leaders, and suddenly you have reprisal killings and shooting back and forth between two groups that had gotten along well together. Strategically look at what he did it was very smart. He isolated us in iraq and then sets off a civil war around us. By 2004 and 2005 we are in bad shape in terms 2005 we are in bad shape in terms of our occupational plans for iraq. So this is kind of background for zarqawi because he is bigger ambition. He wants to become an international star. He feels he has a destiny. He developed the notion that no matter what kind of bombing or shooting you might be able to do, theres nothing more gripping and more horrible thano watching a single execution. So he grabs a random american off the street, kid named burke from philadelphia. Take them into a cell, sits them down with an orange jumpsuit, the image were familiar with and he personally, thats zarqawi reading the script he personally be heads this young man with his own hands. This becomes his calling card, many beheadings will follow. The violence he unleashes tears up the country follow. The violence he unleashes tears up the country and its too much even for al qaeda. So thats not the only difference. Zarqawi begins tojut launch a n Media Campaign with himself at the center using social media platforms just becoming available. So you have the great bearded osama bin laden, reading the sermon from behind a podium, very boarding. Then you have this jihadist action figure, like a black ninja firing his machine gun and killing americans with his own hands. Young jihadists around the world eat this up. Then he is brash enough to make up his own rules because he is not even a high school graduate. Les not very smart. Smart. But he doesnt understand theology and thats liberating to him because he doesnt bother to worry about whether he is committing acts that are very islamic like targeting innocent muslim women and children in suicide attacks. Then he begins think about a big idea which is the idea of restoring the ancient caliphate. The islamic empire of centuries past. He regards themselves as inspired to asher in a new age of ultra pure islam driving out western governments along with brutally destroying everyone elses who stands in his waynd from corrupt governments to things like the shiites. The struggle would end in a mighty battle, and and armageddon. In which armies of islam would finally feed the christianity as some profits were told. This will be his history. Im the sparky used to say. Heating it to see it because he was by now public enemy number one. We poured vast resources into stopping him. He took us nearly three years to to track him down but eventually our intel and Grounds Forces and special Operations Team found a formula for defeating him and hissne network. Without his safe house in 2006 and drop a couple of bombs on it. Thats the end of zarqawi and sell. We dismantle the leadership killing number two and three, just as were figuring this outt other things happen. The iraqi sunni tribes are against the zarqawi followers. We have the mm bar awakening. The u. S. Troop search happen. By 2009 all nine all that is left is a few hundred followers who are being driven deep underground and heidi. Al qaeda in iraq would be essentially be. But not everybody thought so. Heres our second isis personality. We now know him as a bae3, hes is the leader vices today. So in no time people would not have injured him as a leader. He is zarqawis opposite. Kind of shy and boring, his bicycle wasnt very impressive,d has a doctorate degree in islamic law. Colleg Abu Bakr Albaghdadi joined zarqawis gangs because he still feels obliged to fight the infidels. Ce aga he ends up going to jail for a while and has the prison experience and exposed to tough guys around him. H the ra and then he starts to rise up through the ranks, mostly because other leaders around him are getting killed. So in 2010 the leaders of decided they need different kind of leader. They pick this guy, bank two, heats an islamic scholar, Abu Bakr Albaghdadi and so hes no longer calling himself a qaeda in a and i rake. He called himself the Islamic State of iraq. The state part is a joke because they know that theres no real state. One of the leaders wives reacted famously to this as wheres the state youre talking about. In we are living in the desert. Sco but history intervenes again in isiss favor. Just as he is coming to power u. S. Troops are leaving iraq under agreements under the bush ministration. As soon as theyre gone that shiite government feels emboldened to start settling old scores wish any scores wishing he tribes, resting their leaders in kicking out on me officers and then they begin to rebel against the government find a more interesting, and with zarqawis people and isis than with their own governments. Il then, year later civil war breaks out in syria as we all well know. This is a Pivotal Moment because its an opportunity for them to start something new. To start their own Militia Group inside syria. They have a perfect a perfect incubator now with a lawless state, with violence and weapons in the have a new causen writing an oppressive dictator, aside, he stirring up problems with slaughtering civilians. They renamed renamed themselves yet again and now they are Islamic State of iraq in i sean or isis. Theyre the best fighters on the rubble side and they start to attract foreign recruits by the thousands. By 2014 they are readying to break out and they do so in dramatic fashion capturing the eastern half of syria. They invade iraq to declare the establishment of this islamic caliphate. By 2014 in the caliphate. By 2014 in the summer there powerhouse. 30,000 strong there able to overrun the iraqi troops, this is the isis were familiar with today. Theyre also very rich because after capturingg multiple, they have become the wealthiest terrorist group of alltime. The. The oil wells, they owned bankst and universities, hundreds of millions of dollars in currency. But really, beyond their wealth it is zarqawis old organization. Zarqawi. Zarqawi embraced violence for its own sake and these guys do n their own same thing on a grander scale. They also have a boldness to reinterpret islam anyway they want. As a data user religious scholar show he goes out of his way to create theological arguments to justify whatever he does per theres always a verse in the carotid that can be made to justify and make themselves appear to be muslims instead of barbarians. And just as zarqawi understood, isis did the same just got better at it. They are extremely skilled at harnessing the power of social media for recruitment, screening, indoctrinatio