Inside The Wire [Hardcover]

Erik Saar's book is a very breezy, informative read, and seems to me to accurately reflect the duties, skill levels and personal attitudes of military linguists and interrogators and the atmosphere of two American prison facilities I have seen.

The scenarios in the prologue brought many smiles to this reader, a former Army and Air Force linguist trained 30 years earlier than Saar. I had to chuckle when reading the reader reviews critical of Saar's Arabic language skills. An incredibly difficult language, much harder than the languages of Southeast Asia which fell to me and my generation. Saar tells us in his book that he had his fair share of trouble during language training. Who did not? I've had very brief and disappointing experiences inside one of our prisons in Iraq and another in Afghanistan, and never once saw an American who could interrogate at a professional level in Arabic or Pashto, not one. There must be a few out there, but they are rare creatures. We are doing the best we can in a war for which we were almost totally unprepared. I'm hoping that one of the brilliant Titan ethnic Iraqi or Afghan naturalized American citizens who carry the heavy interpreter burden will write his own memoirs about the trials and tribulations of assisting in these interrogations. These interpreters and native speakers have stories that will knock your socks off when compared to those told by young interrogators. The contract interpreters hold the true key insights into our by now well-recognized failures in the war on terror, and our failure to investigate their reactions disappoints me deeply. Saar does mention these contract linguists, and clearly has learned much from his association with them.

I see nothing in Saar's story that rings untrue. The spotless reputation of the FBI in regard to prisoner handling and enlightened interrogation strategies is still intact, and I would hope that any American who reads the internal FBI complaints which came out of Guantanamo has come to accept by now that our efforts have fallen short of the mark. [They always do fall short in many ways; perhaps that is easier for us older and more jaded veterans to recognize and admit.]

The appendix of "Inside the Wire" is a good collection of key policy documents which help us understand some of the origins of this debacle.

Erik Saar leaves me with the impression that he is a fine young man with a good heart, naive in the best and most traditional American way, expecting our actions in an ugly environment to match our declared American ideals and way of life. Sad to say, wars are not humane endeavors, precisely why we should undertake them only as last resort, so as not to bring ourselves down to our enemies' level. My personal feelings are that we would serve the long term goals of the United States much more effectively by treating these prisons as political reorientation facilities, viewing any information obtained as secondary to our primary goal of demonstrating by unfailing example to our prisoners what the American people truly stand for.

Any military prison is a complicated environment which arouses instinctive animal passions, reflexive brands of patriotism, bigotry, religious convictions both radical and reasonable, and deep-seated feelings of what is fair play and what is beyond the pale. Don't look for "heroism" in our interrogators or guards. Saar shows great insight into all of these diverse factors, and gives us detailed observations of the best and the worst of us at work at Guantanamo. Heroism in prison is reserved only for prisoners. Our prisoners who survived the abuses of the Vietnamese communists are our best example of that. The best any interrogator, interpreter, or guard can do is to remain human.

Erik Saar has made a contribution in the best way he could, and I admire his efforts and his service to our nation. I highly recommend "Inside the Wire" to anyone who understands that a sense of compassion and fair play is a prerequisite to being able to call oneself an American at heart, not merely an American by accident of birth.

First of all, I'm glad I read the book, as I was interested to find out more about the subject of the Army interrogations with the potential terrorist prisoners detained since 9/11. Evidently I read slower than those people who immediately posted their opinion, er, "review", the afternoon of Monday, May 02 -- the day this book came out. This is not a bulletin board discussion or open forum, where people write "Yankees suck", or "Sgt. So-and-so is this or that." It is a place for people to present a BOOK REVIEW. Perhaps I'm old fashioned, but one of the prerequisites for this sort of thing might be, oh say, reading the book. Sure, the internet allows people to present their ideas on almost anything imaginable, but it certainly seems that certain previous biased "reviewers" didn't let little things like reading, or the facts, stand in their way of their 1st amendment rights.

I was pleased with the author's first-person account of his experiences, which quickly brought me into the fold. It is a worthwhile read, and one for which I invite you to develop your own opinion, as well. Despite what certain people may fear is written (again, without reading the book), Mr. Saar does not advocate the prosecution of those who participated in these events, as they were only performing their duty under the guidelines (or lack thereof) provided; nor is he saying that what transpired is the "worst of the worst" itself, for example as compared to other interrogation proceedings in the armed forces and government agencies that have recently made the headlines. It was simply his experience.

As with many things in life, we need to be cautious of those with agendas, whether hidden, or plainly visible, such as certain early reviews here. However, it is clear from the book that Mr. Saar did not have an agenda, and in fact, the outcome and reality of the author's experiences at Gitmo were often in stark contrast to those publicized by the government and what was originally anticipated by the author. Mr. Saar wrote about his truth, and that is all that can be asked of anyone. To those who previously questioned "why didn't he come out with this earlier?", or "why didn't he approach his seniors in command?", I simply say, "read the book." It has been less than two years since Saar emerged from Gitmo, and in that relatively short time he had (a) come to the decision to write about his experiences, (b) applied for -- and received -- approval to write the book, directly from the Pentagon (this was absolutely legally necessary, and thus he could not have breached any disclosure agreements), (c) secured a publisher, which can often take even established writers several years, and (d) last but not least, actually written the near 300 pages I have in front of me.

A few other informed reviewers have written accurate descriptions of this book, so I will not bother to repeat essentially the same synopsis here. The bottom line is that you will not know whether you'll enjoy the book or not until you read it. Personally, I became more aware and was satisfied by the things I learned about being "Inside the Wire". Hopefully you'll read it and then establish your own informed opinion about the book -- not the author -- and feel free to post your review, as well.

I actually knew Saar, and want to let the reviewer named 'Mick' realize that he should not assume that Saar missed E-6 and was a bad soldier . . . or had an agenda. Saar was in a trainee status for HALF of his six years, and made E-5 soon after. He could have made E-6, but decided to ETS. He could have pushed to pin on E-6, but he knew he was leaving that year. He had the points.

Saar and I actually used to debate politics, and I was the rare Army Democrat, to his pro-Bush stance. I was shocked when he wrote the book, but it made it that much more credible. He did not have a liberal agenda/bone in him.

I gave the book 4 stars, because it was a rather short read. It is not a masterpiece, but I suggest it be read by those interested in an impartial opinion from a good American.

SSG J

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