The Trade: My Journey into the Labyrinth of Political Kidnapping

by Jere Van Dyk

Overview

A former hostage in the tribal areas of Pakistan returns to meet his kidnappers and uncover how political kidnappings and ransomings take place in the shadows of the world's most lawless territories.

In 2014, Jere Van Dyk traveled to Afghanistan to try to discover the motives behind a kidnapping that had occurred six years earlier — his own. He was haunted by questions about why he was taken and why he was released, and troubled by the refusal of his friends, employer, and government employees to offer him a full account of what they knew. An experienced investigative reporter, he began a quest to interrogate the accuracy of everything he was told, including from the people he trusted most.

In pursuing his kidnappers, and the stories of the intermediaries and money men, Van Dyk uncovered not just the story of his own abduction but the operation of what he calls the Trade: the business of kidnapping. Operating according to its own shadowy rules, the Trade has become a murky form of negotiation between criminal groups, corporations, families, and governments who have no formal lines of communication.

Van Dyk's journey took him from up near the Tribal Areas of Pakistan, to the tea shops of Kabul, to the Obama White House, and revealed evidence of lucrative transactions and rival bandit groups working under the direction of intelligence services. In its course, he met the families of many Americans who were or are still kidnapped, bargaining chips at the mercy of violent and pitiless extremists who thrive in the world's most lawless spaces.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781610394314
Publisher:	PublicAffairs
Publication date:	10/10/2017
Pages:	448
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.70(d)

About the Author

Jere Van Dyk was born in Washington state and raised in a family of Plymouth Brethren. He first went to Afghanistan in 1973 when he and his younger brother drove an old Volkswagen from Germany to Kabul. He returned in 1981 as a young reporter for the New York Times and lived with the mujahideen, our allies fighting the Soviet Union. There, and later when he became the director of Friends of Afghanistan, a non-profit organization overseen by the National Security Council and the State Department, he got to know the leaders who were linked from the beginning with al-Qaeda, and the Taliban, with Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia, and from which emerged the Islamic State.

After 9/11, he returned to Afghanistan and Pakistan for CBS News, for which he covered the kidnapping of Daniel Pearl in Karachi. In 2008, he was the next American journalist kidnapped in Pakistan. He is the author of Captive and In Afghanistan.

Table of Contents

Map xi

Cast of Characters xiii

Author's Note and Acknowledgments xxi

Part 1

Chapter 1 The White House, June 24, 2015 3

Chapter 2 New York, December 23, 2001 16

Chapter 3 Kabul, January 2002 26

Chapter 4 Yunus Khalis, Spring 2002 41

Chapter 5 Family Feuds 58

Chapter 6 Smugglers and Fixers in the Borderlands 82

Chapter 7 The Trade 108

Part 2

Chapter 8 Back Homeland 121

Chapter 9 Michael Semple 135

Chapter 10 The First Daniel Pearl 158

Chapter 11 Local and International 171

Chapter 12 Meetings with Four Important Men 194

Chapter 13 Your Input Is Very Welcome … 222

Part 3

Chapter 14 The Work of Ghosts 235

Chapter 15 The Story of Fazul Rahim 248

Chapter 16 A Rising Star 262

Chapter 17 Closer 271

Chapter 18 The Pakhtun Festival 274

Chapter 19 The Mystery of Gohar Zaman 297

Chapter 20 Ibrahim 312

Chapter 21 A Promise Kept 321

Part 4

Chapter 22 Taliban Military Council 329

Chapter 23 The Families 335

Chapter 24 Ripple Effects 365

Notes 389

Index 399

Editorial Reviews

Van Dyk is a methodical and sensitive reporter, and his emotions are made vivid.

The New York Times Book Review - Janine di Giovanni

09/11/2017
Journalist Van Dyk’s gripping follow-up to Captive—a memoir about his 2008 abduction in Afghanistan—probes the machinations of the criminals, terrorists, and governments behind his ordeal. The book’s tense, sinister first part covers his pre-kidnapping travels to the Afghanistan-Pakistan border to interview Taliban figures and terrorists, a journey that required shadowy Afghan fixers to negotiate safe passage from tribal leaders and militants and ended in betrayal and his six-week captivity. Subsequent chapters follow his post-release struggle to learn who kidnapped him and why. It’s a hard slog to pry loose information, taking Van Dyk to the White House, the FBI, and the security consultants and Afghan power brokers who negotiated his release (some of whom may have orchestrated his kidnapping). The answers he gets are often enigmatic, but they paint a portrait of a burgeoning trade in hostages compounded from gangsterism, ideology, clan vendettas, and the subterfuges of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency, which supports the Taliban while Washington pretends ignorance. Like a Le Carré novel, Van Dyk’s narrative conjures disorientation, danger, and paranoia as he ponders the hidden motives of the smiling, solicitous men he encounters, all the while conveying his deep-seated anguish. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

"Journalist Van Dyk's gripping follow-up to Captive-a memoir about his 2008 abduction in Afghanistan-probes the machinations of the criminals, terrorists, and governments behind his ordeal.... Like a Le Carré novel, Van Dyk's narrative conjures disorientation, danger, and paranoia as he ponders the hidden motives of the smiling, solicitous men he encounters, all the while conveying his deep-seated anguish."—Publishers Weekly

"Tenacious....Van Dyk is a methodical and sensitive reporter, and his emotions are made vivid....There is much to admire in [his] character: his perseverance, the stark pioneer spirit honed in his youth, his desire to seek the truth."—TheNew York Times Book Review

From the Publisher

10/15/2017
Journalist Van Dyk was abducted and held for ransom by the Taliban in 2008. He was released after 45 days. This book is a follow-up to his previous work Captive, which chronicled his kidnapping. Van Dyk uses this volume as a way to heal old wounds and try to find the reasons why he was abducted but then survived. In 2014, Van Dyk returned to Afghanistan to investigate the circumstances that led to his capture. He began to unravel the interconnectedness of how the Taliban operates vis-à-vis Pakistan. He hit road blocks and dead ends to finding who ultimately betrayed him to the Taliban. The narrative is suspenseful and not a light read but reveals a world where problems continue to persist for the United States 16 years after 9/11. This volume can be nicely tied to Aaron B. O'Connell's Our Latest Longest War. VERDICT Recommended for readers who want to understand better current affairs in Pakistan and Afghanistan and for fans of real-life mysteries.—Jacob Sherman, John Peace Lib., Univ. of Texas at San Antonio

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