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Michael's prepared piece on Roy Hallums, an American contractor who was held hostage by Iraqi insurgents for 311 days. Michael also discusses some of the details of his own close call on Haifa Street in 2004.
ANDERSON
COOPER: Up close tonight, we have some extraordinary
video to show you. It's the rescue of an American
held hostage in Iraq for nearly a year. You may
remember him. His name is Roy Hallums, that's him
there being held hostage, an American contractor.
And take a look at this exclusive video. You'll only
see it here at CNN. And we're going to show you much
more of it in a moment. It's Special Forces rescuing
Roy, and the ordeal he went though is simply
stunning.
Our Michael Ware has spent years covering the war in
Iraq, was briefly himself held captive. He joins us
now. Michael, the conditions that Roy Hallums was
held in, it's unthinkable.
MICHAEL WARE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT:
Honestly, it is mind boggling, Anderson. I mean, I've
been grabbed a few times by different people in
different places. I had not had to endure the
long-term captivity that Hallums and others have
experienced.
But even compared to other people, what Hallums went
through -- I'm the only person who's been able to go
back to the house where he was held and go into
the...
COOPER: And this is the underground cell?
WARE: Literally, literally. It was in a farmhouse.
There was a block you would lift up and you would
climb down, and there would be this space. You
couldn't even stand up in it. There were no lights,
there was no ventilation.
And for the last three months -- he was held there
for ten months, always tied, always masked. For the
last three months when they would close the lid, they
would cement it over.
COOPER: They would actually close it up?
WARE: They would cement it over.
So if you take a look here, you can see this was a
space. It had a lid that they would then cover and a
family lived above. They were the cover story for the
kidnap gang.
COOPER: Unbelievable.
WARE: But for the last three months, they would
trowel over with concrete and every three days chip
it open to feed him again. That's a nightmare I can't
even begin to fathom.
COOPER: Let's take a look at this piece.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WARE: Three months after Roy Hallums disappeared in
Baghdad in 2004, this proof of life video appeared.
ROY HALLUMS, KIDNAPPING SURVIVOR (videotape): My name
is Roy Hallums, I'm an American national. Please help
me.
WARE: Hallums was an American contractor, building
mess halls and providing food to the U.S. military,
and his kidnappers were demanding $12 million for his
release.
HALLUMS (on camera): You're just basically in shock.
And you're moving and you're walking but it's almost
like an out of body experience. You can see what's
going on, but you don't believe it.
WARE: Before it was over, Hallums would be held
nearly a full year by Iraqi insurgents -- 311 days,
something I know a little about having been taken by
al Qaeda myself.
WARE (on camera): When I was grabbed by al Qaeda and
pulled from my car, I mean, they were just going to
cut my head off. But it was like it was someone else.
At that moment, it felt to me like it was happening
to someone else even though I was completely or even
hyper-aware of the moment.
HALLUMS: You're right. It's like it's almost third
person, that I can sit there and tell the story. I
can answer any question anybody has. It doesn't
bother me, and what's for lunch, you know?
WARE (voice-over): This is Hallums at the end of his
ordeal. He lost 40 pounds but says he never lost
hope. For most of the time, his kidnappers kept him
in a secret and cramped underground cell, the
entrance sealed shut.
HALLUMS: You could hear them troweling this concrete
over the door, and then they would shove a freezer
over the top of that to hide where the door was.
You're buried in there, and if they decide, well,
it's just too dangerous to go back to the house and
they never come back, then you're in your tomb.
WARE (on camera): Dead men tell no tales.
(voice-over): Eight months after his proof of life
video had appeared, U.S. Special Forces received a
crucial tip on his whereabouts. Worried Hallums would
be moved, they instantly launched a daylight rescue,
four helicopters sweeping into a village south of
Baghdad, this video shot on a soldier's helmet camera
and beamed back live to headquarters. The men smashed
their way into the house. They knew to look under the
freezer, under the rug, and then under the concrete.
HALLUMS: I heard Special Forces pounding on this
little door in the room where I was, and the guy
jumps down in there and says, "Are you Roy?" It's
like, well, this can't really be happening, because
after all this time, they actually found where I was,
you know, which was a miracle.
WARE: Two days after Roy Hallums was rescued, I
joined a U.S. hostage team gathering information and
I shot this video as they returned to the Iraqi
farmhouse and Hallums' hellhole.
It gave me a sense of what may have awaited me or any
other of the westerners kidnapped in Iraq. And now
talking with Hallums, it's forcing me to deal with
things I would rather forget.
My experience began here. I was grabbed in late 2004,
not far from where you see this burning American
Bradley Fighting Vehicle. This is Haifa Street in the
center of Baghdad, and al Qaeda had just taken over
the neighborhood. Like Hallums, I was taken at the
height of al Qaeda's campaign of their videotaped
beheadings, like this one, the last images of one
contractor Nicolas Berg alive.
I actually videotaped my own capture. My camera
catching one of my abductors pulling a pin on a
grenade before they pulled me from the car.
Unlike Hallums, for me there was to be no
imprisonment. This was al Qaeda, and I was going to
die. They readied me immediately for beheading, to be
filmed with my own camera. I was only saved by Iraqi
insurgents I knew who resented al Qaeda's takeover.
(on camera): Your moment of liberation, brother.
(voice-over): Meeting Hallums, sharing our
experiences, flushed up in me a mix of emotions. I
can't even bear the thought of being held for months
on end like he was.
HALLUMS: You're laying there in this little hole in
the dark. You're tied up, hands and feet, and every
little noise, every bump, it's, is this it? Is this
when they're going to do it?
WARE: And as with much in war, you gain a new
perspective on life. We both know nothing is ever
going to be the same for us again.
(on camera): Is it the little things? Like for me,
with all the conflict I've been in, it's the tiny
things. It's a smell or it can be a sound, or it can
be a certain texture or color or word that triggers
or evokes memory. What is it for you?
HALLUMS: Usually little things. I had nylon zip ties
on my wrists 24 hours a day for ten and a half
months. The other day I was out walking my dog and my
neighbor had brought something home from the store
and he was cutting the zip ties off of the bundle,
and I looked down at his yard, and there's these zip
ties laying there that had been cut off.
And it's just one of those things, you remember, you
had a different relationship with that zip tie than
he has.
WARE: In the end, though, it's those who love us
waiting back home, often unknowing, who suffer the
most, while survivors like Hallums -- barely able to
walk or talk after not being able to do either for so
many months -- know just how lucky we are to be
alive.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WARE: And yet as luckily as we are, Anderson, the Roy
Hallums of the world and others know all of this
comes with a price that we'll just keep paying
forever.
COOPER: It's unbelievable how calm he is describing
it.
WARE: He's such a stoic individual. He is so
understated. Yet what I fear is there is so much
buried.
COOPER: It's great that he's made it this far.
Michael, appreciate it, Michael Ware.
WARE: Absolutely.