Posted on 04/26/2003 4:09:07 PM PDT by Dog Gone
Iraqi intelligence documents discovered in Baghdad by The Telegraph have provided the first evidence of a direct link between Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'eda terrorist network and Saddam Hussein's regime.
Papers found yesterday in the bombed headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq's intelligence service, reveal that an al-Qa'eda envoy was invited clandestinely to Baghdad in March 1998.
The documents show that the purpose of the meeting was to establish a relationship between Baghdad and al-Qa'eda based on their mutual hatred of America and Saudi Arabia. The meeting apparently went so well that it was extended by a week and ended with arrangements being discussed for bin Laden to visit Baghdad.
The papers will be seized on by Washington as the first proof of what the United States has long alleged - that, despite denials by both sides, Saddam's regime had a close relationship with al-Qa'eda.
The Telegraph found the file on bin Laden inside a folder lying in the rubble of one of the rooms of the destroyed intelligence HQ. There are three pages, stapled together; two are on paper headed with the insignia and lettering of the Mukhabarat.
They show correspondence between Mukhabarat agencies over preparations for the visit of al-Qa'eda's envoy, who travelled to Iraq from Sudan, where bin Laden had been based until 1996. They disclose what Baghdad hopes to achieve from the meeting, which took place less than five months before bin Laden was placed at the top of America's most wanted list following the bombing of two US embassies in east Africa.
Perhaps aware of the sensitivities of the subject matter, Iraqi agents at some point clumsily attempted to mask out all references to bin Laden, using white correcting fluid. The dried fluid was removed to reveal the clearly legible name three times in the documents.
One paper is marked "Top Secret and Urgent". It is signed "MDA", a codename believed to be the director of one of the intelligence sections within the Mukhabarat, and dated February 19, 1998. It refers to the planned trip from Sudan by bin Laden's unnamed envoy and refers to the arrangements for his visit.
A letter with this document says the envoy is a trusted confidant of bin Laden. It adds: "According to the above, we suggest permission to call the Khartoum station [Iraq's intelligence office in Sudan] to facilitate the travel arrangements for the above-mentioned person to Iraq. And that our body carry all the travel and hotel costs inside Iraq to gain the knowledge of the message from bin Laden and to convey to his envoy an oral message from us to bin Laden."
The letter refers to al-Qa'eda's leader as an opponent of the Saudi Arabian regime and says that the message to convey to him through the envoy "would relate to the future of our relationship with him, bin Laden, and to achieve a direct meeting with him."
According to handwritten notes at the bottom of the page, the letter was passed on through another director in the Mukhabarat and on to the deputy director general of the intelligence service.
It recommends that "the deputy director general bring the envoy to Iraq because we may find in this envoy a way to maintain contacts with bin Laden". The deputy director general has signed the document. All of the signatories use codenames.
The other documents then confirm that the envoy travelled from Khartoum to Baghdad in March 1998, staying at al-Mansour Melia, a first-class hotel. It mentions that his visit was extended by a week. In the notes in a margin, a name "Mohammed F. Mohammed Ahmed" is mentioned, but it is not clear whether this is the the envoy or an agent.
Intriguingly, the Iraqis talk about sending back an oral message to bin Laden, perhaps aware of the risk of a written message being intercepted. However, the documents do not mention if any meeting took place between bin Laden and Iraqi officials.
The file contradicts the claims of Baghdad, bin Laden and many critics of the coalition that there was no link between the Iraqi regime and al-Qa'eda. One Western intelligence official contacted last night described the file as "sensational", adding: "Baghdad clearly sought out the meeting. The regime would have wanted it to happen in the capital as it's only there they would feel safe from surveillance by Western intelligence."
Over the past three weeks, The Telegraph has discovered various other intelligence files in the wrecked Mukhabarat building, including documents revealing how Russia passed on to Iraq details of private conversations between Tony Blair and Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, and how Germany held clandestine meetings with the regime.
A Downing Street spokesman said last night: "Since Saddam's fall a series of documents have come to light which will have to be fully assessed by the proper authorities over a period of time. We will certainly want to study these documents as part of that process to see if they shed new light on the relationship between Saddam's regime and al-Qa'eda.
THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH: Freedom of the press
Our disclosure today does not, of course, amount to evidence that Saddam was directly involved in the destruction of the World Trade Center. But it is a tantalising glimpse of a relationship which may have spawned the most appalling atrocities. We can only speculate about what new revelations - still more explosive - will be made by resourceful journalists in Baghdad.
What was Al Qaeda doing in March '98? I wonder if its first conspicuous attack on us -- the embassy bombings in August (unless TWA 800 the previous month was also Al Qaeda) -- were a result of this alliance with Iraq.
White Out? White Out? They used WhiteOut to cover up Bin Laden's name?
Who was the genius who thought of that? AaHa Ha Ha Ha!
I am laughing my ass off here.
Stop it Iraq, you're killin' me!
I wonder if this find will make them happy.
Probably not.
EYE ON THE GULF
9-11 mastermind Iraqi agent?
Author questions identity of captured al-Qaida operative
Posted: March 19, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
Senior al-Qaida operative Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is not the man he says he is, according to author Laurie Mylroie, who claims if U.S. authorities would do a little digging, they'd discover Mohammed is an Iraqi intelligence agent – a fact that would serve as smoking-gun evidence linking Saddam Hussein to the terror of Sept. 11.
Mylroie, an adjunct fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of the book "The War Against America," laid out her claim in an editorial published by the Wall Street Journal.
Mohammed was captured in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, March 1 and has been providing interrogators with critical information about al-Qaida operations and ongoing attack plots, according to U.S. officials.
WorldNetDaily has reported that Mohammed is being subjected to ''stress and duress''-style interrogation techniques at the Bagram U.S. military base in Afghanistan and has been told that his sons are being held by the U.S.
As the operational leader of the al-Qaida terrorist network, Mohammed is said to be the mastermind of the Sept. 11 terror attacks and is thought to have planned the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings and the bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen in 2000.
Mylroie maintains Mohammed is a Pakistani Baluch, along with Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind behind the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. The two collaborated with a third Baluch in 1995, Abdul Hakam Murad, in an unsuccessful plot to bomb 12 U.S. airplanes. The plot, called "Project Bojinka," involved ramming a fuel-laden airliner into the Pentagon.
Baluchs are Sunni Muslims who live in the desert regions of eastern Iran and western Pakistan – Baluchistan – and have longstanding ties to Iraqi intelligence. Wafiq Samarrai, former chief of Iraqi military intelligence who defected to the West in 1994, explains that Iraqi intelligence worked with the Baluch during the Iran-Iraq war.
WorldNetDaily also reported that information gleaned from the Mohammed interrogations sparked a major new hunt for al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden that was centered around the Baluchistan region. Mohammed said he recently met with bin Laden in the area, and there reportedly have been numerous sightings of bin Laden in the area on both sides of the Iran-Pakistan border.
Mylroie said Mohammed, Yousef and Murad, are part of a tight circle.
Their identities are based on documents from Kuwaiti files that predate Kuwait's liberation from Iraqi occupation. These documents form the basis of Mylroie's false-identity theory. When Iraq occupied Kuwait in 1990 and 1991, it used some Kuwaiti files to create false identities for key agents, according to Mylroie.
There is evidence Yousef's file was tampered with. The front pages of his passport, including his picture and signature are missing. Extraneous information was also inserted: The notation that Yousef and his family left Kuwait on Aug. 26, 1990 – during Iraq's occupation of Kuwait – and traveled through Iraq on their way to Pakistani Baluchistan in Iran.
Mylroie points out people don't provide authorities with itineraries when crossing a border.
She concludes Yousef is an Iraqi agent who assumed the identity of Abdul Basit Karim, a Kuwaiti who disappeared during Iraq's occupation. Records show Yousef entered the U.S. on an Iraqi passport in the name of Ramzi Yousef, but fled on a passport in the name of Abdul Basit Karim.
According to Mylroie, New York FBI – particularly its director, Jim Fox – believed that the 1993 World Trade Center bombing was an Iraqi intelligence operation.
The Los Angeles Times uncovered critical family ties between Mohammed and Karim.
"What little is known about the sister [of Mohammed]," reports the paper, "includes one compelling piece of information: She is thought to be the mother of Abdul Karim Basit, better known as Ramzi Ahmed Yousef."
Mylroie deduces that Mohammed would know if someone was falsely passing himself off as his nephew, and therefore, must be an Iraqi operative as well.
According to documents, Mohammed was born in Kuwait to Pakistani parents on April 19, 1965. That puts Mohammed just under 38 years of age.
In a final point, Mylroie suggests the graying sideburns and heavy jowls in Mohammed's arrest photo circulated by federal agents belong to someone substantially older than 38.
Mylroie's deduction is in keeping with what she has argued for years: Saddam Hussein is likely behind the terrorism against U.S. interests that has occurred throughout the world since the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
This info has been shared with memebers of both parties at briefings. Compare and contrast the reactions. Pubbies openly concerned, Dems saying "Nothing new". IMHO, the Dems were banking on much of this never being made public. The connection now has been. What comes next is "What did the Dems know and when did they know it?".
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