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Vincent Cannistraro, a former C.I.A. counter-terrorism specialist who now consults for the government, told me, “With Chalabi, we paid to fool ourselves. It’s horrible. In other times, it might be funny. But a lot of people are dead as a result of this. It’s reprehensible.”
The humiliating raid on Chalabi’s home was authorized by the White House, as was a recent decision, by the Defense Department, to eliminate an I.N.C. stipend of three hundred and forty-two thousand dollars per month. Chalabi’s allies at the Pentagon were not notified of the raid in advance, although some knew that it was under consideration. The raid took place amid allegations that Chalabi or other members of the I.N.C. had engaged in numerous misdeeds, including embezzlement, theft, and kidnapping. After Baghdad police began investigating these charges, several of Chalabi’s top lieutenants fled Iraq.
One of them, Aras Karim Habib, the I.N.C.’s intelligence chief, escaped just before the serving of an arrest warrant. He is under investigation for passing classified U.S. government information to Iran—a member of what President Bush calls “the axis of evil.” According to a Chalabi aide, the I.N.C. has heard that it will be accused of telling Iran’s intelligence service that the U.S. had cracked one of its internal codes. Chalabi has denied any wrongdoing, and claims that the spying charge is politically motivated. “They are charges put out by George Tenet and his C.I.A. to discredit us,” he told Tim Russert, on “Meet the Press, ” referring to the C.I.A.’s director. Meanwhile, according to Cannistraro, two Pentagon officials connected to Chalabi are being investigated by the F.B.I., to determine whether an American official gave Chalabi classified intelligence on Iran.
The spying charges have forced Chalabi’s patrons at the Pentagon to distance themselves from him. Paul Wolfowitz, who was one of the earliest and most outspoken proponents of an invasion of Iraq, and who has been friends with Chalabi for years, spoke of him with studied detachment at a recent congressional hearing. He praised the I.N.C.’s effectiveness in providing battlefield intelligence since the war began, but he said, “I think there’s quite a bit of street legend out there that somehow he is the favorite of the Defense Department, and we had some idea of installing him as the leader of Iraq.”
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http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040607fa_fact1