Creating the Inevitable

[cal04]

The CIA visits Iraq in April 2002

The Bush Administration continues to claim that war against Iraq was always a last resort, but an overwhelming amount of evidence—such as the Downing Street Memo of July 2002, which said military action was “inevitable”—suggests otherwise. I recently spoke with a number of current and former intelligence officials, including two who were familiar with the CIA's pre-war activities in Iraq, and their remarks certainly suggest that the decision to invade was made long before the war began in March of 2003.

One former officer described how in April of 2002, nearly a year before the invasion, the CIA sent a special unit of eight men to “set up shop” in the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq. The team had no support from the Pentagon and was told that if it got into trouble, team members would have to get out on their own. At the start the team had fixed communications “windows” when it made contact with Washington, but otherwise operated with little input from CIA headquarters. “ had an enormous amount of autonomy,” this officer said.

One of the team's chief goals was to develop a network of intelligence sources that could support the invasion and, afterwards, the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq. The team started its efforts with the Kurds. “The key thing was credibility,” said this person. “We had to get them . . . fully committed by convincing them that this time we were serious, we would finish it and get rid of Saddam.”

The CIA was ultimately able to recruit assets in many parts of Iraq, in part because it won support from tribal leaders. "It was extremely well funded,” said the second person involved in the effort. “They passed out . . . a lot of money to the sheikhs.” Agency operators also distributed satellite phones and other communications equipment to support intelligence gathering, and used laser technology to “paint” buildings and other infrastructure so they could be easily targeted when the war began.

more
http://harpers.org/sb-creating-th-1149534425.html

[natrat]

1. profiteering and massive outright theft+rise in # of offshore bank acts

[MadMaddie]

2. Does this count as treason yet?