Sibel Edmonds Case: Nukes for sale (Pt 2)

[lukery]

In a blockbuster article two weeks ago, the UK's Sunday Times described how a criminal network of Turkish, Israeli, Pakistani and American diplomats and officials conspired to steal nuclear secrets and sell them to the highest bidder in the nuclear black market.

The article, based primarily on the case of former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds, noted that:

"The wider nuclear network has been monitored for many years by a joint Anglo-American intelligence effort. But rather than shut it down, investigations by law enforcement bodies such as the FBI and Britain’s Revenue & Customs have been aborted to preserve diplomatic relations."

The decisions to preserve those "diplomatic relations" - Pakistan, Turkey and Israel - were made by people within the US Government who happened to be personally profiting from those same relationships.

In this post, I'll discuss two other dimensions of the network that the Times article didn't cover:
a) The use of Turkish front groups to supply nuclear hardware to the network
b) The extraordinary legal steps the US and UK governments have used to hide their guilt

***
Turkish Front Groups

One of AQ Khan's American suppliers was a company with strong Turkish roots called Giza Technologies in New Jersey. Giza's 'exposure' was ' officially' the result of an anonoymous email tip in 2003, however, as we know from Sibel's case, the FBI was aware of Giza's role in the AQ Khan network at least two years earlier. According to a documentary about the nuclear black market element of Sibel's case, Kill The Messenger, Giza's CEO Zeki Bilmen "was on the FBI wiretaps translated by Sibel Edmonds" who left the FBI in early 2002.

Given what we learnt in The Times, that phone call was probably between Bilmen and either the American Turkish Council or the Turkish Embassy - both targets of FBI counter-intelligence operations.

Inexplicably, Zeki Bilmen was never charged with his involvement, and Giza continues operating to this day. In 2005, Sibel said:

And (Giza's) business – well, business is good.

They have many shipments going out, coming in, all day long. To places like Dubai, Spain, South Africa, Turkey. They have branches in all these places. Yep, they're sailing along very smoothly.

When asked how this is possible, Sibel replied:

"It's beyond logical explanation. Maybe it was decided in high places that no one would touch him."

In fact, the identity of the company was even hidden in the indictment of one Humayun Khan, a procurer for the network who was close to Pakistan's ISI. In the indictment, Giza is simply referred to as 'a broker in Secaucus, New Jersey,' whereas every other company is clearly identified.

Investigative journalist Joe Trento might have an explanation for why Giza continues to operate, and why the US government wants to hide Giza's involvement. He says that

"The CIA even started using some of the Khan network’s front companies for its own purposes."

As I documented here, it is very possible that Giza one of those companies. In Kill The Messenger, an anonymous "U.S intelligence officer" who is "very familiar with Turkish espionage activities" - including Giza and the American Turkish Council - says:

"There are people within the State Department and also in the U.S Congress that were facilitating the Israelis and the Turks in obtaining proprietary information or restricted technology.

That’s why there is a gag order against Sibel Edmonds!"

That technology, he notes, can be:

"Nuclear or non nuclear. For example, computer hardware, maybe software."

Some people have wondered recently whether maybe Sibel inadvertently stumbled on a sting operation - but that is clearly not the case. The State Dept and Congress are certainly not the people who would be running a sting operation.

Further, when Sibel first reported her case to Congress, the first step taken was to make sure that this was not a covert operation, and that there weren't any double agents involved. Only after Senators Leahy and Grassley were assured this wasn't the case did they proceeded to hold unclassified hearings (which were retroactively classified.)

This shouldn't come as a surprise. Sibel has previously said that from her experience is concerned:

"The Department of State is easily the most corrupted of the major government agencies."

In fact, the same thing has been true for decades. As far back as 1986, the CIA was running diligent operations against the Khan network; then, as now, it was people at the State Dept who were ruining all the operations. As Seymour Hersh documented in 1993, a high-level top secret inter-governmental group was formed in 1986 "in an effort to stop illegal American exports to Pakistan and other non-nuclear nations." This group ran undercover operations to arrest those buying nuclear-related materials for Pakistan's program. Richard Barlow, "the government’s leading expert on illegal Pakistani procurement," with the full knowledge and support of his superiors at the CIA and elsewhere, was able to engineer the arrest of some of Khan's suppliers - but only after they'd learnt not to tell the State Dept what their plans were. Here's Hersh:

"The State Department’s Near East Bureau was not told of the planned operation, for fear that the officers there would tip off the Pakistanis, as they had done in the past...

“We still have cases on Pakistan and we still don’t tell State about it,” a senior Customs Service official told me recently, in anger. “The State Department constituted a security problem for us."

The Guardian effectively debunked with the same 'sting' claims recently:

"Intelligence officials on both sides of the Atlantic have said they waited until 2003 to strike against the Khan network in order to gather evidence on all its activities and all its customers.

"But what did they achieve?" Armstrong asked. "Where are all the people connected to the Khan network? There were at least 50 people in this thing, and there are only a handful of people under house arrest. Did they need three extra years to do that?""

Not only have very few guilty people suffered any consequences, the US government has even "hampered" the criminal prosecutions of some of the suppliers.

A segment on Democracy Now in 2006 notes:

Over the past year Swiss officials have requested at least four times that the Bush administration share documents and evidence related to Khan’s nuclear black market. But the United States has never responded.

Swiss officials maintain it needs U.S. assistance in order to convict three Swiss men accused of helping AQ Khan set up a secret Malaysian factory to make components for gas centrifuges.

Last week U.S. weapons expert David Albright testified before Congress and said, “I find this lack of cooperation frankly embarrassing to the United States and to those of us who believe that the United States should take the lead in bringing members of the Khan network to justice for arming our enemies with nuclear weapons.”

Albright has floated one theory as to why the Bush administration won’t help the Swiss investigators. He says the three Swiss men accused of being part of AQ Khan’s underground network may have been working for the CIA and being paid by the U.S. government.

Albright is echoing the same point made by Joe Trento - and if these firms weren't helping with a sting operation, then what on earth was the CIA using them for? The problem is that as soon as these firms are given immunity for their activities, then they immediately become a likely vehicle for all types of nefarious activities - whether it be funding illegal black-ops, or trafficking narcotics, or both.

Other American Suppliers
Giza is not the only American supplier to Khan's network. Sibel has previously told me that there are others firms. This was confirmed in 2004 by IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei. The involvement of these firms apparently "sheds new light on the activities of the network, known up to now for primarily supplying technology to North Korea, Libya and Iran." None of these firms have apparently been exposed, let alone faced any criminal charges.

Giza's Bilmen claims that he is an innocent victim, though Sibel told me that Bilmen "has social & business ties" with another supplier to Khan's network, Turkish businessman Selim Alguadis.

Other Turkish Suppliers
Giza is not the only Turkish company involved in supplying the AQ Khan network. Firstly, Turkey served as one of the transhipment hubs for components that were sourced in the US and elsewhere. Further, some of the nuclear components for Khan were actually manufactured in Turkey.

In Sibel's fantastic Highjacking of a Nation series, which outlines the contours of her case, she writes:

Turkey played a major role in Pakistan and Libya’s illicit activities in obtaining nuclear technologies. In June 2004, Stephen Fidler, a reporter for Financial Times reported that in 2003, Turkish centrifuge motors and converters destined for Libya's nuclear weapons program turned up in Tripoli aboard a ship (BBC China) that had sailed from Dubai. One of those detained individuals in this incident, a ‘respected and successful’ Turkish Businessman, Selim Alguadis, was cited in a public report from the Malaysian inspector-general of police into the Malaysian end of a Pakistani-led clandestine network that supplied Libya, Iran and North Korea with nuclear weapons technologies, designs and expertise. According to the report, “he supplied these materials to Libya." Mr. Alguadis also confessed that he had on several occasions met A Q Khan, the disgraced Pakistani scientist who has admitted transmitting nuclear expertise to the three countries. Selim Alguadis remains a successful businessman in Turkey with companies in several other countries. He was released immediately after being turned over to Turkish authorities. His partner, another well-known and internationally recognized wealthy businessman, Gunes Cire, also actively participated in transferring nuclear technology and parts to Iran, Pakistan and North Korea. Although under investigation by several international communities, Alguadis and his partners continued to roam free in Turkey and conduct their illegitimate operations via their ‘legit international business’ front companies.

Gunes Cire has since died, however his company, ETI Elektroteknik, continues to operate freely, with Cire's son now at the helm. Selim Alguadis is apparently 'under investigation' but neither he nor his company, EKA, appear to be in any trouble three years later.

It's an odd pattern. There's strong evidence of Turkish complicity in the nuclear proliferation network, yet guilty people are allowed to walk free, and Western governments go to great lengths to cover up the facts.

States (cough) Secrets

There are significant parallels between Sibel's case and the recent case of British Customs official Atif Amin. The UK government, desperate to cover its complicity in allowing the AQ Khan network to continue proliferating, is trying to shut Amin down using the Official Secrets Act, the British equivalent of the State Secrets Privilege gag that has been used to shut down Sibel's case. Informed observers widely recognize that for the Bush administration, the State Secrets Privilege is simply a 'get out of jail free' card to shield themselves when they commit egregious crimes.

The same is true in the UK. An editorial ', Secrets and lies,' in the Guardian last Friday noted:

"National security is being invoked not to protect us but to shield politicians from embarrassment
<...>
There are genuine threats to national security and to our public and personal safety. It is a dangerous abuse if a government hoists the flag of national security and deploys the Official Secrets Act when all it is really trying to do is protect itself from embarrassment."

In the US, we've recently seen the State Secrets card played to cover up illegal spying, torture, and any number of other crimes - including complicity in the spread of nuclear weapons to our purported enemies.

Enough is enough.

**************************
In case you missed it, the unnamed senior State Department official in last week's Times article is Marc Grossman

*************************
In case you missed it, Sibel found a novel way of exposing the other guilty parties. She posted 18 photos on her website, without explanation. I published the faces along with the names here.

( Email me if you want to be added to my Sibel email list. Subject: 'Sibel email list')

(cross-posted at Let Sibel Edmonds Speak)

[Steven_S]

1. Good work...

always glad to k&r this...

[StateSecrets]

2. Highly Recommended

Lukery, excellent as always. K&R!

[lukery]

4. thanks

Always nice to see you here SS

[Oilwellian]

3. K&R

You make a complicated story easier to understand.

[lukery]

6. highest compliment

Thnx George Oilwellian. That's the highest compliment. Now, if only we can get the US media to comprehend and cover the story too...

[mmonk]

5. Excellent as always.

[Spurt]

7. K&R

[mmonk]

8. Giza Technologies hmmmm.

Think I will study up on them.

[DrDebug]

9. N313P - The flagship of the CIA extraordinary rendition

According to Amnesty International (AI) ( http://www.amnesty.org/resources/flash/torture/renditions/ ) N313P-N4476S has "...396 recorded landings or taking offs between 22 November 2002 and 8 September 2005. Flight records show that it was the plane that took Khaled el-Masri from Skopje to Afghanistan in January 2004, and Human Rights Watch has identified it as the 'plane that the CIA used to move several prisoners to and from Europe, Afghanistan, and the Middle East in 2003 and 2004 – it landed in Poland and Romania on direct flights from Afghanistan on two occasions in 2003 and 2004."

However that's not the only thing this plane did:



A photograph of N313P leaving Palma de Mallorca on March 12, 2004, one day after the Madrid Train Bombings. ( http://www.airliners.net/open.file/0798841/M )

Another strange trip involves a former nuclear test site:

Camp Desert Rock, also known as Desert Atom Camp, Nevada, was home to the Army's Atomic Maneuver Battalion in the 1950s. More than 2,300 soldiers were trained here in 1955. The 100 semi-permanent buildings and more than 500 tents often were filled to the 6,000 personnel capacity. The facility is owned by the Department of Energy.

Desert Rock Airport, with its 7,500-foot runway, was built on the former Camp Desert Rock. At peak operation Camp Desert Rock comprised of 100 semi-permanent buildings, more than 500 tents and some 6,000 troops under the command of the Sixth Army, Presidio, San Francisco, Calif.

The camp was activated in the fall of 1951 for the Buster-Jangle series of seven atmospheric tests. The facility continued through the Operation Teapot series in the spring of 1955.

The troops, from all four services, were deployed. Many observed the detonations from trenches, tanks and armored personnel carriers at distances of 2,500 to 7,000 yards.

(...)

In December 2004, the aircraft tail number/registration was changed from N313P to N4476S (serial number 33010) and ownership was switched from Premiere Executive Transport Services Inc. to Keeler and Tate Managemernt LLC, according to FAA records. Robert Blowers, assistant general manager of Aero Contractors, Ltd. of Smithfield, N.C., confirmed that his company leased this jet from Massachusetts-based Premier Executive Transport Services in about 2002 or 2003. "We do government contracts; they are sensitive in nature," said Blowers, a 22-year veteran of the military who began running the company in 1994.

(...)

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Image:ISI_Consulting%3B_Desert_Rock%2C_Nevada.pdf

However N313P wasn't the only plane flying to that remote location: (Article in German, however blick is the largest Swiss newspaper, so it's not an obscure source)

CIA-Jets: Stelldichein in Camp Atom

HENRY HABEGGER UND BEAT KRAUSHAAR
08.03.2006 | 00:03:59

Die Entführungsjets des CIA gaben sich pikante Stelldicheins. Vor der Entführung von Abu Omar etwa im deutschen Ramstein. Aber auffällig oft auch auf einem verlassenen Atom-Testgelände in der Wüste von Nevada, USA. Wurden dort Terrorverdächtige festgehalten?

(...)

Ein noch mysteriöserer Treffpunkt für CIA-Jets liegt in den USA selbst: In der Wüste von Nevada, einem abgelegener Fleck Erde namens Desert Rock, besser bekannt als «Camp Atom».

* Herkules N8183J der CIA-Tarnfirma Rapid Air Transport: Zwischen Oktober und Dezember 2002 drei Landungen im Atom-Camp.
* Herkules N2189M der Rapid Air Transport, betrieben durch die CIA-Firma Tepper:Im Dezember 2002 und Januar 2003 zwei Landungen.
* Beech King Air N4489A der CIA-Tarnfirma Aviation Specialties. Landete Im Oktober 2002 in Desert Rock.
* Beech King Air N5139A der Aviation Specialties im November 2002.

Was hatten diese Jets dort zu suchen?
Noch mysteriöser wird die Sache, weil in dieser Zeit auch die bekannten CIA-Entführungsjets Station im Camp Atom machten:
* Die berüchtigte Entführungs-Boeing N313P traf am 5. Dezember 2002 in Desert Rock ein. Sie kam direkt aus Europa: Pisa, Italien (Abflug: 1. Dezember), Frankfurt, Deutschland (4. Dezember), Mildenhall, England (4. Dezember). Dabei überflog sie zweimal die Schweiz.

(...)

http://www.blick.ch/news/ausland/folterfluege/artikel33394

So a total of five CIA planes visited a nuclear test site and what did N313P do after all that flying back and forth to Camp Atom:

01.12.2002 From: Portsmouth New Hampshire, USA to: Pisa, Italy 
01.12.2002 From: Pisa, Italy to: Frankfurt, Germany 
04.12.2002 From: Frankfurt, Germany to: Mildenhall, England
04.12.2002 From: Mildenhall, England to: Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland, USA
05.12.2002 From: Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland, USA to: Desert Rock, Nevada, USA
05.12.2002 From: Desert Rock, Nevada, USA to: Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
06.12.2002 From: Las Vegas Nevada to: Kinston, North Carolina, USA
14.12.2002 From: Kinston, North Carolina, USA to: Dulles, Washington DC, USA
15.12.2002 From: Dulles, Washington DC, USA to: Frankfurt, Germany
16.12.2002 From: Frankfurt, Germany to: Islamabad, Pakistan

http://www.statewatch.org/cia/documents/flight-log-N313P.pdf

Indeed after visiting the nuclear test site it waited one week until the other planes had accomplished their mission as well and went to Islamabad, Pakistan...

[mmonk]

12. Interesting indeed.

[Echo In Light]

10. To reiterate my reply to the earlier posting: the "war on terror" only exists in propaganda form

[lukery]

11. helluva job

the propaganda has been extraordinary

Kudos to Edwards for calling it out as a 'bumper sticker'

[lukery]

13. oops

I just realized that my blockquote tags didnt work properly, and it's too late to edit. Sorry about that.

[mmonk]

14. It all works.

[StateSecrets]

15. Interesting

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=88121

They ignore all reports establishing Turkey as the number 1 world supplier of Heroin, and here they are linking Iran; cheap shot, that is!

[mmonk]

16. Yep.

It seems Iran is a more convenient target. Why am I not surprised?

[mmonk]

17. BTW

Did you see this report?

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/01/16/former.congressman.indicted.ap/index.html

[StateSecrets]

19. CNN Report

Lantos is on the board of this guy's company: Global Strategies, Inc. Now that's interesting.

[mmonk]

20. Why yes indeed.

[seemslikeadream]

22. Ptech ** Islamic Charities and the IRS

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2700537&mesg_id=2700537

[lukery]

23. on the board?

or just a referee?

[StateSecrets]

24. Referee Board;-)

Bhutto is there too; in spirit, that is.

[leveymg]

29. Lantos. Yes, indeed. Interesting timing.

Why would Lantos have anything to do with lobbying to lift sanctions on Sudan? Or, for that matter, with transhipping money to Iraq? And, what interest might there be in support to Mr. Hekmatyar?

All very interesting questions.

By the way, regarding Siljander, Debbie Schlussel, a former aide, descibes her former Congressional boss as follows: http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2008/01/what_happened_t_2.html

]So deeply religious and so deeply against the Islamic threat, Siljander was known, at the time, as the most pro-Israel Congressman on Capitol Hill, with many Jewish and pro-Israel Evangelical contributors from all over the world. My father was one of those contributors. His Chief of Staff, Robin Luketina, even served in the Israeli Defense Forces.
Mark enlisted me to help him write a tough bill espousing sanctions against the Soviet Union because of its persecution of Soviet Jews. And he enlisted my help in pro-Israel and anti-PLO legislation.
That's why it's so hard for me to read that he may have played for the opposite team--for the enemy.
I'm truly shocked. And I hope it's not true. But--while I have a lot of distrust in the Department of Justice--on this one, I think there must be something there. It's crushing.
I don't know if he knew the ultimate destination of the money. It's not apparent, since the Islamic charity "secretly" sent the money to Al-Qaeda. But what was he even doing lobbying for an Islamic charity? And he apparently lied about it to the FBI. That's not the Mark Siljander I knew and worked for over two summers and several spring breaks.

[StateSecrets]

32. Exactly

Let's see if 'they' delve deeper than this escape-goat.

[lukery]

35. terrific visual :-) n/t

[lukery]

25. clean bill of health

why is it that Turkey always gets a clean bill of health?

The lobbying/blackmail must be brilliant.

[mmonk]

27. There always seems to be a doctor in the house.

[leveymg]

30. Same doctor treats several patients.

A lucrative practice, I'm sure.

[kenoma]

38. And where was that speech given?

The Center for Strategic and International Studies. Brent Scowcroft is a board member. These people are shameless.

[Richard Steele]

18. K&R

[antigop]

21. K & R. n/t

[seemslikeadream]

26. Sibel Edmonds and other Whistleblowers Group

Sibel Edmonds and other Whistleblowers Group

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=344




We love you Sibel

Sibel Edmonds' State Secrets Gallery of Rogues
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=385&topic_id=83928&mesg_id=83928

[mmonk]

28. .

:kick:

[AntiFascist]

31. K&R, neocons need to support nuke development...

so that they have a reason to attack certain ME nations and change their regimes. There's also the chance of a nuke coming into the US from across the southern border so that we can then go after certain Latin American nation and take over their oil resources.

It is interesting to see the involvement of the Swiss since al Qaeda and BCCI money laundering networks have historically made heavy use of Swiss banks.

[Bullet1987]

33. Almost all of them are Rethugs...

[fascisthunter]

34. It Appears as If there is a War within Our Government

It looks as if good and bad elements are head butting constantly...

It seems as if higher ups are allowing this to go on to possibly sow the seeds of war for future pre-emptive strikes? I could see the neo-cons doing crap like that. :shrug:

[robertpaulsen]

36. K & R!

:kick:

[donkeyotay]

37. Anyone have any thoughts about the latest retirement at state

Nicholas Burns, undersecretary for political affairs, formerly with NATO. Is he spending more time with his family?

[lukery]

39. no thoughts from me

as far as we know there is no evidence connecting him to any of this stuff.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

40. curious about Hastert

what was his role?

[annabanana]

41. Giza Technologies current web site...

http://www.gizatech.com/

[mmonk]

48. Thanks.

[frog92969]

42. Thank you.

My kind of reading.
:grr:

[annabanana]

43. It'd all be a helluva movie, wouldn't 'it?. . . . n/t

[lukery]

44. happy ending?

do we get a happy ending?

[druidity33]

45. maybe

in a post-apocalyptic sorta way. How did Mad Max meet his end? Tina in a steel cage? or was it that he succumbed to The Passion?

Either way, happy endings are for children. I'll take an ending that includes Truth, Justice and the American Way, thank you very much.

:)

[mmonk]

46. "an ending that includes Truth, Justice and the American Way"

Yes, this is what we need. Of course, that would be a happy ending.

[DrDebug]

47. There is Truth, but there is no Justice

Lady Iustitia is both deaf and blind...

When I first looked at N313P and I noticed both the possible nuclear proliferation and the weird Libya-Palma de Mallorca-Madrid Bombing-Palma de Mallorca-Baghdad-Kabul entry I was reminded of an picture from 2003:



Please note that 3 of the 8 already got away with their war crimes. Even though Aznar hardly ever makes a public appearance anymore, he got away with the Iraq war, an outrageous amount of lies during the Madrid Boming, and personally paid a company $12,000 for the destruction of all documents and computer files in his presidential headquarters and because there was not enough time left to make a selection, everything was destroyed and he left a completely empty office. ( http://wsws.org/articles/2004/dec2004/spai-d29.shtml )

Rumsfeld of course managed to get away as well despite a dishonorable discharge and Tony Blair is trying to make peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis (it's like making an arson chief of fire department)

Tyrants tend to die in their sleep at a comfortable old age, like Stalin, Mao and we are all waiting for Kissinger, George H.W. Bush and Suharto.