Chalabigate
"Weapons of Mass Deception"
2004-05-21
Chalabi's Seat of Honor Lost to Open Political Warfare With U.S.
The New York Times
May 21, 2004
By DAVID E. SANGER
WASHINGTON, May 20 — By all appearances, Ahmad Chalabi reached the pinnacle of influence in Washington four months ago, when he took a seat of honor right behind Laura Bush at the president's State of the Union address. To all the world, he looked like the Iraqi exile who had returned home victorious, a favorite of the Pentagon who might run the country once the American occupation ended.
In fact, as Mr. Chalabi applauded President Bush, his influence in Washington had already eroded.
The intelligence about unconventional weapons that his Iraqi National Congress helped feed to senior Bush administration officials and data-starved intelligence analysts — evidence that created the urgency behind the march toward war — was already crumbling. Intelligence officials now argue some of it was fabricated. The much-discussed, much-denied effort by Pentagon officials to install him as Iraq's leader had already faded.
By Thursday morning, when his home and office were raided by the Iraqi police and American troops seeking evidence of fraud, embezzlement and kidnapping by members of his Iraqi National Congress — and perhaps an explanation of his dealings with Iranian intelligence — Mr. Chalabi was already engaged in open political warfare with the Bush administration.
Now he says that with the liberation of Iraq, the United States should get out of the way. "My message is let my people go, let my people be free," he said, clearly angry that his bedroom had been invaded and that his computers and papers had been confiscated. "We are grateful to President Bush for liberating Iraq, but it is time for the Iraqi people to run their affairs."
It was an outburst that followed a long winter and spring of growing tensions. Mr. Chalabi has denounced the American plan to let the United Nations choose an interim government for Iraq. Just three days ago, the Pentagon announced that it would terminate his organization's 5,000-a-month contract with the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Over the years, the Iraqi National Congress has received about million from the State Department, according to a new General Accounting Office report. In addition it got million from the Defense Intelligence Agency. In return, Mr. Chalabi provided intelligence on weapons that one senior American intelligence official described earlier this week as "useless at best, and misleading at worst." Other officials say Mr. Chalabi's group was more accurate in identifying the whereabouts of former Saddam Hussein loyalists.
The raid was a remarkable reversal for a man who, in lunches with politicians, secret sessions with intelligence chiefs and frequent conversations with reporters from Foggy Bottom to London's Mayfair, worked furiously to plot Mr. Hussein's fall.
His biggest success came in 1998. That year a group of influential conservatives wrote an "Open Letter" to President Bill Clinton calling for "regime change" in Iraq to become the official policy of the United States. Those signing the document included many of the men who came to dominate the top ranks of the Bush administration three years later: Donald H. Rumsfeld, Paul D. Wolfowitz, Douglas J. Feith, Richard L. Armitage, Elliott Abrams and Zalmay M. Khalilzad, among others.
Their entreaty helped propel an act of Congress that Mr. Clinton endorsed. And the letter stated clearly that the United States should "recognize a provisional government of Iraq based on the principles and leaders of the Iraqi National Congress (I.N.C.) that is representative of all the peoples of Iraq."
That never became official policy, but it clearly cemented Mr. Chalabi's position as a favorite. The act allowed millions of dollars to flow to the Iraqi National Congress, although many in the Clinton administration doubted Mr. Chalabi's ability to lead an overthrow of Iraq. Many of Mr. Clinton's top advisers dismissed him. "Saddam isn't going to be overthrown by a bunch of guys with briefcases in London," Samuel R. Berger, then the national security adviser, once said. Others noted his conviction for defrauding his bank in Jordan 12 years ago; Mr. Chalabi and his supporters say he was framed.
But those doubts were largely forgotten when the signatories of the 1998 letter came to power in 2001. Mr. Chalabi became a frequent visitor to the Pentagon and the White House, even though he was snubbed by the Central Intelligence Agency and the State Department. He became a master of the art of the leak, giving new currency to the suspicions about Mr. Hussein's weapons.
But he also made many enemies. Richard N. Perle, one of his strongest supporters here, another signatory of the letter, and a highly influential figure in defense circles, alluded to that Thursday after calling the raid on the Iraqi National Congress operations "bizarre."
"It is far from obvious how we advance American interests by acting against someone who shares our values and is highly effective," Mr. Perle said in an interview. "They have gone in recent days, at the C.I.A. and the State Department, from saying he has no influence in Iraq to a panic that he is really quite effective and could emerge with great influence" when the occupation ends. He predicted that "the crude nature of this action will actually have the reverse effect, and bolster Ahmad."
Among Mr. Chalabi's other vociferous defenders over the last three years have been Vice President Dick Cheney and Mr. Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense, who could often be overheard describing Mr. Chalabi's love of both the Iraqi people and the land he left at age 13. But both men were careful never to state outright what role they thought Mr. Chalabi should play, beyond a confidence he would rise to the top.
Mr. Chalabi in recent months has veered between tepid defenses of the case he made against Mr. Hussein and increasingly vitriolic descriptions of the American occupation.
"We are heroes in error," he told the London Daily Telegraph in February, when asked whether he had fed faulty intelligence to the United States and Britain to stoke the case for war. "As far as we're concerned we've been entirely successful. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important. The Bush administration is looking for a scapegoat." Mr. Chalabi said later that he had been misquoted.
Quoted accurately or not, he became more concerned that he was becoming that scapegoat and broke with the administration when it seemed clear that he and other leading members of the Governing Council might be frozen out of the interim government that the United Nations is expected to create with American guidance to take over on July 1.
Mr. Wolfowitz told Congress on Tuesday that it was the imminent transfer of sovereignty that led to the Pentagon's decision to end the contract with Mr. Chalabi's group.
Mr. Chalabi had no doubt what his role was: the man who led the liberation of Iraq. In an interview last winter, when he was leading an effort to keep the Iraqi Governing Council in power even after a new Iraqi government took office, Mr. Chalabi argued that he and others on the council "are the ones that opposed Saddam Hussein for all those years and, allied with the United States, overthrew him."
"Now the United States wants to overthrow us?" he asked.
Reacting to that, Sheik Ghazi Marshal Ajil al-Yawar, another council member who is its president today, shook his head and said: "They think they are entitled to a role because they believe they overthrew Saddam Hussein. It was the United States that overthrew Saddam while we were eating TV dinners."
Date: 2004-05-21
Source: The New York Times (www.nytimes.com/2004/05/21/politics/21EXIL.html?hp)
This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
May 21, 2004
By DAVID E. SANGER
WASHINGTON, May 20 — By all appearances, Ahmad Chalabi reached the pinnacle of influence in Washington four months ago, when he took a seat of honor right behind Laura Bush at the president's State of the Union address. To all the world, he looked like the Iraqi exile who had returned home victorious, a favorite of the Pentagon who might run the country once the American occupation ended.
In fact, as Mr. Chalabi applauded President Bush, his influence in Washington had already eroded.
The intelligence about unconventional weapons that his Iraqi National Congress helped feed to senior Bush administration officials and data-starved intelligence analysts — evidence that created the urgency behind the march toward war — was already crumbling. Intelligence officials now argue some of it was fabricated. The much-discussed, much-denied effort by Pentagon officials to install him as Iraq's leader had already faded.
By Thursday morning, when his home and office were raided by the Iraqi police and American troops seeking evidence of fraud, embezzlement and kidnapping by members of his Iraqi National Congress — and perhaps an explanation of his dealings with Iranian intelligence — Mr. Chalabi was already engaged in open political warfare with the Bush administration.
Now he says that with the liberation of Iraq, the United States should get out of the way. "My message is let my people go, let my people be free," he said, clearly angry that his bedroom had been invaded and that his computers and papers had been confiscated. "We are grateful to President Bush for liberating Iraq, but it is time for the Iraqi people to run their affairs."
It was an outburst that followed a long winter and spring of growing tensions. Mr. Chalabi has denounced the American plan to let the United Nations choose an interim government for Iraq. Just three days ago, the Pentagon announced that it would terminate his organization's 5,000-a-month contract with the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Over the years, the Iraqi National Congress has received about million from the State Department, according to a new General Accounting Office report. In addition it got million from the Defense Intelligence Agency. In return, Mr. Chalabi provided intelligence on weapons that one senior American intelligence official described earlier this week as "useless at best, and misleading at worst." Other officials say Mr. Chalabi's group was more accurate in identifying the whereabouts of former Saddam Hussein loyalists.
The raid was a remarkable reversal for a man who, in lunches with politicians, secret sessions with intelligence chiefs and frequent conversations with reporters from Foggy Bottom to London's Mayfair, worked furiously to plot Mr. Hussein's fall.
His biggest success came in 1998. That year a group of influential conservatives wrote an "Open Letter" to President Bill Clinton calling for "regime change" in Iraq to become the official policy of the United States. Those signing the document included many of the men who came to dominate the top ranks of the Bush administration three years later: Donald H. Rumsfeld, Paul D. Wolfowitz, Douglas J. Feith, Richard L. Armitage, Elliott Abrams and Zalmay M. Khalilzad, among others.
Their entreaty helped propel an act of Congress that Mr. Clinton endorsed. And the letter stated clearly that the United States should "recognize a provisional government of Iraq based on the principles and leaders of the Iraqi National Congress (I.N.C.) that is representative of all the peoples of Iraq."
That never became official policy, but it clearly cemented Mr. Chalabi's position as a favorite. The act allowed millions of dollars to flow to the Iraqi National Congress, although many in the Clinton administration doubted Mr. Chalabi's ability to lead an overthrow of Iraq. Many of Mr. Clinton's top advisers dismissed him. "Saddam isn't going to be overthrown by a bunch of guys with briefcases in London," Samuel R. Berger, then the national security adviser, once said. Others noted his conviction for defrauding his bank in Jordan 12 years ago; Mr. Chalabi and his supporters say he was framed.
But those doubts were largely forgotten when the signatories of the 1998 letter came to power in 2001. Mr. Chalabi became a frequent visitor to the Pentagon and the White House, even though he was snubbed by the Central Intelligence Agency and the State Department. He became a master of the art of the leak, giving new currency to the suspicions about Mr. Hussein's weapons.
But he also made many enemies. Richard N. Perle, one of his strongest supporters here, another signatory of the letter, and a highly influential figure in defense circles, alluded to that Thursday after calling the raid on the Iraqi National Congress operations "bizarre."
"It is far from obvious how we advance American interests by acting against someone who shares our values and is highly effective," Mr. Perle said in an interview. "They have gone in recent days, at the C.I.A. and the State Department, from saying he has no influence in Iraq to a panic that he is really quite effective and could emerge with great influence" when the occupation ends. He predicted that "the crude nature of this action will actually have the reverse effect, and bolster Ahmad."
Among Mr. Chalabi's other vociferous defenders over the last three years have been Vice President Dick Cheney and Mr. Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense, who could often be overheard describing Mr. Chalabi's love of both the Iraqi people and the land he left at age 13. But both men were careful never to state outright what role they thought Mr. Chalabi should play, beyond a confidence he would rise to the top.
Mr. Chalabi in recent months has veered between tepid defenses of the case he made against Mr. Hussein and increasingly vitriolic descriptions of the American occupation.
"We are heroes in error," he told the London Daily Telegraph in February, when asked whether he had fed faulty intelligence to the United States and Britain to stoke the case for war. "As far as we're concerned we've been entirely successful. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important. The Bush administration is looking for a scapegoat." Mr. Chalabi said later that he had been misquoted.
Quoted accurately or not, he became more concerned that he was becoming that scapegoat and broke with the administration when it seemed clear that he and other leading members of the Governing Council might be frozen out of the interim government that the United Nations is expected to create with American guidance to take over on July 1.
Mr. Wolfowitz told Congress on Tuesday that it was the imminent transfer of sovereignty that led to the Pentagon's decision to end the contract with Mr. Chalabi's group.
Mr. Chalabi had no doubt what his role was: the man who led the liberation of Iraq. In an interview last winter, when he was leading an effort to keep the Iraqi Governing Council in power even after a new Iraqi government took office, Mr. Chalabi argued that he and others on the council "are the ones that opposed Saddam Hussein for all those years and, allied with the United States, overthrew him."
"Now the United States wants to overthrow us?" he asked.
Reacting to that, Sheik Ghazi Marshal Ajil al-Yawar, another council member who is its president today, shook his head and said: "They think they are entitled to a role because they believe they overthrew Saddam Hussein. It was the United States that overthrew Saddam while we were eating TV dinners."
Date: 2004-05-21
Source: The New York Times (www.nytimes.com/2004/05/21/politics/21EXIL.html?hp)
This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Milton Frihetsson, 06:46
