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Who
is Ahmed Chalabi?
By Michel
Chossudovsky
TFF Associate
Professor of Economics, University of
Ottawa
June 5, 2004
On the 20th of May, US forces
raided the Baghdad home of the head of the Iraqi National
Congress (INC) Ahmed Chalabi. The media in chorus,
without further investigation, described the raid as an
effort to silence Chalabi's condemnation of the US-led
occupation:
"My house was attacked... We
avoided by a hair's breadth a clash with my guards. I am
America's best friend in Iraq. If the CPA finds it
necessary to direct an armed attack against my home, you
can see the state of relations between the CPA and the
Iraqi people." ( Press Conference in Baghdad quoted in
the Independent, 20 May 2004)
The reports pointed to "a changed
relationship" between Chalabi and the Coalition. "It's a
stunning reversal!." Washington has decided "to
drop its backing for Mr Chalabi and to distance itself
from him".
Chalabi is said to have been
plotting against the US by putting together "a sectarian
Shiite faction" to apparently destabilize to the
"UN sponsored" transitional government which is slated to
take office on July 1st.
According to press reports, Chalabi
was the target of a US government investigation "into
whether he betrayed American intelligence secrets to
foreign governments, including Iran."
He is also accused of hiding the
records of the oil for food program and for having
"exaggerated" the threat of weapons of mass destruction,
in intelligence transmitted to the Coalition in the
months leading up to the war. In other words, he is said
to have tricked US intelligence into believing there were
WMDs. Where he got this intelligence is not mentioned.
Chalabi returned to Kurdish held Northern Iraq in
February 2003 after 45 years in exile and the INC did not
have an active network inside Iraq, which would have
enabled it to gather intelligence on
WMDs
Puppet without
Strings
From one day to the next, the
puppet is presented as "pulling the strings" and
maneuvering behind the scenes against the US led
coalition.
The official explanation, as
conveyed by the press reports, simply does not make
sense.
Up until the 18th of May, Chalabi
was still on the Pentagon's payroll receiving a modest
monthly allowance of $355,000 (more than 4 million
dollars a year).
His job was described as
"intelligence gathering." Two days later his house
is raided. According to Deputy Defense Secretary Paul
Wolfowitz, cutting his pocket money was part of the
"natural evolution" towards democracy in Iraq:
"That was a decision that was made
in light of the process of transferring sovereignty to
the Iraqi people... There has been some very valuable
intelligence that's been gathered through that process
that's been very important for our forces, but we will
seek to obtain that in the future through normal
intelligence channels." (quoted in the Financial Times,
21 May 2004)
On the 18th of May, they cut his
money and the following day they raid his
office?
A puppet does not turn against his
master, particularly when key members of his staff,
including his main advisers and spokesmen, are US
appointees who report directly back to the
Pentagon.
Who is Ahmed
Chalabi?
Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi
National Council are a creation of the
CIA.
Chalabi is an Iraqi emigrè,
handpicked by US intelligence.
He left Iraq and moved to the US
with his family at age 13. He holds a US
passport.
Chalabi returned to Iraq barely one
month before the war. He had not set foot in Iraq since
his childhood.
On April 6 2003, US troops escorted
him to Nasiriya, where he established, with the support
of the US military, the so-called Free Iraqi Forces, a
paramilitary army of some 600 fighters.
Since his return to Iraq, he has
been a leading figure of the US sponsored Iraqi Governing
Council.
Chalabi may have some degree of
controlled "independence", but he remains a US sponsored
"intelligence asset". Key members of his staff, report to
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz.
The press reports seem to suggest a
"blowback". Our trusted ally has gone against
us.":
Washington's longtime ally who was
once favored by the Pentagon brass to be Iraq's post-war
leader.
The Iraqi National Police and
American military police hauled away computers,
documents, and a "valuable Koran" from his office,
according to Chalabi, a senior member of Iraq's Governing
Council and head of the Iraqi National
Congress.
In an angry letter to FBI Director
Robert Mueller and CIA Director George Tenet, the Boston
law firm that represents Chalabi, Markham & Read,
said a large contingent of police and armed plainclothes
Americans ransacked the INC's offices and Chalabi's
nearby home, ripping computers from their sockets and
smashing doors.
"They marauded his office and
disrespected his family," attorney John J. E. Markham II
told the Globe by telephone. He said Chalabi believed the
US-led coalition had launched a vendetta against the INC
leader because "he is starting to distance himself from
the folly of [Paul] Bremer," the top US
administrator in Iraq.
Yesterday's raid appeared to be the
climax of a relationship gone bad, in which grievances on
both sides have mounted during the past year's
difficulties in Iraq. Pentagon officials relied on
Chalabi and the INC heavily before the war to assess both
Saddam Hussein's weapons capabilities and the chances of
success of a US-led war. (Boston Globe, 21 May
2004).
Propaganda
Ploy
Following the Gulf War, the CIA
assigned a public relations firm the Rendon Group: "to
help organize, advise, and stage-manage the Iraqi
opposition... " In fact, the Rendon Group created the
Iraqi National Congress (INC) and its leader Ahmed
Chalabi from scratch,--i.e. from a virtually nonexistent
entity into a US sponsored political proxy, which would
faithfully serve US interests. "Were it not for Rendon,"a
State Department official remarked, "the Chalabi group
wouldn't even be on the map.". (See Michel
Chossudovsky, War Propaganda and the Capture of Saddam
Hussein, December
2003)
In fact, the Rendon Group even
chose the name of the INC:
"At the helm of the INC is Ahmed
Chalabi, a US-trained mathematician who fled from Jordan
in 1989 in the trunk of a car after the collapse of a
bank he owned. He was subsequently charged and sentenced
in absentia to 22 years in prison for embezzlement. Back
home in Iraq, he's referred to by some as the so-called
limousine insurgent and is said to hold little actual
standing with the Iraqi public. Shuttling between London
and DC, Chalabi hasn't been in Iraq for over years, and
draws "more support on the Potomac than the Euphrates,"
says Iraq specialist Andrew Parasiliti of the Middle East
Institute in Washington DC.
With funding first from the CIA
throughout the 1990s and more recently the Pentagon,
Rendon managed the INC's every move, an INC spokesperson
acknowledges, even choosing its name, coordinating its
annual strategy conferences, and orchestrating its
meetings with diplomatic heavy hitters, such as James
Baker and Brent Scowcroft. Not that the Rendon Group was
the first purveyor of psy-op tactics for promoting US
foreign policy in the region. In fact, some of the most
impressive spin maneuvers and disinformation campaigns
occurred during the Gulf War in 1991, the lessons of
which are particularly pertinent as the US again gears up
(See Ian Urbina, This War Brought to You by Rendon Group,
Asia Times Online, 12 November 2002,
http://www.gvnews.net/html/Shadow/alert3553.html
).
Since the Gulf War, The Rendon
Group has been involved in several core disinformation
operations. It worked closely with its British partner
Hill and Knowlton, which was responsible for the 1990
Kuwaiti incubator media scam, where Kuwaiti babies were
allegedly removed from incubators in a totally fabricated
news story, which was then used to get Congressional
approval for the 1991 Gulf War. A fabricated statement by
a "Kuwaiti nurse" was presented to the US Congress, who
claimed to have seen Iraqi soldiers removing the babies
from the incubators, looting the maternity ward and
killing the babies. It turned out that the "nurse" was
the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador in Washington. Her
statement, had been commissioned by the Rendon Group.
(See Financial Times, 15 July 2003).
The Office of
Strategic Influence (OSI)
When Donald Rumsfeld created his
propaganda outfit called The Office of Strategic
Influence (OSI) in the wake of September 11, 2001, the
Rendon Group (TRG), was hired by the OSI as a core
consulting firm.
It was to provide the public
relations and psych-ops input in support of the Bush
administration's "war on terrorism". It was also
entrusted with a media and PR campaign to discredit the
Baathist regime in the Middle East, demonize Saddam
Hussein and build an Iraqi opposition.
When the OSI was officially
disbanded, following pressures from the US Congress,
several of its activities were transferred to The Office
of Special Plans (OSP) created by Deputy Secretary
Paul Wolfowitz. (The OSP was subsequently also
disbanded).
Several of the OSP's specific
propaganda operations were outsourced to the private
sector. The Rendon Group, which had created Ahmed
Chalabi, remained one of the key PR firm on
contract to the Pentagon.
The "Liberation of Baghdad" media
spin and the staged pulling down of the statue of Saddam
on Fardhus square on April 8th was in all likelihood the
work of a private PR consulting firm on contract to the
Pentagon. Members of the INC had allegedly been brought
in for a media staged event. (for further details, see
The pulling down of the Statue was a staged media event,
11 April 2003
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/NYI304A.html , See
also Michel Chossudovsky, Killing the "Unembedded Truth"
by Michel Chossudovsky, 11 April 2003,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO304B.html
).
In the wake of the war, Rendon
supported the creation of the INC's daily newspaper Al
Mu'tamar, which played a key role in releasing the story
of Saddam's capture. A (former) staff member of the
Rendon Group, Francis Brooke, who is now Chalabi key
adviser, was behind the "opposition media" in Baghdad
from the beginning of the US led occupation, including TV
and news print (including the Al Mutamar
project).
Was the Raid on
Chalabi's home a Staged Event?
Was the raid on Chalabi's home part
of a staged event, which sought to present a US sponsored
puppet as a legitimate figure of the Iraqi
opposition?
While there is no proof, there are
several pieces of contradictory information, which cast
serious doubt on the official version of
events.
Chalabi is accused of "betraying
American intelligence secrets to foreign governments,
including Iran," In other words, the US is accusing him
of entering into secret negotiations with
Iran:
"The State Department and CIA, have
recently expressed deep concern about a surge in recent
intelligence alleging that the INC and Chalabi have been
passing on potentially dangerous information to officials
in the government of Iran. Though Chalabi has never made
any secret of his cordial relations with top Iranian
officialsóone of his aides claimed that Chalabi
had held discussions with most top Iranian officials over
the last six monthsóBush administration officials
say the latest intelligence indicates he may have been
supplying the Iranians with information on U.S. security
operations in Iraq that could ìget people
killed.î (MNSBC, 20 May 2004)
Visibly these accusations are
fabricated, because the people who are making decisions
for Chalabi with regard to Iran, are Pentagon appointees.
Chalabi cannot move without his US appointed
advisers.
Francis Brooke, who is Chalabi's
right hand man has close ties with National Security
Council Chairman Condoleezza Rice and Deputy Secretary of
Defense Paul Wolfowitz. He has played a central
role in Chalabi's intelligence undertakings including his
links to Iran.
Formerly with the Rendon Group,
Brooke is on contract in Baghdad with BKSH and
Associates, which is controlled by Charles R. "Charlie"
Black, Jr., a leading Republican political strategist and
lobbyist, with close ties to Reagan, Bush Senior and Bush
Junior.
BKSH is using Chalabi and the INC
to "open doors" into Iraq on behalf of US
corporations.
Following the raid on Chalabi's
home, Francis Brooke said that "Mr. Chalabi had never
shared any secret information with the Iranians." The
fact of the matter, is that Chalabi was used by US
intelligence to lead a secret US mission to Tehran and
the man behind that mission was "our man in Baghdad"
Francis Brookes:
Brooke, who was traveling with
Chalabi, ... was so warmly received wherever he went in
Tehran that journalists who met with Chalabi were
intrigued. They noted that Iranian officials from the
departments of security and foreign affairs, the
Revolutionary Guards and the presidency were even more
interested in Brooke than in the INC leader
himself.
A young Iranian journalist who
asked a Foreign Ministry official just back from a
meeting between Brooke and a senior Iranian National
Security official whether Chalabiís PR consultant
had indeed delivered a letter from the US administration
to the Iranian leadership said that the Foreign Ministry
man replied: ìAll I can say is that he (Brooke) is
an important person who knows many secrets. We believe he
is in contact with Washington decision-making circles. We
therefore have to use the opportunity of his being in
Tehran to convey our point of view to the Bush
administration vis-a-vis the war on Iraq especially
since the US government has closed off all other avenues
open to us.î (Ali Nourizadeh, Frances Brooke, the
man behind the new Iran-US entente on Iraq. Daily Star,
22 March 2003)
In other words, it was not Chalabi
who brokered a deal with the Iranians but the Pentagon's
appointee, Francis Brooke.
New
Image
The raid on Chalabi's home creates
the impression that Chalabi is no longer a figurehead
controlled by the US, but a person of political
moderation who speaks his own mind.
The Bush Administration is acutely
aware that for Chalabi to continue performing the role of
an "effective puppet", he needs a new image, which
presents him to public opinion in Iraq and the Middle
East not only as "independent" but
anti-American.
Chalabi is still a puppet. He
cannot move without the consent of the
Pentagon.
With mounting resistance, the US
cannot reasonably install a political proxy and expect
Iraqis to rally behind him.
Whether this strategy will succeed
is doubtful and this is one of the main reasons behind
the US decision to dump the Iraqi Governing
Council.
In Iraq, Chalabi is still viewed
for what he is, a creature of the CIA.
Whether he plays a direct role in
the political transition remains to be seen.
Whether he integrates a transition
government or not, or whether that transition government
will actually be formed by July 1st, Ahmed Chalabi will
continue to perform an important role on behalf of his US
sponsors.
He constitutes a go-between in the
shady dealings of channeling of foreign investment into
Iraq, meaning the confiscation of the country's wealth by
a handful of corporations.
In this context, he is used as a
bridge, between selected Iraqi business collaborators and
US companies. His adviser Francis Brookes acts on
behalf of BKSH and Associates, controlled by Charles R.
"Charlie" Black, Jr. and BKSH acts on behalf of major US
investors into Iraq.
In turn, Chalabi's nephew Salem
Chalabi runs a law firm called the Iraqi International
Law Group (IILG). (The Guardian 24 September 2003). The
IILG was set up in July 2003 ìto provide foreign
enterprise with the information and tools it needs to
enter the emerging Iraq and to succeedî, according
to its website. ìOur clients number among the
largest corporations and institutions on the
planet,î (quoted in Brian
Whitaker, Zionist Settler Joins Iraqi to Promote
Trade,
But it turns out that the IILG
based in Baghdad is in fact a proxy for a Washington
based law firm, Zell, Goldberg & Co, "which claims to
be 'one of Israel's fastest-growing business-oriented law
firms".
In turn, Zell, Goldberg and Co is
the Israeli affiliate of the FANDZ
International Law Group.
Now it just so happens that FANDZ is a partnership
between Marc Zell and Department of Defense
Undersecretary Douglas Feith, who, while on leave from
the company, reports directly to Paul Wolfowitz and Don
Rumsfeld.
"The
FANDZ INTERNATIONAL LAW GROUP was established in 1999
with the formation of Zell, Goldberg & Co. and its
alliance with Feith & Zell, P.C"
In other words, in the complex web
of political puppets, law firms and public relations
consulting outfits, all roads lead up the ladder to the
Pentagon's highest ranks.
Chalabi has not been dumped. Quite
the opposite. He now emerges with a brand new
anti-American image, which contributes to confusing
public opinion. He remains America's Number One
"intelligence asset" in Baghdad, serving a central role
in the economic colonization of Iraq.
The ultimate objective of the US
led occupation is to confiscate Iraq's resources
including its oil wells and gain full control over the
national economy.
Faced with mounting popular
resistance, that desperate process can only be undertaken
under the smokescreen of an illusive national
sovereignty.
The URL of this article is: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO405D.html
©
TFF & the author 2004
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