Operation Iraqi Freedom documents
Encyclopedia : O : OP : OPE : Operation Iraqi Freedom documents
Operation Iraqi Freedom Documents refers to some 55,000 boxes of documents, audiotapes and videotapes that may or may not have been produced by the government of Saddam Hussein. The documents date from the 1980s through the post-Saddam period. The U.S. government seized the records after the 2003 invasion of Iraq and is releasing them on the Internet, requesting Arabic translators around the world to help in the translation. The documents can be found at the Foreign Military Studies Office Joint Reserve Intelligence Center website. [link]
Accordingly, the website issues a warning that:
- the US Government has made no determination regarding the authenticity of the documents, validity or factual accuracy of the information contained therein, or the quality of any translations, when available.
The New York Times reported that "All the documents, which are available on fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/products-docex.htm, have received at least a quick review by Arabic linguists and do not alter the government's official stance, officials say. On some tapes already released, in fact, Mr. Hussein expressed frustration that he did not have unconventional weapons."[link]
An article in Weekly Standard states that at the time the documents were seized, the priority was on learning about the Iraqi WMD program so documents that dealt with other matters such as Saddam's support for Islamic terrorism were less likely to be studied. [link] Recently translated documents indicating a cooperative relationship between Iraqi Intelligence Service and al-Qaeda have persuaded 9/11 Commission member Bob Kerrey the 9/11 Commission underestimated the cooperative working relationhsip.[link]
A \"bold innovation\"
Releasing the documents over the Internet to gain the help of translators around the world is a new idea that was pushed by Congressman Pete Hoekstra. The Associated Press quoted Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists government secrecy project saying it's a "radical notion" that "members of the public could contribute to the intelligence analysis process. ... That is a bold innovation." The AP also quoted Glenn Reynolds, the blogger at Instapundit.com: "The secret of the 21st century is attract a lot of smart people to focus on problems that you think are important." [link]Critics of the approach
John Prados, author of the book, "Hoodwinked: The Documents That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War" said "I would bet that the materials that they chose to post were the ones that were suggestive of a threat." Prados, an analyst with the National Security Archive, a non-governmental research institute, dismissed the documents: "The collection is good material for somebody who wants to do a biography of Saddam Hussein, but in terms of saying one thing or the other about weapons of mass destruction, it's not there." [link]Former CIA and State Department counterterrorism expert Larry C. Johnson said, "It's like putting firearms in the hands of children. The problem is that the documents without context aren't going to tell you a lot." Johnson also noted that "it's also an indictment of the intelligence community. They don't have the resources ... they haven't got the time to go through this stuff."[link]
Other experts have suggested that the problem is that bloggers will cherry pick information from the documents to solidify their own perspectives without putting the tidbits they find in an overall historical context. Former CIA terrorism specialist Michael Scheuer pointed this out in an interview with the New York Times: "There's no quality control. You'll have guys out there with a smattering of Arabic drawing all kinds of crazy conclusions. Rush Limbaugh will cherry-pick from the right, and Al Franken will cherry-pick from the left."[link]
History professor Fritz Umbach claims in Salon.com that the document archive has been seeded "with suggestive jihadist materials" unrelated to the war in Iraq, and cites specific examples. Umbach claims to have identified "approximately 40 files that are either completely unrelated to Iraq, or that are related only through jihadist elements of the insurgency that began after Saddam's fall." He also notes that the archive website was linked "to an entirely unrelated database of al-Qaida materials," the Harmony database, creating confusion over documents suggestive of a link between Iraq and al-Qaeda. Umbach writes, "Whether intentional or not, the conflation and confusion of materials has been more than sufficient to convince bloggers on the political right that there were, as Bush officials insisted, operational links between Saddam's Iraq and al-Qaida."[link]
History of the documents
The Ba'athists were said to be "meticulous record-keepers."[link] The documents were found in government offices in Iraq and Afghanistan. A debate ensued inside the government regarding whether these documents should be released to the public. Because the documents were not being made public through the normal channels, certain documents began to leak out through unconventional channels.The first set of documents were released to an online media outlet called Cybercast News Service.[link] A second set of documents generated greater media attention when they were released to The Intelligence Summit. The Intelligence Summit was holding an international intelligence conference and was able to get national television coverage of some of the audiotapes of Saddam Hussein talking to his top officials.[link] A spokeswoman for John Negroponte, the Directorate of National Intelligence, noted that "Intelligence community analysts from the CIA and the DIA reviewed the translations and found that while fascinating from a historical perspective, the tapes do not reveal anything that changes their postwar analysis of Iraq's weapons programs, nor do they change the findings contained in the comprehensive Iraq Survey Group report."[link]
Congressman Pete Hoekstra, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, described the rationale for the public disclosure of the documents as follows:
- "We're hoping to unleash the power of the Internet, unleash the power of the blogosphere, to get through these documents and give us a better understanding of what was going on in Iraq before the war" [link]
According to Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, the release of the documents "looks like an effort to discover a retrospective justification for the war in Iraq."[link] The Pentagon cautions that the government "has made no determination regarding the authenticity of the documents, validity or factual accuracy of the information contained therein, or the quality of any translations, when available." The Los Angeles Times notes that "the documents do not appear to offer any new evidence of illicit activity by Hussein, or hint at preparations for the insurgency that followed the invasion."[link]
Iraqi Perspectives Project
After the fall of Baghdad, the United States Joint Forces Command commissioned a study of the inner workings and behavior of Saddam's regime, referred to as the Iraqi Perspectives Project. The study authors drew on many of the Iraqi Freedom documents, together with interviews with dozens of captured senior Iraqi military and political leaders, and summarized the study's key findings in a Foreign Affairs article titled [Saddam's Delusions], and have also made their [full report] available.
The study's findings represent the analysis of many of the Iraqi Freedom documents and related interviews. In particular, the project concluded that: (1) Saddam's secretive and authoritarian government, together with his paranoia, rendered the Iraqi army grossly unprepared for conflict with coalition forces; (2) Saddam grossly miscalculated the ability of his contacts with the Russian, French, Chinese and other governments to prevent military action against Iraq, and (3) although Iraq almost certainly did not possess weapons of mass destruction, Saddam's desire to preserve ambiguity on the issue, together with his government's secrecy and previous attempts to deceive UN inspectors made it difficult for Iraq to convince the world that it had disarmed. For more information, see Iraqi Perspectives Project.
The study also cites documents demonstrating that key evidence presented by Colin Powell to the United Nations in February 2003 had been severely misinterpreted by the U.S. government. Audiotapes played by Powell during his presentation, cited by Powell as evidence of Iraqi attempts to circumvent U.N. regulations on WMD, were reexamined in light of the new documents. According to the authors of the study:
- Ironically, it now appears that some of the actions resulting from Saddam's new policy of cooperation actually helped solidify the coalition's case for war. Over the years, Western intelligence services had obtained many internal Iraqi communications, among them a 1996 memorandum from the director of the Iraqi Intelligence Service directing all subordinates to "insure that there is no equipment, materials, research, studies, or books related to manufacturing of the prohibited weapons (chemical, biological, nuclear, and missiles) in your site." And when UN inspectors went to these research and storage locations, they inevitably discovered lingering evidence of WMD-related programs. In 2002, therefore, when the United States intercepted a message between two Iraqi Republican Guard Corps commanders discussing the removal of the words "nerve agents" from "the wireless instructions," or learned of instructions to "search the area surrounding the headquarters camp and [the unit] for any chemical agents, make sure the area is free of chemical containers, and write a report on it," U.S. analysts viewed this information through the prism of a decade of prior deceit. They had no way of knowing that this time the information reflected the regime's attempt to ensure it was in compliance with UN resolutions. What was meant to prevent suspicion thus ended up heightening it.
About select documents
Several news stories about some of the documents were published after their release.
- Document BIAP 2003-000654 was translated by Joseph Shahda and generated an article in the Weekly Standard. [link] The document is a memo from the commander of an Iraqi Air Force base requesting a list of "the names of those who desire to volunteer for Suicide Mission to liberate Palestine and to strike American Interests." [link]
- Document [IZSP-2003-00001122], signed by a Ba'ath Party official, indicates that the Iraqis were worried about the Americans smuggling in and planting weapons of mass destruction (specifically, mobile weapons labs) in order to justify the invasion.[link]
- Document ISGZ 2004-019920 is a letter from Iraqi Intelligence in 2002 warning agents to be on the lookout for Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The letter warns that Zarqawi and another individual are in Iraq and states that apprehending them is a "top priority." According to the Associated Press (16 March 2006), "Attached were three responses in which agents said there was no evidence al-Zarqawi or the other man were in Iraq."[link] ABC notes that "The document does not support allegations that Iraq was colluding with al Qaeda."[link]
- A series of "Sheen 27" documents show Saddam's regime was very involved in training fighters in the use of "improvised explosive devices" or IEDs. In a news report by Laurie Mylroie, several documents are discussed that speak of "Arab Fedayeen" (i.e. non-Iraqis) and the use of "of the people" bombs. Mylroie asserts that one of the documents that was posted was then taken down. [link] The authors of the Iraqi Perspectives Project discussed these documents both in the report and in a hearing before the U.S. House of Representatives (6 April 2006), indicating that Saddam was training a secular pan-Arab army. They wrote in the Foreign Affairs article about the documents, "In the years preceding the coalition invasion, Iraq's leaders had become enamored of the belief that the spirit of the Fedayeen's 'Arab warriors' would allow them to overcome the Americans' advantages. In the end, however, the Fedayeen fighters proved totally unprepared for the kind of war they were asked to fight, and they died by the thousands."[link] In the House hearing on this matter, defense analyst Lieutenant Colonel Kevin M. Woods noted that Saddam began recruiting foreign fighters into this army in the mid-1990s, and he described them as part of an "Arab liberation movement" that had been "part of Baath political philosophy going back to the beginnings of Saddam's regime."[link]
- Other documents concern election laws in France, including correspondence from Iraqi intelligence "ordering the translation of important parts of a 1997 report about campaign financing laws in France." ABC claims that these documents suggest Saddam's "strong interest in the mechanics and legalities of financial contributions to French politicians."[link]
- One Iraqi document purportedly details a meeting on February 19, 1995 in which a representative of Iraq met with Osama Bin Laden in Sudan, who suggested "carrying out joint operations against foreign forces" in Saudi Arabia. Just eight months later, al-Qaeda operatives killed five U.S. military advisors in Saudi Arabia. There has been no evidence or suggestion of Iraqi complicity in that attack or linkage to the February meeting. ABC News, who reported on this document, further notes that "The document does not establish that the two parties did in fact enter into an operational relationship." ABC also cautions that "this document is handwritten and has no official seal."[link]
- Another document claims that Russia had a mole inside the U.S. military who gave the Russians information regarding U.S. troop movements, information that was then forwarded to the Iraqi military. The Russians deny the story and some of the information the Russians reportedly passed to the Iraqis was incorrect.[link] According to ABC, "A Pentagon study released today concludes, however, that the information didn't do Saddam Hussein any good because he never acted it on though it proved to be accurate."
- Another document suggests that the Iraqi government planned to respond to the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq with "camels of mass destruction" -- camels fitted with suicide bombs that would meet the invading army.[link] In another document, Saddam's son Qusay orders captured Kuwaitis to be used as "human shields" against the invaders.[link]
- Document 2RAD-2004-601189-ELC [link], is given the synopsis: "Abu-Zubaydah Statement on the Capability of al-Qaidah to Manufacture and Deliver Nuclear Weapons to the U.S." Abu Zubaydah was captured in Pakistan in March 2002 and is believed to be the highest ranking member of al-Qaeda to be held. There is no indication that this document links Abu Zubaydah to Iraq in any way. Professor Fritz Umbach notes, "the 'statement' itself is nothing more than an Arabic summary of a 2002 CBS News story on Zubaydah's claims. It has no identifiable link to Iraq, other than the odd fact that it appears on a U.S. government site billed as Operation Iraqi Freedom Documents."[link]
- Many of the documents seem to make clear that Saddam's regime had given up on seeking a WMD capability by the mid-1990s. As AP reported, "Repeatedly in the transcripts, Saddam and his lieutenants remind each other that Iraq destroyed its chemical and biological weapons in the early 1990s, and shut down those programs and the nuclear-bomb program, which had never produced a weapon." At one 1996 presidential meeting, top weapons program official Amer Mohammed Rashid, describes his conversation with UN weapons inspector Rolf Ekeus: "We don't have anything to hide, so we're giving you all the details." At another meeting Saddam told his deputies, "We cooperated with the resolutions 100 percent and you all know that, and the 5 percent they claim we have not executed could take them 10 years to (verify). Don't think for a minute that we still have WMD. We have nothing."[link]
- Document ISGQ-2003-00004530 dated Septemeber 15, 2002 is a memo from an Iraqi general about unspecified "chemical material" buried prior to 1998. Joseph Shahda translated the memo to read: "A team from the Military Industrialization Commission when Hussein Kamel Hussein was conducting his responsibilities did bury a large container said that it contains a Chemical Material in the village (Al Subbayhat) part of the district of Karma in Fallujah in a quarry region that was used by SamSung Korean company and close to the homes of some citizens." Also: "No official visited the burial site through out the years which give the impression that it is not currently known by the Military Industrialization Commission." One can deduce from reading the memo that the MIC made no serious effort to conceal this material from local residents, commissioning several overt lorry loads of cement in order to cover over the container, suggesting the buried material may have been some kind of hazardous by-product. [link] [link]
External links
- [U.S. Foreign Military Studies Office Joint Reserve Intelligence Center]
- [U.S. Center for Combatting Terrorism's Project Harmony downloads]
- Dan Darling, "[Putin Vindicated?]," Weekly Standard (April 7, 2006).
- Laurie Mylroie, with Ayad Rahim, "[State-Sponsored Terrorism, Anyone?]" American Spectator (March 31, 2006).
- Translation by Laurie Mylroie and Ayad Rahim, "[Iraqi Intelligence Service Document #ISGZ-2004-009247] (March 31, 2006)
- Peter L. Bergen, "[Enemy of Our Enemy]," ''New York Times (March 28, 2006).
- Dan Darling, "[Jihad TV: Newly released documents identify the man bin Laden wanted on Iraqi television]," Weekly Standard (03/24/2006).
- Eli Lake, "[Saddam, Al Qaeda Did Collaborate, Documents Show]," NY Sun (March 24, 2006).
- [Did Russian Ambassador Give Saddam the U.S. War Plan?] ABC News, March 23, 2006
- U.S. House of Representatives. Committee on International Relations. Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. Hearing on "[The Iraqi Documents]: A Glimpse Into the Regime of Saddam Hussein." (6 April 2006). ([Video])
- [Bush's bogus document dump]
- [jveritas translating the Iraq documents]
- [Tony Snow interviews jveritas] April 13, 2006.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.