US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

by **hmm** » Tue Apr 11, 2006 3:57 pm

<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/09/AR2006040900890.html">www.washingtonpost.com/wp...00890.html</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Military Plays Up Role of Zarqawi Jordanian Painted As Foreign Threat To Iraq's Stability By Thomas E. Ricks Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, April 10, 2006; Page A01 The U.S. military is conducting a propaganda campaign to magnify the role of the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, according to internal military documents and officers familiar with the program. The effort has raised his profile in a way that some military intelligence officials believe may have overstated his importance and helped the Bush administration tie the war to the organization responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002314713">www.editorandpublisher.co...1002314713</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>A U.S. 'Propaganda' Program, al-Zarqawi, and 'The New York Times' By Greg Mitchell Published: April 10, 2006 3:00 PM ET NEW YORK Midway through Thomas Ricks’ Washington Post scoop on Monday detailing a U.S. military “propaganda program” aimed at convincing Iraqis that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has a very prominent role in directing violence in that country, there is one specific tip on how the plan may have also targeted American reporters and audiences. Ricks found that one “selective leak”--about a recently discovered letter written by Zarqawi--was handed by the military to Dexter Filkins, the longtime New York Times reporter in Baghdad. Filkins's resulting article, about the Zarqawi letter boasting of foreigners' role in suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the front page of the Times on Feb. 9, 2004. ~snip~ But Ricks' article, if anything, underplays the impact of the letter in February 2004--and if Filkins had qualms about its authenticity, it hardly deterred him and his paper from giving it serious, and largely uncritical, attention. ~snip~ In his Post story today, Ricks also does not mention what happened next. William Safire, in his Feb. 11, 2004, column for the Times titled “Found: A Smoking Gun,” declared that the letter “demolishes the repeated claim of Bush critics that there was never a '’clear link’ between Saddam and Osama bin Laden.” Safire mocked the Washington Post for burying the story on page 17, while hailing a Reuters account quoting an “amazed” U.S. officials saying, “We couldn’t make this up if we tried.” ~snip~ He also quoted one internal briefing, produced by the U.S. military headquarters in Iraq, which revealed that Kimmitt had concluded that, "The Zarqawi PSYOP program is the most successful information campaign to date." <hr></blockquote> and as todays washington post shows the psyops is ongoing.. <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/10/AR2006041000505.html">www.washingtonpost.com/wp...00505.html</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr> U.S. Spokesman Blames Al-Zarqawi Group The Associated Press Monday, April 10, 2006; 11:29 AM BAGHDAD, Iraq -- More than 90 percent of the suicide attacks in Iraq are carried out by terrorists and foreign fighters recruited, trained and equipped by al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a U.S. military spokesman said Monday.<hr></blockquote>

by **BannedfromDU** » Wed Apr 12, 2006 2:22 am

Lacking biolabs, trailers carried case for war White House pressed Iraq biowarfare claim despite evidence to contrary By Joby Warrick April 11, 2006 --- A secret fact-finding mission to Iraq -- not made public until now -- had already concluded that the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons. Leaders of the Pentagon-sponsored mission transmitted their unanimous findings to Washington in a field report on May 27, 2003, two days before the president's statement. Report shelved while claim went forth The three-page field report and a 122-page final report three weeks later were stamped "secret" and shelved. Meanwhile, for nearly a year, administration and intelligence officials continued to publicly assert that the trailers were weapons factories. The authors of the reports were nine U.S. and British civilian experts -- scientists and engineers with extensive experience in all the technical fields involved in making bioweapons -- who were dispatched to Baghdad by the Defense Intelligence Agency for an analysis of the trailers. Their actions and findings were described to a Washington Post reporter in interviews with six government officials and weapons experts who participated in the mission or had direct knowledge of it. FULL- <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12275328">www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12275328</a>

by **Byrne** » Thu Apr 13, 2006 10:01 am

<img src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/7760/1663/400/zarqawi.jpg" style="border:0;"/> More on this, from <a href="http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/2006/04/zarqawi-gate-more-important-than-you.html" target="top">here</a>. Embedded links therein.<hr /> Zarqawi-gate: More important than you think... (Update) Is the threat posed by Jordanian-born terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi real? Is Zarqawi himself a fiction, as some maintain? The Washington Post's recent revelation that a Pentagon psyop unit hyped up the Zarqawi threat may turn into the next big scandal, especially since the leaked document specifices that the propaganda campaign targeted the "U.S. Home Audience." One segment of the Post story desrves special attention: One slide in the same briefing, for example, noted that a "selective leak" about Zarqawi was made to Dexter Filkins, a New York Times reporter based in Baghdad. Filkins's resulting article, about a letter supposedly written by Zarqawi and boasting of suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the Times front page on Feb. 9, 2004. That letter, though largely forgotten in the onrush of events, attracted some attention at the time. It's a 17-page "Dear Osama" letter in which Zarqawi helpfully demonstrated a link between the insurgency and Al Qaeda. In other words, the letter fulfilled a propaganda purpose. The message to Americans: U.S. forces must stay in Iraq. Otherwise, an insurgency run by Al Qaeda will prevail. As Rachel Maddow noted on her program today (she provided some juicy sound bites), George Bush somewhat incoherently cited this very letter yesterday during a Q-and-A session with students at Johns Hopkins. Here's a segment of the official (and not quite accurate) transcript:  In 2004, we intercepted a letter from Zarqawi to Osama bin Laden. In it, Zarqawi expressed his concern about "the gap that will emerge between us and the people of the land." He declared "democracy is coming." He went on to say, this will mean "suffocation" for the terrorists. Zarqawi laid out his strategy to stop democracy from taking root in Iraq. Bush said these words on the same day the Post story identified this letter as the product of an American psyops team! Incidentally, the transcript has been massaged to make Bush sound more erudite. In the original sound bite, which Maddow played on her program, Dubya's tongue slipped: He referred to this message as something we wrote, as opposed to one Zarqawi wrote. Signs of fakery: In truth, this missive always carried a funky odor. Filkin was not the only recipient of this bit of propaganda. William Safire devoted a column to it in February of 2004, in which he insisted that the Zarqawi communication "proved" the mythical Saddam-Bin Laden axis. (That logic requires one to presume a Saddam-Zarqawi alliance, which is the sort of leap guys like Safire seem happy to make.) The Safire piece gives a detailed account of the letter's orgins:  That Kurdish militia has for years been waging a bloody battle with Ansar al-Islam, the terrorist group affiliated with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and supported by Saddam Hussein in Iraq. It captured a courier carrying a message that demolishes the repeated claim of Bush critics that there was never a "clear link" between Saddam and Osama bin Laden. The terrorist courier with a CD-ROM containing a 17-page document and other messages was Hassan Ghul, who confessed he was taking to Al Qaeda the Ansar document setting forth a strategy to start an Iraqi civil war, along with a plea for reinforcements. The Kurds turned him over to Americans for further interrogation, which is proving fruitful. Quite a story. Worthy of Hollywood, in fact. So far as I know, the Hassan Ghul business first appeared here -- which means that either Safire made the story up out of whole cloth, or someone in the intelligence community gave him this yarn. Unfortunately, Safire's account seriously conflicts with the version proffered by NYT writer Filkin. As Billmon pointed out back in 2004, the Filkin piece included this bit:  A senior United States intelligence official in Washington said, "I know of no reason to believe the letter is bogus in any way." He said the letter was seized in a raid on a known Qaeda safe house in Baghdad, and did not pass through Iraqi groups that American intelligence officials have said in the past may have provided unreliable information.( All emphasis in both quotes added by me.) Well, which is it: Baghdad or Kurdistan? As we now know, this letter entered the newstream pursuant to a psyops campaign -- and by the way, Filkin and Safire were not the only journalists involved: Douglas Jehl of the Times devoted a major piece to the same story. One wonders why the propagandists could not get their stories straight. Why do so many of our citizens (especially our troops) still believe in the purported alliance between Al Qaeda, Saddam and the insurgency? The Zarqawi "evidence" did much to perpetuate the legend. What we are looking at here is a true Wag the Dog scenario -- the creation of a political myth. How real is Zarqawi? Robert Fisk argued on Democracy Now that fairly good evidence suggests that the man died some time ago: ROBERT FISK: Look, Zarqawi has not been seen by anyone other than “U.S. officials say” ever since the beginning of the war. I think it’s possible, and many Iraqis think this, that he was killed in one of the initial air raids on Iraq in the northeastern area, in the Kurdish area, and that his I.D. has somehow come to be used by some other institution. He has a wife of whom he was very possessive, who is now so poor. In the town of Zarqa, she has to get out to work. When his mother died more than a year ago, he didn't even send condolences to the family, or so the family have informed me, unlike a man -- AMY GOODMAN: And the family lives --? ROBERT FISK: In Zarqa, hence his name Zarqawi, of course. In Jordan. But, you know, the problem is that if this man believes he’s a true Muslim, why didn't he send sorrowful greetings to his family on the death of his mother. Very, very weird. And over and over again we hear American military officials say or they think they can identify him in a videotape. This is a guy wearing a hood, right? I don’t know. Maybe he is alive, or maybe he’s a creation, but I’ve never met anyone who’s met him recently in Iraq, which surprises me, because I do meet a lot of people in Iraq. At this point, we must ask how many -- if any -- of the Zarqawi stories we've heard have any truth to them. Fake Bin Laden messages? For example, Bin Laden purportedly wrote a reply of sorts to the fake missive described above. The following news story from March 14, 2005 hits a few now-familiar motifs:  Osama bin Laden attempted to communicate with Al-Qaeda's frontman in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a month ago through a letter that was seized when a ground courier in Pakistan was intercepted, a counter-terrorism expert said here on Monday. "About four weeks ago, we intercepted communication between Osama bin Laden and Zarqawi," which occurred when "a ground courier was intercepted," Bob Newman, director of international security and counter-terrorism services with The GeoScope Group, told an Airport, Port and Terminal Security (APTS) Middle East conference. "We (US intelligence) intercepted the man and looked in his pockets. That's how we found out," he added. Newman, whose Colorado-based organisation provides teams to help track down terror suspects at the planning stage, later told reporters the courier was stopped in west Pakistan, "carrying a letter". Seems to me that the Pentagon psyops crowd might well want to use a private organization of anti-terrorist cowboys as a cut out. Not only that. Bin Laden himself -- in one of those questioned audio tapes -- endorsed Zarqawi in late 2004. Since Al Qaeda was no doubt another target of the psy-op operation, this evidence may prove that Bin Laden simply took the bait. On the other hand, the tape itself may well be a fake. The Berg connection. Zarqawi, wearing a hood, is said to have beheaded Nick Berg. Although I accept the authenticity of that gruesome video, others have questioned it. Still others believe that the video is undoctored but that the action took place in Abu Ghraib. Hence the importance of Zarqawi-gate. Prove that Zarqawi is largely a myth, and you call into question all of the evidence that has ever been offered by this administration to prove any point. Even his base supporters will become infuriated. And no-one will trust any Bush-supplied "evidence" surrounding future events, such as the Iran attack and "Big Wedding II." If any true patriots at the Pentagon are reading these words, all I can say is: More leaks, please! UPDATE: Actually, this isn't really an update so much as a plea. I want to ask the readers to do what they can to make sure this story receives more attention, and to do their own digging . For three reasons: 1. Very few people understand that Bush cited a probable hoax -- yet another fake document -- as his chief ex post facto justification for his war, and that he did so even after the letter was exposed. Just as the Niger forgeries kick-started the conflict, these forgeries keep it chugging forward. 2. The Zarqawi propaganda has convinced many people -- especially our soldiers -- that when we fight the insurgents, we are fighting Al Qaeda. 3. As noted in a post below, someone in the military probably took a great risk when he or she leaked this info. We do not encourage further leaks if we ignore the ones we get. So please...do what you can to spread the word! # posted by Joseph : 2:11 PM 7 comments Comments: Really nice post. I'm linking it and blogrolling you at VichyDems. # posted by Thersites2 : 5:25 PM I second that assessment. Go, Joe! More leaks, indeed. Bring on the leaks! # posted by Jen : 11:48 PM Another nail in the coffin where we buried faith in our government. Great post, Joe. # posted by unirealist : 6:17 AM Well, if a ground communication was intercepted on it's way from Zarqawi to OBL, wouldn't it have been nice to trail it all the way to OBL? Therein I find a problem. Miss P. # posted by Anonymous : 8:58 AM Oops, I said that incorrectly. If a ground communication came from OBL to Zarqawi - wouldn't they spend a little time to track it back? Miss P. # posted by Anonymous : 9:02 AM Really nice post, Joseph. I continue to learn much from reading your blog, and try to spread the word whenever an opportunity arises. Kim in PA # posted by Anonymous : 10:44 AM On October 13, 2005, the London Guardian published an article titled 'Revealed: Al-Qaida plan to seize control of Iraq'. The article tells the story of how the US intercepted a lettter purportedly written by Al-Qaeda 'number 2' Ayman al-Zawahiri, and supposedly destined for Al-Qaeda in Iraq number 1' Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The article states that the office of the director of national intelligence in Washington gave no details of how they came to be in possession of the letter except to say that it was "obtained during counterterrorism operations in Iraq". According to the office of the director of national intelligence: "This lengthy document provides a comprehensive view of al-Qaida's strategy in Iraq and globally." "The document has not been edited in any way and is released in its entirety in both the Arabic and English translated forms. The United States government has the highest confidence in the letter's authenticity." Interesting that they don't reveal how they acquired this 'comprehensive view of al-Qaida's strategy in Iraq' but express their 'highest confidence' in the letter's authenticity. The US, therefore, has no doubt that the letter was written by Ayman al-Zawahiri. They would have us believe that whilst Al-Qaeda are smart enought to plan and execute a massive operation like 9-11, they are dumb enough to send letters between operatives outlining their ultimate plan for "the clash with Israel", and therein lies the clue to who really authored the letter. On April 9th, 2006, the London Times published an article titled 'US leak of Zarqawi letter riles Israelis'. Isreali military intelligence officials are "dismayed" with the decision of John Negroponte to publish the letter on the national intelligence office's website last October. The Israelis accuse the Bush administration of "undermining their attempts to infiltrate Al-Qaeda’s operations in Iraq by revealing the contents of a secret letter." The Israelis admit that it was they who obtained the letter and that they had forwarded it to Washington on the condition of "strict anonymity." Isreali intelligence are not pleased that their 'Operation Tiramisu' in Iraq has been compromised. Perhaps MOSSAD will think twice before they furbish the US with any further forged documents. # posted by The QuoMan : 10:58 AM <hr />

by **StarmanSkye** » Thu Apr 13, 2006 9:58 pm

Byrne posted: Fake Bin Laden messages? For example, Bin Laden purportedly wrote a reply of sorts to the fake missive described above. The following news story from March 14, 2005 hits a few now-familiar motifs: Osama bin Laden attempted to communicate with Al-Qaeda's frontman in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a month ago through a letter that was seized when a ground courier in Pakistan was intercepted, a counter-terrorism expert said here on Monday. "About four weeks ago, we intercepted communication between Osama bin Laden and Zarqawi," which occurred when "a ground courier was intercepted," Bob Newman, director of international security and counter-terrorism services with The GeoScope Group, told an Airport, Port and Terminal Security (APTS) Middle East conference. "We (US intelligence) intercepted the man and looked in his pockets. That's how we found out," he added. Newman, whose Colorado-based organisation provides teams to help track down terror suspects at the planning stage, later told reporters the courier was stopped in west Pakistan, "carrying a letter". . . . On April 9th, 2006, the London Times published an article titled 'US leak of Zarqawi letter riles Israelis'. Isreali military intelligence officials are "dismayed" with the decision of John Negroponte to publish the letter on the national intelligence office's website last October. The Israelis accuse the Bush administration of "undermining their attempts to infiltrate Al-Qaeda’s operations in Iraq by revealing the contents of a secret letter." The Israelis admit that it was they who obtained the letter and that they had forwarded it to Washington on the condition of "strict anonymity." Isreali intelligence are not pleased that their 'Operation Tiramisu' in Iraq has been compromised. (end quote) I'm confused -- Is this the 'same' letter purportedly found by both the Colorado-based Geoscope Group in Feb. '05 and that the Mossad claimed it had found and turned-over to Negroponte, and which the National Intelligence Office posted on their website in Oct. '05? In any case, I doubt Zarqawi is alive. There may be some Psyops guys who don't even know what's really true anymore or who's calling the shots. Starman "Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised." - George Bush, March 17 2003

by **hmm** » Fri Apr 14, 2006 6:07 am

when taken together with this information... <a href="http://p216.ezboard.com/frigorousintuitionfrm17.showMessage?topicID=28.topic">p216.ezboard.com/frigorou...D=28.topic</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>To prove to myself a gut-feeling i had, i played a funny game with a al-qaida terror message. If i can do this,make this connection based on a single news item, think of all that this implies. the news item: <a href="http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Terrorism&loid=8.0.184286030&par=0">www.adnki.com/index_2Leve...&par=0</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>"TERRORISM: AL-ZARQAWI CALLS WOMEN TO JIHAD Baghdad, 6 July (AKI) - The latest audio message, purporting to be from Jordanian militant leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, has called on Muslim women to play a more active role in the Jihad or Holy War. The one-hour-long speech, posted on Islamist Internet forums, is entitled 'Religion declines and I am still alive'. ~snip~ The message confirms al-Qaeda's strategy of involving Muslim women in its terror activities, as first indicated nearly a year ago on an al-Qaeda-linked website, Al-Khansa, targeted at a female audi<hr></blockquote><hr></blockquote> It was this Al-Khansa,the al-qaida's female terrorists story that caught my attention. It turns out there is a Al-Khansa but its a Palestinian womens association doing the things that womens organisations do worldwide if one is to believe their innocent looking website. So i moved on to the two stories in the western media mentioning Al-Khansa that came up first on google. <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3594982.stm">news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl...594982.stm</a> <a href="http://www.washtimes.com/world/20050117-122001-8417r.htm">www.washtimes.com/world/2...-8417r.htm</a> The bbc article offers only this as a further clue: <blockquote>Quote:<hr>"The magazine says it is published by an organisation called "The Women's Media Bureau in the Arabian Peninsula"."<hr></blockquote> The washington Times article's source for the Al-Khansa information is "Italy's SISDE secret service" This is the sister organisation of SISME that gave the USA the iraqi yellowcake "intelligence". but thats not close enough for me so i googled my bbc clue and this is where it got even more interesting: <a href="http://www.memri.de/uebersetzungen_analysen/themen/islamistische_ideologie/isl_qaidawomen_08_09_04.htm">www.memri.de/uebersetzung..._09_04.htm</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>"The new online magazine Al-Khansaa [1] is published by Al Qa'ida's Arabian Peninsula Women's Information Bureau. The first issue features articles calling on women to participate in Jihad, along with an article criticizing women in Saudi television. The following are excerpts from the articles: [2] ~snip all the BS~ [2] The website is presently not online, but MEMRI has a copy of the magazine."<hr></blockquote> The website is not online anymore but rest assured, MEMRI has a copy.So who is MEMRI? I only need a quote from respected scholar Juan Cole to illustrate: <a href="http://antiwar.com/cole/?articleid=3898">antiwar.com/cole/?articleid=3898</a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr> "MEMRI was founded by a retired Israeli colonel from military intelligence, and co-run by Meyrav Wurmser, wife of David Wurmser. David Wurmser is close to the Likud Party in Israel and served in Douglas Feith's Office of Special Plans in the Pentagon, where he helped manufacture the case that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and was linked to al-Qaeda. ~snip~ MEMRI is funded to the tune of $60 million a year by someone, and it is a sophisticated anti-Arab propaganda machine."<hr></blockquote> David Wurmser currently works for Dick Cheney. I have tried to keep it simple for maximum impact but there is much more flesh to this story. the people that need there to be an Al-Qaida bring us Al-Qaida,the people that faked the reasons for war on iraq bring us more fakes? some more background: <a href="http://www.juancole.com/2004/11/intimidation-by-israeli-linked.html">www.juancole.com/2004/11/...inked.html</a> <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,773258,00.html">www.guardian.co.uk/elsewh...58,00.html</a> <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/wiki.phtml?title=David_Wurmser">www.sourcewatch.org/wiki....id_Wurmser</a> <a href="http://www.al-khansa.org/english/about.html">www.al-khansa.org/english/about.html</a> <a href="http://www.al-khansa.org/english/projects.html">www.al-khansa.org/english/projects.html</a> if that isnt enough Meyrav Wurmser co-wrote the infamous "Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm" (see sourcewatch link)

by **Byrne** » Fri Apr 14, 2006 6:24 am

Starman, <blockquote>Quote:<hr>There may be some Psyops guys who don't even know what's really true anymore or who's calling the shots<hr></blockquote> I believe that to be the case. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been used as a convenient reason for extending & prolonging the War on Terror'. Before the (Iraq) war, <a href="http://www.comw.org/pda/0410zarqawi.html" target="top">Zarqawi</a> was proffered as a living link between Al-Qaeda and the Hussein regime, which helped justify the war. Today, he serves to link the post-war turmoil in Iraq to the broader war on terror. The adjectives often used to describe him and his cohort - "elusive" and "mysterious" - might as well be applied to the evidence offered by the administration to support its view of his influence. It was the mention of Zarqawi in Colin Powell's Address to the UN Security Council of February 5, 2003 which provided a cranking up of the rhetoric for the invasion of Iraq. From <a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO405B.html" target="top">here:</a><blockquote>Quote:<hr> In the months leading up to the war on Iraq, Al Zarqawi's name reemerges, this time almost on daily basis, with reports focusing on his sinister relationship to Saddam Hussein. A major turning point in the propaganda campaign occurs on February 5, 2003. Al-Zarqawi was in the spot light following Colin Powell's flopped WMD report to the UN Security Council. Powell's speech presented "documentation" on the ties between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda, while focusing on the central role of Al-Zarqawi: (emphasis added): Our concern is not just about these illicit weapons; it's the way that these illicit weapons can be connected to terrorists and terrorist organizations... But what I want to bring to your attention today is the potentially much more sinister nexus between Iraq and the Al Qaeda terrorist network, a nexus that combines classic terrorist organizations and modern methods of murder. Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network, headed by Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi, an associate and collaborator of Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda lieutenants. Zarqawi, a Palestinian born in Jordan, fought in the Afghan War more than a decade ago. Returning to Afghanistan in 2000, he oversaw a terrorist training camp. One of his specialties and one of the specialties of this camp is poisons. When our coalition ousted the Taliban, the Zarqawi network helped establish another poison and explosive training center camp, and this camp is located in Northeastern Iraq. You see a picture of this camp. <hr></blockquote> So, reading & assimilating all the various official explanations (who does?), we are led to believe that Zarqawi & his network are very busy people organising insurgency worldwide. In reality, how likely is this?? Zarqawi has also been linked into the background of the UK/London events -it was reported that it was a call (intercepted in the USA at the NSA) from Zarqawi & his network to the UK that started off the Operation Crevice investigation that uncovered the 7 'suspects' who are currently on trial at the Old Bailey in London, under the evidence of 'supergrass' <a href="http://intelligence-summit.blogspot.com/2005/10/ht-took-over-islamic-center-of-queens.html" target="top">Mohammed Junaid Babar</a>. This article provides an assessment <a href="http://www.comw.org/pda/0410zarqawi.html" target="top">The al-Zarqawi Assessment: Another Instance of 'Cooked' Intelligence?</a>. The article includes comment on the intercepted al-Zarqawi letters - i.e. "Iraq: Captured 'Al-Qaeda Letter' Poses More Questions than Answers." Jim Lobe, IPS-Inter Press Service, 16 February 2004.

by **Byrne** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 9:42 am

from <a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=CHO20060418&articleId=2275" target="top">here</a> (links therein) <hr /> Who is behind "Al Qaeda in Iraq"? Pentagon acknowledges fabricating a "Zarqawi Legend" by Michel Chossudovsky April 18, 2006 GlobalResearch.ca Abu Musab Al Zarqawi has been presented both by the Bush administration and the Western media as the mastermind behind the "insurgency" in Iraq, allegedly responsible for the massacres of Iraqi civilians. Zarqawi is the outside enemy of America. The Bush administration in official statements, including presidential speeches, national security documents, etc. has repeatedly pointed to the need to "go after" Abu Musab Al Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden. "You know, I hate to predict violence, but I just understand the nature of the killers. This guy, Zarqawi, an al Qaeda associate -- who was in Baghdad, by the way, prior to the removal of Saddam Hussein -- is still at large in Iraq. And as you might remember, part of his operational plan was to sow violence and discord amongst the various groups in Iraq by cold- blooded killing. And we need to help find Zarqawi so that the people of Iraq can have a more bright -- bright future." (George W. Bush, Press Conference, 1 June 2004) The official mandate of US and British occupation forces is to fight and win the "war on terrorism" on behalf of the Iraqi people. Zarqawi constitutes Washington's justification for the continued military occupation of Iraq, not to mention the brutal siege of densely populated urban areas directed against "Al Qaeda in Iraq" which is said to be led by Zarqawi. Coalition forces are upheld as playing a "peace keeping role" in consultation with the United Nations. The Western media in chorus has consistently upheld the legitimacy of the "war on terrorism". It has not only presented Zarqawi as a brutal terrorist, it has also failed to report on the Pentagon's disinformation campaign, which has been known and documented since 2002. Pentagon PSYOP Zarqawi Program In an unusual twist, the Washington Post in a recent article, has acknowledged that the role of Zarqawi had been deliberately "magnified" by the Pentagon with a view to galvanizing public support for the US-UK led "war on terrorism": "The Zarqawi campaign is discussed in several of the internal military documents. "Villainize Zarqawi/leverage xenophobia response," one U.S. military briefing from 2004 stated. It listed three methods: "Media operations," "Special Ops (626)" (a reference to Task Force 626, an elite U.S. military unit assigned primarily to hunt in Iraq for senior officials in Hussein's government) and "PSYOP," the U.S. military term for propaganda work..." (WP. 10 April 2006) The military's propaganda program, according to the Washington Post, has "largely been aimed at Iraqis, but seems to have spilled over into the U.S. media. One briefing slide about U.S. "strategic communications" in Iraq, prepared for Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, describes the "home audience" as one of six major targets of the American side of the war." (WP, op cit.) An internal document produced by U.S. military headquarters in Iraq, states that "the Zarqawi PSYOP program is the most successful information campaign to date." (WP, op cit). The senior commander entrusted with Pentagon's PSYOP operation is General Kimmitt who now occupies the position of senior planner at US Central Command (USCENTCOM), responsible for directing operations in Iraq and the Middle East. "In 2003 and 2004, he coordinated public affairs, information operations and psychological operations in Iraq -- though he said in an interview the internal briefing must be mistaken because he did not actually run the psychological operations and could not speak for them. Kimmitt said, "There was clearly an information campaign to raise the public awareness of who Zarqawi was, primarily for the Iraqi audience but also with the international audience." A goal of the campaign was to drive a wedge into the insurgency by emphasizing Zarqawi's terrorist acts and foreign origin, said officers familiar with the program. "Through aggressive Strategic Communications, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi now represents: Terrorism in Iraq/Foreign Fighters in Iraq/Suffering of Iraqi People (Infrastructure Attacks)/Denial of Iraqi Aspirations," the same briefing asserts... ... It is difficult to determine how much has been spent on the Zarqawi campaign, which began two years ago and is believed to be ongoing. U.S. propaganda efforts in Iraq in 2004 cost $24 million, but that included extensive building of offices and residences for troops involved, as well as radio broadcasts and distribution of thousands of leaflets with Zarqawi's face on them, said the officer speaking on background... The Zarqawi program at the Pentagon was run concurrently with a related operation "led by the Lincoln Group, a U.S. consulting firm, to place pro-U.S. articles in Iraq newspapers, according to the officer familiar with the program who spoke on background." According to The Washington Post, however, there was no relationship between the Pentagon's PSYOP program and that run by the Lincoln Group on behalf of the Pentagon. (WP, 10 April 2006) Disinformation and war propaganda are an integral part of military planning. What the Washington Post fails to mention, however, is its own role in sustaining the Zarqawi legend , along with network TV, most of the printed press, and of course CNN and Fox News, not to mention a significant portion of the alternative media. Disinformation regarding the War on terrorism has been fed into the news chain by a limited number of "top feeders": A relatively few well-connected correspondents provide the "scoops" that get the coverage in the relatively few mainstream news sources - the four TV networks, TIME, Newsweek, CNN - where the parameters of debate are set and the "official reality" is consecrated for the bottom feeders in the news chain. In other countries, this is what is known as propaganda - or, put less politely, psychological warfare. ( Chaim Kupferberg, The Propaganda Preparation for 9/11) Zarqawi has been identified by the US media as being behind the "insurgency" in Fallujah, Tal Afar and Samara. He was held responsible for the Amman hotel bombings as well as terrorist attacks in several Western capitals.. He is indelibly behind the suicide bomb attacks in Iraq as confirmed by the Washington Post: " The ruling Shiite leadership has Zarqawi squarely in its sights. He has led the suicide bombers whose Shiite victims are now climbing into the thousands." ( 11 December 2005). The Pentagon's PSYOP is a cover-up for US sponsored atrocities by the US media, which has upheld the "villainize Zarqawi" focus in its news and editorials coverage of the Iraqi resistance movement. The top U.S. military intelligence officer in Iraq said Abu Musab Zarqawi and his foreign and Iraqi associates have essentially commandeered the insurgency, becoming the dominant opposition force and the greatest immediate threat to U.S. objectives in the country. "I think what you really have here is an insurgency that's been hijacked by a terrorist campaign," Army Maj. Gen. Richard Zahner said in an interview. "In part, by Zarqawi becoming the face of this thing, he has certainly gotten the funding, the media and, frankly, has allowed other folks to work along in his draft." (WP, 25 September 2005) Amid the continuing bloodshed in Iraq, there is evidence of fresh thinking. The change is, ironically, brought about by Abu Musab Zarqawi himself, whose indiscriminate terrorism appears to have succeeded in uniting people there against his global jihad ideology. Since the hotel bombings in Zarqawi's native Jordan, more and more Sunni Iraqis and Arabs have condemned the terrorist leader's nightmarish vision for their societies -- one that promises further "catastrophic" suicide attacks. (WP, 4 December 2005) Immediate withdrawal from Iraq is not an option the U.S. administration can or should entertain. It would give Abu Musab Zarqawi and his small band of foreign fighters the opportunity to claim victory and to announce that they have successfully defeated a superpower. This would strengthen al Qaeda's hand across the Middle East and elsewhere, and lead to greater instability throughout the region. (WP, 11 December 2006) The US media has identified the nature of the insurgency, centering on the key role of Zarqawi and his ties to the former Baathist regime: "The backbone of the insurgency appears to be an alliance between the die-hard Baathists and the network of terrorists mostly under the command of Abu Musab Zarqawi. It is a partnership of convenience; both groups are fighting the same battle, but for different reasons and with different goals. (WP, 8 May 2005) [S]enior officials at the Pentagon and in Iraq say they believe that Mr. Zarqawi and the insurgency's ''center of gravity'' is now in the bends and towns of the Euphrates River valley near the Syrian border.(New York Times, 17 September 2005) In Fallujah, the siege of the city, which resulted in thousands of civilian deaths was described as a battle against the "Zarqawi network":. U.S. forces have conducted four airstrikes on what have been described as targets associated with Zarqawi's network in and around the city. Among them was a housing compound in an agricultural area about 15 miles south of Fallujah where the U.S. military said as many as 90 foreign fighters were meeting. The military said the strike, which occurred on Thursday evening, killed about 60 foreign fighters. Witnesses and hospital officials disputed the account, saying that about 30 men were killed, many of them Iraqi. They said 15 children and 11 women also died in the attack. Neither version of the strike could be independently verified. The following night, the U.S. military said in a statement that it conducted "another successful precision strike" on a meeting of "approximately 10 Zarqawi terrorists" in central Fallujah. "There was no indication that any innocent civilians were in the immediate vicinity of the meeting location," the military said in the statement. (WP, 21 Sept 2004) Concluding Remarks If indeed Zarqawi's role was fabricated as part of the Pentagon's PSYOP, what is the accuracy of these media reports? The internal military documents leaked to Washington Post confirm that the Pentagon is involved in an ongoing propaganda campaign which seeks to provide a face to the enemy. The purpose is to portray the enemy as a terrorist, to mislead public opinion. Counterterrorism and war propaganda are intertwined. The propaganda apparatus feeds disinformation into the news chain. The objective is to present the terror groups as "enemies of America." responsible for countless atrocities in Iraq and around the World. The underlying objective is to galvanize public opinion in support of America's Middle East war agenda. US military-intelligence has created it own terrorist organizations. In turn, it has developed a cohesive multibillion dollar counterterrorism program "to go after" these terrorist organizations. To reach its foreign policy objectives, the images of terrorism in the Iraqi war theater must remain vivid in the minds of the citizens, who are constantly reminded of the terrorist threat. The Iraqi resistance movement is described as terrorists led by Zarqawi. The propaganda campaign using the Western media, presents the portraits of the leaders behind the terror network. In other words, at the level of what constitutes an "advertising" campaign, "it gives a face to terror." The "war on terrorism" rests on the creation of one or more evil bogeymen, the terror leaders, Osama bin Laden, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, et al, whose names and photos are presented ad nauseam in daily news reports. Without Zarqawi and bin Laden, the "war on terrorism" would loose its raison d'être. The main casus belli is to wage a " war on terrorism". The Pentagon documents leaked to the Washington Post regarding Zarqawi have revealed that Al Qaeda in Iraq is fabricated. The suicide attacks in Iraq are indeed real, but who is behind them? There are indications that some of the suicide attacks could have been organized by the US-UK military and intelligence. (See references below pertaining to British Special Forces Soldiers caught Planting Bombs in Basra.) Michel Chossudovsky is the author of the international best seller "The Globalization of Poverty " published in eleven languages. He is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Center for Research on Globalization, at www.globalresearch.ca . He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His most recent book is entitled: America’s "War on Terrorism", Global Research, 2005. To order Chossudovsky's book America's "War on Terrorism", click here. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Related articles British Chief Police Investigator in Basra dies under mysterious circumstances - by Michel Chossudovsky - 2005-10-17 Were British Special Forces Soldiers Planting Bombs in Basra? - by Michael Keefer - 2005-09-25 British "Undercover Soldiers" Caught driving Booby Trapped Car - by Michel Chossudovsky - 2005-09-20 Did Al-Zarqawi Really Bomb Amman? - by Dr. Elias Akleh - 2005-11-15 The Al-Zarqawi 11/9 Amman Bombings: More Holes in the Official Story - by Michel Chossudovsky - 2005-11-15 Fabricating an Enemy: "Al Qaeda in Iraq". Who is Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi?: - by Michel Chossudovsky - 2005-09-30 Al Qaeda and the Iraqi Resistance Movement - by Michel Chossudovsky - 2005-09-18

US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

Re: US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

Re: US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

Re: US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

9 month old post:zionist/neocon roots of alqaida in the news

Re: US army internal briefing:The Zarqawi PSYOP program

more...

Who is online