Authors: Aki Peritz,Eric Rosenbach
Find, Fix, Finish (18 page)
THE POLITICS OF INTELLIGENCE
Nearly a year and a half after the release of the SSCI’s
Phase I
report, some Democrats argued that the Republican-controlled committee under Roberts wanted to delay the second phase of the investigation until after the November congressional midterm elections in 2006. California Senator Dianne Feinstein sent a letter to Chairman Roberts on August 2, 2005, stating:
Phase I
report, some Democrats argued that the Republican-controlled committee under Roberts wanted to delay the second phase of the investigation until after the November congressional midterm elections in 2006. California Senator Dianne Feinstein sent a letter to Chairman Roberts on August 2, 2005, stating:
I am increasingly dismayed by the delay in completing the Committee’s “Phase II” investigation into intelligence prior to the Iraq War. As you know, the Committee voted unanimously on February 12, 2004, to investigate five questions on pre-war intelligence, including use of intelligence by policymakers. Nearly eighteen months later, much work remains before these questions will be satisfactorily answered.
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Democratic senators as well as the Armed Services Committee continued to examine prewar and postwar intelligence, investigating whether the Bush administration had misused intelligence data to deceive other policymakers and the country into invading Iraq. Al-Libi’s case appeared to provide such evidence.
Accordingly, in October 2005, SSCI members Jay Rockefeller and Carl Levin sent a letter to DIA requesting that specific sections of a DIA report based on al-Libi’s interrogation in Egypt in 2002 be declassified.
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Specifically, the senators highlighted the following excerpt from the report:
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Specifically, the senators highlighted the following excerpt from the report:
This is the first report from Ibn al-Shaykh [al-Libi] in which he claims Iraq assisted al Qaida’s CBRN efforts. However, he lacks specific details on the Iraqis involved, the CBRN materials associated with the assistance, and the location where the training occurred. It is possible he does not know any further details; it is more likely this individual is intentionally misleading the debriefers. Ibn al-Shaykh has been undergoing debriefs for several weeks and may be describing scenarios to the debriefers that he knows will retain their interest. Saddam’s regime is intensely secular and is wary of Islamic revolutionary movements. Moreover, Baghdad is unlikely to provide assistance to a group it cannot control.
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Later that month, DIA declassified relevant portions of DITSUM 044–02.
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The national media eventually took note of the declassified report, and Democrats used the report as evidence that the White House had misused prewar intelligence. “This newly declassified information provides additional, dramatic evidence that the administration’s prewar statements were deceptive,” said Senator Levin. “More than a year before Secretary Powell included that charge in his presentation to the United Nations, the DIA had said it believed the detainee’s claims were bogus.”
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In response, some Republicans accused Democrats of attempting to use the al-Libi case for partisan purposes. After Democrats forced Republicans into a highly unusual closed session of the entire Senate to review the report and secure assurances that Phase II would be completed, GOP Senator Orrin Hatch called the move “a political stunt.”
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“Whether [the intelligence] is from defense intelligence, whether it’s from the CIA, whether it’s from other sources around the world, we need to get that right to make the right decisions,” opined Senator George Allen. “But what we don’t need is a bunch of partisanship.”
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PHASE II COMPLETED144
“Whether [the intelligence] is from defense intelligence, whether it’s from the CIA, whether it’s from other sources around the world, we need to get that right to make the right decisions,” opined Senator George Allen. “But what we don’t need is a bunch of partisanship.”
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In early September 2006, just two months before the November midterm elections, SSCI released the first two parts of the Phase II investigation, titled
Postwar Findings About Iraq’s WMD Programs and Links to Terrorism and How They Compare with Prewar Assessments,
and
The Use by the Intelligence Community of Information Provided by the Iraqi National Congress
. The reports documented the numerous disputes among analysts within the various intelligence agencies over both Iraq’s WMD capabilities and the links between al-Qaeda and Iraq.
Postwar Findings About Iraq’s WMD Programs and Links to Terrorism and How They Compare with Prewar Assessments,
and
The Use by the Intelligence Community of Information Provided by the Iraqi National Congress
. The reports documented the numerous disputes among analysts within the various intelligence agencies over both Iraq’s WMD capabilities and the links between al-Qaeda and Iraq.
Given al-Libi’s prominence in providing WMD-related intelligence, SSCI scrutinized his debriefing materials. The
Postwar Findings
section zeroed in on CIA’s analysis in 2002 and 2003 of al-Libi’s assertions that al-Qaeda received chemical and biological weapons training in Iraq.
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Postwar Findings
similarly drew attention to 2002–2003 DIA reports that expressed doubt about al-Libi’s statements—citing his lack of knowledge about the details of the weapons training—as well as the suggestion that al-Libi was “intentionally misleading his debriefers.”
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Postwar Findings
section zeroed in on CIA’s analysis in 2002 and 2003 of al-Libi’s assertions that al-Qaeda received chemical and biological weapons training in Iraq.
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Postwar Findings
similarly drew attention to 2002–2003 DIA reports that expressed doubt about al-Libi’s statements—citing his lack of knowledge about the details of the weapons training—as well as the suggestion that al-Libi was “intentionally misleading his debriefers.”
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The report also outlined changing assurances from officials about al-Libi’s information. For instance, it referenced Tenet’s testimony before the SSCI from September 2002. At that time, Tenet recognized the supporting evidence might be wrong: “As with much of the information on the overall relationship, details on training are second-hand or from sources of varying reliability.” Tenet did not discuss the “varying reliability” of the IC’s sources; still, when he testified again in February 2003, he claimed that “[Iraq] has also provided training in poisons and gases to two al-Qaeda associates. One of these associates characterized the relationship he forged with Iraqi officials as successful.”
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After the two reports were released, the media focused on the partisan rancor of the debate over prewar intelligence. For instance, White House spokesman Tony Snow dismissed the findings in the reports as old news, declaring, “If we have people who want to re-litigate that, that’s fine.”
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Senator Carl Levin on the other hand pointed to the reports’ continuing relevance: “The President is still distorting [the truth]. He’s still making statements which are false.”
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Senator Carl Levin on the other hand pointed to the reports’ continuing relevance: “The President is still distorting [the truth]. He’s still making statements which are false.”
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After the 2006 midterm elections, Democrats gained a majority in both the Senate and the House—the first time that Democrats had controlled both chambers of Congress in twelve years. Democrat Jay Rockefeller took control of SSCI, and the former chairman, Senator Pat Roberts, decided to leave the committee.
After al-Libi recanted his statements in early 2004, his whereabouts became largely unknown to the general public for the next two years; no Bush administration official mentioned his name again. Human rights organizations in the US and UK, however, continued to attempt to track detainees like al-Libi who had been rendered to third countries and dubbed them “ghost detainees” or “ghost prisoners.” Without access to the detainees themselves or to the classified intelligence reports concerning them, however, they found the task of accounting for all detainees and pressing the US government for greater transparency and accountability an enormous challenge.
Even members of the US Congress could not confirm al-Libi’s whereabouts. In a May 2007 letter to President Bush, Representatives Edward Markey, William Delahunt, and Jerrold Nadler requested a “detailed account of al-Libi’s whereabouts since he was first detained by Pakistani authorities.
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They sent the letter several months after Markey introduced the Torture Outsourcing Prevention Act, which aimed to prevent the rendition of US detainees to foreign countries, particularly countries in which torture or other inhumane treatments were known to occur.
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They sent the letter several months after Markey introduced the Torture Outsourcing Prevention Act, which aimed to prevent the rendition of US detainees to foreign countries, particularly countries in which torture or other inhumane treatments were known to occur.
The letter also asked the Bush administration to clarify how and why it transferred al-Libi to Egypt, when the US government first learned that al-Libi claimed to have been tortured, and how the administration verified al-Libi’s information while he was in Egyptian custody.
The congressmen never received a response.
In early 2006, al-Libi arrived in Libya, where he fell ill with tuberculosis.
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Following 9/11, US-Libya relations had improved dramatically. Libyan president Muammar Qadhafi, attempting to improve relations with the US and the European Union, renounced Libya’s WMD program in December 2003, and the US reestablished diplomatic relations with Tripoli in 2004. Later that year, as the Bush administration sought to reduce the number of detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Libya began taking back Libyan detainees. Later in 2006, al-Libi was tried before the State Security Court and then detained in the infamous Abu Salim prison.
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Following 9/11, US-Libya relations had improved dramatically. Libyan president Muammar Qadhafi, attempting to improve relations with the US and the European Union, renounced Libya’s WMD program in December 2003, and the US reestablished diplomatic relations with Tripoli in 2004. Later that year, as the Bush administration sought to reduce the number of detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Libya began taking back Libyan detainees. Later in 2006, al-Libi was tried before the State Security Court and then detained in the infamous Abu Salim prison.
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A sojourn in a Libyan jail must have been much worse than incarceration in Guantanamo Bay. “Abu Salim and Ain Zara prisons are run by Libya’s internal security agency and are not under the jurisdiction of the Libyan Ministry of Justice like other prisons in Libya,” said Heba Morayef, a researcher from Human Rights Watch. “Abu Salim is usually where the Libyan government places anyone suspected of being affiliated with or involved in Islamist activities. Members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group are all kept there.”
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Morayef and a colleague from Human Rights Watch visited Abu Salim in April 2009. Human rights organizations had long suspected that al-Libi was imprisoned there, but up to this point, had never been granted access to the prison or to al-Libi. One day, however, prison authorities gave Morayef and her colleague access to several Libyan detainees, including al-Libi. The first four prisoners claimed they had been arrested, detained, and tortured by US forces in Thailand and Pakistan and claimed they had also been detained in Bagram.
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They described these experiences to Morayef and claimed the CIA had questioned them throughout their detention.
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They described these experiences to Morayef and claimed the CIA had questioned them throughout their detention.
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“We learned that most of the prisoners had been before the Libyan State Security Court and not given a fair trial,” Morayef explained. “Some said they didn’t have a lawyer, and those that did said they weren’t able to meet with their lawyer before their trial. We realized that they were taking significant risks in even telling us that much.”
After the two researchers spoke with the first four prisoners, the prison guards brought al-Libi to meet them. “He could walk fine, slowly, but unassisted. Although we only saw him for about three minutes, there were no obvious signs of scarring or recent harm that we could detect. He looked thin and gaunt, but not seriously ill,” reported Morayef. Al-Libi, she said, was wearing a blue jumpsuit. According to the prisoners, a blue jumpsuit meant a sentence of life in prison. Red jumpsuits indicated a prisoner had been sentenced to death.
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“Al-Libi sat farther away from us,” explained Morayef. “His movements were angry and agitated, and he glared at us. [My colleague] explained that we were there to hear al-Libi’s story and explain to the world what has happened to him, and I translated it into Arabic.” But when they explained they only interviewed prisoners with their consent, al-Libi abruptly stood up and said, “Where were you when I was being tortured in American prisons?” and walked away.
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“We never expected that we would be allowed to meet al-Libi,” recalled Morayef. “They could have so easily refused us access—they refused to allow us to meet seven other prisoners we asked to meet. They brought him out because they wanted us to see him. The only way I can explain the fact that he was immediately so angry with us, before we even said anything, is that he must have been forced to come out and tell us that he didn’t want to speak to us.”
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On May 11, two weeks after Morayef’s visit, al-Libi allegedly killed himself.
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Oea
, a Libyan newspaper founded by Qadhafi’s son, Saif al-Islam, first reported al-Libi’s death. Al-Libi’s family was told that he had committed suicide by hanging himself with a bed sheet, though his friends apparently doubted a man of such conservative religious conviction would commit suicide, a practice prohibited in Islam.
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Oea
, a Libyan newspaper founded by Qadhafi’s son, Saif al-Islam, first reported al-Libi’s death. Al-Libi’s family was told that he had committed suicide by hanging himself with a bed sheet, though his friends apparently doubted a man of such conservative religious conviction would commit suicide, a practice prohibited in Islam.
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Others apparently doubted that al-Libi’s death was a suicide as well. For example, al-Libi’s family told Libyan friends that in a recent visit al-Libi had appeared positive and thought there was a chance he might be released from Abu Salim.
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Abu Zubaydah’s defense attorneys had also recently attempted to arrange to talk with al-Libi.
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Brent Mickum, Abu Zubaydah’s lawyer, said, “The timing of this [was] weird.”
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Abu Zubaydah’s defense attorneys had also recently attempted to arrange to talk with al-Libi.
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Brent Mickum, Abu Zubaydah’s lawyer, said, “The timing of this [was] weird.”
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Accordingly, human rights organizations called for an immediate investigation into al-Libi’s death. Human Rights Watch called on Libyan authorities to conduct a full investigation, adding that the authorities should also reveal what they knew of al-Libi’s treatment while he was in Egyptian and US custody.
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In the US, officials appeared to take al-Libi’s death seriously, stating that they were looking into the situation and were working with the US embassy in Tripoli.
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In the US, officials appeared to take al-Libi’s death seriously, stating that they were looking into the situation and were working with the US embassy in Tripoli.
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THE STRANGE
case of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi highlights troubling aspects of the limitations of intelligence and the intelligence community—if top policymakers are dead-set on one course of action, enablers can take highly classified information and massage it to their liking. The business of intelligence is to provide the leadership of a country the most accurate view of the way the world works, but ultimately it is up to the civilian leadership to accept, reject, or exploit it for its own ends. When intelligence is murky—and it usually is—the conclusions of the professional bureaucracy can be jettisoned for the political requirements of the elected (and unelected) few.
case of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi highlights troubling aspects of the limitations of intelligence and the intelligence community—if top policymakers are dead-set on one course of action, enablers can take highly classified information and massage it to their liking. The business of intelligence is to provide the leadership of a country the most accurate view of the way the world works, but ultimately it is up to the civilian leadership to accept, reject, or exploit it for its own ends. When intelligence is murky—and it usually is—the conclusions of the professional bureaucracy can be jettisoned for the political requirements of the elected (and unelected) few.
Intelligence officers have been aware of this for generations. Dick Helms, who headed the CIA from 1966 to 1973 and who was caught up in an imbroglio over conflicting loyalties and convicted of lying to Congress, wrote that “public debate lessens our usefulness to the nation by casting doubt on our integrity and objectivity. If we are not believed, we have no purpose.”
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The intelligence analysis that led up to the Iraq war severely tarnished the overall credibility of the IC. The attributes that Helms held dearly—integrity and objectivity—were trampled in the rush to war.
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The intelligence analysis that led up to the Iraq war severely tarnished the overall credibility of the IC. The attributes that Helms held dearly—integrity and objectivity—were trampled in the rush to war.
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