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Revision as of 03:06, 28 March 2006

Operation Iraqi Freedom Documents refers to some 35,000 boxes of documents, audiotapes and videotapes produced by the government of Saddam Hussein and seized after the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The documents date from the mid-1990s until early 2003. The U.S. government is now releasing these documents over the internet and 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.

History of the documents

The Ba'athists were said to be "meticulous record-keepers." 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. 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. 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."

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"

John Negroponte at first tried to delay the release of the documents, but softened his opposition to releasing after conversations with Rep. Hoekstra. President Bush directed Negroponte to release the documents and they are slowly being made available.

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." 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."

What the documents show

Several news stories about the documents have been published recently. One document detailed a meeting on February 19, 1995, that showed that Osama bin Laden 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 even speculation, however, of Iraqi complicity in that attack.

Another document, 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 recently captured 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.

One document (PDF) records Saddam Hussein ordering the use of chemical weapons in the "Balisan Basin."

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. 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. In another document, Saddam's son Qusay orders captured Kuwaitis to be used as "human shields" against the invaders.

An authoritative study of some of these documents by Pentagon analysts Kevin Woods, James Lacey, and Williamson Murray entitled "Saddam's Delusions" argues that the documents above all confirm that Saddam's overall strategic calculus was based on misinformation and faulty judgement regarding the country's confrontation with the United States. "As far as can be determined from the interviews and records reviewed so far," the authors wrote, for example, "there was no national plan to embark on a guerrilla war in the event of a military defeat. Nor did the regime appear to cobble together such a plan as its world crumbled around it. Buoyed by his earlier conviction that the Americans would never dare enter Baghdad, Saddam hoped to the very last minute that he could stay in power. And his military and civilian bureaucrats went through their daily routines until the very end."

The study also suggests that Saddam's government purposefully obfuscated on the issue of WMD until 2002 in order to deter Israel from aggressive actions: "According to Chemical Ali, Saddam was asked about the weapons during a meeting with members of the Revolutionary Command Council. He replied that Iraq did not have WMD but flatly rejected a suggestion that the regime remove all doubts to the contrary, going on to explain that such a declaration might encourage the Israelis to attack."

The study also cites documents demonstrating that key evidence presented by Colin Powell to the United Nations in February 2003 had been 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 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.

External links

• Foreign Military Studies Office Joint Reserve Intelligence Center
• Kevin Woods, James Lacey, and Williamson Murray, "Saddam's Delusions: The View from the Inside" Foreign Affairs (May/June 2006).
• Iraqi Perspectives Report, Joint Center for Operational Analysis at United States Department of Defense, March 2006

• Causes and prelude of the 2003 Iraq conflict
• Foreign relations of Iraq