CIA recruiting Saddam’s secret police

[Aidoneus]

CIA recruiting Saddam’s secret police
By Julie Hyland
26 September 2003

The Sunday Times has reported that the CIA is recruiting former agents from Saddam Hussein’s notorious security forces in Iraq.

According to the newspaper, “American forces have launched a covert campaign to recruit former officers of the Mukhabarat, Saddam Hussein’s infamous secret police, who were responsible for the deaths and torture of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis.”

It reports that dozens of these sadistic and brutal murderers are now employed by the US “for help in hunting resistance groups” within Iraq, as well as “identifying and tracking down Iraqis suspected of spying for Iran and Syria, the neighbouring countries most hostile to Washington”.

The Times interviewed one such new recruit, Mohammed Abdullah, who had spent 10 years in the Mukhabarat and eight in military intelligence. Abdullah confirmed that he had been working with the CIA since May, for which he is paid $700 a month.

“We are under strict instructions not to publicise our work with the Americans, but dozens of former Mukhabarat officers have already been recruited,” he said. “They need us. The Mukhabarat was one of the best state security organisations in the world.”

Abdullah’s new job description is to help identify Iraqis, described as Baath party loyalists, who “could be worth questioning”. In truth, this means tracking down anyone that could be involved in the ongoing and growing resistance to the US and British occupation, as it is now routine for the coalition to brand any acts of opposition to its illegal takeover of the country as the work of Saddam Hussein loyalists.

With the Mukhabarat, however, the US is actually working with some of the staunchest defenders of the former dictator. In his interview, Abdullah is at pains to stress his allegiance to the old regime. “Saddam was highly intelligent and he loved his people. He was a strong leader and the mistakes he made were the fault of people around him who gave him poor advice.

--snip--

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/sep2003/iraq-s26_prn.shtml

[emad]

1. ...and enrolling them onto Dubya's 2004 campaign?

???

[jayfish]

2. Ahhh, Yes... Hearts And Minds.

That ought to win'em.

Jay

[PATRICK]

3. to be strictly retrained

...at the School of the Americas.

[Nevernose]

4. Isn't this what they did with the gestapo after WWII ?

n/t

[havocmom]

5. Yep, once again America's ruling class claim the right to get rid of evil

only to induct the minions of that evil into service of their class.

[Aidoneus]

indeed they did

I believe the recruitment of Nazi scientists was referred to as "Project Paperclip", but I forget the name given to the large scale recruitment of Nazi spies/etc by the CIA for use against the USSR and dominating post-war Europe, which overnight also turned anti-fascist resistance fighters all over Europe & Asia into the new enemy suppressed by the post-war order. One such war criminal that escaped his well-deserved punishment by enlisting his valuable services to the CIA was General Gehlen, one name I remember off hand, more is probably easy to find on Google.. I think it's said that the Dulles Brothers as heads of the CIA brought some 10,000 Nazi war criminals into the United States--and we name airports after them as a tribute?

It's not much a surprise that it's actually the "deadenders" in Iraq that have the real motive to collaborate with the occupation forces. These Mukhabarat people have much to offer towards suppressing probably much the same resistance fighters who fought the government before. Any poor saps who bought the "liberation"/"democracy" rhetoric have a lot of naivety for Chalabi to eventually beat out of them.

[emad]

7. Operation Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon?

Goering left a number of assholes who were easily recruited and sucked into the system

[Aidoneus]

6. post deleted

accidental double post..

[shanti]

8. exactly

GMTA

[teryang]

9. This 'small democracy' is in need of our help

Isn't that what chimp told the UN? This is sick.