Re: Russia gave data to Iraqis? I remember now...!

[Bonobo]

Does this have something to do with all that extremely detailed data on troop movements that was being put on the net during the first few days of the war?
Does anyone else remember what I am talking about? There was a website providing intel from the Russians that painted a very different picture of the fighting than we were told. On MTP, Russert mentioned the Russian Intel concerned troop movements...

Any thoughts? Sorry for the hasty post... I am swamped with work...

[htuttle]

1. It ended up on irakwar.ru

...but started as part of a Russian aircraft site (can't recall the name right now -- 'Veniks'? maybe -- yup here it is: http://www.aeronautics.ru/ ).

IIRC, It was a group of retired Russian GRU officers, working from old contacts and their knowledge of Iraq. Roughly equivalent to when Faux News has 'Military Consultants' on the air -- except the Russians seemed more interested in what was actually going on, as opposed to what they wanted us to think was going on.

[tatertop]

5. I looked at that site every day. They definitely had some facts.

[Warren Stupidity]

7. It might have had 'some' facts

but mostly it was a load of total bullshit, as is our Ministry of Disinformation report about a Russian source in our military HQ aiding the Evil Saddam.

You all need to get a grip about this particular propaganda onslaught. Hint: as others have pointed out, this is all about our Iran mess and our displeasure with Russia and China's refusal to play along.

[tatertop]

8. All this US propaganda is leading to the inevitable invasion of Iran

I know that better than most.
Still, that was a cool site.

[On the Road]

2. Yes, I Checked That Site Several Times a Day During the War

I believe it was a link from Venik's Aviation.

The Iraq reports were pretty straight anti-American propaganda, but probably contained quire a bit of real information. Lots of reports of armored vehicle breakdowns and delays in the US advance due to battles in cities like Najaf. Definitely a good counterbalance to US coverage.

The reports were very detailed and were given some weight by the fact that American coverage of the war was inconsistent. US ground troops were advancing rapidly, only two days from Baghdad. Then three days later they were still two days from Baghdad with no indication of any resistance or delays.

That particular series of reports was eliminated at the end of major combat -- according to the website, their source had to flee the country. But the larger site remained up -- it had a lot of articles on Iraq from foreign sources giving a more pessimistic view than US media. To my dismay, it was discontinued a year or so afterwards. Would be nice to find a similar source of foreign coverage of Iraq and other hot spots.

[peacetalksforall]

3. During this period there were also all kinds of reports of stolen laptops?

[Bonobo]

4. So is it the same intel? Same issue they're talking about?

[htuttle]

6. It could be -- it's occured to me that it is

It wasn't really anything classified, though. Just a bunch of tea-room talk, estimates, guesses, 'rumor-mill' stuff, etc... Certainly a fair amount of it was reports from Iraqi contacts -- some true, some not.

I remember something about the site saying they were getting pressure from the Russian government to pipe down at one point -- perhaps they were worried about disclosing former sources and methods, pissing Bush off, who knows.

It strikes me odd that anyone would be surprised the Mukabarat had good human intelligence. I even recall an article shortly after the war started suggesting that even though the Iraqi army was pathetic in many ways -- it had very good 'ground level' intelligence.

Here it is:

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4176/is_20031108/ai_n14563549

Iraq military intelligence low-tech but first-rate
Oakland Tribune, Nov 8, 2003 by Knut Royce - NEWSDAY
(snip)
The study, based on on-site visits to Iraq, 176 interviews with coalition forces and Iraqi prisoners of war, as well as primary- source documents, said that Iraqi intelligence "used low-tech means to assemble picture(s) sufficient to move paramilitaries (and) multiple Republican Guard divisions."

in ways that imply timely knowledge of our whereabouts."

It said that the Iraqi scouts shadowed virtually all allied movements and communicated positions up the command chain using phones and couriers, often resulting in accurate anticipation of planned coalition offensives. In some instances the Iraqis were able to conduct massive division redeployments through paths they knew to be undefended. In Nasiriyah, Marines captured "a detailed, accurate sand table of U.S. positions," the study discloses, indicating precise, real-time knowledge of allied movements. A sand table is a miniature model of the battlefield that helps commanders plot the next moves.

"That sand table, that's a big deal," said W. Patrick Lang, who became intimately familiar with the Iraqi military while directing the Defense Intelligence Agency's Mideast division during the Iran- Iraq war and during Desert Storm in 1991. "You don't do sand tables unless you know what you're doing. It tells you Iraqi military intelligence was functioning pretty well."
(snip)