ACLU Urges Supreme Court to Review Case of FBI Whistleblower

[Gavur]

'Inconvenient Patriot'

9/11 TESTIMONY OF 'INCONVENIENT PATRIOT' IMPLICATES DENNIS HASTERT, OTHER TOP OFFICIALS IN AL QAEDA-RELATED BRIBERY SCANDAL
By Mike Mejia
Online Journal Contributing Writer

Online Journal, FL
Aug 31 2005

August 31, 2005-Thanks to a Vanity Fair article penned by British
Journalist David Rose, as well as to some excellent follow-up
interviews in the alternative press, the final 'dots' in the story
of fired FBI contract linguist and 9/11 whistleblower Sibel Edmonds
are close to being fully connected.

A case that has been shrouded in unprecedented government secrecy
for over three years is finally being forced into sharp focus,
giving the mainstream press no more excuses to ignore a scandal
that makes Tom DeLay's lobbying shenanigans look like an exercise
in 'good government' by comparison. We now have a very good idea
of the countries, organizations and individuals Edmonds heard in
wiretaps connected with the money laundering, arms dealing and drug
trafficking activities that the whistleblower says facilitated the
crimes of September 11, 2001.

Although the Turkish-American Edmonds had always been creative
in drawing an abstract outline of the official corruption she had
discovered as a translator of Central Asian languages at the FBI,
where she was hired a few days after 9/11, she was hindered from
'naming names' by a series of Justice Department gag orders. However,
the Vanity Fair article has opened a floodgate of new information,
as author Rose was able to obtain leaks from congressional sources
and FBI officials present during Ms. Edmonds classified testimony
before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The article reveals for the first time that one of the elected
officials that bin Laden-connected Turkish nationals claimed to
have on their payroll was none other than Republican House Speaker
Dennis Hastert, to whom bribes and illicit campaign contributions may
have been funneled in order to get him to pull a House Resolution on
Armenian Genocide from the House Floor in 2000. It also reveals that
these same Turkish nationals claimed to have bribed several State
Department and Defense Department officials to facilitate illicit
conventional and nuclear arms trades, and had infiltrated U.S.
nuclear weapons laboratories in order to sell U.S. technology to the
"highest bidder" (al Qaeda, North Korea, Iran?)

The one flaw in the Vanity Fair article is that it seems to boil
Sibel Edmonds' testimony down to an Armenian Genocide resolution, when
actually most of what Edmonds has testified about relates directly to
9-11 (It is not clear why a bunch of Turkish mafia types would have
been so interested in a non-binding resolution on the slaughter of the
Armenians by the Ottoman Turks at the beginning of the 20th Century:
were they acting on behalf of the Turkish government, or were they
afraid a freeze in U.S.-Turkish relations would cut off Turkey as a
transshipment point for heroin and nuclear materials?)

As a result, Ms. Edmonds has been made a pariah in Turkey, while
Dennis Hastert is apparently no worse off than before: except
for one article in USA Today, no major newspaper has reported on
these explosive revelations surrounding the speaker of the House of
Representatives. But although the Rose article missed the mark in
certain respects, it provided a useful launching pad for the follow-up
interviews the FBI whistleblower gave with Amy Goodman, Scott Horton
and Chris Deliso, in which she fleshed out many additional details
of the scandal.

Pulling all this new data together, we now have a pretty good idea
of what exactly Attorney General Ashcroft was trying to hide when
he twice invoked the "State Secrets" privilege to suppress Edmonds'
testimony in the U.S. court system.

Foreign Relations: The Edmonds case has always been quashed by the
State and Justice Departments under the guise of protecting "sensitive
foreign relations." In the Deliso and Horton interviews, Edmonds hints
this is because U.S. "quasi-allies" Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan,
Tajikistan, and at least one Balkan country, are implicated in 9-11,
mainly through partnership with al Qaeda in the global heroin trade.

Government officials: Besides Dennis Hastert, Edmonds testimony
pointed to bribes given to State Department and Pentagon officials.
Edmonds harshest rhetoric is directed at the State Department,
which she hints blocked the investigation into the "drugs for arms"
network, partially because some of its own officials had been bribed.
She also claims that at least some neocons are involved in this
illicit activity.

Organizations: At least three Turkish organizations were apparently
named in Edmonds testimony, including the American Turkish Council
and the Assembly of Turkish American Associations. However, Edmonds,
has spoken of "several" such "semi-legitimate" organizations. Some
of her recent statements may put AIPAC in that category, as well as
other organizations connected to the above mentioned Central Asian
countries (I would personally not be surprised to find the Project
for a New American Century end up on the list someday).

So how does one pull all these new clues together to develop a coherent
narrative of what Edmonds testified to before various Committees and
the 9-11 Commission? One thing that struck this author is the close
parallel between the claims the 'Inconvenient Patriot' has been making
and the testimony given by author Peter Dale Scott at the recent 9/11
symposium organized by Representative Cynthia McKinney. Specifically,
Scott pointed out how the U.S. geopolitical strategy in Central
Asia-primarily designed to gain control of the energy resources in
the region-has led to a tolerance of and maybe even complicity in the
heroin trade and to a much more complex relationship with al Qaeda
than was revealed in the 9-11 Commission Report.

Scott writes: "The truth is that for at least two decades the United
States has engaged in energetic covert programs to secure U.S.
control over the Persian Gulf, and also to open up Central Asia for
development by U.S. oil companies . . . To this end, time after time,
U.S. covert operations in the region have used so-called 'Arab Afghan'
warriors as assets, the jihadis whom we loosely link with the name and
leadership of al Qaeda. In country after country these 'Arab Afghans'
have been involved in trafficking Afghan heroin."

Combining the analysis of Mr. Scott with the testimony of Edmonds,
it would appear that investigative reporter John Stanton had it
exactly right when he wrote that the American people " . . . are easily
sacrificed for a perceived greater good." From the U.S. support for the
drug-running KLA in Kosovo, to its coddling of totalitarian regimes
in Central Asia, it appears that once again the U.S. is complicit in
the drug trade, even though that same trade also benefits our alleged
enemy, Osama Bin Laden. And the heroin is not just going into Europe:

Edmonds makes clear that the pipeline of Southwest Asian heroin to
the United States that closed after the end of the Soviet-Afghan war
has been reopened. The DEA's own website may give credence to her
allegations: According to the its Domestic Monitor Program, Southwest
Asian Heroin, which had previously been brought in small quantities by
West African couriers, principally through JFK Airport in New York,
suddenly began appearing in larger quantities in Washington D.C. in
2001. Was this heroin coming in with the full knowledge and even
the support of the U.S. government? Were these narcotics, and not
some obscure collection of Islamic charities, the primary financing
mechanism for the 9-11 attacks?

Anyone who has studied the history of U.S. intelligence agencies
involvement with drug traffickers and terrorists should not be
surprised about these revelations. However, this would be the first
time as far as this author knows, that the drugs being allowed into
the country by U.S. officials may be financing the very attacks that
endanger our citizen's lives-a fact that would be almost comical if
it were not so tragic. And the next attack, if it comes, could be with
WMD-knowledge obtained not from tinhorn dictators or Iranian mullahs,
but from our own military-industrial complex.

While those of us looking to reopen the 9-11 inquiry have much to be
encouraged about with the recent clues put out by Sibel Edmonds, we
are once again disappointed with the tepid response of the corporate
media, and frankly, the nonresponse of much of the Internet community
(Where are Buzzflash, Josh Marshall, Daily KOS and Juan Cole on
this issue?) Beyond Online Journal, Antiwar.com and Democracy Now,
these stunning allegations have received scant coverage. Yet, if Ms.
Edmonds is correct-and Republican Senator Charles Grassley calling her
'credible' is a strong indicator that she is-then at this very moment,
our nuclear secrets are being sold to the very alleged terrorists
our government claims to be chasing down in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Is there any issue more important than the fact that the reckless
hypocrisy of the U.S. government could result in a nuclear attack on
American soil and the subsequent shredding of what little remains of
the U.S. Constitution? If there is, I'm all ears.

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/083105Mejia/083105mejia.html

[Gavur]

Special Report

9/11 testimony of 'Inconvenient Patriot' implicates Dennis Hastert, other top officials in al Qaeda-related bribery scandal

By Mike Mejia
Online Journal Contributing Writer


August 31, 2005—Thanks to a Vanity Fair article penned by British Journalist David Rose, as well as to some excellent follow-up interviews in the alternative press, the final 'dots' in the story of fired FBI contract linguist and 9/11 whistleblower Sibel Edmonds are close to being fully connected.

A case that has been shrouded in unprecedented government secrecy for over three years is finally being forced into sharp focus, giving the mainstream press no more excuses to ignore a scandal that makes Tom DeLay's lobbying shenanigans look like an exercise in 'good government' by comparison. We now have a very good idea of the countries, organizations and individuals Edmonds heard in wiretaps connected with the money laundering, arms dealing and drug trafficking activities that the whistleblower says facilitated the crimes of September 11, 2001.

Although the Turkish-American Edmonds had always been creative in drawing an abstract outline of the official corruption she had discovered as a translator of Central Asian languages at the FBI, where she was hired a few days after 9/11, she was hindered from 'naming names' by a series of Justice Department gag orders. However, the Vanity Fair article has opened a floodgate of new information, as author Rose was able to obtain leaks from congressional sources and FBI officials present during Ms. Edmonds classified testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The article reveals for the first time that one of the elected officials that bin Laden-connected Turkish nationals claimed to have on their payroll was none other than Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert, to whom bribes and illicit campaign contributions may have been funneled in order to get him to pull a House Resolution on Armenian Genocide from the House Floor in 2000. It also reveals that these same Turkish nationals claimed to have bribed several State Department and Defense Department officials to facilitate illicit conventional and nuclear arms trades, and had infiltrated U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories in order to sell U.S. technology to the "highest bidder" (al Qaeda, North Korea, Iran?)

The one flaw in the Vanity Fair article is that it seems to boil Sibel Edmonds' testimony down to an Armenian Genocide resolution, when actually most of what Edmonds has testified about relates directly to 9–11 (It is not clear why a bunch of Turkish mafia types would have been so interested in a non-binding resolution on the slaughter of the Armenians by the Ottoman Turks at the beginning of the 20th Century: were they acting on behalf of the Turkish government, or were they afraid a freeze in U.S.-Turkish relations would cut off Turkey as a transshipment point for heroin and nuclear materials?)

As a result, Ms. Edmonds has been made a pariah in Turkey, while Dennis Hastert is apparently no worse off than before: except for one article in USA Today, no major newspaper has reported on these explosive revelations surrounding the speaker of the House of Representatives. But although the Rose article missed the mark in certain respects, it provided a useful launching pad for the follow-up interviews the FBI whistleblower gave with Amy Goodman, Scott Horton and Chris Deliso, in which she fleshed out many additional details of the scandal.

Pulling all this new data together, we now have a pretty good idea of what exactly Attorney General Ashcroft was trying to hide when he twice invoked the "State Secrets" privilege to suppress Edmonds' testimony in the U.S. court system.

Foreign Relations: The Edmonds case has always been quashed by the State and Justice Departments under the guise of protecting "sensitive foreign relations." In the Deliso and Horton interviews, Edmonds hints this is because U.S. "quasi-allies" Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, and at least one Balkan country, are implicated in 9–11, mainly through partnership with al Qaeda in the global heroin trade.

Government officials: Besides Dennis Hastert, Edmonds testimony pointed to bribes given to State Department and Pentagon officials. Edmonds harshest rhetoric is directed at the State Department, which she hints blocked the investigation into the "drugs for arms" network, partially because some of its own officials had been bribed. She also claims that at least some neocons are involved in this illicit activity.

Organizations: At least three Turkish organizations were apparently named in Edmonds testimony, including the American Turkish Council and the Assembly of Turkish American Associations. However, Edmonds, has spoken of "several" such "semi-legitimate" organizations. Some of her recent statements may put AIPAC in that category, as well as other organizations connected to the above mentioned Central Asian countries (I would personally not be surprised to find the Project for a New American Century end up on the list someday).

So how does one pull all these new clues together to develop a coherent narrative of what Edmonds testified to before various Committees and the 9–11 Commission? One thing that struck this author is the close parallel between the claims the 'Inconvenient Patriot' has been making and the testimony given by author Peter Dale Scott at the recent 9/11 symposium organized by Representative Cynthia McKinney. Specifically, Scott pointed out how the U.S. geopolitical strategy in Central Asia—primarily designed to gain control of the energy resources in the region—has led to a tolerance of and maybe even complicity in the heroin trade and to a much more complex relationship with al Qaeda than was revealed in the 9–11 Commission Report.

Scott writes: "The truth is that for at least two decades the United States has engaged in energetic covert programs to secure U.S. control over the Persian Gulf, and also to open up Central Asia for development by U.S. oil companies . . . To this end, time after time, U.S. covert operations in the region have used so-called 'Arab Afghan' warriors as assets, the jihadis whom we loosely link with the name and leadership of al Qaeda. In country after country these 'Arab Afghans' have been involved in trafficking Afghan heroin."

Combining the analysis of Mr. Scott with the testimony of Edmonds, it would appear that investigative reporter John Stanton had it exactly right when he wrote that the American people " . . . are easily sacrificed for a perceived greater good." From the U.S. support for the drug-running KLA in Kosovo, to its coddling of totalitarian regimes in Central Asia, it appears that once again the U.S. is complicit in the drug trade, even though that same trade also benefits our alleged enemy, Osama Bin Laden. And the heroin is not just going into Europe:

Edmonds makes clear that the pipeline of Southwest Asian heroin to the United States that closed after the end of the Soviet-Afghan war has been reopened. The DEA's own website may give credence to her allegations: According to the its Domestic Monitor Program, Southwest Asian Heroin, which had previously been brought in small quantities by West African couriers, principally through JFK Airport in New York, suddenly began appearing in larger quantities in Washington D.C. in 2001. Was this heroin coming in with the full knowledge and even the support of the U.S. government? Were these narcotics, and not some obscure collection of Islamic charities, the primary financing mechanism for the 9–11 attacks?

Anyone who has studied the history of U.S. intelligence agencies involvement with drug traffickers and terrorists should not be surprised about these revelations. However, this would be the first time as far as this author knows, that the drugs being allowed into the country by U.S. officials may be financing the very attacks that endanger our citizen's lives—a fact that would be almost comical if it were not so tragic. And the next attack, if it comes, could be with WMD-knowledge obtained not from tinhorn dictators or Iranian mullahs, but from our own military-industrial complex.

While those of us looking to reopen the 9–11 inquiry have much to be encouraged about with the recent clues put out by Sibel Edmonds, we are once again disappointed with the tepid response of the corporate media, and frankly, the nonresponse of much of the Internet community (Where are Buzzflash, Josh Marshall, Daily KOS and Juan Cole on this issue?) Beyond Online Journal, Antiwar.com and Democracy Now, these stunning allegations have received scant coverage. Yet, if Ms. Edmonds is correct—and Republican Senator Charles Grassley calling her 'credible' is a strong indicator that she is—then at this very moment, our nuclear secrets are being sold to the very alleged terrorists our government claims to be chasing down in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Is there any issue more important than the fact that the reckless hypocrisy of the U.S. government could result in a nuclear attack on American soil and the subsequent shredding of what little remains of the U.S. Constitution? If there is, I'm all ears.





The views expressed herein are the writers' own and do not necessarily reflect those of Online Journal.
Email [email protected]
Copyright © 1998-2005 Online Journal™. All rights reserved.

[Gavur]

Turkey, drugs, Faustian alliances and Sibel Edmonds

Special Report

By John Stanton
Online Journal Contributing Writer


June 29, 2004—Taking Turkey as the focal point and with a start date of 1998, it is easy to speculate why Sibel Edmonds indicated that there was a convergence of US and foreign counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism and US national security and economic interests all of which were too preoccupied to surface critical information warning Americans of the attacks of September 11, 2001. After all, who would have believed drug runners operating in Central Asia? And besides, President Clinton was promoting Turkey, one of the world's top drug transit points, as a model for Muslim-Western cooperation and a country necessary to reshape the Middle East.

The FBI's Office of International Operations, in conjunction with the CIA and the US State Department counter-narcotics section, the United Kingdom's MI6, Israel's Mossad, Pakistan's ISI, the US DEA, Turkey's MIT, and the governments and intelligence agencies of dozens of nations, were in one way or another involved in the illicit drug trade, either trying to stop it or benefit from it. What can be surmised from the public record is that from 1998 to September 10, 2001, the "War on Drugs" kept bumping into the nascent "War on Terror" and new directions in US foreign policy.

It's easy to imagine the thousands of drug couriers, middlemen, financiers and lab technicians moving back and forth between Pakistan and Turkey, and over to Western Europe and the United States, and the tidbits of information they gleaned from their sponsors as they traveled. As information gathering assets for the intelligence agencies of the world, they must have been invaluable. And given the dozens of foreign intelligence services working in the counter-narcotics/terrorism fields, the "chatter" that just dozens of well-placed operatives may have overheard about attacks against Western targets must have found its way into the US intelligence apparatus. But, again, who could believe the audacity of non-state actors organizing a domestic attack against the supreme power of the day, the USA? Implementing a new strategic direction and business deals may have overcome the wacky warnings from the counter-narcotics folks.

Back in the late 1990s and early 2000, who would have believed the rants of a drug courier from Afghanistan saying that some guy named bin Laden was going to attack America, particularly if it involved America's newest friend, Turkey? Or that a grand design to reshape Central Asia and the Middle East with Turkey and Israel as pivot points was being pushed by the Clinton administration as a matter of national policy.

The historical record shows that the US "War on Drugs" and the nascent "War on Terror" kept colliding with not only within the US intelligence, policy and business apparatus, but also with European strategic and business interests. Turkey continues its push for entry into the European Union and the USA wants that to happen as the current meeting of NATO, and President [sic] Bush's attendance under dangerous circumstances, in Turkey demonstrates. Turkey is one of the USA's and Europe's top arms buyers and is located near what could be some of the biggest oil and natural gas fields in the world. At this point it's worth noting that the one of the FBI's tasks is to counter industrial espionage and to engage in it. Where big arms sales pit the US against its European competitors—as is the case in Turkey (particularly starting in 1998)—the FBI is busy making sure the US gets the edge over its competition. Allies are friends only so far.

Did warnings foretelling of an attack on American soil by bin Laden's crew get lost in the War on Drugs or the US national and economic interest in troublesome Turkey? It seems only Ms Edmonds knows.

Turkey Cold to UK and USA Concerns

In 1998, the US Department of State (DOS) was finally forced to admit that Turkey was a major refining and transit point for the flow of heroin from Southwest Asia to Western Europe, with small quantities of the stuff finding its way to the streets of the USA. In that same year, Kendal Nezan, writing for Le Monde Diplomatique, reported that MIT and the Turkish National Police force were actively supporting the trade in illicit drugs not only for fun and profit, but out of desperation.

"After the Gulf War in 1991, Turkey found itself deprived of the all-important Iraqi market and, since it lacked significant oil reserves of its own, it decided to make up for the loss by turning more massively to drugs. The trafficking increased in intensity with the arrival of the hawks in power, after the death in suspicious circumstances of President Turgut Özal in April 1993. According to the minister of interior, the war in Kurdistan had cost the Turkish exchequer upwards of $12.5 billion. According to the daily Hürriyet, Turkey's heroin trafficking brought in $25 billion in 1995 and $37.5 billion in 1996 . . . Only criminal networks working in close cooperation with the police and the army could possibly organize trafficking on such a scale. Drug barons have stated publicly, on Turkish television and in the West, that they have been working under the protection of the Turkish government and to its financial benefit. The traffickers themselves travel on diplomatic passports. The drugs are even transported by military helicopter from the Iranian border."

Nowhere is the pain of Turkey's role in the heroin trade felt more horribly than in the United Kingdom. According to London's Letter written by a Member of Parliament, "The war against drugs and drug trafficking in Britain is huge. Turkish heroin in particular is a top priority for the MI6 and the Foreign Ministry. During his visit to the British Embassy in Ankara, the head of the Foreign Office's Turkey Department was clear about this. He reassured an English journalist that the heroin trade was more important than billions of pounds worth off trade capacity and weapons selling. When the journalist in question told me about this, I was reminded of my teacher's words at university in Ankara ten years ago. He was also working for the Turkish Foreign Ministry. The topic of a lecture discussion was about Turkey's Economy and I still remember his words today, '50 billion dollars worth of foreign debt is nothing, it is two lorry loads of heroin . . . '"

Afghanistan: Top Opiate Producer and America's Friend

Both the DOS and the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) described in detail the transit routes and countries involved in getting the goods to Turkey. Intelligence organizations here and abroad must have sanctioned the role that they, and Turkey and Afghanistan, played in the process. "Afghanistan is the original source of most of the opiates reaching Turkey. Afghan opiates, and also hashish, are stockpiled at storage and staging areas in Pakistan, from where a ton or larger quantities are smuggled by overland vehicles to Turkey via Iran. Multi-ton quantities of opiates and hashish also are moved to coastal areas of Pakistan and Iran, where the drugs are loaded on ships waiting off-shore, which then smuggle the contraband to points in Turkey along the Mediterranean, Aegean, and/or Marmara seas. Opiates and hashish also are smuggled overland from Afghanistan via Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, and Georgia to Turkey.

"Turkish-based traffickers and brokers operate directly and in conjunction with narcotic suppliers, smugglers, transporters, laboratory operators, drug distributors, money collectors, and money launderers in and outside Turkey. Traffickers in Turkey illegally acquire the precursor chemical acetic anhydride, which is used in the production of heroin, from sources in Western Europe, the Balkans, and Russia. During the 27-month period from July 1, 1999, to September 30, 2001, over 56 metric tons of illicit acetic anhydride were seized in or destined for Turkey."

The Ankara Pact

The Middle East Report concluded in 1998 that probably the greatest strategic move in the Clinton post-Cold War years is what could be called "The Ankara Pact"—an alliance between the US, Turkey, and Israel that essentially circumvents and bottles up the Arab countries. Earlier in 1997, Turkish Prime Minister Yilmaz visited with Bill Clinton to ensure him that Turkey would attempt to improve its human rights record by slaughtering fewer Kurds, but also mentioned that if the US pushed too hard on that subject or if the US Congress adopted an Armenian Genocide Resolution, Turkey might award a billion dollar contract for attack helicopters to the Europeans or maybe even Russia.

During this timeframe, and with approval from the USA, Turkey began to let contracts to Israel to upgrade its F-4, F-5 and F-16 aircraft. Pemra Hazbay, writing in the May 2004 issue of Peace Watch, reported that total Israeli arms sales to Turkey had exceeded $1 billion since 2000. "In December 1996, Israel won a deal worth $630 million to upgrade Turkey's fleet of fifty-four F-4 Phantom fighter jets. In 1998, Turkey awarded a $75 million contract to upgrade its fleet of 48 F-5 fighter jets to Israel Aircraft Industries' Lahav division, beating out strong French competition. In 2002, Turkey ratified its largest military deal with Israel, a $700 million contract for the renovation of Turkish tanks." But that pales in comparison to the $20 billion in US arms exports and military aid dealt to Turkey over the last 24 years.

Then in 1999 came a news item from a publication known as the Foreign Report based in the United Kingdom. That publication indicated that "Israeli intelligence, the Mossad, had expanded its base in Turkey and opened branches in Turkey for other two departments stationed in Tel Aviv. The Mossad carried out several spy operations and plans through its elements stationed in Istanbul and Ankara, where it received support and full cooperation from the Turkish government. According to the military cooperation agreement between the Mossad and its Turkish counterpart, the MIT, signed by former Turkish Foreign Minister Hekmet Citen during his visit to Israel in 1993, the Mossad had provided Turkey with plans aiding it in closing its border with Iraq, as well as being involved in the arrest the chairman of the PKK, Abdullah Ocalan." That agreement also included help with counter-narcotics.

Earlier in 1998, Israeli, Turkish and American military forces engaged in exercises in the Mediterranean, according to Reuters and Agencie France Press. "'[These exercises] signal to the radical states in the region that there is a strong alliance between Israel, Turkey and the United States which they must fear,' Israeli political scientist Efraim Inbar said. Defense officials said during last month's visit to Ankara that they hoped the Jewish lobby in Washington would help Turkey offset Greek and Armenian influence on Capitol Hill. 'That's certainly part of this. They expect us to help them and we do help them a bit,' said David Ivri, an adviser who directs biannual strategy talks with Turkey.'" Reports also indicated that the CIA and Pentagon intelligence organizations had regularly chaired meetings of Turkish and Israeli officers in Tel Aviv for years.

DEA & FBI

Prior to the US invasion of Afghanistan, the DEA monitored the Afghanistan drug trade from its two offices in Pakistan: The Islamabad Country Office and the Peshawar Resident Office. In addition to Pakistan and Afghanistan, the DEA Islamabad Country Office also includes in its area of responsibility Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman. Asa Hutchinson, the administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, testified in October 2001 that DEA intelligence confirmed the presence of a linkage between Afghanistan's ruling Taliban and international "terrorist" Osama bin Laden.

He went on to say that although DEA had no direct evidence to confirm that bin Laden is involved in the drug trade, the relationship between the Taliban and bin Laden is believed to have flourished in large part due to the Taliban's substantial reliance on the opium trade as a source of organizational revenue. "While the activities of the two entities do not always follow the same trajectory, we know that drugs and terror frequently share the common ground of geography, money, and violence. In this respect, the very sanctuary enjoyed by bin Laden is based on the existence of the Taliban's support for the drug trade. This connection defines the deadly, symbiotic relationship between the illicit drug trade and international terrorism."

Meanwhile, back at the FBI, the Office of International Operations oversees the Legal Attaché Program operating at 46 locations around the world. The operation maintains contact with Interpol, other US federal agencies such as the CIA and military agencies such as the Defense Intelligence Agency, and foreign police and security officers. Its job is to investigate or counter threats from foreign intelligence, terrorists and criminal enterprises that threaten the national or economic security of the USA. It coordinates its activities with all US and foreign intelligence operations. In 2000, it opened offices in Ankara, Turkey, and Almaty, Kazhakstan. Since 1996, it has had offices in Islamabad, Pakistan, and Tel Aviv, Israel. In 1997 it opened one in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Combined, these offices monitor the entire Middle East, Persian Gulf and Central Asian threat areas, developing thousands of "investigative leads."

Ms Edmonds has given the American people leads that show that they are easily sacrificed for a perceived greater good.

John Stanton is a Virginia based writer specializing in national security and political issues. His forthcoming book is "America 2004: A Power But Not Super." He is the author, along with Wayne Madsen, of "America's Nightmare: The Presidency of George Bush II." Email him at [email protected].





The views expressed herein are the writers' own and do not necessarily reflect those of Online Journal.
Email [email protected]
Copyright © 1998-2005 Online Journal™. All rights reserved.

[Gavur]

Whistleblower Has Elite Interests Running Scared

by Christian Nicholson

Antiwar.com
October 24, 2005

If people know of Sibel Edmonds at all, they know her as an FBI
whistleblower. Since mid-2002, her face has graced newspapers
across America; she's testified before numerous senators and had her
deposition subpoenaed by family members of 9/11 victims; as late as
September 2005, Vanity Fair devoted 11 pages to her. Yet almost no
one can tell you what she has to say. Like a star in a silent movie,
Edmonds has been cast as the heroine in a legal drama whose details
are obscure.

That's because Sibel Edmonds is the most gagged person in the history
of the United States, at least according to her ACLU lawyers. If
gag orders were nickels, she'd be rich. Since her dismissal from the
FBI in March 2002, Edmonds has borne the burden of state censorship
with relative aplomb, working constantly within the law to make her
story heard. After she gave a brief spate of interviews, John Ashcroft
invoked the "state secrets" privilege, silencing her before the press
and denying Edmonds her day in court. Apparently, her lawsuit involves
secrets so secret that not even Edmonds' lawyers are allowed to know
the reasons why her case cannot be tried. Aside from an independent
investigator, the Supreme Court is her only remaining option, and
the Court will decide whether or not to hear her case in mid-October.

After the FBI fired her, Sibel Edmonds sued the bureau for negligent
endangerment, negligent investigation, conversion of property, and
infliction of emotional distress, among other things. During her
six-month stint as a translator in the FBI's Washington, D.C., unit,
she had stumbled upon what she alleges were serial acts of espionage
on the part of one of her colleagues, Melek Can xxxxerson, who worked
with Edmonds evaluating all sorts of missives and communications, and
translating into English those communications pertinent to ongoing FBI
investigations. xxxxerson, it turns out, was a former employee of the
American-Turkish Council, a Turkish organization under investigation
for espionage and bribing public officials, and she considered
most of her former colleagues' communications to have no pertinence
whatsoever. Edmonds thought otherwise and reported her colleague.
Getting no response, Edmonds reported her again and again, moving up
the chain of command until Edmonds herself was finally fired. Shortly
thereafter, xxxxerson and her husband fled the country.

Setting aside the gross injustice of it all, why would Ashcroft
bother gagging a contract linguist with no more than six months under
her belt? Why would he go so far as to forbid her from naming the
languages she speaks, or ban all mention of her place of birth? Citing
"sensitive diplomatic relations" and their importance to America's
national security, the Justice Department preferred the shameful
embarrassment of muzzling a witness in the 9/11 case to the outright
scandal that would likely erupt were Edmonds' story known.

Some of Edmonds' story, however, can be reconstructed from the public
record, which includes interviews she gave prior to the slew of gag
orders, as well as an inspector general's report, the declassified
version of which was released in January 2005, largely corroborating
Edmonds' charges and pointing out that the FBI botched the subsequent
investigation. This, of course, is why whistleblowers are fired:
they make incompetent people look bad. But is it enough to get
whistleblowers gagged?

In the Edmonds case, it's not just "sensitive foreign relations"
that are on the line, it's the Americans who are doing the
sensitive relating. Indeed, a glance at the bigwigs involved in the
American-Turkish Council reveals a panoply of hawks, former ambassadors
and generals, and numerous lights of the three Bush administrations:
the ATC Board of Directors chair is Brent Scowcroft, erstwhile national
security adviser to Bush père; xxxx Cheney himself is a former member,
and many of his former colleagues at Halliburton remain on board,
as do higher-ups at Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Sikorsky, Northrop
Grumman, Boeing, and Eli Lilly.

David Rose of Vanity Fair, on the authority of congressional staffers
who were present for Edmonds' classified testimony before Senators
Grassley and Leahy of the Senate Judicial Committee, relates how ATC
employees allegedly spoke of senior politicians maintaining covert
relations with - and benefiting from the clandestine financial support
of - the ATC. One of the notables that purportedly figured in Edmonds'
testimony was House Speaker Dennis Hastert [.pdf]. Edmonds has also
supposedly testified about a State Department staffer and a Pentagon
official trafficking in information - that is, exchanging secrets
for money.

Edmonds herself claims, inasmuch as she can claim anything at all
on camera, that events hidden from the American public are much
bigger than the simple case of an upright translator done wrong, and
bigger even than highly placed elected officials taking bribes. She
evokes widespread criminal activity involving nationals from several
countries, linked by transnational criminal networks and engaged in
clandestine contraband of all sorts - including drugs, weapons, and
sensitive information. Some of that criminal activity, she claims,
is relevant to the events leading up to 9/11. It seems appropriate to
ask, then, what sensitive foreign relations could outweigh a national
security complex compromised on multiple fronts? And if Edmonds'
claims are mere bunk, then what's the harm in allowing them to be
refuted publicly?

On the other hand, maybe what Edmonds has to say cuts a little
too close to the interests of influential neoconservatives and
hawks. Consider Turkey. Crossroads of Europe and Asia, it has long held
a privileged place in America's geopolitical ambitions. Turkey has
hosted NSA "elephant cages," spying on the chitchat of then-Soviet
subs cruising through the Sea of Marmara, for decades. It played
a crucial role in containment during the Cold War, and it plays a
crucial role now, serving as a gateway into the New Eurasia and a
welcome, non-Arab ally for Israel in the Middle East.

Turkey figures large in neoconservative strategies for "democratizing"
the Caucasus hinterlands and destabilizing recalcitrant states like
Syria. When Richard Perle et al. drafted "A Clean Break: A New Strategy
for Securing the Realm" for the Institute for Advanced Strategic and
Political Studies in 1996, they highlighted Turkey's usefulness for
Israel as Jerusalem sought to encircle Damascus and emerge from its
isolation in the region.

Interestingly, Turkey seems to be engaged in more than just joint
military exercises with Israel - America's two quasi-allies are also
both embroiled in espionage scandals, having spied in much the same
manner. While ATC employees discussed corrupting civil servants and
political appointees in Washington and Chicago, American Israeli Public
Affairs Committee (AIPAC) staffers were sitting down with Lawrence
Franklin, the Defense Department Iran analyst who was recently indicted
for disclosing classified information about U.S. forces in Iraq,
to glean sensitive information that they allegedly passed on to Israel.

Clearly, in Sibel Edmonds v. Department of Justice, there's a great
deal more involved than a wrongful dismissal. Also at stake are the
ideological and material interests of the American Right, from the
neoconservative intellectuals in the service of the military-industrial
complex, to the erstwhile Cold Warriors still bent on denying Russia
that warm-water port it has sought for much of the 20th century. These
projects depend on a stable relationship with Turkey, a country whose
loyalties were shaken before, during, and after the U.S. invasion of
Iraq, which wrought enormous damage to the Turkish economy. Turkey,
and the archipelago of Turkic and Muslim states that span Eurasia,
are instrumental to U.S. foreign policy and are major clients for
American arms. And so, with the same tired rhetoric that justified the
excesses of America's authoritarian allies throughout the Cold War,
Washington apparently would rather turn a blind eye to the ways in
which these states (and America's own politicians) prosper in order
to keep them appeased. If it costs the liberties of one former FBI
translator - or the security of a few thousand everyday citizens -
well, that's America: love it or leave it.

Christian Nicholson is a freelance writer based in Paris.

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/nicholson.php?articleid=7738

[Gavur]

Daily views collaboration of Turkish intelligence with CIA "secret

Hurriyet website, Istanbul
4 Nov 05



Text of a report by Oktay Eksi: "Just curious" published by Turkish
daily Hurriyet website on 4 November

The US government has always been very skilful in steering public
opinion at home as well as in countries where it considers such
steering necessary.

Indeed there was a time when we thought, like many other people, that
the United States has no purpose other than performing good deeds for
humanity. We learned that the United States is not so sometimes 20 and
sometimes 30 years later.

When the United States stands up for a "freedom" it makes sure that
"that freedom is exercised in favour of its own interests".

Indeed after the disaster of 11 September 2001 the US methods of
influencing public opinion began to change like everything
else. Instead of appeasing individual journalists the United States
began using secret pressuring methods.

However it is not so easy to silence newspapers. Two days ago the
Washington Post reported the existence of "secret prisons in many
countries where the United States detains terrorist suspects".

These centres, which were started, and are used by the CIA, are
reportedly located in Thailand, Afghanistan and East European
countries like Poland. The paper reported that no one knows the fate
of people held in these secret interrogation centres. Essentially
President [George] Bush, a few people in the top echelons of the CIA,
and a very small number of very senior officials of the secret
services of the countries hosting these centres reportedly know about
their existence and locations.

[According to The Washington Post] in these centres the CIA
interrogates suspects it has kidnapped with its own means or using the
agents of the secret services of the collaborating countries without
having to comply with any laws or humanitarian rules and subsequently
does whatever is necessary. This is said to be an open-ended
situation, but taking the suspects to Guantanamo is one of the
possibilities being discussed.

The daily Yeni Safak reported some interesting information on this
issue yesterday. Let us read together:

"A plane that took off from Istanbul on 7 March (presumably 2005)
landed at Copenhagen Airport in Denmark. It waited there for 23
hours. Then it took off and landed at Keflavik Airport in Iceland.
Then it took off towards the United States and landed in an unknown
city.

"It was revealed that the plane belonged to the CIA. This created much
furore in Denmark. Frank Aaen, the defence policy spokesman of the
opposition left-wing Unity Party, demanded from Foreign Minister Peg
Stir Moller to clarify why the CIA plane landed in the Danish
capital."

The Yeni Safak article further reports that the Danish foreign
minister confirmed the incident but said that "he had no information
about the reason the plane landed."

We have come to the end of this article but here is what interests us
most in this article:

[According to the Yeni Safak article] "the Swedish state radio
disclosed that Turkish security agencies captured individuals
suspected by the United States of being terrorists in operations
inside and outside Turkey and turned them over to the CIA without
questioning them." The radio cited the "plane that took off from
Istanbul" as an example of such actions.

Do you think that the main opposition Republican People's Party will
ask the ruling Justice and Development Party for information about
this issue? Will or could our National Intelligence Organization tell
the public that "it did not take part in any such operation"?

[Gavur]

Correction: Former FBI tells of dispute

http://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism/view.php?StoryID=20051115-032233-9387r

[Gavur]

Brent Scowcroft talks Turkey; Sibel Edmonds fights fascism

By John Stanton
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Nov 18, 2005, 20:22


The Sibel Edmonds v. Department of Justice saga continues as the year 2005 draws to a close.

The only breaking news to come from the ongoing drama is the implication, published in Vanity Fair, that Dennis Hastert, speaker of the US House Representatives, was the recipient of campaign contributions and assorted bribes from the Turkish-American community. That another US politician is on the take comes as no surprise. But more on that later.

Sibel’s story might have quietly died from the suffocating oppression of the US government had it not been for very recent revelations that the US sanctions and operates interrogation/torture facilities in Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s and Vice President xxxx Cheney’s New Europe (Poland, Albania, Romania, Bulgaria, etc.).

While the buzz is all around the Plame-Wilson-Libby-Woodward-Rove-Hadley affair, and the lies that got the US into Iraq, the real news is that military and non-military torture chambers stretching from Mexico to Asia have become standard operating procedure for the US. Further, the response of official Washington to the torture expose was not disgust, but a call to prosecute the whistleblower that leaked the awful news.

Within the remarkable public revelation from the Washington Post and Human Rights Watch, is the imprimatur of Rumsfeld and Cheney -- the two crusty Nixon administration buddies -- and perhaps the most ruthless and dangerous Americans ever to hold office in the corporate/government world. They and their disciples share the view that “conduct unbecoming” does not exist. No law, no boundary, no moral code, no amount of lives or outdated parchments, like the US Constitution and Bill of Rights, will be a barrier as they push forward their foreign and domestic agenda for some of the US population, Turkey and Israel. They hide behind the veil of “the national security of the United States of America” and label Top Secret/Special Compartmentalized Information data that would implicate them, not save a US soldier in a Humvee, or they slap a State’s Secret order on the likes of Sibel Edmonds mainly to protect balance sheets and business deals.

Me Ne Frego!

There is a name for this kind of government-corporation and the society it creates and it is fascism, pure and simple. There just isn’t any other way to describe people like Rumsfeld or Cheney. To that we must add the name Brent Scowcroft.

According to Wikipedia, fascism’s appearance in Italy in the 1920s (rooted in the term fascio from the 1800’s) marked a new political and economic system that combined corporatism and nationalism in a state designed to bind all classes together under a capitalist system. Dissent was discouraged, political discourse of the time was highly inflammatory, and the society overly militaristic. Under Mussolini’s dictatorship, from 1922-1945, the effectiveness of its parliamentary system was virtually abolished though its forms were publicly preserved. The opposition was ferried to remote islands far from Italy proper where they would be tortured and sometimes killed. Mussolini was an active proponent of preemption. In 1923, he bombed Corfu and later established a puppet regime in Albania (according to the FBI in 2003, the Albanian Mafia is the most feared).

Rumsfeld and Cheney have been able to push their fascist doctrine into mainstream America and into every decision making element in the US government. Their spokesman and head buffoon is George Bush II, who recently stated on his trip to Asia that criticism of his war in Iraq was irresponsible and unpatriotic, and is also on the record saying “we do not torture." One sure sign of fascism is when the president speaks to his minions almost entirely from the safe confines of a US military base. These strangely American fascists have adopted the motto of Mussolini’s Black Shirts who were the enforcement arm of his government, “Me Ne Frego," or "I do not give a damn," they’d say as they went about brutalizing dissenters, union bosses, journalists, et al. It’s the kind of attitude that produces “freedom is messy," “bring ‘em on” and “people are fungible."

Italian Fascism was based on state control of financial/commercial interests and public thought. American Fascism has done the reverse, outsourcing its mandate of protecting and defending the US Constitution and Bill of Rights to corporations and powerful ideological domestic and foreign interests. These groups make the key decisions on US domestic and foreign policy. The actors in the stage production called “the three branches of US government," give the public audience a sense that they are somehow involved in staging the production.

Fascists don’t see a distinction between legitimate and semi-legitimate organizations. Front companies, informants, pundits, mafia, consultants, retired generals, drug dealers and junkies, arms traders, spies, assassins, associations, politicians, lobbyists, judges are all just tools to advance the national and foreign interests.

It’s this kind of madness that Sibel Edmonds and those like her are fighting against. They are trying to smash the mirrors and blow away the smoke that clouds the minds of so many who refuse to acknowledge that the US is rapidly becoming a reflection of Benito Mussolini’s Fascist Italy.

How Wars Are Conducted

A little known news piece by investigative reporter Bill Conroy takes us to Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. There we get a glimpse into how US officials conduct themselves in the War on Drugs and, in all likelihood, the War on Terror. According to Conroy, from 2003-2004 12 people were brutally tortured and murdered in what came to be known as the House of Death case.

Agents from the US Department of Homeland Security-Immigration and Customs Service (ICE) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) were attempting to capture Heriberto Santillan Tabares, apparently a top dog in Vincente Carrillo Fuente’s Juarez drug operation. The US agents successfully dropped an informant into Tabares’ operation. Problem was that the informant ended up gleefully taking part in the torture and murder of all 12 people. The bigger problem was that the then Attorney General of the United States, John Ashcroft, the head of the DEA, and the US government prosecutor wanted to maintain the informant’s undercover status and his fine torture and murder credentials so that they could bag Tabares and, later, other drug dealers. Former DEA agent Sandalio Gonzalez was appalled at this activity and sent an internal letter to Department of Justice officials. Their immediate response was to drum him out of the DEA, according to Conroy.

The head of the DEA said that Gonzalez’s action was “inexcusable” and in testimony lets on that incompetence and inter-agency squabbling was the real issue, not the fact that 12 apparently innocent people were murdered with the approval of the US government. Tandy stated that “there was a substantial issue between DEA and ICE over the use of the informant . . . And the jeopardy that DEA agents and others had been placed in as a result of ICE’s handling of an informant that the DEA had previously blackballed . . . It was such a sensitive issue that . . . I went personally to brief the attorney general . . ."

This bit of news leads us to Rumsfeld’s Death Star in Arlington, Virginia -- the Pentagon -- and there into the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy. Known simply as The Policy Organization, it is the former home of the notorious neocon Douglas Feith. But that’s not the interesting part. Under organizational titles like Policy, International Security, Homeland Defense, and Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict, exist operational elements like Counternarcotics, Detainees, Combating Terrorism, Homeland Security Integration, Stability Operations and the Defense Policy Board. Their leaderships boast Kissinger and Cheney protégés, stridently pro-Israel and Turkey supporters, and a former US Phoenix Project operative.

And this is where the guidelines for the Wars on Terror, Drugs, and Weapons of Mass Destruction are developed and implemented in the field, more than likely by former special operations operatives under contract. The Policy Organization has no problem dealing with psychopathic killers, buying and selling drugs, dropping white phosphorous on women and children, using the global black market to help a “critical” country upgrade its nuclear capability, or selling out the American people for the sake of profit. The lives of 12 or 1.2 million human beings are inconsequential -- nothing more than expendable extras in the big show. “Sensitive” matters must be classified or not discussed at all.

Undersecretary of Defense Eric Edelman (Cheney’s pick) runs The Policy Organization. Not surprisingly, he’s the former Ambassador to Turkey.

Gobble, Gobble

“Turkey’s long-term commitment to the principles of democracy and their commitment to undertaking the reforms Europe demanded before even the first round of accession negotiations -- have produced economic opportunity, stable political institutions, and the peaceful rule of law. Turkey is proof that our strategy of spreading democracy in the Islamic world can work," said Edelman. Lofty and duplicitous words that are not to be believed. For the real story, listen to Brent Scowcroft. As head of the American Turkish Council, he speaks on behalf of US corporations and the Turkish government.

In September, Scowcroft sent a letter to Hastert that stated, according to the Armenian National Committee of America, “even discussion of the Armenian Genocide on the floor of the US House of Representatives would be counter-productive to the interests of the United States." Indeed, the letter states in no uncertain terms that Turkey is at the “center of American’s current and long term interests . . . The genocide resolutions encourage those who would pull Turkey away from the West. The careless use of genocide language provides and [sic] excuse to do so, delivering a direct blow to American interests in the region . . . I strongly urge you to oppose floor deliberation . . . of this highly sensitive issue."

It should be an eye-opener when former US general and presidential advisor -- now the spokesman for US businesses and the Turkish government -- asks the “people’s house” to remain silent on a matter, thoroughly documented in American and British newspapers of the day, that involved the systematic slaughter of 1.2 million Armenians. If the issue is that important -- after all, we’re not talking about a puny drug war -- then it is likely that Scowcroft told his Turkish Council members to fill the campaign coffers of the speaker, former Majority Leader Tom DeLay, and current Majority Leader Roy Blount. And Scowcroft may have suggested to the Turkish government that it contract with former US congressmen Stephen Solarz and Robert Livingston (members of the ATC) to lobby on behalf of the Turkish government in the US House and Senate.

The Turkish newspaper Sabah reported that Hastert was pressured by AIPAC to defeat another House resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide back in the year 2000. Trade associations in Washington, DC, frequently unite on issues and, so it seems, Scowcroft’s ATC and AIPAC worked together to get rid of the Armenian matter.

Intrepid reporter Jason Vest writing in the Nation in 2002, noted that Richard Perle and Douglas Feith worked as foreign registered lobbyists for Turkey back in the late 1980s and into the 1990s. They “quietly and deftly kept the {American] arms sluice to Turkey open,” said Vest. Feith had hired former executive director of AIPAC, Morris Amitay, to assist in the task. Solarz and Livingston, have picked up where the largely disgraced Perle and Feith left off. One thing is for certain, though; during Feith’s reign over The Policy Organization, the ATC and AIPAC had their operatives well placed and, perhaps, under control.

Black Market Bingo

The ATC and the Turkish Consulate in Chicago had been under the watchful eye of the FBI since the late 1990s and one suspects it still is. But that’s about it since FBI field agents were told/are told to follow but not arrest suspected Turkish operatives.

The ATC was/is also being monitored by the CIA. For example, Valerie Plame had attended a number of functions at the ATC and took several trips to Turkey. The newspaper Hurriyet confirmed that she was hunting for WMDs, more likely their components, in a country well-known for its expertise in pushing products through the black market. This brings us to some excerpts from the PBS program Frontline:

Oscilloscopes and oscillators manufactured by Tektronix (equipment used to build missiles and nuclear weapons); and triggered spark gaps manufactured by PerkinElmer (small cylindrical devices that can be used to spark nuclear explosions). Asher Karni [Israeli businessman in South Africa] writes Zeki Bilmen [Turkish businessman] of Giza Technologies, a New Jersey-based company that, according to its Web site, provides "procurement services for state of the art electronic, electro-mechanical and mechanical components, systems, and other products related to the Electronics Manufacturing Sector. Karni asks Bilmen for an update on the EG&G order [triggered spark gaps]. Bilmen replies that the Tektronix equipment has arrived in New Jersey, but that he will wait until additional equipment arrives to ship them on, and that EG&G order has been processed. Bilmen adds in a separate email: "One Good News regarding the EG&G order [the triggered spark gaps]. NO EXPORT LICENSE REQUIRED to South Africa. I thought you might want to know.

These excerpts are from transactional emails made between Karni, Bilmen and Humayun Kahn, a Pakistan operative for the Pakistani military. They are meant to illustrate the ease with which these products traverse the globe and that, in all likelihood, are allowed to until a really big fish can be caught. Turkey’s role in the illicit nuclear transactions and selling of classified US military data to the highest bidder have been frequently reported. As far back as 1981, the US quietly complained to the Turkish ambassador about the sale of nuclear triggering devices to Pakistan. They would ultimately be used to launch Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program. Of course there is another country that operates the same way -- Israel.

Shining Beacon of Democracy?

Would it be a surprise that The Policy Organization, the attorney general and assorted US government operatives tracking these activities would turn a blind eye to Turkey and Israel’s trade in these types of goods? No. Why? Again, if Turkey and Israel are so “damn” critical to the USA’s interests, then they can operate around the globe with impunity, protected by names like Rumsfeld, Cheney, Hastert, Scowcroft, Edelman, Bush and, once upon a time, Doug Feith.

Meanwhile, back in Turkey, the Turkish Press reported in August of 2005 that the military there continues its top officer purges of Islamists, or those with questionable religious connections, from the Army and Navy. That has been done with the approval of Recip Tayip Erdogan who back in 1997 was banned from politics for being overly Islamist. Turkey’s atrocious treatment of its Kurdish population and its threat to invade Kurdistan -- now located in Northern Iraq, go unnoticed in the US. Turkey has purchased 30 “Cobra-type” armored vehicles from Otokor, a unit of Koc Holdings, to bolster its fight against a growing domestic Kurdish insurgency. And the Turkish military-industrial complex has expanded by 30 percent since 2004.

John Stanton is a Virginia-based writer specializing in political and national security matters. He is the author of "America 2004: A Power But no Super," and co-author of America’s "Nightmare: The Presidency of George Bush II." Reach him at [email protected].

Copyright © 1998-2005 Online Journal

[Gavur]

Nuclear Turkey

Plame, Pakistan, a Nuclear Turkey, and the Neocons

Antiwar.com
November 21, 2005
by Christopher Deliso
balkanalysis.com

While it's well known that the war party's fateful "outing" of CIA
agent Valerie Plame was partly revenge against her husband, Joseph
Wilson, for his 2003 New York Times article, it may have also been
motivated by a desire to neutralize Plame's investigations into rogue
nuclear trafficking. The long and storied history of indiscretions
of powerful neocons in and around the Bush administration gives us
reason to consider this possibility.

Plame at the CIA: Background

Within the CIA, Valerie Plame was an NOC (non-official cover) agent,
meaning that she had "little or no protection from the U.S. government
if she got caught." Far from being a "bit player," as neocons
once belittled her, Plame was operating undercover and working to
counter the spread of the world's most dangerous materials. And,
while the front company by which she was ostensibly employed as an
energy consultant, Brewster Jennings & Associates, may indeed have
been little more than a "telephone and post office box" in Boston,
Plame and her colleagues were using this ruse as a means of getting
important information and undertaking delicate missions abroad.
Bob Novak's revelation of July 2003 thus did not just affect Plame. It
affected all of us. Former CIA chief of counterterrorism operations and
analysis Vince Cannistraro stated in October 2003 that since not only
Plame but other agents were run through this front company, the leak
had put them all in danger - and disrupted the international network
of contacts the agents had carefully developed over the years. It
severely impeded long-standing CIA investigations into one of the
world's most serious issues.

The leak had wider effects, therefore, than just ruining one
woman's career. It had serious national security implications,
which have astonishingly enough been ignored by red-blooded backers
of Washington's war party. The question thus becomes: who in the
government would have stood to gain by ruining a CIA investigation
into rogue nuclear trafficking, and in what ways?

Convergences Arise

An article published in Turkish newspaper Hurriyet, entitled "She Came
to Turkey Too," cites an anonymous American intelligence expert who
verifies that Plame's job involved "the 'top secret' part of nuclear
weapons proliferation." The source also claims that it had brought her
to Turkey several times, for follow-up visits with persons of interest:

"[P]lame and other employees of Brewster & Jennings, the CIA's fake
energy consulting firm, used to visit the International Atomic Energy
Agency [IAEA, located in Vienna] frequently. They used to attend the
meetings and undertake deliberate operations to get 'targeted names'
on their side. "Plame and other 'energy consultants' used to continue
with follow-up meetings for those persons whom they had contacted in
Vienna, in Istanbul. ... Plame met with foreign dignitaries who are in
charge of nuclear weapons in their countries and scientists in Turkey,
where she has visited several times as an 'energy consultant.'"

Independently of this, former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds told me
recently that "Plame's undercover job involved the organizations
[the FBI had been investigating], the ATC (American-Turkish Council)
and the ATA (American-Turkish Association)."

Further, she adds, "the Brewster Jennings network was very active
in Turkey and with the Turkish community in the U.S. during the late
1990s, 2000, and 2001 ... in places like Chicago, Boston, and Paterson,
N.J." These disclosures make it clear that nuclear trafficking was one
of the widespread illegal activities enjoyed by government officials,
foreign agents, rogue businessmen, and terrorists under surveillance
prior to and during Ms. Edmonds' time at the FBI

Case Studies in Nuclear Smuggling

In May 2004, an intricate multinational scheme for smuggling in nuclear
parts was documented by the L.A. Times. The case, which began with an
anonymous tip from someone in South Africa in July 2003, "offers a rare
glimpse into what authorities say is an international bazaar teeming
with entrepreneurs, transporters, scientists, manufacturers, government
agents, organized-crime syndicates, and, perhaps, terrorists."

The case centered around an Israeli, Asher Karni, who was caught trying
to sell 200 triggered spark gaps that can be used for medical purposes
- as well as for nuclear weapons - to Humayun Khan, a Pakistani with
military and radical Islamist links, whose father had been a supplier
to Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission in the 1970s. The Pakistani
government was thus suspected to be the final recipient.

Some two months before the L.A. Times piece, the New Yorker's
Seymour Hersh had provided detailed information on Pakistan's
"nuclear godfather," A.Q. Khan (no relation to Humayun Khan), who
had been forced to admit to a long career of black-market nuclear
trafficking that helped arm various volatile states. The revelations
came when Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi voluntarily gave up his
nuclear program, ushering in UN inspectors and casting light on the
complex and far-flung network of dealers, suppliers, and clients from
Malaysia to Dubai. This in turn implicated Khan, who was pardoned by
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, despite being regarded as a hero
for his role in developing the bomb. Official Washington said little
about the pardon, though the investigations picked up. For successive
American administrations that had held up Pakistan as a stellar ally,
the disclosure was an embarrassment, to say the least.

The Karni-Humayun Khan transaction was allowed to continue so
that investigators could trace the whole operation. Karni first
requested the spark gaps from a Massachusetts company, Perkin-Elmer
Optoelectronics, but a company official told him that he first "needed
to submit required U.S. certificates detailing what the switches would
be used for, and promising not to send them to blacklisted countries
such as Pakistan or use them in nuclear-related applications."

Deciding not to fill out the forms, Karni instead contacted
Zeki Bilmen, a Turkish Jew and head of Giza Technologies in
Secaucus, N.J. Bilmen secured the shipment by giving Perkin-Elmer
certificates stating that the switches would be used in a South African
hospital. However, authorities became suspicious when Perkin-Elmer told
them a typical hospital would only request five or six such devices,
not 200. What followed was a textbook case of rerouted shipments,
front companies, and multiple handoffs in numerous countries before
it finally finished in Pakistan.

Bilmen's company also described the spark gaps as "'electrical splices
and couplings for switchings," something for which no export license
would be required. However, an affidavit filed by Special Agent James
R. Brigham of the Commerce Department's Office of Export Enforcement
pointedly noted that "providing such false or misleading information
is a violation of federal law."

What is more, court records cited by the L.A. Times show that this
was not the first time this threesome had worked together: in one of
the several "suspicious deals" mentioned, "Karni bought for Khan a
type of sophisticated oscilloscope often used in nuclear weapons and
military programs, also through Giza."

Protections and Paradoxes

Despite these red flags, Zeki Bilmen was not implicated; with more
success than the other two characters involved, he portrayed himself
as a naïvely innocent victim of circumstances. "It's beyond logical
explanation," said Sibel Edmonds back in August. "Maybe it was decided
in high places that no one would touch him."

According to her, Giza's business in New Jersey, staffed by Jewish
Turks, was not affected by the controversy:

"[T]hey have many shipments going out, coming in, all day long. To
places like Dubai, Spain, South Africa, Turkey. They have branches
in all these places. Yep, they're sailing along very smoothly."
Giza Technologies' Web site states that the company is characterized
"by the speed and dexterity by the way it locates hard-to-find
products and the flexibility and efficiency of the service that it
gives its customers." The company's main European branch is located
in Madrid, Spain, and it claims to have worked in an (unspecified)
capacity on various European defense projects such as the Eurofighter,
F-100 Frigate, and Leopard tank.

>>From the Hersh piece, one also gets the sense that the worst
proliferators are getting off with a slap on the wrist. A former
Pakistani government official, Husain Haqqani, quipped that with
the A.Q. Khan case "it is not a few scientists pocketing money and
getting rich. It's a state policy." This might explain the American
reticence to put an end to the unsavory activities by embarrassing
key ally Pakistan. One mystified international counter-proliferation
official asked Hersh, "Why hasn't A. Q. Khan been taken out by Israel
or the United States?"

An American intelligence officer "with years of experience in
nonproliferation issues" could only lament to Hersh that "we had
every opportunity to put a stop to the A.Q. Khan network 15 years
ago. Some of those involved today in the smuggling are the children
of those we knew about in the '80s. It's the second generation now."

Back to the Future

In the present context, nothing illustrates the old adage that the
more things change, the more they stay the same better than this
comprehensive 1993 report from the New Yorker's archive. Seymour
Hersh chronicled how a desire to maintain certain foreign relations
and prolong the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan, as well as
to cash in on lucrative military deals, inspired the Reagan and Bush
I regimes to help Pakistan develop its nuclear arsenal - something
that brought the volatile Southeast Asian state to the brink of
Armageddon with neighboring adversary India in 1990. The Pakistanis,
led by the aforementioned A.Q. Khan and radical Islamist generals,
were able to develop a nuclear program "with the aid of many millions
of dollars' worth of restricted, high-tech materials bought inside
the United States."

As with the situation today, the State Department back then efficiently
neutralized the many incriminating intelligence reports that revealed
the clandestine role of prominent individuals and government officials
in the whole sordid affair. Just as with the whistleblower cases of
the past few years, the Pakistan imbroglio had its own hardworking
and talented young agent to sacrifice: Richard M. Barlow, an expert
on Pakistani nuclear proliferation issues. As with Sibel Edmonds a
generation later, he stumbled upon hugely significant information
while "rummaging" through a forgotten backlog of data. And, as with
Edmonds, Barlow was harassed and then fired for refusing to shut up
when he spoke up about clear evidence of wrongdoing. Hersh recounted
events thus:

"[E]ven as Barlow began his digging, some senior State Department
officials were worried that too much investigation would create what
Barlow called 'embarrassment for Pakistan and trigger the Solarz
Amendment, which would cut off all aid.' Protecting the Afghanistan
war had emerged as a major policy of the State Department's Bureau of
Near East and South Asia Affairs, which was responsible for Pakistani
policy."

The State Department, deemed "easily the most corrupt" of major
government agencies by Edmonds, was again the target in another
of Barlow's investigations, which involved "possibly illegal
State Department approval of licenses to the Pakistani Embassy in
Washington for equipment whose export had previously been denied -
for nuclear-proliferation reasons - by the Commerce Department."

The realities of then and now collide unhappily yet again with the
ultimate example of What It's All About. When Barlow discovered
that the government "was once again distorting intelligence on
Pakistan's nuclear capability," he prepared a comprehensive study
for the benefit of "Secretary of Defense Richard Cheney and other
senior officials." Barlow's report, which was backed up by a similar
one from the Defense Intelligence Agency, proved that Pakistan was
retrofitting its American F-16 fighter jets to carry nuclear warheads.

This revelation presented a "big problem" for Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz,
and the boys, because it imperiled the $1.6 billion they expected
to rake in from the sale of 60 more F-16 fighters and subsequent
acceleration of the India-Pakistan arms race. When Deputy Assistant
Secretary of Defense Arthur Hughes stood before Congress on Aug. 2,
1989, and claimed that the planes could not be modified to carry
nuclear missiles, Barlow immediately protested to his superiors that
this was a lie, and was just as immediately terminated. The deal,
like all the others before and after it, went ahead.

Humorously enough, when Khan finally admitted his black-market role
in 2004, Cheney purported to be "shocked." For this act, he could
have taken home the Oscar.

Continued...

[Gavur]

The Turkish-Pakistani Connection

Turkey has long been known as a vital transit and assembly point
for contraband nuclear materials. It has been aiding the nuclear
aspirations of Pakistan, in particular, since a military coup in
1980. A report from back in 2000 recalled that:

"[T]urkey has already been implicated in nuclear arms aid to
Pakistan. An earlier attempt to build an Argentinean-designed reactor
was likely aimed at plutonium production for nuclear weapons.

Evidence of nuclear smuggling based in Turkey, and Turkey's push
for its own nuclear fuel capability and indigenous reactor design,
all pointed to possible nuclear weapons development. The support of
prominent Turkish citizens for nuclear weapons development has leant
credence to this evidence." Over the past 20 years, various Turkish
and Pakistani governments, as well as sections of the military, have
looked kindly on the idea of creating Islamic nuclear states. The
countries were specifically linked in the A.Q. Khan network; this
July 2004 summary gives detailed information:

"[W]orkshops in Turkey made the centrifuge motor and frequency
converters used to drive the motor and spin the rotor to high
speeds. These workshops imported subcomponents from Europe and
elsewhere, and they assembled these centrifuge items in Turkey. Under
false end-user certificates, these components were shipped to Dubai
for repackaging and shipment to Libya." Today, it is not known whether
Turkey possesses nuclear weapons. But remember, the crucial part of
the above-cited 2000 report is:

"[E]vidence of nuclear smuggling based in Turkey, and Turkey's push
for its own nuclear fuel capability and indigenous reactor design,
all pointed to possible nuclear weapons development. The support of
prominent Turkish citizens for nuclear weapons development has leant
credence to this evidence."

Total trafficking levels are hard to adduce, though it's clear that
more supplies get through than are caught. From 1993-1999 alone, there
were 18 high-profile incidents of nuclear trafficking involving Turkey
- the sort of cases that Valerie Plame's unit sought to investigate. As
this report details, "these cases include nuclear material seized in
Turkey, nuclear material interdicted en route to Turkey, and seizure
of nuclear material smuggled by Turkish nationals." In most of the
cases, the nuclear materials originated in unstable former Soviet
states such as Georgia, Romania, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan,
Uzbekistan, and Russia itself. Among the destination states, Libya
and Iran jump out. In addition to Turks, detained smugglers included
nationals of Azerbaijan, Russia, Georgia, Romania, as well as a Kazakh
army colonel and suspected Iranian secret service agents.

A couple of years later, on Sept. 10, 2001, the N.Y. Times reported
that "in the last eight years, there have been 104 attempts to smuggle
nuclear material into Turkey, according to an internal report by the
Turkish Atomic Energy Authority."

An Unpredictable Future

As Seymour Hersh related in his 1993 article, Pakistani leaders were
smart enough to know that the U.S. was just using them for their
proximity to Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation. They knew
that when the Russians withdrew, the U.S. would have no further need
for them - and would be less enthusiastic about letting the country
go nuclear. However, by the time the Soviets pulled out, the damage
had long been done. After all, A.Q. Khan had been boasting since the
mid-1980s that his country had the bomb.

An even more frightening prospect is a nuclear Turkey. The country has
been militarily subsidized even more than Pakistan; mass military aid
and technology transfer were justified first of all by Turkey's status
as a key Cold War ally and thereafter as a bulwark of secular Islam,
holding the wall against Syria, Iran, and Iraq.

However, the very same American leaders who have been arming Turkey
and allowing, in some cases even profiting from, nuclear smuggling
there have also ruined the delicate balance of regional power with
the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and brought the world far
closer to nuclear confrontations.

In the former case, they put huge strain on the "pro-Western" Musharraf
government, strengthening the hand of fundamentalist Islamists in both
the mosque and in the armed forces. Musharraf has survived multiple
assassination attempts, but there is no guarantee that he will enjoy
lucky escapes forever. If he goes, what then? Any coup by a populist,
fundamentalist-based leader would instantly put both Pakistan and
India on high alert, taking us back to previous near-apocalyptic
nuclear showdowns. Mired in numerous other bloody commitments of
its own making, there's no certainty that the U.S. could finesse the
situation as it did in 1990.

While Turkey is much less likely to fall victim to an Islamist coup,
preserved as it is by a strongly secular military, it could easily grow
more isolationist. Major changes have occurred since the invasion of
Iraq that have manifested themselves in a demoted role for Turkey in
U.S. foreign policy considerations, a shifting relationship between
it and Europe, a return to Islamic roots, and the revival of armed
Kurdish insurrectionists in the southeast.

With 2002's war planning, the neocons decided that it was not enough
to merely keep Turkey on as the dependable bulwark of the West's
hinterland; instead, they chose to take the bull by the horns and
seize the whole neighborhood for themselves. After the Iraq invasion
gave the U.S. troops a huge and probably permanent regional military
presence and the capabilities to easily strike Iran and Syria,
Turkey's strategic importance has been downgraded. At the same
time, the revival of Kurdish terrorism in Turkey, inspired by the
"liberation" next door in Iraq, has left many Turks feeling angry
and apprehensive that the U.S. no longer has its best interests in
mind. They also sympathize on religious grounds with fellow Muslims
who are being injured and killed every day in Iraq.

The way Turkey's other external relationships are handled in the
coming months will also play a role in deciding the direction of future
trends. The European Union recently began candidacy negotiations with
Turkey, something about which large sections of the European public
have deep misgivings. It's hard to see how they will become more
eager to welcome Turkey aboard after having seen the rioting of Muslim
immigrants that swept France and neighboring countries in recent weeks.

The issue of the EU is controversial not only in Europe, however;
nationalist and religious-minded Turks do not want to make the
sometimes humiliating concessions and "reforms" Brussels is requesting
of them. That the Iraq war added to the volatility of the Middle
East, rather than to its stabilization, goes without saying. But
Turkey's sudden drop in the estimation of U.S. policy planners and
its arm's-length treatment from the EU can only increase feelings of
frustration and alienation among the general populace, strengthening
the religious-based parties and go-it-alone nationalist sentiment
alike.

Proud Turkey has always wanted to be seen as an important country. Were
it to declare itself a nuclear one, it would become, for a time
at least, the most important country in the world. The entire
balance of power in Europe and the Middle East would be radically
altered overnight, and the overall side results would not at all
be positive for Turkey or anyone else - except of course for those
cashing in on illicit nuclear sales. Nevertheless, the country is
probably technologically capable by now. A new question that has thus
arisen, as articulated recently by Turkish scholar Mehmet Kalyoncu
on Balkanalysis.com, is the following: "If the U.S. and the EU do
not approve of Turkey having nuclear weapons, what do they have to
offer Turkey instead?"

This is a startling question that no one hopes will be asked. If it
is, it certainly won't come as a surprise to those neocons of long
experience who have gotten rich by helping Pakistan (and perhaps soon
Turkey) realize nuclear ambitions - making the world a safer place
for all of us in the process.

http://groong.usc.edu/news/msg129803.html

http://www.antiwar.com/deliso/?articleid=8091

[Gavur]

Supreme Court denies FBI translator's case

Monday, November 28, 2005 · Last updated 7:19 a.m. PT



By TONI LOCY
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

WASHINGTON -- A former FBI translator failed Monday to persuade the Supreme Court to revive her lawsuit alleging she was fired for reporting possible wrongdoing by other linguists involved in counterterrorism investigations.

The high court also rebuffed a request by Sibel Edmonds and media groups to rule on whether an appellate court improperly held arguments in the case in secret without being asked to do so by either side.

"When courts are sealed, the public may suspect the worst and lose faith in their government simply because they are prohibited access," wrote lawyers for media groups, including The Associated Press.

Edmonds, 32, who was hired after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and fired in March 2002, argued that a trial court judge was wrong to accept the Justice Department's claim that allowing her lawsuit to go forward would threaten "state secrets," or national security.

The former translator claimed the FBI terminated her contract after she complained about the quality of translations of terrorism-related wiretaps and had reported that another translator was leaking information to targets of investigations.

At the time, the FBI said it fired Edmonds because she had committed security violations and had disrupted the translation unit at the bureau's Washington field office where she worked.



Edmonds' firing was controversial among some lawmakers in Congress, especially after the Justice Department's inspector general found that the FBI had not taken her complaints seriously enough and had fired her for lodging complaints about the translation unit.

Her lawyers argued the government should not be allowed to use the "state secrets privilege" to silence whistleblowers, such as Edmonds, who reveal "national security blunders."

U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton dismissed Edmonds' lawsuit in 2004 after then-Attorney General John Ashcroft invoked the "state secrets privilege" before Justice Department lawyers had responded to any of the case's allegations.

News organizations wanted the court to clarify when and how appellate arguments over civil lawsuits can be closed to the public.

"Closing cases that involve allegations of government wrongdoing ... fosters public doubts about the private justice that certain people and entities get in the public courts, harms public debate about the issues involved ... and perhaps most devastatingly, fosters an appearance of unfairness that the government can close off access to the public courts when it is under fire," the media lawyers said in a friend-of-the-court filing.