Habbush Letter
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The Habbush letter, or Habbush memo (), is a handwritten message dated July 1, 2001, which appears to show a link between
al-Qaeda , image = Flag of Jihad.svg , caption = Jihadist flag, Flag used by various al-Qaeda factions , founder = Osama bin Laden{{Assassinated, Killing of Osama bin Laden , leaders = {{Plainlist, * Osama bin Lad ...
and
Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...
's government. It purports to be a direct communication between the head of Iraqi Intelligence, General Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti, to Iraqi president
Saddam Hussein Saddam Hussein (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 until Saddam Hussein statue destruction, his overthrow in 2003 during the 2003 invasion of Ira ...
, outlining mission training which
Mohamed Atta Mohamed Atta (1 September 196811 September 2001) was an Egyptian terrorist hijacker for al-Qaeda. Ideologically a Pan-Islamism, pan-Islamist, he was the ringleader of the September 11 attacks and served as the Aircraft hijacking, hijacker-pi ...
, one of the organizers of the
September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...
, supposedly received in Iraq. The letter also claims that Hussein accepted a shipment from
Niger Niger, officially the Republic of the Niger, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is a unitary state Geography of Niger#Political geography, bordered by Libya to the Libya–Niger border, north-east, Chad to the Chad–Niger border, east ...
, an apparent reference to an alleged
uranium Uranium is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Ura ...
acquisition attempt that U.S. President
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...
cited in his January 2003
State of the Union The State of the Union Address (sometimes abbreviated to SOTU) is an annual message delivered by the president of the United States to a Joint session of the United States Congress, joint session of the United States Congress near the beginning ...
address. The authenticity of the letter has been disputed since it was first made public in December 2003. In 2008, journalist Ron Suskind claimed that it was a forgery created by the
Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...
(CIA), under the direction of the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...
. Two of Suskind's sources denied having knowledge of anyone in their chain of command ordering the forging the letter. John Conyers, Chairman of the
United States House Committee on the Judiciary The U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, also called the House Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of the United States House of Representatives. It is charged with overseeing the administration of justice within the federal courts, f ...
, released a report into the allegations in 2009, in which he concluded that "the Administration figures who ordered and authored the apparent forgery ... remain unidentified".


Background

On December 13, 2003, the day of Saddam Hussein's capture by US forces, ''
The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...
'' of
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
ran a front-page story that not only claimed
Saddam Hussein Saddam Hussein (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 until Saddam Hussein statue destruction, his overthrow in 2003 during the 2003 invasion of Ira ...
had trained one of the
hijackers in the September 11 attacks The aircraft hijackers in the September 11 attacks were 19 men affiliated with Jihadism, jihadist organization al-Qaeda. They hailed from four countries; 15 of them were citizens of Saudi Arabia, two were from the United Arab Emirates, one was f ...
, but also that his government, assisted by a "small team from the Al Qaeda organization", was expecting to receive a suspicious consignment from the country of Niger. The article, and a second piece, were both written by Con Coughlin, executive foreign editor to the paper.Coughlin, Con (December 13, 2003)
"Terrorist behind September 11 strike was trained by Saddam"
''Daily Telegraph''.
Coughlin, Con (December 13, 2003)

''Daily Telegraph''.
Coughlin's information came from a secret intelligence memorandum, purportedly handwritten during Saddam Hussein's final days in power and discovered later by the newly formed Iraqi Interim Government, which summarized an operational relationship between
Mohamed Atta Mohamed Atta (1 September 196811 September 2001) was an Egyptian terrorist hijacker for al-Qaeda. Ideologically a Pan-Islamism, pan-Islamist, he was the ringleader of the September 11 attacks and served as the Aircraft hijacking, hijacker-pi ...
, a known associate of al-Qaeda and one of the hijackers in the
September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...
, and the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS). The letter was signed by General Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti, chief of IIS, and directed to the
President of Iraq The President of the Republic of Iraq is the head of state of Iraq. Since the mid-2000s, the presidency is primarily a symbolic office, as the position does not possess significant power within the country according to the Constitution of Iraq, ...
. Coughlin said that he had received this document from a "senior member of the Iraqi interim government", though this person "declined to reveal where and how they obtained it."


Content

Habbush's July 1, 2001, letter is labeled "Intelligence Items" and is addressed: "To the President of the Ba'ath Revolution Party and President of the Republic, may God protect you." It continues:


Initial reaction to the letter

Ayad Allawi, interim Prime Minister of Iraq, was quoted in the original report, offering personal assurance over the document's authenticity: "We are uncovering evidence all the time of Saddam's involvement with al-Qaeda. ... But this is the most compelling piece of evidence that we have found so far. It shows that not only did Saddam have contacts with al-Qaeda, he had contact with those responsible for the September 11 attacks." The story was quickly picked up and repeated by several conservative columnists in the US, including syndicated columnist Deroy Murdock and William Safire. Safire talked about the document in an op-ed for the ''
New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', claiming Saddam had attempted to cover-up his links to 9/11 by assassinating Abu Nidal, who the letter claims was with Mohammed Atta in Iraq. Three weeks later, in an interview with the ''Rocky Mountain News'',
Vice President A vice president or vice-president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vi ...
Dick Cheney Richard Bruce Cheney ( ; born January 30, 1941) is an American former politician and businessman who served as the 46th vice president of the United States from 2001 to 2009 under President George W. Bush. He has been called vice presidency o ...
spoke more broadly on Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda link allegations:


Doubts

On December 17, 2003, a ''Newsweek'' article titled "Terror Watch: Dubious Link Between Atta And Saddam", by Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball, outlined some of the main reasons to doubt the authenticity of the letter: The article also quoted an Iraq document expert named Hassan Mneimneh, as well as unnamed US officials, who claim that the document was probably part of "a thriving new trade in dubious Iraqi documents".


Ron Suskind's allegation

Ron Suskind, in his 2008 book '' The Way of the World'', claimed that the Habbush letter had been forged by the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...
, with the co-operation of senior CIA officials, including Robert Richer, the Associate Deputy Director of Operations. The letter was intended to be used as evidence of a link between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein, thereby further justifying the invasion of Iraq. Suskind goes on to describe what he believes happened next: Richer spoke to John Maguire, a CIA Iraq expert, who said that this plan would not work, as Habbush would not sign anything himself because the
insurgency An insurgency is a violent, armed rebellion by small, lightly armed bands who practice guerrilla warfare against a larger authority. The key descriptive feature of insurgency is its asymmetric warfare, asymmetric nature: small irregular forces ...
would harm his family. This, by Suskind's account, led to the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...
telling the CIA to hand-write the letter itself. Suskind's book says that this new order was eventually passed down to the Iraq Operations Group, who carried it out. Maguire left for Baghdad to help run the CIA station there and was not involved directly in the mission, other than discussing the mission with Richer. Suskind also contends that Habbush, who still carries a $1 million reward for his capture, was secretly resettled in
Jordan Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian ter ...
by the CIA with $5 million in US taxpayers' money. Suskind claimed to have held tape-recorded interviews with Richer, Maguire, and Nigel Inkster of the British
Secret Intelligence Service The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 (MI numbers, Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of Human i ...
, in which they apparently testified that the White House was behind the forging of the letter. According to a partial transcript of one of Suskind's interviews with Richer, published on Suskind's website, Richer saw a letter on White House stationery that had been passed down the ranks of the CIA – through George Tenet, then-CIA director, then to James Pavitt, the deputy director of Operations, then to Pavitt's chief of staff, who passed it on to Richer. The letter, which Richer said might or might not have come from the vice president's office, described a plan to create a forged document and release it "as essentially a representation of something Habbush says". On August 5, 2008, the White House issued a statement on behalf of George Tenet, Robert Richer and John Maguire, addressing Suskind's allegation. Tenet said: The CIA issued its own statement on August 22, 2008, saying that Suskind's allegations regarding Habbush "did not happen", and Tenet followed the same day with a second statement saying that Suskind's charges were "demonstrably false in every regard." Nigel Inkster told the ''Guardian'' that "Mr Suskind's characterisation of our meeting is more the stuff of creative fiction than serious reportage".


Subsequent reactions

In '' The American Conservative'' on August 7, 2008, Philip Giraldi stated that "extremely reliable and well placed source in the intelligence community" told him that Suskind's basic story about the White House ordering the forgery was correct but that some of his details were not. According to Giraldi, his source cleared CIA officials George Tenet, Robert Richer, and John Maguire of involvement, but stated that Dick Cheney ordered the forgery using the Office of Special Plans run by Douglas Feith. Author Joe Conason noted that Ayad Allawi had visited CIA headquarters in Langley just days before speaking with Con Coughlin of the ''Telegraph''. Coughlin, in a blog post highly critical of Suskind, confirmed that he had indeed received the letter from Ayad Allawi. He also called the letter a "leak" and said he got it in November 2003, in Baghdad.Coughlin, Con (August 19, 2008)
"The Great WMD Conspiracy Theory Unravels"
''Daily Telegraph''.
John Conyers, Chairman of the
United States House Committee on the Judiciary The U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, also called the House Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of the United States House of Representatives. It is charged with overseeing the administration of justice within the federal courts, f ...
, released a statement on August 11, 2008, indicating that he had instructed his staff to review a number of Suskind's allegations. On August 20, he wrote to six current and former officials with the Bush administration—Tenet, Richer, Maguire,
Lewis Libby I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby (first name generally given as Irv, Irve or Irving; born August 22, 1950) is an American lawyer and former chief of staff to Vice President of the United States, Vice President Dick Cheney known for his high-profile indic ...
, A. B. Krongard, and John Hannah—requesting that they contact his committee staff regarding the allegations. A month later, his inquiry was reported to have made little progress. In January 2009, Conyers released his report entitled ''Reining in the Imperial Presidency'' that he described as "detailing the abuses and excesses of the Bush administration and recommending steps to address them." He reiterated Suskind's allegation and stated that he received no information from the officials that confirmed any knowledge of the fabrication. Conyers concluded that "the Administration figures who ordered and authored the apparent forgery ... remain unidentified".


See also

*
Iraq War The Iraq War (), also referred to as the Second Gulf War, was a prolonged conflict in Iraq lasting from 2003 to 2011. It began with 2003 invasion of Iraq, the invasion by a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition, which ...
* Iraq War misappropriations * Mohamed Atta's alleged Prague connection * Niger uranium forgeries


References


Further reading

* *


External links


Interview with Ron Suskind – Part I
Democracy Now.
Interview with Ron Suskind – Part II
Democracy Now. {{DEFAULTSORT:Habbush Letter Iraq and weapons of mass destruction Letters (message) Political forgery Central Intelligence Agency operations George W. Bush administration controversies Causes and prelude of the Iraq War Al-Qaeda Disinformation operations 2001 documents Iraq War documents Propaganda in the Iraq War