Clinton Back's Bush's War in Iraq

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Really? That's funny. That other article you linked, IIRC from WSJ, said he's from U Penn. But it doesn't matter, since there's no such professor from Penn State as well.

Ummm...... as we like to say in Happy Valley. He is...... Penn State.


Dr. Christopher Carney - PSU Faculty Page

Also seeing as he received his doctorate at Nebraska there is a tie in for Drake as well.

Realizing the internet is a powerful tool that defies normal attempts at censorship, I suggest for future go rounds you merely ask for proof rather than cast disparagements.

It so much more mod like.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia


only because it got developed. before, they had nothing. same thing can happen in africa.

[conjecture]
Interesting. While true no natural resources of note are in evidence in the pac rim area one great cultural advantage exists. The natural inclination to obey authority and moreover the establishment of rule of law. Until such time as Africa becomes stabilized and rule of law becomes ingrained into the psyche of Africa/ME the likelihood of meaningful advances is slight.
[/conjecture]

[GePap]

The problems with Africa are not mystifying folks- a bunch of failed or failing states and the vageries of international economics.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Ummm...... as we like to say in Happy Valley. He is...... Penn State.


Dr. Christopher Carney - PSU Faculty Page

MAJOR PWNAGE!

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Major Kudos to investigative work by Mr. Cut and Paste.

[lord of the mark]

another cut and paste to play with]

from Windsofchange.net

Shakir

Much has been made in recent days of 9/11 commissioner John Lehman's claim that a prominent al-Qaeda member was an officer in the Saddam Fedayeen, with the usual suspects (as I said, you'd be amazed at how many of these "senior administration officials," "current/former intelligence officials," ect. are all just a couple dozen people inside of government who want to get their views aired anonymously for a variety of reasons and have cultivated relationships with certain journalists to do just that) have been arguing that Lehman was too stupid to distinguish between Ahmad Hikmat Shakir Azzawi and Lieutenant Colonel Hikmat Shakir Ahmad. Ignoring the fact that there at least 3 different ways to spell "Mohammed" in English, all of which can show up on translated Arabic documents, let me just say that my definite animus for the commission (or more specifically, Staff Statement No. 15) aside that Lehman is not as dumb as Pincus, Royce, et al. would have one believe.

I would also note that in somebody in the intelligence community inadvertently overplayed their hand when they told Jonathan Landay that Ahmad Hikmat Shakir Azzawi (referred hereafter as simply "Shakir") was employed with the aid of Iraqi intelligence as a greeter in Kuala Lumpur. Previously, individuals within the intelligence community opposed to the idea that Shakir was working with the Iraqis in Kuala Lumpur had made the case, particularly to the folks from Newsweek, that Shakir's patron at the embassy was too low-level to be a Mukhabarat operative. I don't imagine that this will register to most reporters, but setting Shakir up as a recipient of Mukhabarat aid is a pretty big deal whether or not he was ever in the Saddam Fedayeen. Without knowing it, those individuals who were so busy trying to undercut what Lehman said pretty much shot themselves in the foot.

Oops.

One final point is that this is not so much a partisan battle as it is clash of worldviews betweening prevailing assumptions within certain quarters of the intelligence community concerning the nature and extent of Iraqi ties to al-Qaeda. This whole idea that secular and religious fundamentalists don't cooperate, incidentally, appears to be one of several memes that a number of individuals hold to.

Here are some others:

The Saudi royals would never cooperate with al-Qaeda, whose purported purpose it is to bring down their regime.
Shi'ite and Sunni Islamist groups have such opposing worldviews to the extent that they would never cooperate with one another.
The Pakistani military-intelligence apparatus, even those quasi-independent arms of it, would never knowingly cooperate with al-Qaeda because the Pakistani worldview is regional, in contrast to al-Qaeda's global agenda.
These assumptions and others like them, which are most assuredly not held by everyone within the US intelligence community, have severely hampered the ability of the United States to assess the war on terrorism. Doug Feith, for example, pretty much figured out the true extent of the Saudi role with regard to al-Qaeda back in November 2001 but he was listened to by the policy-makers until nearly half a year later. If one is curious as to why the administration appears so willing to listen to the neocons on so many policy issues, I would submit to my readership that it is in large part due to the fact that they have been more or less correct in the majority of such issues with respect to al-Qaeda.

[Ramo]

This guy makes the same logical fallacy as the WSJ that embassy contact = intelligence agent.

As for the reasons for co-operation with al-Qaeda, the idea is that secular (and especially Arab nationalist) states don't help out radical Islamists unless there exists a practical reason to do so (since the ideological imperative is lacking).

Pakistani assistance to the Taleban was part of power plays with India (not much different from our assisstance to the Mujahadeen). The Saudi funding of al-Qaeda was part maintaining the stability of its regime. Likewise with Saddam and Ansar, an attempt at destabilizing the Kurds.

When you look at Iraq, there are two huge incentives for the gov't not to support al-Qaeda. First of all, there's the threat of American invasion because of such a provocation. Secondly, there's a very real threat of getting stabbed in its back. And of course there's absolutely no incentive for them to support al-Qaeda.

[GePap]

The Saudi royals would never cooperate with al-Qaeda, whose purported purpose it is to bring down their regime.

There are 5000 princes, many of whom will never see power thought they will see lots of money. Some of them are bound to be religious extremists. Big woop.

Shi'ite and Sunni Islamist groups have such opposing worldviews to the extent that they would never cooperate with one another.

What, three weeks of local cooperation..world shattering there.

The Pakistani military-intelligence apparatus, even those quasi-independent arms of it, would never knowingly cooperate with al-Qaeda because the Pakistani worldview is regional, in contrast to al-Qaeda's global agenda.

Now who made that claim? I never heard it.

These assumptions and others like them, which are most assuredly not held by everyone within the US intelligence community, have severely hampered the ability of the United States to assess the war on terrorism. Doug Feith, for example, pretty much figured out the true extent of the Saudi role with regard to al-Qaeda back in November 2001 but he was listened to by the policy-makers until nearly half a year later. If one is curious as to why the administration appears so willing to listen to the neocons on so many policy issues, I would submit to my readership that it is in large part due to the fact that they have been more or less correct in the majority of such issues with respect to al-Qaeda.

God that last bit is funny, in the view of the abysmal performance of the neo-cons since they came to power. As they say, proof is in the pudding, and the neo-cons have screwed up royally over and over.

[GePap]

That is the best bit about it: the Neocons got their chance in Iraq. Will Iraq be an eventual success? perhaps, and I hope so. BUt given the last year of actions, if in the end Iraq is a success, it willnot be due to the hands of the neo-cons, but due to the actions of their opponents, whoc will come in an save them from their mistakes, many which were voice long before the invasion.

Many people do overstate the notion that ideologically opposed factions simply won't work together. BUT in the end, ideologically opposed factions don;t get beyond cooperation which is expedient to each other. Once that expediency ends, so does their cooperation.

[Ramo]

Oooh, just saw this great Juan Cole post:

The al-Qaeda employee in Malaysia is named Ahmad Hikmat Shakir Azzawi.

The Iraqi intelligence agent is named Lt. Col. Hikmat Shakir Ahmad.

Political Scientist Christopher Carney, who was brought in to look at documents by Doug Feith's Office of Special Plans so as to second-guess trained analysts at the CIA who actually know Arabic, first made the mistake of identifying the two. Carney is an Americanist at Penn State and had no business butting in.

The family name (here, nisba) of the al-Qaeda guy in Malaysia is Azzawi.

The family name of the guy in Iraqi intelligence is Ahmad.

Do you notice how they are not the same?

The personal or first name of the al-Qaeda guy is Ahmad.

The personal or first name of the Iraqi intelligence agent is Hikmat.

Do you notice how it is not the same?

So, Ahmad Azzawi is not Hikmat Ahmad. See how easy that is?

Mr. Ahmad Azzawi has a couple of middle names, to wit, Hikmat Shakir. Having a couple of middle names is common in the Arab world.

Lt. Col. Hikmat Ahmad just has one middle name, Shakir. This is the only place at which there is any overlap between them at all. They share a middle name. And, o.k., one of Azzawi's middle names is the same as Lt. Col. Ahmad's first name.

This would be like having someone named Mark Walter Paul Johnson who is a chauffeur for Holiday Inn.

And then you have a CIA agent named Walter Paul Mark.

Obviously, it is the same guy, right? Natch.

Azzawi is a nisbah, a form of last name having to do with a place or occupation or tribe. I'm not sure, but an `azzaw might be someone who specialized in consoling family members over the death of a loved one. It is being used as a family name.

Lt. Col. Ahmad's last name could also be used as a first name. It may well be his father's first name. Some Arab families use a system like that in Scandinavia. Thus, the father is Thor Odinsson and the son is Loki Thorsson. There isn't a stable family name in that case. In the old style, he might be Hikmat ibn Ahmad or the son of Ahmad, but a lot of people drop the ibn nowadays. Most families either have a nisba type family name or they don't. If a guy's last name is Azzawi, that would certainly be in the government records. Lt. Col. Ahmad did not have Azzawi as a family name.

The first name or personal name is called "ism". In this case, the first name of the al-Qaeda guy is Ahmad. This means "the most praised" and is an epithet of the Prophet Muhammad.

The ism or personal name of the intelligence officer is Hikmat. Hikmah in Arabic means "wisdom." Hikmat with a long 't' at the end shows Ottoman influence, which in turn suggests an upper class Sunni background.

There isn't actually any similarity at all between the names of chauffeur Mr. Ahmad Azzawi and intelligence official Lt. Col. Hikmat Ahmad, from an Arab point of view. (For a lot of purposes you would drop the middle names).

Mr. Carney, Mr. Lehman, journalist Stephen Hayes, Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, and all the other persons who gave a moment's thought to the idea that these two are the same person, based on these names, have wasted precious moments of their lives and have helped kill over 800 US servicemen, over an elementary error deriving from complete ignorance of Arabic and Arab culture.

Isn't it a shame that we have these key people doing important things who are either incompetent ignoramuses or dumb as posts?

Stephen Hayes of the Weekly Standard was on Jon Stewart's Daily Show Monday, by the way, peddling his book, which is full of similar nonsense, and at one point Stewart actually told him he thought the book was a load of crap. Stewart's Daily Show is among the best sources of news analysis on television.

http://www.juancole.com/

Juan Cole is ****ing awesome.

And Kerry should pick Jon Stewart as VP.

[GePap]

And to continue my rant vs. this "evidence":

Much has been made in recent days of 9/11 commissioner John Lehman's claim that a prominent al-Qaeda member was an officer in the Saddam Fedayeen, with the usual suspects (as I said, you'd be amazed at how many of these "senior administration officials," "current/former intelligence officials," ect. are all just a couple dozen people inside of government who want to get their views aired anonymously for a variety of reasons and have cultivated relationships with certain journalists to do just that) have been arguing that Lehman was too stupid to distinguish between Ahmad Hikmat Shakir Azzawi and Lieutenant Colonel Hikmat Shakir Ahmad. Ignoring the fact that there at least 3 different ways to spell "Mohammed" in English, all of which can show up on translated Arabic documents, let me just say that my definite animus for the commission (or more specifically, Staff Statement No. 15) aside that Lehman is not as dumb as Pincus, Royce, et al. would have one believe.

One, it was members of the amdin. who released this rumor in the first place. Second, Lehman did no such thing- he made mention of an article-it is the article that people question. Why can;t this guy get his facts straight? As for his point about the spelling of Mohammed, how does that help him? If anything, givent he variances in spelling, it only makes proving this rumor more difficult, not less.

I would also note that in somebody in the intelligence community inadvertently overplayed their hand when they told Jonathan Landay that Ahmad Hikmat Shakir Azzawi (referred hereafter as simply "Shakir") was employed with the aid of Iraqi intelligence as a greeter in Kuala Lumpur. Previously, individuals within the intelligence community opposed to the idea that Shakir was working with the Iraqis in Kuala Lumpur had made the case, particularly to the folks from Newsweek, that Shakir's patron at the embassy was too low-level to be a Mukhabarat operative. I don't imagine that this will register to most reporters, but setting Shakir up as a recipient of Mukhabarat aid is a pretty big deal whether or not he was ever in the Saddam Fedayeen. Without knowing it, those individuals who were so busy trying to undercut what Lehman said pretty much shot themselves in the foot.

Whaa? So one individual said this guy was employed as a greeter "with the aid"-what does that mean? And why is this one intelligence agent the source of all truth all of a sudden? Look like a case of cherry picking the instances someone says something that could be seen a helpful to the case.


So what do these fools have? They are still stuck at similar names for one really. It is really amazing that after having the files of the secret services for an entire year, all they could find was that. If connections were extensive and important, wouldn't we have found more? i mean, didn't we capture X number of documents from Ansar Al islam camps? And yet the whole "case" hinges on one name? come on

Let me not even get started on why, even if this whole thing were true, it would not matter

[Ramo]

Incidentally lotm, I was wondering what you thought of Allawi's hand-picked interior minister, Nakib, talking about implementing marshal law? Is Allawi still the great pick that you made him out to be?

[GePap]

Ramo, don't you remember the whole funny famr of characters has labelled you "pzzwoned" or whatever? How dare you post something like that? Shame on you man, shame on you.

[Ramo]

D'oh, I forgot my place.

[GePap]

Well, wasn't that interesting- Ramo post that quote, and bam...certain posters scurry for the hills.

Talk about being pnowed