How Much Does Chalabi Cost?
Michael Ledeen defends Chalabi by pointing out that several Iraqi leaders are (as far as we can tell) just as close to the Iranian mullahs as Chalabi--yet they remain in the good graces of the U.S. Ledeen, of course, is not able to comment on the new damning evidence against Chalabi, which is causing Feith and Wolfowitz to keep their mouths shut.
Still, you get an uneasy feeling the Iranians have been running things for a while.
"Next: If we're going to worry about Iraqi political groups' associations with Iran, let's look at the really dramatic cases. There's Abdul Aziz al Hakim, the head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). SCIRI is funded directly by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (RG) to the tune of $1.2 million a month, and significant numbers of SCIRI members are paid personally by the RG. Hakim reports regularly to an Iranian intelligence official named Sulemani, surely one of the most dangerous men in the country. And SCIRI has its own militia, the Badr Brigades, which at least until very recently conducted military maneuvers with units of the Revolutionary Guards on Iraqi territory adjoining the Iranian border.
"But Hakim is a member of the Governing Council and is in our good graces."
Wow. That is impressive. $1.2 million a month, just for starters. This is not too far from the $30 million over three years Chalabi got directly from the Pentagon. (Chalabi has obviously been paid from other U.S. official sources as well, and for a longer period). Hypothetically, if Chalabi were working for the Iranian mullahs, would they have to pay him more than they pay Hakim? After all, Chalabi seems to have achieved more ... access than any of them.
Ledeen goes on. "Then there's the Dawa party, represented on the Governing Council by Ibrahim Jaffari. The Dawa is a fundamentalist Islamic party that was part of the Iranian-supported campaign against Saddam Hussein in the early 1980s. Its leaders lived in Iran for years--Jaffari was there from 1982-89 recruiting Iraqis to spy in their homeland, and reportedly informed on Iraqis in Iran who might be problems for the regime--and the party is funded directly by the Iranians. Dawa was believed involved in terrorist attacks against United States targets in the Persian Gulf in the early and mid-1980s. On his frequent trips to Iran, Jaffari meets the top leaders of the Islamic Republic, including Supreme Leader Khamenei.
"But Jaffari is in our good graces."
Ledeen doesn't say how much Iran has been paying Jaffari. Is there a price list somewhere?
"Then there are the Kurds, most of whom are actively engaged in commerce with Iran, including arms, explosives, and alcohol. Jalal Talabani is closely linked to the Revolutionary Guards and the Iranian Intelligence Service, and reported to Tehran on U.S. activities in 1996 during the failed uprising against Saddam. His deputy reports directly to Iranian intelligence. Massoud Barzani, the other prime Kurdish leader, uses his cousin as a conduit to Iran, and the cousin is the head of Kurdish Hezbollah, an Iranian creation. Barzani meets regularly in Baghdad with the Iranians' top man, who was a guest in Barzani's house just two weeks ago. Barzani and Talabani both get funding from Iran.
"Both Barzani and Talabani are in our good graces."
So the Kurds also receive payment beyond what they are (rightly, surely) paid for merchandise. In the good graces of the U.S.? On the one hand, Barbara Lerner practically refers to the two Kurdish leaders as "our noble Kurdish friends (alongside noble Chalabi)."
On the other hand, in the latest constitutional "suggestions" or "hints" from the U.S., there was apparently no mention of an autonomous Kurdistan. This makes Timothy Noah worry, not for the first time, that Bush would sell the Kurds out for fifty cents. At one time it seemed he would sell them out to the Turks. Now it would more likely be to the Shiites/mullahs, who apparently promise some kind of peace and stability in Iraq, allowing the U.S. in the near future to bug out and declare victory. The mullahs, of course, are unabashedly pro-Iran.
UPDATE June 9: Nick Gillespie also thinks the Kurds have been left "in the punch bowl" by the Shiite mullahs and the U.S.
If this were Le Carre's novel, Smiley's People, it would become obvious about now that Iranian intelligence had turned the U.S. operation in Iraq completely inside out--partly by spending millions of dollars to do so. Poor Ledeen's point is simply that Chalabi is ... probably no more guilty of working for Iran than all these other guys.
UPDATE June 12: The Kurd story that Noah has been patiently following for years makes the big time.
UPDATE on Chalabi's cost to the U.S.:
While we're at it: a piece in the New Yorker on Chalabi (via Atrios): A new total! "Between 1992 and the raid on Chalabi's home, the U.S. government funnelled more than a hundred million dollars to the Iraqi National Congress. The current Bush Administration gave Chalabi's group at least thirty-nine million dollars." Making Saddam look as bad as possible was originally a CIA operation, with money channelled through the Rendon Group.
|
