Ironduke

Al-Qaida letter: Iraqi recruits are not flocking to bin Laden

By Jim Krane
Associated Press


BAGHDAD — A letter seized from an al-Qaida courier shows Osama bin Laden has made little headway in recruiting Iraqis for a holy war against America, raising questions about the Bush administration’s contention that Iraq is the central front in the war on terror.
The 17-page letter, cited as a key piece of intelligence that offered a rare window into foreign terrorist operations in Iraq, appealed to al-Qaida leaders to help spark a civil war between Iraq’s two main Muslim sects in an effort to “tear the country apart,” U.S. officials said Monday.

One senior U.S. officer, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, warned the plea could mean more “spectacular” attacks because the rebels were despairing that their devastating car bombs and the steady killing of U.S. troops were failing to shove the Americans from Iraq or spark massive discord.

The letter was believed written by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian suspected of al-Qaida links. Al-Zarqawi is the chief suspect in several recent bombings, and the Bush administration cited his presence in Iraq as evidence of Iraq’s terrorist connections even before the war.

Having found no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the administration has been shifting the reason for going to war to the fight against global terrorism and to oust Saddam Hussein.

Military and coalition officials who rarely speak about intelligence information were quick to describe the letter as proof of a terrorist role in the Iraqi resistance.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said that the letter, first reported Monday by The New York Times, shows that “Iraq is the central front in the war on terrorism.”

“There are foreign terrorists who realize the stakes are high and they seek to do everything they can to undermine the aspirations of the Iraqi people,” McClellan said. “But democracy and freedom are taking root in Iraq and there’s no turning back.”

The letter, as quoted by the Times, acknowledges problems in recruiting Iraqis to join the fight against an American force “growing stronger day after day.”

“Many Iraqis would honor you as a guest and give you refuge, for you are a Muslim brother,” it said. “However, they will not allow you to make their home a base for operations or a safe house.”

That suggests that Iraqis may be willing to support their homegrown insurgency but have little interest in backing foreign infiltrators. The letter’s appeals for outside help raises questions whether al-Qaida had a support network here before Saddam’s downfall.

There is little to bind Iraqi rebels to foreign terrorists other than a common wish “to bloody the United States,” said David L. Phillips, a former State Department expert on Iraq, now with the Council on Foreign Relations.

“There are far more Iraqis who are resisting American occupation than there are al-Qaida operatives inside Iraq,” Phillips said. “Most violence against the U.S. in Iraq is being committed by so-called dead-enders and Iraqis who resent the U.S. occupation.”

The al-Qaida presence has consistently been exaggerated, Phillips said.

The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Jane Harman of California, said al-Qaida is in Iraq because of the American presence there.

“It’s a good organizing tool,” she said in an interview. “One of their big targets is America. There’s a large American presence in Iraq.”

Top U.S. commanders have previously said that the Iraqi resistance sees al-Qaida as an unwelcome presence. For the most part, commanders have said, the conflict is a homegrown guerrilla war waged primarily by Saddam supporters and Iraqis angry over foreign military occupation.

Nevertheless, the Bush administration and coalition spokesmen here portrayed the letter as proof that Iraq was on the front lines of global terrorism.

Secretary of State Colin Powell said the letter shows terrorists haven’t given up in Iraq.

“They’re trying to get more terrorists into Iraq and they’re trying to create more terrorist organizations to try to defeat our purposes,” Powell told reporters. “But they will not succeed.”

Al-Zarqawi, the letter’s purported author, is the top suspect in the 2002 assassination of U.S. diplomat Laurence Foley in Amman, Jordan.

The letter writer’s claims that he directed 25 suicide bombings in Iraq are being taken seriously, said Kimmitt, the deputy chief of operations.

“We feel he is the most capable terrorist in Iraq today,” a U.S. official said of al-Zarqawi.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, described the document as a “business plan” for terror, with a plea for financing and for workers imbued with the jihad spirit who could carry out attacks on Shiite Muslim holy sites and leaders.

The U.S. military got a copy of the letter after the capture of Hassan Ghul, a senior al-Qaida courier arrested last month by Kurdish forces in northern Iraq. The letter was on a CD-ROM Ghul carried.

“We downloaded the document and printed it,” a U.S. official told reporters in Baghdad. He briefly displayed a copy of the Arabic-language letter taped to a board, but did not give reporters time to read it or take notes.

The U.S. official said the document’s language was flowery and rhetorical. It wasn’t clear whether claims made in it were factual or rhetorical.

The Times said its reporter viewed the Arabic document and a military translation on Sunday. The newspaper’s report quoted unidentified U.S. officials as saying a courier was taking the document to Afghanistan to get it to al-Qaida’s senior leaders.

Al-Zarqawi, believed to be still in Iraq, was believed to have set up an al-Qaida “franchise” there, the U.S. official said.

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f...25-2628422.php

tomas

BAGHDAD — A letter seized from an al-Qaida courier shows Osama bin Laden has made little headway in recruiting Iraqis for a holy war against America, raising questions about the Bush administration’s contention that Iraq is the central front in the war on terror.
The 17-page letter, cited as a key piece of intelligence that offered a rare window into foreign terrorist operations in Iraq, appealed to al-Qaida leaders to help spark a civil war between Iraq’s two main Muslim sects in an effort to “tear the country apart,” U.S. officials said Monday.

finally some good news this means less killing of soldiers of ours

__________________
two wrongs dont make a right but three wrongs do. ;D

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ChrisF202

I guess all the libs were wrong in there statement that "recruits would flock to Al Qaeda by the thousands if we invaded Iraq"

Anvilanthony

This is new to me guys, I mean considering I always thought birds attacked in flocks.

tomas

:doh! that was dumb and bad