Progress Pond

Month: October 2005

BREAKING IN ITALY: How the Iraq War was Prepared

Posted by | Oct 31, 2005 |

[promoted from the diaries by catnip]

Cross-posted at Eurotrib by de Gondi.

While Berlusconi dishes out his intergalactic bullshit (Title of il Manifesto yesterday: Balle spaziale) as a latter-day peacenik, the Bonini- D’Avanzo team publish a new series that promises to have far-reaching consequences. The first installment reveals what happened at the secret Rome meetings starting in December 2001, involving Sismi agents, Ledeen, Franklin, Rhode and the crucial protagonists, Aras Habib Karim and Francis Brooke. Ghorbanifar, according to Sismi sources, had a minor role, more as a decoy, to divert attention.

The scoop reveals the behind the scene preparation of the war and the key role of the Italian secret services in infiltrating southern Iraq to prepare the terrain for the land invasion through their long-standing network in Iraq.

The Rome meetings were arranged at the behest of the Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans in collaboration with the Iranian regime which certainly had converging interests to eliminate Saddam and expand their influence in Southern Iraq.

Here follow translations of significant parts of the first article. I will update it throughout the day, and expect Nur-al Cubicle to do so also:

“…We must say who Ahmed Chalabi is. A neo-con Benjamin, Chalabi was charged by Pentagon hawks to funnel information to European intelligence services on WMDs obtained from so-called scientists that had defected from the [Iraq] regime. The man responsible for gathering together and constructing the “legends” [spin] was Chalabi’s intelligence chief, Aras Habib Karim. Aras is a key figure. He coordinates the Intelligence Collection Programme. He runs and confections dissident “material.” He’s a Shiite Kurd, just under 50, crafty, mean, a master at double-crossing and falsification of documents. With a peculiarity: the CIA has always considered him “an Iranian agent.” The second key player is Francis Brooke. The false Niger Uranium dossier ended up in his hands although it is not known how. Brooke holds the strings to Condoleeza Rice and Paul Wolfowitz and between the Iraqi National Congress and the Pentagon. His ties to Iran are excellent, far more than Chalabi’s.

The American intelligence source continues: “Ahmed Chalabi and his best men- Karim, Brooke- work as a team with the Pentagon and the American Enterprise Institute. An example to understand better. In 2004 the three [sic] men who alternate in Baghdad together with Chalabi as “liason officers” are Michael Rubin, president of theAmerican Enterprise Institute; [and] Harold Rhode, Douglas Feith’s assistant at the Office of Special Plans and Paul Wolfowitz’s “advisor for Islamic Affairs.” Just as in Italy before the war. The meetings in Rome brought together representatives of the whole team: Michael Ledeen, of the American Enterprise Institute; Larry Franklin and Harold Rhode of the Office of Special Plans; the colonels of the Iraqi National Congress; and the Iraqi Shiites of the Supreme Council of the Iraqi Islamic Revolution, and of course “the Guardians of the Revolution.” That was the situation in Rome. Interesting, isn’t it?” [Yes] interesting…

The following translation concludes the first installment of today’s la Repubblica scoop by Carlo Bonini and Giuseppe d’Avanzo. A full translation is presently going on line thanks to Nur-al Cubicle.

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Happy Halloween From Transylvania!

Posted by | Oct 31, 2005 |

Well today is Halloween so I would be remiss if I didn’t write an article.

I currently live in Romania, which really doesn’t celebrate Halloween at all except as a kind of “fad” to observe some western holidays (like St. Patrick’s Day for instance).  That being said, one of the key figures in Halloween is Dracula, which most definitely has ties to my new homeland.

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Wilson and Reid to Bush: Fire Rove

Posted by | Oct 31, 2005 |

“I think the president should fire [Karl Rove] … these are firing offenses,” Joe Wilson told NBC Today show’s Katie Couric.


MSNBC has the Today show video. “Wilson said Rove also had a role since Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper has said it was Rove who told him about Plame.” Wilson also told Couric that Rove is a “party to the compromise of national security of this country.”


On ABC’s This Week yesterday, Sen. Minority Leader Harry Reid also called on President Bush to fire Karl Rove and apologize to the nation. Crooks & Liars has Reid’s statement on video. Raw Story links the WaPo story on Reid’s remarks.


Wilson, who appears today on CNN’s Situation Room between 3pm-6pm ET, told Ed Bradley of CBS’s 60 Minutes last night (article / 60 Minutes video) that “[i]t was the White House that decided they were going to go after me, and the tactic they decided to use was to go after my wife.” Crooks & Liars also has excerpts of the 60 Minutes segment.

This was done to silence others. This was a shot across the bow to others. The message was if you do to us what Wilson did to us, we’ll do to you what we just did to Wilson’s family.


“Her career has been ended,” [former CIA agent Jim Marcinkowsk] said on 60 Minutes. The MSNBC article also quotes another former CIA agent, BoomanTribune contributor Larry Johnson, a CIA classmate of Valerie Plame, who he knew only as Val P.:

For all intents and purposes out at the CIA, she’s like a leper … she’s radioactive.”


For more talking points on the CIA leak case, read Larry’s recent stories here:



Update [2005-10-31 10:59:14 by susanhu]: Larry Johnson is Amy Goodman’s guest for a major segment today on Democracy Now!. You can listen or watch, dial-up or broadband. On DISH satellite, I watch DN! on both Free Speech TV and LINK TV. LINK TV is also on DirectTV satellite.

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