Friends,
At the bottom, this article makes the following claim:
"This information was leaked by American sources.
Nevertheless, it should be more than 75 percent true
because it originated with political and not military
personnel."
We have an Arab source citing an American source, and
therefore needing to justify its credibility! Ironic
justice for America, the fabled land of 'truth and
freedom'. I don't know whether the information is
accurate or complete, but it may well be. It seems to
fit the facts well, and it makes sense from the point
of view of each party involved.
If anyone can verify or contradict any of the claims,
please let me know.
all the best,
rkm
---<fwd>---
Delivered-To: •••@••.•••
From: "Brit Eckhart" <•••@••.•••>
Subject: Fw: RE The Deal
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2003 12:04:25 -0400
The Deal
^^^^^^^^
http://www1.iraqwar.ru/iraq-read_article.php?articleId=3443&lang=en
LEBANON -- One day after the start of the war against
Iraq American Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
appeared on American television screens to say
something that the press interpreted as some sort of
American propaganda. In reality, though, it was the
basis for what was later to take place.
Rumsfeld said that there had been communications
between the Americans and leaders in the Republican
Guard in Iraq. He said that the details could not be
disclosed now, but urged listeners to wait for coming
days.
Three days later the American media played an audio
tape on which recorded voices could be heard speaking
in Arabic guiding American forces to important bombing
targets. The voices were translated immediately in the
headquarters of the American forces so that orders
could be issued accordingly.
In fact, Rumsfeld was not just talking at random. There
had been communications that took place in total
secrecy between the leaders of the Republican Guard and
the Commanders of Saddam's Fedayeen, unbeknownst to the
Iraqi leader and his son who was in charge of a huge
military organization that could have made life hell
for the American forces had they joined the battle.
The communications grew in intensity after the
Republican Guard entered its first battle against the
American forces in the environs of Baghdad, and after
much of its equipment was destroyed. The Americans
could see that they were facing a force with high
military preparedness, one that was well trained and
could inflict tremendous losses on the American forces
whenever they tried to enter Baghdad.
The offer proposed by the American command in Iraq to
the Republican Guard and Saddam's Fedayeen was
generous. The offers were run past Secretary of Defense
Rumsfeld, who okayed them immediately. The provided
for:
1. In return for not opposing American forces and for
laying down their weapons, the United States will give
the following:
Transportation for the Republican Guards top echelon to
secure locations outside of Iraq,
Transportation of the Republican Guards leaders of the
second echelon to "liberated" places of which the
Anglo-American forces had control inside Iraq,
Granting to the top echelon of the Republican Guards
large sums of money, with lesser sums going to the
second echelon,
Granting some of the leaders of the top echelon of the
Republican Guard, and to those who had not committed
"war crimes" official roles in "liberated" Iraq after
the end of the war,
Granting American citizenship and residency in the
United States to some of the first echelon commanders
and their families, depending on their wishes,
Establishing a balance between the Iraqi Opposition
that will have a limited role in the administration of
Iraq on the one hand, and Republican Guard commanders
who did not fight the American forces, on the other.
2. As a guarantee of this (which the commanders of the
Republican Guard did not completely trust), the United
States disclosed some of its agents whom it had planted
among the "human shields" who were guiding the American
military to positions to be bombed and where President
Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi leadership could be found.
A brief meeting was held between one of the agents
serving as a "human shield" and some members of the
Republican Guard during which the latter were handed
official written documents addressed to the first
echelon of the Republican Guard. These reassured the
Republican Guard commanders that the assurances were
reliable. The documents provided for:
After the occupation of Saddam International Airport,
Republican Guards of the top echelon should arrive at
the airport so that they could be transported away. If
that proved impossible, a place should be agreed upon
where an Apache helicopter or two could land somewhere
near Baghdad in order to transport them away.
Some commanders of the second echelon should secure
themselves within the Iraqi Republican Palace adjacent
to the Airport. American forces would fire some shells
at it in order to announce that they had taken it, then
American forces would transfer them to the airport.
Orders should be issued to the commanders of the Second
Echelon of the Republican Guard not to resist and to
lay down their weapons, together with promises of their
safety, and that of their families, and they would be
transported to secure locations. In turn they were to
issue orders to those of lower rank in their commands
not to put up resistance. The Republican Guard's first
echelon used a deception to get lower ranks to accept
such an order by telling them that the resistance would
be carried on secretly in accordance with a plan
prepared by the Iraqi leadership to protract the war
and catch the American forces in a trap that had been
laid for them. This trick was used on the lower ranking
commanders of the Republican Guard. First and Second
echelon commanders of the Republican Guard would be
given sums of money in dollars as a down payment to
guarantee the implementation of the agreement.
Human Shields:
From the beginning, the heads of the American Central
Intelligence Agency followed a plan to use the work of
agents posing as "human shields." The CIA chiefs used
peace activists in America carefully and
systematically. They sent three groups of peace
activists to the region, and in particular into Baghdad
on the basis that that would be the place where the
decisive battle would be fought.
The deception worked with the Iraqi leaders who placed
different groups of human shields in important places
such as: factories and manufactories that had great
importance for the population. Storehouses of weapons
belonging to the Republican Guard were located inside
those factories and manufactories, and this fact was
openly acknowledged. But inside, hidden under ground,
there were huge stockpiles of weapons sufficient for
waging a resistance struggle for years. These were
ostensibly civilian installations but on the inside
were military. These included centers where rockets
were gathered for destruction under the UN supervised
program, while some of them were stored in underground
military storehouses.
The Iraqi measures, whereby they distributed the human
shields to vital locations, was in fact a trap set for
the Iraqis, for the human shields carried
difficult-to-detect delicate communication devices for
communicating with the American forces during the
bombing. It later became clear that these devices
played an outstanding role in pinpointing the positions
of Saddam and his leaders, as well as places where
weapons were being stored.
Occupation of the Airport:
The occupation of Saddam International Airport was a
turning point inasmuch as it enabled the American
forces to carry out their entire plan as it had been
detailed in the documents that they had been given and
as they had been promised. The commanders of the
Republican Guard were reassured, in particular those of
the first echelon, that what the American forces had
promised them was the truth. The Republican Guard
commanders then provided complete information about the
various military positions around the airport and
inside of it. They also gave complete information about
the tunnels that extended from the Republican Palace to
inside the airport, tunnels that had been built
especially so that the Iraqi president could use them
should he ever be in danger. American forces occupied
these tunnels, unknown to any but the first echelon of
the Republican Guard.
On the second day after the occupation of the airport
Muhammad Sa`id as-Sahhaf assured the world that Saddam
International Airport was still in the hands of the
Iraqi forces. He based his assurances on a promise of
an "innovative and unusual" sort of response, as he put
it, when Iraqi fighters and Republican Guards would
sweep from the palace through the tunnels and on
towards the airport in a surprise attack on the
American forces occupying the airport. He did not know
even as he spoke that American forces had discovered
the location of those secure tunnels and that they
would confront the small numbers of Iraqis who were
sent there, under the leadership of third echelon
commanders of the Republican Guard, and who would find
the Americans waiting for them.
Time at that difficult juncture was golden. The
American forces saw that the road had opened up to
Baghdad, so they carried out two essential operations
simultaneously:
The first operation: to introduce tanks to the approaches of Baghdad from
where they would penetrate to the area of the Palestine Hotel, on condition
that they would not cross the bridge to the opposite bank. This occurred
after they were sure that orders had been issued to the Republican Guard to
disappear in accordance with the "secret plan" to which the first echelon
commanders had already alerted their junior officers.
The second operation: to prepare a military transport plane of at least 200
seats to transport the first echelon commanders of the Republican Guard and
some members of the second echelon to secure locations.
The orders given to the American soldiers who advanced to secure a
bridgehead for the rest of their forces were as follows:
First: attempt to silence the media that were
transmitting pictures of the places where the
breakthrough was occurring (this is what took place
when the offices of al-Jazeera TV, and the Abu Dhabi TV
station, were shelled) and to try to herd the
journalists into a place from which they could not
move, except by order of the coalition forces, or, to
be precise, the US Marines.
Second: To cut communications and electricity off from
the area and to attempt to shell the little electricity
generators in the area in order to completely knock out
any means for transmission once and for all.
Third: To shell the satellite dishes on the roof of the
Palestine Hotel. It was here where the al-Jazeera
journalist Tariq Ayyoub was martyred.
Fourth: To deal with the limited resistance in the area
of the bridge with small arms rather than with
artillery bombardment because some of the second
echelon the Republican Guard were too late to reach the
appointed meeting places in time and might possibly
have to reach the coalition forces by crossing the
Sanak Bridge.
Military Aircraft:
Many first-echelon commanders of the Republican Guard
gathered at Saddam International Airport. They had to
wait eight more hours before the rest of the commanders
showed up. The American command found to their surprise
that the first echelon commanders of Republican Guard
forces had brought along with them the top commander of
Saddam's Fedayeen, a man who took his orders directly
from Saddam Hussein's son. This convinced the American
forces that they had put Saddam's Fedayeen out of
action along with the Republican Guard. After that
commander informed them that had been attracted by the
agreement reached with the Republican Guard, and
requested that he be accorded the same terms that had
been granted to the Republican Guard, consent was
granted immediately.
The American military aircraft took off from Saddam
International airport at 8:00 p.m. on the third day of
the occupation of the airport. Some sources in the
American command maintain that the plane flew directly
to the United States, via Germany. Others say that it
took them by way of Kuwait. What is certain, however,
is the fact that they left for the United States. At
the same time two helicopters were whisking the second
echelon commanders of the Republican Guard to Basra
where they were met by British forces.
The Fate of Saddam Hussein:
Some American political sources maintain that those
secret communications between Republican Guard
commanders and the Americans took place according to
American instructions that were issued to the
Republican Guard leaders so as to prevent their being
detected. The most modern technology was used,
including tiny transmitter-receiver devices that had
been given to the Republican Guard Commanders in their
first meeting with the Human Shields. This is the
secret of how they kept Saddam Hussein in the dark
about their contacts.
The final task of the Republican Guard Commanders
gathered at the airport was to give the important
information about the location of the Iraqi president
and his leadership in what was to be their last meeting
in al-Mansour. This information enabled the American
forces to aim at the place where the meeting was being
held and strike it with guided missiles. Most probably
the Iraqi President and his leadership, including his
two sons, were killed in the bombardment. None of the
leadership was saved from that attack except Muhammad
Sa`id as-Sahhaf, the Information Minister, whose
whereabouts are still unknown. He alone among the
members of the leadership was out of the area at the
time of the attack, which came shortly after he
delivered a press statement in front of the Palestine
Hotel that day.
Saddam's Family:
The American Authorities have kept quiet about the
whereabouts of Saddam's family, in particular the women
and children among them, although they know where they
are, and whether they are living or dead. There are
some reports that they are in Syria. Others have said
that they slipped away to Tikrit. In fact, however, the
American forces bombed the location where the family
was staying and were able to catch the whole family
together after they slipped away to the place where the
President's half-brother Barzan at-Tikriti was staying.
When his house near Baghdad was bombed the family was
wiped out.
A Final Word: This information was leaked by American
sources. Nevertheless, it should be more than 75
percent true because it originated with political and
not military personnel.
One question remains: Where did those mountains of
weapons go? Where did the forces who "melted away" into
the angry Iraqi population go? The Marines did discover
vast storehouses of weapons that could have been used
by the Republican Guard -- though they were in fact
never used -- heavy weapons, light weapons in a huge
store room in Baghdad. American forces are keeping that
quiet -- which is a further indication of the proof of
what we have said.
But one major question remains open. If they did not
find the bodies of Saddam, his leaders and his two
sons, the matter remains a source of embarrassment.
Coming weeks will no doubt provide us much more
information. The above news item is translated and
reproduced without editing other than typographical
Walid Rabbah/Sawt al-`Urouba/Rense.com/www.fpp.co.uk
