"I transcribed a quote from Sibel in a February 2005 interview with Charles Goyette that may help explain how some of the various alleged illegal activities (nuclear black market, money laundering and weapons procurement) of the Turkish organizations fit together. First let’s remember what Vanity Fair said about the drug smuggling aspects of the case:i agree with most of what mike says. i'm not sure if i mentioned it earlier, but i had a curious exchange with sibel. as i've previously written, in an interview with scott, she said something like 'imagine if feith was doing xyz, that would make him a traitor' - i immediately thought that she must have been talking about someone else - i assumed that her gag order would prohibit something so direct. i asked her about it and she indicated that she felt comfortable doing that so long as she said 'for example' - even though she is directly pointing at feith in other comments. therefore, her 'examples' are likely to be very specific pointers.
"Some of the calls reportedly contained what sounded like references to large scale drug shipments and other crimes. To a person who knew nothing about their context, the details were confusing.."
What’s missing from this story? David Rose does not tell us the context! But thankfully we have this other quote from Sibel that might give us a clue:
"Let’s say in organizational terms…those people have presence and lobbying power here..and it wouldn’t be surprising to see certain high-level State Department officials on the boards of these semi-legit organizations as board members, and it wouldn’t be outrageous to think that a lot of money may be going to certain people…certain elected officials illegally and legally, as campaign contributions… and then you get visas even though you have links to certain weapons procurement including information procurement and nuclear-related stuff from this country. getting in the hands of those people we call ‘terrorists’, and the intermediaries here are involved, and narcotics from there are supporting these activities, again involve the same intermediaries…"
If we read into Sibel’s statement to Goyette, it becomes more clear what the “proper context” is of the drug smuggling and money laundering: to support the nuclear black market and weapons procurement activities. Notice the similarity between this allegation of Sibel’s and the Operation Diamondback operation to which you alluded in an earlier post.)
Thus, drug smuggling appears not to be the “end game” in Sibel’s case- it is just a means to the true end- greasing the skids of illegal arms sales and the procurement of nuclear secrets.
And some of this nuclear stuff might be getting in Bin Laden's hands!
i don't know what to make of this statement from sibel:
"and narcotics from there are supporting these activities, again involve the same intermediaries…"i don't quite understand the value chain. whose drugs 'support' which nuclear blackmarket? are these state or 'terrorist' players? state players dont generally need to resort to specific financing programs such as drugs-for-arms (iran-contra notwithstanding) - therefore it seems as though sibel is pointing to non-state terrorist organisations, and presumably they are buying off the grossmans and edelmans and what have you. my basic presumption is that there is no such thing as al qaeda (let alone any stoopid application form) - are there really non-state players out there trying to acquire nuclear power? the best guess is that even iran is a decade away from having nuclear power - surely a group without a state can't possibly expect to develop a nuclear capacity - apart from the scary 'briefcase' nonsense.
the other point i'll make is that mike points to sibel saying that these people might be selling nuclear secrets for campaign contributions. if we believe this is true for the moment, we've really entered into a shakespearean nightmare. i thought that i had a pretty jaundiced view of the possible lower limits of humanity when it comes to power and criminality. i can totally understand the mindset of a.q.khan - pure unadulterated personal greed even if it comes at the risk of a nuclear end to humanity? that i can understand. no problem. i basically figured that if you had enough money, you could probably find people to accept your money to do just about anything. anything. for personal remuneration. you want a hitman? you can find one for a price. wanna kill 100 people? you'll get a bulk discount. that i can understand. senior government officials being bribed for massive personal gain - that i can understand - even if it is from a defense contractor who wants to start a war. but what i dont understand is being on the take by people who could destroy humanity for campaign contributions. i've written before, with astonishment, about how cheap american democracy is - a few thousand here and there and you can buy your own bill - but when we consider that this money isn't even selfishly put into a trust fund for the grandkids or something similar, but simply to buy another tv ad then we are really beyond the pale.
think about that - they are selling nuclear secrets, not for personal benefit, and not for ideological reasons - both of which i could understand - but they are selling their souls purely to fill the campaign coffers so that they might get re-elected. that's pretty fucked up.
i believe that humans are ultimately quite rational and self interested - if politicians and career govt folk are willing to sell nuclear secrets purely to stay in office, then the office must be very lucrative indeed.
2 comments:
lukery,
I don't think the elected officials were bribed for nuclear secrets- I believe the bribes to Pentagon officials were for the nuclear secrets. I think the Congressional reps received bribes for the same type of thing that the Livingston Group lobbied for- approval for arms deals and quashing any human rights criticism of Turkey. Here is what David Rose said during his interview with Amy Goodman:
"AMY GOODMAN: And David Rose, the issue of the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, and conversations overheard that link his office with improper dealings with Turkish nationals, can you talk about particular legislation?
DAVID ROSE: Well, there was – there were two things, I understand, which those who were wiretapped, whose conversations were recorded and translated, referred to. One was the controversial deal to sell helicopters, attack helicopters, to Turkey, which was an issue of great controversy in the late 1990s. At that point, Turkey was fighting a pretty hot civil war with the Kurdish separatists in the east of the country. There were allegations of human rights abuses and so forth, and some in America thought it was wrong that Turkey should be sold several billion dollars worth of attack helicopters in those circumstances. So some of the calls allegedly referred to the hope that the Congress would approve that very large weapons sale.
But the second occasion or second event which is allegedly referred to in these wiretaps is the Armenian genocide resolution..."
"state players dont generally need to resort to specific financing programs such as drugs-for-arms (iran-contra notwithstanding) - therefore it seems as though sibel is pointing to non-state terrorist organisations, and presumably they are buying off the grossmans and edelmans and what have you."
Normally this statment would be correct. However, remember Turkey was in a severe financial crisis during the time period when they were fighting a hot (and expensieve) civil war with the Kurds. Notice how Sibel rhetorically asked Scott Horton what percentage of certain Central Asian countries budget comes from narcotics...the implication being that certain countries are almost "narco-states", like Colombia.
And Sibel clearly says al-Qaeda is involved in this drug trade. So though the Turks/Central Asian countries and Bin Laden may be totally opposed to each other ideologically speaking, they are both dependent on the Afghan heroin trade. And the US is reluctant to cut off this heroin trade, because it would damage relations with these countries.
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