Back in May, Seymour Hersh upended the
“official” narrative surrounding the death of Osama bin Laden and in the
process created a media firestorm prompting a response from the White
House.
The explosive revelations about the events that ultimately led to
bin Laden’s demise came a year-and-a-half after Hersh accused the Obama
administration of not telling the whole story with regard to an infamous sarin
gas attack that nearly served as an excuse for airstrikes against the Assad
regime in 2013.
In the six months since Hersh’s bin Laden story made international
headlines, the war in Syria has escalated meaningfully. Indeed, the country is
now the theatre for what amounts to World War III with the US, France, Britain,
Russia, Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Iraq all involved either directly
or indirectly.
As we
noted just three days ago, we're beginning to see the formation of three
alliances in the Mid-East: 1) Russia, Iran, Syria, and Iraq; 2) Turkey, Saudi
Arabia, and Qatar; 3) Britain, France, and Germany. Here’s how we described the
situation:
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The first alliance is pro-Assad, anti-terror. The second is
anti-Assad, pro-Sunni extremist. The third is anti-Assad (although less
vehemently so), anti-terror (conspiracy theories aside). Note that we've left
the US out. Why? Because Washington is now stuck. The US wants
desperately to maintain coordination with Ankara, Riyadh, and Doha, but between
stepped up media coverage of Saudi Arabia's role in underwriting extremism (via
the promotion of Wahhabism) and hightened scrutiny on Erdogan's role in
financing terrorists, the position is becoming increasingly untenable. But
aligning solely with the UK, France, and Germany entails adopting a more
conciliatory approach to Assad- just ask Berlin which, as we reported on
Friday, is now working with Assad's intelligence police and may soon establish
a base in Damascus.
Well, if you believe Seymour Hersh’s latest expose, we were even
more right than we knew because as it turns out, some elements within
the US military began tacitly cooperating with Assad two years ago after
becoming concerned with Turkey and Saudi Arabia's support for Sunni extremists.
In a new 6,600 word piece, Hersh details what he says was a covert
plot by the Joint Chiefs of Staff to undercut the “Assad must go” line promoted
and pursued by the Obama administration and the CIA on the way to sharing valuable
intelligence with the Assad government. The report also verifies the role of
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and especially Turkey in arming and financing al-Nusra and
ISIS.
Hersh begins by recounting a secret assessment of the security
situation in Syria that dates from 2013 :
The military’s resistance dates back to the summer of 2013, when a
highly classified assessment, put together by the Defense Intelligence Agency
(DIA) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then led by General Martin Dempsey,
forecast that the fall of the Assad regime would lead to chaos and,
potentially, to Syria’s takeover by jihadi extremists, much as was then
happening in Libya. A former senior adviser to the Joint Chiefs told me that
the document was an ‘all-source’ appraisal, drawing on information from
signals, satellite and human intelligence, and took a dim view of the Obama
administration’s insistence on continuing to finance and arm the so-called
moderate rebel groups. By then, the CIA had been conspiring for more
than a year with allies in the UK, Saudi Arabia and Qatar to ship guns and
goods – to be used for the overthrow of Assad – from Libya, via Turkey, into
Syria. The new intelligence estimate singled out Turkey as a major
impediment to Obama’s Syria policy. The document showed, the adviser
said, ‘that what was started as a covert US programme to arm and support the
moderate rebels fighting Assad had been co-opted by Turkey, and had morphed
into an across-the-board technical, arms and logistical programme for all of
the opposition, including Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic State.
He then moves immediately to indict Ankara:
Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, director of the DIA between 2012
and 2014, confirmed that his agency had sent a constant stream of classified
warnings to the civilian leadership about the dire consequences of toppling
Assad. The jihadists, he said, were in control of the opposition.
Turkey wasn’t doing enough to stop the smuggling of foreign fighters and
weapons across the border. ‘If the American public saw the intelligence we were
producing daily, at the most sensitive level, they would go ballistic,’ Flynn
told me. ‘We understood Isis’s long-term strategy and its campaign plans, and
we also discussed the fact that Turkey was looking the other way when it came
to the growth of the Islamic State inside Syria.
And here, according to Hersh, is how the plan was hatched:
‘Our policy of arming the opposition to Assad was unsuccessful and
actually having a negative impact,’ the former JCS adviser said. ‘The
Joint Chiefs believed that Assad should not be replaced by fundamentalists. The
administration’s policy was contradictory. They wanted Assad to go but the
opposition was dominated by extremists. So who was going to replace him? To
say Assad’s got to go is fine, but if you follow that through – therefore
anyone is better. It’s the “anybody else is better” issue that the JCS had with
Obama’s policy.’ The Joint Chiefs felt that a direct challenge to
Obama’s policy would have ‘had a zero chance of success’. So in the autumn of 2013
they decided to take steps against the extremists without going through
political channels, by providing US intelligence to the militaries of other
nations, on the understanding that it would be passed on to the Syrian army and
used against the common enemy, Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic State.
Germany, Israel and Russia were in contact with the Syrian army,
and able to exercise some influence over Assad’s decisions – it was through
them that US intelligence would be shared.
Once the flow of US intelligence began, Germany, Israel and Russia
started passing on information about the whereabouts and intent of radical
jihadist groups to the Syrian army; in
return, Syria provided information about its own capabilities and intentions.
There was no direct contact between the US and the Syrian military; instead,
the adviser said, ‘we provided the information – including long-range analyses
on Syria’s future put together by contractors or one of our war colleges – and
these countries could do with it what they chose, including sharing it with
Assad. We were saying to the Germans and the others: “Here’s some information
that’s pretty interesting and our interest is mutual.” End of conversation.
But the intelligence didn't come without conditions:
The Joint Chiefs let it be known that in return the US would
require four things: Assad must restrain Hizbullah from attacking Israel; he
must renew the stalled negotiations with Israel to reach a settlement on the
Golan Heights; he must agree to accept Russian and other outside military
advisers; and he must commit to holding open elections after the war with a
wide range of factions included.
The Joint Chiefs then allegedly pulled a fast one on the
CIA:
By the late summer of 2013, the DIA’s assessment had been
circulated widely, but although many in the American intelligence community
were aware that the Syrian opposition was dominated by extremists the
CIA-sponsored weapons kept coming, presenting a continuing problem for Assad’s
army. Gaddafi’s stockpile had created an international arms bazaar, though
prices were high. ‘There was no way to stop the arms shipments that had been
authorised by the president,’ the JCS adviser said. ‘The solution involved an
appeal to the pocketbook. The CIA was approached by a representative from the
Joint Chiefs with a suggestion: there were far less costly weapons available in
Turkish arsenals that could reach the Syrian rebels within days, and without a
boat ride.’ But it wasn’t only the CIA that benefited. ‘We worked with Turks we
trusted who were not loyal to Erdo?an,’ the adviser said, ‘and got them to ship
the jihadists in Syria all the obsolete weapons in the arsenal, including M1
carbines that hadn’t been seen since the Korean War and lots of Soviet arms. It
was a message Assad could understand: “We have the power to diminish a
presidential policy in its tracks.”’
Then comes yet another damning indictment of the Erdogan
government:
But the Saudis were far from the only problem: American
intelligence had accumulated intercept and human intelligence demonstrating
that the Erdogan government had been supporting Jabhat al-Nusra for years, and
was now doing the same for Islamic State. ‘We can
handle the Saudis,’ the adviser said. ‘We can handle the Muslim Brotherhood.
You can argue that the whole balance in the Middle East is based on a form of
mutually assured destruction between Israel and the rest of the Middle East,
and Turkey can disrupt the balance – which is Erdogan’s dream. We told him we
wanted him to shut down the pipeline of foreign jihadists flowing into Turkey.
But he is dreaming big – of restoring the Ottoman Empire – and he did not
realise the extent to which he could be successful in this.’
Gabbard later told me that many of her colleagues in Congress,
Democrats and Republicans, have thanked her privately for speaking out. ‘There
are a lot of people in the general public, and even in the Congress, who need
to have things clearly explained to them,’ Gabbard said. ‘But it’s hard when
there’s so much deception about what is going on. The truth is not out.’
Ultimately, Hersh says the effort to assist Assad died with
Dempsey's retirement:
The military’s indirect pathway to Assad disappeared with
Dempsey’s retirement in September. His replacement as chairman of the Joint
Chiefs, General Joseph Dunford, testified before the Senate Armed Services
Committee in July, two months before assuming office. ‘If you want to talk
about a nation that could pose an existential threat to the United States, I’d
have to point to Russia,’ Dunford said. ‘If you look at their behaviour, it’s
nothing short of alarming.’ In October, as chairman, Dunford dismissed the
Russian bombing efforts in Syria, telling the same committee that Russia ‘is
not fighting’ IS. He added that America must ‘work with Turkish partners to
secure the northern border of Syria’ and ‘do all we can to enable vetted Syrian
opposition forces’ – i.e. the ‘moderates’ – to fight the extremists.
Obama now has a more compliant Pentagon. There will be no
more indirect challenges from the military leadership to his policy of disdain
for Assad and support for Erdogan. Dempsey and his associates remain
mystified by Obama’s continued public defence of Erdogan, given the American
intelligence community’s strong case against him – and the evidence that Obama,
in private, accepts that case. ‘We know what you’re doing with the radicals in
Syria,’ the president told Erdogan’s intelligence chief at a tense meeting at
the White House (as I reported in the LRB of 17 April 2014). The Joint
Chiefs and the DIA were constantly telling Washington’s leadership of the
jihadist threat in Syria, and of Turkey’s support for it. The message was never
listened to. Why not?
Read the full report below.
