[Peace-discuss] Fwd: the deal

[Al Kagan]

FYI.  A good friend sent me this article translated from the Arabic. 
If true, it explains a lot about why it was so easy for the US to go 
into Baghdad, with implications for the future.

>The Deal
>
>By Walid Rabah
>
>Arab Voice
>17 April, 2003
>
>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.
>
>Translated from Arabic.
>
>
>
>


-- 


Al Kagan
African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
Africana Unit, Room 328
University of Illinois Library
1408 W. Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801, USA

tel. 217-333-6519
fax. 217-333-2214
e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu
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