PART 5 : EXTREME PREJUDICE: THE TERRIFYING STORY OF THE PATRIOT ACT & THE COVER UPS OF 911 AND IRAQ

Iraq never got a fair chance,Jr was determined to take care of Pop's business partner.We cannot let them repeat this same play with Iran...

EXTREME PREJUDICE:

THE TERRIFYING STORY  OF 

THE PATRIOT ACT & THE 

COVER UPS OF 911 AND IRAQ

BY SUSAN LINDAUER

CHAPTER 10: 

BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS 

You’d never guess from all our success securing Iraq’s cooperation with anti-terrorism policy that I suffered from chronic exhaustion. My double-life was becoming more difficult to sustain. 

While the whole country grieved over 9/11, I had to swallow my pain. My part in the 9/11 investigation allowed no time for grief. But that didn’t mean I wasn’t suffering like everyone else. 

By early October, 2001, I began to experience panic attacks whenever I had to cross the street. My heart would start pounding; I would feel faint and dizzy. My legs would teeter, as if I might collapse on the pavement in the middle of oncoming traffic. I’d have to stop myself from grabbing the arms of strangers to get across the road. Lunchtime on Connecticut Avenue in the heart of downtown Washington about killed me. 

I suffered terrible insomnia. I’d wake up at three in the morning, and sit on my back porch, chain smoking cigarettes until I could fall asleep. (I quit several years ago.) A couple of times I saw flashes of camera lights, and wondered if one of my early rising neighbors in artsy Takoma Park had photographed my self-abasement—or if the spooks were checking up on the lady who warned about 9/11. My paranoia skyrocketed. However someone definitely photographed me several times late at night in November and December, 2001. That’s also true. I saw them do it. 

I beat myself up with recriminations over our failure to stop 9/11. I tortured myself wondering what more we could have done. (Honestly, nothing). That didn’t stop me from long nights imagining the possibilities. What if I had not left Andy Card’s house that day in mid-August? What if I’d waited another hour in my car? (I waited two hours.) Why didn’t I go back to drop off a written warning about our suspicions? 

I considered the 9/11 investigation my personal responsibility. I would report to Dr. Fuisz’s office, and physically shake. My legs couldn’t stop bouncing —tapping my feet on the floor. I was totally wired, so much it hurt. But I couldn’t come down off it, either. 

I’d always been addicted to danger. I thrived in harsh situations. I contributed to many other terrorist investigations. This was my element. I visited the Iraqi embassy whenever the U.S. bombed Baghdad. Diplomats raved that I was unnaturally calm in a crisis. I was notoriously not afraid in situations that would overwhelm most adrenaline junkies. I never flinched from those encounters. 

“Paranoia” was another matter. Paranoia was an occupational hazard. Surveillance targeting me during any terrorism investigation could get hyper intense. The Intelligence Community needed to know what the hell was going on. And I would be the first to find out, because of my special contacts with pariah Arab governments. So I would get tracked heavily. 

By example, at the close of the Lockerbie negotiations, on the night that Tripoli handed over the two Libyans for trial however, was highly perplexed. That intensity of surveillance, while perfectly legitimate in these circumstances, aggravated my stress levels all the more. It was not “irrational” paranoia, as some have questioned. But it was stress provoking, nonetheless, because that degree of surveillance gets highly aggressive and intrusive. Sometimes whole teams would track my movements. Black sedans would chase me as I zig zagged through traffic on Interstate 95 all the way to New York. Over the years I learned to identify them. That didn’t make them the enemy. It was just part of the culture. A stressful surveillance culture. 

After 9/11, they followed me into restaurants when I dined with Arab diplomats in New York. They checked into adjoining hotel rooms in New York to monitor my meetings with Iraqi diplomats on resuming the weapons inspections. They tried to wire hotel rooms that we might use again. They always tapped my phones. They’d jump out like paparazzi with cameras on the street. It happened in Washington and New York, with Rani Ali of Malaysia, and many times with Libya’s Ambassador Issa Babaa and others, who shall be glad to stay anonymous. I’d be sitting in a chair, and somebody would pop up close to my face, whisper a code and disappear like a ghost . We’re in place. We’re ready. Face gone. 

In late November or early December, 2001, I saw Richard— for the last time, it turns out—though I had no inkling that afternoon. I was debriefing him jubilantly about my successful visit with the Iraqi delegation, and Baghdad’s enthusiasm for the peace framework. I voiced concern over how detailed my letter to Andy Card, dated December 2, 2001, should be, as far as detailing the peace framework. 

Richard replied: “You don’t have to worry. We always know exactly where you are, and everything you’re doing. We know it as soon as it happens. If you give us the Andy Card letters or not, we’re going to know anyway.” 

Then he said something that I regarded as strange: “Even if I could not communicate with you directly, Susan— for any reason— you can trust that at all times I have full knowledge of the status of this project. And I expect you to complete it. Do you understand?” 

In retrospect, I suspect that about this time, Dr. Fuisz got debriefed on the early war planning against Iraq—which he could not divulge to me under any circumstances. It got confusing on my end, for sure. But I don’t blame Dr. Fuisz. After 9/11, the spooks played at the top of their game. As long as they showed up in New York, I felt safe. Their appearance meant that my messages to Dr. Fuisz as to meeting times and locations made it up the chain. This was Iraq’s cooperation with U.S. anti-terrorism policy, after all, and resuming the weapons inspections. This was the hottest party in town. It’s incomprehensible that anybody would argue the Intelligence Community had no reason to track my engagements. That’s absurd. And wrong. They tracked it very heavily. 

My pain was altogether different and private. 

After 9/11, I was overwhelmed by “what ifs.” I recycled non-stop through my conversations with Dr. Fuisz in the summer of 2001. Many times I thought back to the day of FBI Director Robert Mueller’s nomination hearings on August 2, when Dr. Fuisz urged me not to go back to New York. 

That’s why I remember everything so clearly to this day. I wanted to be ready to tell Congress everything before the attack. I could never have believed that Congress, as leaders of the American people, would not want to know precisely and accurately what our warnings entailed. So I replayed my conversation with Attorney General John Ashcroft’s private staff on August 7 or 8 over and over in my mind. I replayed every detail of hanging up the phone to Ashcroft’s office, and immediately dialing the Office of Counter-Terrorism at his staff’s insistence—right down to the last irrelevant details. I wanted to be ready. I made a decision to read no reports by other sources –not even the 9/11 Commission Report— so that external sourcing would not influence my first-hand descriptions of our warnings. 

By November, there was a new tension in my midnight solitude: How extraordinary that nobody appeared willing to acknowledge our warnings before the attack? 

Now that stumped me. I suffered no delusions that I gave the only warning. You’d be wrong to think that . There were others. Trust me. 

Exhaustion was starting to wear me down. But something did not sit right. It struck me that somebody was cooking the intelligence books. I was just too exhausted to figure out why. I was so damn tired! And that proved my undoing. 

All of my energies had to stay focused on Baghdad —and fulfilling the mandate from the White House, Congress and all those Washington pundits who railed against Iraq on CNN and the Fox News Channel after 9/11. 

Dr. Fuisz and Hoven pushed me hard for results. They watched “Meet the Press, ” too. They listened to the speechifying on Capitol Hill, and all of us recognized that Iraq was the second hottest front in counter-terrorism after Afghanistan and Pakistan. And Iraq was our baby. If the White House was guided by a secret agenda of leading our nation to War with Baghdad, they dropped no hints to an anti-war Asset who campaigned aggressively against sanctions. Truly I don’t believe Dr. Fuisz or Hoven understood that agenda for awhile to come, either. 

You see the obstacles I had no idea I was confronting? 

Let me underscore this point: Every time White House or Congressional leaders opened their mouths with public demands for Iraq’s cooperation, they were speaking to my team. I was the Asset designated to carry out that particular mission. My back-channel had filled that purpose since August, 1996. 

For those reasons, Dr. Fuisz urged me not to get distracted by our advance warnings about 9/11. We’d confront them later, he said, after our work got finished. He didn’t say when it would be safe to discuss. I don’t think he knew. He only said that he couldn’t use me if I fell apart. 

I definitely exhibited signs that I might. I suffered night sweats. I’d wake up from nightmares where I’d spin like a twister out of my body. Then I’d crash into my bed drenched in a cold sweat, my sheets and nightclothes soaking wet. Those are clear signs of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. 

Does that disappoint you? It shouldn’t. 

Everyone can help in good times when things are easy. Everybody’s your buddy and your pal. Everybody wants to contribute. What separates the “men from the boys”— or the “women from the ladies” is who stays in when situations get really tough. Who doesn’t give up? Who doesn’t quit? 

After 9/11, you needed me. I considered my actions on your behalf to be the proudest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Because I did this work when it got hardest for me. Because I pulled myself through my own pain and grief, and gave everything I had. I tore myself apart for this. I did not break. I did not give up. 

Regrettably America, you did not help me. 

When I begged for a budget to support my work, Dr. Fuisz said, and I quote: “Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. You don’t ask for anything.” 

Paul Hoven echoed those sentiments, with a few ugly, anti-feminist expletives thrown in. “Susan: President Bush said you’re either with us or against us. You’d better get to work and stop asking my friend for money.” And so I kept going. 

By November, Dr. Fuisz accessed a large pot of money totaling $13 million from emergency “black budget” appropriations for the 9/11 investigation. While I argued that money existed to support our field operations, Dr. Fuisz handled it as his own private financial compensation. When I pleaded desperately to receive “something” to hold my own finances together, Dr. Fuisz vigorously refused. He had started building a mansion in Virginia earlier that year. An architect stole $3 million dollars off the $8 million project, Dr. Fuisz claimed. As a result,construction on his extravagant house stalled throughout the summer. Having listened to his phone calls many times on visits to his office, I saw for myself that he could raise no more cash to finish his mansion. 

All of a sudden after 9/11, Dr. Fuisz was flush again. When I expressed heart-felt relief for the availability of funds, Dr. Fuisz told me straight out that $13 million (definitely from the feds) gave his family the opportunity to start construction from scratch. He talked about buying new land, and starting from the foundation up. And this mansion would be more spectacular than the first, because now he had $13 million to build with! I have always wondered if some of that money bought fancy houses for his college-age children, as well. Either way, he gave me nothing. 

My request for funds to acquire Iraq’s cooperation with the 9/11 investigation: Denied. 

Was Richard motivated solely by greed? Did a Pro-War faction at the White House relay a clandestine order to stall our Iraqi project? Or did Richard augur the future War policy on his own, and conclude the White House would be supremely pleased if all that federal gold got invested anywhere except to compel Iraq’s cooperation with the 9/11 investigation? In which case, nobody at the White House or CIA would mind if funds got diverted to the construction of his great house in Virginia. 

Senior officials might have speculated that without budget resources, I would get fed up and quit. If so, they had a poor understanding of our team. We accepted the challenge under any conditions that we had to face. Dr. Fuisz gave me a personal check for $2,500 in October, and I kept going. This had to get done. We would make sure it got done right. These men aren’t quitters. Neither am I. If members of Congress aren’t who they pretend to be, that had nothing to do with us. 

Not surprisingly, the lack of funds made it vastly more difficult for me on a personal level. I had to push forward with no safety net at all. My furnace broke that winter, and I had no heat for almost 10 days from Christmas Eve until after New Year’s. I cranked up my kitchen stove to stay warm through the Holidays. Dr. Fuisz sent me a honey baked ham for Christmas dinner. But life got awfully grim in my household, while Homeland Security beefed up its bureaucracy, and the National Security Agency splurged on high tech gadgetry. 

I shudder to recall it, even today. Honestly, I felt heart-broken and I suffered for it. Yes I did. For months I pushed Richard to intercede on my behalf to secure the annuity payment promised as reward for my work on Lockerbie, the U.S.S. Cole, 9/11—You name it. I was entitled to receive rewards for all those projects. 

Failure to honor those promises amounted to massive leadership fraud. It was a major betrayal of Congressional pledges of support for Assets in anti-terrorism, flags flying high on the sound stages of CNN and the Fox News Channel. 

Meanwhile, the “Black Budgets” exploded to $85 billion a year—all of it taxpayer dollars off the books to federal auditors— paid from the salaries of hard working teachers, doctors, construction workers, farmers, and every day Americans across the country, who sweat, like me, from pay check to pay check. There’s no accountability for handling those “black budget” appropriations. Congress has barred itself from auditing black budget projects. So in truth, Capitol Hill has no idea whether appropriations reach the field, or if monies get diverted to private bank accounts for nonprofessional uses, resulting in thefts of billions of U.S. tax dollars. 

Failing to provide resources to Assets like me, engaged in the daily work of counter-terrorism amounted to gross command negligence, however. 

There’s a time-honored tradition in military style structures that leadership entails a responsibility to provide for the welfare of individuals under the command. Underlings give obedience, and commanders act in good faith to provide for their honest needs— not extravagantly, but at a basic threshold. It’s known as “Jus in Bello, ” and it’s critical for the success of the command unit. 

This time they failed badly, and I suffered intensely as a result. 

And all because of the total absence of black budget oversight. Black budget monies are equivalent to 100 percent, interest free gifts to the notorious Beltway Bandits in Washington, who grab for that cash with open fists. They have no obligations to provide any services to the government in return, or to repay the money if businesses are sold for a profit down the road. It’s corporate welfare. Small business owners across America would be so lucky. They’d be thrilled. 

As a result, it is impossible for me to hear leaders on Capitol Hill brag about their outstanding leadership support for Assets and anti-terrorism without becoming very, very angry. Congress should keep its mouths shut, until whatever time black budgets get reformed. An overhaul of intelligence appropriations is long overdue. 

Unhappily after 9/11, I needed to buy groceries and pay my mortgage and utility bills just like other Americans. I tightened my belt and kept going. After 9/11, I got to New York twice a month on average for meetings with Iraqi and Libyan diplomats. I went after Iraq’s cooperation pretty hard. And the spooks kept track of it all. 

Later on, when I got accused of acting as an “Iraqi Agent, ” I dreamed of going into Court wearing a shirt that read: I Warned About 9/11 And All I Got was This Lousy T-Shirt & a Federal Indictment. 

Pretty scandalous, eh? 

Bottom line: Republicans on Capitol Hill got a free ride on the publicity train after 9/11. They never paid the fares. Promises were broken and forgot as soon as the TV cameras packed up. Unhappily, their deception carried a bitter cost for Assets like me. 

After my indictment, my emotional stress after 9/11 would become a matter of fierce conjecture and debate. The spooks would grab for any excuse to block my demands for a trial, and thereby prevent exposure of Iraqi Pre-War Intelligence and our 9/11 warnings. My panic attacks and chronic fatigue gave them a reprieve. They would not let it go. 

Ominously, the Justice Department attack would spiral beyond their grasp. And Congress would hold no inquiry to check the facts of my history as an Asset. They would not want the truth about Iraq or 9/11 coming out either. My indictment helped a lot of people tell a lot of lies. 

And so it’s important to know what really occurred during those twelve months after 9/11. My “emotional state” turns out to be nothing remotely similar to what it was portrayed to be. 

Chronic fatigue should not be confused with depression. In fact, it has quite the opposite effect. I experienced stress and anxiety, which I associated with my profound disappointment over our team’s failure to stop 9/11. However, I continued to feel motivated to pursue my work. I worried for my future. But I also expected any private setback to be short term. Throughout those months I never stopped appealing to Dr. Fuisz for funding. 

I suspect chronic fatigue is something I have shared with Heath Ledger and Michael Jackson. It’s a condition where your body becomes so tired you can’t sleep at all, because you’re throbbing with energy of what has to be done. You know that you must sleep, and it hurts physically that you can’t. You’re just too wired and hyped. It’s a bad cycle to fall into. It’s more likely to occur, I think, if you’re forced onto a sustained level of high energy, when your body does not get a chance to recuperate or slow down as part of its normal cycle. 

In fact, my chronic fatigue was the brunt of hard work. I was accustomed to the quirks of my trade, and perfectly content. I lived my life the way I chose. I pursued projects I loved. Dr. Fuisz and Hoven never coerced me for help. Our team was incredibly close, and I wanted to do this, despite the lack of funding, which I considered grossly unfair and selfish. Up to this point, in every respect I lived the best life that I could have chosen, given who I am. I made sacrifices, but I considered those worthwhile. I was a good sprinter. I was at the top of my game, no matter how exhausted I felt. 

What I needed was a long vacation on a tropical island, with snorkeling and horseback riding and a private masseuse. Or a hike through the Australian Outback. I certainly deserved it! I had earned those rewards promised by Congressional leaders on CNN and the Fox News Channel. 

Alas my daily life had to be far more practical. After my trip to Baghdad, I started a job as Press Secretary to Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat from San Jose, California. That proved to be a horrible mistake. 

There’s an honorary code of silence among former Hill staffers. Suffice it to say that Washington P.A.C's keep Lofgren in office, no matter what happens to San Jose, California. She’s a safe Democratic seat. She’s not going anywhere. 

In fact, she got promoted. Today, Rep. Lofgren chairs the House Ethics Committee, though I recall her angrily hiding in her office, waiting for a San Francisco TV journalist to leave the front waiting room, so she could take her car for an oil change. 

I had no tolerance for that sort of behavior on Capitol Hill. As it was, I lost eight weeks sitting at a desk in Lofgren’s House office, doing absolutely nothing. Sure I needed the rest quite desperately. But every day I chomped at the tether, longing to get back to work. 

It all came to a head when my old friend, Rita Cosby at the FOX News Channel breathlessly informed me that Iraqi diplomats told her about the documents proving a Middle Eastern connection to the Oklahoma City Bombing and the 1993 World Trade Center attack. I was convinced those papers tracked Ramzi Youseff’s financial accounts from what we formerly called the “Inter-Arab Group, ” at the birth of Al Qaeda. That made the decision for me. I had to get those papers. When a frivolous dispute arose inside Lofgren’s office, I managed to extricate myself from her ego trip within the hour. I was not alone in the flight out of her office. She hired four press secretaries in the 12 months before me. That says everything. 

I was glad to get out of there. I had real work to do. Working made me feel better. 

PART TWO: 

WHEN TRUTH BECOMES TREASON 

CHAPTER 11: 

THE OLD POTOMAC TWO-STEP 

It’s not the size of the dog in the fight. It’s the size of the fight in the dog. 

–Mark Twain 

Arguably, I just might be the most slandered woman in America. In which case, I am also the subject of the greatest farce. 

Think I’m exaggerating? 

You’ve all heard the rap: Bad Intelligence before the war. No options for peace. Lousy Assets got our facts wrong. Incompetent! Poor risk taking and creative problem solving. 

Oh yes, it’s my fault the U.S. invaded Iraq! I’m the fool who ruined us! 

That’s right. Assets are supposed to be proactive and creative fighters, aren’t you? You guys are supposed to stick your fingers in the dyke to hold back catastrophe. 

You’re supposed to find a way when the situation’s hopeless. You’re supposed to create opportunities for action where there are none. That’s what an Asset does. It’s what an Asset’s for. 

So where the hell did you disappear to before the War? Did you get lost in the Gobi Desert, and couldn’t get an internet connection to find out what lunacy was seizing Washington? Were you stuck in a Siberian gulag? Lost in the Australian Outback? Hiking in the Himalayas on a quest to find the true Dalai Lama? Did you find Amelia Earhart in Tonga? 

Where did you go? Why didn’t you do something when all of us needed you so badly? 

You dealt with Libya and Saddam Hussein for years. Couldn’t you handle Andy Card and Colin Powell? Was Nancy Pelosi really so difficult? 

Oh I see. If only I’d gone to Capitol Hill, and confronted congressional staffers about the gross mistakes in their assumptions about Iraq’s weapons stocks! Maybe Congress would have allowed U.N. weapons inspectors to finish their jobs, instead of racing to spout war propaganda loaded with salacious intelligence “facts” that were totally wrong! 

Surely they would have listened to me. Obviously I had better access to higher quality intelligence than they did! I was a primary source for intelligence on Iraq after all. 

If only I had debriefed Congress about the comprehensive peace framework constructed by the CIA, protecting all U.S. interests, post-sanctions— 

Oil contracts? Got it. 

Lucrative reconstruction contracts for U.S. corporations in telecommunications, transportation and health care? Done. 

Anti-terrorism? Bulls eye. 

Weapons inspections? Not a problem. 

Democracy? Some very creative ideas on the table. 

Surely if I informed them, Congress would have recognized that all the problems identified by Washington could be resolved without firing a single missile. No American soldier had to die, or lose his arm or leg in five tours of duty in Mosul and Fallujah. No Iraqi civilian had to lose their home, or watch their future destroyed. 

Picture the streets of Baghdad with no I.E.D's. No suicide bombings. No fragmentation of Iraq. 

There would be no quagmires. No $5 Trillion Dollar war deficit. No financial meltdown bankrupting the Middle Class. Just peace and prosperity for all of our days! A future of contentment and envy around the world, while the Greatest Super Power of All Time enjoyed bountiful blessings, dominating the global agenda. 

The world could have been spared so much pain… 

Why didn’t I think of that! 

My apologies to Nancy Pelosi, but my actions totally demolish the rants on Capitol Hill about Assets and Pre-War Intelligence. 

I might have been “last to know” on the Intelligence food chain of what the Bush Boys were up to in Baghdad. But I certainly got the message that something was wrong before the rest of the American people or the world community. 

I am a life-long peace activist, after all. I live six miles from Capitol Hill. It’s a 12 minute metro ride. Door to door, it’s a half hour trip. I worked as a congressional press secretary myself back in the 1990's. I know how Congress works. I know how to schedule meetings with staff. 

When I hear this nonsense in TV sound bites about how poorly Assets performed before the War, I have learned to roar with laughter. 

Am I a punch line? Or a punching bag? Or both? 

I can only say that the truth feels much more tragic, because it so intimately relates to my own lost hopes for the Iraqi people. 

Before my trip to Baghdad in March 2002, the finish line looked so close. By April and May of 2002, it appeared more distant. None of our successful arm twisting in Baghdad was sinking into the Washington mindset. “Think tanks” spewed endless misinformed conference papers. Congress appeared to grasp none of the facts about Iraq’s current status. It was not difficult to conclude that information about Baghdad’s cooperation was not reaching Capitol Hill. 

OK. I could fix that. How hard could it be? 

By mid-May, 2002— almost a year before the Invasion— I began a round of meetings on Capitol Hill to bring top Republican and Democrats up to speed on the substantial gains from our back channel talks. This was good stuff after all. 

Throughout May, June and July of 2002, a healthy smattering of House and Senate offices got the good news that Andy Card had already received: The CIA had built a substantial framework for peace that protected all major U.S. concerns in any post sanctions period. Hallelujah! 

As part of the sit down debriefings, senior staffers got copies of the most important Andy Card letters, detailing Iraq’s response to 9/11 and its efforts to cooperate with U.S anti-terrorism policy. They were fully informed of efforts to safeguard U.S. interests at multiple levels —including some objectives not yet identified by Congress. 

My first stop was Senator Carl Levin’s office, days after I returned from Baghdad. I was confident the Michigan Democrat and Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee would be thrilled to hear of Iraq’s promise to purchase one million American automobiles every year for 10 years. Or how U.S. corporations would enjoy preferential contracts in telecommunications, health care and pharmaceuticals. That would translate to thousands of high paying union jobs and equipment purchases for Michigan, Indiana and Ohio. The Rust- Belt of America, so aptly named for its faded industrial glory, would receive some of the most substantial benefits from America’s share of this peace dividend. Iraq’s commitment would have to be publicly ratified before the international community, giving American workers a measure of protection. There’s no question that Senator Levin’s constituents would have benefited enormously from long term economic development multipliers. 

Given Michigan’s large Arab-American population, I also expected excitement from Sen. Levin’s staff for our progress targeting genuine terrorist cells, as opposed to frightened taxi drivers and plumbers in the general Arab population, who have nothing to do with terrorism. The vast majority, in fact. 

Neither rendition, nor water-boarding nor the Patriot Act would have been necessary instruments of our success. Nobody had to worry that funds would be seized from legitimate Islamic charities engaged in community building, financing schools and health clinics for the poor, providing food for widows and children—all those good things that encourage hopefulness in the community. Nor would Americans worry about deploying the National Guard to Buffalo, New York, a shocking prospect that White House officials actually debated during this same time period.

And since “real” terrorism financing comes from global heroin trafficking, we would have tackled that other monster— the global profits of illegal narcotics—at the same time. We could have crippled heroin profits for those cartels on a global scale. (Except apparently Congress does not understand how one pays for the other.) 

My conversation with Senator Levin’s staff was dynamic and far reaching— with great implications for Washington on so many levels. Notably, his staffer surprised me by revealing the Office had been debriefed about the comprehensive peace framework already. His staff was familiar with different parts of it. 

That gave me hope as I continued my rounds. 

Senior staff for Senator Debbie Stabenow’s office, also serving Michigan, got the same private debriefing. Ultimately, both Senator Levin and Senator Stabenow opposed the Iraq War Resolution in October, 2002. However neither Senator informed Michigan voters about these substantial opportunities for addressing so many urgent problems, like job creation for the local community. 

I carried the good news to Senator Wellstone’s office— that much beloved and unabashed Liberal Democrat from Minnesota. Senator Wellstone provided a strong voice for peace until his tragic death in a mysterious airplane crash. 

I visited the Black Caucus, including Rep. Elijah Cummings, and several other key representatives from Maryland, including former Rep. Connie Morella (GOP) and Rep. Chris Van Hollen, who both represented my tiny hamlet of Takoma Park. In fairness, Rep. Van Hollen —who defeated Morella— was newly sworn into office weeks before the Iraq invasion. He faced a steep learning curve, and our meeting included a group of 20 local anti-war activists. There was not an appropriate moment to debrief his staff about the peace framework. However Rep. Van Hollen hit the ground running, with a strong showing of support for the peace community. 

His predecessor, Rep. Connie Morella, got the Andy Card papers in May of 2002. As a mark of her wisdom, Rep. Morella was one of only six Republicans in the House of Representatives to vote against the War Authorization bill. Courageously, she bucked the party machine and voted with her constituents, something Marylander's like me greatly appreciated. It took guts to go against Karl Rove and my dearest cousin, Andy Card. Rep. Morella deserves real praise for that, too. 

Outrageously, some of the most aggressive attacks on Assets engaged in Pre-War Intelligence came from a handful of House and Senate offices that received my debriefings—and lied about it afterwards. For example, the chief of staff and legislative director for former Rep. Jane Harman, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, received copies of the Andy Card letters, including the peace framework, with a request to share them with Rep. Harman. 

As it happens, Rep. Harman and I are both alumnae of Smith College, one of the Seven Sister women’s colleges in Northampton, Massachusetts. Smith prides itself on building women’s leadership. If not for Smith College, I would not have carried the confidence to fight so hard in my battle ahead with the Justice Department. 

Imagine my astonishment, therefore, to open the Smith Alumnae Quarterly, and read criticism from Rep. Harman, attacking Assets before the War. Rep. Harman gave speeches throughout the foreign policy community, criticizing Assets for failing to develop a Peace Option to War— in essence trapping Congress into following White House policy. That’s exactly what I had done. And senior staff in her office knew it. 

Rep. Harman was not alone in repackaging the truth. 

Ah but to my face, those Congressional staffers smiled, all peachy and nice. They might have strongly desired to shut me up— like Senator Lott and Senator McCain in February, 2004, resulting in my arrest on the Patriot Act. But they were not so uncouth as to threaten me to my face.

Quite the opposite, staff for Senator Don Nickles of Oklahoma, Majority Whip for the Republican Party and Rep. JC Watts of Oklahoma thanked me graciously and generously for gathering new leads on the Oklahoma City Bombing, including efforts to acquire financial records on Al Qaeda. I felt deeply gratified by their praise—which doesn’t mean they did not complain to the FBI afterwards.

Senator Lott’s and Senator McCain’s staff were very polite, too—And they got me arrested thirty days after I requested to testify. 

Those Pre-War meetings occurred in mid June, 2002. 210 And so the question of who sicked the FBI on me—the Democrats or the Republicans— becomes highly intriguing. 

By July 2002, somebody in those Congressional offices complained to the FBI. 

Shockingly, instead of turning its focus onto terrorist finances, as I expected, the FBI turned its sights on me, and launched a major investigation of my anti-war activities. 

We know the timing, because the FBI was forced to turn over wire taps 211 for 28,000 phone calls, 8,000 emails and hundreds of faxes after my arrest. FBI phone taps started in mid July, 2002—five months after my trip to Baghdad in March, 2002—but just a few weeks after I started making the rounds on Capitol Hill. 

Surveillance photos prove the FBI or National Security Agency captured my meetings with Iraqi diplomats in New York in February, while the trip to Baghdad was planned. If the Feds believed I was breaking the law—instead of organizing my trip the way I thought I was supposed to—the FBI would have registered a phone tap and email capture immediately, as part of a criminal investigation. Nobody did so for another five months. That screams volumes that my trip to Baghdad was no big deal. 

It’s crucial to understand that ordinarily the FBI applies for a wiretap separately from the National Security Agency. The NSA had tapped my phones for years, going back to the 1993 World Trade Center attack. But those wire taps would not automatically get shared with the FBI, unless the Intelligence Community referred my activities for a criminal investigation. 

The FBI took no such action. Instead—by coincidence I’m sure, the FBI started its phone taps exactly when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee planned a series of hearings on Iraq in late July, 2002. 212 

That timing suggests the FBI wanted to monitor what Congress would learn about the realities of Pre-War Intelligence, which contradicted everything the White House was preaching on FOX News and CNN. 

In which case, the Justice Department discovered that I told Congress a lot—and Congress rewarded the White House by pretending that I had not said a word. 

But phone taps don’t lie. Numerous phone conversations with Congressional offices show that I identified myself as one of the few Assets covering Iraq. 213 Some of my calls described the peace framework, assuring Congressional staffers that diplomacy could achieve the full scope of results sought by U.S policymakers. 

Other conversations warned how Imams in Baghdad threatened to tear American soldiers apart, limb from limb, if the U.S invaded Iraq. On my trip to Baghdad in March, 2002— one year before the invasion — Iraqi Imams threatened to use suicide bombs, and swore that even Iraqi women would launch a powerful resistance to any U.S Occupation. Over and over, Iraqi Imams promised it wouldn’t matter if the people hated Saddam. They hated the United States much more, because of the brutality of sanctions, which had destroyed Iraq’s society and economy. There would be hell to pay if the United States tried to occupy Baghdad. 

FBI phone taps captured it all, making a lie of complaints that Assets failed to warn U.S. leaders off this catastrophe. My phone calls were loaded with pleas to turn back from disaster. 214 

Ironically, a large part of my debriefing focused on the need for leadership on Capitol Hill to bring the CIA and the FBI together to launch the Terrorism Task Force inside Iraq. Most Congressional staffers could spout flaming rhetoric with regards to anti-terrorism policy. But they could not grasp necessary strategies for achieving results on the ground. Their eyes took on a blank glaze when I described how the FBI and the CIA would have to engage in inter-agency cooperation, in order to secure those financial records from Iraq. And of course, I explained the value of identifying the cash pipeline. 

Closing down the financial pipeline for terrorist activities should have been a top priority for Republicans and Democrats alike. And let nobody forget, those monies come from heroin trafficking, a network that runs from Afghanistan and the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon to Colombia. Genuine terrorist organizations are heavily interconnected with those smuggling cartels. That’s where their operating dollars come from. 

I expected Congressional staffers to seize the opportunity with gusto. I expected them to rally enthusiastically to the challenge. Indeed, it remains a mystery why any responsible government official would not grab the chance to investigate those accounts, and track the flow of cash in and out of them. 

Unconscionably, Republicans preferred to deprive Baghdad of an opportunity to cooperate with global anti-terrorism— with dire consequences. Failure to act allowed that cash flow to remain active and accessible in other conflicts to this day— in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan. It probably financed attacks on Mombai, savaging Pakistan’s peace with India. Indonesia is experiencing a low-grade insurgency against Islamic rebels. The list goes on. 

Above all, heroin trafficking has financed the Taliban’s War in Afghanistan against U.S. Armed Forces. Profits from opium production account for why a rag tag militia of Afghan mountain fighters has prevailed over the combined military strength of the United States, Britain and 42 NATO governments, which boast the most sophisticated weapons on the planet. 

To put that in context, Afghanistan rakes in about $3 billion a year from opium production, supplying 85 percent of the world’s raw ingredients for heroin, morphine and other opiate mixtures. 

According to the UN World Drug Report of 2010, heroin commanded a global market value of $55 billion, and a trafficking network that employs 1 million people. 

Notably, the year of 9/11—2001—saw Afghanistan’s lowest opium production since the 1980's — approximately 100 tons, thanks to the Clinton Administration’s successful programs paying Afghan farmers to stop opium harvests. Under President Clinton, opium production was almost eradicated—a superbly successful anti-drug policy that likewise cut off financial resources for armed conflict. 

When President Bush stopped paying Afghan farmers to convert from poppy crops, opium production jumped to 3,200 tons in 2002. 

Opium production skyrocketed thereafter, throughout the Afghan War, peaking at 8,000 tons in 2008, when President Bush left office. 

By 2009, President Obama’s drug policies cut opium production to 7,000 tons in 2009. But the damage has been done. Though military strategists are loathe to admit it, the United States and NATO have lost the Afghan War to these ferocious rag tag fighters, who have no technology, but reap the harvests of endless cash supplies for their Jihad. 

And so I stand by this criticism: 

Refusing to shut down the financial pipeline shared by Jihadi fighters in Afghanistan and terrorist cells organized by Al Qaeda qualifies as the single most dangerous failure of national security by the Republican leadership. 

American soldiers have died because of it. Afghan and Iraqi civilians have suffered endlessly in the cross fighting. Civilian infrastructure has been wrecked. A future has been destroyed—The U.S. came home defeated from Iraq. And after 10 years of War, the Taliban is guaranteed to dominate the political landscape after NATO pulls out in 2014. 

Finally, the Republican failure has set loose a ticking time bomb that threatens domestic security inside the United States, as well. There’s a significant probability that the next major terrorist attack on America soil will receive financing through that same international financial network. It was grossly negligent— and suspicious — not to identify that financial pipeline, and shut the damn thing down. 

Instead, the United States made a great show of seizing donations to legitimate Islamic charities engaged in community building. There’s a tragic sort of irony in that, because the health, education and food programs funded by those Charities provide the best deterrents against violence in the community. Those programs create a sense of future, in addition to providing for basic survival. Seizing those charitable donations is not only morally wrong, it’s desperately short-sighted. It’s the worst sort of grandstanding in Washington. It demonstrates that U.S. leaders don’t comprehend how terrorism originates, or what keeps it alive. U.S. leaders are cutting down the community infrastructure that might make it possible to stop the violence. 

On top of all that, the FBI wanted to eat the CIA’s lunch. They tried to swallow up the CIA’s mission overseas. That did not sit well in Washington, and complicated possible joint ventures like this one. Instead of cooperating like Sister Agencies, the FBI sought to push the CIA out of the picture altogether, and took advantage of the CIA’s perceived failure to stop 9/11, in order to savage the competence of the agency. 

That’s almost funny, in the blackest way— considering the Justice Department refused the CIA’s urgent appeals for cooperation to preempt the 9/11 strike throughout the summer of 2001, in the first place. 

Leadership from Congress would have put those relations back on track. But it never emerged. As an Asset, I was greatly frustrated. I could see that Congress lacked the skill to carry its agenda into the real world. Cut past the rhetoric, and Congress was not the high flying, results-driven leadership it was selling to the American Heartland. 

Within six months of 9/11, terrorism had become a media spectacle, a Big Top Circus of hype and drama on Capitol Hill to hold people’s attention. But none of that emotional regalia after 9/11 translated into action that would have made a difference to terrorism controls in the field. It was purely a publicity stunt. 

Most aggravating of all, Congress appeared to be afraid of losing the public’s attention. CNN was calling for guest interviews. Voters held their leadership in high esteem. Beneath the veneer of patriotism, Congress was reviving the art of demagoguery. Pushed to deliver substance by somebody like myself, who understands the dynamics of anti-terrorism at the field level, Congress proved useless to provide any sort of leadership assistance, or bring the FBI and CIA together for cooperative projects. 

Unfortunately, leaders in Washington quickly saw that nobody would know the difference. So the rhetoric on Capitol Hill became more aggressive after 9/11, while their performance flagged far behind.

Then in July, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee decided to hold hearings to examine U.S. policy in Iraq. The Senate Chamber was packed to overflow, but I got a seat in the audience. There I listened, dumb-struck, while Senate leaders bandied about ridiculous allegations about Iraq’s illegal weapons stocks and refusal to accept U.N. weapons inspections, in contradiction to all current facts on the ground. 

I couldn’t believe the stupidity of what I was hearing. It was all political grandstanding. I was absolutely furious.

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The Battle for Peace