The Globalists and the
Islamists:
Fomenting the "Clash of
Civilizations" for a New World Order
Part One:
The British, the Middle East and
Radical Islam
Introduction
As the American government, led by the Bush Administration,
fights its so-called "War On Terror" with plans to invade and overthrow Iraq,
America's steadfast ally in this endeavor continues to be the British government
of Tony Blair. The following study will take a look at the history of the region
that America has become entangled in, a region that used to be, and to some
degree still is, almost entirely controlled by Britain. Is this current "War On
Terror" truly a war to bring freedom to the region and to promote traditional
American ideals, or is it a power-play to solidify global American hegemony? And
what does Britain have to gain?
Britain appears to be our greatest ally but it must be understood
that British geo-strategists are the masters of political manipulation and
subversion. Even as the physical British colonial empire was declining in the
first half of this century they were already building the framework for a
completely global empire based on the legacy of Cecil Rhodes utilizing the
resources of the super-capitalists and financiers of New York and London. These
elites may be predominantly British and American in nationality, but they reject
democracy and the American Constitution and work against the best interests of
British, American and international citizens. By studying the history of the
Middle East, and the elitist manipulation of it, we can perhaps predict what is
to come after this last final push of the American Empire.
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I. Britain takes the Middle East
As documented in F. William Engdahl's book A
Century of War - Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order,
Britain's interest in the Middle East was piqued when her leaders realized
that oil would replace coal as the energy source of the future. At the turn of
the century Britain had no first-hand access to oil and was dependant upon
America, Russia or Mexico for her supplies. This was quickly understood as an
unacceptable situation and through intrigues involving British spy Sidney Reilly
and Australian geologist and engineer William Knox d'Arcy Britain was able to
secure drilling rights to Persian oil from Persian monarch Reza Khan. D'Arcy
paid what amounted to $20,000 cash for rights to tap Persian oil until 1961,
with a 16% royalty from all sales going to the Shah. The British company that
Reilly persuaded d'Arcy to ally with then became known as the Anglo-Persian Oil
Company, which was a forerunner of the mighty
British
Petroleum (BP).
However, even with a supply of Persian oil, Britain was losing
the race to secure Middle Eastern oil reserves to the Germans. In the years
prior to World War I Germany had enjoyed an astonishing economic explosion and
this was helped by her alliance with the Ottoman Empire which allowed her access
to their vast reserves. In 1889 the Germans worked out an agreement to finance,
through Deutsche Bank, a railway from Constantinople into Anatolia, and later in
1899 the final agreement for a complete Berlin-to-Baghdad railway was signed.
The British made sure that this rail link was never completed
through the use of her ally Serbia, which stood in the middle of the German
alliance that included Austro-Hungary, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire. World
War I is commonly understood as sparked by the assassination of the Austrian
Archduke Ferdinand by Serbian assassins. Serbia did play a key part in World War
I, but the conflict was not simply a result of this solitary event. The truth is
that World War I was fomented by the British so that they could control oil,
foreseen by their geo-strategists as the world's most important emerging
resource. (1)
In 1916, at the height of World War I, the British worked out
an agreement with France, Italy and Russia known as the Sykes-Picot Agreement
that carved up the Ottoman Empire into Western colonies. This secret agreement
created the arbitrary boundaries of what are today the countries of Jordan,
Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Kuwait. Britain would control the oil-rich Persian Gulf
through Iraq and Kuwait and would also receive Palestine and Jordan. France
would receive Syria and Lebanon, Italy was promised parts of Anatolia and some
Mediterranean islands and Russia was to get parts of Armenia and Kurdistan.
During the war Britain diverted more than 1.4 million troops
from the Western Front to fight the Ottomans in the east. While the French lost
1.5 million dead and suffered 2.6 million wounded in the trenches the British
gained victory after victory in the Middle East. After the war ended the British
continued to maintain over a million troops in the area, and in 1918 the British
General Allenby found that he was the de-facto military dictator over almost the
entire Arab Middle East. (2)
While T.E. Lawrence was directing the Arab revolt against the
Ottomans on behalf of the British he had assured his Arab allies that Britain
would honor their desires for independence, but after the war these promises
were ignored. During the war the famous Balfour Declaration was also given. It
was a letter between Lord Balfour and Lord Rothschild that promised official
British endorsement of a Jewish state in Palestine. The plain fact is that the
Arabs were cheated, betrayed and used in a British drive to gain control of the
region that contained the world's largest known oil reserves.
In the fight against the Ottoman Empire the British gained the
support of two important Arab leaders. The first was Hussein I of the Hashemite
dynasty, a dynasty that traced a direct lineage back to the prophet Mohammed. He
was the ruler of the Hijaz area that included Mecca and Medina and the British
hyped his "holy" status to maximize his popular support. The second prominent
Arab leader that the British eventually brought into the fold was Ibn Saud, the
leader of the tribal Wahhabi sect of central Arabia. Ibn Saud used his British
financing to enhance his position as a religious figure and to buy the support
of the Bedouins.
After the Ottomans were defeated and the Sykes-Picot and
Balfour Agreements were revealed Hussein I realized the treachery that had
defeated him and he abdicated his throne. His three sons Ali, Faisal and
Abdallah then tried their luck at Arab rule.
Prince Ali took over the Hijaz but lost it in 1925 in his
clash with the forces of the British-supported Ibn Saud. The Saudis have ruled
Arabia ever since. The biggest mistake Britain made was losing interest in the
Saudis and the Arabian deserts, allowing Standard Oil of California to come in
and purchase the rights to search for oil in Saudi Arabia for $250,000 in 1933
(3). Since that time the Saudi royal family has
enjoyed a very special relationship with the United States.
Prince Faisal, who had worked with T.E. Lawrence and conquered
Damascus from the Ottomans, made a claim to rule French-governed Syria in 1920,
but the French ended this attempt after just four months. Faisal then retreated
to Britain and a year later he was recycled when he, a Sunni prince, was given
the predominantly Shia territory of Iraq to govern as king. Faisal I ruled until
his death in 1933. His son Ghazi ruled Iraq until he died in 1939, followed by
Ghazi's son Faisal II, the last king of Iraq, who was killed in a military coup
in 1958.
The Hashemite dynasty continues to this day only through the
third of our trio of Hussein's sons. Prince Abdallah was given the land of
Trans-Jordan to govern in 1921 and as king he maintained a strong pro-British
stance, despite the treachery displayed to his father. Abdallah understood that
there was no future in contradicting his masters, and the British used him to
check the fury of his own population as the British desire to establish a Jewish
state in Israel came into focus. King Abdallah was killed in the Al Aqsa Mosque
in 1951, and his sixteen year old grandson Hussein took the throne. King Hussein
ruled until his death in 1999, and his son King Abdullah now rules the Hashemite
Kingdom of Jordan.
The main point that must be understood from the historical
record, as it relates to the main focus of this article, is the cynical manner
in which the religion of Islam has been used by the British Empire to further
British political goals. In the book by Arab historian Said Aburish, A
Brutal Friendship - The West and the Arab Elite, the author
identifies three distinct phases of Islam's relationship with the West within
the 20th Century. (4)
The first phase, according to Aburish, was the phase
immediately after World War I. The Arab leaders had been cheated and betrayed,
but they were still dependant upon the British to allow them any type of rule
over the Arab masses.
Ibn Saud was the leader of the Wahhabi sect, and the British
acknowledged his influence as a religious figure and funded his conquest of all
of Arabia.
The Hashemites were the strongest traditional Arab force, but
their back was broken when Ibn Saud threw them out of Mecca and Medina. In their
"pity" the British then placed Abdallah and Faisal over Jordan and Iraq. These
Hashemite princes were outsiders, to say the least, but the British played the
religion card for all it was worth and justified their actions to the Arab
people through the Hashemite lineage that traced back to Mohammed. Certainly any
Arab would be happy to be ruled by a "holy" clan like the Hashemites!
The British used Islam in Palestine as well when, in 1921,
they engineered the election of their choice, Haj Amin Husseini, a descendant of
Mohammed, to the post of Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. In Palestine almost all of
the elite Arab families quickly found it profitable to be pro-British, and the
Grand Mufti maintained this stance as well, at least up until 1936 when the
imminent establishment of a Jewish Israel forced him to finally support the
desires of his people. (5)
Regarding the first phase of Islam's relationship with the
West Aburish writes, "All political leadership of the time depended on Islam
for legitimacy and all political leaders were pro-British. Islam was a tool to
legitimize the rule, tyranny and corruption of Arab leaders. To the West, Islam
was acceptable; it could be and was used." (6)
This phase of elitist domination of the Arab people, using
Islam as the legitimizing factor, could not continue indefinitely. The force
that rose up to counter it was secular Arab nationalism and it eventually
revolved around the person of Gamal Abd-al Nasser of Egypt. This movement sought
to free the Middle East from Western domination and at the same time it was
cynical of the Islam that had been used so successfully to prop up and justify
elitist rule. We will identify the second phase of Western-Islamic relations
that began with the rise of Arab nationalism, but first we must take a brief
historical look at Egypt
II. Britain and Egypt
By the beginning of World War I Egypt had been
controlled by Britain for more than thirty years. While the British used Islam
to topple the Ottomans and prop up their client states outside of Egypt, within
Egypt they found that Islam was not such a malleable asset, at least not while
Britain remained as the colonizer.
Western influence over Egypt began in 1798,
when Napoleon invaded Egypt to threaten Britain's trade routes to India. This
was the first major and decisive conquest of an Arab Muslim nation in the
history of Islam and marked the beginning of a slow decline in Muslim pride and
influence. Napoleon's rule didn't last long, however, because the British
temporarily allied with the Ottomans to throw the French out after only a few
years.
Out of the chaos emerged an Albanian commander of the Ottoman
army named Mohammed Ali, who helped to drive out the British, afterwards
becoming governor of Egypt under Ottoman authority. Ali neutralized the native
Mamluke threat, and then turned his attention to modernizing Egypt. After Ali
died his successors Abbas, and then Said Pasha ruled Egypt. Said Pasha started
the Suez Canal, and then his successor Khedive Ismail finished it in 1869. The
canal was financed primarily by French investors, but by this time France was
firmly controlled by Britain. After that the British influence in Egypt slowly
became stronger and stronger, and was initially done not militarily but
economically. The British "free-trade" ideology was adopted and Egyptian
manufacturing and industry suffered. Egypt soon found itself deep in debt.
In 1879 Ismail was forced from power and was eventually
succeeded by his son Tewfiq Pasha who finally gave up and effectively ceded
complete control of the Egyptian economy over to the British. In 1882 British
troops landed and completed the takeover of Egypt. They would occupy Egypt until
1956 when they were finally expelled by President Nasser.
At the beginning of World War I the Khedive Abbas perceived a
chance to shake off the British and he urged popular support for the Ottomans.
The British quickly deposed him and placed his uncle Hussein Kamil in power.
After the war was over nationalist forces within Egypt waged a continuous
campaign against the British occupiers for independence, even lobbying for
international recognition for independence in Paris, but their desires were
dashed when the United States sided with Britain.
In 1922 the British repealed the "Protectorate Status" over
Egypt, but they maintained responsibility for Egypt's "defense" and for
protection of foreigners within Egypt. Egypt was said to have achieved
"independence" and King Fouad I, descendent of Mohammed Ali, took power,
although British occupation continued.
In 1928 the "Muslim Brotherhood" was founded by an Egyptian
schoolteacher named Hasan al-Banna. The Brotherhood was a religious secret
society known publicly for its emphasis on Islamic education and for its
charitable activities. Prior to World War II British Intelligence cultivated
ties with the Brotherhood through agent Freya Stark, the British adventurer and
writer (1). These covert connections were used to
keep track of the growing German presence in North Africa and to stay informed
of the many different political movements that were springing up. The Muslim
Brotherhood spread throughout the Muslim world and has evolved into something
like a Muslim equivalent of the West's Masonic brotherhood. It became one of the
first Islamic Fundamentalist terror organizations and will crop up often in this
study.
In the years prior to World War II Egyptian intrigues revolved
around the three main camps of the British, who did all they could to maintain
control over their colony and the Suez Canal, the Royalists allied with King
Fouad, and after 1935 his son King Farouk, and the nationalist Wafd party that
was supported by the people through the Egyptian parliament that had been set up
by the British.
When World War II broke out the Wafd party, at least publicly,
supported the allies because they were led to believe that complete independence
would immediately follow the war. King Farouk, however, was more reserved in his
support for the allies and privately held deep axis sympathies, while many
rank-and-file members of the Muslim Brotherhood were known to favor Germany as
well. Germany was not destined to free Egypt from the British, however, and the
axis' North African army was defeated at the Battle of El-Alamein in October,
1942 and then gradually pushed out of Africa.
After the war both the Muslim Brotherhood and the populist
Wafd Party agitated against the repressive monarchy of King Farouk and against
the British who delayed their pullout from Egyptian territory. In 1949 Hasan al-Banna
was assassinated by the Egyptian government, enraging the fundamentalists even
more. In 1952 the Wafd Party won a great victory in Parliamentary elections and
in the aftermath Prime Minister Nahas Pasha repealed the 1936 agreement that had
been made between Farouk and the British allowing British control of the Suez
Canal. Farouk promptly dismissed Nahas Pasha and widespread violent anti-British
riots ensued. A secret cabal of high-level Egyptian Army officers, calling
themselves the Free Officers, seized this opportunity and staged a coup, taking
over the country and throwing out King Farouk.
The Free Officers were led by General Muhammad Naguib and
included Gamal Abd-al Nasser and Anwar al-Sadat. In the aftermath Naguib was
removed and Nasser emerged as the man in power in 1954. He promptly banned the
Wafd Party as well as the Muslim Brotherhood and began to rule as a firm
dictator.
Nasser was quick and bold in his moves to modernize and
industrialize Egypt and to assert his nation's independence. He reached out to
the United States and to the World Bank to help him finance the construction of
the Aswan Dam, but he was denied and forced to turn to the Soviets. He also
sought to improve his army and was offered Western armaments but on condition
that he commit his country to the British-controlled regional military
alliances. Nasser declined, and signed an arms deal with Czechoslovakia in 1955.
On July 26, 1956 Nasser evicted the British from the Suez
Canal Zone, returning it to total Egyptian control for the first time since
1882. Three months later the Suez War began. Israel took over Gaza in five days
and British and French troops took over the Canal Zone. The United Nations
condemned the action and a cease fire was agreed to on November 6. The Canal was
then returned to Egypt.
In the aftermath of this war Nasser became a hero to the Arab
people and secular nationalist movements sprang up throughout the Middle East.
Egypt merged with Syria forming the United Arab Republic in 1958, and then
(North) Yemen federated with them as well. This pan-Arab movement was loved by
the Arab masses but feared by their leaders. Aburish writes,
"In the 1950s and later, the West opposed the secular Arab
nationalist movement for two reasons: it challenged its regional hegemony and
threatened the survival of its clients leaders and countries. Specifically,
there was nothing to stop a secular movement from cooperating with the USSR; in
fact, most of them were mildly socialist. Furthermore, most secular movements
advocated various schemes of Arab unity, a union or a unified policy, which
threatened and undermined the pro-West traditional regimes of Saudi Arabia,
Jordan and other client states. The West saw it as a challenge that had to be
met." (2)
This brings us to the second phase of Western-Islamic
relations as defined by Aburish. It is a period during which the West used
Islamic Fundamentalism as a tool to destabilize or topple the regimes that
refused to be dominated by the West.
III. The Overthrow of Iran's First Democracy
From the beginning America's Central
Intelligence Agency has maintained a very close relationship with British
intelligence and this is proven by the details of the Mossadegh coup in Iran in
1953, which marked the beginning of the second phase.
Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh was a lifelong leader of the Iranian
nationalist movement against the imperialism of the British Empire. Born into
Iran's ruling class he was elected to the Iranian parliament in 1906, but turned
down the post because, legally, he was to young (being not yet 30). He received
his education in France and Switzerland and received his law doctorate in 1913.
He returned to Iran and served as a university professor, deputy Finance
Minister and Minister of Justice prior to the British-backed coup of 1921 which
placed Shah Reza Khan back in power.
In the following years Mossadegh served the Iranian people in
a number of different capacities, finally being forcibly removed from public
service near the end of Reza Khan's reign due to his criticism of the corrupt
regime. In 1941 the government changed again and Reza Khan was forced to flee to
South Africa, where he lived until he died. Mossadegh was then able to return to
Tehran, where he was active in the Parliament, clashing with Reza Khan's son
Mohammad Reza Shah.
After fighting through a great deal of interference and fraud
Mossadegh was elected as Iran's Prime Minister by the Iranian Parliament in
1951. On May 1, in one of his first actions as Prime Minister, Mossadegh
nationalized Iranian oil, taking it over from the British owned Anglo-Persian
Oil Company. The British had bought control of Iranian oil for 60 years, through
William Knox d'Arcy, from Reza Khan back in 1901. They purchased another 60-year
lease from the Shah again in 1933. After taking control of Iranian oil Mossadegh
was forced to campaign at the UN and at The Hague to counter a British lawsuit
by arguing that the contracts made with prior governments were not valid.
Mossadegh was successful and the international community declared that Iran had
every right to take control of its own oil.
Mossadegh's nationalization move was not made without concern
for British interests. His government promised to pay 25% of oil profits to the
British as compensation and guaranteed the safety of British jobs. Nonetheless,
the British refused to negotiate and responded with a show of naval force,
followed by economic blockades, boycotts and the freezing of Iranian assets.
(1)
Over the preceding years widespread
anti-British sentiment had resulted in a greatly decreased intelligence
capability for the British within Iran, so to effectively deal with Mossadegh
the British turned to their pals in the American CIA. Author Stephen Dorril
documents this affair in his book MI6: Inside the Covert World of Her
Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service. He writes,
"Despite British propaganda, the Mossadeq government was generally democratic, moderate, and seemed likely to succeed in establishing a middle-class hold over the state. It was officially viewed by the Truman administration as popular, nationalist and anti-communist." (2)
"Despite British propaganda, the Mossadeq government was generally democratic, moderate, and seemed likely to succeed in establishing a middle-class hold over the state. It was officially viewed by the Truman administration as popular, nationalist and anti-communist." (2)
To change the American position on Mossadegh British
strategists capitalized on America's communist paranoia and tried to portray
Mossadegh's regime as weak and a possible avenue for Soviet manipulation. Near
the tail end of the Truman administration the head of the CIA's Middle East
Department, Kermit Roosevelt, met with John Sinclair and other MI-6
representatives where they "put to him the proposal that they jointly topple
Mossadeq"(3). After Eisenhower took over
the presidency in January of 1953 the CIA was free to act, and American
involvement was confirmed when the British promised to allow American oil
companies a 40% stake in Iranian oil in return for toppling Mossadegh and
re-acquiring Iranian oil reserves. (4)
The British and Americans finally settled on the virtually
powerless son of Reza Khan, Mohammad Reza Shah, to be the new ruler of Iran. At
first the young Shah turned down the offers made to him by the conspirators,
even after visits from American Colonel H. Norman Schwarzkopf on August 1, 1953,
and a later meeting with Kermit Roosevelt. Dorril writes that, "The Shah
finally agreed to support the plan only 'after official US and British
involvement had been confirmed through a special radio broadcast.'" BBC
Persia was used to convey a pre-arranged coded message over the airwaves for the
ears of the Shah in order to satisfy his doubts. (5)
To prepare for the coup the Americans funded Ayatollah Bihbani
and the British gave a group led by Ayatollah Qanatabadi $100,000 to stir up
unrest against Mossadegh. Ayatollah Kashani was given $10,000 by the CIA and his
followers played a role in the demonstrations in central Tehran. Another group
of fundamentalist agitators was led by Tayyeb Hsaj-Reza'i, a figure who later
became a supporter of the Ayatollah Khomeini. (6)
In mid-August, 1953, Mossadegh's government was beset by a
multitude of CIA and British-funded plots and demonstrations. On August 15
Mossadegh's Foreign Minister was kidnapped in a bid to intimidate the
government. On August 16 the Shah issued a statement dismissing Mossadegh as
Prime Minister and at the same time propaganda materials were distributed that
falsely alleged that religious mullahs were to be hanged by members of the
communist Tudeh party (7). On August 17 and 18 mobs
made up of religious fanatics and supporters of the Shah converged on Tehran
creating chaos and terror. On August 19, in collusion with the chief of police,
the mobs were able to reach the Prime Minister's residence and after a fierce
battle Mossadegh was forced from power. Several days later the Shah returned
from Italy and thus began his 25-year dictatorial regime. The story of the
Shah's downfall twenty-five years later, at the hands of the same fundamentalist
fanatics who helped him acquire his throne in the first place, involves the
British as well, which we will find out momentarily.
Radical Islam was indeed a useful tool for the British, and their
manipulation of it was only just beginning.
IV. The British War Against Nasser
In their dealings with Nasser the British used any means
necessary, including espionage, diplomacy, bribery and even direct military
might to retain control over Egypt and the Suez Canal. The newly founded CIA
also became interested in Egypt when Nasser showed signs of tilting to the
Soviet Union. Aburish explains how this new avenue of intrigue evolved,
"According to CIA agent Miles Copeland, the Americans
began looking for a Muslim Billy Graham around 1955... When finding or creating
a Muslim Billy Graham proved elusive, the CIA began to cooperate with the Muslim
Brotherhood, the Muslim mass organization founded in Egypt but with followers
throughout the Arab Middle East... This signalled the beginning of an alliance
between the traditional regimes and mass Islamic movements against Nasser and
other secular forces." (1)
The CIA was following the example of British Intelligence and
sought to use Islam to further its goals. They wanted to find a charismatic
religious leader that they could promote and control and they began to cooperate
with groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood. With the rise of Nasser the
Brotherhood was also courted more seriously by the pro-Western Arab regimes of
Saudi Arabia and Jordan. They needed all the popular support that they could
muster against the rise of Nasser-inspired Arab nationalism to keep their
regimes intact.
The Muslim Brotherhood was an obvious ally against Nasser,
because he had abolished it from Egypt after it was involved in a failed
assassination attempt on his life in 1954. The Brotherhood rejected Nasser's
policy that, for the most part, kept religion out of politics. Officially the
Brotherhood was an outlawed organization, but it remained influential and active
within Egypt working against the secular regime, often hand-in-hand with British
Intelligence. In June of 1955 MI6 was already
approaching the Brotherhood in Syria to agitate against the new government that
showed strong left-wing tendencies and a desire to merge with Egypt
(2). The Brotherhood became an even more
important asset after Nasser announced the Egyptian takeover of the Suez. Author
Stephen Dorril documents how this move was viewed from Britain,
"On 26 July in Alexandria, in a calm speech, but one that
was described by London as hysterical, Nasser made his nationalisation
announcement, which from a strictly legal point of view was no more 'than a
decision to buy out the shareholders.' That night in Downing Street,
[British Prime Minister] Eden's bitterness at the decision was not concealed
from his guests... Eden summoned a council of war, which continued until 4 a.m.
An emotional Prime Minister told his colleagues that Nasser could not be
allowed, in Eden's phrase, 'to have his hand on our windpipe.' The 'muslim
Mussolini' must be 'destroyed.' Eden added: 'I want him removed and I don't give
a damn if there's anarchy and chaos in Egypt.'" (3)
Former Prime Minister Churchill had fueled
Eden's fire by counseling him about the Egyptians, saying, "Tell them if we
have any more of their cheek we will set the Jews on them and drive them into
the gutter, from which they should have never emerged." (4)
Sir Anthony Nutting, a member of the Foreign
Office at the time, recalls an irate phone call from Eden who was upset at the
slow pace of the campaign against Nasser. Eden raged, "What's all this
poppycock you've sent me? ... What's all this nonsense about isolating Nasser or
"neutralizing" him, as you call it? I want him destroyed, can't you understand?
I want him murdered..." (5)
To prepare the way for the desired coup the
British Information Research Department (IRD) was called into action. They
ratcheted up their efforts to control radio broadcasts into Egypt and they
planted false stories in the BBC, the London Press Service and the Arab News
Agency. Forged documents were created that suggested that Nasser was planning to
take over the entire Middle East oil trade, and a bogus report was disseminated
that alleged that Egyptian dissidents were being sent to a concentration camp
manned by ex-Nazis. (6)
The British had a problem though in deciding who would take
over Egypt after Nasser's removal. MI-6 held meetings with members of the old
Wafd party and allies of former premier Nahas Pasha. The original Free Officer's
leader General Neguib, who had been removed and placed under house arrest by
Nasser, was viewed as a possible president, and some British circles even
advocated that Prince Abdul Monheim, the most 'presentable' Egyptian royal, be
made king. (7)
According to Dorril, the most important
recruit to the British plot to topple Nasser was an Egyptian Intelligence officer Isameddine Mahmoud
Khalil, who was maintained as a contact by supplying him with intelligence about
Egypt's most pressing enemy: Israel. Dorril offers a Mossad chief's remarks
about this situation who said, "Harming Israel's security by handing over
secret information about her did not apparently trouble the conscience of the
British." This was a very complicated time for the British, because they
were presently working with Israel to coordinate a military attack on
Egypt which eventually took place in October. (8)
Evidently, the lack of a clear-cut candidate to replace Nasser
did not stop the coup plotters. Dorril concludes that, "MI6 did not believe,
however, that it was absolutely necessary to have an alternative in place. The
Service was confident that once Nasser was overthrown suitable candidates would
emerge." (9)
In late August Nasser acted against the growing threat from
British Intelligence. The offices of the Arab News Agency were raided and a
number of employees were arrested and confessed to being British agents. Two
British diplomats were expelled, one of them, J. B. Flux, had "been in
contact with 'students of a religious inclination' with the idea of 'encouraging
fundamentalist riots that could provide an excuse for military intervention to
protect European lives.'" Other British "businessmen" and "diplomats" were
arrested or expelled as well, and because of Nasser's effective offensive Dorril
writes that immediately prior to the Suez War British Intelligence found that it
was left "With no assets in the country," and that "MI6 had to use
outside agents for its assassination plans." (10)
In the end all of this British subversion and agitation
failed, even after they decided upon the direct military confrontation that was
played out in the Suez War of October 1956. Popular Egyptian support for Nasser
was just too much, and the international community sided with Nasser against the
British as well, forcing the Suez Canal to be returned to Egypt. Nasser emerged
leading an Egypt finally free from British control.
Since then Britain has continually waged a low-level covert
war against Egyptian governments: against Nasser until his death, against Sadat
who took over, and even against Mubarak after him, up until this very day. The
secular Egyptian government has traditionally been one of the toughest enemies
of Islamic terrorism, whereas the single most important backer of Egyptian
terror groups has been Britain. This last statement goes entirely against the
preconceptions of most British and American citizens, but in the pages that
follow we will offer proof to back it up.
V. Islam Turns Against the West
As we have related, in his book A Brutal Friendship,
Said Aburish defined three phases of Western-Islamic relations. The first was
the period during which Britain used Islam to help legitimize the puppet
dictators that they had installed over their Arab colonies after World War I.
The second phase was a period during which Britain (and America) used militant
Islam as a force to help topple governments such as Mossadegh's and Nasser's
that were trying to fight Western domination. Aburish writes,
"The struggle between Nasser and the Muslim Brotherhood and
its offshoots and Western and traditional Arab regimes' supporters continued
until the 1967 War. Western support for Islam was provided openly and accepted
by the leadership of the Islamic movements without reservation."
(1)
Aburish notes that Islam had a good image in the West up to
this time. The Islamic movement was noted most for its anti-communist outlook
and there was little foresight that conservative Islam might turn against the
West. Aburish then begins to describe the third phase,
"The third phase in the development of Islamic movements
occurred after the 1967 war. The defeat of Nasser was a defeat for the force he
represented, secularism, and with Nasser diminished, the Islamic movements moved
to assume the political leadership of the masses of Arab Middle East."
(2)
After 1967 the power of the Islamic movements
greatly increased. Islamic theology overtook secularism and a more potent form
of Arab nationalism emerged. The Six Day War saw the West stand by as Israel
defeated her Arab neighbors, capturing the Sinai, the West Bank and the Golan
Heights. It then became clear to most Muslims that the West favored Israel over
the Arabs and resentment towards the West increased. This third phase of
Western-Islamic relations began when factions of this predominantly anti-Western
Fundamentalist Islamic movement began to exercise their new political influence
throughout areas of the Muslim world.
After Nasser died in 1970 and was replaced by Anwar al-Sadat
the new Egyptian president tried to appease the threat of militant Islam by
releasing all of the imprisoned members of the Muslim Brotherhood, despite the
fact that the Brotherhood had been involved in at least four separate
assassination attempts on Nasser's life over the previous sixteen years. Sadat
then joined forces with King Faisal of Saudi Arabia and they became sponsors and
promoters of the Al Azhar Islamic university as well as Islamic movements such
as Al Dawa and I'tisam. These leaders realized that it was best to at least
appear to support the rise of the Islamic movements. (3)
On October 6, 1973 Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack
on the Israeli Army in the Sinai and the Golan Heights. On October 16 OPEC
raised the price of oil by a whopping 70%, and then the next day Arab OPEC
leaders announced that they would enforce a progressive embargo against Europe
and the United States until Israel was forced to withdraw to their pre-1967
borders.
Engdahl's book, A Century of War, relates
how US National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger was able to convince Germany
not to declare neutrality regarding the October war, while Britain "was
allowed to clearly state its neutrality." Britain remained neutral
throughout the entire episode and was one of the few Western countries not
placed under the Arab oil embargo. (4)
The Yom Kippur War ended on October 26, but the effects were
such that the Arab regimes came out much better in several respects. Firstly,
they had finally been effective militarily against Israel and they had won back
some territory. Secondly, their regimes were infused with a great deal of
popular support and the voice of the Islamic militants was temporarily quelled.
Lastly, the Arab nations suddenly became the benefactors of a huge increase in
oil revenues, from $3.01 a barrel in early '73, to $11.65 a barrel in early '74.
(5)
Engdahl relates that the rise in oil prices was something that
had been planned previously by the Anglo-American Establishment and mentioned at
the Bilderberg conference in May, 1973 in
Saltsjoebaden, Sweden. Kissinger was the point man in engineering the
Arab-Israeli conflict that created the excuse for the oil price hike that helped
to rescue Britain's North Sea oil projects that had previously been seen as
risky investments. The most catastrophic effect, however, was that the rise in
energy prices put a quick halt to Third World industrialization, forcing many
countries to borrow a great deal of money over the years to pay for energy, thus
setting the stage for the long-term indebtedness of the Third World to
Anglo-American banks (6). After the war the
Establishment awarded Kissinger the Nobel Peace Prize and later he received an
honorary knighthood from Queen Elizabeth, for his lifelong devoted service to
the Crown, in 1995.
The Arab regimes were suddenly greatly enriched as a result of
the rise in oil prices, but the threat of the Islamic movements remained. King
Faisal of Saudi Arabia feigned support for Islam, but was often forced to crack
down on the religious leaders and organizations that seemed to constantly
criticize the royal family's overt greed, luxury and corruption. Faisal was
assassinated in 1975 by his nephew Prince Faisali bni Musad, in retaliation for
Faisal's execution of Musad's Muslim Zealot brother who had attacked a TV
station on the grounds that it was a violation of Islam. (7)
In Egypt Sadat's regime came under extreme pressure from the
Islamic movements after he signed the Camp David Accords with Israel in 1978.
This led to the assassination of Sadat, by members of Islamic Jihad, an offshoot
group of the Muslim Brotherhood, on October 6, 1981.
In Syria, in 1982, there was a major conflict between the
Muslim Brotherhood and the Syrian government at the city of Hamma that resulted
in 20,000 casualties.
In the aftermath Syria's President Asad revealed that the Muslim
Brotherhood forces were armed with US-made equipment.
Aburish comments on how none of these events seemed to change
the way in which militant Islam was used,
"Hamma, the assassination of Sadat and Faisal and less
portentous acts didn't interrupt Western and Arab client regimes' support for
Islamic movements, and Saudi Arabia and Egypt allowed pro-Islamic use of their
state propaganda apparatus... And Israel, forever inclined to back divisive
movements, surfaced as another supporter of Islam and began to fund the Muslim
Brotherhood and the Palestinian Islamic movement Hamas." (8)
The most noteworthy success of the Islamic movement during
this time was of course the overthrow of the Shah of Iran and the installation of
the Ayatollah Khomeini as the Islamic dictator.
British Intelligence had used their contacts with Iran's mullahs and
ayatollahs to help overthrow Mossadegh and install the Shah back in 1953,
and these contacts were maintained and used again to overthrow the Shah when his
regime fell out of favor.
The Establishment history of Iran's Islamic
Revolution is that Khomeini's revolt was spontaneous and populist, and that it
overthrew a repressive dictatorship that was hated by the people but supported
wholeheartedly by the United States. It is true that the Shah's government was
not a democracy and that his secret service, trained by the CIA, was one of
the most effective intelligence organizations in the world. But what is not
reported is that prior to the British-sponsored massive public relations
campaign on behalf of the Ayatollah the government of the Shah was loved by
the vast majority of the population.
After taking over from Mossadegh the Shah
began to push forward a number of nationalist policies that increased his
popularity at home but, in some cases, worried the Anglo-American
Establishment. First, he signed petroleum agreements with ENI, the Italian oil
company. Then in 1963 he pushed forward on a series of popular reforms that
became known as the White Revolution. The Shah evolved into a nationalist
whose path paralleled that of Nasser far too much for the Establishment's
liking:
- He bought land from the upper classes and, along with the crown's own land, sold it back cheaply to tenant farmers, allowing over one a half million people to become land owners and ending the old feudal system.
- He allowed women the right to vote, and brought an end to the wearing of the veil, which were "Westernizing" moves unwelcomed by the religious sector.
- He pushed forward on a $90 billion nuclear power program.
- He moved to shut down the lucrative opium industry that had been created during the days of British Empire control that had been running for a hundred years. (9)
- He bought land from the upper classes and, along with the crown's own land, sold it back cheaply to tenant farmers, allowing over one a half million people to become land owners and ending the old feudal system.
- He allowed women the right to vote, and brought an end to the wearing of the veil, which were "Westernizing" moves unwelcomed by the religious sector.
- He pushed forward on a $90 billion nuclear power program.
- He moved to shut down the lucrative opium industry that had been created during the days of British Empire control that had been running for a hundred years. (9)
In 1973 The Economist
magazine featured Iran on the front cover with the caption: "Iran the Next
Japan of the Middle East?" Iran's economy had grown at a rate of 7-8% each
year from 1965-1973 and was becoming an example for the developing nations of
the world to follow. As far as the Anglo-American Establishment was concerned
this could not be allowed to continue. Establishment goals were focused on
world de-population and de-industrialization as formulated by policy makers
like Lord Bertrand Russell and as advocated by establishment lackeys such as
Kissinger, Zibigniew Brzezinski and Robert McNamara (the head of the World
Bank), as well as by the British elites who controlled the World Wildlife Fund
and other environmental front groups. Iran had to be brought down.
(10)
The attack on the Shah's government came
through the Muslim Brotherhood and through the mullahs and ayatollahs of Iran,
supported and manipulated by British Intelligence. Dr. John Coleman, a former
British Intelligence agent and author of a number of books and monographs
detailing the Establishment's plan for a socialist world government, states in
his report on Iran's Islamic Revolution (11)
that the Muslim
Brotherhood was created by "the great names of British Middle East
intelligence, T.E. Lawrence, E.G. Browne, Arnold Toynbee. St. John Philby and
Bertrand Russell," and that their mission was to "keep the Middle East
backward so that its natural resource, oil, could continue to be looted..."
Dr. Coleman writes that in 1980 the
broadcasts of Radio Free Iran divided the enemies of the Shah into four
categories: 1. Iranian politicians bought by the Israeli Shin Bet, 2. The
CIA's network of agents, 3. The feudal landowners, 4. The Freemasons and the
Muslim Brotherhood (viewed as the same enemy).
In his report Dr. Coleman writes that in
Iran, "At one time there was even a joke about the mullahs being stamped
'made in Britain.'" When the Shah introduced his plan for modernization in
1963 the Ayatollah Khomeini emerged as the leader of the religious opposition.
Up until his exile from Iran in 1964, Khomeini was based at the religious city
of Qom. Dr. Coleman relates that Radio Free Iran claimed that while at Qom
Khomeini received a "monthly stipend from the British, and he is in
constant contact with his masters, the British."
Khomeini was kicked out of Iran and settled
in Iraq. He lived there for a number of years until he was arrested by the Iraqi
government and deported in 1978. French President D'Estang was then pressured
to offer Khomeini refuge in France to continue his "Islamic studies." While in
France he became a Western celebrity and the symbol of the anti-Shah Islamic
revolution. Coleman writes, "Once Khomeini was installed at the Chateau
Neauphle, he began to receive a constant stream of visitors, many of them from
the BBC, the CIA and British intelligence."
At the same time Amnesty International was
continuing its intense campaign against the Shah's government, accusing it of torture and
other terrible human rights abuses. The international press picked up on this
theme and carried it around the world.
The BBC then became the Ayatollah's main
promoter. Dr. Coleman writes, "It was the BBC, which prepared and
distributed to the mullahs in Iran all of the cassette tapes of Khomeini's
speeches, which inflamed the peasants. Then the BBC began to beam accounts of
torture by the Shah's SAVAK to all corners of the world... In September and
October 1978 the BBC began to beam Khomeini's inflammatory ravings direct to
Iran in Farsi. The Washington Post said, 'the BBC
is Iran's public enemy number one.'"
The BBC Persian Service came to be nicknamed
in Iran the "Ayatollah BBC" for its non-stop coverage of everything that
Khomeini wanted to say (12). Soon a large segment
of the Iranian public, most of them impressionable young students, became
convinced that the Shah truly was evil and that a return to pure shi'ite
Islam under the Ayatollah's leadership was the only way to save their country.
The Carter Administration, manipulated by British lackey Zbigniew Brzezinski,
then collaborated with the British to topple the Shah and install Khomeini.
Dr. Coleman relates that Carter appointed
Trilateralist George Ball to head a commission on U.S. policy in the Persian
Gulf. Ball's recommendation was that the U.S. should withdraw its support for
the Shah's regime. Dr. Coleman quotes from the Shah's own memoirs to confirm
the American stance, the reality that is contrary to the mass-marketed
Establishment line that the U.S. supported the Shah to the end,
"I did not know it then, perhaps I did
not want to know - but it is clear to me now, the Americans wanted me out.
What was I to make of the sudden appointment of Ball to the White House as an
advisor to Iran? I knew that Ball was no friend of Iran. I understood that
Ball was working on a special report on Iran. But no one ever informed me what
areas the report was to cover, let alone its conclusions. I read them months
later when I was in exile, and my worst fears were confirmed. Ball was among
those Americans who wanted to abandon me, and ultimately my country."
After the Shah stepped down in 1979 and fled
the country his "firm ally," the United States, even refused to allow him
asylum forcing him to move with his family to Egypt.
During the subsequent takeover of the American embassy when
supporters of the Ayatollah kept Americans hostage for 444 days it became crystal clear to the entire world that the
anti-democratic, anti-Israel Islamic movement was also very anti-West.
Nonetheless the Anglo-American Establishment continued to support and promote
radical Islam.
In 1977 Bhutto of Pakistan, who we will
cover shortly, was removed; in 1979 the Shah of Iran was removed; in 1981
Sadat was assassinated, and in 1982 the Muslim Brotherhood revolted in Syria.
Before 1977 the Middle East was on the verge of achieving stability and
industrial and economic parity with the West through nationalist policies and
high oil prices, but by the early '80s the Middle East was in flames. Egypt
was reeling and Mubarak was consolidating a shaky hold on power. Iran and
Iraq, both armed by the West, were beginning their long war. Israel and Syria
were invading Lebanon that was fighting a civil war, and Russia was invading
Afghanistan whose rebels were being supported by Pakistan. The de-population
and de-industrialization scheme advocated by the British and adopted by the
Americans was off to a great start.
VI. Afghanistan, Pakistan, the ISI and the BCCI
On July 3, 1979, at the insistence of advisors
such as Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter signed a directive authorizing
covert aid to the fundamentalist opponents of the ruling communist regime in
Afghanistan (1). This move was understood as one
that would likely lead to direct Soviet intervention and that is exactly what
happened on December 24 of that year when, after being invited by the Afghani
government, the Russian military took up positions to protect government assets
from rebel attacks.
From the beginning of the Afghan War the CIA partnered with
Pakistani Intelligence (ISI) and funded the rebel mujahedin fighters. Today
it is generally understood that radical Islam received its biggest boost as a
result of the mujahedin's successful jihad against Soviet forces, and
when the Soviets retreated from Afghan territory in early 1989 the country was
left with tens of thousands of unemployed Islamic mercenaries who then turned
their attention to the West.
The history of Afghanistan has always been closely connected
with Pakistan, a region formerly colonized by Britain. British involvement in
the subcontinent goes back as far as the early years of the seventeenth century
when British East India Company merchants were allowed to establish trading
posts by the the Emperor Jahangir of the Islamic Mughal Empire. Direct British
rule in India is generally seen as beginning in 1757 when BEIC forces led by
Robert Clive defeated the army of the Nawab of Bengal at the Battle of Plessey.
In 1803 British control over the subcontinent increased even further when the
rulers of the Mughal Empire became pensioners of the BEIC. The Indus River
Valley, the center of modern Pakistan, was brought under British control through
the successful campaign of 1848-1849 that conquered the Sikh empire, giving the
British the Punjab. Since then the regions that are today India and Pakistan
were ruled by Britain continuously until the British Empire withdrew and created
the two nations in 1947.
When Britain withdrew a number of British officers remained
behind to help shepherd (and control) the emerging Pakistani Army. One of these
was Major General Walter Joseph Cawthorn who, as Deputy Chief of Staff of the
Pakistani Army established Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in 1948.
Cawthorn was an Australian-born British Intelligence (MI-6) agent who had
directed operations in the Middle East, Indian, and Southeast Asian bureaus from
1939-1945. He became Sir Cawthorn in 1958 when he was knighted by the British
Crown, and later he served in Australia as head of their Secret Intelligence
Service (2). Pakistan's ISI was originally a
military intelligence agency created to help defend Pakistan in the early wars
against India over Kashmir and other border issues, but over the years it has
grown to become Pakistan's version of the CIA, and it has continually maintained
close ties with British Intelligence.
The power of the ISI increased for its first twenty years
until the emergence of Pakistan's first popularly elected civilian leader, the
socialist Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1971. Bhutto immediately displayed the same
nationalistic characteristics as Nasser, Mossadegh and the Shah and his regime fell out of
favor with the British government and the West. In 1972 Bhutto withdrew his
country from the British Commonwealth of Nations and he pursued closer relations
with Russia, China and the Arab states.
In 1977 the inevitable coup took place, and President Bhutto
was overthrown by General Zia Ul-Haq, who had been appointed to Chief of the
Army Staff by Bhutto in 1976 at the insistence of Gulam Jilani Khan, the
longstanding Director General of the ISI. Bhutto comments at great length on his
constant struggles with, and betrayal by, the ISI in his book If I Am
Assassinated, penned from his Pakistani prison cell. He also relates how
Kissinger threatened him for pushing forward on Pakistan's nuclear power
program, telling him, "We will make an example of you!" He was. Bhutto
was executed in 1978 after being subjected to a sham trial, despite the objections of
heads of state from around the globe. (3)
A radical spokesman of the Muslim Brotherhood had this to say
several years later, "The Brotherhood has taken over in Iran and
Pakistan. Bhutto stood for intrusion of the West into Islam. Bhutto was
everything that Pakistan was not. That is why we killed him. And we will use his
death as a warning to others."
(3a)
Britain's relation with the Pakistan underworld becomes clear
with a look back at the BCCI scandal. The Bank of Credit and Commerce
International was the first Third World multinational bank, created in 1972 by
Pakistani banker Agha Hasan Abedi. It was initially funded by Sheik Zayed of Abu
Dhabi, and from a $2.5 million operation it grew to be worth $23 billion when it
was finally shut down in 1991. It was created just in time to take advantage of
the river of cash that was flowing into the Middle East through the oil
industry.
One of BCCI's early moves to gain international influence was its
purchase in 1976 of 85% of the Banque de Commerce et Placements (BCP) of Geneva,
Switzerland. After the BCCI took over this bank it installed Alfred Hartmann as
manager. Hartmann then became the chief financial officer for BCC Holding and
thus one of BCCI's most influential directors. Hartmann was a member of the
British banking establishment through his connections with the Rothschild
family, being a member of the board of directors of N.M. Rothschild and Sons,
London, and president of Rothschild Bank AG of Zurich. (4)
BCCI was initially incorporated in
Luxembourg, famous for its lax banking restrictions, and soon branches and
holding companies sprouted up around the globe: in the Cayman Islands, the
Netherlands Antilles, Hong Kong, Abu Dhabi, Washington DC and just about
everywhere else. However, by 1980, when the BCCI finally applied for and
received a license from the Bank of England, there were already more branches
in the UK than in any other nation. In fact, one of BCCI's primary economics
advisors was the former British Prime Minister (1976-79) Lord James Callaghan
(5).
The BCCI may have been created by a Pakistani, but in the end it was a
British-based and British-controlled bank.
Over the years the BCCI became involved in just about every
type of illicit transaction that a bank could be involved in including drug
money laundering, weapons dealing, bribery, fraud, etc. It was used
extensively by the CIA throughout its history, it played a part in the
Iran-Contra scandal, it was a bank used by the Medellin Colombian cocaine
cartel, and a branch was even set up in Panama for the cash that Manuel Noriega
was funneling out of his country. After BCCI was shut down the UK's The
Guardian newspaper reported that the terrorist Abu Nidal had maintained
BCCI accounts. Jonathan Beaty and S.C. Gwynne, the Time reporters who
covered the scandal write,
"According to The Guardian's sources, the Nidal
group had long used a London branch of BCCI to move the money it used to mount
attacks on Western targets, and MI5 -- the English equivalent of the CIA -- had
known about the accounts. There seemed to be no doubt that the BCCI bankers knew
exactly who they were dealing with: One of the bankers at the London branch
described how anxious they had been to provide every service to the terrorists
in order to keep their multibillion-dollar accounts." (6)
However, the main purpose of the BCCI, and the reason behind
its meteoric rise, was its connection to the ISI and the mujahedin fighting the
Soviet Union in Afghanistan. After Zia replaced Bhutto as Pakistan's president he appointed
his friend Fazle Haq to be the governor of Pakistan's North-West Frontier
Province in 1978. This is the area that borders Afghanistan through which tons
of drugs and weapons were smuggled over the Khyber Pass. Fazle Haq was an
important friend and backer of BCCI's founder Abedi, and the BCCI was used to
launder untold millions of ISI narcotics revenues (7).
Coincidentally, in 1983 the British-based World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)
suggested that two national parks be created in Pakistan's northwest, and although rather thin in natural
wildlife the preserves proved to be excellent for poppy growing and for staging
mujahedin incursions into Afghanistan. (8)
Former Senate investigator Jack Blum said this about the
BCCI's connection to the Afghan war during his testimony to the U.S. Congress,
"This bank was a product of the
Afghan War and people very close to the mujahideen have said that many Pakistani
military officials who were deeply involved in assisting and supporting the
Afghan rebel movement were stealing our foreign assistance money and using BCCI
to hide the money they stole; to market American weapons that were to be
delivered that they stole; and to market and manage funds that came from the
selling of heroin that was apparently engineered by one of the mujahideen
groups." (9)
When General Zia took over Pakistan all
of the pieces were in place to begin the massive drug running, fraud and
swindling operation that was the Afghan War. According to Beaty and Gwynne,
Zia already had a "close and cooperative relationship" with BCCI
founder Agha Hasan Abedi when he took power
(10). The triangle of
General Zia's government, the ISI (who had empowered Zia) and the BCCI
then proceeded to run the Afghan mujahedin uprising for the CIA, with
input from above from British Intelligence. Over the course of the Afghan war up to
$5 billion of American taxpayer aid was funneled into the war effort, and
through the duration Pakistan's ISI trained about 83,000 Muslim mujahedin
fighters.
Britain's role in promoting the Afghan
experiment was crucial, although now it is often overlooked. Almost
immediately after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan Lord Nicholas Bethell, a
career British Intelligence agent, formed Radio Free Kabul as a voice for the
mujahedin. Bethell had been involved with Russian and
Mid-East operations his entire career, and he was a close friend of British spy
Kim Philby. Other members of Radio Free Kabul included Winston Churchill III,
former Foreign Secretary Baron Chalfont, Lord Morrison of Lambeth the former
head of the Foreign Office, and British Intelligence official Ray Whitney. In
1981 Lord Bethell accompanied Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on a tour of the
U.S. to drum up support for the resistance, and together they met with over 60
congressmen and senators, eventually leading to the creation of the US-based
Committee for a Free Afghanistan which continually lobbied in support of
the mujahedin. (11)
Another British creation was Afghan Aid UK, first set up in
Peshawar, Pakistan by the wife of British journalist John Fullerton. This
group's primary sponsor was Britain's Viscount Cranbourne, who later testified
before the U.S. Congress Special Joint Task Force on Afghanistan to lobby for US
support. His organization was granted substantial funding by the British
government and by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
(11)
Britain
lobbied to create a war in Afghanistan, they wanted American taxpayers to pay
for it, and they manipulated the financial situation so that they might profit
from it. The BCCI was shut down by the Bank of England in 1991 only after
the Russian withdrawal, and only then because of the courageous campaigning of a
handful of American investigators. Beaty and Gwynne write,
"Though the Bank of England had
pulled the trigger on BCCI on July 5, 1991, and had thereby started a global
chain reaction that had smashed Agha Hasan Abedi's brainchild into tiny pieces,
it had done so only reluctantly and only after waiting an extraordinary amount
of time. It had been cowardly rather than heroic; it had moved only when forced
to do so by a formidable U.S. alliance between the Federal Reserve Bank and the
Manhattan district attorney." (12)
The final U.S. congressional report on
the BCCI affair states,
"By agreement, the Bank of England
had in effect entered into a plan with BCCI, Abu Dhabi and Price Waterhouse in
which they would keep the true state of affairs at BCCI secret in return for
cooperation with one another in trying to avoid a catastrophic
multibillion-dollar collapse. From April 1990 forward, the Bank of England had
now inadvertently become partner to a cover-up of BCCI's criminality."
(13)
BCCI was the favored bank for Middle Eastern terrorists and arms and drug
runners, South American drug cartels, organized crime lords, and even for
intelligence services such as the ISI, Mossad, MI6 and the CIA. In fact then-CIA
assistant director Robert Gates once referred to BCCI jokingly as the "Bank of
Crooks and Criminals"
(14). For at least a
decade British authorities allowed it to run amuck out of their living room and
after it's fall important records were sealed away and kept from American
investigators. When the scandal broke the media backlash focused primarily on BCCI's American links and
the CIA, but only because of the British establishment's secrecy and expertise
in damage control. It's likely that the whole truth will never be known.
As the war in Afghanistan wound down and the Russian withdrawal became
inevitable, the situation became much more complex. American
support for the mujahedin dropped off as the CIA tried to resist the
establishment of a fanatical Afghani government. New warlords emerged and other
avenues of drug smuggling were increasingly utilized, through Iran and through
the southern Soviet republics. The dwindling supply of U.S. Government money and
arms, coupled with a decreasing supply of drug cash, helped along the BCCI
decline.
This brings us to focus on the drug industry and the impact it has had in
shaping Afghanistan. Peter Dale Scott,
Alfred W. McCoy and
Michael C. Ruppert are three
authorities in this area. In brief, the conclusion reached by the experiences
and research of these men is that drugs (most notably cocaine and heroin) are
controlled commodities, just like oil, gold and diamonds, with intricate
Western-supported systems of production, distribution and cash flow. Today the
global drug industry generates about $600 Billion a year, and the vast majority
of this cash is funneled (laundered) into Anglo-American banks and/or Wall
Street. These researchers allege that one of the most important tasks of Western
intelligence services has been to make sure that the flow of drug cash back into
the Anglo-American financial system continues unimpeded. (And yes, the
London-based BCCI was, for all intents and purposes, an Anglo-American bank.)
Whatever the case may be, it is worth pointing out that when Britain and the
CIA became involved in Afghanistan the production of opium skyrocketed. From an
estimated harvest of only 100 tons per year in the early seventies, opium
production went up to 300 tons in 1982 and then to 575 tons in 1983. By the late
eighties, near the end of the war, Afghani opium poppy production had reached an
estimated 1600 tons per year.
(15)
The CIA's drug racket was so successful that by 1981 Afghanistan supplied
about 60% of America's heroin from contributing an almost negligible amount just
two years previously. The crops were grown in Afghanistan, synthesized into
heroin in labs on both sides of the Pak-Afghan border, and then smuggled into
the US and Europe. General Zia's government was drowning in a sea of heroin as
well, despite the international accolades he was receiving for simultaneously
reducing the poppy crop on his side of the border, and Pakistan's
heroin-addict population grew from about 5,000 in 1981 to over 1.2 million by
1985. (16)
It is also worth noting that the US-led war on the Taliban regime
occurred after one of the most successful poppy-eradication programs ever seen.
In July of 2000 Mullah Omar placed a ban on poppy growing and by February of
2001 UN drug control officials were able to confirm that poppy production had
come to a virtual standstill in Taliban-controlled areas. Was the expected loss
of drug-revenue an added incentive for the West to remove the Taliban? Does this
explain why Afghan farmers have had little resistance in their quick return to
their favorite cash crop after the Taliban's demise? (17)
When the CIA became involved in Afghanistan they
were almost entirely dependent on their ISI contacts within Pakistan for
intelligence and for guidance in directing the war effort. As the war
evolved American support was channeled, at the behest of the ISI, to a group of
seven independent Afghani mujahedin warlords who became known as the
Peshawar Seven.
Eventually one of the seven, a warlord by the name of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, emerged as the
primary recipient of American aid, despite his communist past, his radical view
of Islam and his blatant anti-Americanism. Hekmatyar had been an engineering student at
Kabul University, and then he had trained at the Kabul Military Academy before
being kicked out. Hekmatyar became affiliated with the Muslim
Brotherhood in the early '70s, and by the time of the Afghan war he had emerged
as the leader of a group called Hezb-i-Islami, or Party of Islam, even though he
had never received a classical Islamic education. Over the years his followers
became known for their strict Muslim fanaticism (they were notorious for
throwing acid on the faces of women who refused to wear a veil), and Hekmatyar
became Afghanistan's biggest opium producer. He possessed thousands of acres of
poppy fields and, according to McCoy, he owned at
least six heroin laboratories on the Pakistan side of the Khyber Pass.
(18)
In March of 1990 the
US House Republican Research Committee of the Task Force on Terrorism and
Unconventional Warfare submitted a 19-page report that criticized the CIA for
its
dealings with Hekmatyar's "Party of Islam" and for covering up the problems that
his group had created. Over time it has emerged that Hekmatyar was an ISI asset
who laundered his money through BCCI, and also cooperated with the Russian
KGB to ensure his status as the most powerful warlord among many rivals. Jeffrey
Steinberg of EIR sums it up,
"Although American diplomats and intelligence officers
posted in Pakistan often warned of Hekmatyar's strong anti-western and
pro-Iranian views, speculated about possible Soviet KGB links, and even
acknowledged his undisputed status as Afghanistan's "heroin king," his forces
received the largest portion of American and other international military
support throughout the Afghan War. Intelligence reports back to Washington about
the progress of the war were notoriously biased, and filled with disinformation
portraying Hekmatyar's mujahideen as the most successful fighters. Often the
reports to the Pentagon and the CIA were identical to the reports prepared by
British intelligence—complete with the same spelling and typographical errors.
More reliable on-the-scene reports indicated that Hekmatyar spent more time and
effort fighting rival mujahideen groups than battling the Soviets."
(19)
The ISI's spin on the situation comes through in the book
Afghanistan: The Bear Trap, in which Brigadier Mohammed Yousaf, the former head of the ISI's Afghan Bureau,
(co-written with a former British Army officer), describes Hekmatyar as
"scrupulously honest" and the toughest and most vigorous mujahedin leader. Yousaf
was the ISI's director of the mujahedin and he argues that the
war was drawn out longer than necessary because the United
States did not give Hekmatyar and the Islamists enough support, which
began to fade in the late '80s while the Soviets still occupied Afghanistan.
Yousef resents the fact that the CIA
did not give the Islamists
an overwhelming victory, even though the Taliban eventually emerged after
several years
of civil war. (20)
Yousef's point of view can be compared to the 1990 US House Republican Report
which is covered in this
article by journalist Imran Akbar of The News International, which
also details the suspected KGB links maintained by Hekmatyar.
After the Taliban
took power Hekmatyar was forced to flee to Iran. In February of this year the
Iranian government shut down his operations in Iran and expelled him back to
Afghanistan. Hekmatyar has been as outspoken as ever in his anti-American
views, offering reward money for the killing of American troops and calling
the new US-installed Afghan government illegitimate. In May the CIA reportedly tried to assassinate
him with a missile fired from an unmanned Predator drone as he and his
entourage journeyed near Kabul. This ISI favorite remains one of the most dangerous
players in Afghanistan today. (21)
In his book Yousef also goes to great lengths to make it clear that American
personnel were never involved in training any of the Afghan mujahedin,
"Up to the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in early 1989, no American
or Chinese instructor was ever involved in giving training on any kind of weapon
or equipment to the Mujahideen. Even with the heavier and more sophisticated
weapons systems... it was always our Pakistani teams who trained the Mujahideen.
This was a deliberate, carefully considered policy that we steadfastly refused
to change despite mounting pressure from the CIA, and later from the US Defense
Department, to allow them to take it over. From the start the Americans wanted
to be directly involved with the distribution of the weapons, the operational
planning of operations and the training of guerillas. From the start, until
the last Soviet soldier quit the country, we successfully resisted."
[emphasis added] (22)
Other than being financier and armament
supplier, the American CIA was out of the loop. It was Yousef's ISI that ran the
Afghan jihad against the Soviets, and it was the ISI that channeled CIA support
to the most undesirable Afghan warlords. What becomes clear after reviewing the
record of this era is that the ISI's agenda, and that of the Afghan War in
general, was set to a far greater degree by the British than it was by the CIA.
The British had formulated and promoted the plan for American involvement; they
maintained close relations with the ISI that ran the war; they controlled the
bank that largely benefited from it; and when the war was over they welcomed
into Britain the many mujahedin veterans who applied for British asylum.
Osama
bin Laden was one of these veterans and in early 1994 he purchased an estate
and lived for a short while in the London suburb of Wembley. During his time in
London he established his Advice and Reformation Committee to oversee his
economic network, and he solidified his propoganda links to the Western world
through his connections with London's Sheikh Omar Bakri and with Abdel Bari
Atwan, the editor of al-Quds al-Arabi, one of the most
influential Arabic-language newspapers in the world.
Yossef Bodansky, author of the best-selling biography of bin Laden writes that,
"By the time bin Laden left London, he had consolidated a comprehensive
system of entities with a solid -though clandestine- source of funding. This
London-based data-dissemination system still works efficiently." (Written in
1999).
(23)
Section
Notes and SourcesPeter Goodgame
August 11, 2002
Further Information
From Executive Intelligence Review:
Put Britain On the List of States Sponsoring Terrorism
Who Really Controls International Terrorism?
Why the Real Name is 'Osama bin London'
Bernard Lewis: British Svengali Behind Clash of Civilizations, by Scott Thompson and Jeffrey Steinberg
War In Afghanistan Spawned A Global Narco-Terrorist Force, by Jeffrey Steinberg
From the Middle East Media Research Institute
Sheikh Omar Bakri Mohammed - London, another member of the Muslim Brotherhood
Islamist Leaders In London Interviewed
Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood Presents New Suicide Bombers
From the BBC
UK is 'Money Launderers Paradise'
FBI Highlights UK Terror Suspects
Other Sources
The British Connection, by Hichem Karoui
Britain's dissident community of Arab Islamists is a hotbed of radicalism, by Nicolas Pelham
Islamic Militants Have Base In London, Newsday.com
London Seen As Hub For Radicals, USATODAY.com
UK Recruiting Ground for Al-Qaeda, The Times of India
Notes and Sources
Britain takes the Middle East
Sources
A Century of War - Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order, F. William Engdahl, 1993
A Brutal Friendship - The West and the Arab Elite, Said K. Aburish, 1997
Notes
1. Engdahl, pp. 30-36
2. Engdahl, pp. 50-52
3. Aburish, p. 76
4. Aburish, p. 57
5. Aburish, p. 57 and 59
6. Aburish, p. 57
Britain and Egypt
Sources
History of Egypt: British Occupation (1882-1952), Arab.net
Timeline of Egypt, utexas.edu
The Egypt of Naguib Mahfouz, chronology
MI6 - Inside the Covert World of Her Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service, Stephen Dorril, 2000
Notes
1. Dorril, p. 622
2. Aburish, p. 60
The Overthrow of Iran's First Democracy
Sources
The Biography of Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh, jebhemelli.org
Killing Hope - U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, William Blum, 1995
MI6 - Inside the Covert World of Her Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service, Stephen Dorril, 2000
Notes
1. Blum, p. 65
2. Dorril, p. 575
3. Dorril, p. 580
4. Dorril, p. 583
5. Dorril, p. 589
6. Dorril, pp. 592-593
7. Dorril, p. 592
The British War Against Nasser
Sources
A Brutal Friendship, Aburish
MI6, Dorril
Descent to Suez - Foreign Office Diaries 1951-1956, Sir Evelyn Shuckburgh, 1986
Notes
1. Aburish, p. 60-61
2. Dorril, p. 622
3. Dorril, p. 623
4. Shuckburgh, inside flap
5. Dorril, p. 613
6. Dorril, pp. 624-625
7. Dorril, p. 629
8. Dorril, p. 629-630
9. Dorril, p. 630
10. Dorril, p. 632-633
Islam Turns Against the West
Sources
A Brutal Friendship, Aburish
A Century of War, Engdahl
Conspirators' Hierarchy: The Committee of 300, Dr. John Coleman, 1992 - order at 1-800-942-0821
What Really Happened In Iran, Dr. John Coleman, 1984, special report, World In Review publications, 2533 North Carson Street, Suite J-118, Carson City, Nevada, 89706 - order by phone 1-800-942-0821
"The real Iranian hostage story from the files of Fara Monsoor," Harry V. Martin, 1995
Notes
1. Aburish, p. 61
2. Aburish, pp. 61-62
3. Aburish, p. 62
4. Engdahl, p. 151
5. Engdahl, pp. 151-152
6. Engdahl, pp. 150-156
7. Aburish, p. 62
8. Aburish, p. 62
9. Committee of 300, p. 129, http://www.sedona.net/pahlavi/mrp.html and http://www.cbc.ca/news/indepth/iran/iran2.html
10. What the Malthusians Say, Establishment plans to stop Third World development and kill off useless eaters
11. What Really Happened In Iran, Dr. John Coleman
12. BBC Persia brings down two Iranian regimes, and The BBC In Iran
Afghanistan, Pakistan, the ISI and the BCCI
Sources
The Outlaw Bank: A Wild Ride Into the Secret Heart of BCCI, Jonathan Beaty and S.C. Gwynne, 1993
The Nefarious Activities of Pak I.S.I., website
"Breaking the Bank," commentary, Wall Street Journal Europe, 8-03-01
British India, ucla.edu
Killing Hope,William Blum, 1995
Afghanistan- The Bear Trap, the Defeat of a Superpower, Mohammad Yousaf and Major Mark Adkin, 1992
Bin Laden - The Man Who Declared War On America, Yossef Bodansky, 1999
Notes
1. Interview With Zbigniew Brzezinski, Le Nouvel Observateur
2. "First Supplement to A Who's Who of the British Secret State" LOBSTER magazine, May 1990
"Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence in Afghanistan," SAPRA INDIA
There to the Bitter End, Anne Blair
3. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto biography, ppp.org
"ISI and its Chicanery in Exporting Terrorism," by Maj Gen Yashwant Deva, The Indian Defence Review
3a. What Really Happened In Iran, Coleman, p.16, 1984 World In Review, 1-800-942-0821
4. "The Real Story of the BCCI," Bill Engdahl and Jeff Steinberg, EIR, 10-13-95
5. Beaty and Gwynne, p. xv
6. Beaty and Gwynne, p. 118
7. Beaty and Gwynn, pp. 48-49
8. "Sadruddin Aga Khan: Mujahideen Coordinator," Scott Thomspon and Joseph Brewda, EIR, 10-13-95. The WWF has been used and abused by British Intelligence since its inception in 1961, as documented by British investigative journalist Kevin Dowling. See related article and stories by Dowling in Noseweek magazine.
9. "The Real Story of the BCCI," Bill Engdahl and Jeff Steinberg, EIR, 10-13-95
10. Beaty and Gwynn, p. 146, also pp. 251, 262, 279, 286-7, 324, 346
11. "The Anglo-American Support Apparatus Behind the Afghani Mujahideen," Adam K. East, EIR, 10-13-95
12. Beaty and Gwynne, p. 101
13. Beaty and Gwynne, p. 106
14. Beaty and Gwynn, p. 346, and "The BCCI Affair," overview and key documents
15. "Opium History, 1979 To 1994" Alfred McCoy
16. "Drug Fallout," Alfred McCoy, and Pakistan's statement to the UN regarding drug trafficking
17. "The Lies About Taliban Heroin," Michael C. Ruppert, FTW
18. Blum, pp. 338-352 and "Osama Bin Laden - A CIA Creation and its 'Blowback,'" Mike Ruppert citing McCoy regarding Hekmatyar's six labs, and "Gulbuddin Hekmatyar Had Links With KGB," Imran Akbar
19. "War In Afghanistan Spawned A Global Narco-Terrorist Force," Steinberg, 10-13-95 EIR
20. Yousef, pp. 40-41, 233-235
21. "CIA 'tried to kill Afghan warlord,'" BBC, May 10, 2002
22. Yousef, p. 115
23. Bodansky, pp. 101-102
