Saturday, January 19, 2008

UK Times: Official Documents Prove FBI lied to protect US officials

The UK's Sunday Times has another explosive article out tonight.
THE FBI has been accused of covering up a key case file detailing evidence against corrupt government officials and their dealings with a network stealing nuclear secrets.

The Times has obtained official documents which prove that the FBI is lying about the existence of a counterintelligence operation targeting high-level US officials and Turkish operatives.

The FBI's comments demonstrate conclusively that either:
a) They are lying, or
b) They have destroyed the evidence of this multi-year investigation concerning the corruption of high-level US officials, the nuclear black market, money laundering and narcotics trafficking.

****

The revelations in the Times are also the first known incident where official FBI documents have been leaked to the press confirming the FBI's counterintelligence operations targeting Turkish operatives in US. According to the Times, these operations have been taking place since 1996.

Destruction of Evidence?
The Times has obtained an official FBI document which confirms the existence of the Turkish counter-intelligence operation, including the official Case Number of the operation. This case number, 203A-WF-210023, has been very tightly held because it directly ties the Turkish operation to specific documents and wiretaps which can then be used as evidence.

The FBI has, till recently, been very careful not to respond to any requests that might disclose, confirm or deny any information in this matter, however:
...the FBI responded to a freedom of information request for a file of exactly the same number by claiming that it did not exist. But The Sunday Times has obtained a document signed by an FBI official showing the existence of the file.


With the FBI claiming that these documents don't exist, we must conclude either that they are demonstrably lying, or that they have destroyed all the evidence.

Unfortunately for the FBI, we are aware of at least two other cases where this operation was referenced, and those references were documented outside the FBI. The first case was that of former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds; her case was reported by the Justice Department's Inspector General, as well as the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the second case was that of former FBI Special Agent Gilbert Graham, whose cases was also documented in Congress and by the Inspector General.

If the FBI is telling the truth that these documents do not (currently) exist, then the FBI must have destroyed them. Did they destroy ALL the copies that existed? Did the FBI retrieve ALL the copies and references seen by the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Inspector General's report which was seen by Henry Waxman's office and perhaps elsewhere? How far did they go to retrieve the evidence? We do know that in May 2004, two years after the Senate Judiciary Committee held unclassified hearings into Sibel's case, the Department of Justice retroactively classified details of those hearings. Did the DoJ destroy all the evidence, and all the case files, at the same time?

We also know that at least one other FBI Special Agent filed classified protected reports in early 2002. Special Agent Gilbert Graham, one of Sibel's bosses, worked on "counterintelligence investigations involved espionage activities by Turkish officials and agents in the United States." Graham's primary concern, according to the unclassified version of his filings was that the FBI was using phony FISA warrants to spy on "high-profile U.S. public officials."

Gilbert Graham's filings with the Inspector General, as well as his evidence to the Senate Judiciary Committee certainly contained the relevant Case Numbers that the FBI is now denying exists. Were all of Graham's reports destroyed too?

For years, Sibel has challenged US officials: (youtube):
"We have the facts, we have the documents, we have the witnesses. Put out the tapes, put out the documents, put out the intercepts. Put out the truth."

The FBI is apparently still obstructing justice, and still blocking the truth from coming out.

Asked for a comment, Sibel said:
"I cannot comment on the contents of the case file, however I can tell you with 100% certainty that the FBI lied when they said that it doesn't exist."

The FBI/DoJ is currently investigating the CIA's destruction of evidence, the torture/interrogation tapes of al-Qa'ida suspect Abu Zubaydah and others. If they have destroyed all the evidence in this Turkish Counter-Intelligence operation, how can they possibly be trusted to investigate the CIA's destruction of evidence?


Brewster Jennings
The official document obtained by The Times has some very damning evidence regarding Marc Grossman, former #3 at the State Department and former Ambassador to Turkey. Two weeks ago, The Times ran an explosive article detailing how Marc Grossman was a mole for foreign criminal groups which stole American nuclear secrets and sold them to the highest bidder.

According to the latest Times article, they have an anonymous letter which:
claims the government official [Grossman] warned a Turkish member of the network that they should not deal with a company called Brewster Jennings because it was a CIA front company investigating the nuclear black market. The official’s warning came two years before Brewster Jennings was publicly outed when one of its staff, Valerie Plame, was revealed to be a CIA agent in a case that became a cause célèbre in the US.
Former CIA agent Phil Giraldi, who was stationed in Turkey, is another who is familiar with these matters. Giraldi wrote a terrific article for the American Conservative in 2006 describing Sibel's case. In Kill The Messenger, a documentary about the nuclear black market element of Sibel case, Giraldi says:
"And that Brewster Jennings was, apparently, working against the target of Turkey, meaning that Turkey was being investigated by the CIA as a proliferator of weapons."

One of Brewster Jennings targets was the American Turkish Council, a lobbying group known to be a hub of the activity facilitating the theft and sale of nuclear secrets, among other things.

Journalist Chris Deliso wrote a terrific article in Nov 2005 linking Marc Grossman, Brewster Jennings, the American Turkish Council and the Turkish connection to the nuclear black market. Although the new Times article doesn't mention Grossman by name, it is clear that Grossman is again the unnamed former official in this article.

Crimes, Cover-ups, and... Consequences?
We are all familiar with the cliche that 'the cover-up is worse than the crime,' but that is often nonsense. Just as in the CIA tape destruction case, here we have rational people making 'rational' decisions, not in the heat of the moment, to commit felonies by destroying evidence of treason amongst other crimes. The original crimes are much worse than the cover-up, and the guilty parties know it, that's why they decided to destroy and cover up all of the evidence.

Will Congress finally hold hearings into the foreign criminal penetration of every branch of the US government which has been repeatedly corroborated?

We have the crimes, we have the cover-ups, where are the consequences?

*******************
Digg THis

(Email me if you want to be added to my Sibel email list. Subject: 'Sibel email list')

9 comments:

mmonk said...

It's usually the coverup that finally gets them.

lukery said...

let's hope the coverup (or anything) gets them this time.

Anonymous said...

Wow. It is getting interesting!! A second article!

It's a tremendous blog and source of information you have created, Luke. The main problem now - as usual on the net - seems to be How To Get People to Read and Understand. I might have some useful ideas there, even if they might offend seasoned individuals (like Sibel and you).

If we sort start at the top level I don't think this ever will be grabbed by US media if brought through regular channels (editorial and news desks). As Sibel says, quoted on Brads blog today,"... a lot of it is the self-censorship [of the U.S. media] and the reliance 100% on only government sources."

Probably Sibel has tried to "massage" individual journalists and writers into looking deeper into her story and write about it, but there is really a significant number of candidates here: Seymour Hersh, Steve Coll, (ex-?) Washington Post and author of "Ghost Wars", Ron Suskind, James Bamford just to name a few. I don't know if Joe Trento is published in "major" media outlets, but that's another one you have mentioned here. Chris Hedges (TruthDig.com) has a stellar reputation and solid readership even if he doesn't write in New York Times anymore. Robert Dreyfuss is another brilliant investigative journalist. Etc., etc.

As I wrote recently on We Can Change the World more synergy between bloggers (on this and any related issue) is needed. Here I am some sort of expert: let's make a simplified two-camp situation with (a) pro-establishment (pro-Bush, pro-Republican, pro-War etc.) and (b) the opposite views. The first camp has adopted the strategies that used be the property of (b) in the past (like during the 60's and 70's) and is very much playing the upper hand today.

(b) is an aggressive grass root movement taking every drop out of the opportunities of the web. They comment on each other blogs and are quick to link back and forth and are thus creating an image that is even larger than the actual activism, which is impressive per se.

(a) remains in the illusion that everything is like it used be and continues with roughly the same strategies developed in the last decade or so. Won't do. The US Army, the White House, the Republican Party leak stuff to the (a)-camp and really use the web as an extension of the current propaganda apparatus. It will take a huge effort from all those working in the (b)-camp to counter this powerful machine. (A machine which, BTW, is bi-partisan according to American politics.)

A tiny little drop off collective effort could be seen in the Washington Note comments, but since you posted on January 12 the thread dropped dead. Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com recently brought down the wrath from CNN's John King by criticizing his lame attempt to "question" John McCain. Going one step further down it's not really more inappropriate for us further down the ladder to question the silence from established bloggers like Steve Clemons, Glenn Greenwald, Josh Marshall (Talking Points Memo); David Neiwert (Orcinus), just to name a few. It's at least very reasonable to use their comments sections for reminders.

Greetings from Old Europe

Anonymous said...

I posted a follow-up over at Washington Note. Actually it became two copies posts since the comments cgi got a hick-up :-)

Anonymous said...

Reference to "Exhibit 203a" published BEFORE London Times Doc 203A article was made public, seems to confirm Sibel case- Sibel told the truth.
At Syriacomment.com- a M.E. blog has been having a hot discussion since Jan 17, two days before the latest Sibel revelations came out addressing Israeli treason. "T"'s thread addresses the issue indepth. The entire thread must be viewed to get full impact. Then "T" refers to "Exhibit 203a" as being evidence used in a court case to convict Israeli dual nationals of treason/spying. The Item was posted BEFORE the information was ever made public on the London Times news site. (The post is stamped 7:07pm but on this site- 5hrs is always added from the actual time of the blogger hitting the "submit" key. Which makes the post at 2:07pm EST. Calls to London TimesOnline said no version of the Sibel Edmonds article went public BEFORE 2:43pm EST (7:43 London GMT). See "Saudi Money Cant buy you love- or success" in the comments section of Syriacomment.com.

Anonymous said...

I, like many others, have been amazed at the lack of interest in this story by the MSM in the U.S.. But, then, they didn't think the Downing Street Memo was "news" either.

Thanks to all that have picked up on this story and have tried to distribute it through the internet. I got the original link on Raw Story which took me to the Sunday Times story as well as the info on Brad's Blog which brought me here. I agree with oldeurope on this thread that we should all do our part to send this info to those credible reporters that could do something with it. I've already sent info to James Bramford (various books about the U.S. intelligence services) and Marie Cocco (investigative reporter and columnist for the Washington Post Writers Group) a few weeks ago and will now send links to all the pertinent threads to Amy Goodman at DemocracyNow! , Robert Sheer at Truthdig.com, and Robert Parry at Consortiumnews.com all of whom are great investigative journalists.

The big mystery here is that not only the FBI higher ups know about this case but so do the members of congress and the 9/11 Commission that have heard Sibyl Edmonds testify. Why isn't this being investigated or has it been investigated and found to lack substance or is there some kind of legitmate intelligence operation that can't be publicly exposed???

Anonymous said...

Where, if anywhere, does it fit in that Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame met at an American Turkish Council event ("The Politics of Truth", page 240)?

lukery said...

CambridgeKnitter - Plame's Brewster Jennings was running a Counterintelligence operation against the ATC.

As it happens, Joe Wilson did some work with the ATC!

lukery said...

Old Europe - thanks for your thoughts.

Yes - it certainly would be advantageous to have those bloggers on our side. I know for a fact that they are all familiar with Sibel's story.

It'd be great to see them picking up the mantle.