Ansar Al-Islam: Iraq's Al-Qaeda Connection

Does anyone have any more information about these guys?

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937 posted on 01/17/2003 12:24 PM PST by Brad's Gramma

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I have quite a bit, actually.

What is it you would like to know?

Info can be found at the following links:

Taliban-style group grows in Iraq

Iraqi funds, training fuel Islamic terror group

Saddam 'sends troops to help bin Laden men'

But there is more to the Al Queda/Iraq connection than Ansar al-Islam:

Check out the following lawsuit on Find Law

Ashton, et al. v. al Qaeda, et al.: Complaint (PDF) Lawsuit claiming a 9/11 link between Iraq and al Qaeda. Sept. 3, 2002

The file is in slow loading .pdf format, but it is an interesting read. Some excerpts:

39. Upon information and belief, there have been numerous meetings between IRAQI Intelligence agents and high-ranking AL QAEDA terrorists to plan terror attacks. Once such meeting occurred in 1992, when ZAWAHIRI (EGYPTIAN ISLAMIC JIHAD leader and AL QAEDA officer) met with IRAQI INTELLIGENCE agents in Baghdad, IRAQ over several days. An IRAQI serving with the TALIBAN who fled Afghanistan in the fall of 2001, was captured in Kurdistan and has corroborated this meeting and confirmed that IRAQI contacts with AL QAEDA began in 1992.

During the early 1990s, Sudan’s Sheikh Hassan al-Tourabi of the Islamic National Front arranged meetings between BIN-LADEN and IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officials. BIN LADEN met with FARUQ AL-HIJAZI, an IRAQI INTELLIGENCE agent in the Sudan who would later head IRAQI INTELLIGENCE for SADDAM HUSSEIN. BIN LADEN again met with IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officers in 1994 and 1995 in the Sudan. At these meetings, BIN-LADEN and IRAQI INTELLIGENCE secret service director FARUQ AL-HIJAZI agreed to work together on terrorist projects directed against the U.S.

55. From 1996 until 2001, BIN LADEN with the financial and logistical support of OMAR and others in the TALIBAN and IRAQ and IRAQI INTELLIGENCE, created, supplied and operated at least five training camps in order to create an “Islamic Foreign Legion” capable of attacking their enemies throughout the world. These camps trained men from 15 nations in guerrilla warfare, terrorist activities, rocket warfare, demolition and bombing, including the use of mines, grenades, TNT, nitroglycerine and plastic explosives. Classes were also given in “how to kill a policeman” and “traps, murder and terrorist moves.”

57. In February 1997, BIN LADEN publicly expressed his support for IRAQ in its conflict with the United States stating:

“The hearts of the Muslims are filled with hatred towards the United States of America and the American president for American conduct towards IRAQ.”

59. IRAQ upon information and belief, agreed to supply arms to AL QAEDA and provide AL QAEDA with access to and training in the use of chemical and biological weapons and agreed to instruct AL QAEDA terror trainers at its Salman Pak camp in Baghdad that contained a Boeing 707 used to practice hijacking. IRAQ also agreed to supply AL QAEDA terrorists with new identities and passports from Yemen and the United Arab Emirates.

60. AL QAEDA agreed to provide protection from political opponents to IRAQ and SADDAM HUSSEIN, and to commit assassinations and other acts of violence to create instability in regions of IRAQ, particularly Kurdistan, to assist the regime of SADDAM HUSSEIN. AL QAEDA further agreed to provide trained terrorists, assassins and martyrs to carry out terror attacks in concert with IRAQ against their common enemies, including the United States.

64. Between April 25 and May 1, 1998, two of BIN LADEN’s senior military commanders, MUHAMMAD ABU-ISLAM and ABDULLAH QASSIM, visited Baghdad for discussions with SADDAM HUSSEIN’s son -- QUSAY HUSSEIN -- the “czar” of IRAQI INTELLIGENCE.

65. QUSAY HUSSEIN’s participation in those meetings highlights the importance of the talks in both symbolic and practical terms. Upon information and belief, as a direct result of these meetings, IRAQ again made commitments to provide training, intelligence, clandestine Saudi border crossings, financial support and weapons and explosives to AL QAEDA.

66. IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officials met with BIN LADEN in Afghanistan several more times. A second group of BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA operatives from Saudi Arabia were then trained by IRAQI INTELLIGENCE in IRAQ to smuggle weapons and explosives into Saudi Arabia and other countries, which they later accomplished in an effort to carry out future terrorist acts of violence. A third group of BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA operatives received a month of sophisticated guerrilla operations training from IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officials later in the Summer of 1998.

67. Despite philosophical and religious differences with SADDAM HUSSEIN, BIN LADEN continually sought to strengthen and reinforce the support he and AL QAEDA received from IRAQ. In mid-July 1998, BIN LADEN sent Dr. AYMAN AL-ZAWAHIRI, the Egyptian co-founder of AL QAEDA, to IRAQ to meet with senior Iraqi officials, including Iraqi vice president TAHA YASSIN RAMADAN. Upon information and belief, the purpose of this meeting was to discuss and plan a joint strategy for a terrorist campaign against the United States.

69. During the July 1998 visit ZAWAHIRI toured an IRAQI military base and nuclear and chemical weapons facility near al-Fallujah in IRAQ and upon information and belief, observed training by IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officials of AL QAEDA operatives at the al-Nasiriyah military and chemical weapons facility in IRAQ.

79. Following the December 1998 air strikes on IRAQ, SADDAM HUSSEIN dispatched FARUQ AL-HIJAZI to Kandahar, Afghanistan in order to meet with BIN LADEN and plot their revenge.

81. To demonstrate IRAQ’s commitment to BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA, HIJAZI presented BIN LADEN with a pack of blank, official Yemeni passports, supplied to IRAQI INTELLIGENCE from their Yemeni contacts. HIJAZI’s visit to Kandahar was followed by a contingent of IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officials who provided additional training and instruction to BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA operatives in Afghanistan. These Iraqi officials included members of “Unit 999,” a group of elite IRAQI INTELLIGENCE officials who provided advanced sabotage and infiltration training and instruction to AL QAEDA operatives.

82. At that meeting, upon information and belief, BIN LADEN, AL QAEDA and IRAQ agreed to join efforts in a detailed, coordinated plan for a protracted terrorist war against the United States.

84. IRAQ maintains an advanced chemical and biological weapons program and is one of only three countries in the world producing a highly developed weaponized anthrax. Some time during or after 1998, IRAQ agreed to help BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA develop a laboratory in Afghanistan designed to produce anthrax.

85. In addition to the al-Nasiriyah and Salman Pak training camps, by January 1999, BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA operatives were being trained by IRAQI INTELLIGENCE and military officers at other training camps on the outskirts of Baghdad.

86. In January 1999, IRAQ began reorganizing and mobilizing IRAQI INTELLIGENCE front operations throughout Europe in support of BIN LADEN and AL QAEDA. HAQI ISMAIL, believed to be a member of the IRAQ’S MUKHABARAT Secret Service, left IRAQ to train in an Afghanistan AL QAEDA camp. ISMAIL was believed to be a liason between IRAQ, the TALIBAN and AL QAEDA and was rewarded with a position in the TALIBAN Foreign Ministry.

103. On July 21, approximately six weeks before the September 11 th attacks, IRAQI columnist Mulhalhal reported that BIN LADEN was making plans to “demolish the Pentagon after he destroys the White House.”

104. Mulhalhal’s July 21 article further informed that BIN LADEN would strike America “on the arm that is already hurting.” Upon information and belief, this references a second IRAQI sponsored attack on the World Trade Center. This interpretation is further bolstered by another reference to New York as “[BIN LADEN] will curse the memory of Frank Sinatra everytime he hears his songs.” (e.g., “New York, New York”) identifying New York, New York as a target.

105. Mulhalhal further indicated, “The wings of a dove and the bullet are all but one and the same in the heart of a believer.” (Emphasis supplied) This appears to be a reference to the use of commercial aircraft as a weapon. The information was reported in an IRAQI newspaper who’s editor-in-chief serves as secretary to UDAY HUSSEIN’S Iraqi Syndicate of Journalists. The article expressed IRAQI admiration and support for BIN LADEN’s plans and its appearance in the newspaper would clearly have to be endorsed by SADDAM HUSSEIN himself.

106. All IRAQI news media is strictly controlled and censored by the government of SADDAM HUSSEIN and is under the direct oversight of UDAY HUSSEIN. Various members of IRAQI intelligence work at and control the content of each and every newspaper published inside IRAQ. 107. The information contained in Mulhalhal’s published statements were known prior to the events of September 11 th , and that Mulhalhal has ties to IRAQI intelligence, demonstrates foreknowledge of the planned attacks by BIN LADEN and indicates support by IRAQI co-conspirators.

110. According to U.S. and foreign intelligence officials, in the spring of 2000, IRAQI INTELLIGENCE agents met with September 11 th pilot hijackers ZAID SAMIR JARRAH and MARWAN AL-SHEHHI in Dubai, UAE in order to advance the hijacking of U.S. aircraft to commit terrorist acts. Not long after the meeting, AL-SHEHHI entered the United States on May 29 and JARRAH entered on June 27, to begin preparations for attacks.

133. Instruction documents on an artillery weapon known as the “Super Gun” were found in AL QAEDA camps when they were captured by U.S. forces in the winter of 2001-2002. IRAQ is the only state known to have purchased and assembled the super gun, a weapon so large it must be constructed in segments. It has a range of several hundred miles.

Well, a bit about Ansar's membership-like what are it's members. Like how many are Kurds and how many are not. Of the Kurdish members, how many are Iraqi Kurds, and are there any non-Iraqi Kurds? What are the membership of the non-Kurd fighters. What is the exact nature of Iraqi, Iranian, and Al-Qaeda support. A bit about ANsar's order of battle, it's weaponry and equipment, their sources.

"Well, a bit about Ansar's membership-like what are it's members."

When the organization was first formed by Mullah Krekar in September 2001, there were only around 100. In December 2001, Krekar got orders from the al-Qaeda leadership to establish a safe haven in Iraq that would act as a crossover point between Iran and Georgia. From Georgia, the fleeing al-Qaeda could either aid their Chechen affiliates in their war against Russia or continue westward to the Balkans. From the Balkans, they can receive European passports (real or forged) and essentially travel anywhere in the world.

As the importance of Ansar increased in December 2001, Saif al-Adel (who has been serving as al-Qaeda's military commander ever since Mohammed Atef was killed by the CIA in November 2001) sent an additional force 150 al-Qaeda fighters and $600,000 (quite a bit in northern Iraq) to reinforce the group's power. This, combined with Krekar's new recruits, brought the size of the group to around 400.

The organization (now numbering 600 fighters) first popped onto the headlines in March of 2002, when the leaders of the Kurdish Patriotic Union informed the US that they had captured a handful of Ansar soldiers after several heated skirmishes and that they had confessed to being members of the al-Qaeda network. The KPU leaders also said that the group had established an enclave in several villages along the Iranian border and ruled over a population of roughly 4,000.

The organization vanished for awhile, then reappeared in August 2002 when the press learned that President Bush had scrapped an order for the CIA to attack the Ansar al-Islam after they learned that both Abu Musab Zarqawi (Abu Zubaydah's replacement as al-Qaeda's global operations chief) and Abu Khabab (al-Qaeda's top chemical weapons scientist and a former Egyptian WMD scientist) were staying at the Ansar capital in Beyara.

Abu Khabab is believed to have established two crude chemical weapons facilities for the terrorist organization over the summer, one in Beyara, the other near the Pankisi Gorge in Georgia operating under his senior aide, Abu Yasser. Zarqawi was apparently in Beyara to see how far along Khabab was in making sufficient quantities of chemical and biological weapons for al-Qaeda to use against the West.

The Bush administration reportedly scrapped the plan to attack Beyara because most of the Ansar fighters (1,000 at this point) were in the area and the consensus was that the mission could not be accomplished without the risk of US casualties. Needless to say, dead US troops in Iraq would not have been good for the administration's plans to deal with Saddam Hussein at that point.

After inspecting Khabab's progress in crude chemical and biological weaponry, Zarqawi went on to Baghdad. What he did there was anybody's guess, but you don't get into Baghdad without Saddam knowing you're there.

In September 2002, Mullah Krekar was arrested in the Netherlands while on a return flight to Norway (where he holds refugee status) to pick up cash from the al-Qaeda charity fronts that have been established in Norway for the sole purpose of funding Ansar. He was released in late December and returned to Norway to pick up the necessary cash.

From October to December 2002, Ansar al-Islam has grown to encompass over 2,000 fighters and become a serious threat to the two major Kurdish factions, the Kurdish Patriotic Union and the Kurdish Democratic Party (don't let the names fool you, both are basically fronts for the Kurdish warlords). Ever time Kurdish forces have gone up against the Ansar, they have been massacred, largely due to the fact that al-Qaeda operatives are far better trained, equipped, and motivated than their Kurdish equivalents.

In November 2002, five trucks from Jalawla (a Kurdish town controlled by Saddam) travelled to Beyara and al-Talweera, the twin center's Ansar's power. Officials of the Iraqi Mukhabarat (Iraqi intelligence) met with senior Ansar leaders and possibly Abu Khabab at the time. Also with the Mukhabarat officers was Shakir al-Iraqi, the nom de guerre of an al-Qaeda operative who met with Mohammed Atta and Abu Dahdah (al-Qaeda's Spanish commander, arrested in November 2001) in Spain prior to the 9/11 attacks.

In early December, the Washington Post reported that Ansar al-Islam had purchased several tons worth of VX from Iraq and had smuggled it through Turkey to either Georgia or the Balkans.

The last news of the group was of a pitched battle outside the town of Halabjah where they killed over 40 PUK soldiers and lost only a dozen of their own. Though the attack was repulsed, communiques posted on the group's website have claimed that Ansar has killed over 1,000 PUK soldiers ever since the fighting between the two factions began.

"Like how many are Kurds and how many are not. Of the Kurdish members, how many are Iraqi Kurds, and are there any non-Iraqi Kurds?"

Around 150 Arab al-Qaeda were sent to reinforce the group in December. Ansar now has 2,000 members, and the working assumption is around half are al-Qaeda Arabs. All of the Kurds in the organization appear to be Iraqi Kurds that I can determine.

"What is the exact nature of Iraqi, Iranian, and Al-Qaeda support."

The group is a front for al-Qaeda and it receives $600,000 from it every 2 months in addition to the ~$50,000 a week from al-Qaeda's international slush fund (a collection of Wahhabi charities and bogus Islamic charities controlled by bin Laden's brother-in-law Mohammed Jamal Khalifa and Sheikh Saiid that gives out cash whenever the affiliates need it). In addition, Iran pays the organization anywhere between $25,000 and $130,000 on a bi-monthly basis.

Iraq's support is primarily in terms of what toys Saddam is willing to give on sell them in exchange for their continuing to pester his Kurdish enemies. Also, the CIA has reported that Iraq has provided the group with WMD expertise, training facilities at Salman Pak (an Iraqi terrorist training camp just south of Baghdad), and even biological weapons. The general consensus in the intelligence community, though, is that Saddam is hardly playing Santa to the Ansar and that all of these activities are done on a pure cash basis.

"A bit about ANsar's order of battle, it's weaponry and equipment, their sources."

Largely unknown, due to the group's penchant for killing non-members. Kurdish sources say that they're roughly on par with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan or the Chechen rebels in terms of training and equipment.

"Kurdish sources say that they're roughly on par with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan or the Chechen rebels in terms of training and equipment."

Okay. Could you please tell me about the IMU and the Chechen rebels with regards to training and equipment?

The IMU and the Chechens are both basically better trained than the armies of most Third World dictatorships and the Chechens are motivated enough to inflict a signifigant amount of damage on the Russian army. The IMU has repeatedly pulverized the Uzbek army (most of which are former Soviet soldiers who returned home after the USSR crumbled), though with the death of most its leadership in Operation Anaconda the threat has decreased somewhat.

Most of the equipment is basically what the Afghan mujahideen had access to during the 1980s: small arms, some artillery, mortars, antiquated armor, that sort of thing. In combat terms, most terrorist organizations are fairly rag-tag groups, which is why they resort to assymetrical warfare to even the playing field as it were.

Do you have a list of the specific names, origins and models of weaponry used? Like "East German MpiKM", for example? I'm curious about the kinds of weaponry used, like makes of small arms (pistols, submachine guns, rifles), machine guns, rocket launchers, etc.

This should help, as these are generally the types of weapons and equipment al-Qaeda uses worldwide (that the public has access to, of course):

Tanks: T-34, T-54/55, T-62, PT-76 (all Soviet)

Vehicles: BRDM-2 (armored reconnaissance vehicle), BTR-60 APC, BTR-70 APC, BTR-80 APC, BTR-152 APC, BMP-1 AICV, BMP-2 AICV (all Soviet)

APC = Armored Personnel Carrier
AICV = Armored Infantry Combat Vehicle

Towed Guns: 2S9 Anona 120mm SPH/Mortar (Soviet), D-20/M-55 152mm Towed Gun-Howitzer (Soviet), Type-66 152mm Towed Gun-Howitzer (Chinese/Iraqi)

Rocket Launchers: Sakr-18 (Egyptian), BM-13 Katysha Multiple Rocket Launcher (Soviet), BM-14/RPU-14 140mm towed rocket launcher (Soviet), 9P140 Hurricane 220mm Multiple Rocket Launcher (Chinese), AT-1 Snapper (Libyan)

SAMs: Hongying-5 (Chinese/North Korean), Anza MKI (Pakistani), Ayn al-Sakr (Egyptian), FIM-92A Stinger (American)

Artillery: ZPU-1 14.5mm (Soviet), ZPU-2 Type 58 (Soviet), ZPU-4 Type 56 (Chinese), Shilka 23mm (Soviet), ZU-23 23mm (Soviet), S-60 57mm (Iranian), KS-12 Type-72 (North Korean), KS-19 Type-59 (North Korean)

Still looking for information on small arms.

Thanks. I can't wait for the small arms and other infantry weapons. SO these are used by AL-Qaeda and their buddies the world over, like Afghanistan, Uzbeksitan, Chechnya, Bosnai, Philippines, and Kosovo?

In Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Chechnya, Bosnia, the southern Philippines, and Kosovo, yes. Also in Eritrea, Somalia, and Sudan as well.

In Indonesia, however, the Laskar Jihad is supplied with weaponry by the Indonesian army, and I'm still looking for data on that. Does this help you out, though?

Definetely. Mucho Gracias, Angelus. I'm somewhat curious about small arms and other infantry weapons.