Posted on 11/08/2005 3:27:25 PM PST by Matchett-PI
Edited on 11/08/2005 3:52:31 PM PST by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
Ahmad Chalabi, Iraq's deputy prime minister and head of the Iraqi National Congress, arrives today on a visit to Washington and New York, his first trip to the United States in nearly two years. The official American invitation reflects a recognition that Chalabi is among Iraq's most effective political figures and a repudiation of an earlier, perverse U.S. effort to "marginalize," if not destroy, him.
(Excerpt) Read more at nysun.com ...
Whatever happened to the trumped up charges that Chalabi stole money?
Chalabi is a fraud, an asset of Iranian intelligence, and the looter of other people's bank accounts. Nice guy, otherwise.
I have no idea. The "Arabists" in the CIA and State Department were no doubt behind the whole caper. bttt
Ya think so, huh?
The CIA has had the knives out for Chalabi from the beginning. It's hard to determinte the truth here, but I am finding the CIA harder and harder to believe.
"I am finding the CIA harder and harder to believe."
I am, too. I'm beginning to question everything they say or do, wondering if they have an agenda to undermine Pres. Bush. I'll know Chalabi is a good guy if Kerry and the rest of the dims leave town rather than meet him.
If he was really guilty of anything serious, he'd be rotting in a jail cell by now. There are a LOT of people in the new Iraq who wanted him gone.
From what I recall, he was running a sound banking operation in Pakistan or some similar country, and the authorities shut him down because he was stepping on a few entrenched competitors.
If my memory serves, the goverment that accused him is notoriously corrupt, in bed with the established oligarchy of the country. So when he came in as an upstart, they gunned for him and he fled the country.
I think what they did was to increase the reserve requirement of his bank without prior notice to an amount he couldn't afford to raise.
From all accounts I know of he appears to have worked tirelessly and in good faith to support Iraq and the changes now going on there. He's on our side, and he's been very good at getting the various warring factions to see eye to eye.
He has been accused of working with the Iranians. He's a person whose success is based on creating personal contacts everywhere, so that's not surprising. However, from everything I've heard, he's been working for secular government in Iraq, which I don't think is something the Iranians want.
He does operate in the moral shadows and is used to working with corrupt regimes. No question. Is he corrupt himself? Possibly. But is he working towards an improved future for Iraq? Certainly, and he's becoming a much admired figure within Iraq for it.
I would look at what the man's actually doing, instead of what his opponents accuse him of. They don't have such a great track record either.
D
The CIA tried to smear Chalibi just as they're trying to wreck the Bush administration. Part of the reason the Bush administration could not point to Iraq's involvement in 9/11 (confirmed by Mrs. Mylorie) is the CIA would conduct a smear campaign against Bush for that, too.
Oh, I really like Chalabi, very much, and always considered him an honest broker. As honest as we're going to get, anyway.
And thought at the time the "charges" were ill timed and definitely designed to take down yet another architect of teh war in Iraq.
Chalabi has the same enemies as Bush.
It had to happen sooner or later my FRiend! I disagree with you:)
I never trusted Chalabi- before, during and after he was the darling of Washington.
I don't have any sound reasons- just a strong gut reaction to him- watching and listening to him I've always had the sense this man wasn't someone to trust. Nothing I've learned has given me cause to change my mind.
I've been wrong before and I'll be wrong again :-)
Bump to myself
That happens to you, too? Here I thought I was the only one..:)
That was a CIA operation.
The CIA is dangerously out of control and I don't see where Porter Goss is having any effect whatsoever.
Hi, sinkspur. Although I rarely figure stuff out in advance, I rather think it WAS indeed the CIA out to discredit Chalabi.
Just think how much easier and cushier it was to work under, say, a Clinton administration than a Bush administration.
Under the former, there is no risk of going to war based on bad intelligence which makes analysis quite a bit easier, given that no action will be taken on ANY intelligence.
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