Pentagon: Russia Gave Saddam U.S. Intel

Yahoo ^ | March 24, 2006 | ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

WASHINGTON - The Russian government provided Saddam Hussein with intelligence on U.S. military movements and plans during the opening days of the war in 2003, according to a Pentagon report released Friday.

The unclassified report does not assess the value of the information or provide details beyond citing an Iraqi document that says the battlefield intelligence was provided to Saddam through the Russian ambassador in Baghdad.

A classified version of the Pentagon report, titled "Iraqi Perspectives Project," is not being made public.

Whether by chance or design, one piece of Russian intelligence actually contributed to an important U.S. military deception effort. By telling Saddam that the main attack on Baghdad would not begin until the Army's 4th Infantry Division arrived around April 15, the Russians reinforced an impression that U.S. commanders were trying to create to catch the Iraqis by surprise.

The attack on Baghdad began well before the 4th Infantry arrived, and the Saddam regime collapsed quickly.

As originally planned by Gen. Tommy Franks, the Central Command chief who ran the war, the 4th Infantry was to attack into northern

Iraq from Turkey, but the Turkish government refused to go along. Meanwhile the 4th Infantry's tanks and other equipment remained on ships in the eastern Mediterranean for weeks — a problem that Franks sought to turn into an advantage by assaulting Baghdad without them.

Based on a captured Iraqi document — a memo to Saddam from his Ministry of Foreign Affairs, dated April 2 — Russian intelligence reported through its ambassador that the American forces were moving to cut off Baghdad from the south, east and north, with the heaviest concentration of troops in the Karbala area. It said the Americans had 12,000 troops in the area, along with 1,000 vehicles.

In fact, Karbala was a major step on the U.S. invasion route along the Euphrates River to Baghdad. The Karbala assault was launched April 1. A key bridge over the Euphrates, near Karbala, was seized on April 2, permitting U.S. forces to approach Baghdad from the southwest before Iraq could move sufficient forces from the north.

The Pentagon report also said the Russians told the Iraqis that the Americans planned to concentrate on bombing in and around Baghdad, cutting the road to

Syria and Jordan and creating enough confusion to force Baghdad residents to flee.

The Pentagon report, designed to help U.S. officials understand in hindsight how Saddam and his military commanders prepared for and fought the war, paints a picture of an Iraqi regime blind to the threat it faced from the U.S. invaders, hamstrung by Saddam's inept military leadership and deceived by its own propaganda.

"The largest contributing factor to the complete defeat of Iraq's military forces was the continued interference by Saddam," the report said.

While Saddam disastrously miscalculated, the U.S. military also erred in areas beyond the well-known failure to realize that the Baghdad regime had no weapons of mass destruction, according to the 210-page report.

U.S. officials believed Iraq would set its oil wells on fire as part of a scorched-earth policy, and the invasion plan was constructed in ways meant to get U.S. troops to the southern oil wells before they could be torched.

The new report said, however, that while captured Iraqi documents show that there were plans made at the regional or local level to destroy the northern and southern oil wells, Saddam had expressly forbidden it.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

The Reuters report:

Pentagon report says Russia gave Iraq intelligence

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Pentagon report says Russia gave Iraq intelligence

30 minutes ago

Russia provided intelligence to Iraq's government in the opening days of the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, including information that fed Iraqi suspicions that the main U.S. invasion force coming from Kuwait was actually a diversion, a Pentagon report released on Friday stated.

The report said an April 2, 2003, document from the Iraqi minister of foreign affairs to President Saddam Hussein stated that Russian intelligence had reported information on American troops plans to the Iraqis through the Russian ambassador.

The intelligence, the document stated, was that the American forces were moving to cut off Baghdad from the south, east and north, that U.S. bombing would concentrate on Baghdad and that the assault on Baghdad would not begin before around April 15.

In fact, Baghdad fell about a week before that date.

"Significantly, the regime was also receiving intelligence from the Russians that fed suspicions that the attack out of Kuwait was merely a diversion," the report stated.

The revelations were contained in a report by the U.S. military's Joint Forces Command assessing the events in the opening months of the war.

[b4its2late]

Just goes to show you how intelligent the Russians are. Like we weren't going to find out? What will we do? Probably nothing.......

[Wristpin]

They gave them GPS Jammers, improved RPG's and Night vision equipment also.

[Cyclone59]

My question is, why on earth would we tell anyone of an attack plan in the first place?

[LZ_Bayonet]

"one piece of Russian intelligence actually contributed to an important U.S. military deception effort"

With enemies like this, who needs friends!

[Gay State Conservative]

Gee,I wonder why they would have done that! I wonder if they also might have had a motive (or a number of motives) to help Sadaam move/hide/destroy his WMDs.

[GEC]

The Russians are still scum.

[tomahawk]

How many Americans died as a result?

Why should we not given the Chechen freedom fighters intel on Russian army movements?

Russia is our enemy.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thread on this:

Did Russian Ambassador Give Saddam the U.S. War Plan?

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Might have been part of the plan:

"Significantly, the regime was also receiving intelligence from the Russians that fed suspicions that the attack out of Kuwait was merely a diversion," the report stated.

[KarlInOhio]

But the Dems were braying for more partners to help us. Would the French have betrayed us this way? Oops, stupid question.

[GeorgefromGeorgia]

I question how Russia acquired our war plans? Espionage, intelligence, satellite data, or combination? I don't think we gave it to them, unless it was planned to encourage Saddam to cave? That I seriously doubt.

[Enchante]

The Russians are not our friends - was Bush ever so naive as to think they were, or was he just playing along with Putin to try to get something, anything at all, out of him? Churchill held his nose and worked with Stalin to win WWII, but he was never naive enough to forget that Stalin was really an enemy of freedom and democracy. I do find it interesting that the Russky briefing(s) may have helped to lead to a more rapid collapse of Saddam's regime, though I'm not sure how much more Iraq could have resisted even if they knew exactly what was really happening.

"Whether by chance or design, one piece of Russian intelligence actually contributed to an important U.S. military deception effort. By telling Saddam that the main attack on Baghdad would not begin until the Army's 4th Infantry Division arrived around April 15, the Russians reinforced an impression that U.S. commanders were trying to create to catch the Iraqis by surprise."

[A.A. Cunningham]

Wonder if the ambassador had dinner with Jay Rockefeller?

[hawkaw]

Yes. I believe there were extra deaths as a result.

Yet, when I look back on that war (or that part of the war) I really think what harmed the coalition was the lack of a push from the north to the south as Turkey did not allow the 4th ID into her country.

Of course, it was still a record speed military achievement. Hell, I can still remember the press conference with Bush and Blair and the press crying the blues that the battle for Iraq was taking way longer than predicted - LOL.

[daybreakcoming]

Might have been part of the plan:

Those were my thoughts also. Some more of that "misinformation" that the President warned that would be given out. And then I read elsewhere that Russians in civilian clothing helped load and truck WMDs over to Syria.

[LZ_Bayonet]

Today, on another thread, I addressed the incompetence of the MSM media - this is perfect example, made even more so because it is by an "expert" MSM writer (the "AP Military Writer"):

"U.S. military also erred"
"U.S. officials believed Iraq would set its oil wells on fire as part of a scorched-earth policy, and the invasion plan was constructed in ways meant to get U.S. troops to the southern oil wells before they could be torched. The new report said, however, that while captured Iraqi documents show that there were plans made at the regional or local level to destroy the northern and southern oil wells, Saddam had expressly forbidden it."

Mr. AP "Military Writer", please tell me how long it would take Saddam to "unforbid" torching the oil wells and to transmit that order via radio? Five seconds? Forty seconds?

Now tell me how long it would take to determine that he had made the "unforbid" decision and to put forces in place to protect the wells?

[george wythe]

Whether by chance or design, one piece of Russian intelligence actually contributed to an important U.S. military deception effort. By telling Saddam that the main attack on Baghdad would not begin until the Army's 4th Infantry Division arrived around April 15, the Russians reinforced an impression that U.S. commanders were trying to create to catch the Iraqis by surprise.

I all can say it that Allah must have been ticked off with Saddam Hussein.

"All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." Romans 8:28

[shezza]

This was known during the opening weeks of the war, was it not? Russian advisors on hand, including those in the ... er ... "diplomatic" convoy of trucks heading for Syria, had to be evacuated and their safety assured before American action could be taken, regardless of their nefarious reasons for being there in the first place.

Russia is NOT our friend (the president's view to Putin's soul notwithstanding).