Seeds of Chaos
The Baghdad Files: A trove of secret intelligence reports shows how Saddam Hussein planned the current insurgency in Iraq Long before the invasion that toppled his regime was even launched
Saddam's allies, at his reported direction, planned and carried out attacks against Iraqi police, in an intimidation campaign. Another Saddam-linked group, the Black Falcons, was tasked to target coalition forces with improvised explosive devices, or IED s. According to an Iraq Survey Group intelligence report, the Black Falcons were directed by former military and intelligence officials loyal to Saddam. Still other reports say that Saddam targeted water plants. A report prepared at the military's coalition headquarters in Baghdad tells the story: "Plan 549, a document purporting to provide guidance from Saddam Hussein to his forces . . . calls for attacks on water plants. Such attacks could be devastating in terms of the populace's confidence in the coalition and public order." In late November 2003, U.S.-led forces "detained an individual who had over 40 videotapes of water purification sites throughout Iraq," a military task force report said. "The tapes were used for reconnaissance for future attacks."
Agents in place. The intelligence provides no clarity on how Saddam communicated with insurgents loyal to him. But one report, a "daily threat assessment" issued in December 2003 by the Iraq Survey Group and the Coalition Provisional Authority, makes it clear that Saddam was actively directing his forces. "Previous reporting indicates Saddam Hussein had sent a communique to his supporters," the report says, "indicating a more concerted effort should be made to capture coalition forces to exchange for captured former regime elements."
Several former Saddam aides were identified in the reports as key figures in the insurgency. They include Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri, who was chairman of the regime's National Security Council, and Muhammad Yunis al-Ahmed, a leader in the Baath Party's Military Bureau. Both men remain at large. In a raid last December on a Samarra safe house, allegedly controlled by Duri's associates, coalition forces discovered $1.94 million in cash. Duri and Ahmed, the reports say, have "provided guidance and funding" for insurgents who flocked to northern Mosul, one of Iraq's largest cities, both before and shortly after the invasion. One military assessment says that an estimated 1,200 fedayeen fighters were based in Mosul at the time of the invasion. Another "1,000 former military leaders and Baath loyalists have taken up residence since the fall of the regime," the report says. "Reporting indicates at least a dozen FRE groups are currently operating in the city." Mosul remains a serious trouble spot and a haven for former Saddam loyalists and some foreign terrorists, U.S. military officials say.
Infiltrating operations. Saddam's hand in the insurgency was not always clear to analysts, who repeatedly described attacks and planned operations as the handiwork of former regime elements or "former regime loyalists," without any specific reference to the individuals involved. One report, citing "foreign government service sensitive reporting," says Baath Party members were offering money to Iraqis and others to carry out assassinations and attacks on Iraqi infrastructure. Former regime intelligence officers also infiltrated coalition operations, including the Coalition Provisional Authority, and planted agents as journalists in some media operations, according to various reports. Former regime elements "are seizing the opportunity to place agents in positions that permit them to monitor all coalition activities from the inside," a headquarters military analyst in Baghdad wrote more than a year ago. "Background investigations of these individuals to try and eliminate possible spies will become a necessity if any semblance of both internal and operational security is to be maintained."
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