Month: October 2005

The Zawahiri Letter

Posted by | Oct 17, 2005 |

by Pat Lang

Col. Patrick W. Lang (Ret.), a highly decorated retired senior officer of U.S. Military Intelligence and U.S. Army Special Forces, served as “Defense Intelligence Officer for the Middle East, South Asia and Terrorism” for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and was later the first Director of the Defense Humint Service. Col. Lang was the first Professor of the Arabic Language at the United States Military Academy at West Point. For his service in the DIA, he was awarded the “Presidential Rank of Distinguished Executive.” He is a frequent commentator on television and radio, including PBS’s Newshour, and most recently on MSNBC’s Hardball and NPR’s “All Things Considered.”

His CV and blog are linked below the fold.

I have read the letter in English and looked at the Arabic on a “sampling” basis and my conclusion would be that it was writen by someone who was not a native speaker of Arabic but who had been well educated in the language. I would guess that an Iranian, A Pakistani or the odd Westerner with such a capability would be likely possibilities. (Download in PDF format.)


I would opt for the Westerner because it reads the way a Westerner with an education in Political Science would lay out strategic guidance and argumentation in sending a directive to a subordinate. All that stuff about – first we do this and then we do that and lastly we do such and such is a bit much for me and does not sound like your basic Islamic fanatic however well educated in Egyptian schools.
Also, the eagerness to list all those heroes of Islam with great concern for their patronimics seems excessive. They generally take such knowledge for granted. Doesn’t eveyone know who Nur ad-Din Zengi was?


I think it is a phony, but why it was written and by whom, I know not. I would not rule out a third world person educated in our methodology.
The Arabic is, to me, a little simplistic and too simple for the way an Egyptian like Zawahiri would write. This is the way I would write if trying to do this.

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Miller, Mylroie, and the Anti-Saddam Wurlitzer: A Thirteen Year Odyssey

Posted by | Oct 17, 2005 |

Let’s looks at a slice of the Plame Timeline and then look at Walter Pincus’s column from June 5th, 2003:

May 2003

May 6

* Nicholas Kristof in “Missing in Action: Truth” for the New York Times mentions Joseph Wilson’s trip to Niger to investigate claims Iraq sought purchase of ‘yellowcake’ uranium (no names mentioned) and that the fabled 16 words in George W. Bush’s 2003 State of the Union Address (SOTU) came from forged documents.

June 2003

June 1-7

* During the first week of June, Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus makes an inquiry about Joseph Wilson’s trip, with the CIA public affairs office. That office contacts the Conterproliferation Division (CPD) at the CIA, (Valerie Plame’s unit), but no report is produced. These events are later reported in Time magazines Sunday, Jul. 31, 2005 article, “When They Knew”

June 8

* Then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice appears on Meet the Press and attempts to refute Kristof’s claims in his early May article.

June 10

* A classified State Department memorandum is drafted for Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman (from Carl Ford’s office) containing information about CIA officer Valerie Plame. She is named in the memo in a paragraph marked “(SNF)” for secret, non-foreign (i.e., not to be shared with foreign agencies, even allies). Plame — who is referred to by her married name, Valerie Wilson, in the memo — is mentioned in the second paragraph of the three-page document, which was written by an analyst in the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR).

June 12

* Walter Pincus of the Washington Post writes “CIA Did Not Share Doubt on Iraq Data”, about Joseph Wilson’s trip without naming the retired Ambassador. Pincus also reports that according to an administration official neither Dick Cheney or his staff learned of its role in spurring the mission until it was disclosed by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof on May 6.

* After the June 12 article by Pincus, “there was general discussion with the National Security Council and the White House and State Department and others” regarding Wilson and his trip, says a former intelligence officer. Source: Time Magazine, “When They Knew”

June 13

* Kristof responds and sticks by his claim. Joseph Wilson is again not named in the article.

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