CIA insider says U.S. fighting wrong war

A career CIA officer claims in a new book that America is losing the war on terror, in part because of the invasion of Iraq, which, he says, distracted the United States from the war against terrorism and further fueled al-Qaida's struggle against the United States. The author, who writes as "Anonymous," is a 22-year veteran of the CIA and still works for the intelligence agency, which allowed him to publish the book after reviewing it for classified information.

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In an interview with NBC's Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell, he calls the U.S. war in Iraq a dream come true for Osama bin Laden, saying, "Bin Laden saw the invasion of Iraq as a Christmas gift he never thought he'd get." By invading a country that's regarded as the second holiest place in Islam, he asserts, the Bush administration inadvertently validated bin Laden's assertions that the United States intends a holy war against Muslims.

In his book, titled "Imperial Hubris," he calls the Iraq invasion "an avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked war against a foe who posed no immediate threat," arguing against the concept of pre-emptive war put forward by President Bush as justification for the Iraq war.

The book also argues that the U.S. focus on bin Laden as a terrorist is the wrong way to fight him and the wrong way to think of the foe. The real enemy, he asserts, is the radical form of Islam that bin Laden and his followers espouse. And he calls for escalating the level of violence in the war against al-Qaida.

Andrea Mitchell: "What is your background? How many years were you, are you in the agency?"

Anonymous: "Well, I've been in the intelligence community for 22 years. My background is I was trained as a historian, British imperial history. But I've been here since 1982 and have had a very good career."

Mitchell: "Starting in 1996, the CIA decided to create a station devoted to Osama bin Laden. Why?"

Anonymous: "I think it was created because the intelligence community had turned up bits and pieces of information in multiple areas of the world, after the end of the Afghan war, that indicated bin Laden was involved in one way or another with various Islamist groups who were opposing the Egyptian government or the Saudi government, the Yemeni government. And it was decided to try to make a concerted effort against this individual, to see where it would lead, to see if he was either a spendthrift billionaire, or if he was a serious military-minded opponent of the United States. And that was, I think, the genesis of the effort."

Mitchell: "Now, you were placed in charge of this station, the first time that the CIA developed a station just devoted to a man, to a person, not to a country."

Anonymous: "That's what I understand, yes."

Mitchell: "You say in your new book that the United States is not making a dent in the war on terror against these foes. Why do you think so?"


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9/11 commission

The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States wrapped up its public hearings with a two-day session on June 16 and 17.
• No Iraq-al-Qaida link: Story | Statement
• Al-Qaida's plan: Story | Statement
• Day of attack: Story | Statement
• Commission Web site
Anonymous: "Well, I think we have made a dent in some areas. I think in the leadership, the first generation of al-Qaida leadership, we've made a ?- certainly made a dent. America's clandestine service has done a terrific job in that regard. But we are ?- we remain in a state of denial about the size of the organization we face, the multiple allies it has, and more importantly probably than anything, the genius of bin Laden that's behind the movement and the power of religion that motivates the movement. I think we are, for various reasons, loath to talk about the role of religion in this war. And it's not to criticize one religion or another, but bin Laden is motivated and his followers and his associates are motivated by what they believe their religion requires them to do. And until we accept that fact and stop identifying them as gangsters or terrorists or criminals, we're very much behind the curve. Their power will wax our costs in treasure, and blood will also wax."

Mitchell: "But isn't it a distortion of Islam, what they espouse? How can you say that this is the Muslim belief to attack us and to wage war against us?"

Anonymous: "I'm certainly not an expert and neither am I a Muslim. I think the appeal that bin Laden has across the Muslim ?- I indeed think he's probably the only heroic figure, the only leadership figure that exists in the Islamic world today, and he does so because he is defending Muslims, Islamic lands, Islamic resources. From his perspective it's very much a war against someone who is oppressing or killing Muslims.

"And the genius that lies behind it, because he's not a man who rants against our freedoms, our liberties, our voting, our ?- the fact that our women go to school. He's not the Ayatollah Khomeini; he really doesn't care about all those things. To think that he's trying to rob us of our liberties and freedom is, I think, a gross mistake. What he has done, his genius, is identify particular American foreign policies that are offensive to Muslims whether they support these martial actions or not ?- our support for Israel, our presence on the Arabian Peninsula, our activities in Afghanistan and Iraq, our support for governments that Muslims believe oppress Muslims, be it India, China, Russia, Uzbekistan. Bin Laden has focused the Muslim world on specific, tangible, visual American policies.

"And there seems to be very little opposition to him within the Muslim world, and that's why I think that our assumption that he distorts Islam is just that, it's analysis by assertion. I'm not sure it's quite accurate."

Mitchell: "Well, you say in your book that the reality is that there is a large and growing among the world's 1.3 billion Muslims against America, not because of a misunderstanding of America but because they understand our policies very well."

Anonymous: "That's exactly right. I certainly believe that, and I think the substantial amount of polling that's been done by the Pew Trust and by other very reputable pollsters in the Islamic world indicate that most of the Islamic world believes they know exactly what we're up to, and that's to deny the Palestinians a country, to make sure that oil flows at prices that may seem outrageous to the American consumer, but are not market prices in the Islamist's eyes, supporting Russia against Chechnya. I think very coolly bin Laden has focused them on substance rather than rhetoric. And his rhetoric is only powerful because that is the case. He's focused them on U.S. policies."

Mitchell: "You're saying that no amount of public diplomacy will reach the Muslim world and change their minds because they hate everything that we stand for."

Anonymous: "No, I don't think they hate everything that they ?- that we stand for. In fact, the same polls that show the depths of their hatred of our policies show a very strong affection for the traditional American sense of fair play, the idea of rule by law, the ability of people to educate their children. I think the mistake is made on our part to assume that they hate all those things. What they hate is the policy and the repercussions of that policy, whether it's in Israel or on the Arabian Peninsula. It's not a hatred of us as a society, it's a hatred of our policies."

Mitchell: "You call for some very tough actions here. You talk about escalating our war against them, and you say in your book that killing in large numbers is not enough to defeat our Muslim foes. This killing must be a Sherman-like razing of infrastructure. You talk about civilian deaths. You talk about landmines. Is that really what we have come to in this war on terror?"

Anonymous: "I think we've come to the place where the military is about our only option. We have not really discussed the idea of why we're at war with what I think is an increasing number of Muslims. Which ?- it's very hard in this country to debate policy regarding Israel or to debate actions or policies that might result in more expensive energy. I don't think it's something that we wanted to do, but I think it's where we've arrived. We've arrived at the point where the only option is military. And quite frankly, in Iraq and in Afghanistan we've applied that military force with a certain daintiness that has not served our interests well.

'The major problem with the Iraq war is that it distracted us from the war against terrorism. But more importantly... it caused us to invade a country that's the second holiest place in Islam.'

?- Anonymous
Mitchell: "But in fact in your book you argue that we are waging half-failed wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan that have only further incited Osama bin Laden and his sympathizers."

Anonymous: "Well, I think we made no impression on them with our military might. We are unquestionably the strongest military power on earth. And in both Iraq and Afghanistan, our opponents rode out that war. I wrote in the book that if we give the military, you know, substantial credit for actions, probably 40,000 Taliban fighters went home with their guns in Afghanistan; probably 400,000 Iraqis went home with their guns in Iraq, all to fight another day. We seem to have a little bit of trouble distinguishing between winning a war and winning a battle. And I think ?-

Mitchell: "In other words, we're winning the battles but not the war."

Anonymous: "We're ?- yes, ma'am. We've won, we won quite a few battles and marvelously so, but we're fighting opponents that perceive tactical losses rather than strategic losses. And it's quite clear that these wars are half-started."

Mitchell: "You call the invasion of Iraq, ?'an avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked war against a foe who posed no immediate threat.' Why do you think so?"

Anonymous: "For several reasons. That was a passage cut from a larger passage where I describe my personal aversion to aggressive war, to the war started by the United States. And I tried to draw an analogy between our war against Mexico in the 19th century and just saying it is not part of the American character or our basic sense of decency to wage wars except in self-defense or preemption.

"The major problem with the Iraq war is that it distracted us from the war against terrorism. But more importantly, it allowed?-it made us invade, or it caused us to invade a country that's the second holiest place in Islam. It's not really the same as the Russians invading Afghanistan in 1979. Afghanistan is an Islamic country, but it was far from the mainstream of world Islam.

"Iraq, however, for both Sunnis and Shias, is the second holiest place in the Islamic world. And to invade that country, on the face of it, is a great offense to Islam and an action which almost entirely validated bin Laden's assertions about what the United States intended vis-à-vis the Islamic world."