Ahmad Chalabi Says, 'The Real Culprit is Wolfowitz'

Interesting viewpoint by Ahmad Chalabi, Iran's secret agent in Iraq. ---BBB

'NYT' Sunday Preview: Ahmad Chalabi Says, 'The Real Culprit is Wolfowitz'
By E&P Staff
Published: November 03, 2006 9:40 AM ET

So, Ahmad Chalabi, what went wrong in Iraq in the war you helped to sell? "The Americans sold us out," he tells longtime Baghdad reporter Dexter Filkins in a lengthy cover story in this coming Sunday's New York Times Magazine, reviewed by E&P.

Chalabi was the Iraqi exile who worked -- via everyone from Paul Wolfowitz to Judith Miller -- to convince America to topple Saddam in 2003 (not that many in the administration needed much convincing).

Now, in an interview in his London home, Chalabi, betraying what Filkins calls "a touch of bitterness," declares, "The real culprit in all this is Wolfowitz," the former assistant secretary of defense, whom he still considers a friend. "They chickened out. The Pentagon guys chickened out…The Americans screwed it up."

But that's not because they did too little but, rather, too much. Chalabi thinks the U.S. should have exited quickly and turned things over to Iraqis, such as himself and Moktada al-Sadr. "It was a puppet show!" he says referring to the occupation. "The worst of all worlds. We were in charge, and we had no power."

He adds: "America betrays its friends. It sets them up and betrays them. I'd rather be America's enemy."

The massive article is titled "Where Plan 'A' Left Ahmad Chalabi." It ranges from the present day in London - where Chalabi still carries himself "like a monarch" despite the utter rejection by Iraqi voters earlier this year - to Filkins' travels with him in 2005, including a visit to Iran.

One of the fascinating anecdotes revolves around the May 20,2004 raid by Iraqi and American forces on Chalabi's Baghdad compound, after the U.S. accused him of giving secrets to the Iranians. "Look, I think they tried to kill him," Richard Perle, the Pentagon adviser and close Chalabi friend, tells Filkins. "I think the raid on his house was intended to result in violence….It is a miracle that it didn't result in a massive shootout."

Filkins returns later to speculation that it was at the behest of the Iranians that Chalabi got the U.S. into the war. Perle refutes this.

What about the WMD propaganda? Chalabi counters views that he was the catalyst, saying that it was Bush officials who "came to us and asked, ?'Can you help us find something on Saddam?'"

He also claims that he warned the Bush people that various Iraqi informants were unreliable, only to hear the Americans say, referring to the source, "This guy is the mother lode." Chalabi, of all people asks, "Can you believe that on such a basis the United States would go to war?

Chalabi has nothing to say about his leaks to Judith Miller of The New York Times, but Filkins does recall her famous email from 2003 when she boasted that Chalabi had "provided most of the front-apge exclusives on WMD to our paper."

David Kay, the weapons inspector, weighs in on Wolfowitz: "He was a true believer. He thought he had the evidence. That came from the defectors. They came from Chalabi."

Filkins concludes: "The gamble failed, a nation imploded and Chalabi never ascended to the throne he so coveted. But in an odd turn of fortune, the throne no longer had anything to offer."