The Political Conundrum!

The Jihadists’ Revolt Against Al Qaeda: Why Some of Al Qaeda’s Old Allies Have Turned Against It

Tuesday, September 23, 10 am, 2255 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC

Co-sponsored by New America Foundation and The Counterterrorism Foundation

Participants:

Peter Bergen, Schwartz Senior Fellow, New America Foundation

Paul Cruickshank, Fellow, Center on Law and Security, New York University School of Law

Evan Kohlmann, Senior Investigator, NEFA Foundation

Stephen Coughlin, Visiting Fellow, International Strategy & Assessment Center

Andrew Cochran, Moderator
Co-Chairman, Counterterrorism Foundation and Founder & Site Editor, Counterterrorism Blog

Guest Commentator: Maajid Nawaz, Director, Quilliam Foundation

Seats are limited. Please RSVP to Andrew Cochran

A new "Strategic Command" may be in the Air Force's future, as a Pentagon advisory group recommended Friday that the service, which has been embarrassed by a series of nuclear-related mishaps, should consolidate its now-divided nuclear weapons responsibilities under a single organization.

Previously unseen footage emerged Sept. 11 showing Republican presidential candidate John McCain as a proud, stoic prisoner of war in Hanoi on the day his Vietnamese captors released him to the U.S. military.

Yesterday, Center for Terrorism Research (CTR) adjunct fellow Bill Roggio posted an important report at the Long War Journal. He noted that a series of letters intercepted by Multinational Forces-Iraq—letters that chronicle the communications between al-Qaeda deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Ayyub al-Masri, and Islamic State of Iraq leader Abu Omar al-Baghdadi—sheds light on how “Al Qaeda’s senior leadership has lost confidence in its commander in Iraq and views the situation in the country as dire.” These communications highlight divisions in the organization, the failures in its leadership, and problems with communications and propaganda efforts.

Today the Center for Terrorism Research provides an exclusive translation of these important documents, courtesy of CTR research fellow Tony Badran. We believe that this translation constitutes an important primary document for understanding the current state of the al-Qaeda network inside Iraq. To see the translation, click here.

The news that both Bolivia and Venezuela, whose presidents are staunch allies and friends, have chosen to expel the respective U.S. ambassadors is the most visible evidence of the frayed relations the United States now has with much of Latin America.

As my colleague Andrew Cochran wrote the United States then immediately took the step of designating the three most visible Venezuelan officials whose ties to the FARC were clearly established.

What is amazing is that, until this blow-up, U.S. officials in different departments of the government, have been minimizing the well-documented alliance, as well as other issues discussed below, that have made Latin America a far different place than it was five years ago.

Unfortunately, with the exception of Colombia policy, there has been virtually no policy toward Latin America, and the festering issues there have been left to fester.

As a friend said after recently sitting through a 50-minute briefing by a senior government official on security issues facing Latin America without once mentioning Venezuela, Iran or Russia, the presentation was a true "tour de force."

This was because the official managed to never mention any of the burning issues, instead painting a relatively upbeat picture of the regions as a free trade, democratic region in the full flower of health.

Much of the evidence against the three designated Venezuelans: Hugo Armando Carvajal (head of military intelligence); Henry de Jesus Rangel (director of intelligence); and Ramon Emilio Rodriguez Chacin (former minister of defense and interior) comes from the computer of Raul Reyes, the FARC's deputy commander killed in Ecuador by Colombian forces on March 1.

The Reyes documents (which I have analyzed in this NEFA Foundation paper clearly outline the role of the three in protecting the FARC, meeting regularly with FARC leadership and discussing weapons shipments with the rebels.

The FARC moves its some 250 kilos of cocaine, largely Europe-bound, through Venezuela, and internal FARC documents show that the shipments are often escorted by Venezuelan military or intelligence officials to the ports from which they are embarked, in order to insure the drugs' safe transit. My full blog is here.

This morning, after Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez publicly ran the U.S. Ambassador out of the country, the U.S. Treasury department announced that two current and one former senior Venezuelan officials will be designated under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (the “Kingpin Act”). The designation indicates that the U.S. has proof that the Chavez officials are playing a siginifcant role in international drug trafficking on their own or providing material support to another person designated under the Act for drug trafficking - in this case, the FARC in Colombia. In short, the United States caught the Chavez government red-handed helping the worst narco-terrorists in the Western Hemisphere. From the press release:

“Today’s designation exposes two senior Venezuelan government officials and one former official who armed, abetted, and funded the FARC, even as it terrorized and kidnapped innocents,” said Adam J. Szubin, Director of OFAC... Hugo Armando Carvajal Barrios is the Director of Venezuela’s Military Intelligence Directorate (DGIM). His assistance to the FARC includes protecting drug shipments from seizure by Venezuelan anti-narcotics authorities and providing weapons to the FARC, allowing them to maintain their stronghold of the coveted Arauca Department... Carvajal Barrios also provides the FARC with official Venezuelan government identification documents that allow FARC members to travel to and from Venezuela with ease... Henry de Jesus Rangel Silva, the Director of Venezuela’s Directorate of Intelligence and Prevention Services or DISIP... has materially assisted the narcotics trafficking activities of the FARC. He has also pushed for greater cooperation between the Venezuelan government and the FARC... Ramon Emilio Rodriguez Chacin, who was Venezuela’s Minister of Interior and Justice until September 8, is the Venezuelan government’s main weapons contact for the FARC. The FARC uses its proceeds from narcotics sales to purchase weapons from the Venezuelan government... Rodriguez Chacin has held numerous meetings with senior FARC members, one of which occurred at the Venezuelan government’s Miraflores Palace in late 2007. Rodriguez Chacin has also assisted the FARC by trying to facilitate a $250 million dollar loan from the Venezuelan government to the FARC in late 2007. We cannot confirm whether the loan materialized."

Treasury also released an Adobe Acrobat file with the links between the three officials designated today and specific FARC leaders.

This is the most serious official measure by the Bush Administration against the Chavez government, and I wouldn't be surprised to see more designations of Venezuelan, and perhaps Bolivian, officials. Obviously this has been in the works for some time. I would surmise that the level of investigative work and the interagency discussions which led to to this announcement gave Chavez just enough intel upon which to make a pre-emptive strike and dismiss our ambassador.

This site has been among the leaders in the coverage of Chavez's assistance to the FARC in posts by Douglas Farah (see his archives); Jonathan Winer (see his archives); and Aaron Mannes (see his archives).

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev today likened Georgian military action against its breakaway province of South Ossetia to the September 11 attacks on the United States.

A C-17 Globemaster III airlift crew from McChord Air Force Base scrambled to rescue a scientist at McMurdo Station on Sept. 10, Air Force officials say.

The commander of the U.S. Navy's Fourth Fleet said his forces were keeping an eye on Russian Blackjack bombers that have landed in Venezuela for training exercises - but he dismissed the deployment as a major challenge to the United States.

Twisted chunks of steel torn from the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, will be displayed aboard a new Navy ship named after Arlington County, Va.