Peris
11-06-2008, 01:43 PM
Turkish soldiers and CIA teams were nearly involved in an armed clash during America's invasion of Iraq in 2003, according to a former agent for the U.S. intelligence service.
Charles Sam Faddis, who led a CIA team into northern Iraq following the 9/11 attacks, claimed the Turkish armed forces, or TSK, hampered the CIA's covert operations in the region in 2002 and 2003, daily Milliyet reported yesterday.
According to Faddis' recently published book Operation Hotel California: The Clandestine War Inside Iraq, the CIA's counter-terror agents entered northern Iraq on June 7, 2002, despite opposition by the TSK. He said his team was supposed to guide members of the U.S. Army 10th Special Forces Group into an area of northern Iraq where a local Kurdish terrorist group, Ansar al Islam, was giving shelter to al-Qaeda leaders who had fled across Iran from the U.S. bombing in Afghanistan. The cooperation between the CIA and the Kurdish peshmergas started with this operation, according to Faddis.
We had proof that al-Qaeda manufactured chemical weapons near Kurmal and Sargat. We needed authorization from the White House, as well as guns and choppers to be sent via Turkey. However Turkey did not allow the operation and the White House did not gave the green light,he wrote.
According to the book, the friction of Faddis' team with the TSK became apparent after February 2003. We needed supplies from the Incirlik base for covert operations. We needed TSK's authorization for each operation and the procedures that took weeks made our job very difficult. The commander in Silopi (a district of Şırnak in eastern Turkey) was really disturbed by our presence in the region, he wrote.
A high-level official from the CIA came to the region to observe the situation. TSK officials said they wanted to send their observers to the meetings a demand rejected by the CIA. The commander of the special operations unit in Silopi got really upset. One day he came to a meeting in Salahaddin and said the CIA official would be arrested if he crossed the Turkish border,he wrote.
Afterwards Faddis said they prepared for an armed clash, warning, Turkish soldiers might die if anything would happen to the CIA official.
In the end somebody tipped off the commander in Silopi and the chief crossed the border. We would follow him even to Ankara if necessary, Faddis said.
In his book Faddis also claimed Turkey prevented the Kurds from entering Mosul for two years and that it led to a two-year civil war in Iraq, as well as the revival of al-Qaeda in Mosul. Faddis suggested that the United States should give independence to the Kurds and remove all TSK elements from northern Iraq.
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=118571
Charles Sam Faddis, who led a CIA team into northern Iraq following the 9/11 attacks, claimed the Turkish armed forces, or TSK, hampered the CIA's covert operations in the region in 2002 and 2003, daily Milliyet reported yesterday.
According to Faddis' recently published book Operation Hotel California: The Clandestine War Inside Iraq, the CIA's counter-terror agents entered northern Iraq on June 7, 2002, despite opposition by the TSK. He said his team was supposed to guide members of the U.S. Army 10th Special Forces Group into an area of northern Iraq where a local Kurdish terrorist group, Ansar al Islam, was giving shelter to al-Qaeda leaders who had fled across Iran from the U.S. bombing in Afghanistan. The cooperation between the CIA and the Kurdish peshmergas started with this operation, according to Faddis.
We had proof that al-Qaeda manufactured chemical weapons near Kurmal and Sargat. We needed authorization from the White House, as well as guns and choppers to be sent via Turkey. However Turkey did not allow the operation and the White House did not gave the green light,he wrote.
According to the book, the friction of Faddis' team with the TSK became apparent after February 2003. We needed supplies from the Incirlik base for covert operations. We needed TSK's authorization for each operation and the procedures that took weeks made our job very difficult. The commander in Silopi (a district of Şırnak in eastern Turkey) was really disturbed by our presence in the region, he wrote.
A high-level official from the CIA came to the region to observe the situation. TSK officials said they wanted to send their observers to the meetings a demand rejected by the CIA. The commander of the special operations unit in Silopi got really upset. One day he came to a meeting in Salahaddin and said the CIA official would be arrested if he crossed the Turkish border,he wrote.
Afterwards Faddis said they prepared for an armed clash, warning, Turkish soldiers might die if anything would happen to the CIA official.
In the end somebody tipped off the commander in Silopi and the chief crossed the border. We would follow him even to Ankara if necessary, Faddis said.
In his book Faddis also claimed Turkey prevented the Kurds from entering Mosul for two years and that it led to a two-year civil war in Iraq, as well as the revival of al-Qaeda in Mosul. Faddis suggested that the United States should give independence to the Kurds and remove all TSK elements from northern Iraq.
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=118571