Skimming the transcripts

I've skimmed a bunch more of the transcripts in the Iraqi documents, most of which seem to date to somewhere in 1994-95 (no dates are given anywhere, but the discussions concern Resolution 986 and Rolf Ekeus as head of UNSCOM).   They're all in English, so no special Arabic skills required - just a willingness to download lots of unsorted PDF files, and to try to figure out who's talking and what they're talking about (hint: a background in the microscopic details of a decade's worth of UN Security Council resolution negotiations and UNSCOM protocols will help). They can make for deadly dull reading at times, especially without context, but often can be absolutely fascinating - the interplay between Saddam and Tareq Aziz and others isn't always what you'd expect (or at least what I would have expected).  There's a lot of top-level discussion of the minutae of the UNSCOM inspections, Rolf Ekeus, and the various players at the Security Council, as well as intriguing glimpses into what these Iraqi leaders thought of various Arab leaders (King Hussein, Hosni Mubarak, King Hassan of Jordan, and Yasir Arafat all come up at various points in transcripts I've read so far - none of them in a particularly flattering light).   A couple of perhaps interesting points jump out:

• In the Iraqi view, Ekeus's UNSCOM was very effective.  The transcripts are full of complaints about his effectiveness and thoroughness.  In one (DOCEX Saddam 030306), Tareq Aziz tells Saddam, "Sir, since 1993, July 1993, when the leadership was instructed to cooperate technically with Ekeus and the technical committees, these people did a hell of a job. This is how I describe it. Ekeus did not miss a single thing, a lie, or data without raising it, and they discussed it with him and resolved them."  There are lots of discussions throughout of how to deal with Ekeus's questions - showing an obvious intent to deceive, but that they were having a hard time doing so.   They also doubt Ekeus's ability to stand up to the US, or his willingness to do so.
• At least in this time period, Iraq's leaders did not seem to view the French as a reliable ally.  The transcripts are full of concerns about the French.  ("The French, Sir, are tricky, really tricky" is my favorite line in DOCEX Saddam 030306.)  There are some remarks to the effect that the elections might change things, and positive references to Chirac pop up. 
• On WMD, everyone seems to share the basic understanding that there were no nuclear or chemical weapons left, but that the biological weapons file was a problem. Tareq Aziz (in DOCEX Saddam 030306) says flat out: "we played the rules of the game and we paied the price, Sir. We paid the price. In 1991, our weapons were destroyed. We destroyed the whole nuclear program and they also destroyed it.  We also destroyed the missiles with our hands and their hands.  The main factories were destroyed."   There was disagreement over whether Iraq could prove this to UNSCOM, but none really over their existence.  Of course, this might have all been stage-managed for Saddam's benefit, or reflect genuine ignorance on the part of officials in a highly compartmentalized regime, but that's what they were saying. 

Like I wrote last night, though, it would be a mistake to draw any strong or overly excited conclusions on either side of any serious debate (about WMD, about al-Qaeda, about France, about anything) from a few documents deemed by the DNI to be of "no intelligence value." 

In a way the seemingly random nature of the documents I've read so far is somewhat reassuring - at least in the transcripts, there doesn't seem to be an overwhelmingly obvious selection bias. If anything, the randomness (combined with the absence of any dates or context) makes it seem like the DNI is taking pains to not go out of its way to make things easy for researchers, which would fit with its evidently grudging agreement with releasing them in the first place.  Whatever the case, I'm finding them fascinating independently of the question of new information or revelations - just really interesting to read them, and looking forward to more. 

Comments

[collounsbury]

King Hassan of Jordan?

[aardvark]

King Hassan of Morocco. There's a long section on the jealousy and lack of trust between the two.