4um: SIBEL EDMONDS SPEAKS TO UK SUNDAY TIMES: SAYS U.S. OFFICIALS INVOLVED IN RELEASE OF NUKE SECRETS TO TURKEY, PAKISTAN, IRAN, OTHERS, POSSIBLY EVEN AL-QAEDA

Title: SIBEL EDMONDS SPEAKS TO UK SUNDAY TIMES: SAYS U.S. OFFICIALS INVOLVED IN RELEASE OF NUKE SECRETS TO TURKEY, PAKISTAN, IRAN, OTHERS, POSSIBLY EVEN AL-QAEDA
Source: bradblog
URL Source: http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5518
Published: Jan 6, 2008
Author: Brad Friedman
Post Date: 2008-01-06 19:47:52 by robin
Keywords: None
Views: 677
Comments: 79

-- By Brad Friedman

[Updated with several significant items and additional info, at the end of the article.]

Sibel Edmonds, the former FBI translator who has been under a Bush administration gag order for the past 5 years, has now begun to disclose some of the classified information she has been prohibited from revealing.

"A WHISTLEBLOWER has made a series of extraordinary claims about how corrupt government officials allowed Pakistan and other states to steal nuclear weapons secrets," reports Great Britain's Sunday Times in the lede of their front page exclusive, headlined "For sale: West’s deadly nuclear secrets."

In the article, just filed tonight, Edmonds reveals details overheard on wiretaps she translated during her time at the FBI, just after 9/11. Her disclosures to the Times reveal a maze of nuclear black market espionage involving U.S. Defense and State Department officials, that resulted in the sale and propagation of nuclear secrets to Turkish and Israeli interests. In turn, that information was then sold to Pakistan and used by A.Q. Kahn for development of nuclear weapons. The secrets were subsequently proliferated to Iran, Libya, North Korea, and potentially al-Qaeda's Osama bin Laden, just weeks prior to September 11th, 2001.

The explosive allegations, shared with the Sunday Times over the last several weeks, follows on the heels of two reports published late last year by The BRAD BLOG, based on our own exclusive interviews with Edmonds.

While not everything Edmonds has to reveal is reported by the Times tonight, the foreign paper's front-page feature underscores, yet again, the failure of the U.S. mainstream media to adequately report on issues of extraordinary importance to American national security.

In late October, Edmonds had told The BRAD BLOG she was prepared to reveal the information to any major U.S. broadcast media outlet, after feeling that she had exhausted all efforts to see the disturbing information properly investigated by U.S. Government agencies. She had, in fact, spent years in classified interviews with high-ranking officials from the FBI, DoJ, 9/11 Commission and both houses of the U.S. Congress, in hopes of seeing accountability brought concerning the issues of national security, which the DoJ's own Inspector General had described as "credible," "serious," and "warrant[ing] a thorough and careful review by the FBI."

Despite broken promises for hearings on her case by U.S. Congressman Henry Waxman (D-CA), support from Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Patrick Leahy (D-MI), and a number of mainstream exposés several years ago detailing aspects of her story before she was willing to break her unprecedented "States Secrets Privilege" gag order, none of the American broadcast media outlets took her up on her offer.

"She has now decided to divulge some of that information after becoming disillusioned with the US authorities' failure to act," reports the Sunday Times tonight...

In our mid-November follow-up article, the legendary 1970's whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg had excoriated the U.S. media for their failure to cover the story, even as Edmonds was risking jail in order to expose crimes and massive corruption, allegedly, in the highest levels of the government. At the time, Ellsberg told us that he believed the information she had been forced by the Administration to withhold "is far more explosive than the Pentagon Papers."

Ellsberg is known for having released thousands of pages of top-secret Defense Department documents, concerning America's involvement in Vietnam, to the New York Times in 1971, in what became a landmark whistleblower case.

"I can tell the American public exactly what it is, and what it is that they are covering up," Edmonds had promised in our October article. But it was, in fact, a UK media outlet that finally took up the Turkish-born, American citizen's offer for the whistleblower interview. The result is the release of explosive details on at least one aspect of the U.S. national security-related secrets that she is now willing to disclose.

"What I found was damning," Edmonds tells the Times about the information she learned while at the FBI concerning the nuclear blackmarket activities and proliferation of several government agencies, including her own unit at the FBI. "While the FBI was investigating, several arms of the government were shielding what was going on."

Among the newly disclosed information from Edmonds, in the extraordinary front-page Times article tonight:

Ç9; Foreign intelligence agents from Turkey, Israel and Pakistan enlisted the support of high-level US officials in order to acquire a network of moles deep inside of sensitive American military and nuclear agencies, including "PhD students – with security clearance [at] Los Alamos nuclear laboratory in New Mexico, which is responsible for the security of the US nuclear deterrent."
Ç9; Members of the diplomatic community were given lists of potential "moles" at the sensitive installations. Edmonds tells the Times: "the lists contained all their 'hooking points', which could be financial or sexual pressure points, their exact job in the Pentagon and what stuff they had access to."
Ç9; Well-known US officials were then bribed by foreign agents to steal US nuclear secrets. One such incident from 2000 involves an agent overheard on a wiretap discussing "nuclear information that had been stolen from an air force base in Alabama," in which the agent allegedly is heard saying: "We have a package and we’re going to sell it for $250,000."
Ç9; Nuclear secrets were then subsequently sold by foreign agents to America's enemies, including Iran, North Korea and Libya.
Ç9; Pakistani officials involved in the nuclear black market network have significant cross-over with al-Qaeda and 9/11. Officials such as the chief of ISI, Pakistan's spy agency, allegedly sent $100,000 to 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta, and aides of A.Q. Kahn --- who had used the stolen secrets to develop nuclear weapons for Pakistan --- met with Osama bin Laden "weeks before 9/11...to discuss an Al-Qaeda nuclear device."

Ç9; Elements of the US government have repeatedly shut down investigations into these crimes under the guise of protecting "certain diplomatic relations."
Ç9; The US government has been aware of all of the above information since at least 2001.

Read the Times' full article for many more disturbing details and connected dots.

But we can add to at least one item of note in their report, concerning an unnamed "well-known senior official in the US State Department," allegedly heard to have received bribes as part of the network. According to the paper:

Among the hours of covert tape recordings, she says she heard evidence that one well-known senior official in the US State Department was being paid by Turkish agents in Washington who were selling the information on to black market buyers, including Pakistan.

The name of the official – who has held a series of top government posts – is known to The Sunday Times. He strongly denies the claims.

However, Edmonds said: “He was aiding foreign operatives against US interests by passing them highly classified information, not only from the State Department but also from the Pentagon, in exchange for money, position and political objectives.”

She claims that the FBI was also gathering evidence against senior Pentagon officials – including household names – who were aiding foreign agents.
...
"In one conversation Edmonds heard the official arranging to pick up a $15,000 cash bribe."
...
Edmonds said: “I heard at least three transactions like this over a period of 2½ years. There are almost certainly more.”

While that "well-known senior" State Department official is not named by the paper, Australia's Luke Ryland, who writes at a number of sites as "Lukery", is perhaps the world's foremost expert concerning the Sibel Edmonds story. Ryland has told The BRAD BLOG that the official, unnamed by the Times, is Marc Grossman.

Grossman was the U.S. Ambassador to Turkey ('94-'97), the Asst. Sec. of State for European Affairs ('97-'00) and served under Colin Powell and Richard Armitage at the State Department from 2001 to 2005 as the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs. He's currently employed as the Vice Chairman of the D.C. and China-based consulting firm, The Cohen Group, founded by the former Republican Defense Secretary for Bill Clinton, William S. Cohen.

"The Cohen Group provides global business consulting services and advice on tactical and strategic opportunities in virtually every market," advertises the firm on the front page of their website.

Additional information on a related angle of Grossman's alleged involvement in these matters was reported by the prolific Ryland in 2006, on his blog, WotIsItGood4.

"The senior official in the State Department [who] no longer works there" offered the Times this non-denial denial of Edmonds' allegations: "If you are calling me to say somebody said that I took money that’s outrageous," he reportedly said. "I do not have anything to say about such stupid ridiculous things as this."

Apparently, he also doesn't have anything to say, along the lines of "I never took any such money, or did any such thing," either.

"In researching this article, The Sunday Times has talked to two FBI officers (one serving, one former) and two former CIA sources who worked on nuclear proliferation," the paper writes. "While none was aware of specific allegations against officials she names, they did provide overlapping corroboration of Edmonds’s story."

In a 15-page 2005 exposé in Vanity Fair, concerning yet another, if perhaps-related, aspect of Edmonds' allegations, British reporter David Rose detailed charges of nearly $500,000 in bribes from Turkish interests, said to have been prepared for former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL). His attorney has denied those allegations, though, in another BRAD BLOG exclusive, Edmonds challenged specific details of the denial. Hastert recently resigned from Congress, sparking speculation for his sudden departure after reports by ABC News in 2006, that he was under DoJ investigation for bribery charges related to convicted Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

In our October story, Edmonds had told us that, in addition to Hastert, she was prepared to name and give details of corruption involving at least "two other well-known" members of Congress. She told us at the time that they are both Republicans from the U.S. House and "one of them is recently no longer there."

For more details on the Edmonds case, in an easy to read primer, see "What The Heck is the Sibel Edmonds Case Anyway? And Why Should You Care About It?", a recent BRAD BLOG item based, in part, on the reporting of Ryland.

Whether the Sunday Times story tonight will give permission to the U.S. corporate media to finally pick up the story, and cover the many still-unreported aspects of Edmonds' charges, remains to be seen.

If any of them wish to contact us, we'll be happy, as we've offered many times, to help put them in contact with her.

As our friend Joseph Cannon mentions tonight, in relation to our coverage of the at least 4-years-overdue New York Times Magazine's Sunday cover story on the disaster of e-voting: "Journalism delayed is journalism denied."

UPDATE 12:06pm: Several notable reactions, furtherances of today's Sunday Times front page stunner...

Ç9; As usual, Luke Ryland offers tons of info, analysis, links and background in his dKos coverage (cross-posted at Let Sibel Edmonds Speak). Just a couple of the notable passages offering additional context on the story, from his coverage today:

The Times article then notes something that I reported 18 months ago. Immediately after 911, the FBI arrested a bunch of people suspected of being involved with the attacks - including four associates of key targets of FBI's counterintelligence operations. Sibel heard the targets tell Marc Grossman: "We need to get them out of the US because we can’t afford for them to spill the beans." Grossman duly facilitated their release from jail and the suspects immediately left the country without further investigation or interrogation.
Let me repeat that for emphasis: The #3 guy at the State Dept facilitated the immediate release of 911 suspects at the request of targets of the FBI's investigation.

...and this...
high-level Pentagon officials were maintaining 'dossiers' on the sexual and financial proclivities of their underlings in order to be able to blackmail them.
I know that many of you have been (rightly) concerned about FISA, and many of you have (rightly) been confused by the inexplicable behaviour of Democrats in Congress, and wonder why they behave as though they are being blackmailed.
Now you know.

Ç9; Rightwing blogger and "9/11 conspiracy theory debunker", Pat Curley, a previous --- and we would add, irresponsible --- critic of Edmonds' at ScrewLooseChange, offers what can only be seen as an ersatz apology for his previous coverage, in his item on today's news. Still, we note he has yet to retract, or issue a specific apology to Edmonds, for comments made in his previous irresponsible coverage. Given the focus of the Screw Loose Change site, we'd think journalistic integrity would be paramount, and that he'd add a retraction/apology to his previous coverage, if he's actually had the change of heart today's post would seem to indicate.

Ç9; Blogger Joseph Cannon describes the piece as a "BOMBSHELL!" and offers additional details on Pakistan's ISI chief Mahmoud Ahmad --- who is central to the Times story, and Edmonds allegations --- including his relationship to both al-Qaeda, and a very cozy relationship with the neo-Cons in D.C. Writes Cannon:
Get the picture? Valerie Plame was trying to stop Khan in his tracks. But Armitage stopped Valerie Plame in her tracks. Armitage and his neocon comrades are good buddies with Mehmood Ahmad, who was engineering this trade in nukes.

Ç9; And, speaking of the Plame angle, her former CIA classmate, former CIA analyst Larry Johnson of NoQuarter notes this, about Edmonds claims of payoffs to Grossman, Hastert and others, in his coverage this morning:

The role that foreign money and intelligence officers have played in U.S. politics is not a Sibel Edmonds fantasy. The woman is simply trying to tell folks what she heard. This matter needs to be investigated. I do not believe that Sibel is making up what she heard.

UPDATE 1:14pm Further reaction from the 'sphere...

Ç9; Our friend, RAW STORY investigative journalist, Larisa Alexandrovna, a longtime expert on this particular foreign affairs/nuclear black market beat, adds some thoughts and details on her at-Largely blog (and also cross-posted to Huffington Post.)
She too confirms the unnamed State Dept. official from the story to be Marc Grossman, and writes: "The Times could have published the name and also provided the denial from Grossman's camp. I find it incredibly disturbing that they would not name the official."

Noting that her source for this information is not Edmonds, she also adds the following about some of the other unnamed officials referred to in the story:
Those senior DOD officials that are not mentioned the Times, all but one are no longer in government. They are alleged to be Doug Feith, Richard Perle, among others. There is also one person who is part of these allegations, still serving in a high level position at the DOD. His last name begins with an E.

...as she goes on to include this additional excoriation of the Times' unwillingness to name names, and of the dangers of outsourcing national security to the global marketplace:
That the Times ran these allegations (she is under a state secrets gag folks, so it is not like she is gagged for lying) is encouraging. But that they omitted all names from the allegations is unethical. The point of a free press is not to protect the powerful against the weak, but to protect the public from the powerful. The Times was willing to stick a toe in, but was not willing to risk upsetting a foreign government (This is, after all, a British paper).
There are more names, including members of Congress and people serving in the FBI. This is what happens when basic government services as well as the most sensitive government functions are outsourced to the global marketplace.
...

You can see why Edmonds had to be silenced for "diplomatic reasons." As though diplomatic (read: business) relationships are more important than national security.

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Lukery's Daily Kos thread gives the names of the officials involved. The high-ranking former State Department official is apparently Marc Grossman. Others involved are Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, Eric Edelman, Stephen Solarz, and possibly Paul Wolfowitz.

Those names -- and the article's mention of Israeli moles being involved -- very much raises the question of Israel's involvement in the criminal conspiracy. Perhaps this kind of conspiracy is how nuclear technology was originally transferred to Israel. Having used this mechanism to get nukes, cash-pressed Israel might later use the mechanism to sell nukes indirectly, and thus get money, and serve various foreign-policy goals as well.

The involvement of ISI and Gen. Ahmad raises the question of whether it was this conspiracy that arranged 9/11.

I understand from the Daily Kos thread that the Times of London actually mentions Gen. Ahmad's role in financing 9/11. If that is really the case, this is even more spectacular journalism than the Times of London's scoop on the Downing Street Memo.

To reason, indeed, he was not in the habit of attending. His mode of arguing, if it is to be so called, was one not uncommon among dull and stubborn persons, who are accustomed to be surrounded by their inferiors. He asserted a proposition; and, as often as wiser people ventured respectfully to show that it was erroneous, he asserted it again, in exactly the same words, and conceived that, by doing so, he at once disposed of all objections. - Macaulay, "History of England," Vol. 1, Chapter 6, on James II.

Brent, has the Times story relating to Sibel Edmonds hit the Canadian press yet?

The entire Times article is in post #3 of this thread. And palo posted the link as well.

Marc Grossman was appointed by Prez. clinton
I wonder if clinton was in cahoots with his traitorism...
that would explain why all of government protects Marc Grossman, no one will go up against bill clinton

I doubt President Ron Paul's AG will have the guts to go up aginst bill clinton either
as usual bill clinton gets away with anything, including collusion in traitorism..

Marc Grossman connived for our nuclear secrets to be stolen and sold to Pakistan
Pakistan made the bomb plus sold the info on the black market to North Korea and Iran

and according to Sibel Edmonds, Major Dickerson of US Air Force, before he was promoted,
sold the smuggled nuclear material on the black market

I don't see how President Ron Paul will stop any of this
it requires too much courage and fortitude to go up against bill clinton's crime syndicate

we will just have to live with serious criminality at the core of our government

all President Ron Paul will do is prevent our country going police state
and we will stop bombing innocent people
I guess that is enough

we can save our Constitution, but we cannot save our government being in cahoots with gangsters...

but I still won't reckon without God
altho I don't see light here, I am open-minded to idea there would be developments in unexpected ways
Love, Palo

Hi scrapper, Hi Brent
do you want to be pinged to my post above this
I didn't know who is following this story
Love, Palo

I hope you're wrong on this one palo, and that Dr. Paul finds a way. I'm not sure you have the correct label either, "Bill Clinton's crime syndicate", I would call it "Bush 41's crime syndicate" or "The Bush Crime Family and Friends".

Robin, you did superb to post this story
my mind was wholly on Ron Paul, I would have missed it if you had not posted it here
thank you
it matters so much
Love, Palo

I will email the link to London Times story to Drudge, be he hasn't wanted to touch Sibel Edmonds stuff so far

Hi Robin
I have labeled it correctly according to my own perception
I hope I am allowed to see things my own way, even if I am the only one who sees it this way

as for the future, of course I hope I am wrong, and President Ron Paul's AG goes after the traitors in our government
but I just don't see it right now

do you realize who is complicit in it
many members of our State Dept, FBI, DOD, and on and on
how can President Paul get all these traitors out of our government
esp. when both Parties are willing to protect them
even the US Supreme court protects them (Sibel brought her evidence to US Supreme Court, they refused to hear the case)

I just think President Paul will have too much on his plate
Congress will go to war with him about changing our foreign policy
plus go to war with him about getting rid of income tax

will he have his AG go after all the criminals in our government
I don't see it, but I hope and pray I am wrong
miracles do happen!!!!
I will pray
I would give anything for clean government
it enrages me someone is put into prison for years because for pot
when criminals and traitors flourish in our government and are making a fortune from our tax money

Absolutely! darling
you are right!
not only that, it matters far more
we will no longer shed innocent blood, and cause all that grief to their loved ones
we will no longer destroy all their homes and animals
and our citizens will enjoy liberty
that matters more than criminals in our government carrying out their criminal and traitorous activities
and at least they won't have their representative in the White House!!!!
Love, Palo

Congress is being blackmailed and bribed into not representing their constituents. They are agents of some powerful group or groups. Once there is no money for foreign aid, for foreign wars or for the military industrial complex, there will be fewer reasons to bribe Congress. That's my hope. Senior Bush spoke of a NWO before Slick, they all belong to Skull and Bones. I suspect they all answer to some powerful group (foreign and/or domestic), and that there is more than one power dynamic involved.

Does anyone think it is odd that Sibel told her story to a Rupert Murdoch paper?

altho according to Sibel, the heroin is brought in from the East
illegal arms are sold on the black market
and it is the money from these 2 things which goes into the Congressmen's campaigns

You are right tho!
because the other side of it, the vast money in our Treasury (our tax money)
which goes to military industrial complex and foreign aid
which then is used to buy all the Generals and Congressmen etc
this money will no longer be there with President Ron Paul, hopefully
this is why we will not have the same foreign policy
It will be a great thing President Ron Paul's administration
it won't get rid of the gangsterism in government
but it will stop the military industrial complex from controlling our government, to serve their greed
Love, Palo

foreign aid money is used to buy US weapons
that is why it is connected up with military industrial complex

I'm not
I thought from the get-go if she continues to act impeccably she would be protected by God
it is God's work she is doing, she is shedding light in the darkness
and bringing darkness to light
She is the most courageous person on our planet imho
I love her and I am so grateful to her
She is a great American hero, and should be celebrated as long as history exists
Let God bless her and protect her always, and her family too
Love, Palo

Jersey Mum Patty Casazza discusses the trouble establishing the 911 Commission and the significance of Sibel Edmonds' testimony.

There has been zero mass media coverage of Sibel (until this article yesterday)
and it is in a London newspaper
so how would our fellow citizens even know what she has evidence of

I emailed the London Times article to Drudge and to Brit Hume at Fox News
also to some of my friends
one of my friends just wrote back she had already read it, because she switched from Whitney Strieber's site to Jeff Rense's
Rense linked to the article there and she downloaded it
my friend is immensely pleased Sibel is getting some press coverage finally
I am very grateful to Jeff Rense for posting the Sibel article on his site
The more who read it, the better
Love and kisses, Palo

If America is destroyed, it may be by Americans who salute the flag, sing the national anthem, march in patriotic parades, cheer Fourth of July speakers - normally good Americans who fail to comprehend what is required to keep our country strong and free - Americans who have been lulled into a false security (April 1968).---Ezra Taft Benson, US Secretary of Agriculture 1953-1961 under Eisenhower

Mehmet Ali Aca, the man who tried to assassinate Pope John Paul II, was a member of the Gray Wolves.

I'm against capital punishment, yet find myself lamenting the demise of the electric chair. Lethal injection - well, that's never going to happen to these traitorous bastards anyway, so we might as well have some fun with this fantasy we call justice. When I brought this up at work one person was lobbying for firing squad, but I think that should be reserved for professional military. Then we went to hangings, but I felt even that carries a sort of outlaw mystique, and I can't imagine Perle rustling his own cattle.

Pending fair trial of course I think Shock and Awe of electric chair is fitting justice for these warmongering thugs.

"Most of the trouble in this world has been caused by folks who can't mind their own business, because they have no business of their own to mind, any more than a smallpox virus has." - William S Burroughs