If You Can't Beat 'Em, Hire 'Em:

There's a new policy livening things up over at the Pentagon. Israeli-trained US Special Forces are planning to set up a "hit squad" of former Baathist Iraqi intelligence officers, men who could get the dirt on resistance leaders and ideally, kill them. That such a remarkable plan is even being considered indicates the desperation gripping the Bush Administration, as Iraq's deadly resistance campaign continues.

The controversial policy of targeted assassinations has been carried out clumsily and over large areas (Afghanistan) as well as efficiently (the missile attack that took out a suspected al Qaeda leader in Yemen last November). However, questions of efficacy aside, there is also the issue of ethical actions, especially when a morally self-righteous blusterer like America is performing them. Charges veteran journalist and former military man Charley Reese:

"…the idea is to hire some of the worst of the worst – members of Saddam's old secret police – to infiltrate the resistance and finger key players for the American murder squads. Thus, we climb in bed with the very people our boy president likes to moralize about – those dreaded evildoers. Only now they will be evildoers on our payroll instead of Saddam's. Only now, instead of bringing democratic values to Iraq, we will show the Iraqis we are just as good at murder as Saddam."

Rumsfeld's 'Manhunt': Gladly Seeking Out Monsters

Not just antiwar critics are concerned about Defense Secretary Rumsfeld's enthusiastic backing for this "Manhunt" policy, one that by virtue of its method is being relegated to the shadows. Even Establishment opponents fear that Rumsfeld's increasing use of the secrecy-bound Special Forces will allow the Pentagon to remain largely unaccountable before Congress and the public. Coming from Rumsfeld, this is hardly a surprise; the tactic was used with his "Office of Special Plans," a pseudo-intelligence lie factory set up to tell the Secretary what he wanted to hear about Iraq and its potential threat to the United States in the run-up to the war.

Now, however, the executor of that operation – Undersecretary for Defense Doug Feith – is being pushed aside, according to another comprehensive exposé from the New Yorker's Seymour Hersh. Yet this neocon's apparent fall from favor should not be taken to mean that Rumsfeld has tired of the movement – much to the contrary, the transition from Special Plans to Special Forces indicates that Rumsfeld is championing not just neoconservatism, but neoconservatism on steroids. Hersh provides more details about the new policy:

"…they (the Americans) plan to assemble teams drawn from the upper ranks of the old Iraqi intelligence services and train them to penetrate the insurgency. The idea is for the infiltrators to provide information about individual insurgents for the Americans to act on. A former C.I.A. station chief described the strategy in simple terms: 'U.S. shooters and Iraqi intelligence.' He added, 'There are Iraqis in the intelligence business who have a better idea, and we're tapping into them. We have to resuscitate Iraqi intelligence, holding our nose, and have Delta and agency shooters break down doors and take them' – the insurgents – 'out.'"

Rumsfeld's New Yes-Men

According to Hersh, the men who now have Rumsfeld's ear are Under-Secretary for Intelligence Stephen Cambone and his assistant, Lieutenant General William Boykin. The former's neoconservative logic harmonizes with the Rumsfeldian one that led to the Office of Special Plans. Cambone argues that "…intelligence agencies should be willing to go beyond the data at hand in their analyses." Indeed, he does seem to fit the bill:

"'…Rumsfeld's been looking for somebody to have all the answers, and Steve is the guy,' a former high-level Pentagon official told me. 'He has more direct access to Rummy than anyone else.'"

As for Lieutenant General Boykin, his faith-based intelligence is far more literal. A fundamentalist Christian, he has gotten into trouble for claiming that God ordains and protects America's wars against the Islamic "Satan," and that all manner of phenomena – such as a smudged picture evidently indicating the maleficent presence of demons – can be interpreted in this context.

Despite these rather unorthodox views, Boykin has achieved great popularity in Washington for his martial zeal and can-do attitude. Most importantly, Boykin also has experience with the kind of targeted assassination program Rumsfeld and Cambone are pushing. In 1993, Boykin was in charge of a Delta Force mission to hunt down Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar, and a little later commanded the infamous Mogadishu raid, meant to capture a Somali warlord, which instead ended in death, ignominy, and a box-office hit.

Rambo Reasoning

Hersh records other backers of the plan who express even burlier bravado:

"…a former intelligence official said that getting inside the Baathist leadership could be compared to 'fighting your way into a coconut – you bang away and bang away until you find a soft spot, and then you can clean it out.' An American who has advised the civilian authority in Baghdad said, 'The only way we can win is to go unconventional. We're going to have to play their game. Guerrilla versus guerrilla. Terrorism versus terrorism. We've got to scare the Iraqis into submission.'"

Despite this gung-ho fervor, one suspects that the project might not be as easy as it seems. ABC News recently interviewed unnamed "Pentagon officials" regarding the appearance of resistance spies within the newly-established Iraqi police force. The dismaying response from the Pentagon officials – who have consistently gone out of their way to say that Iraq will not be another Vietnam – was that they "…were not surprised about the infiltration. It is a common tactic that certainly happened in Vietnam, they said."

According to the report, the main reason that the US ended up hiring Iraqis with malevolent intentions was "hastiness" in the vetting process. Still, considering the pressure being put on President Bush to both lower the American death toll and speed up the transition to an Iraqi-run government, time is not a luxury now available to the US. Besides, even if there were time to properly "vet" the recruits, who could possibly separate the "good" guys from the bad? Has America penetrated Iraqi society so well that its soldiers can tell the difference? Or should they just rely on the input of well-meaning "allies," like Ahmad Chalabi?

The answer to these questions is, of course, no. And the Pentagon seems to have accepted this. As the desire to win hearts and minds continues to wane, war planners have changed tack entirely. For rather than recruit Iraqis who might be good, they're going to hire the ones they know to be the worst. It's one way of being sure, alright.

Will It Be Another Vietnam? Do They Even Care?

This is essentially what the zealots quoted above are alluding to when they speak of "holding our noses" while working with the Iraqis, of somehow "going unconventional." Yet is this operating procedure really so unusual for the Americans? Some have argued that the plan has a lot in common with the Phoenix Program, a disastrous campaign aimed at eliminating Vietcong sympathizers. From 1968-72, somewhere between 20,000 and 40,000 people were killed – many of them innocent civilians. Then there were the personal grudge killings set up by South Vietnamese "allies." Reminiscing on that war which allegedly bears no resemblance to today's, Charley Reese recounts:

"…another friend of mine, on loan to the CIA from the Green Berets, paid Nung mercenaries $5 for each Vietnamese head they brought in. They brought them in by the croaker sack full, but of course a severed head can't tell you if the person who used to wear it was a Viet Cong or just a poor farmer the Nungs happened upon. After all, they hated all the Vietnamese without regard for ideology.

"The same thing will happen in Iraq. Our paid evildoers will finger people they have a personal grudge against or, if they are smart, innocent Iraqis actually on our side. That way our death squads will endear us to the Iraqi people just as the Israeli death squads have endeared them to the Palestinians."

A similar opinion was expressed by a Pentagon advisor and expert on unconventional warfare interviewed by Seymour Hersh:

"'…there are people saying all sorts of wild things about Manhunts,' he said. 'But they aren't at the policy level. It's not a no-holds policy, and it shouldn't be. I'm as tough as anybody, but we're also a democratic society, and we don't fight terror with terror. There will be a lot of close controls – do's and don'ts and rules of engagement.' The adviser added, 'the problem is that we've not penetrated the bad guys. The Baath Party is run like a cell system. It's like penetrating the Vietcong – we never could do it.'"

And, speaking of the Iraqis, a critical former Special Forces officer added:

"'…these guys have their own agenda. Will we be doing hits (based) on grudges? When you set up host-nation elements' – units composed of Iraqis, rather than Americans – 'it's hard not to have them going off to do what they want to do. You have to keep them on a short leash.'"

Is the Program Already in Place?

However, the targeted assassination policy has many more enthusiastic backers, and especially after the capture of Saddam, it should be an easy sell. In the Pentagon today, the sentiment seems to be that since the US has suffered enough, the answer is not to pack up and go home – but simply to step up the brutality. As one former CIA official and supporter bloviated, "…we did the American things – and we've been the nice guy. Now we're going to be the bad guy, and being the bad guy works."

Whether or not this is true, Rumsfeld and Cambone are certainly going to give it their all, and this will mean increased usage of "off the books" units – for example, the ultra-secret Task Force 121, created in November to hunt down Saddam. Buoyed by his successful capture, the "Manhunt" amen corner is bound to get louder in the days and weeks ahead.

Yet what if the policy gets "out of control," as Seymour Hersh stated about the Vietnam-era Phoenix Program? There are two likely problem areas here: one, the clandestine cooperation with Israel; and two, the Pentagon's zeal for "cross-border raids." A recent report from the Guardian described the Israeli training program – and its potential fallout:

"'…this is basically an assassination programme. That is what is being conceptualised here. This is a hunter-killer team,' said a former senior US intelligence official, who added that he feared the new tactics and enhanced cooperation with Israel would only inflame a volatile situation in the Middle East.

"'It is bonkers, insane. Here we are – we're already being compared to Sharon in the Arab world, and we've just confirmed it by bringing in the Israelis and setting up assassination teams.'"

The same source alleged that US Special Forces are also operating in Syria, "attempting to kill foreign jihadists before they cross the border." It is this logic of deterrence more than anything that may invite serious problems for America and the whole Middle East region.

According to Hersh, there is currently a "debate" raging within the Bush Administration about whether the same type of "cross-border raids" should be conducted against Iran. Suspecting that Tehran may be behind the Iraq insurgency, the War Party has come up with the brilliant idea of unleashing the "worst of the worst" from Saddam's former loyalists on Iranian government troops. Now that would be a great idea.

Rumsfeld and the Assassins