Sibel Edmonds, Turkey, Pakistan, and Nuclear Secrets

[mmonk]

She approached The Sunday Times last month after reading about an Al-Qaeda terrorist who had revealed his role in training some of the 9/11 hijackers while he was in Turkey.

-snip-

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.

-snip-

Her story shows just how much the West was infiltrated by foreign states seeking nuclear secrets. It illustrates how western government officials turned a blind eye to, or were even helping, countries such as Pakistan acquire bomb technology

-snip-

They were helped, she says, by the high-ranking State Department official who provided some of their moles – mainly PhD students – with security clearance to work in sensitive nuclear research facilities. These included the Los Alamos nuclear laboratory in New Mexico, which is responsible for the security of the US nuclear deterrent.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article3137695.ece

Thanks to lukery for calling this article to my attention.

[rodeodance]

1. Turkey is deep in shit with this issue.

......One of the Pentagon figures under investigation was Lawrence Franklin, a former Pentagon analyst, who was jailed in 2006 for passing US defence information to lobbyists and sharing classified information with an Israeli diplomat.

“He was one of the top people providing information and packages during 2000 and 2001,” she said.

Once acquired, the nuclear secrets could have gone anywhere. The FBI monitored Turkish diplomats who were selling copies of the information to the highest bidder.

Edmonds said: “Certain greedy Turkish operators would make copies of the material and look around for buyers. They had agents who would find potential buyers.”

[mmonk]

2. Yes.

And it seems the effort to thwart counterintelligence on this issue was successful and helped by some member of the state department. I really think corruption in our government has reached a critical level and needs to be investigated and revealed (of course there has been an investigation, but states secrets has been involved to protect those involved).

[porphyrian]

3. I'll kick that. -n/t

[AP]

4. Why all the 'manufactured' stories about security at Los Alamos, like Wen Ho Lee,

when the US gov't is sitting on this type of evidence?

And does anyone feel safer now that Bechtel, BWX Technologies, and Washington Group International are the new partners with University of California who manage security at Los Alamos?

Anyone interested in connecting dots, here's an interesting story:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/24/national/main2122004.shtml

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/11/03/national/main2151021.shtml

[mmonk]

6. The problem we have is semi-legitimate groups

tied to different interests. A major component of these semi-legitimate "groups" are major corporate interests. This is a bad mix.

[HamdenRice]

5. Sibel is violating her gag order; also linking nuclear blackmarket, moles, 9/11

She also seems to be linking the nuclear network, Pentagon mole and 9/11 stories together.

A must read:

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.

...

She claims that the FBI was also gathering evidence against senior Pentagon officials – including household names – who were aiding foreign agents.

...


The Pakistani operation was led by General Mahmoud Ahmad, then the ISI chief... Intelligence analysts say that members of the ISI were close to Al-Qaeda before and after 9/11. Indeed, Ahmad was accused of sanctioning a $100,000 wire payment to Mohammed Atta, one of the 9/11 hijackers, immediately before the attacks.

<end quote>

Thanks.

[mmonk]

7. Yes, but she would be violating her gag order

if she were pulled over on a traffic offense and produced her license to the officer that pulled her over (since even her birthday falls under the order).

[HamdenRice]

8. ROFL! Yup, and if she repeated her testimony to Congressional staff as well nt

[The Backlash Cometh]

9. Damn frightening. Damn frightening.

So Sibel's information will give us answers to who was responsible for the Loa Alamos breach? Way back to the Clinton years?

[mmonk]

12. Some of the tapes for translation were pre-9/11.

[The Backlash Cometh]

15. Wow. Just wow.

And you know that the Republicans had to know something about this, all the time they were blaming Clinton for everything. It seems the real culprits will be breaches in our own government agencies. People who have way too much interaction with corporations.

[mmonk]

16. Revolving door syndrome.

Government work to lobbyist after government work.

[The Backlash Cometh]

21. I think most of us are convinced that this style of relationship between

business and government is a National Security problem.

That's the secret that they want to keep from us.

It doesn't work at a local level either.

[HamdenRice]

10. Bradblog: Sibel will reveal US officials HELPED recruit Turkish, Pakistani, Israeli moles

Bradblog, commenting on the Times expose, says that Sibel has more to reveal, including US officials helping foreign governments recruit nuclear moles and US officials assisting foreign governments in blackmail, bribery of other US officials to recruit moles:

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5518

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.

...

● Foreign intelligence agents from Turkey, Israel, Pakistan and Turkey 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 Los Alamos nuclear laboratory in New Mexico, which is responsible for the security of the US nuclear deterrent."

● 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."

...

● 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."

[mmonk]

11. Thanks for the Bradblog link.

[lukery]

13. Marc Grossman

The unidentified State Dept official is Marc Grossman
Bio: http://cohengroup.net/about/teammember.cfm?id=5

[mmonk]

14. Thanks very much.

[eek]

17. Armenian Genocide Resolution?

This summer, the Congressional battle for passage of the Armeniam Genocide Resolution took up what felt to me like an awful lotta time, ink, political capital and so on.

I was baffled by what the complicated backstory must have been.


This latest from the Sibel Edmonds saga caused me to look back a bit.
It seems worth noting who was For, who was Against that resolution.
Further interesting is the membership of the American Turkish Council.


Not that I know why this seems interesting, mind, it just looks "dotty".



That Sibel Edmonds is one heckuva brave person.

[mmonk]

19. You got it.

Influence.

[bluesmail]

18. A Kick

and a recommend for her tenacious bravery. AND on the front page of The Sunday Times

[lukery]

20. thread hijack

My post on this is here
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2609572