Shaphan

Robin Cook, the Database and Secrets

On the day after the July 7th, 2005 bombings on London transport, former foreign secretary Robin Cook MP wrote what turned out to be his penultimate newspaper column for the Guardian.  In it he revealed something about al-Qaeda that perhaps he shouldn't have.

Bin Laden was, though, a product of a monumental miscalculation by western security agencies.  Throughout the 80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. 

Al-Qaida, literally "the database", was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians.  Inexplicably, and with disastrous consequences, it never appears to have occurred to Washington that once Russia was out of the way, Bin Laden's organisation would turn its attention to the west.

As far as I know, this was the first time publicly, in the anglophone world, that the al-Qaeda name had been explained as referring to a computer database.

In the francophone world, a colourful former French military intelligence officer, Pierre-Henri Bunel, had had a book published in 2004, "Proche-Orient, une guerre mondiale?", extracts of which appeared [in French] on a French conspiracy website.  The extract went into some detail of how al-Qaeda originally referred to a computer database of Islamist fighters.  But, AFAIK, it was not until after Robin Cook had revealed the same in the Guardian, and after his death a month later, that an English translation of Bunel's words appeared on the web.  It's a rough translation, which doesn't read well.  But the basic outline of his account accords with what Cook had revealed.

Here's my suspicion:  that Robin Cook knew nothing about P-H Bunel's book or article, and that his knowledge of the origin of the Qaeda name stemmed solelyfrom his time at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.  In other words, that both men had, independently of each other, revealed that, as they understood it, the designation 'al-Qaeda' had originally referred to a computer database.  And, according to Bunel, that that name had been operative at least by the mid-'80s.

But yesterday MI5 the government published its 'narrative' of the July 7th bombings [.pdf].  Annex 3 of the whitewash was a chronology of the development of modern jihadism.  Extract:

c1984   Radical preacher Abdullah Azzam set up an organisation called Maktab al-Khidmat (MAK) "Bureau of Services" to disseminate propaganda about jihad in Afghanistan.  Usama bin Laden (UbL) joins.

1989   Withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan.  UbL returns to Saudi Arabia.  Decision by MAK to continue to support jihadist causes.  Thinking around "the base" or "foundation" (translation: Al Qaida) for further operations articulated.

1988-89   UbL disagreement over focus of the cause and starts to form Al Qaida. [...]

So, MI5's version of the aetiology of the 'Qaeda' name makes no mention of computer databases, or its use by western intelligence agencies before 1989, and it repeats previous explanations as to its origins.  So, either Cook and Bunel were wrong, or they were right but wrong to reveal it.  And while Bunel is a peripheral figure lacking credibility, Robin Cook was neither.

When I first read Cook's July 8th article, and the zinger about 'al-Qaeda' as a database, I wondered about what secret he might reveal to us next.  But now I wonder about what, say, MI6 thought about the possibility of the former foreign secretary, who had signed the Official Secrets Act for life, revealing other things that he shouldn't (if, that is, the database story were true).  Then, it would have become a matter of national security.  How could they prevent him from repeating his mistake?  Could they have had him arrested and charged under the OSA?  Did they try to speak to him, between July 8th and August 6th, 2005, to warn him as to his future conduct?

If Robin Cook was starting to spill secrets, his sudden death one month later would have saved the defence, intelligence and security services from having to confront a difficult problem, one which would have had no obvious, certain solution.

De Menezes was innocent, okay?

Six weeks ago, it emerged that rape allegations had been made against Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian shot dead by the police on the tube.  A woman had come forward to say that the photos of De Menezes in the press had reminded her of the man who had raped her three years before.  The police then told the press, who smeared reported it widely.

Now, however, given much less coverage - in fact, barely any at all - is the news that De Menezes has been cleared following forensic tests.

Forensic tests have cleared an innocent Brazilian man shot dead by police who mistook him for a suicide bomber of an allegation of rape, Scotland Yard has said.

The victim of the attack in London's West End more than three years ago alleged earlier this year that Jean Charles de Menezes had committed the rape.

The Forensic Science Service compared forensic material recovered from the victim and a sample of Mr de Menezes' blood, after his family gave permission for a comparison to be made.

The tests showed Mr de Menezes was not responsible for the rape, police said.

Unless this gets more publicity, far more people will know about the rape allegation against De Menezes than that it was false.  And, you know, rapists deserve shooting, don't they?

P.S.  I don't understand why the Met Police, who had forensically gathered up samples of his blood after shooting him seven times the head, could not have compared the DNA sample they already possessed with the one of the woman who had made the allegation, without the need to get the family's permission and before they leaked the story to the press?  Wouldn't it have saved a lot of grief?

The Name's Langman, Nicholas Langman

A few people have reached this blog in recent days by using 'Nicholas Langman MI6' as search terms.  Langman (Nicholas John Andrew Langman) was one of the two MI6 officers in Paris the night Diana PoW, Dodi Fayed and MI6-asset Henri Paul were killed.  (The other, Richard Spearman, was made an OBE in June this year's Queen's birthday honours.)

An MI6 officer was recently withdrawn from Athens after having been named in a magazine, Proto Thema, as implicated in the mistreatment of 28 Pakistani workers in Greece, following the G8 bombings in London, and I wondered if Langman was involved.  Now Cryptome reports today that Nicholas Langman was indeed the MI6 officer recalled from Greece.

The British media have had DA-Notices slapped on them preventing them from publishing Nicholas Langman's name, but bloggers aren't subject to such censorship.  I don't read Greek so don't know exactly what Langman is accused of, but it seems he oversaw a joint operation by Greek EYP and British counter-terrorism officers (led by a "dark-skinned" man), who acted over-zealously, cruelly, towards the Pakistanis.  Langman would just have been following orders (as he was in Paris) and is probably unlucky to have been named.  But as he has been, and his name was already in the public domain, I see no reason not to.

If Ming Campbell gets his wish for the intelligence and security committee to investigate the matter, I hope they finger the person above Langman in the food-chain - might it have been MI6 boss John Scarlett?

ADDENDUM

If googlers to this blog are to be believed, Langman is known to his friends as Nick.  So the title of this entry should perhaps be 'The name's Langman, Nick Langman'.

Rebekah Wade, MI5 and the G8 bombings - an hypothesis

[1. I've mentioned this Wade thing before but feel it needs its own, expanded entry.  2. I've come to think of the July 7th bombs as the 'G8 bombings', for they appear to have been timed to coincide with start of the G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland.]

On Thursday 3rd November, 2005, the Daily MIrror ran an important story.

FEARS were last night growing over the ability to stop terror attacks after the security blunders that let the London bombers slip through the net. [sic]

The four men who brought carnage to streets of the capital on July 7 were watched by intelligence officers a year before they killed 52 people on Tube trains and a bus.

But security chiefs called off the operation after it was decided the gang posed no threat. Last week the Mirror revealed how 30-year-old ringleader Mohammed Sidique Khan was filmed with a terror suspect last year and spotted chatting to an al-Qaeda fixer. No action was taken against him.

And last night a police source said the other three bombers - Shehzad Tanweer, 22, Jermaine Lindsay, 19, and Hasib Hussain, 18 - were also being tracked.

They were on a list of up to 100 people throughout the country feared to be Islamic fanatics.

A fifth man, thought to be an al-Qaeda operative, was being watched.  He is on the run, believed to be in Pakistan, and could return to attack Britain again.

Field agents kept an eye the men's behaviour for several weeks but decided there was nothing out of the ordinary and pulled the plug.

The police source said the four "did not fit the preconceived terrorist profile". [my emphases]

So, all four (or five) G8 bombers were under surveillance by MI5 as potential terrorists until about July 2004.  Then, Able-Danger-like, MI5 loses all interest in and stops watching them.   Of all the fewer-than-100 fanatics under MI5's surveillance, it's those very four (or five) who will bomb London 12 months on.  The Mirror's story, if true, looked very bad for MI5 -  MI5 was shown to be utterly incompetent, or worse.  It was a story that ought to have got a lot of attention.  But then the Rebekah Wade affair happened.

Even I, who would never read buy the Sun and have never watched an episode of Eastenders, was transfixed by the 4am arrest of the Sun's editor for spousal abuse.  I had glanced at the Mirror's scoop on the web that morning, and had thought it important, but then my mind was so distracted by the unfolding Rebekah Wade drama that I forgot even to bookmark the story.  As things got ever more surreal, when Ross Kemp's - Mr Wade's - on-screen brother's ex-girlfriend slapped the latter around, a la Wade, thoughts about MI5 incompetence and/or skullduggery were nearly banished completely.  As Max Clifford said:  "You couldn't make it up. One story like this is big, but two stories on one day about two actors who play brothers on one of the country's biggest TV shows is massive."

Wade and Kemp had been, the previous evening, consoling David Blunkett on his second resignation from the Cabinet in a year.  That afternoon, at his parting press conference, Blunkett had been asked if he believed he had ever been bugged.  He sighed and smiled and said, "On my walks in Derbyshire I have even suspected at times that the birds in the trees were wired up."  I don't think he was referring only to the press when he made his remark - I suspect Blunkett suspects that MI5 had a hand in his downfall.  Be that as it may, Wade and Kemp returned home after midnight.

Sometime around 3am, a 999 call is placed from within their house.  The cops arrive, Kemp has a minor facial wound, and Wade is nicked.  Who placed the call?   Kemp has a split lip and he calls 999 to get his wife, the Sun's editor, arrested for spousal abuse?  Did he fear for his life?  If not, why wasn't he arrested for wasting police time?  Why would Kemp want to ruin his wife's public reputation?  The story of how Wade came to arrested doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

If my theory holds, MI5 pulled the Rebekah Wade stunt in order to distract attention from the Mirror's embarrassing scoop.  I wonder what Wade may have done to piss off MI5 - was it her friendship with Blunkett, or something that she had previously published, or was her record irrelevant compared to the burning need, perhaps at only several hours' notice, to create a diversion from the Daily Mirror exclusive that morning?  And I also wonder at the role of Max Clifford, his part in Blunkett's, and others', downfall, and his role on November 3rd, 2005 - might there be more to Max Clifford than meets the eye?

Public enquires why Blair decides to have no public inquiry into July 7th bombings

So the Blair government refuses to hold a public inquiry into the July 7th London bombings - instead, a senior civil servant will write an official narrative of the events, drawing upon MI5's investigation into the four bombers.  That's not good for anyone except the government and MI5.  The Hutton Inquiry, for all its faults, was a valuable exercise in at least two respects - one, reams of semi-secret data concerning Downing Street, its pro-war dossiers and the intellligence services were revealed to public scrutiny; two, it showed that the Kelly affair was composed of multiple, overlapping and sometimes contradictory narratives.  For the government to give us one narrative of 7/7, without allowing competing narratives to be officially aired in the process, is insulting to all involved.

People have all sorts of theories about July 7th, me included.  I won't recount my theory, because it's unverifiable and unfalsifiable. But some things about 7/7 nag me - odd things such as:

Whenever George Bush visits the UK, al-Qaeda-linked suicide bombers attack British interests.  The last time, in November 2003, bombers attacked the British consulate and the HSBC building in Istambul, while George Bush was on a state visit to the UK (link).  The next time he was here, at the G8 summit in Scotland, London gets bombed.  Each time, Tony Blair gets to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with George Bush and denounce terrorism (link; link).  It's as if al-Qaeda waits before bombing British interests until Bush and Blair are together in the UK and available for a public statement and a photo-op.  If Bush comes again, I'm staying home that day.

Why did they choose July 7th to bomb the London transport system?  Was it to coincide with the start of the G8 summit in Gleneagles?  If so, it would be quite a comedown from their audacious plan to fly a plane packed with explosives into the meeting-hall of the G8 summit in Genoa in July 2001 (link; link).  If the bombers were not directed by al-Qaeda but were acting independently, were they as much influenced by Bono and Bob Geldof as they were by Sayyid Qtub?  Why pick a day when all the world's most powerful leaders would be gathered together in Scotland?  By choosing July 7th, and by bombing civilians rather than government or military targets, they twice-over gave the propaganda initiative to Blair et al.  (If I were a fanatical Muslim and determined to martyr myself in the Jihad, I'd blow myself up in Whitehall, or outside parliament, or in an army recruitment office - I wouldn't risk jeopardising my place in paradise by killing random London commuters.)  Whoever was advising the bombers sure picked a target and a day that played into the hands of the security service and the MI5-ocracy that is the Blair government.

The third thing is that on November 3rd the Daily Mirror ran a story (link) that deserved more attention than it got.  It would perhaps have got much more attention had not the police, at 4 o'clock that morning, arrested Rebekah Wade, editor of rival newspaper The Sun, for assaulting her actor-celebrity boyfriend.  That story drowned out the one about all four bombers being known to MI5 a year before the bombings.  Given that, might the Wade episode have been deliberately staged by MI5 to distract attention away from the Mirror's scoop?