CONFLICTED
S01E03
Thomas Small Welcome back to Conflicted. If this is your first time listening, this is a podcast series where we explore the real story of the War on Terror and the conflicts raging throughout the Middle East. It's an extremely complex tapestry, but stick with us. We are going to do our best to unpick those threads for you to make sense of what seems to be a lot of chaos.
Some of you know me already. I'm one of your guides through this exploration of the Middle East, Thomas Small. So, in the last episode we spoke about the War on Terror, and my co-host for the series, Aimen Dean, talked about his role within that war. I asked him whether this US-led counter-terrorism campaign had been a success, and he said that it was launched with good intentions, but it was carried out in an idiotic way. And he specifically pointed to one event in particular that caused the whole thing to unravel.
Aimen Dean Taking Saddam down was the dumbest strategic mistake that Bush and Blair ever done. And that what revived the fortunes of al-Qaeda and the global jihad.
Thomas Small We'll explore why in this episode. This is Conflicted.
Right. Has the bomb squad left? Did they find any bombs under my chair tonight? Here I am with Aimen Dean again, with a fatwā on his head, former al-Qaeda member, author of Nine Lives: My Time as MI6.
Aimen Dean My Time as MI6's Top Spy Inside al-Qaeda. How many times do I have to remind you?
Thomas Small My Time as MI6's Top Spy Inside al-Qaeda. Well, that tells us everything we need to know about you. I'm Thomas Small, co-producer of the documentary film Path of Blood: The True Story of al-Qaeda's Attempts to Overthrow the Saudi Monarchy. Welcome. How are you today?
Aimen Dean Well, as I always remind you, Thomas, I'm still alive.
Thomas Small You still have one life left.
Aimen Dean Touch wood. I would rather think there are quite few more of them.
Thomas Small Me, too. I hope. I hope. So, in the last episode we spoke about the War on Terror and your role within that war. I asked you whether it has been a success. And you said, "Well, it was launched with good intentions, but it was carried out in an idiotic way." And you specified one event in particular that caused the whole thing to unravel, which we'll talk about today: the Iraq War.
So, you say that America invaded the wrong country. It was a huge mistake. It was based on their stupidity. But was it also perhaps premeditated? Did they know it was going to result in chaos? I remember, I think, it was Richard Perle or Wolfowitz. You know, the neo-con security advisors in the Bush administration. One of them said what the Middle East really needs is for someone to throw a grenade into the middle of it, to see what results. Creative chaos, just like the jihadists.
Aimen Dean You see, I do believe in creative chaos as a force for good sometime, because, you know, forests need forest fires between now and then to rejuvenate. But that has to be organically grown from within.
Thomas Small Sure. But do you think that the neo-cons knew they were going to create chaos in Iraq? For the listener, the neo-cons being a group of geopolitical strategists around the George W. Bush administration. For many decades, they had been advocating a more muscular American approach to policing the world, especially in the Middle East. Do you think they knew what they were doing to Iraq, Aimen?
Aimen Dean I don't think they really realise, you know, what kind of a disaster they are going to. I mean, they were just a bunch of teenagers going into the forest, having an uncontrolled campfire. And then, basically, they set the entire forest on fire. That it wasn't their intention. I think their intention was, "Oh, we're going to build this, you know, democracy. You know, [unintelligible]. The war, you know, as Donald Trump stupidly once said, will pay for itself. Well, it didn't.
Thomas Small No.
Aimen Dean It did not. It cost trillions. And even all the oil of Iraq, if it was ever extracted and sold right now, it won't even cover fifty percent of the war costs. So, anyone who says, "Oh, it was only for oil," they don't get it.
Thomas Small But we now know, I think it's pretty fair to say, that the justifications they gave at the time for launching the war, the WMDs, that Saddam Hussein was in league with bin Laden, they knew that this was not true. The dossier was sexed up. They were lying to people. They had had it in their minds all along to invade Iraq. 9/11 was just the pretext they needed to sell it to the American people.
Aimen Dean Do you remember when we talked about how al-Qaeda leaders read the letter that was written in 1998, five years before the Iraq invasion and—?
Thomas Small The letter from the Project for the New American Century.
Aimen Dean Indeed. That letter was signed by all the architects of the Iraq War when they were just only in a think tank and not in government.
Thomas Small Yes. It's amazing. It goes to show you.
Aimen Dean So, their intention was there a long time ago, because they wanted to throw that grenade into the Middle East, but it wasn't with the intention of creating this, you know, blood-soaked chaos. What they wanted basically is to rearrange the Middle East in a way that will be favourable towards America. But what happened is that they rearranged the Middle East in a way that is favourable to Iran and Russia ironically.
Thomas Small It was the bulldozer, the bulldozer that al-Qaeda was looking forward to from the United States to come and cause chaos in the. Is that right?
Aimen Dean Oh, yes. Indeed.
Thomas Small Okay. So, let's discussed Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein from Tikrit, in Iraq, rose up through the military, joined the Ba'ath Party at an early age, and, eventually, by proving himself a consummate insider, the power behind the throne of the leader of the Ba'ath Party at the time, eventually became vice president where he effectively ruled the country and then president from 1979 until his hanging in 2006.
Aimen Dean Yeah. We have to remember that Saddam Hussein was the pillar of secular Arab nationalism. So, secular nationalism is an ideology that began to emerge, you know, in the 1940s and '50s, especially with the uprising in Egypt in 1952, which deposed the monarchy and brought about the idea of Arab nationalism. Arab nationalism was more or less invented as a way in order to create a identity around the Arabic language as something that will rally the people behind. Why? So, in order to rally the people behind the cause, you need to have a cause that is uniting, not dividing.
So, the thought that religion could be dividing, because, don't forget, you have a lot of Christians within the Arab world. Those Christians, even though they were a minority—roughly ten percent—they were the educated classes. They were really highly educated, motivated, engaged, involved.
Thomas Small Also, to some extent, the capitalist classes. They were wealthy.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, you know, without them, there will be no progress. Without them, we couldn't go forward. And so, therefore, the idea was that Arab secular nationalism. So, they spoke Arabic. We spoke Arabic, you know. So, how about we use Arabic identity and Arab identity as the rallying cause, as the uniting ideology?
Thomas Small And the Arab leaders who subscribed to this ideology wanted to unite the Arab world, because, well, because they wanted power, but also because they thought only if the Arab world were truly united could it withstand the combined onslaught of America and the Soviets.
Now, I know it seems we're going off track, but let's discuss the Israel-Palestine conflict for. I promise you, listeners, that this is relevant to Saddam Hussein and the work of the Ba'ath Party in the region. So, Aimen, how resonant to this day is the Israel-Palestine situation to these conflicts that are raging?
Aimen Dean You see, the 1960s, '70s, '80s, and even in the 1990s and the early 2000s, the Palestinian cause was so ever-present in the minds and the hearts of the people, 'cause, of course, it was reinforced by the constant propaganda by the dictators. Because for the dictators, for the Arab, you know, world autocrats, the Palestinian was a good painkiller to give to the people. If the people basically are hungry, "Oh, we have to be hungry for Palestine." If the people are saying, "Yes. But we have no freedom." "Oh, yeah. Because if we have freedom, then we lose the Palestinian cause and we lose Palestine." So, Palestine as a cause was used and abused by a multitude of Arab dictators.
Thomas Small Not just the dictators. The monarchs as well. Everyone was playing that game.
Aimen Dean Everyone. Everyone. Everyone..
Thomas Small If you were an Arab leader, you were a defender of Palestine. It became really part and parcel of – of Arab leadership.
Aimen Dean Yeah. Well, indeed. The only one who broke away from that was the wisest Arab leader to have ever existed.
Thomas Small Anwar Sadat.
Aimen Dean Exactly.
Thomas Small Anwar Sadat, president of Egypt throughout the '70s, famously signed the Camp David Peace Accords with the Israelis to put an end, or so he hoped, to conflict between Israel and the Arabs, was paid for his pains by being assassinated by jihadists at that time, including Ayman al-Zawahiri, now the leader of al-Qaeda, the grandfather of the sort of total violence we associate now with ISIS. After a time in prison, ended up joining al-Qaeda. And after a series of adventures, establishing what was known as al-Qaeda in Iraq, I remember, in the mid-noughties, he was releasing videos of himself, propaganda videos, brandishing – brandishing knives, brandishing Kalashnikovs, rallying the Muslims to rise up and join him in Iraq to expel the American invader. He was a harbinger for things to come.
The story goes on and on. It's an immense tapestry of events. You know, I'm sure listeners are thinking, "How do we keep this in our heads?" But it's very important to realise that the War on Terror, 9/11, the Gulf War, this story stretches back decades. This is a decades-long conflict between various forces in the Middle East. And this podcast is attempting to string together this very complex tapestry. Now, what did jihadists have against Israel?
Aimen Dean Because, remember. Do you remember when we discussed in the first episode, when we talked about the apocalyptic and eschatological and prophetic visions of jihadists?
Thomas Small The prophecies. The end time prophecies.
Aimen Dean They believe that the return of the Jews to the Holy Land was the trigger for the age of prophecies and that it will end all of it. All of it will end in a great, huge battle around Jerusalem. So—.
Thomas Small Basically, their version of the Christian Armageddon.
Aimen Dean Exactly. That is why attacking Israel is always going to earn you some brownie points.
Thomas Small So, let's put the characters in place. We've got a slew of Arab leaders who wanted to strengthen and unite the Muslim world by subscribing to what is known as secular Arab nationalism. For these Arab leaders, this unity would strengthen the Arab. For jihadists, it's a good thing, because it all plays into their cause: the fulfilment of the prophecies.
We'll get to where they play a role in all of this in a bit. But first, let's bring this conversation back to Iraq. We said earlier Saddam Hussein was a pillar of Arab nationalism and he led the Ba'ath Party. So, Aimen, what's so important about the Ba'ath Party?
Aimen Dean By the way, the Ba'ath Party in Arabic means the Renaissance Party. The founder of the Ba'ath Party was a Christian Syrian, and his name was Michel Aflaq. You know, he was supported by many Syrian, Iraq, and Lebanese Christian intellectuals who saw, in the Ba'ath Party, a mechanism to unite Muslims who are also Sunni and Shia together with Alawites and with Christians of all sorts—Christian Orthodox, Christian Catholics—, you know, around this banner of Arab nationalism. So, you know, the Ba'ath Party was an umbrella organisation that actually gathered beneath it many forces from Iraq, from Syria, and also from Egypt and Libya and Algeria. But in fact, it took hold in both Iraq and Syria.
Thomas Small I mean, we've all been told that Saddam Hussein, leader of the Iraqi Ba'ath Party, was a maniac. Wasn't he, in the Ba'ath Party, was utterly oppressive of the people?
Aimen Dean Remember, the Ba'ath Party was modelled on the socialist Bolshevik, you know, model. So, it was not exactly a plural, capitalist, you know, model. It was actually—.
Thomas Small It wasn't liberal, say.
Aimen Dean No. No. No. There was no – nothing liberal about the Ba'ath Party. The Ba'ath Party was a – an organisation or a party that basically sought to enforce unity from the top. And at the same time, if you are believing that you are the only vehicle for progress, then you want to, you know, basically be the only ruling party. And that was the case in both Iraq and Syria, where the Ba'ath Party became the ruling party.
Thomas Small So, the American invasion of Iraq and the destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime served the interests of al-Qaeda.
Aimen Dean Of course. You know, you see the Ba'ath Party was ruling Iraq since 1968 and Syria since 1970. And in both cases, it was one-single party rule completely dominated by ideologues. And these ideologues wanted to destroy any semblance of involvement of religion and politics. But that, of course, failed, you know, at later stage, because Saddam's version of Arab nationalism and Iraq became not anti-Shia, because he wasn't sectarian. I would say it became, you know, an anti-Persian.
Thomas Small Yes. Because, of course, Saddam Hussein, throughout the '80s, was the great lion of the Arabs, protecting the Arab world from the spread of the Iranian revolution. And at that point, his regime, secular in nature, did take on the trappings of Islamic symbology, which led him, eventually, into conflict with the House of Saud, the custodians of the two Holy Mosques, which, you know, eventually culminated in the Gulf War, the first Gulf War of 1991.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. And, you know, and in Syria, it was a very different story altogether. President Assad, you know, the father of the current one, Hafez al-Assad, he decided to go in a different path. So, he was a Ba'ath Party, yes. But because of his Alawite minority background and the—.
Thomas Small Yes. He was not as Sunni. The Alawites are a strange sectarian, Shia branch of Islam. Very small numbers within – within the Muslim world.
Aimen Dean Indeed. A fringe, you know – you know, sect, you can call them. But they – they saw Iran as more ideologically aligned with them than Iraq. And because of the competition between the two Ba'ath Party branches—the Baghdad branch and the Damascus branch—was so intense, it's similar to the intensity of the competition between Beijing and Moscow over who was the true communist after the breakup
between the two powers.
Thomas Small During the Cold War. That's right. Yes, that's right. So, when you were growing up in Khobar, before Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and potentially threatened you and your family by invading Saudi Arabia, what image did you have of Saddam Hussein as an Arab leader?
Aimen Dean Well, we used to call him, in Arabic, the phrase "hami albawaabat alsharqia." You know, the protector of the Eastern gate, you know, of course, against the savage Persian hordes, you know, who were trying to bring, you know, this kind of messianic version of Islam and overwhelm our, you know, sparsely populated Arabian Peninsula. So, of course, his image was that of a strong man, you know. He was Stalin who defeated Hitler, you know. He knows that—. You know, the Iraqi Stalin who defeated the, you know, Iranian Hitler, Khomeini. So, that's how he was seen.
Thomas Small You are talking about Saddam Hussein as if he was an admirable character. But, you know, he was a real arsehole.
Aimen Dean Oh, no. No – no question about it. Like, not only he was a brutal, brutal dictator, you know, modelling the style of his rule on Stalin, but he did, in fact, use chemical weapons to great effect against the Iranians, you know, in the Iran-Iraq war, and also against the Kurd in the north of the country. But we must also remember it wasn't only Iraq and Saddam Hussein that used chemical weapons during the Iraq-Iran War. Iran used chemical weapons, too.
Thomas Small Yes. We also have to remember that, I think, that if you were to look at the canisters of Saddam Hussein's chemical weapons arsenal, they would have imprinted upon them a factory probably located somewhere in the Midwest of the United States.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And you see, the use of those chemical weapons, you know, happened during the 1980s when Saddam was the darling of the DC, so.
Thomas Small The darling of DC.
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small But—. So, you know—. So, yeah. Saddam Hussein was an arsehole. But perhaps what you're saying is that Iraq needed an arsehole. Only a real brutal dictator would be the master chemist that Iraq needed to keep it together.
Aimen Dean Saddam Hussein used to say that Iraq is a complicated chemical formula. Only a master chemist can understand it. And he was that master chemist, because he actually reigned over Iraq for thirty-four years. He knew basically how to rule the country and keep it together. Actually, Iraq, throughout the Islamic history, was always stable under the rule of a tyrant. Always.
Thomas Small Now, I remember where I was when I heard that George W. Bush and the Americans had invaded Iraq on the 20th of March, 2003. I was still in the monastery in Greece. In fact, I left ten days later. I don't think there's a connection between those two events, but it just so happened I did leave ten days later. And at the time inside the monastery—and I think this resonates with what you were talking about in the first episode—there was a genuine apocalyptic mentality going on. The monks believed that this war was the beginning salvo in the end of times war, the great war that would culminate in Armageddon. I wouldn't say that they were excited about it. They weren't supporting the war, but they were excited about the prospect of the end of history coming imminently.
And this is true as well within the ranks of the jihadists, I suppose. They thought the prophecies are coming true. The Americans have taken the bait. They've moved into Iraq. "They're the bulldozer we need to create the creative chaos in which we will be able to reform the caliphate."
Aimen Dean Well, you just summed it absolutely, perfectly right. The problem is that the proceeding five years before the Iraq War, between 1998 and 2003, those last five years of Saddam Hussein's reign in Iraq were actually the best of his reign. You know, it was a time of the least repression, I would call it this way. It was a time when he started to open up a bit as far as the population were concerned. You know, even though there were severe sanctions, but the effects of the sanction started to subside.
Thomas Small Sanctions overseen by the UN, most famously the oil for food program where Saddam Hussein was only able to sell oil on the global market in exchange for food for his people.
Aimen Dean You know, it started to actually improve. And it became clear that Iraq actually was on the cusp of breaking the sanctions, of having rapprochement with Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and already the relationship with Jordan was excellent. And with Turkey, was excellent. So, you know, things started to improve considerably.
Thomas Small Well, if that's the case, you know, put us in the mind of the neo-con establishment in Washington. Why did they want to get rid of Saddam Hussein so badly then? Clearly, this is someone that, perhaps with a little bit more time, they could have worked with to combat the rising tide of violent Islamism?
Aimen Dean The ironic thing is that they already worked with him in the 1980s. They
already did.
Thomas Small So, why did they want to get rid of him so badly? In fact, as you said in the first episode, they wanted to get rid of him before 9/11. He was their main target. Why?
Aimen Dean They saw Iraq and they saw Saddam Hussein, you know, as someone who could be a threat in the future, you know, forgetting that, at some point, basically, he was useful for their policy of containing Iran. And he managed actually to contain Iran all the way 'til the end. Iran's ambitions in the region was only unleashed after his fall in 2003. But if you see what the neo-cons were looking at, if you read their writings, they thought that Iraq was ideally situated, you know, within the Middle East, in the heart of the Middle East, bordering different civilisations and ethnic groups. It's bordering the Persians, the Kurds, the Turks, the Arabs. And the idea is that it is oil-rich and it is strategically positioned at the heart of the Muslim world. So, it is the ideal place to start a new experiment in bringing about democracy. Because they believe that only when we remove dictators and installed democratic values, then these countries will forever be grateful to America and American intervention.
There was one problem, though. It might seem small, but it was what undermined the whole strategy altogether. The people who were talking about this were looking at Iraq on the map. They were looking at the green, yellow, and brown colours of Iraq on the map, with the rivers crisscrossing the map. And that's it. They were not looking at the demographics and the history of the people. They ignore that Iraq was always, always a bastion of instability within the Middle East.
Thomas Small The Iraq War was the great mistake, you said. As a double agent working for MI6b inside al-Qaeda, you must have felt demoralised.
Aimen Dean Well, I always felt that we were involved in one of the worst historical exercise in futility. That we are capturing or killing terrorists only for these terrorists to be replaced ten times 'cause of what's happening in, you know, in many parts of Iraq, And why? I always ask myself, "Why am I continuing? Why am I working? You know, what's the point?" Because the Iraq war has radicalised so many young Muslims across the world. You see, if it was necessary, I would have supported it. And I have supported the war in Afghanistan…
Thomas Small As you said.
Aimen Dean …to depose the Taliban. I supported that, because it was right to do. Although maybe it's later execution was not exactly perfect, but at least, you know, the initial campaign was on the right track. And if they just—. If the Americans just persevered just another year or a year and a half, they would have finished al-Qaeda and Taliban for good.
On the eve of the invasion of Iraq and before that, I was advising my MI6 handlers and other officers I used to meet to read the writings of Professor Ali Al-Wardi.
Thomas Small Who's Ali Al-Wardi? I've never heard of him.
Aimen Dean Oh. He is the most important person you never heard of, Thomas.
Thomas Small You're the expert here, Aimen. I'm just trying to get – get the gold nuggets out of your head.
Aimen Dean Well, Professor Ali Al-Wardi was an Iraqi professor of sociology in Baghdad University. He was a professor in the '40s and '50s. So, we're talking, really, a while ago. But his writings are so accurate in its analysis of the Iraqi individual personality.
Thomas Small What – what is this personality?
Aimen Dean Well, he said, basically, that the census tells us that there are fifteen million Iraqis in Iraq, but he believed there were thirty million, because each Iraq, in his opinion, basically, was, you know, two individuals within one body—an individual that is capable of being a good husband, a good father, a good neighbour, a wonderful person, a humorous, generous, selfless. But then on the other hand, the sample – the same person is capable of being sadist, violent psychopath. You know, capable of murder, dismemberment, torture.
Thomas Small Now, I mean, if this guy wasn't an Iraqi himself, you know, I would be inclined to dismiss this as just, you know, quack sociological racism, really. I mean, it seem—. It does seem a bit – a bit extreme to say that every Iraqi has the capacity for being a brutal sadist.
Aimen Dean But remember he was talking about his own people. He was analysing how, you know, how Iraq, throughout the ages, was always basically a bastion of instability.
Thomas Small So, you then, when you realised that the Americans were going to invade Iraq, you knew it would be a disaster. Where were you when you first realised this is going to happen? The Americans are going to make this godawful mistake.
Aimen Dean I was in Bahrain, monitoring the al-Qaeda's movement between Iran and Saudi Arabia. And the, you know—. And, of course, basically, al-Qaeda was keeping an eye on the American preparations for invading Iraq. So, this is when I realised that this was a mistake, because the reaction of al-Qaeda individuals and operatives who I was meeting on regular basis at the time was that of gleeful anticipation. So excited. "That's exactly the trap that we want the Americans to walk into."
Thomas Small Amazing. Amazing. And the irony, of course, is there you are in Bahrain, keeping tabs on al-Qaeda militants inside Iran. That's where the al-Qaeda militants were. That's who was facilitating them, not Saddam Hussein.
Aimen Dean I will tell you something. I used to have screaming sessions with my MI5 and MI6 handlers when I used to hear Colin Powell and others talking about how Iraq was a source of al-Qaeda's chemical weapons capabilities.
Thomas Small You, of course, had intimate knowledge of those capabilities. You had been a chem- – chemical weapons expert for al-Qaeda.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And those actually did not come from Iraq. Those came from people who worked in the Egyptian and Syrian chemical weapons programs in the 1970s and '80s Nothing to do with Iraq. These were people who converted to jihadism from Egypt and from Syria, came to Afghanistan and brought that capability. Not a single Iraqi came, you know, and gave that capability to al-Qaeda.
Thomas Small But what about Iran, though? I mean, Iran was actually a facilitating al-Qaeda at this time, was it? I mean, it was keeping it some of its top leaders, like Saif al-Adel, the military head of al-Qaeda at that time, under house arrest, was allowing him to contact his al-Qaeda comrades across the – across the world. Is that not right?
Aimen Dean Well, I remember when one of the envoys of Hamza Rabia—. Hamza Rabia was the head of al-Qaeda's operation, external operations. So, he was based in Iran. And the envoy used to tell us that the Iranians, you know, programmed landlines and the phones that we had to dial only two international codes—009006 and 00973, which are the international codes for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, respectively.
Thomas Small And why – why those two countries? Why did they allow al-Qaeda operatives inside Iran to contact people inside Bahrain and Saudi Arabia?
Aimen Dean Because they—. These countries where the target. Because Bahrain is the home of the US Fifth fleet. You know, thousands of US personnel are stationed there. And, of course, Saudi Arabia is the home of the Saudi monarchy, the greatest obstacle against Iran's total hegemony of the Middle East.
Thomas Small Yes. I mean, that's very interesting, because not enough people realise that two months after the invasion of Iraq, the uprising inside Saudi Arabia of al-Qaeda cells that had been planted there in the proceeding years occurred. Osama bin Ladin thought, following the invasion of Iraq, that anti-American sentiment would be so strong inside Saudi Arabia, that ordinary Saudi civilians would answer his call to rise up and overthrow the government there. So, he pressed go on a series of audacious bombings, shootings, kidnappings, beheadings that ravaged the kingdom for three years, all the while America is in Iraq and the jihadists there are causing havoc as well. You must have been aware that this was all going on. You were intimately involved in countering the al-Qaeda campaign inside Saudi Arabia.
Aimen Dean Indeed. That campaign actually also had considerable links with a group in Iraq that began to emerge and had strong links and ties to al-Qaeda. Because many Saudis were also traveling to Iraq to fight there against the Americans.
Thomas Small Well, that's the irony. That, in fact, the radicalised Saudis, in general, did not respond to al-Qaeda's call to attack their own government. What they did is they went to Iraq and attack the Americans.
Aimen Dean More than three thousand Saudis, at least, went to fight in Iraq. Many of them.
Thomas Small So, had you still been in the organisation properly, not as a double agent, but as a true believer, do you think you would have rallied to Zarqawi's cause? Or do you think you would have been one of those scratching their heads, thinking, "This is not the right way to go?"
Aimen Dean Well, if I was still possessing the same mentality when I gave my allegiance to Osama bin Laden in the autumn of '97, I would say yes. I would have gone to fight in Iraq, because it was a pure case of an aggressive war that has no just calls, whatsoever. It was a pure invasion, you know. And so, I would have gotten and, you know, and fought against the Americans. But, of course, basically, I mean, by that time you know, my allegiance was completely different.
Thomas Small The—. Was the atmosphere within al-Qaeda during the – the high watermark of Zarqawi's reign of terror particularly tense? Were they on the lookout for double agents like yourself? Did you feel ever that you were being scrutinised especially strongly at this time?
Aimen Dean The – the irony was that, while al-Qaeda was less paranoid—. Of course, they were extremely paranoid organisation, but they managed even to be less paranoid before 9/11, because they were comfortable. They had their own camps. They have their own structure in Afghanistan. And they were less, you know, paranoid. But that atmosphere was far more difficult to work in, because you—. You know, when you are there, you are seen by multitude of people seeing you. You know, you're praying next to them. You are, you know, eating next to them. So, you are scrutinised by a large number of people who are together within the same tent, let's put it this way. After 9/11, al-Qaeda cells became so paranoid. So paranoid that we're always worried about infiltration. But, you know, what helped me there, even though the paranoia was higher, but it was easier environment to work in, because I was always dealing only with very few people, because it was cells. Cells here. Cells there. A cell here. A cell there. So, they were separated. So, I'm not scrutinised by a large number of people at the same time, but scrutinised by few people at any given time, which means that I can deploy my own charm offensive to win them over.
Thomas Small Did you ever come close to being discovered?
Aimen Dean No. It was before rather than after 9/11 that, you know, people basically were more suspicious, even though they were less paranoid. So, it – it shows basically that it's not necessarily that the general pa- – paranoia could actually be, you know, positive or negative for you. It's all about the structure of the organisation you are infiltrating. If it is a solid structure with a centre that is vibrant, it's more difficult to infiltrate it than if you infiltrate just individual cells. Not to mention, of course, the fact, as we mentioned before that many of al-Qaeda's talented bowmakers were either captured or killed. The lack of talent after 9/11 opened the door wide for me to be welcomed into, you know, several cells and that enabled me, basically, to thwart several plots happening.
So, the issue here was that, if the Americans really wanted to end the phenomenon of al-Qaeda and to finish it, they should have stayed in Afghanistan and finished the job there. And then, al-Qaeda was really drawing the last two or three breaths. But somehow—somehow—the Americans just were fixated with Iraq or Saddam Hussein who posed no threat to – whatsoever to American, British, European, or even regional interests.
Thomas Small No WMDs? The famous WMDs? Weapons of mass destruction?
Aimen Dean Well, of course, as Scott Ritter and other UN WMD inspectors always testified that, you know, it's almost impossible to think that Iraq has retained any credible capability in terms of production or store. So, what are they now? Where are the chemical weapons? You know, it's been, what, almost, you know, fifteen years since they invasion. You will have thought that someone would have found them by now.
Thomas Small So, really, with the invasion of Iraq and everything that followed, you have a clash of two totalitarian ideologies or totalising ideologies. And, actually, underneath them, there is something like a similar religiosity. Obviously, the religiosity of al-Qaeda is well-known. "This is the end of times. The prophecies are coming true. The caliphate will be reborn." Et cetera. Et cetera. But even on the neo-con side, and its allies like Tony Blair in the UK, there was this undercurrent of fervent Christian piety. Tony Blair and George W. Bush praying together the evening before the launch of the war. The sense that George W. Bush certainly had. And I think that if you look into his eyes, Tony Blair clearly has of being elected by some kind of destiny to bring about peace, harmony, democracy, liberalism, prosperity to the whole world. There's something mad there.
Aimen Dean Yeah. At the end of barrel of a gun. I mean, that doesn't work. In comparison to Saddam Hussein, America seemed like a pizza delivery boy. Clueless. Didn't know basically what they were getting into and how will they, basically, manage the place. And that basically opened the door for Iran to come and, you know, sectarianise, you know, the Iraqi Shia who were mostly secular throughout Saddam Hussein's rule. So, suddenly, basically, there is a new radicalised generation. And then, the Sunnis who were secular during Saddam Hussein's rule were radicalised by al-Qaeda. So, al-Qaeda camel, radicalised the Sunnis. Iran came, radicalised the Shia. And suddenly, that, you know, miraculous sectarian harmony that existed, yuk, for almost a thousand years in Iraq completely disintegrated.
Thomas Small Now, Iran is really playing a double game. Iran knows what it's doing. It's going to radicalise the Iraqi people, at least a minority of the Iraqi people, to make it impossible for America to achieve any of its objectives in Iraq.
Aimen Dean Well, of course. I remember on the eve of the invasion when it happened, I used to joke, you know, to many friends. I used to say, "Well, yeah. They invaded the wrong. I mean, you know, if you want to establish democracy, why do you actually go after a secular Arab nationalist country? I mean, why don't you go after a radical, fanatic, theocratic country just next door? Iran?"
Thomas Small Well, I mean, God help us if America decides to invade Iran. The Iranians don't take things like that lying down.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And, you know, in my opinion, there shouldn't be any invasion of anyone whatsoever.
Thomas Small No. Of course.
Aimen Dean You know, unless if someone's threaten you directly. And, you know, for me, I'm one of those people who, again, controversially, you know, supported the war in Afghanistan. You know, I believe basically it was a just cause to remove the Taliban, because they harboured someone who attacked America on a big scale. And, of course, you can't, you know, be, you know, empathetic, pacifist, basically saying, "Oh, no. No. No. Invasion will not going to solve the problem." No, of course, invasion would have solved the problem. Again, if they stayed the course just another year, with immense fire power and with good planning using special forces, they would have finished al-Qaeda. What happened is that al-Qaeda relocated to Iraq. And that's where—call it destiny, fate, whatever, luck—that one of the most psychopathic jihadist happened to take over the reigns of leadership of the jihad cause in Iraq.
Thomas Small Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, did you ever meet him? Did you know him?
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small You met Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. My goodness. Bring the bomb experts back in.
Aimen Dean So, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. I would say basically that my first encounter with him was in late 1999, when he arrived to Afghanistan and specifically Abu Khabab Camp. Abu Khabab, of course, is the most famous master bombmaker al-Qaeda ever had.
Thomas Small So, what – what kind of a man was he? What was – what was your—? I mean, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, during his reign at the top of al-Qaeda in Iraq, he unleashed an unbelievable tidal wave of jihadist terror across the country. When you met him, what was your impression of him?
Aimen Dean Do you remember when I said in the first podcast that my first impression of Osama bin Laden is very different from everyone's impression, because I saw him when he was just a refugee…
Thomas Small Yes.
Aimen Dean …landing of a plane coming from Sudan, looking dishevelled?
Thomas Small Yes.
Aimen Dean Not exactly wearing, you know, these neat, you know, crease-free robes and turbans.
Thomas Small Zarqawi?
Aimen Dean Zarqawi, you know, he's not the same guy who the world met through these neat videos, who looked menacing, you know, and, you know, looked as if, basically, he was about to, you know, have you for breakfast, have your brother for dinner, and have your grandfather for lunch. I mean, he looked different when I met him. First of all, he just came out of prison. He left Jordan after he came out of prison and came to Afghanistan. And he just looked as someone basically who is embarking on a big plan, but doesn't know yet how or what shape this plan will take. He just was on a revenge mission against the Hashemite royal family of Jordan. And he believed that they were the biggest obstacle to jihad against the Israelis. So, for him, there were two very defined targets—Jordan and Israel.
So, I remember when he came to the camp. He stated his intention. He said to us that he is here with Abu Khabab to train and then to pass that knowledge on, to build a separate camp for young Jordanians and Palestinians who want to come learn to make bombs and then use that knowledge to destabilise Jordan, and to possibly even cross the border and attack the Israelis. That was his plan. No Iraq. Nothing. So—.
Thomas Small How – how did he end up in Iraq then?
Aimen Dean Well, you see, what happened is that, you know, after the two weeks he spent with us, he tried to attack Jordan as he was, you know, always saying. He kept true to his word that he wanted to attack Jordan. And there was a plot that's failed. But nonetheless, he managed to establish a camp in the northeast of Afghanistan..
Thomas Small So, on the Iranian border?
Aimen Dean On the Iranian border. In Herat. And that camp was for Palestinians and Jordanians only. Then, the Americans invaded Afghanistan after 9/11. And he escaped. And the only route of escape was towards Iran. He went into Iran. And there, with the help of Kurdish jihadists from Iraq, and they smuggled him into the mountain just north of [selamaniya] in Iraqi Kurdistan, there – there was a group called Ansar Islam. And, in fact, one of their leaders was someone who I knew quite well from my hometown also, from an Khobar, and who was later killed in the cruise myself that, you know, were the first actually American strike against Iraq. It wasn't against Saddam Hussein, actually it was against that particular camp. And Zarqawi survived that attack.
And, of course, the jihadist started to congregate there, because they knew that the Americans were about to invade. So, they need to be in a prime position. Zarqawi then made his way to Baghdad during the chaos of the American invasion. And that's basically when he set up a with cells of Iraqi, Jordanian, Palestinian, and Kurdish militants. They set up together the first cell that was called Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad.
Thomas Small A group of monotheism and jihad.
Aimen Dean Indeed. So, al-Tawhid wal-Jihad was the first cell that was organised there. But their greatest coup, when some Ba'athists intelligence officers who were having Salafist sympathies joined up with them.
Thomas Small Now, this is one of America's biggest mistakes. That it basically sacked any member of the Ba'ath Party from both the civil service and the military. So, if you had been a member of the Ba'ath Party, you no longer had a career. You no longer had an income. You had to do something to make money. And, probably, you were going to do that by joining a criminal organisation like al-Qaeda.
Aimen Dean Indeed. In fact, the American administration of Iraq sacked the entire army. The whole Iraqi army was sacked, dismissed, including the Republican guard. You know, people who you could have relied on to pacify the country. But because, of course, basically the Shia Iraq, as we're saying, we will rebel if you don't do it. But then, that was a mistake. The Americans could have said to the Shia Iraqis, "Shut up. Sit down. We are on the show, not you." And, unfortunately, the Americans did not have the guts to say that. Instead they obeyed that demand, which was not exactly a Shia Iraqi demand. It was actually a clandestine Iranian demand. So – so, what happened is those Ba'athist from the Ba'ath Party, the intelligence, the Republican guard, they went and joined Zarqawi, because some of them were already having some Salafist Jihadi sympathies. So, they went to join him and they gave him the most important piece of intelligence that enabled him to become the monster he became.
Thomas Small What's that? What did they tell?
Aimen Dean "We know where to find a big pile of cash."
Thomas Small Money.
Aimen Dean Exactly.
Thomas Small Zarqawi needed money.
Aimen Dean Yes.
Thomas Small And where was this big pile of cash?
Aimen Dean This big pile of cash happened to be with one of Saddam Hussein's son, Qusay Saddam Hussein. So, Qusay Saddam Hussein, along with the then-Iraqi vice president, Izzat al-Douri, they went to the central bank in Iraq and they emptied north of six hundred to $660 million in cash into, you know, big truck and they took it.
Thomas Small This is astonishing. This is something out of a Hollywood movie. You're saying that the Americans invade. Immediately, one of Saddam Hussein's sons goes to the central bank and just unloads a tremendous amount of cash into a truck and drives off.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. Cash and gold bars. So, they took everything into the, you know, this truck and basically drove off. And that was, you know, as the Americans were on the gates of Baghdad itself. So, it was 9th of April. That's a date when the Iraqi9 Central Bank was rated by Qusay Saddam Hussein and Ibrahim Izzat al-Douri, the Iraqi VP.
So, the idea is that this money will be distributed among Ba'athist cells in order to carry out the counter offensive. You know, a Vietcong kind of offensive.
Thomas Small That was Saddam Hussein son's idea?
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small But Zarqawi had another idea with what he could use the money for.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And so, basically, with the knowledge he obtained from those Ba'athist intelligence and the Republican guard officers who defected to him, he located Qusay Saddam Hussein and confiscated whatever remained, which was roughly $340 million.
Thomas Small And what – what would he have done with that money?
Aimen Dean Oh. Then, Zarqawi, basically, you know, embarked on one of the most impressive M&A exercise in terror history.
Thomas Small M&A?
Aimen Dean Merger and acquisition.
Thomas Small I see. So, he was a – he was a great capitalist. What do you mean by that? He merged with home and acquired what?
Aimen Dean Okay. So, you know, imagine, you know, Iraq and the insurgency/terrorism scene in Iraq after the American invasion. Imagine it's like the chaos of the dot-com bubble, you know. The chaos of the Silicon Valley, you know. Ten thousand start-ups everywhere. So, suddenly, you know, those who have cash can swallow those who don't.
Thomas Small I see. So, we're – we're in a – we're in an environment now where there are lots of disparate unconnected cells of people pissed off at the Americans and wanting to kill. Zarqawi bribes them, pays them off, brings them into his big tent.
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small And there you have al-Qaeda in Iraq.
Aimen Dean So, it was a process that lasted more than a year and a half, from May 2003, you know, all the way until November of 2004.
Thomas Small And if I'm not mistaken, in fact, Iraq was rather peaceful during this time, lulling the Americans into a sense that, "Oh, we've got this. This is going to be fine." And then, suddenly, pfft.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. You see, Zarqawi should have been given the title of CEO of the year.
Thomas Small So, what – what was Zarqawi's aim then now? 'Cause, originally, you said he wanted to rally Jordanians and Palestinians against Israel. What's his new aim? He's now in charge of a huge number of jihadists in Iraq. They're – they're attacking America, planting IEDs along roadsides, blowing up armoured vehicles, popping up here and there. Shooting, taking pot shots at soldiers, while at the same time, kidnapping other Iraqis, killing people, participating in the ethnic cleansing of neighbourhoods, participating in that whole great bloodshed that was going on. What's his ultimate goal?
Aimen Dean His two ultimate goals—. Well, there were three ultimate goals as far as al-Zarqawi was concerned. The first one was to frustrate the establishment of a Shia-dominated government in Iraq.
Thomas Small That was – that was one of their fears, that the Shia, the majority, would dominate the government. What was the second goal?
Aimen Dean The second goal was to expel the Americans out of Iraq.
Thomas Small And the third?
Aimen Dean And the third was to establish a Sunni Islamic state in Iraq.
Thomas Small Well, that's funny, because that reminds me of a certain institution that was established about ten years later in Iraq called ISIS. Of course, we'll get there in
the end.
Aimen Dean Actually, Zarqawi joined al-Qaeda 2005 officially, you know, and gave the [unintelligible] to Osama bin Laden, because he wanted this legitimacy that comes with his connection to al-Qaeda. That's the first thing. And he called his group al-Qaeda in Iraq. And the next year, he established something called the Shura council of the Mujahideen or the United Council of the Mujahideen. But in a film that was, you know, released by Zarqawi and his people six weeks before he died, he was meeting with his Shura council. He was meeting with his—.
Thomas Small Council of advisors.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. And the commanders, also. And in that meeting, he was asked, "What about the project for the Islamic state? What about the project for the Islamic state?" And he said, "God-willing, this will be concluded within a year." So, actually that film, you know, you can see him, his face, talking, answering that question and saying that the project for the Islamic state in Iraq is going to conclude within a year. They will have an Islamic state in Iraq. Of course, he died six weeks after that. But less than a year later, his successors announced the Islamic State of Iraq.
Thomas Small Now, let's talk about the consequences on the Arab street to Zarqawi's his reign of terror. Because actually, in the end, Zarqawi alienated himself from Osama bin Laden. Even Osama bin Ladin thought that Zarqawi's methods were too cruel, that he was behaving in too much indiscriminate killing, and that it was turning Arabs against jihadism. They were realising that scratched the surface and these people are just sadistic psychopaths. Was that your experience as an Arab at the time? Were you aware that maybe Arabs were thinking, were seeing the beheadings, were seeing the – the – the – the sheer number of their fellow Muslims being killed as collateral damage or as targets, and thinking, "What the hell? We don't want anything to do with this?"
Aimen Dean No. I will tell you something even more interesting than just what the Arabs though on the street. What the al-Qaeda members thought themselves.
Thomas Small What did they think?
Aimen Dean Well, the al-Qaeda members I used to mingle with, you know, in Bahrain and in Saudi Arabia and then the rest of the gulf, you can see within the ranks of al-Qaeda the immediate division based on class rather than on ideology.
Thomas Small This is back to what we were talking about in episode two, the – the bourgeois recruits and the working-class recruits.
Aimen Dean Even worse. The criminal class recruits.
Thomas Small The criminal class recruits.
Aimen Dean Because—.
Thomas Small They – they loved Zarqawi, of course. They thought, "Oh, my God. He's our – he's our hero."
Aimen Dean Exactly. Because Zarqawi is the graduate of Jordanian prisons. First, in his previous life, he was a thug. He was a thug. You know, a street criminal. And later became a jihadist. So, he brought with him that sadism and psychopathic tendencies, you know, to the jihad he embraced. And that is why, you know, you can see considerable brutality and you can see the gangster in him emerging in the way he behaved with his opponents. With his followers, he was a sweet, gentle, charismatic, and easy to deal with and easy to—.
Thomas Small Like Don Corleone. If – if you're on his good side, he's your grandfather. If you're on his bad side, he takes you to the mattresses.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. I mean, after all, basically, how did he, you know, manage to coerce his way into being the largest leader of the largest insurgency in Iraq?
Because he made people offer they can't refuse. So, you know—. And that's exactly what happened here. So—.
Thomas Small The bourgeois—. Your bourgeois—.
Aimen Dean Were upset.
Thomas Small Because they just thought this is – this is uncivilised. I mean, they're just a bit more – more – more sensitive souls?
Aimen Dean Well, the bourgeoisie jihadist, you know, they felt that they were closer, you know, to the mentality of the average individual in the Arab world. They understand that too much brutality will put off people. You need to behave in a more magnanimous way if you want to signal to the people that you are ready to rule. The problem with the criminal classes within the jihadist movement is that they lacked magnanimity. The phrase—. The word "magnanimity" is not present in their dictionary. And that was their downfall.
Thomas Small So, inside al-Qaeda, the bourgeois jihadists were growing rather disillusioned with Zarqawi's methods and with the brutality that the criminal class within al-Qaeda was manifesting. Now, this is interesting, because, as I said before, at the same time, as all of this is going on in Iraq, inside Saudi Arabia, there's a violent jihadist campaign going on, trying to overthrow the government, increasingly resorting to more and more brutal methods, including kidnapping and killing people. And the Saudi government doing a very good job of highlighting the brutality, turning the people against jihadists, creating within al-Qaeda this – this dialogue. "Have we gone too far? Are we losing hearts and minds?"
Now, that's interesting, of course, because America, we're always being told, was losing hearts and minds in Iraq and elsewhere. At the same time, al-Qaeda is losing hearts and minds. So, did the Iraq War and America's bundling of that, did it turn you against the American global order? What's called the Atlanticist World Order, that world order underpinned by American military power, keeping markets open, advocating for global trade, for greater liberalism. Did it turn you against that as a – as a global ideal?
Aimen Dean Ironically, my faith in the nation states and the global order was only reinforced, actually, after the Iraq War. Ironically. And the reason for this is because I saw what chaos can do to a nation state once the leadership has decapitated. And I'm talking about Iraq. Yes, I deeply loathed American foreign policy at that time. But I did not – I did not return to being anti-American. Why? Because I always closed my eyes and I was thinking, "If America disappeared today, what would happen to the world?" And the reality is we will have China and Russia terrorising the rest of the world into submission while Europe is cowering in a corner, because America is no more, is not there anymore. So, America became, for me, the necessary evil during the Iraq War. Now, it is unnecessary nuisance.
Thomas Small Yes. The importance of the nation state. I can understand how that might have been reinforced in you as an ideal during the Iraq War as you watched Iraq descend into chaos. Of course, only a few years later, the so-called Arab Spring would begin when the destabilisation of nation states across the Arab world rocked that world, and the consequences of which, we're still living with.
And that brings us up to the next episode where we'll talk about the Arab Spring, specifically the way it has played out in Yemen, where they begin to regroup, they begin to think, "What went wrong? Why have we been so thoroughly defeated? Why have we lost Arab hearts and minds?"
And in Yemen, they're going to form, in a way, al-Qaeda 3.0. First, you had the al-Qaeda that launched 9/11. Then, you had the brutal bloodletting al-Qaeda of Zarqawi and that era. And then, in Yemen, al-Qaeda 3.0, which would be much more sensitive to the local populations' needs and their ideas, much, much more shrewd in their dealings with people in the way they carried out terrorism. Of course, we'll talk about Yemen and its history following the Arab Spring uprisings and the launch of the war that is currently ravaging that country. A conflict which has created great human suffering there, including what is being reported as the worst famine in a hundred years.
This episode of Conflicted was produced by Jake Warren and Sandra Ferrari. Original music by Matt Huxley. If you want to hear more of Conflicted, make sure you search for us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download yours.