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Saddam's Network Resembles Mafia
Aired December 23, 2003 - 14:31 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, if you follow "The Sopranos" or even "Law And Order" you've got a pretty fair idea how U.S. troops and snoops analysts and experts go after high-value targets. In that sense, Saddam Hussein wasn't all that different from a drug kingpin or a Mafia boss.
CNN's Ken Robinson now joins me from Washington with some hard- won insights. Ken, good to see you.
KEN ROBINSON, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Hi, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: We kind of put this -- wanted to put in the graphic terms, shall we say. Just kind of talking about this spider web. You and I were talking about this yesterday. This type of Mafia scenario that Saddam Hussein had. Taking a look at how it plays out. Saddam's enablers. You've got logistics, you've got finance, you've got chief of staff. Explain the correlation, Saddam's regime, "Sopranos."
ROBINSON: I think it's a great analogy, Kyra. The crime families of New York, the five crime families of New York, the FBI was able to dismantle and really hurt those crime families by starting with their friends, relatives, acquaintances, known associates. And then pulling people in for interviews, arresting certain people, offering certain deals for certain people at a low level to rat out somebody at a higher level.
And that same type of analogy was used in the intelligence operations in Iraq. These support cells cannot be passive. All terrorist organizations, all underground organizations need to be able to eat, sleep, communicate, plan, finance, and be able to continue to move on with their operations. And Saddam did that through these five families.
And so this intelligence community, both at the strategic operational and tactical level, realized that they had to change certain tactics that they were doing in terms of how to be able to break the back of the Ba'athist regimes that were -- they were fighting against. And to do that they went after these families and did some pretty brilliant intelligence analysis.
PHILLIPS: It's interesting, Ken, because when Saddam was captured there were so many analysts coming forward saying, there's no way he could have directed these attacks that have been taking place and letting these -- telling these insurgents what to do.
But actually if you look at the Mafia-type spider web, all he had to do was say one thing and then it funneled down.
ROBINSON: Well, you know, the jury's still out on exactly how much complicity he had in actually assigning operations. He may have only been kept in the information loop or he may have directed specific operations to occur in specific areas, leading underlings to go ahead and take care of them.
In most case when they did find people who were dead on these different objectives where attacks occurred, they haven't found too many of them that were connected with these five family members. They were going out and outsourcing that. And I think the jury's still out on exactly how much he was able to control the day-to-day operation of this.
PHILLIPS: The thought is the chain of command says something to an enabler, the enabler somehow contacts one of the families within a cell. And then by person, by person, by person, ultimately it hits the trigger man.
ROBINSON: And you know in the case of these money buys lot of love in Iraq right now. You know if you make $12 a month and someone is offering you $500 a month to attack a coalition member, that gets a lot of attention.
Also, we can't forget that they're not the only enemy that are out there in Iraq that they're trying to chase right now. Ansar al Islam, former terrorist in the north in the Kurdish area, Whabbists coming across from Saudi Arabia. Also foreign fighters coming from Iran, fighters coming from Syria and each of them with their own motivations and their own cells.
So the Ba'athist and this group they just disrupted is not the only threat to coalition forces.
PHILLIPS: Well talk about disruption -- and I hear what you're saying about these other entities -- just back to Saddam quickly, my final question. His closest confident, Al-Duri, when Saddam was captured there was this talk that Al-Duri might have been captured also.
But from an intelligence stand point you were saying to me, even if he were to be captured, if you look at this kinds of Mafia mentality, you wouldn't want to announce that Al-Duri was captured for a number of reasons, right?
ROBINSON: Well, we don't know whether he was or was not captured yet. But you can assume that if you telegraphed someone who's that close to Saddam being captured you would think that then the behavior of members of the cell would be different.
In the case again of crime families in the New York crime families, that's how they've approached this standpoint. So there's no really way to know until the government finally discloses what his current status is. He's either really hot on the run right now or possibly he could have contributed to information that led to Saddam's capture. PHILLIPS: Ken Robinson, always a pleasure. Thank you.
ROBINSON: Thanks, Kyra.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 23, 2003 - 14:31 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, if you follow "The Sopranos" or even "Law And Order" you've got a pretty fair idea how U.S. troops and snoops analysts and experts go after high-value targets. In that sense, Saddam Hussein wasn't all that different from a drug kingpin or a Mafia boss.
CNN's Ken Robinson now joins me from Washington with some hard- won insights. Ken, good to see you.
KEN ROBINSON, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Hi, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: We kind of put this -- wanted to put in the graphic terms, shall we say. Just kind of talking about this spider web. You and I were talking about this yesterday. This type of Mafia scenario that Saddam Hussein had. Taking a look at how it plays out. Saddam's enablers. You've got logistics, you've got finance, you've got chief of staff. Explain the correlation, Saddam's regime, "Sopranos."
ROBINSON: I think it's a great analogy, Kyra. The crime families of New York, the five crime families of New York, the FBI was able to dismantle and really hurt those crime families by starting with their friends, relatives, acquaintances, known associates. And then pulling people in for interviews, arresting certain people, offering certain deals for certain people at a low level to rat out somebody at a higher level.
And that same type of analogy was used in the intelligence operations in Iraq. These support cells cannot be passive. All terrorist organizations, all underground organizations need to be able to eat, sleep, communicate, plan, finance, and be able to continue to move on with their operations. And Saddam did that through these five families.
And so this intelligence community, both at the strategic operational and tactical level, realized that they had to change certain tactics that they were doing in terms of how to be able to break the back of the Ba'athist regimes that were -- they were fighting against. And to do that they went after these families and did some pretty brilliant intelligence analysis.
PHILLIPS: It's interesting, Ken, because when Saddam was captured there were so many analysts coming forward saying, there's no way he could have directed these attacks that have been taking place and letting these -- telling these insurgents what to do.
But actually if you look at the Mafia-type spider web, all he had to do was say one thing and then it funneled down.
ROBINSON: Well, you know, the jury's still out on exactly how much complicity he had in actually assigning operations. He may have only been kept in the information loop or he may have directed specific operations to occur in specific areas, leading underlings to go ahead and take care of them.
In most case when they did find people who were dead on these different objectives where attacks occurred, they haven't found too many of them that were connected with these five family members. They were going out and outsourcing that. And I think the jury's still out on exactly how much he was able to control the day-to-day operation of this.
PHILLIPS: The thought is the chain of command says something to an enabler, the enabler somehow contacts one of the families within a cell. And then by person, by person, by person, ultimately it hits the trigger man.
ROBINSON: And you know in the case of these money buys lot of love in Iraq right now. You know if you make $12 a month and someone is offering you $500 a month to attack a coalition member, that gets a lot of attention.
Also, we can't forget that they're not the only enemy that are out there in Iraq that they're trying to chase right now. Ansar al Islam, former terrorist in the north in the Kurdish area, Whabbists coming across from Saudi Arabia. Also foreign fighters coming from Iran, fighters coming from Syria and each of them with their own motivations and their own cells.
So the Ba'athist and this group they just disrupted is not the only threat to coalition forces.
PHILLIPS: Well talk about disruption -- and I hear what you're saying about these other entities -- just back to Saddam quickly, my final question. His closest confident, Al-Duri, when Saddam was captured there was this talk that Al-Duri might have been captured also.
But from an intelligence stand point you were saying to me, even if he were to be captured, if you look at this kinds of Mafia mentality, you wouldn't want to announce that Al-Duri was captured for a number of reasons, right?
ROBINSON: Well, we don't know whether he was or was not captured yet. But you can assume that if you telegraphed someone who's that close to Saddam being captured you would think that then the behavior of members of the cell would be different.
In the case again of crime families in the New York crime families, that's how they've approached this standpoint. So there's no really way to know until the government finally discloses what his current status is. He's either really hot on the run right now or possibly he could have contributed to information that led to Saddam's capture. PHILLIPS: Ken Robinson, always a pleasure. Thank you.
ROBINSON: Thanks, Kyra.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
