What are we to make of the furor over whether the Russians aided Saddam Hussein’s regime around the time of the US-led invasion? US Defense Department’s 210-page study clearly cites Iraqi documents from March 2003 that contain information allegedly provided by Russian diplomats and intelligence officers. A day after its release, a spokesman for the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) denied that any such intelligence had been supplied to Iraq.
First, it’s important to understand that the impressively documented Pentagon report was never intended to assess whether, or under what circumstances, the Russians may have provided such information. The analysts were responsible only for assessing the Iraqi regime’s perspective on the war.
Which brings us to the two main documents in question: An undated, three-page handwritten description of US force deployments as of early March 2003 based on information allegedly provided by Russian Ambassador Vladimir Titorenko; and a typed, eight-page description of US war plans dated March 25, 2003 and based on information also attributed to Titorenko. There is no inherent reason to doubt the authenticity of these documents. Whether the information they contain is accurate is another matter.
Reports in the Russian and Western press in March 2003 indicated that Gen. Vladislav Achalov, the former commander of Soviet airborne forces who supported the attempted coup in Moscow in August 1991, visited Baghdad shortly before the March 2003 invasion, accompanied by another retired Russian general. Achalov has since acknowledged that he traveled to Iraq at least 15 to 20 times in the years leading up to the war.
Press reports from March 2003 and afterward also indicated that other GRU officers were working with the Iraqi regime on a daily basis before and during the war. In addition, a GRU “working group” known as Ramzaj, which posted daily assessments on a Russian military website, was widely described in the Russian press as aiding the Iraqi government. Although Ramzaj’s forecasts and some of its information proved to be wildly off the mark, the reports in major Russian dailies and respected trade publications lend strong credence to the assertions in the Iraqi documents that Titorenko and some Russian military intelligence officers aided the Iraqi efforts to withstand the US invasion.
If Titorenko did provide illicit assistance, his motive may have been largely financial. It is unlikely that Titorenko’s apparent actions and the GRU cooperation were authorized at high levels.
One excerpt from the Iraqi document, dated March 25, 2003, has drawn particular attention. It refers to “information that the Russians have collected from their sources inside the American Central Command in Doha.” Many journalists have construed this as meaning that the Russians had a spy working there. Far more likely is the possibility that the Russian information was collected through electronic means or possibly even through an authorized sharing of information. The Americans may have counted on the likelihood that false information would be picked up by Russian military intelligence and divulged to the Iraqis. If this was indeed the case, the US scheme worked brilliantly.
The attempts this past week by Russian officials to link the publication of the Pentagon report with the ongoing debate about Iran in the UN Security Council are far-fetched. Even more preposterous is the claim by Sergei Oznobishchev, head of the Moscow-based Institute of Strategic Evaluations and Analyses, that Pentagon officials issued the report because they are irritated by Russia’s strengthening position in the international arena.
So what are we to make of all this? The Iraqi documents have exacerbated US concerns about Russia only a few months before Putin is to chair the G-8 summit in St. Petersburg. The uproar surrounding the disclosures is a sign of how frayed the West’s relationship with Russia has become. The Russian government would be wise to clear up the matter as expeditiously as possible.
— Mark Kramer is director of the Harvard Project on Cold War Studies and a senior associate of the university’s Davis Center for Russian Studies.
