Pentagon vs Außenministerium

December 2001
The Bush administration sends two Defense officials, Harold Rhode and Larry Franklin, to meet with Iranians in Rome in response to an Iranian government offer to provide information relevant to the war on terrorism. The offer had been back-channeled by the Iranians to the White House through Manucher Ghorbanifar, an Iranian arms trader and a central person in the Iran-Contra affair, who contacted another Iran-Contra figure, Michael Ledeen of the American Enterprise Institute. Ledeen passed the information on to his friends in the Defense Department who then relayed the offer to National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley. Hadley expressed no reservations about the proposed meeting and informed George J. Tenet, the director of the CIA, and Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage. According to officials interviewed by the New York Times, the United States Embassy in Rome was not notified of the planned meeting as required by standard interagency procedures. Neither the US embassy nor CIA station chief in Rome learn of the three-day meeting, apparently attended by both Ghorbanifar and Ledeen, until after it happens. When they do catch wind of the meeting, they notify CIA and State Department headquarters in Washington which complain to the administration about how the meetings had been arranged. [New York Times, 1/7/2004; Washington Post, 9/9/2003; Newsday, 9/9/2003]

June 2002
In Paris, Defense Department officials (including either Harold Rhode or Larry Franklin) meet with Iranian officials and Manucher Ghorbanifar, an Iranian arms trader who had been a central figure in the Iran-Contra affair. The meeting reportedly resulted from “an unplanned, unscheduled encounter,” that took place without White House approval. An earlier meeting involving several of the same figures had taken place seven months earlier (See December 2001). [New York Times, 1/7/2004; Washington Post, 9/9/2003] When Secretary of State Colin Powell learns of the meeting, he complains directly to Condoleezza Rice and the office of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. [Washington Post, 9/9/2003; Newsday, 9/9/2003]

Es ist schon erstaunlich, wie bei solchen Gesprächen wiederholt das eigentlich zuständige Außenministerium unter Colin Powell (und anscheinend sogar das Weiße Haus) vom Pentagon regelmäßig übergangen wurde. Ähnliches war auch vor dem Irak-Krieg zu beobachten gewesen. Bezeichnend auch, daß ein iranischer Waffenhändler hier als Kontaktperson fungierte. So gesehen ist es nur zu logisch, daß mit Conduleeza Rice die ehemalige Sicherheitsberaterin im zweiten Kabinett George Walker Bush´s Colin Powell als Außenminister abgelöst hat.