Douglas Feith invented a Dutch company to fake ties

[Hieronymus]

between Iraq and bin Laden.


http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/24/feith-iraq-alqaeda

Feith Referenced Fake Company As Evidence Of Pre-War Ties Between Iraq And Bin Laden

Early last month, Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) released a declassified version of a Pentagon Inspector General report that found that in Sept. 2002, Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith gave a briefing entitled Assessing the Relationship Between Iraq and al-Qaida to Vice President Cheneys chief of staff.

In this alternative intelligence assessment, Feith asserted that Osama Bin Ladens al-Hijra Company had business contacts with a Dutch company, Vlemmo N.V. and that Vlemmo was a front for Iraqi military procurement:

Dick Cheney publicly praised the Feith assessment as the best source of information on the topic.

Yesterday, however, the Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen explained that Feith had apparently invented the company, saying Vlemmo is unknown to the Netherlands:

The company has never been registered with the Chamber of Commerce in the Netherlands and is also not known to the tax service. That the company may have served as a front for illegal arms trade with Iraq is equally unknown to me.

The Inspector General report concluded that Feith inappropriately developed, produced and then disseminated alternative intelligence assessments on the Iraq and al-Qaeda relationship, which included conclusions that were inconsistent with the consensus of the Intelligence Community.

Juan Cole has more.

Ryan Powers

[WCGreen]

1. Fraud.....

WHo would have figured Bush cronies would resort to such a thing....

[smalll]

2. Oh no, clip-ons!

Fake ties:

[Eric J in MN]

3. Bob Harris writes that it may have been a real company.

http://thismodernworld.com/3767

One of Feith’s alleged links between Saddam and Al-Qaeda involved a company called Vlemmo NV, said to be Dutch. (The “NV” seems to be analogous to our “Inc.” or “LLP.”)

But the Dutch government announced this week that they’d searched high and low and found no evidence whatsoever that any such company had ever existed in the Netherlands. And a bunch of lefty blogs have picked up on the report as further evidence that Feith was full of crap.

Tempting to join in. But I did some poking, and Vlemmo may well have existed after all.

It gets arcane from here, with links to Belgian justice ministry documents and my half-assed attempts to translate Dutch. Full bit over in puduland.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. The end justifies the means

this is Strauss at his best, and the Neo Con movement

[Hieronymus]

5. Absolutely Straussian ..

[laststeamtrain]

6. K&R n/t

[acmavm]

7. And the lying bastard is now teaching young college students about

government where?

<snip>

Feith is now on the faculty of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_J._Feith

<snip>

That's just seems disgusting and wrong to me.

[HowHasItComeToThis]

8. FEITH IS A CHEAP CRIMINAL SHOULD BE CHARGED, TRIED, JAILED

THESE ANIMALS WILL STOP AT NOTHING.

THEY ARE A THREAT TO EARTH.