Sunday, January 17, 2010

How The CIA Was Infiltrated by An Al Qaeda Double Agent



In Afghanistan Attack, CIA Fell Victim To Series Of Miscalculations About Informant -- Washington Post

AMMAN, JORDAN -- He was an ambitious young doctor from a large family who had a foreign wife and two children -- details that officers of Jordan's intelligence service viewed as exploitable vulnerabilities, not biography.

Early last year, the General Intelligence Department picked up Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi after his pseudonymous postings on extremist Web sites had become increasingly strident. During three days of questioning, GID officers threatened to have Balawi jailed and end his medical career, and they hinted they could cause problems for his family, according to a former U.S. official and a Jordanian official, both of whom have knowledge of Balawi's detention.

Read more ....

My Comment: A sobering review of how the CIA and Jordanian intelligence failed in this case. But unlike other operations that have failed, these mistakes resulted in the deaths of a number of CIA personnel and the disruption of key CIA operations in Afghanistan/Pakistan.

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