INTELLIGENCE SUMMARY VERSION ISSN 1245-2122 N. 81 New Series, 8 June 1998 Publishing since 1980 Editor Olivier Schmidt (email intelligence-adi@wanadoo.fr; web http://www.blythe.org/Intelligence) TABLE OF CONTENTS, N. 81, 8 June 1998 FRONT PAGE BELGIUM - THATCHER, ASTRA, IRAQ & MURDER OF GERALD BULL p.1 TECHNOLOGY AND TECHNIQUES CIABASE SEPTEMBER 1997 - JUNE 1998 UPDATE p.2 MOLECULAR TRACKER TECHNOLOGY p.3 ANTI-COUNTERFEIT TECH FOR BRITISH PASSPORT p.4 MILITARY - Publications at EuroSatory. p.5 TECHNOLOGY & TECHNIQUES - Briefs, Books & Media Reports. p.6 PEOPLE USA - FRANCIS ALBERT "FRANK" SINATRA p.7 GREAT BRITAIN - JONATHAN AITKEN p.8 FRANCE - FRANCOIS ROUSSELY p.9 AUSTRALIA/BURMA - JAMES RUPERT MAWDSLEY p.10 ISRAEL - Shaul Mofaz. p.11 PEOPLE - Briefs and Media Reports. p.12 AGENDA COMING EVENTS THROUGH 15 JULY 1998 p.13 INTELLIGENCE AROUND THE WORLD USA - FALLOUT FROM INDIAN TESTS SETTLES ON WASHINGTON p.14 - PDD 62, 63 & SINGLE POINT OVERRELIANCE p.15 - Briefs and Media Reports. p.16 GREAT BRITAIN - POLICE EXEMPTION FROM DATA DISCLOSURE & G-8 SHOW p.17 - GRIPING ABOUT 21ST CENTURY MILITARY p.18 NORTHERN IRELAND - KITSON'S EXPERIMENT BEHIND "BLOODY SUNDAY" p.19 - Beware of the Bugs. p.20 FRANCE - EXCHANGE TERRORISTS FOR TOURISTS WITH EGYPT p.21 - STRANGE PLATFORMS FLOATING AT SEA p.22 GERMANY - ANOTHER FOERTSCH "SCANDAL" DEFLATES p.23 WESTERN EUROPE - Briefs and Media Reports. p.24 LITHUANIA - SERIOUS RESHUFFLING IN INTELLIGENCE p.25 EASTERN EUROPE - Briefs and Media Reports. p.26 LATIN AMERICA - Briefs and Media Reports. p.27 AFRICA - Briefs and Media Reports. p.28 PALESTINE - NETANYAHU WANTS IT BOTH WAYS AS WAR APPROACHES p.29 JORDAN - SADDAM HUSSEIN'S DIRTY MONEY NETWORK UNRAVELS p.30 MIDDLE EAST - Briefs and Media Reports. p.31 INDONESIA - HARD TIMES AHEAD FOR SUHARTO-BRIT COMPANIES p.32 ASIA - Briefs and Media Reports. p.33 --------------------------------------------- FRONT PAGE Intelligence, N. 81, 8 June 1998, p. 1 BELGIUM THATCHER, ASTRA, IRAQ & MURDER OF GERALD BULL The international press has been caught sleeping ... or has intentionally ignored a "block-buster": 40 pages of raw intelligence data from MI5 and MI6 directly implicating the inner circle of British prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, in the murder of Gerald Bull in Brussels on 22 March 1990. That is what Walter De Bock revealed in the Flemish daily, "De Morgen", on 15 April and which has generated in the international press ... two articles. The documents have been passed on to the Belgian judge, Christian De Valkeneer, who has been investigating the Bull murder and recently decided to reopen the case on the basis of this documentation. Gerald Bull was a Canadian engineer who had been working in Belgium and secretly collaborating with the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein in developing the "Super Cannon" which was supposed to be able to hit Israel from Iraq. Quite normally, the murder inquiry got under way by investigating the possible involvement of Mossad, but after six years, including two years of intensive work just after the murder, De Valkeneer shelved the inquiry with little or nothing to prove Israeli implication. It now appears that Mossad's nemesis, the Tory British defense and intelligence establishment (the "Old Boy" network), is the real culprit and handily turned the inquiry toward Mossad to cover its own tracks and, in particular, those of Stephan Adolph Kock, the central figure of the Bull murder and apparently the direct liaison to the Conservative Old Boy network and the Thatcher inner circle (see our biography of Kock in INT, n. 76 16). Following the "De Morgen" revelations, the "Independent" published a one-page article entitled "Who is Stephan Kock?" on 26 April. The only other article on the affair was published by the Sunday magazine, "Business Times". Needless to say, publication of MI5 and MI6 documents in the British press would have been met with a rigorous "D Notice" before public release. Bull was a serious rival to the Thatcher-Old Boy clique since they were involved in truly "cut-throat" competition on the same market: illegally furnishing arms to Iraq during the Iraq-Iran war. Much more so than Bull, the Thatcher-Old Boy clique -- a very pro-NATO and pro-US group -- was illegally furnishing both sides, making sure neither side gained a strategic advantage, while making tremendous profits. Bull knew this and apparently had extensive documentation on the Thatcher-Old Boy clique's secret arms traffic, but this "insurance policy" didn't save him from British "Big Boy rules". Judge De Valkeneer is now focusing his investigation on a mysterious visit to Brussels of a four-member SAS team lead by Kock and including Terry Hardy, "MoD" (British Ministry of Defence), Colonel Ian Jack, SHAPE liaison officer to the SAS and other British special forces, Michael Blane, British "Tactical Support Staff". Kock is described as a former SAS officer, an MI5 agent and -- which is exceptional -- also an MI6 agent, and a director of Astra Holdings with which Bull had been fighting "tooth and nail" for the ownership of the Belgian PRB munitions firm, formerly the Pouderies Reunies de Belgique. In this fight with the Thatcher-Old Boy clique, Bull lost the battle for PRB and then his life. On 2 March 1990, a fax message, with the heading "Visit of UK MoD Special Forces Staff to PRB", announced the arrival in Brussels of the above four-member team for a supposed 19-21 March visit to PRB facilities. The team was particularly interested in looking into the possible production of special forces explosive devices by PRB, according to the fax. PRB had never produced such devices and was in no way equipped to do so. The team supposedly left Brussels for London on the evening of 21 March. The next day Bull was killed and this team's visit to Brussels is the center of Judge De Valkeneer's new investigation. De Valkeneer also has a 6 March 1990 document from Astra announcing the team's arrival and intention to visit four PRB ammunition factories. Besides Kock, an Astra director, none of the team members had previously had anything to do with PRB. Just before his death on 22 March, Bull had a five-hour meeting with Chris Gumbley, until just a few days previously director general of Astra Holdings, in Brussels. The meeting was also attended by two lawyers, one a Swiss who had also worked as a PRB representative, and a Belgian who was Bull's lawyer. Gumbley had been brutally ejected by Kock from Astra management and Astra chairman of the board, Gerald James, had his board chairmanship taken away from him, but was left as an ordinary board member. This "coup" was executed by Kock alone, who was Astra's new executive director apparently acting on behalf of the Thatcher-Old Boy clique. After this "coup", and several weeks before his death, Bull met with James. Since the murder of Bull, Kock denied, in several different official British inquiries, that he had traveled to Brussels at the time, but later admitted he had been in Brussels in March 1990. According to "De Morgen", Kock was the only person aware of the meeting between Gumbley and Bull because Gumbley had told him. He was also the top MI5 and MI6 agent for information concerning illegal international arms traffic and therefore would have known about Bull's involvement in the Iraqi Super Cannon and probably also about Bull's knowledge of the Thatcher-Old Boy clique's international arms trafficking. Indeed, this seems to have been the subject of the Gumbley-Bull meeting. The owner of PRB, Societe Generale, had been trying to sell the company to either Bull or Astra -- then under James and Gumbley -- without letting either know until the very end they were competing against each other. When Astra bought control of PRB, both Bull and Astra wanted to know how they had been manipulated. Bull, having worked with PRB since the 1970s, including for his arms deals and Super Cannon work for Iraq, knew very well that PRB was insolvent and, without the secret Iraq deals, would have been bankrupt long ago. Astra management, under James and Gumbley, did not know this and thought they were purchasing a dynamic munitions manufacturer. Bull soon learned Astra's position, and, probably feeling that both he and the James-Gumbley Astra management had been manipulated by Societe Generale and the Thatcher-Old Boy clique (Bull's real competitors), Bull apparently sought revenge by "cluing them in". This is not at all what Kock and the Thatcher-Old Boy clique wanted. James and Gumbley were kicked out and Bull was "terminated with extreme prejudice" (CIA, not MI6 terminology). The "termination" of Bull did not come any too early. During his 22 March meeting with James and Gumbley, Bull gave them explosive information on deep involvement of senior British Conservative Party officials in massive illegal weapons contracts with Iran and Iraq extending over many years. Some of this came out in the "Iraqgate" scandal involving Matrix Churchill (see INT, n. 55 12, n. 59 29 & n. 79 28). Via Kock, the Thatcher inner circle probably knew what was happening in Brussels. James and Gumbley had had trouble with Thatcher's Tory government and the Thatcher inner circle which was secretly furnishing Iran and Iraq with arms to keep them strategically balanced. In the center of the Thatcher-Old Boy clique is the Midland Bank, MI6 and the SAS. In the 1980s, when Margaret Thatcher came to power, a leading figure at Midland was French aristocrat, Count Herve de Carmoy, who headed a secret department in charge of financing the illegal British arms traffic with Iraq and Iran. In 1988, de Carmoy left the Midland to take up a senior job at the Societe Generale and, indirectly, the PRB. Later, at Societe Generale, de Carmoy was succeeded by the Belgian aristocrat and former Belgian military counter-espionage officer, Viscount Steve Davignon, who also negotiated with Bull and Astra. Societe Generale, Midland Bank and the Thatcher-Old Boy clique all knew about PRB's real situation and hid it from the James-Gumbley management of Astra which bought control of PRB just before being disposed of. James told "De Morgen" that Kock was a top MI6 and MI5 informant and also in direct contact with the Thatcher inner circle via Richard Unwin, also a MI6 officer who was directly linked to Gerald Howarth, chief of Thatcher's cabinet. In 1997, Howarth was elected a Tory MP against a "New Labour" candidate. "De Morgen" considered the principal question behind this affair to be why the Thatcher-Old Boy clique was so interested in Astra and PRB. The Thatcher defense industry in the 1980s was involved in massive illegal arms trade to Iran and Iraq and they wanted to maintain a monopoly and suppress any leaks. After the Iraq-Iran war, the British defense industry continued to export arms to Iraq which helped build up the Iraq armed forces, led to the invasion of Kuwait and made the Gulf War possible. This traffic passed through complicated networks involving third parties, and the Thatcher-Old Boy clique controlled them with Kock as coordinator and "enforcer". In early 1990, James and Gumbley became a risk for this vast operation and were pushed aside. They decided to contact Bull who could tell them much more about the network and the central role of the Thatcher-Old Boy clique. Bull was out for revenge, sided with James and Gumbley, and furnished massive documentation and specialized lawyers to "blow" the British network and expose the Thatcher government. James met Bull briefly, then Gumbley decided to secretly meet Bull for five hours on 22 March just before Bull's murder. After that, Gumbley and James underwent serious harassment in Great Britain. After Bull's murder, PRB changed its name and became Gechem, sold off its ammunitions production capacity and kept only synthetic foam production. James and Gumbley tried to fight back under difficult circumstances and Kock seems to have "done further service" for the Thatcher-Old Boy clique. Recently, James claims to have seen documents, supposedly from the CIA or the US State Department, stating that Kock was much more active than previously known. One document reportedly mentions that Kock, on 26 March-2 April 1990, just after the Bull murder, was "shadowed" in Santiago, Chile, at the Hotel Carrera with another MI6 officer, Roger Holdness. Holdness was probably the "Michael Blane" who was a member of the team which visited Brussels. On 31 March 1990, in Hotel Carrera room 406, Jonathan Moyle, British defense journalist working as editor of "Defence Helicopter World", was murdered as a poorly-disguised "suicide". Moyle was investigating the very same thing up against which Bull had come: secret British involvement in weapons traffic to Iraq, this time involving helicopters (see "Great Britain/Chile - Death of Journalist J. Moyle", INT, n. 76 34). The official British inquiry into Moyle's death ran into serious obstacles and eventually led nowhere, probably due to the fact that the British prime minister's son, Mark Thatcher, was linked to Chilian arms dealer, Carlos Cardoen, who Moyle was investigating. Cardoen, since condemned in a US court, has consistently claimed his Iraqi weapons sales were known and "verified" by British and US military attaches based in Santiago. Judge De Valkeneer has indeed a hefty task cut out for himself. Copyright @ Walter De Bock and "De Morgen", 1998 --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 81, 8 June 1998, p. 21 FRANCE EXCHANGE TERRORISTS FOR TOURISTS WITH EGYPT Even a casual reader could see through the media management surrounding the recent massive arrests of suspected Islamic terrorists in France and throughout Western Europe. You don't need to be a specialist to realize that the more than 80 persons detained by police on 26 May are not involved only in an attempt to kill moderate Islamic leader, Dalil Bubakeur, rector of the Paris mosque, as a 2 June official French government press release stated. The last such terrorist operation in Paris involved a hit squad of two with a small backup-watchers team and a few hideouts in Paris. Moreover, on a normal day, tourists walking on the banks of the Seine are lucky to see one police river patrol. There are currently five simultaneous river patrols cruising the Seine in light-weight inflatable commando boat, speedboat and even a police tugboat - - just in case terrorists floated a barge full of explosives into central Paris. Indeed, the security alert is at its highest possible level: alert 1! Large "dragnets" or "fishing expeditions" could be expected before the opening of the World Cup and during the EuroSatory military equipment fair in Paris, but this hardly justifies similar operations in Great Britain, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. Reportedly only 16 persons have been formally arrested and incarcerated by police in France, but specialists believe the true figure is almost three times that. This means something more than World Cup security is afoot in Paris and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who recently visited Paris with a large intelligence service contingent, knows why. Mubarak is also fighting Islamic terrorism which is destroying Egypt's important tourism industry. He has already criticized Great Britain for harboring terrorists and encouraged the passing of British legislation which would making militant activity by foreigners much more difficult (INT, n. 72 29). His trip to Paris involved more "give and take" than with London. First of all, there was touring, curtesy visits and "normal" business, such as the purchase of 20 white Ford Maverick four- wheel-drive vehicles for Egyptian security forces, kindly ordered through the CRS-1 French riot troops in Velisy near Paris. Then there was the "real business": a multilevel Egyptian-French tourism/anti-terrorism exchange. On 4 May, in our "People" section, we mentioned that "Christian Prouteau, founding commander of the elite anti-terrorist GIGN, (...) has been hired to do a security audit of Egyptian tourist sites." Prouteau is the specialist whom Saudi Arabia invited, with the GIGN, into Islam's most sacred site in Mecca to smoke out armed Islamic terrorists who had taken it over several years ago. Prouteau, probably the only armed Christian ever invited into Mecca, earned high marks for the job. Following the Luxor massacre in November, Prouteau would appear to be a natural choice to do an anti-Islamic terrorist security audit in Egypt. Another part of the "package deal" apparently was the security contract for the recent grand reopening of the Sphinx, following ten years of restoration. That contract also went to a French firm. And, of course, there are the new advertisements in the Paris metro on visiting the "eternal Nile" and appreciating the beauties of Egypt. In exchange for French anti-terrorist know-how, and help with bringing tourists back to Egypt, Mubarak and his intelligence services brought to Paris some "hot potatoes": the list and detailed description of three dozen Algerian Groupe Islamic Arme (GIA) terrorists who recently arrived in Western Europe from Egypt. Indeed, Libya, Tunisia and Morocco are not particularly friendly "fallback" areas or staging grounds for the GIA. The Islamic regime of Sudan is trying to have its terrorist past forgotten while fighting for its life against non-Islamic rebels in the south. This makes Egypt, with its indigenous Islamic terrorist groups, the best place for GIA members moving in and out of Algeria. According to Mubarak's intelligence, the three dozen GIA members who traveled to Western Europe via Egypt represent the opening of a new and serious campaign against France, probably intended to correspond with the World Cup. Indeed, certain specialists says those behind bars now in France (plus a few abroad) are exactly those who figured on Mubarak's list. Their arrival from Belgium, Spain and the Netherlands is what caused the alert 1 signal to go off. --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 81, 8 June 1998, p. 30 JORDAN SADDAM HUSSEIN'S DIRTY MONEY NETWORK UNRAVELS On 2 June, the "Jordan Times" claimed that five suspects, accused of killing the Iraqi charge d'affaires to Jordan, Hikmat Hajouthe, on 17 January in Amman, have been arrested, while one other suspect remains at large and another was shot and killed during a pursuit. Five other people have been arrested in the case, but the Jordanian Interior Ministry has not identified the suspects. On 17 January, six Iraqis, including Hajouthe, his wife and Iraqi businessman, Nameer Auchi, and two Egyptians were stabbed to death for what Jordanian authorities claim were strictly "financial" motives. Local media reports alleged that the murders were carried out under orders from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's family members and that large quantities of financial and banking documentation was stolen. Although this may be the first detailed report in English on the arrests, the Jordanian journal, "Al-Arab al-Yawm", reported the arrests in Arabic on 22 January, adding that the arrests were made on 19 January in the Safawi Jordanian-Iraqi border area with the use of helicopters and military troops. The chief of Public Security, Lieutenant General Nasuh Muhyi-al-Din was reported in the area, probably directing the operation. There has been press speculation that a group known as "Saddam's Fedayeen", led by Uday Hussein, eldest son of Saddam Hussein, carried out the operation and Iraq tried to negotiate the release of the arrested suspects. Talks supposedly broke off when General Samih Bader el Dien al Buttikhi, head of Jordan's General Intelligence Department, asked for information concerning the unsolved 12 April murder of international lawyer, Hanna Naddeh, his son and a psychiatrist in Amman. Apparently Jordanian intelligence believes the two affairs are related. Indeed, Naddeh was a close friend of Auchi and Major General Hussein Kamel, who fled to Jordan in August 1995 with his brother, Saddam Kamel, before returning to Iraq where they were killed in 1996. The Kamel brothers were sons-in-law to Saddam Hussein. On 28 May, the "New York Times" reported that a daughter of Saddam Hussein, Rana, had begun legal action in Amman to recover millions of dollars that she claims belonged to her late husband, Hussein Kamel. He had directed Iraq's clandestine weapons program and Saddam Kamel had led a branch of the secret police. Saddam Kamel's widow, Rajhad, is believed to be under house arrest along with Rana in Iraq. COMMENT -- The sums the Kamel brothers hid were probably the massive monetary reserves put aside by Saddam Hussein for secret arms deals and foreign clandestine operations. Strictly speaking, Jordanian authorities are right: the affair is "strictly financial" ... but it's Saddam Hussein's secret foreign "financial" system. A Jordanian weekly, "Al Urdun", estimated that these funds total $1 billion and are probably under the control of a network of Jordanian, Iraqi and Arab friends of the late Kamels. In court, Rana Hussein is asking for 5 percent annual interest on a $20 million savings account that belonged to her late husband. --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 81, 8 June 1998, p. 31 MIDDLE EAST - Briefs and Media Reports. - TURKEY The Turkish press reveals secret ties between the Gendarmerie and organized crime - two arrested assassins are sons of police officers and received secret paramilitary training under Gendarme officer, Cengiz Ersever; Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz has said that with the capture of Mahmut Yildirim, also known as Yesil or Green, it will be possible to shed light on crime-Gendarmerie ties; Arrests made in shooting of Turkish human rights activist. - EGYPT Americans arrest Palestinian in Egypt - former PLO official, Mohammed Rashid; Additional measures to protect tourism - The Interior Ministry has begun to train tourist guides in self-defense. - ISRAEL Mossad officially back in business?; Mossad shield of secrecy has been cracked; Israel defends use of torture. - PALESTINE HAMAS (Islamic Resistance Movement) profile; Hamas founder urges Palestinians to fight Israel; Israeli soldiers injured six Palestinians in Hebron during clashes. - SAUDI ARABIA Saudi Arabia finishes investigation of US base bombing, finding no external or Iranian implication and signs a cooperative agreement with Iran No foreign involvement in 1996 bombing, Saudis say; The second anniversary of the 26 June 1996 Al-Khobar bombing is approaching; Saudi Arabia does face home-grown opposition among Sunni Muslim activists. - IRAN Alleged Iranian-Russian aid; Raising new questions about Russia's determination to end assistance to Iran's missile program; Son-in-law of dissident Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri arrested and charged with "provoking conflict and tension. ---------------------------------------------