Who Is Richard Armitage
And What Is His Interest In Afghanistan?

The Man Or The Myth? - Drugs, Arms And CIA Covert Operations

"....for the foreseeable future oil will remain an essential commodity. Greater attention must therefore be given to increasing supplies of oil in ways that diversify supplies from areas other than the Persian Gulf. The most promising new source of world supplies is the Caspian region, which appears to contain the largest petroleum reserves discovered since the North Sea. This geopolitical crossroad, which includes Iran, Russia, and a number of newly-independent states struggling with post-Soviet modernization and dangers of Islamic extremism, demands more attention by American policymakers."
AMERICA’S NATIONAL INTERESTS
A Report from The Commission on America’s National Interests, July 2000
Co-authored by Richard Armitage et al [pdf]

"The men who perfected the guns-for-dope traffic moved to the Middle East as experts in the sale of sophisticated arms, protected by officials at the top in the Pentagon and CIA. Richard Armitage, now the key Pentagon official in counter-terror and covert operations [under President Bush Snr, former CIA chief] is named consistently by investigators as the man who helped the drug warlords market their crops.... The most prominent name recurring in this [drug tafficking] connection is Vice President George Bush. While he was CIA director, much of these activities blossomed, but more serious charges are being made by former intelligence officers ..... who fear that their institutions have been corrupted by a few self-proclaimed patriots."
BANK OF INTRIGUE
Toronto Sun, 13 August 1987

"While we usually think of corruption in relation to police officers on the street and local prosecutors, the drug war has managed to offer incentives for corruption that reach to the very highest levels of the United States government. It is indeed ironic that the very agencies of government who are beating the drums loudest in the war on drugs have also established an infamous record of accepting assistance from and providing logistical support to some of the largest drug trafficking syndicates in the world."
CRJ 875: Crime and Public Policy
Module 5: The Failure of Drug Control Policies
Gary W. Potter, Professor, Criminal Justice and Police Studies
Eastern Kentucky University

"...From 1989 through 1992 Mr. Armitage filled key diplomatic positions as Presidential Special Negotiator for the Philippines Military Bases Agreement and Special Mediator for Water in the Middle East. President Bush sent him as a Special Emissary to Jordan's King Hussein during the 1991 Gulf War. In the Pentagon from June 1983 to May 1989, he served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. He represented the Department of Defense in developing politico-military relationships and initiatives throughout the world, spearheaded U.S. Pacific security policy including the U.S.-Japan and U.S.-China security relationships, managed all DoD Security Assistance programs, and provided oversight of policies related to the law of the sea, U.S. special operations forces, and counter-terrorism. He played a leading role in Middle East Security policies. In May 1975 Mr. Armitage came to Washington as a Pentagon consultant and was posted in Tehran, Iran until November 1976. Following two years in the private sector, he took the position as Administrative Assistant to Senator Robert Dole of Kansas in 1978. In the 1980 Reagan campaign Mr. Armitage was senior advisor to the Interim Foreign Policy Advisory Board, which prepared the President-Elect for major international policy issues confronting the new administration. From 1981 until June 1983 Mr. Armitage was Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for East Asia and Pacific Affairs in the Office of the Secretary of Defense..."
[FROM AN APPROVED BIOGRAPHY]
Ambassador Richard Lee Armitage

"President George Bush is rapidly putting his own stamp on the US presidency, but his recent lower-level appointments show that the substance of the new team in Washington is overwhelmingly from of the era of his father and Ronald Reagan. The return of the Reaganites is particularly evident in the areas of foreign and defence policy, where Mr Bush has just appointed Richard Armitage deputy secretary of state under Colin Powell. Mr Armitage is a Pentagon veteran of the Reagan and Bush Sr era, during which he played a key role as a Middle East policy expert. His role in the Iran-contra arms smuggling scandal was sufficiently important to force George Bush Sr to withdraw his the nomination as army secretary in 1989. Mr Armitage worked closely with Colonel Oliver North in the secret Reagan White House effort to trade arms to Iran and syphon some of the profits to Nicaraguan contra rebels in defiance of an arms ban."
Return of the Reaganites
Guardian, 14 February 2001

Official State Department Biography - click here

"The appointment of career covert operative and Annapolis graduate Richard Armitage as Deputy Secretary of State under Colin Powell only underscores the clear message that the Bush administration is sending to the world. Armitage - better known as 'Armitage The Executioner' - was denied a 1989 appointment as Assistant Secretary of State because of his links to Iran-Contra and other scandals. He served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs in the Reagan years. US government stipulations in the Oliver North trial specifically named Armitage as one of the officials responsible for illegal transfers of weapons to Iran and the Contras. Activist group Voices from the Wilderness notes: 'Armitage has also been routinely exposed as a Bush-era covert functionary who has been linked to covert operations, drug smuggling and the expansion of organized crime operations in Russia, Central Asia and the Far East.' Clearly, the Iran-Contra team is coming back to power with a vengeance."
War on Other Nations
Chicago Media Watch

"It is generally believed that Mr. Armitage actually served in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) till 1978 and from 1976, after a cover resignation from the CIA, worked for some private companies of the CIA, which were being used by it for covert actions in Indo-China.  His critics had alleged in the past that he was the author of the idea of using heroin to weaken the fighting capability of the communists in Indo-China and then in Afghanistan..."
DONALD RUMSFELD AND RICHARD ARMITAGE:  Background Notes
South Asia Analysis Group, 6 June 2002

"Mr. Armitage, who had spent some years of his career in the CIA/DIA and holds the highest Pakistani civil decoration that could be awarded to a foreigner for his role during the Afghan war of the 1980s, has a large circle of friends in the Pakistani military and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate."
MUSHARRAF: FROM CIA WITH LOVE?
South Asia Analysis Group, 28 May 2001

"The last time a Republican administration was put together, there were only two political appointees who didn't make it through the confirmation process. One was John Tower, the elder President Bush's ill-fated pick to head the Defense Department. The other was Richard L. Armitage. Armitage, who served as an assistant secretary of defense under President Reagan, was to be the new administration's secretary of the Army. Before his nomination could come to a vote, however, he withdrew his name, citing the traditional need to spend more time with his family.... Perhaps more relevant was the draft of an article of mine that had just been shown by a right-wing Republican senator to a top Pentagon official. Co-authored by Richard Ryan, this article never appeared in print, but the threat that it would soon be published apparently convinced Armitage and the administration that the confirmation process would not be worth the trouble. The article was about Armitage's relationship with a woman named Nguyet Thi O'Rourke, a Vietnamese immigrant convicted of running a gambling operation in Northern Virginia.... We were interested in Armitage because of his prominent role in the Christic Institute lawsuit. The lawsuit--which was eventually thrown out of court, with sanctions that crushed the nonprofit law firm--alleged that members of the secret Contra resupply effort like Richard Secord were part of a long-standing 'Secret Team' of military and intelligence operatives that had been involved in various illegal activities going back at least to 1959. According to the Christic Institute's affidavit, Armitage was a key player in this team, helping to funnel drug profits from Laos and Thailand into assassination programs in Vietnam and Iran.... Armitage also attended a Pentagon meeting in August 1986 in which Oliver North outlined the covert activities in support of the Contras that he had been supervising through the National Security Council. Armitage denied remembering anything about this meeting as well....The withdrawal of Armitage's nomination as Army secretary was by no means an exile. He went on to become a sort of trouble-shooter for the first Bush administration, serving as a special liaison to the Philippines and the Middle East. After the breakup of the Soviet Union, he oversaw U.S. aid programs to the former Soviet republics as a special ambassador."
Secret Agent Man
Iran-Contra operative Richard Armitage is now Colin Powell's No.2
In TheseTimes.com, 5 March 2001

"Years before George W. Bush entered the White House, and years before the Sept. 11 attacks set the direction of his presidency, a group of influential neo-conservatives hatched a plan to get Saddam Hussein out of power... The group was never secret about its aims. In its 1998 open letter to Clinton, the group openly advocated unilateral U.S. action against Iraq.... Of the 18 people who signed the letter, 10 are now in the Bush administration. As well as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, they include Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage   ... "
Were Neo-Conservatives’ 1998 Memos a Blueprint for Iraq War?
ABC News, 10 March 2003

"On March 23, after being recommended in a unanimous 18-0 vote by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, former Vietnam-era covert operative and Contra-era figure Richard Armitage was confirmed as Deputy Secretary of State in a voice vote on the Senate Floor. The unchallenged confirmation of a figure who had previously been investigated by President Reagan's Commission on Organized Crime (1984) for alleged links to gambling and prostitution was totally ignored by the major American media.... Armitage, who was denied a 1989 appointment as Assistant Secretary of State because of links to Iran-Contra and other scandals, served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs in the Reagan years. U.S. Government stipulations in the Oliver North trial specifically named Armitage as one of the DoD officials responsible for illegal transfers of weapons to Iran and the Contras. But Armitage's dirty past goes much deeper. A Vietnam veteran and graduate of Annapolis, Armitage's roots have been thoroughly intertwined with the likes of CIA veteran Ted Shackley, Richard Secord, Heine Aderholt, Elliot Abrams, Dewey Clarridge, Edwin Wilson and Tom Clines. All of these men have been directly linked to CIA covert operations, the drug trade, the abandonment of U.S. prisoners of War after Vietnam and/or Iran-Contra. Armitage has also been routinely discussed in FTW as a Bush-era covert functionary who has been linked to covert operations, drug smuggling and the expansion of organized crime operations in Russia, Central Asia and the Far East."
RICHARD ARMITAGE QUIETLY CONFIRMED AS DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE
From The Wilderness Publications, March 2001

"A proposal drafted by Elliott Abrams, a special assistant to President George W. Bush on the National Security Council(NSC), arguing for the United States to assert de facto control of Iraqi oil fields has stunned State Department officials. It doesn't help that Abrams (right) was convicted of withholding information from Congress during the Iran-Contra scandal, only to receive a presidential pardon from the current president's father.... Pentagon sources say Abrams has the backing of Paul Wolfowitz, the conservative deputy defense secretary, and the support of the office of conservative Vice President Dick Cheney. "
Iraqi oil strategy divides state, White House
Insight Magazine, 24 December 2002

"The administration would sell arms to Iran and divert the proceeds to the Contras. Since both ends of the operation were highly illegal - Iran was also under a US arms embargo - it had to be secret.... But ... later the Nicaraguans shot down a CIA supply plane. A month after that, a Lebanese newspaper reported Reagan's arms deals with Iran. A frenzy of shredding and the destruction of emails broke out, and it took a congressional investigation - during which Poindexter, Elliott Abrams, Caspar Weinberger, Colin Powell (now [2003] secretary of state) and Richard Armitage (now [2003] deputy secretary of state) lied - and a specially appointed independent counsel to get the full story. By then, though, as the independent counsel reported, the administration's web of deceit had achieved its objectives - to protect Reagan, vice-president George Bush and the rest from the consequences of their conspiracy. As the independent counsel put it, Poindexter and North were made 'the scapegoats whose sacrifice would protect the Reagan administration in its final two years'.... Poindexter, North and two others were indicted on 23 counts of conspiracy to defraud the US and Poindexter was convicted on five felony counts of conspiracy, false statements, destruction and removal of records and obstruction of Congress. Elliott Abrams later pleaded guilty to withholding information from Congress. George Bush senior pardoned him; and Bush junior appointed him director of the National Security Council's office for democracy, human rights and international operations and then to his current job as director of Middle East affairs in the White House. The wars these men promoted had left 75,000 dead in El Salvador and 30,000-40,000 dead in Nicaragua, not to mention many thousands dead in Guatemala and Honduras".
Masters of deceit
Convicted felons responsible for thousands of deaths are calling the shots at the White House
Guardian, 7 August 2003

"Another key player in the Bush Administration, Deputy Secretary of Defense Richard Armitage, left his post as an Assistant Secretary of Defense in the Reagan Administration after a series of scandals connected to CIA operatives Ed Wilson, Ted Shackley, Richard Secord and Tom Clines placed him at the brink of criminal indictment and jail. Shackley and Secord are veterans of Vietnam operations and have long been linked to opium/heroin smuggling. The Armitage scandals all focused on the illegal provision of weapons and war materiel to potential or actual enemies of the U.S. and to the Contras in Central America. Armitage, a former Navy SEAL, who reportedly enjoyed combat missions and killing during covert operations in Laos during the Vietnam War, has never been far from the Bush family's side. Throughout his career, both in and out of government, he has been perpetually connected to CIA drug smuggling operations. Secretary of State Colin Powell, in a 1995 Washington Post story, called Armitage, 'my white son.' In 1990, then President Bush dispatched Armitage to Russia to aid in its 'transition' to capitalism. Armitage's Russian work for Bush has been frequently connected to the explosion of drug trafficking under the Russian Mafias, which became virtual rulers of the nation afterwards. In the early 1990s Armitage had extensive involvement in Albania at the same time that the Albanian ally, Kosovo Liberation Army was coming to power and consolidating its grip, according to The Christian Science Monitor, on 70% of the world's opium trade. [See FTW Vol. II, No 2 - April 24, 1999] Armitage and Carlucci are both Board Members of the influential Washington think tank, the Middle East Policy Council. The connections continue with Vice President Dick Cheney."
The Best Enemies Money Can Buy
From the Wilderness Publications, 9 October 2001

"On March 23, after being recommended in a unanimous 18-0 vote by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, former Vietnam-era covert operative and Contra-era figure Richard Armitage was confirmed as Deputy Secretary of State in a voice vote on the Senate Floor.... The total lack of opposition to Armitage's appointment indicates an apparent inability of the US Congress to muster any critical examination of appointments... Armitage, who was denied a 1989 appointment as Assistant Secretary of State because of links to Iran-Contra and other scandals, served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs in the Reagan years. U.S. Government stipulations in the Oliver North trial specifically named Armitage as one of the DoD officials responsible for illegal transfers of weapons to Iran and the Contras.... A Vietnam veteran and graduate of Annapolis, Armitage's roots have been thoroughly intertwined with the likes of CIA veteran Ted Shackley, Richard Secord, Heine Aderholt, Elliot Abrams, Dewey Clarridge, Edwin Wilson and Tom Clines. All of these men have been directly linked to CIA covert operations.... "
Richard Armitage Quietly Confirmed As Deputy Secretary of State
'From The Wilderness', March 2001

"A proposal drafted by Elliott Abrams, a special assistant to President George W. Bush on the National Security Council(NSC), arguing for the United States to assert de facto control of Iraqi oil fields has stunned State Department officials. It doesn't help that Abrams (right) was convicted of withholding information from Congress during the Iran-Contra scandal, only to receive a presidential pardon from the current president's father.... Pentagon sources say Abrams has the backing of Paul Wolfowitz, the conservative deputy defense secretary, and the support of the office of conservative Vice President Dick Cheney. "
Iraqi oil strategy divides state, White House
Insight Magazine, 24 December 2002

"Yesterday I detailed one of a series of news reports about Richard Armitage, the nominee to be deputy secretary of state. Syndicated columnist Jack Anderson extensively reported in 1986 about Armitage's alleged connection with a Vietnamese woman. Armitage had written a letter on behalf of the woman during the time she was being investigated for participating in an organized crime gambling ring. That report contributed to Armitage twice having to withdraw from consideration for high-ranking positions in the first Bush administration. He simply could not get past Senate confirmation. But that was not all that helped derail Armitage back then. As the Associated Press reported on June 4, 1987, 'A drug warlord in Burma accuses Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard L. Armitage and others of drug trafficking to fund anti-communist operations, the Riverside Press-Enterprise reported Thursday.' The AP story then stated, 'In a three-hour videotape interview smuggled out of Southeast Asia within the past week, Khun Sa said high-ranking American officials were involved in drug trafficking between 1965 and at least 1979.' This three-hour videotape was made by retired Army Green Beret Lt. Colonel James 'Bo' Gritz and then smuggled out of Burma. I have seen part of this tape – and it is chilling. It is now being sent to the FBI and to the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee to be used during Armitage's confirmation process. Mr. Armitage denied any involvement in the drug trade. He called the allegations, according to AP, 'ludicrous and baseless.' He also was never charged with any crime based on these or other allegations. But Khun Sa, according to the AP story, 'said Armitage controlled the finances of the alleged American drug operation.' On the tape, one of Khun Sa's aides says, 'After the Vietnam War, Richard Armitage was a prominent trafficker in Bangkok. Between 1975 and 1979 he was a very popular trafficker. He was one of the embassy employees.' Armitage, in his denial, also denied being an 'embassy employee.' However, he does claim to have worked as a 'consultant' to the Defense Department working on Iran naval programs. An allegation of participation in 'drug trafficking', reported by AP, and another allegation of using his Pentagon office to help an alleged gambler, reported by Jack Anderson. No wonder he could not be confirmed by the U.S. Senate! Now, however, Colin Powell wants his 'best friend in the world' in the super-powerful position of deputy secretary of state. Why, if Armitage was not able to pass muster 12 years ago, should he make the grade this time?"
Why Taint the New Bush Administration?
NewsMax, 1 March 2001

"Those who served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War swear that indeed the CIA actively participated in drug running as an 'off-the-books' way to finance the secret war in Laos. And, two decades later, similar charges flew that the CIA used the same playbook in Central America to finance our support for the Contras in Nicaragua during a time when Congress refused to fund that effort. Six weeks ago here I quoted various newspapers from the mid-1980s that carried the charge by Burmese Drug War Lord Kun Sa against longtime CIA employee Richard Armitage - by name - that Armitage was directly involved in the drug trade and in importing the drugs into the U.S. Armitage has always denied these reports. Still, he is the only U.S. government employee I have ever heard of who was specifically fingered by name in a drug charge. Despite these serious charges – and with no investigation whatsoever - the US Senate last month confirmed Armitage as deputy secretary of state. Makes you wonder how serious Washington really is about the War on Drugs, doesn’t it?"
Could the CIA Be Bringing Drugs Into the USA?
NewsMax, 26 April 2001

"After his appointment in 1981, Armitage began working in Southeast Asia to track down reports of MIAs in Viet-Nam; [Ross] Perot suspected him of not doing enough. Last October, Perot met with Armitage at the Pentagon and bluntly demanded that he resign....... At the meeting, Armitage vigorously denied any implication that he had anything to do with an illicit arms or drug network, Perot then took his case to George Bush. The Vice President's office has confirmed that Perot raised 'what he considered to be evidence of wrongdoing ' by Armitage. Bush told Perot to go to the 'proper authorities.' So the billionaire called on FBI Director William Webster. Perot has also made at least one visit to the White House carrying a pile of documents. Yet he has received no support from the Reagan Administration. In fact, National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci in January called him in to ask him to stop pursuing Armitage....."
PEROT'S PRIVATE PROBES
Time Magazine, 4 May 1987

"The men who perfected the guns-for-dope traffic moved to the Middle East as experts in the sale of sophisticated arms, protected by officials at the top in the Pentagon and CIA. Richard Armitage, now the key Pentagon official in counter-terror and covert operations [under President Bush Snr, former CIA chief] is named consistently by investigators as the man who helped the drug warlords market their crops.... The most prominent name recurring in this [CIA drug tafficking] connection is Vice President George Bush. While he was CIA director, much of these activities blossomed, but more serious charges are being made by former intelligence officers ..... who fear that their institutions have been corrupted by a few self-proclaimed patriots."
BANK OF INTRIGUE
Toronto Sun, 13 August 1987

"A drug warlord in Burma accuses Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard L. Armitage and others of drug trafficking to fund anti-communist operations, the Riverside Press-Enterprise reported Thursday...In a three-hour videotape interview smuggled out of Southeast Asia within the past week, Khun Sa said high-ranking American officials were involved in drug trafficking between 1965 and at least 1979."
Associated Press 4 June, 1987

"The refusal of the United State government to accept our 'SIX YEARS DRUGS ERADICATION PLAN' presented at the Congressional Hearing by Congressman Mr. Lester Wolff after his visit to Thailand in April 1977, was really a great disappointment for us. Even after this disappointment, we continued writing letters to President Carter and President Reagan forwarding our sincere wish to help and participate in eradicating drugs. We are really surprised and doubtful as to "why the US government refuses our participation and help to make a success of the drugs eradication program.... During the period (1965 -1975) CIA Chief in Laos, Theodore Shackley was in the drug business, having contacts with the Opium Warlord Lor Sing Han and his followers. Santo Trafficante acted as his buying and transporting agent while Richard Armitage handled the financial section with the Banks in Australia. Even after the Vietnam War ended, when Richard Armitage was being posted to the U S Embassy in Thailand, his dealings in the drug business continued as before. He was then acting as the US government official concerning with the drugs problems in South East Asia. After 1979, Richard Armitage resigned from the US Embassy's posting and set up the 'Far East Trading Company' as a front for his continuation in the drug trade and to bribe CIA agents in Laos and around the world. Soon After, Daniel Arnold was made to handle the drug business as well as the transportation of arms sales. Jerry Daniels then took over the drug trade from Richard Armitage. For over 10 years, Armitage supported his men in Laos and Thailand with the profits from his drug trade and most of the cash were deposited with the banks in Australia which was to be used in buying his way for quicker promotions to higher positions. Within the month of July, 1980, Thailand's English newspaper Bangkok Post: included a news-report that CIA agents were using Australia as a transit-base for their drug business and the banks in Australia for depositing, transferring the large sum of money . Verifications of the news report can be made by the US Justice Department with Bangkok Post and in Australia."
Letter to US Justice Department 28 June 1987
Vice Chairman, THAILAND REVOLUTIONARY COUNCIL ( T.R. C.)

"What has happened over the years to the CIA? They have become a government inside a government. One problem is that the CIA spies on its own government. Yes, the CIA places 'agents' in other federal agencies, and on the staffs of House and Senate committees, to 'keep an eye on things.' Which leads to this serious oversight problem: Every congressional committee that oversees intelligence activities has CIA staff on its staff. That way Langley can keep track of trouble brewing it its own backyard. That's like having the fox guarding the chicken coop. This is the biggest - and so far unreported - scandal in the US today. Bigger than Enron, bigger than anything else. The very fact that the CIA is an uncontrollable agency operating outside the Constitution - and getting away with it - is something that one day is going to blow open, and cause big trouble. A small - but meaningful - example: In the mid-1980's, then-Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Armitage personally arranged for a uniformed military officer to be detailed to temporary White House duty. This officer had some innocuous job description. In reality his assignment was simple: to spy on the inner workings of the President's Reagan's office. Get the daily schedule of the senior staff, listen in on as many conversations as possible, find out what was 'brewing' before others knew - and then report all of this daily back to Armitage. A career CIA man, Armitage wanted to know what was happening at the White House -- so that the Pentagon and the CIA could be 'ahead of the curve.' Armitage today is Deputy Secretary of State and may very well have a similar 'operative' placed in the White House and National Security Council. This is plain out-and-out wrong. Federal agencies should not be expending taxpayers' money and human intelligence spying on each other, instead of spying on our foreign adversaries. But they do. And that is but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the enormous leeway the CIA has --because of the very nature of its' secretive mission - to do anything it wants. Less well known to the general public is the extent to which the CIA is also protected by certain federal judges. These friends of the agency, strategically placed on the federal bench (some used to work for the CIA) will always be there to get the CIA off the hook in case something bad happens."
CIA: THE ENRON OF INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES
The Idler, 8 February 2002

"The Department of State is under growing pressure from the Central Intelligence Agency to destroy its inventory of an official history of U.S. relations with Greece during the 1960s and to replace it with a new, sanitized version...The sticking point appears to be a handful of documents that allude to CIA intervention in the electoral process in Greece some 35 years ago. ... Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet has gotten personally involved in the matter, attempting to enlist the help of Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage in blocking release of the official history. According to one source, Mr. Tenet contacted Mr. Armitage to discuss the matter as recently as the night of September 10, at a time when his attention might have been more profitably directed elsewhere. A State Department official would not confirm or deny that the September 10 conversation took place."
STATE DEPT MULLS "BOOK BURNING"
Federation of American Scientists, 21 September 2001

"So what was the UK's 'national security adviser' doing in America on Sept 11? Was his visit prompted by the terrorist threat that Tony Blair now confirms 'everybody knew' was being planned? Despite his de facto status as Blair's special envoy on foreign affairs and security matters the US State Department appointment records show no scheduled meetings for Manning with Secretary Powell himself during the days immediately prior to the attacks. Those records do, however, show that he was meeting with Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage on September 10th. Armitage is second in command to Colin Powell who left for a trip to Peru later that day, meaning that the Bush administration's principal 'dove' was out of the country when the attacks happened. In Powell's absence 'when the storm breaks [on 911] Richard Armitage... is at its heart' according to the BBC's Edward Stourton (Radio 4, 27 August: 'With Us or Against Us'). So who is Richard Armitage? Described by Stourton as a 'bulldog diplomat', Armitage has had a 'colourful' previous history. This embraces alleged covert operations with the CIA, including illegal arms and drug running on behalf of the US government. Those activities include illicit dealings with people within what is now know as the 'axis of evil' (see links at bottom of page). He was also deputy to Dick Cheney when the Vice President was Secretary of Defense in the previous Bush administration. However, Armitage's wider interests are especially pertinent to the situation that had developed in Afghanistan by the summer of 2001. As Armitage himself has publicly acknowledged the energy reserves of the Caspian Sea region are of great strategic importance to America and its allies in the industrialised world. But they also appear to be of some personal importance to Armitage himself. A report by the US National Bureau of Asian Research cites an article in the Washington Times 28 July 1997 which lists Armitage, along with Dick Cheney, as having business or consulting interests in the Caspian zone. It is also claimed that Armitage was contracted by US oil and gas corporation Unocal to work on Central Asia pipeline interests in 1997 when he was head of Armitage Associates (also at Armitage Associates was Peter Watson, previously Director of Asian Affairs at the National Security Council in the first Bush administration. Watson was appointed President of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) by George W. Bush in 2001. OPIC provides political risk insurance and loans to US companies operating overseas 'because it is in America's economic and strategic interest'. Since Watson's appointment, in a deal worth $350 million, Unocal has absorbed nearly the whole of the allocation of an OPIC joint initiative with the U.S. Export-Import Bank and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency for US business investment in Indonesia . The allocation had been announced September 2001. The deal is despite Unocal's human rights record and allegations that State Department documents indicate the company's involvement in 'corruption, collusion and nepotism' in several billion-dollar power plant deals with the Suharto government. Similar allegations have also been made against Enron). The importance of Afghanistan in this context was spelt out in evidence given to a congressional hearing in 1998 by Unocal's Vice President for International Relations, John Maresca: 'Mr. Chairman, the Caspian region contains tremendous untapped hydrocarbon reserves......[one] option is to build a pipeline south from Central Asia to the Indian Ocean. One obvious route south would cross Iran, but this is foreclosed for American companies because of U.S. sanctions legislation. The only other possible route is across Afghanistan, which has of course its own unique challenges..... From the outset, we have made it clear that construction of the pipeline we have proposed across Afghanistan could not begin until a recognized government is in place that has the confidence of governments, lenders, and our company.....' Unfortunately efforts by the Bush administration to reach a deal with the Taliban over the proposed pipeline collapsed in the summer of 2001. No longer willing to tolerate an impasse the US government threatened Afghanistan with military action during at a meeting which the BBC reports took place in Berlin in July. According to one representative of Pakistan who attended the meeting a US attack on Afghanistan was already planned for October. Thanks to the special 'skills' of US diplomacy, therefore, it seems that the first overt provocation in the west's new war with the Taliban was made by the US in Berlin in July 2001, and not by al-Qaeda in New York on Sept 11. It is something of an understatement to say that in the history of international affairs it is not unknown for provocation to produce response. Given the threat made by the US in July, it would be reasonable to have expected trouble there onwards. The intelligence picked up by the British and other governments last summer would seem to confirm this. This brings us back to Sir David Manning's meeting in Washington with Armitage on September 10. Presumably Manning also had other meetings in Washington that day, although with whom it is not clear. Neither is the purpose of his visit. Was he in fact passing on specific intelligence information about the impending terrorist attacks? It is certainly possible. By coincidence or otherwise Newsweek magazine reported 24 September that on that same day 'a group of top Pentagon officials suddenly canceled travel plans for the next morning, apparently because of security concerns.' It would be interesting to know what, if any, security issues relating to America where discussed by Manning during his pre-Sept 11 meetings in Washington and whether they involved any specific intelligence."
'The Special Relationship' - Armitage And The UK National Security Adviser
What Did Britain Know About 911?
'Fight Smart', 28 August 2002

"The U.S. military's use of private contractors for the sensitive task of wartime interrogation marks a sharp shift from traditional practices and is raising difficult issues of accountability as authorities investigate the alleged role civilian workers played in the abuse of Iraqi prisoners.... J.P. 'Jack' London, the chairman and chief executive officer of CACI International Inc. - an Arlington, Va., company implicated in an internal Army investigation of abuses in Iraq - acknowledged in a phone interview yesterday that his company has done interrogation work for the U.S. government since the mid- to late 1990s.... More than 90 percent of CACI's business comes from its main customer - the Pentagon - and other federal agencies, according to reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Among the company's former directors is Richard L. Armitage, who resigned in 2001 to accept an appointment from President Bush as deputy secretary of state."
Contractors act as interrogators
Baltimore Sun, 4 May 2004

"Armitage is always one of those characters who just happen to be standing around when something BAD happens to America. Never anything good. ALWAYS something BAD. If he was a sailor, his shipmates would call him a Jonah."
(Internet forum response to above Baltimore Sun article)
Libertypost.org, 8 May 2004

"When the [911] storm breaks, Richard Armitage, Vietnam veteran and bulldog diplomat, is at its heart. The number two at the State department, he is minding the shop for Colin Powell, who is away on official business in Peru. [According to Armitage] 'I was seated in this very room, and my executive assistant came in and said one of the towers in New York had been hit by an aircraft. I ran in there, immediately picked up the phone and called to the assistant secretary for counter-terrorism. Even before the second airplane went in, I thought it was impossible to have this happen actually on a clear day and said, 'We've got a problem.' About that moment, the second aircraft went into the tower, which I watched on television. Immediately after that, I was told to go to the operations center here to get on call to the vice-president, and I spent the rest of the day in the ops center with the vice-president.'"
Richard Armitage, Deputy Secretary of State
'With Us or Against US', Programme 1, BBC Radio 4, 20 August 2002
(note: the wording   'and I spent the rest of the day in the ops center with the vice-president' was not included in the broadcast radio transmission or in the transcript of the full programme, but is included in the BBC's unedited transcript of the solo Armitage interview)

"The Bush Administration faced deep embarrassment yesterday after having to admit that its claims for the 'success' of the war on terrorism were wrong.... The State Department’s annual terrorism report, Patterns of Global Terrorism, said that the number of attacks last year fell to a 34-year low, down by 45 per cent since 2001. Fewer people were being killed, injured and kidnapped, it said, and 'mild' terrorism events with no fatalities had dwindled from 231 in 2001 to 21 last year. Richard Armitage, General Powell’s deputy, said that the report provided 'clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight against global terrorism'. In fact, the number of terror attacks rose sharply during that period to a 20-year high. The report also failed to show that the worst kind of terrorist attacks had spread to at least ten countries. The errors were uncovered after Henry Waxman, a Democratic congressman from California, asked the Congressional Research Service to check the facts. Mr Waxman complained that the State Department had refused to address his concerns three weeks ago. He had told General Powell at the time: 'This manipulation may serve the Administration’s political interests, but it calls into serious doubt the integrity of the report.'”
US admits false terror statistics
London Times, 12 June 2004

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