Before March 20, 2003: CIA Discusses Producing Fake Videos to Assist Iraq Invasion

The CIA’s Iraq Operations Group discusses several ideas for discrediting Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in the eyes of his people using fake videos. One video would purport to show Hussein having sex with a teenage boy, according to two former CIA officials familiar with the project. “It would look like it was taken by a hidden camera,” one of the former officials will say. “Very grainy, like it was a secret videotaping of a sex session.” The idea is to then “flood Iraq with the videos,” the former official will add. Another idea is to interrupt Iraqi television programming with a fake special news bulletin. An actor playing Hussein would announce that he is stepping down in favor of his son Uday, who is unpopular with the Iraqi people. “I’m sure you will throw your support behind His Excellency Uday,” the fake Hussein would say. The agency’s Office of Technical Services collaborates on the ideas, which also include inserting fake “crawls”—messages at the bottom of the screen—into Iraqi newscasts. At the same time as these discussions, the agency makes a video with an Osama bin Laden impersonator (see (2003)). According to another former officer, the projects grind to a halt as nobody can come to an agreement on them. In particular, they are opposed by Deputy Director for Operations James Pavitt and his deputy, Hugh Turner, who keeps “throwing darts at it.” The officer will say that the ideas are ridiculous and, “They came from people whose careers were spent in Latin America or East Asia,” and do not understand the cultural nuances of the region. “Saddam playing with boys would have no resonance in the Middle East—nobody cares,” a third former official will say. “Trying to mount such a campaign would show a total misunderstanding of the target. We always mistake our own taboos as universal when, in fact, they are just our taboos.” After the CIA abandons the projects, they are apparently revived by the military. “The military took them over,” one former official will say. “They had assets in psy-war down at Ft. Bragg,” at the Army’s Special Warfare Center. The projects will be revealed in the Washington Post in 2010. [Washington Post, 5/25/2010]