January 2003: CIA Moves Anabasis Team to Jordan

The CIA’s Iraq Operations Group flies the Anabasis team from their Nevada training site to Jordan to wait for a green light from the White House. If the signal is given, the team—comprised of more than 100 members—will be flown to an isolated Iraqi military base near the Saudi border where they will announce a coup on the radio and call on other military units to join them. Then, when Hussein flies his troops south to quell the insurrection, the US Air Force will shoot them down for violating the no-fly zone. The confrontation will then be used as a pretext for full-scale war (see also Late November 2001 or December 2001). But the operation will be opposed by General Franks, and the Anabasis team will never receive the signal (see After January 2003). [Isikoff and Corn, 2006, pp. 166]