Massive Security Breach

America’s top spy catcher quit in the midst of a secret investigation into how Saddam and Osama bin Laden obtained state-of-the-art U.S. spy software.

 

By Gordon Thomas

 

America’s top spy-catcher, Paul Redmond, has suddenly resigned in the middle of his secret investigation into how Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden obtained state-of-the-art U.S. computer software.

The software is claimed to enable the two most wanted men in the world to avoid capture because it can pin-point their every move.

Redmond’s departure last week was accepted “without discussion” by President Bush—the man who had brought the spy catcher out of retirement to conduct the investigation.

Hours after Redmond had cleared his desk, Bush ordered a $25 million bounty on Saddam’s head.

He wants Saddam “dead or alive.” And the same for bin Laden.

Bush has agreed that either man, if caught, would not receive a trial and would be shot after interrogation.

The official reason given for Redmond’s abrupt departure from his wide-ranging investigation reaching deep into the Bush administration was “health reasons.”

But stunned colleagues in the Homeland Security Department in Washington, where Redmond had his office, insist the former associate director of the CIA was in perfect health.

Redmond’s abrupt departure has led to intense speculation that he may have begun to uncover embarrassing details of how the software came into the hands of Saddam and bin Laden.

Documents obtained by the respected International Currency Review, a London based newsletter for the financial community, allege that the software was provided to Saddam on the authority of President Bush’s father when he was in the White House—a time when relations between Iraq and Washington were close, during Baghdad’s war with Iran.

The Review’s publisher, Christopher Story, a former financial adviser to Lady Margaret Thatcher, operates from offices near Buckingham Palace.

“The documents are extremely sensitive and raise some very serious questions,” was all Story would say.

He confirmed they had originally been in the possession of Barzan al-Takriti, Saddam’s half-brother, when he was managing Saddam’s fortune, which has been estimated to be anywhere from $2 billion to more than $40 billion.

A Paris intelligence source said the documents were copied by operatives of DGSE, the French intelligence service, earlier this year when al-Takriti made a visit to several banks in Geneva.

He is now in American hands—one of the key names on the famous “deck of cards” list.

Shortly after the documents reached Washington on the eve of the war with Iraq, Bush brought Paul Redmond out of retirement.

Redmond was a legendary CIA spy catcher who helped unmask some of the most infamous spies before his 1998 retirement.

He was told to investigate how Robert P. Hanssen, the renegade FBI computer specialist who was a long-time Soviet agent, had handed over a copy of the software—known as Promis—to his KGB controllers for $2 million.

Hanssen, now serving a life sentence for his treachery, has yet to reveal all he knows about how the KGB sold a copy of the software to bin Laden for $4 million shortly before the attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon.

“But until Redmond’s abrupt resignation, increasingly the documents relating to Saddam’s use of Promis—and his relationship with President Bush’s father—were what Redmond had begun to focus on,” said a source close to the departed spy catcher.

Originally developed by a small company in Washington called Inslaw, there are now a number of versions of the software.

One version was installed by Britain’s MI6 early in the 1990s. After Hanssen’s arrest, the software was removed.

Germany’s intelligence service, BND, did the same to its version of the software—supplied by the CIA in 1993.

William Hamilton, the president of Inslaw, said that top Bush aides and FBI Director Robert Mueller had met to discuss the “implications” of Redmond’s investigation.

“Redmond has said that Hanssen did hundreds of billions of dollars worth of damage. I have been told that Redmond’s health is fine and there is a much more important reason for his resignation,” said Hamilton.

Like Story, Hamilton did not want to elaborate. But both men conceded that Redmond’s investigation could have caused embarrassment to Bush and his family.