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ZeroHedge.com<\/p>\n
The inside account of how the now infamous “phony” letter announcing complete US troop withdrawal from Iraq after seventeen years\u00a0details astoundingly how the<\/a>\u00a0“posting of the letter online unleashed\u00a0a mad, behind-the-scenes scramble at the Pentagon, the White House, and on Capitol Hill<\/strong>, as elected officials, policymakers, military advisers and journalists sought to understand whether the letter intended to communicate what its plain language suggested.”<\/p>\n As different departments and levels within the Pentagon bureaucracy attempted to account for it, the story changed multiple times.\u00a0In a matter of a couple hours it went from\u00a0“authentic”\u00a0to “phony” to part of an effort to sow “active disinformation”<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0finally<\/a>\u00a0according to a confused press briefing by\u00a0Gen. Milley and Defense Secretary Mark Esper\u00a0an “unauthorized draft” and\u00a0“an honest mistake”.<\/p>\n This after\u00a0The Washington Post\u00a0<\/em>and a host of other major outlets “confirmed” it as “authentic”\u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/em>in the words<\/a>\u00a0of WaPo’s Beirut Bureau chief Liz Sly.<\/p>\n https:\/\/twitter.com\/JimLaPorta\/status\/1214304224370143233?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1214304224370143233&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fgeopolitical%2Fanatomy-iraq-exit-letter-authentic-active-disinformation-unauthorized-draft<\/p>\n At Monday’s Pentagon briefing itself which attempted to assess the origins of the mysterious draft letter,\u00a0The Dispatch<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>summarized the atmosphere:\u00a0“Was the United States really moving to remove its remaining troops from Iraq? Nobody seemed to know.”<\/strong><\/p>\n And ultimately no definitive answers came, other than the Pentagon and administration denying than an Iraq pullout is happening,\u00a0as to just how a “draft letter” which had been making the rounds at CENTCOM came to be in the hands of the Iraqis, after which it was posted online.<\/p>\n As\u00a0The Dispatch\u00a0<\/em>notes, the letter wasn’t merely announced by some Iraqi politician in Baghdad, but was\u00a0released via America’s enemies<\/a>:<\/p>\n The news was a propaganda coup for the Iranians and those in Iraq who support them.<\/strong>\u00a0The story broke on the television channel of an Iran-backed Iraqi militia, Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH), after it was leaked by the Iraqi prime minister\u2019s office, according to Liz Sly, Beirut bureau chief for the\u00a0Washington Post<\/em>, who noted that\u00a0the leader of AAH is a U.S.-designated terrorist and his militia is responsible for the deaths of dozens of Americans<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The letter soon made its way into the American media.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Initially, there was this statement out of the Pentagon policy office in conjunction with Operation Inherent Resolve: \u201cOIR has confirmed with us at the working level that this is active disinformation.\u201d The Pentagon was \u201cfairly certain that this is a fake\u201d according to that early media statement.<\/p>\n Though the letter doesn\u2019t bear a signature, the US military has confirmed its authenticity. Not clear yet whether it\u2019s a full or partial withdrawal, but the reference to deference to the Iraqi parliament\u2019s decision makes it seem pretty definitive.<\/p>\n — Liz Sly (@LizSly) January 6, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n