U.S. "Iraq Threat Finance Cell" Puncturing Insurgents' Financial Network

By Andrew Cochran

On November 2, I posted on the degree of integration of a "threat finance" mindset into the Pentagon's intelligence and military operations, and discussed the Iraq Threat Finance Cell co-directed in Baghdad by DoD and the Treasury Department. Today's Washington Post reports on recent successes that U.S. force have had in targeting and shutting down the financial network of Al Qaeda in Iraq. An excerpt:

Mosul is the central hub in Iraq for wiring money to the insurgency from Syria and other countries, Welsh said, with three of the largest banks in the country that transfer money operating branches in the city. He said U.S. forces have shut down several such money exchanges in Mosul.

U.S. forces detained a major al-Qaeda in Iraq financier Sept. 25 with a passport that showed he had been to Syria 30 times, according to a military summary of his capture.

Another man, captured by the Iraqi army Sept. 3, is thought to be the No. 1 al-Qaeda in Iraq financier in Nineveh province, responsible for negotiating the release of kidnapping victims, according to another military summary. It said he was found with checks totaling 775 million dinars, or $600,000.

My sources informed me weeks ago of the recent success of the ITFC in shutting down elements of Al Qaeda's financial network, and that the government of a key Gulf state has assisted in these efforts. That cooperation is a welcome contrast to the situation a year ago, when that same government seemed unwilling or incapable of blocking the flow of funds to Sunnis in Iraq.

The article notes that "a growing number of insurgent cells, struggling to pay recruits, are turning to gangster-style racketeering operations." That is consistent with the behavior of numerous terrorists, now self-financing through transnational criminal enterprise, as discussed here often and most recently by Douglas Farah. Recognition of that model should be a foundation for counterinsurgency and asymetric warfare officials in Western governments, as should the success of the ITFC concept against such enterprises.

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