I beg your forbearance up front. This article is not intended to be a comprehensive, scholarly assessment of the CIA’s history of supporting Islamic extremist groups like ISIS or Hay’at Tahrir Al Sham. Here is the lede–the CIA has a history of working with groups the US identified as terrorists in order to try to weaken Russia or Iran. My goal is to get a discussion started. I want to focus on the Kosovo War (1998-1999).

 

Part of my inspiration is Jim Jatras. I recorded an interview today with Jim for my Counter Currents channel. It will probably go up on Friday. Jim was a Foreign Service Officer (FSO) and then worked on Capitol Hill as a staffer on the Foreign Relations committee. Jim is a recognized expert on the subject.

What makes the 1998-1999 period worthy of attention is that the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center (CTC) was raising the alarm about Al Qaeda, which had attacked two US embassies in east Africa in August 1998, while the CIA’s Special Activities Division was working with the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which was receiving support from Al Qaeda and was considered a terrorist organization in 1998.

Al Qaeda began supporting the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) in the mid-1990s. Intelligence reports indicate that the KLA had established connections with Al Qaeda as early as 1996. Some sources suggest that KLA representatives met with American, British, and Swiss intelligence agencies in 1996, and possibly even earlier23.

The support from Al Qaeda to the KLA included:

1. Training: KLA members were trained in terrorist camps run by Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and other locations.
2. Financial support: Bin Laden’s organization, al-Qaeda, provided financial backing to the KLA.
3. Personnel: Islamic terrorists, including members of the Mujahideen, were enlisted as soldiers in the KLA’s conflict against Serbia.
4. Shared infrastructure: The KLA and al-Qaeda had a common staging area in Tropoje, Albania, which served as a center for Islamic terrorists.

 

So, at the very moment the KLA is getting help from Bin Laden’s crew, it also is getting clandestine and overt assistance from Western countries. The CIA’s assistance to Albanians in the war against Serbia primarily focused on supporting the KLA. American intelligence officers admitted to training the KLA before NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia. This support was part of a broader strategy to counter Serbian influence in the region. But the real target was Russia.

This was not the first time that the CIA worked with Albanian groups. It started during the first days of the Cold War. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the CIA, along with British intelligence, conducted Operation Valuable (codenamed FIEND by the CIA), which aimed to overthrow the communist regime in Albania. While this operation was not directly related to the conflict with Serbia, it established a precedent for CIA involvement in Albanian affairs and, by extension, Albanians who lived in the former Yugoslavia.

The case of the KLA is just another example of how flexible Western governments are when it comes to terrorism. In the blink of an eye, the KLA transitioned from being considered a terrorist organization by some Western governments to a key player worthy of support because they were fighting Serbian forces favored by Russia. During the Kosovo War, the CIA and NATO assistance to the KLA included, which is eerily similar to the support provided by Al Qaeda:

1. Intelligence Sharing: The CIA and other Western intelligence agencies reportedly provided the KLA with intelligence on Serbian military movements and positions, which helped the KLA coordinate its operations.
2. Training and Advisory Support: There are claims that the CIA or other Western entities provided training and advisory support to the KLA, though the extent of this involvement is not fully documented.
3. Diplomatic and Political Support: The U.S. and NATO countries supported the KLA’s political goals, advocating for Kosovo’s autonomy and later independence. This included diplomatic pressure on Serbia and efforts to build international consensus against the Yugoslav government.
4. NATO Intervention: In 1999, NATO launched a bombing campaign against Yugoslavia (Operation Allied Force) to force Serbian forces to withdraw from Kosovo. This intervention was a significant turning point in the conflict and aligned with the KLA’s objectives.
5. Humanitarian and Logistical Aid: The U.S. and other Western countries provided humanitarian aid to Albanian refugees and may have facilitated logistical support for the KLA.

 

I do not believe that Kosovo was an exception. To the contrary, it has been a longstanding practice of the CIA to forge relations with Islamic terrorist organization — or those groups identified as such by the West — at the same time those groups are identified as a threat to US security.

The hypocrisy is staggering. The US did it in Afghanistan, the US rehabilitated the the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI), also known as Mojahedin-e-Khalq(MEK), which has carried out terrorist attacks in Iran, and, most recently, the US helped Hay’at Tahrir Al Sham take power in Syria.

We also know that Al Qaeda supported the Chechen war in Russia. I do not have any information to confirm that the CIA or MI6 was involved in helping the terrorists, but I believe it is likely. Al Qaeda supported the Chechen in several ways:

Al Qaeda provided financial support to Chechen rebels, with radical Islamist networks reportedly sending over $100 million in aid to the rebels since 1996.

Al Qaeda trained Chechen fighters in Afghanistan. Several hundred Chechens were trained in Al Qaeda’s Afghan camps and provided with weapons.

The Islamic International Peacekeeping Brigade (IIPB) served as the primary channel for Islamic funding of Chechen guerillas, partly through links to al-Qaeda-related financiers on the Arabian Peninsula.

Al Qaeda-influenced Al-Ansar mujahideen were considered the fiercest and most organized of the three major groups fighting the Russians in Chechnya. Prominent figures like Ibn al-Khattab, who had ties to Osama bin Laden, led one of Chechnya’s best-trained units from 1995 until his death in 2002.

I know it sounds strange to talk about the CIA fighting a global war on terror while also training and equipping groups the US State Department identifies as terrorists, but this has been the reality. US policy can best be described as malevolent schizophrenia.