CIA abandons defection lure for Iraqi leaders

The CIA has abandoned efforts to persuade Iraqi generals and political leaders to defect after underestimating their “hatred” of America, officials said today.

The three-month campaign using telephone calls, e-mails and face-to-face appeals failed to convince any senior military officials and Baath Party representatives to surrender and help overthrow Saddam Hussein.

“We misjudged their tenacity,” an American intelligence official told USA Today.

“These guys are driven by a hatred (of the US) that we may have underestimated.”

Potential defectors were promised asylum, money and a position in a post-war Iraqi government.

Some refused to desert until Saddam was captured or killed because they feared retribution, the official said.

Others resisted changing sides because they had been rewarded for their loyalty to the regime with promotions, houses and cars.

But the official said the repeated refusal of many generals and political leaders to surrender indicated a widespread hostility towards the United States.

Iraqi Major General Ali Musa Ramadan said: “Iraqi people are ready to fight. We are ready to defend President Saddam Hussein.”

He and his colleagues “laugh and hang up” on Iraqi opposition leaders when they made the offers, he said. “They are wasting their time.”

The Bush Administration hoped mass defections at the start of war would cause Saddam’s regime to collapse and save allied forces from having to go into Baghdad.

The Pentagon was so confident that it could persuade Iraqi leaders to surrender that it delayed the start of the “shock and awe” bombing campaign by several hours.

But a US military official said: “Our intelligence assessments were overly optimistic.”