CIA Covert Operations

Covert operations by twenty-five American CIA operatives have been going on in Germany behind the German government’s back, according to an office announcement Jan. 10 following the publishing of an article in the U.S. magazine Vanity Fair.

Following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 against the United States, the CIA, in cooperation with Blackwater contractors, sent in the 25 agents to carry out illegal renditions of al-Qaeda suspects in Germany.

The United States’ Central Intelligence Agency failed to contact German officials about their presence, despite agreements for shared information and military action through the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The plan was scrapped once word reached other parts of the CIA and more members started questioning the operation’s legality. "We said no because we were of the opinion that you just couldn’t do a thing like that in a friendly country, where there were so many U.S. soldiers based," said a military source, speaking on the promise of anonymity, The objective of the mission was to transfer or rendition several suspected al-Qaeda informants to countries outside the restrictions of the Geneva Accords. In addition, there were plans to assassinate a primary suspect  who knew three of the hijackers of 9/11, a Syrian-born German named Mamun Darkanzali.