Spying: U.S. Is Worried Foe Is Tracking Targets in Iraq:
"Bush administration officials are increasingly concerned that anti-American forces in Iraq are using simple but effective means to monitor activities and coordinate attacks against the American military, civilian administrators and visiting dignitaries. "

As evidence, Pentagon and military officials cite a recent raid by troops of the 101st Airborne Division during which they broke up an apparent plot to assassinate an American colonel. The would-be assailants, they said, had observed and charted the Army officer's daily routine — including his jogging route and schedule of public appearances — to plan their attack.

Evidence gathered by investigators also sheds new light on the rocket attack that struck the Rashid Hotel during the overnight visit to Baghdad by Paul D. Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, in late October. Military intelligence officers have reported that the hotel staff was infiltrated over the summer by at least one former member of Saddam Hussein's secret service.…American troops already vary their routes and routines, officials said, and are being encouraged to do it more. But Baghdad's infrastructure of roads and secure places to stay is limited, making it difficult to obscure actions that might allow an observant resistance to plan attacks.

"It does not require a very robust intelligence capability to pick up from time to time the presence of `high value' American officials," said a Bush administration official with access to intelligence reports from Iraq. "It is hard to shield the large security presence that identifies senior officials in Iraq."

Investigators are reviewing recent attacks on American convoys hit by improvised explosives to see whether the routes had become so routine as to make them obvious targets. They are also examining the bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad in August, in which the explosives-packed vehicle detonated adjacent to the United Nations special representative's window.

American officials say operatives loyal to the ousted Hussein government do not require high-technology eavesdropping devices to gather substantial amounts of information on the activities of American officials. "Given the size of our footprint, you can't overestimate the amount of information you can gather just standing on a street corner and watching," one official said.

Mr. Hussein's government operated a Stalinist-style domestic security apparatus to control Iraqis, so there is no shortage of agents skilled in traditional surveillance techniques.

In the case of the Rashid, which had become home to Americans and other foreigners working for the Coalition Provisional Authority, "the hotel was penetrated," according to a Pentagon official.

Military intelligence officers discovered that, at least as early as summer, the Rashid's catering service had on its staff a former member of Mr. Hussein's intelligence agency, officials in Washington and Iraq said.

But officials noted that given the large Iraqi staff at the hotel, valuable information could just as easily have been gathered by listening to coffee house gossip, or by watching streets around the hotel for unusually large convoys.

Much of the intelligence-gathering by supporters of the former government falls into this category of waiting, watching and listening in order to plan attacks, officials said.…

American officials in Washington and Iraq offer differing assessments on whether the multiple-rocket launcher set up outside the Rashid's security wall during the visit by Mr. Wolfowitz was specifically timed for that. One Army officer was killed, and more than a dozen Americans and other foreigners were wounded.

The launcher itself had taken weeks to construct, military officials said. While Mr. Wolfowitz's visit was a closely held secret before his departure, "I cannot believe that former regime loyalists were unaware the deputy was staying there," a senior administration official said. "He had been in the country for a day or two, which was widely publicized. He hosted an event the night before in the hotel, and did not leave. He travels with not a small footprint."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/29/international/middleeast/29INTE.html?pagewanted=all&position=