United States Institute of Peace
Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training
HUGH TANT
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Interviewed by: Mark Gribbin
Initial interview date: October 22,
2004
Copyright 2004 ADST
Brigadier General Hugh Tant, retired, is a career
army officer who has
extensive experience in financial management. Most
recently, he spent five-an-ahalf
years in charge of two-thirds ($44 billion) of the
Army's budget. He
volunteered to lead the currency exchange program in Iraq
from October 15 2003 to January 15 2003 .
Currency exchange was necessary for five reasons; (1)
two currencies
were in circulation, the old Swiss dinar in the north
and the Saddam dinar in the
rest of the country; (2) inadequate numbers of
denominations existed, the Swiss
dinar came in 3 denominations and the Saddam came in
only two denominations;
(3) the currency was poorly made and easily
counterfeited; (4) the Saddam dinar
had been devalued and the public had little trust in
it; (5) the presence of Saddam
on the currency was inappropriate.
Tant details the logistical challenges his team
faced, including (1)
redesigning the currency; (2) printing new bills; (3)
transporting new currency
into Iraq
public of the exchange program; (5) the physical
exchange of currency conducted
at hundreds of banks nationwide (old Saddam and Swiss
dinars for new dinars);
(6) counterfeit spotting; (7) accountability
mechanisms; and (8) disposal of old
currency.
Tant’s team worked closely with the Central Bank of Iraq
ran all operations except for transport and security.
Central Bank staff rode along
in convoys, signed for exchanges of old and new
currency, oversaw exchanges,
ran accountability checks, and supervised disposal.
Staff at local banks actually
conducted currency exchanges.
Security for the program was provided by several
sources. Tant’s team had
a 700-man security detail on contract from Global
Risk Strategies. This force was
responsible for protecting the convoys that carried
new currency to (and old
currency from) the 243 banks involved in the
exchange. As needed, the coalition
military provided additional support for the convoys.
Banks were protected by
coalition and contract security during the exchanges
and by indigenous Iraqi
forces at night.
Security was an issue during the exchange, with most
difficulties
encountered in the Sunni Triangle. There were also a
few problems in Najaf, but
these were not major. The flexibility of the exchange
operation allowed for the
program to avoid flare-ups of violence.
Tant’s rank and connections allowed him all the
support he needed. He
comments on the high quality of his contract forces,
the coalition military, the
CPA (especially Ambassador Bremer), and the Iraqi
Central Bank leadership and
staff. His one complaint was that the contractor for “life
support” (food, lodgings,
etc.) did a poor job.
United States Institute of Peace
Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training
HUGH TANT
Interviewed by: Mark Gribbin
Initial interview date: October 22,
2004
Copyright 2004 ADST
Q: Today is October the 22nd. This is Mark Gribbin. This is an interview with
Brigadier
General Hugh Tant. General Tant, to start off, could
tell me a little bit about your
background, your experience that led you on the road
to Iraq
TANT: My name's Hugh Tant, and I spent over 30 years
in the United States Army after
graduating from the Citadel Military College of South
Carolina, and served in various
positions, including the Airborne Infantry and in
many financial management positions,
culminating in serving in the Pentagon my last 5.5
years, where I was in charge of twothirds
of the Army's budget, about $44 billion. I briefed
the Hill – the staffers and
congressmen – about our justification of the budget
and requirements for the budget. I
also provided review and analysis of the budget. This
was necessary to ensure that our
army was funded to the level necessary to ensure
success on the battlefield and to win our
nation's wars.
That was the kind of money that I was responsible for
– the Army’s operation and
maintenance appropriation. We use that money to train
and recruit the troops, to fix our
equipment, repair our buildings, and essentially make
sure the troops are ready to go to
war.
After holding that position, I retired on the 1st of October, 2001and returned to my home
area of Mount Pleasant , South
Carolina
months after I was a banker, I got the call to
volunteer in Iraq
Q: When did you go to Iraq
TANT: I went to Iraq
The purpose of me going there was to serve as the
director of the Iraqi Currency
Exchange. Ambassador Bremer needed a person with
leadership skills to change out the
currency in Iraq
money. So I served as the director of the Iraqi
currency exchange, working closely with
the Central Bank of Iraq
conducted the mission.
Q: When you arrived on the ground, what sort of shape
was the Central Bank in? I
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understand that under the previous regime, it was
just riddled with corruption.
TANT: Well, during the war, most of the banks in Iraq
the population there, and destroyed, as was the
Central Bank of Iraq
RPGs and tried to fire and break into the vaults down
there. Of course I understand that
some of the culprits who tried to do that lost their
lives.
Q: Poetic justice.
TANT: They were in too close to the proximity of the
explosion. Of course, there was
flooding in the Central Bank of Iraq
They had some pretty good leaders there. Ahmed
Mohammad al-Jabouri, who is the
deputy, as well as Haji Fallah, who was another
deputy governor of the Central Bank of
the governor of the Central Bank of Iraq
and the other two fellows had worked there for some
time – really good people. Under
their leadership, things started happening,
improvements were made for the Central Bank
of Iraq
Q: What was the nature of the Iraqi banking system?
Did the Central Bank have
branches throughout the country? Could you explain
how the banking system worked?
TANT: You had the Central Bank which answered, of
course, to Saddam. And
whenever he directed, they had to print more money,
which was a negative inflationary
monetary policy. That was one of the reasons why the
currency had to be replaced. There
were banks – to get back specifically to your
question – there were banks throughout
headquarters were collocated on the same compound in Baghdad
of Iraq
But they owned/operated some 80, 90 percent of the
banks throughout Iraq
were some private banks that had branches throughout Iraq
Q: What exactly were Rafidain and Rashid?
TANT: They were the two state banks. Most of the
banks – a great, great majority of the
banks – fell under their control.
Q: How strong were the state banks' ties to the
regime?
TANT: I imagine they were very strongly tied to the
regime. They were at the beck and
call of Saddam and did anything the regime demanded.
They had to. As a result of that,
the currency was just devalued in an enormous way. We
found that they had two
currencies over there, and when you're trying to
unify a country, you need to have one
currency. That was another one of the reasons why we
had to change out the currency.
5
Q: They had two currencies?
TANT: Yes. The original currency of the country was
called the Swiss dinar. The
Kurdish area up in the north is where they used that:
north of the no-fly zone line. They
mainly continued to operate in the Swiss dinar, the
original currency.That currency was
not replaced, recycled, if you will, and it had a lot
more value than the Saddam dinar.
There were some negotiations that went on about how
to exchange this currency, and at
what rate, for the new dinar. The rate ended up being
150 to one. In other words, in the
Kurdish area, when they turned in Swiss dinars to one
of the operating banks used during
the exchange (and there were about 243 banks used
during the exchange), they would get
150 of the new dinar for one of the Swiss dinar. The
Swiss dinar basically had three
denominations.
But, in the great majority of the country, they had
the Saddam dinar with Saddam's face
on it. There were basically only two denominations of
that: there was a 10,000-dinar
note, which was worth about $5, and there was a
250-dinar note, which was worth about
12.5 cents, 12 cents. The
reason its value had dropped so low was because of Saddam’s
inflationary monetary policy. In
comparison, back in the '80s, before the Saddam dinar
came about, the rate of exchange was about
$3 to one dinar. But because of Saddam
there was now a total upside-down situation
where one dollar was worth about 2,300
dinar.
Q: Wow, that's incredible inflation.
TANT: Incredible inflation. That was another reason
that we had to change out the
currency. What we needed, and Ambassador Bremer
recognized this early on, was a
single, stable, secure, convenient, and meaningful
currency for the people. They needed
a single currency, mainly for the reason that I
described earlier, in that when you're
unifying a country, you don't want to have two
currencies in it. That doesn't make any
sense. And you need a secure currency, because Saddam's
currency was so highly
counterfeited.
The Saddam dinar was made on cheap paper and didn't
have many protective measures,
so it was easily and widely counterfeited. As a
matter of fact, the Secret Service lady
who briefed me right before I went to the airport on 9/11/2003 said “You're going to the
counterfeit capital of the world, where nearly two to
three notes of 1,000 are considered
counterfeit.” She provided me with a nice package of
how to identify counterfeit
currency. It had beautiful color pictures of what
counterfeit Iraqi dinar looked like under
ultraviolet light (We provided ultraviolet lights to
all of the banks who participated in the
exchange program).
So looking at the situation, you needed a single
currency, you needed a secure currency,
you needed a stable currency. The currency was not
stable because it had such a wide
change in value over a relatively short period of
time. I mean, there was drastic change.
6
For a people that want to reestablish their economy,
a good, stable currency is an
absolutely critical first step. It’s a foundation
step towards building a new economy.
On the 7th of July 2003 , Ambassador Bremer announced that there would be a
currency
exchange conducted from the October 15th 2003 to January 15 2004 . The exchange
would be nationwide, and that's what we did.
Another component is that you need a convenient
currency. As I mentioned, Saddam's
currency was basically two denominations, the
equivalent of a 12-cent note and a $5 note.
You can just imagine how difficult that is for a
shopkeeper or a shopper to deal with that.
Q: It was literally printed only in those two
denominations? There were no other
denominations?
TANT: Yes.
Q: That's incredible.
TANT: Now, with the new dinar, we have six
denominations for the people. I understand
that they're going to reestablish some coinage and
perhaps two additional denominations,
giving them a total of eight denominations plus
coinage to continue progressing the
currency situation.
But, of course, my team and I, we dealt in the six
new denominations. I can send you
pictures of that and descriptive information of each
of the notes NOTE: These materials
have been supplied by General Tant as a supplemental
to the interview.
Now the other thing is, you needed to have a currency
that was meaningful to the people.
It was important to take Saddam's face off the
currency and replace it with meaningful
characters, persons and places that were had
historical and cultural significance to Iraqis.
There were discussions with the Central Bank of Iraq
all of them decided that they would like to basically
use the characters that were on the
Swiss dinar (the original currency of the country), but
change the denominations.
And so that's what we did. We contacted a British
company called De La Rue. This
company was almost 200 years old and had produced
currency for over 150 nations.
They were the masters in anti-counterfeiting
techniques and using high-quality paper.
The cost to produce the currency was approximately
six cents per note, which allowed for
a very high-quality paper. All of the currencies, the
six denominations, are different
colors and different sizes, based on their
denomination. That also helps prevent
counterfeiting. The currency has metallic threads and
metallic strips. It has a watermark,
where you hold the currency up to a light and you an
see a white Arabian stallion. And,
when you rub your thumb across the face or the back
of the currency, the numbers and
letters are raised. It's not just flat like on cheap
paper.
7
It's wonderful now, the characters they now have on
there. For example, on the back of
the 25,000-dinar note, which is the largest
denomination, is a portrait of Hamurabi. In
1700 BC, 3700 years ago, he issued the first code of
laws. He is a famous character in
world history. On the front of the 10,000-dinar note,
there's a gentleman with his turban
on, and he was born in 965 in Basrah, in southeastern
Iraq
He published over 200 volumes on math and science. He
published seven volumes on
how the eye operates, and this was in the Middle
Ages! He was designated the father of
ophthalmology or something like that. That might not
have been the exact title for him,
but he was credited with being the first scientist to
actually determine how the eye works
with reflective light off of an object back into the
eye.
Q: That's incredible.
TANT: He also developed analytical geometry, tying
geometry and algebra together. He
was quite a genius, and so he's on the face of the
10,000-dinar note. There are all kinds
of images of Iraqi culture on the notes: minarets, a
grain elevator, the University of
“Dinar” is derived from Greek and Latin, perhaps from
“denarius” or “denari” (I don't
know my Greek and Latin as well as I should). In both
cases it means “money”. Many
other countries in that part of the world use dinar
as the word to describe their currency.
Q: The British company that did the printing, how did
you guys decide on them? I'm not
sure how big the money-printing world is. How was
that decision made?
TANT: The Central Bank of Iraq
throughout the entire effort, we wanted to put an
Iraqi face on this entire effort. We were
doing it for them in all instances, and we were not
trying to force anything on anybody.
It was mainly to help the Iraqi people and help the
Central Bank of Iraq
have the capability to transport and secure the
currency to the 243 banks throughout Iraq
(these were the banks we used for the exchange), so
we did that. But we did that task with
them, and we had one of their bank representatives on
every one of the convoys. We
performed about 1,000 convoys throughout the entire
exchange period.
Q: Convoys to the 243 banks scattered throughout the
country?
TANT: Yes. Iraq California
our security and logistics teams. They normally
traveled in 35-man armed convoys, and
we had about six to eight trucks. The trucks went out
to the banks to carry the new
currency in. After it was exchanged, they carried the
old currency out.
We also liaised with the active duty units, the
military units, in whose areas we would
travel. We had several layers of communications,
redundant communications, with them.
If we were to come under attack they would send out a
quick reaction force to fly to our
aid.
8
Sometimes, when we were going through dangerous
areas, they would provide us escorts
and supplement our 35-man armed guard teams. That was
very helpful. The 82nd
Airborne, 101st Airborne, the 1st Armored Division, and the British division down in the
Basrah area, they were all very helpful, as well as
the Poles and the Spanish units. They
would help make sure we had safe passage.
We were attacked 15 times directly over there. We had
11 people wounded, and there are
other stories.
Q: That is during the exchange?
TANT: During the exchange, yes.
Q: That seems like a pretty low number, though,
considering all the money that you were
moving.
TANT: Yes, it was 1,000 convoys but only 15 attacks.
It wasn't enormous in terms of us
being attacked, you're right.
Q: The people moving the currency, was that coalition
forces, or were there also private
security contractors?
TANT: The people who helped us with some of the
escorting business, on top of our
contractor security, were the active duty units. When
we were going through a dangerous
area, they would often give us direct support,
leading and following us through areas.
That was the coalition military’s role.
The 700 men we had on the Iraqi currency exchange
team were contractors. Most were
former soldiers from several different countries.
They were contracted by CPA.
Q: Right. I had spoken with a gentleman who was a
security contractor. There were
groups like Blackwater doing that…
TANT: Yes. Our contractor for security and logistics
was Global Risk Strategies.
Q: When you were carrying out the operation, what was
the logistics train? First, you
had to work with the Iraqis to figure out what the
currency would look like and how many
denominations were going to be printed. Then you had
to find the printing company.
After that, how did you get all the new currency into
your hands? Did the printers set up
shop in Iraq
TANT: Good questions. All of the currency was
produced outside of Iraq Kenya
currency under the auspices of De La Rue. They were
provided plates and a mission to
perform a certain portion of the currency. All of the
currency was then taken into
9
The plan called for 27 747 loads of currency to be
transported. It was about 90 tons of
currency that was flown in on these 747-type flights.
Now, we actually did about 18, 19
of those. At that time, the DHL flight was shot down.
That wasn't our flight, but it was...
Q: In the same period?
TANT: Yes, during that period. So Hanover Aviation,
who we contracted with for the
flights of the money, didn't want to fly directly
into Baghdad
circuitous route: they flew it into another country
where it was offloaded, secured, and
put on smaller aircraft. And so it almost doubled the
aircraft that we had to use to get the
entire 2,300-plus tons (almost 2,400 tons) of new
currency into Iraq
Q: But it went off all right? I mean, you were still
able to meet your deadlines?
TANT: Oh, yes, we didn't miss a beat. We received the
first shipment of currency on the
18th of September. Al-Jabouri, one
of the Bank’s deputy governors, went to England
flew in with it. I met him at the Baghdad International Airport
Our security force was all around, securing the area.
The U.S. Air Force offloaded the
currency for us with big, heavy-duty forklifts. They
put it onto the flatbeds that we had
arranged for and then we transported it to a secure
hub inside the Baghdad International
area, where we secured our funds.
Q: Was that the Green Zone?
TANT: No. Not the Green Zone. We had three main
distribution hubs. We had the main
hub in Baghdad Baghdad International Airport Mosul
where the 101st Airborne Division
was. Then we had one down in the south, in Basrah,
where the British forces were located. These were all
located near airports so we could
use the former Russian aircraft that we had to ship
currency around the country.
We had two IL-76s and two Antonovs. An IL-76 is
equivalent of like a C-141. The
Antonovs are equivalent of like a C-130 aircraft.
We used those aircraft to fly the necessary amounts
of currency to the north and the
south. They would also fly the old currency back to Baghdad
300 troops – our contracted former soldiers, security
and logistics teams – right there at
200 down in Basrah. And we had trucks at all three of
those locations. So if you can just
imagine, we covered all of Iraq
We would fly new currency in and it would be taken
out by trucks to the banks in their
particular area of responsibility. The collection of
the old currency would then be
accomplished and driven back to that particular hub.
Once a load of old currency was
driven back to, let's say the northern hub, it would
be put on the aircraft and flown down
to our central hub at Baghdad International Airport
10
It would then be called forward to a location in Baghdad
verifiers (predominantly Iraqi women) from the
Central Bank of Iraq
the currency to make sure it was properly accounted
for. They would also check for
counterfeit currency in those. The old currency was
transported in big sacks 80-or-90
pound sacks. There were just thousands and thousands
and thousands of sacks that we
had to bring back.
There was also a training program that went on. A
fellow named Larry Blume, out of
Treasury, was on my team. He went on what we called “the
Road Show”. He had a few
people that went with him. They trained the bankers
on how to exchange the money,
how to check for the counterfeit using the
ultraviolet lights. We provided generators to
power operations. We provided Thuraya satellite
phones for communication. To deface
the old currency as exchanged, we provided aprons and
red dye.
When the currency came across to the teller, the
first teller would verify the amount there
and check if it was counterfeit. A second teller,
collocated with the first teller, would
double check it for counterfeit and to ensure
accountability. A third teller would then take
it and dip one-third of the note into red dye. Then
the currency was put into these sacks
and it was identified by the bank, the name of the
teller, the date, and the amount of
money contained. This was done for each sack.
The ultimate accountability check was done by the 650
people back in Baghdad
for the Central Bank of Iraq
particular teller or any particular bank. Luckily, we
had any few problems. The tellers
and bank managers were paid incentive pay to work
longer hours to get this thing done.
They were also given incentive pay for their accuracy
– checking for counterfeit and not
including counterfeit in the sacks.
We had procedures to handle all of that. If there
were any problem cases at any bank, we
had a chain of command, so to speak. For example, if
a person came to the bank and
tried to exchange counterfeit, the teller would have
to explain the problem. The teller
would explain that counterfeit money could not be
exchanged, no new dinars would be
passed over, and that the counterfeit would not be
returned. Instead, the customer would
get a receipt indicating they had handed over
counterfeit currency. If the teller had
problems explaining this, or if the person wanted to
talk to somebody at the bank other
than the teller, it was set up so that they could
talk to the bank manager. If that didn't
satisfy the customer, then somebody from the Central
Bank of Iraq
didn't have to execute that, but we still had the
plan in place.
We also had to provide security for each of those
banks to make sure that there was no
disruption of the exchange program. There were
generally five to 20 people, depending
on size and location of the bank, that were there to
secure it during operational hours.
There were also Iraqi security guards who spent the
night in the banks. That provided us
the degree of protection that we thought was
necessary to have as smooth an operation as
possible, and it worked.
11
Q: Another logistics question: you bring in the new
bills and you exchange them with the
money that the bank had, as well as with persons who
came in?
TANT: Yes, let me say it my way. Let me just take you
through the whole flow. We
would bring the new currency into the Central Bank of
Iraq
northern hub, up near Mosul
We would fly the currency estimated as necessary to
meet those banks' requirements in
their area of responsibility. There were probably
about 50 or 60 banks up there that we
delivered new currency to. When we delivered the new
currency, those banks would sign
for it. They would sign for it with an Iraqi Central
Bank of employee who went with us
on each of our convoys.
We kept the chain of currency custody in the hands of
the Central Bank of Iraq
time. None of my people ever signed for any currency.
We had a good working
relationship with the Central Bank. An Iraqi bank
manager would sign for the currency
from the Central Bank employee, and then he would
conduct business. The population in
that community would come in with sacks of money, and
they would exchange that
money with that particular bank. They would receive
their new currency on the spot.
Now, we did publish exchange procedures prior to the
exchange. That was done through
a very dynamic information operations campaign led by
a lady named Karen Triggs out
of the UK
have accounts with the bank, there's no need to draw
your money out of that account and
turn right around and exchange it. There will be an
automatic exchange for the new
currency based on the existing deposits.”
Q: You said earlier there was a 150 to one exchange
rate for the Swiss dinar and the
new dinar?
TANT: Right.
Q: What was the exchange rate for the Saddam dinar,
seeing as it had been so devalue?
TANT: One to one.
Q: One to one?
TANT: One to one. I have to tell you, I had two
dynamic guys, one from the UK
Treasury named Jacob Nell and one from the Bank of
England named Simon Gray.
These guys are absolute geniuses in banking and
treasury operations, and they worked
closely with the Central Bank of Iraq
would have request meetings. I'd go to the big
meetings over there with all the heads of
the Rafidain, Rashid, and the Central Bank of Iraq
requirements, and incentive pay. We would talk about
all of these different issues to
12
ensure we had teamwork that worked.
Our motto throughout the operation was “Teamwork that
Works.” We made that reality.
We also had a second motto, “Delivery Under Fire”,
because of the attacks that we had
and the security situation in Iraq
I emailed a sergeant major I knew up in Korea
present these great former soldiers and civilians
that I worked with any sort of award.” I
saw this thing was going really well, and so we
ordered these coins as a small token of
appreciation. And that's quite interesting, because
now they have a touchstone that they
can go to. On the front it says "Teamwork that
Works, Iraqi Currency Exchange" with a
picture of a date palm tree on the front. On the back
side, it says “Delivery Under Fire,
Coalition Provisional Authority," and “Operation
Iraqi Freedom.” It was done just to
give them something to remind them of the great job they
did for the Iraqi people.
Q: You gave that to the Iraqi staff as well as
Central Bank?
TANT: I gave them to Iraqi staff. I gave it to all
700 of our guys and the one lady, Karen
Triggs, who helped us. We also gave it to people like
Ambassador Bremer and all who
supported us wholeheartedly throughout the operation.
I even had the wonderful
opportunity to present the ICE (Iraqi Currency
Exchange) coin to President George W.
Bush when he visited Charleston , South Carolina
about us and was proud of what we accomplished.
Q: That sounds like a good thing. That's the perfect
memento for the mission.
TANT: Right. Yes.
Q: Back to the exchange operation: after the old
currency had been sorted, double
checked, shipped, and sorted again in Baghdad
disposed of?
TANT: Yes, good question. It was disposed of. After
the 650 ladies verified the
currency, the Central Bank of Iraq
would be taken to the incinerators. There were
approximately 47 incinerators running
when we were at full capacity. The incinerators would
be loaded with the old currency,
and ignited. On the third day, the incinerators would
be cleaned out.
These incinerators looked something like shipping
containers, the 20-foot-long containers
that you use to transport good on ships. They had
been converted with smokestacks and
all that sort of stuff. Just a real nasty operation.
The Iraqis did that. They actually did
the loading. We did the transporting and securing –
mainly transporting – that had to
occur. Then they offloaded the pallets of old bills
and set it on fire, supervised the
burning, and then cleaned out the incinerators. And then
the process was repeated over
and over and over again.
Q: Of course you also had extra check, that if any
money got blown away on the wind, it
was dyed red so it couldn't be converted again.
TANT: That's right.
Q: Now, the counterfeiting issue, you had mentioned
earlier that there was an estimated
two to three fake notes per thousand?
TANT: Yes, that was according to the Secret Service.
Q: What was the rate that you discovered?
TANT: It was less than 1 percent.
Q: Less than 1 percent?
TANT: We would get these reports from the Central
Bank of Iraq
1 percent. So that was much better than what we
anticipated.
Q: You also mentioned that there was a vigorous
public information campaign. Could
you tell me a little bit more about that?
TANT: Absolutely. Karen Triggs led it. We used
multiple media outlets: newspapers,
television, and radio. We used handbills that were
issued by the civil affairs soldiers on
the streets throughout the country. These were
colorful handbills that illustrated the new
currency, and explained the program and how it would
be run from 15 October to 15
January.
We of course explained that they didn’t all have to
show up on the 15th of October,
because there was going to be plenty of money to go
around. There would be enough for
everybody to exchange their money, so don't think you
have to rush to the bank. Words
to that effect were written in the Iraqi language,
and it just reassured people that this was
going to be a very high-quality currency and it would
be something that they would be
proud of, how it would have illustrations on it that
were meaningful to their history and
culture.
And it was widely well received by the Iraqi people.
I only saw one article where a guy
said, "I don't think we need to do this. We
don't have to get rid of Saddam." He was a
guy up in Tikrit, if I remember correctly. That was
Saddam’s hometown.
Q: I'm not surprised.
TANT: But all the other articles, and there were a
lot of feedback-type articles from the
people, were glad about the new currency. So it was a
wonderful thing. Now, some of
them wanted additional denominations, and my
understanding here recently is that
Central Bank of Iraq
14
going to end up with something like eight
denominations. There is also the coinage, and
that will be very helpful to people.
Q: Who's going to be printing this in the future? Are
there are efforts underway to create
an indigenous printing capacity, or is that going to
continue to be farmed out?
TANT: I don’t know for certain. We talked about that
when I was over there, but they
did not yet have the capability to do it. I believe
they're going to continue to use De La
Rue, at least in the near term. That's not to say
that they wouldn't, in the future, develop
their own capability to print their own currency. But
I don't know if that's going to
happen anytime soon.
Q: Looking back on your experience, what were the
major lessons learned? Why was
this so successful?
TANT: Well, it was successful because we worked like
the best team in town. We had
established a chain of command and we had meetings
every day to get feedback and
plans for the next day.
We had to work hard and communicate with one another.
In my main cell, I had a
wonderful guy, Colonel Wilkinson, retired from the
British armed forces. He led my
security and logistics operation. He was just
fantastic. My deputy, John Rooney from
from BearingPoint, an American consulting firm, who
helped us. He and his team helped
with program management, doing things like arranging
for flights, arranging schedules,
and keeping track of how much currency we had
actually taken out of the hub and
transported. Essentially they were keeping daily
track of everything we did to ensure
overall accountability.
We had to stay on this thing constantly. We had
learned as leaders to go and meet with
the people who were doing the job to build spirit and
keep the troops motivated. We did
all of those things: we worked like just one big
family. We knew the importance of what
we were doing, we were proud of what we were doing,
and we were very successful in
getting it done.
Every aspect of it was a success. Karen Triggs with
her campaign, getting the word out to
the entire population. We were prepared to go to the
desert to take care of some of the
Bedouin tribes! We got the word out to them where
their nearest bank was. If they had
any problems, they knew how to contact us. We got the
word out to everybody, and
everybody got their money exchanged. It just took a
lot of energy and a lot of teamwork
to make it all happen.
Ambassador Bremer and the military gave us everything
we asked for. There was no
hesitation. I mean, if we needed another aircraft, we
got another aircraft. We just had a
great team effort.
15
Q: So both the military and the CPA gave you all of
the support that you needed?
TANT: CPA gave us all the support we needed. The
military definitely did as well.
They went above and beyond the call of duty for us. I
was on the phone or e-mail
regularly with the commanding generals of the
divisions. The U.S.
gave us tremendous support and advice. A man named
Tom Simpson arrived when I was
there. He did an assessment of what he thought needed
to be done. I used that to help me
get things done, to get my head clearly in the game.
END SIDE 1
Q: Do you have anything else to add about the
support?
TANT: Well, I just would like to say the 700 former
soldiers we had, the security
forcesthat were contracted to the currency exchange
program, were terrific. They came
out of Fiji Australia New Zealand Great Britain USA South Africa Rhodesia
(now Zimbabwe Canada
It was quite interesting.
Q: How were most of the foreign personnel brought
into the project? Were they
recruited by CPA?
TANT: Through the contract with Global Risk
Strategies. The security and logistics
force was predominantly from Global, and through
their processes and means got the
Fijians, South Africans, Canadians, and etcetera.
Q: You were working with a number of different
groups, everything from coalition
military to the CPA, as well as of course the
different Iraqi organizations. Did you have
any coordination difficulties, or was it a pretty
well-oiled machine?
TANT: No, it wasn’t, and that's why they brought me
in. I was a recently retired
brigadier general, and I knew all the generals, like
Rick Sanchez, the senior military guy
over there. He and I lived across the street from
each other for a year at the Army War
College. I mean, if I needed anything, I'd just say,
"Hey Rick, I need this," and it would
happen.
Q: Great.
TANT: Lieutenant General Sanchez, they don't get any
better than him, and Dave
Petraeus up in 101st, and Ray Odierno
pulled my bacon out of the fire in Samarra
were going into Samarra
number of attacks per day were like 15 a day in
August/September, and then they started
getting higher. There were about 35 attacks a day
with IEDs (improvised explosive
devices) or mortars or rockets.
November was a tough time with these attacks. We'd
been attacked and ambushed in the
16
commanding general of the 4th Infantry Division, and Samarra
responsibility. He provided us with an escort
consisting of 10 tanks, four infantry fighting
vehicles, an Apache attack helicopter, an A-10 Air
Force Warthog (close air support
aircraft), and we still got attacked.
We were delivering to two banks that day, (one on the
west of the town and one on the
east), so I had two 35-man convoys,. We went in with
that heavy escort from the 4th
Infantry Division, and sure enough, we still got
attacked. There was about a 45-minute
gun battle that ensued. I understand that there were
at least 46 of the enemy, terrorists and
former regime loyalist, who perished that day as a
result. There were about six of us who
got wounded. One of my guys got wounded in the knee.
He got shot through the knee.
He killed the guy that shot him, I understand. And
then there were five of our U.S.
who got wounded that day.
But, in all of that, we still delivered the money and
picked up the old money. So that was
delivery under fire, that was the second motto that
we had. Teamwork that works and
delivery under fire. I'm just so proud of all of
those troops. I mean, it was just the best of
the best. The cooperation with the military and the
troops that were provided to me, I
couldn't ask for any better. It was an incredible
experience.
Q: The people who were attacking you, were they part
of the general insurgency, or
were these criminals just out to make a quick buck?
TANT: Oh, no, we never lost any money. When they
attacked us, they never got to the
money.
Q: I understand that, but I'm just saying, do you
know who they were?
TANT: Yes, it was the same terrorists and former
regime loyalists who have caused
problems in Samarra
from the same cloth. About 5 percent over there don't
understand anything except to be
eliminated, and our guys are eliminating them as fast
as they can. The coalition is
eliminating them as fast as they can. Ninety-five
percent of the people over there are
fantastic people. They're just great people. But the
5 percent of them are causing all
these problems, and they just have to be destroyed.
Q: Were most of your problems with attacks in the
Sunni Triangle area?
TANT: Oh, yes. Yes. The rest of the provinces and the
governorates, they didn't cause
us hardly any problem. We had to stay at the ready
all the time when we were in the
Sunni Triangle.
Q: How about in the south, when Moqtad al-Sadr’s
militia was active?
TANT: Yes, every now and then, down in – what was it?
17
Q: Najaf?
TANT: Yes, Najaf. Occasionally, we'd have some
problems down in Najaf, in that area.
But the military was on top of that. If there were
serious problems, we just had to change
our mission and go somewhere else. We had that kind
of flexibility. But for the most
part, we were on track with our missions every day.
We did have to adjust every now
and then, and that's understandable, but we'd always
go back and pick them up a couple
days later, make the delivery a couple days later.
That didn't happen that often.
Q: As far as other security questions, you mentioned
that you had your own security
force on the convoys and that you could always rely
on coalition military to assist. There
were also coalition forces who helped protect the
banks during the transfer. You also
mentioned, and this is what I'd like to get into, the
Iraqi security teams that would protect
the bank at night. I was wondering what the role of
groups like that was, what the
indigenous Iraqi security role was in your
operations. For example, the police or other
security forces.
TANT: That's another good point you bring up. We
discussed that, “Who was going to
secure the banks?” We wanted to put an Iraqi face on
it, so the Iraqi police were
coordinated with and these Iraqi indigenous security
people, like their ...
Q: Facilities protection, or something like that?
TANT: The facilities protection. They actually
performed that mission. And they were
the main security of the banks themselves. They fell
under the Ministry of the Interior.
Now, of course, all military units over there had
areas of responsibility, and so they were
sensitive to things going on all the time in their
area of responsibility. That's why we had
liaisons, because we had to communicate with the
active military every time we were
going through an area. They knew we were coming and
would be traveling to a bank in
their area. And so they would often provide us
additional escorts, or at least they knew
we were there and ready to help us, should we need
help.
Ray Odierno, Major General Ray Odierno, with the 4th Infantry Division, I told you about
his support during the 30th November attack in Samarra
two weeks later, that's when they pulled Saddam out
of the hole. That was the same unit
that pulled Saddam out of the hole.
Q: The last thing I have to ask is just about the
Iraqi banking system in general. We kind
of touched on this early on. How would you
characterize it? Was it largely intact? Not
from a physical sense, but from ...
TANT: There had to be a lot of construction to get
the flooding out of the vaults at the
Central Bank of Iraq
gentlemen, al-Jabouri and Haji Fallah… It was very
apparent to me and others that their
18
employees highly respected these two individuals.
They had good teamwork as well and
got things going again for the Central Bank of Iraq
happened there. Many of the branch banks required
some renovation as there was
extreme looting that occurred after the fighting.
Now, we actually delivered over 2,300 tons of new
currency, but we took out of over
circulation 13,000 tons.
Q: Oh, wow.
TANT: The original estimate was like 3,000 tons, and
they realized that, no, there was a
lot more currency. So we had to expand our operation
dramatically to accommodate that.
13,000 tons of old currency is a lot. One of my
fellows figured it out, if you put the notes
end on end, it would go around the earth's
circumference about 32 times.
Q: That's a lot of money. So these gentlemen,
al-Jabouri and Haji Fallah were the
heads of the bank?
TANT: They were the deputy governors. The actual head
is Dr. Sinan al-Shabibi. He
was an economist, a PhD, and they brought him in.
Wonderful man.
Q: These gentlemen had worked for the Central Bank
before?
TANT: Yes, Haji Fallah and al-Jabouri were at the
bank, yes.
Q: There wasn't any problem with a Baathist element
in the bank.
TANT: Nope, nope. They were vetted and good men.
Q: I'm not saying that they were Baathists, but was
there a large Baathist presence in the
banking system that had to be vetted out?
TANT: Not that I'm aware of. I'm not aware of that.
Q: I think that is all the questions I have for you,
sir. Do you have any final comments
that you'd like to add? Any lessons learned or any
advice that you'd pass on for future
operations?
TANT: Well, for future operations, there needs to be
one contractor that provides
security, logistics, and life support. We had to have
a company provide life support, and
they were unacceptable. They provided us trucks that
didn't work a lot of the time. They
didn't provide us the living quarters needed for
those 700 troops in a timely manner. The
food was less than it should have been from time to
time. I understand that they're under
investigation for falsifying contracts, and not just
with our operation, but with other
security operations that they were involved with.
19
Q: Who was this?
TANT: That's a company called Custer Battles. They
are under investigation. It hit the
news. We were just a piece of their pie, but in the
future, it would have been much better
to have one contractor that provided not just the
security and logistics, but also the life
support. To me that was the most critical lesson
learned.
Q: All right. Just to clarify, you were based in Baghdad
the country, is that correct?
TANT: I personally lived in Baghdad
Bremer was, and I reported to him on a regular basis.
Sometimes daily. I answered to
him. Fantastic leader. If our motto was “Teamwork
that Works”, his motto should be
“Leadership that Works”, because he was absolutely
the best leader for that situation.
And I experienced a lot of things I haven't told you
about in terms of examples of
leadership and all over there, but Ambassador Bremer,
he has my highest regard and so
does Lieutenant General Sanchez, for that matter.
That was a dynamic duo, there.
Q: The funding for the currency exchange operation,
was that funded out of DFI
(Development Fund for Iraq
TANT: As I understand it, yes. Overall, it was about
a $200 million operation. The
largest portion of that was for the printing of the
currency and the transportation of the
currency, and it was somewhere around – I'm giving
you approximations – $60 or $70
million for the security force and life support.
Q: Right. But most of the transporting of the
currency, at least in Iraq
military vehicles?
TANT: No. They were mostly not done with military
vehicles. They were done mostly
with contractor-provided vehicles. They were just
foreign-made trucks, and it was just
different sizes of trucks – big trucks, small trucks.
They were not government vehicles
for the most part.
When the contractor failed to provide operationally
sound trucks, or a sufficient quantity
of trucks, we had to call on the military to support
us.
Q: These were locally contracted from, for example,
an Iraqi contracting firm? A firm
would be contracted to help deliver?
TANT: That's right. We used a contractor who would
sub-contract with foreign firms for
different requirements and services.
Q: Regional. The flights: did you charter flights to
bring the money in from the various
places?
20
TANT: Yes, we contracted through Hanover Aviation,
which is a British firm, for the
747s which were hauling the new currency into Iraq
the IL-76s, the former Russian aircraft, and for the
Antonov aircraft. Those were used
inside of Iraq
Q: OK, well, I promise that's the end of my
questions. Do you have anything else you'd
like to add, sir?
TANT: No, I'll tell you
what. That was great.
