At least one Muslim analyst in the building had been greatly offended; others privately worried that if these covers were leaked during a war conducted in an Islamic nation, the fallout— as one Pentagon staffer would later say—“would be as bad as Abu Ghraib.”

Imagine how enlightened moderate, General Musharraf would have reacted — or the American media, if they had wind of it — if he had received a Brief from GHQ with verses from the Holy Quran on the cover. Yet, it has been revealed that Briefs on the War being provided to the leader of the global coalition against Fundamentalism, Extremism, etc., etc., US President George Bush, were regularly adorned with inspirational verses from the Bible!

According to Robert Draper at GQ, the Pentagon’s top-secret daily briefing for George W. Bush, called Worldwide Intelligence Update, prepared by US General Glen Shaffer, delivered by hand by former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, routinely had inspirational verses from the Bible to shore up Dubya’s resolve:

on the morning of Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld’s Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president; Rumsfeld himself often delivered it, by hand, to the White House. The briefing’s cover sheet generally featured triumphant, color images from the previous days’ war efforts: On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline secretary of defense, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: “Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him…To deliver their soul from death.”

This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine. On March 31, a U.S. tank roared through the desert beneath a quote from Ephesians: “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” On April 7, Saddam Hussein struck a dictatorial pose, under this passage from the First Epistle of Peter: “It is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.”

These cover sheets were the brainchild of Major General Glen Shaffer, a director for intelligence serving both the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the secretary of defense. In the days before the Iraq war, Shaffer’s staff had created humorous covers in an attempt to alleviate the stress of preparing for battle. Then, as the body counting began, Shaffer, a Christian, deemed the biblical passages more suitable. Several others in the Pentagon disagreed. At least one Muslim analyst in the building had been greatly offended; others privately worried that if these covers were leaked during a war conducted in an Islamic nation, the fallout—as one Pentagon staffer would later say—“would be as bad as Abu Ghraib.”

But the Pentagon’s top officials were apparently unconcerned about the effect such a disclosure might have on the conduct of the war or on Bush’s public standing. When colleagues complained to Shaffer that including a religious message with an intelligence briefing seemed inappropriate, Shaffer politely informed them that the practice would continue, because “my seniors”—JCS chairman Richard Myers, Rumsfeld, and the commander in chief himself—appreciated the cover pages.

CQ provides a selection of these cover sheets in a slide show, in which the following verses from the Bible are quoted, just below the title:

TOP SECRET/HCS/COMINT-GAMMA.ORCON,NOFORN/XDIS//X1,X6
Secretary of Defense
Worldwide Intelligence Update

• “Seek the Lord and His strength; seek His face continually.” 1 Chron 16:11.
• “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us.” (With picture of soldiers in uniform, heads bowed in prayer, 17 March 2003.)
• “If I rise on the wings of the dawn,/ if I settle on the far side of the sea,/ even there your hand will guide me,/ your right hand will hold me fast, O LORD.” Pslam 1, 19, 9-10. (19 March 2003.)
• “Their arrows are sharp, all their bows are strung; their horses’ hoofs seem like flint, their chariot wheels are like a whirlwind.” Isaiah 5:28. (20 March 2003.)
• “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” Ephesians 6:13. (31 March 2003.)
• “Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.” Proverbs 16:13. (1 April 2003.)
• “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:9. (3 April 2003.)
• “It is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.” 1 Peter 2:15 (Over a picture of Saddam Hussein, in a dictatorial pose, 7 April 2003.)
• “Open the gate that the righteous nation may enter, The nation that keeps faith.” Isaiah 26:2 (8 April 2003.)
• “Suddenly the fingers of a human hand appeared & [sic] wrote on the plaster of the wall, near a lampstand in the royal palace. The king watched the hand as it wrote… This is what these words mean: Mene: God has numbered the days of your reign & brought it to an end. Tekel: you have been weighed on the scales & found wanting. Peres: your kingdom is divided.” Daniel 5: 5-28. (Over picture of Saddam, and American tanks in one of his palaces, 9 April 2003)
• “The king is not saved by a might [sic] army; A warrior is not delivered by great strength. A horse is a false hope for victory; Nor does it deliver anyone by its great strength. Behold the eye of the LORD is on those who fear Him, On those who hope for His loving kindness, to deliver his soul from death.” Psalm 33-16-19 [sic]. (On a collage showing the statue of Sadda falling, an Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and an Iraqi woman celebrating. 10 April 2003)

Postscript (31 May 2009)

And, if you are wondering what those jumble of letters at the top of these Briefs mean, wonder no more; thanks to Marc Ambinder [his post, reproduced below] we know:

[BEGIN QUOTE]  Robert Draper’s fascinating story about Donald Rumsfeld in GQ is the worth the luxurious read. The highlight is his discovery that Rumsfeld, not particularly a pious man, interspersed biblical references with classified daily briefings in order to prompt a more friendly contextualization of the war from the perspective of those who were commanding it.

The briefings are replete with bodacious classification markings, like TOP SECRET//HCS-COMINT-GAMMA//ORCON, NOFORN//EXDIS/X1, X6.

Let’s unpack:

TOP SECRET — well, you know what that means. It’s the formal “classification” of the document.

HCS-COMINT-GAMMA  — This is the SCI control system phrase, with “SCI” being the catch-all term for a variety of Sensitive Compartmented Intelligence.

HCS refers to the “Humint Control System,” which is a special classified information distribution channel for intelligence received from human sources or obtained by covert HUMan INTelligence case officers working around the globe. Because of the sensitivity of the sourcing, all info marked HCS must be laundered through this special security channel.  COMINT — information derived from signals intelligence collection platforms. GAMMA is a subcompartment of COMINT.

ORCON — Stands for “Originator Control,” which gives the office which has classified the briefing the control over its dissemination.

NOFORN — Don’t show this to foreign governments!!!

EXDIS — The distribution is limited to an “EXclusive” number of people. Note that the briefing slide contains a marking that shows there to be only ten copies of the briefing in existence.

X1, X6 — These are exemption codes; generally, classified information is releasable or declassifiable after 10 years; this coding system gives the military and government a series of exemptions to extend that period. X1 refers to information about collection platforms, like secret spy satellites, hidden bugs or other sensitive programs. X6 refers to information that might damage the relationship between the U.S. and other governments.

Several of the GQ slides have blacked out some portion of the classification line. That’s because the classifications themselves remain a secret, probably because they refer to sub-channels of classified information that are specific to ongoing operations. [END QUOTE]