READ:

“The redacted version of “Saddam and Terrorism” is the most definitive public assessment to date from the Harmony program, the trove of “exploitable” documents, audio and video records, and computer files captured in Iraq. On the basis of about 600,000 items, the report lays out Saddam’s willingness to use terrorism against American and other international targets, as well as his larger state sponsorship of terror, which included harboring, training and equipping jihadis throughout the Middle East.

“The rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the region gave Saddam the opportunity to make terrorism, one of the few tools remaining in Saddam’s ‘coercion’ toolbox, not only cost effective but a formal instrument of state power,” the authors conclude. Throughout the 1990s, the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS) cooperated with Hamas; the Palestine Liberation Front, which maintained a Baghdad office; Force 17, Yasser Arafat’s private army; and others. The IIS gave commando training for members of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the organization that assassinated Anwar Sadat and whose “emir” was Ayman al-Zawahiri, who became Osama bin Laden’s second-in-command when the group merged with al Qaeda in 1998.

At the very least the report should dispel the notion that outwardly “secular” Saddam would never consort with religious types like al Qaeda. A pan-Arab nationalist, Saddam viewed radical Islamists as potential allies, and they likewise. According to a 1993 memo, Saddam decided to “form a group to start hunting Americans present on Arab soil; especially Somalia,” where al Qaeda was then working with warlords against U.S. humanitarian forces. Saddam also trained Sudanese fighters in Iraq.

The Pentagon report cites this as “a tactical example” of their cooperation. When Saddam “was ordering action in Somalia aimed at the American presence, Osama bin Laden was doing the same thing.” Saddam took an interest in “far-flung terrorist groups . . . to locate any organization whose services he might use in the future.” The Harmony documents “reveal that the regime was willing to co-opt or support organizations it knew to be part of al Qaeda — as long as that organization’s near-term goals supported Saddam’s long-term version.”

For 20 years, such “support” included using Fedayeen Saddam training camps to school terrorists, especially Palestinians but also non-Iraqis “directly associated” with al Qaeda, continuing up to the fall of Baghdad. Saddam also provided financial support and weapons, amounting to “a state-directed program of significant scale.” In July 2001, the regime began patronizing a terror cartel in Bahrain calling itself the Army of Muhammad, which, according to an Iraqi memo, “is under the wings of bin Laden.”
Link: http://online.wsj.com/article_print/SB120631495290958169.html

I would have leveled at least half of the Middle East on 12 September 2001, but I’m a former Soldier, not a politician.

There were numerous links to al-Qaeda since the end of the first Gulf War. In 1992, Hasan al-Turabi, leader of the Islamic revolution in Sudan, set up a meeting between Iraqi intelligence services and al-Qaeda with the goal of creating a “common strategy” for deposing pro-Western Arab governments. Those talks fell apart but there were later contacts, according to the 9/11 report on page 66. Furthermore, Iraq intelligence services have found documents that prove meetings in Iraq between al-Zarqawi and al-Qaeda chief Zawahiri.

All this according to Lawrence Wright’s masterful book “The Looming Tower. al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11.” It is based on more than 600 interviews that took the author to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Sudan and Europe. Every American should read this book.

What about the Vice President, he is already in a position of power and has a responsibilty to tell the truth yet even while admitting that his own theory is wrong (i.e. Saddam-al Qaeda link was wrong) he continues to say, “We don’t know. I mean, we’ve never been able to, to, to link it, and the FBI and CIA have worked it aggressively. I would say, at this point, nobody has been able to confirm…” That is not a clear answer. The Senate report said there is no link.

Even the president has tried to avoid this and link by association by stating, there was no link between Hussein and al Qaeda but there is a link between Iraq and the War on Terror. Both statements are true, but he does not say that it was his policy to invade Iraq that made Iraq a front in the war on terror. Moreover, as much as Iraq is a front in the war on terror, it is unlikely that al Qaeda could get much of a foothold there once the US leaves given all the competing players who would jump into the fray, from Iran to the Saudis to Turkey and more. At most, it would become a very unstable area. The biggest front in the war on terror is Afghanistan and juding by recent reports, we are loosing. That is where Bin Laden was on 9/11, that is where we went to capture him, and that is where he is still hiding, somewhere on the Afghan-Pakistan border. Iraq is important, but Afghanistan is far much more.

Perhaps Alan’s point is the answer; that Bush supporters (and those hawkish democrats) want to give a positive answer to that poll question because of the geopolitical / ideological link in the context of a greater war on Islamic fascism. Perhaps those polled percieve the question as synonimous with, “a link between Iraq and Al-Queda.” Or the polled feel subconsicously threatened by the question, as if the polster is trying to get them to admit the war in Iraq is difinitively unjustified…I dont’k know! Maybe they are just nutty and believe its true!

Whatever the case, I see no evidence that anyone in the administaration is tacitly supporting a groupthink amongst their constituants that Saddam played a direct role in the planning or execution of the 9/11 attack. I don’t know of any republican politician who perpetuates the idea, and whenever the question is asked to them if there is a direct link between 9/11 and Saddam, it is always rebuked.

As long as the republicans are not pandering to, or promoting this meme, then I don’t think they necessarily have any extra responsibility to “come out in full force and ’say it.’” Just like its not the Howard Dean’s responsibility to use DNC funds and organize the “debunking 9/11 conspiracies symposium.”

Both the DNC and the GOP do have a reposibility to make sure their candidates do not endorse these false conspiracies. As I see it, this is becoming more a problem with the Democrats because of their pandeering to the Kos Krowd, and running congressional candidates such as Cynthia McKinney and Bob Bowman.

It does not appear to be an exclusively Republican problem if fully 1/3 of democrats believe the same thing.

Of course not, and I didn’t suggest that. But since they’re pretty much double any other affiliation, do you think those Republicans are getting this message from Bush and company or from the “liberal” media? And no, that’s not a rhetorical question. I’d like you to answer it Jimmy and please give reasons.

Actually, the recent report stated that

1) there was no connection between Saddam and 9/11

2) no connection between Saddam and Zarqawi, and

3) no connection between Saddam and al Qaeda.

The only terrorism Saddam is guilty of sponsoring was that directed against Israel by Palestinian groups. Those Palestinian groups, as vile as their actions are, were not the people who attacked us on 9/11. The war between Israel and the Palestinians is a completely different issue and has different reasons than our war against al Qaeda.

Here’s part of the article I linked to above:

Senate report on Iraq questions Saddam link with terrorists

It concludes that postwar findings do not support a 2002 intelligence community report that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program, possessed biological weapons or ever developed mobile facilities for producing biological warfare agents.

The New York Times

By MARK MAZZETTI
Published: September 8, 2006

WASHINGTON, Sept. 8 � The Central Intelligence Agency last fall repudiated the idea that there were pre-war ties between Saddam Hussein’s government and the Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, according to a report issued on Friday by the Senate intelligence committee.

The disclosure undercuts continuing claims by the Bush administration that such ties existed, and that they provided evidence of links between Iraq and Al Qaeda. The Republican-controlled committee also sharply criticized the administration for its reliance on the Iraqi National Congress during the run-up to the war in Iraq.

In fact, the Senate investigation concluded that Mr. Hussein regarded Al Qaeda as a threat rather as a potential ally, and that the Iraqi intelligence service “actively attempted to locate and capture al-Zarqawi without success.’’

So, as much as Bush might say that Saddam was not involved in 9/11, he’s still going to say we are in Iraq because of 9/11. If 65% of Republicans (and a lesser percent of Dems and Indies) are too ignorant or lazy to understand the difference, then that is really on them at this point.

Also…look at those zogby nubers again. 32% of Democrats and 39% of Independents also think there was a link between Saddam and 9/11. Those are substantial numbers…It does not appear to be an exclusively Republican problem if fully 1/3 of democrats believe the same thing.

Since Bush has always said “it,” and the Democrats (except for several cogressional candidates!) have always rejected the 9/11 conspiracies, at what point do we say that Americans are coming up with this stuff on their own, or at least talkin’ sh*t when they take a poll?

I’ll tell you why: Ignorance, fanatical rantings, and conspiracy theorists run amok.

Seriously…how can 65% of Republicans still believe that Saddam had something to do with 9/11? How can that be? Answer me that.

He admitted that Iraq/Saddam had no link to 9/11. He then proceeded to defend the Iraq invasion as part of the war on terror, thus re-establishing the link he had just denied. Masterful.

You know, “Iraq/Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, but winning in Iraq is necessary to win the war on terror.”

The impression left is that defending our Iraq actions on 9/11 implies a link between the two.

There is a more ephemeral link between Saddam and 9/11, and now this administration has finally come out to say what has been the truth all along: that western civilization is at war with a world-wide Islamic fascist movement with its origins in the middle-east, and often supported or ignored by dictators and theocrats from Somalia to Iran.

Anyone who actually believes that Bush didn’t deliberately edit and maybe even rewrite the intelligence information to justify the war in Iraq seriously needs to have their heads examined.

Too often these three issues are lumped together to support or oppose the war. Too many people don’t listen to the question when asked by pollsters.

46% thought there was a connection between Saddam and 9/11
33% believe Bush did it
The remaining 21% who knows??

And if you link to a spam blog again, I’ll delete your comment.

FYI.