Posted on 05/11/2004 7:13:09 AM PDT by TrebleRebel
Thanks for posting the websites. Appreciate it.
I can't answer the indictment question, as I have little criminal experience, but as far as conviction, the notation might be hearsay, and thus inadmissible. It depends on who allegedly made the notation and perhaps several other things. If it gets entered, it can be weight with all the other evidence.
But we aren't really talking about a court of law that's based on justice and protecting the rights of innocents. We are talking about war where there is no specific burden of proof. What coroboration is there for the event in question? Is there another, reasonable, explanation for the existence of that evidence outside complicity? How likely is that explanation compared to the complicit one? Questions like these determine the value of intelligence.
The Czech connection was just one of a few overt pieces of intel. A far more important one was a hand written note, that both speaks to the Yellow Cake issue and the AQ/Iraq tie to 9/11:
Written in the neat, precise hand of Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti, the former head of the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS) and one of the few named in the US government's pack of cards of most-wanted Iraqis not to have been apprehended, the personal memo to Saddam is signed by Habbush in distinctive green ink.
Headed simply "Intelligence Items", and dated July 1, 2001, it is addressed: "To the President of the Ba'ath Revolution Party and President of the Republic, may God protect you."
The first paragraph states that "Mohammed Atta, an Egyptian national, came with Abu Ammer (an Arabic nom-de-guerre - his real identity is unknown) and we hosted him in Abu Nidal's house at al-Dora under our direct supervision.
"We arranged a work programme for him for three days with a team dedicated to working with him . . . He displayed extraordinary effort and showed a firm commitment to lead the team which will be responsible for attacking the targets that we have agreed to destroy."
There is nothing in the document that provides any clue to the identity of the "targets", although Iraqi officials say it is a coded reference to the September 11 attacks.
The second item contains a report of how Iraqi intelligence, helped by "a small team from the al-Qaeda organisation", arranged for an (unspecified) shipment from Niger to reach Baghdad by way of Libya and Syria.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=11313
DK
There is supposed to be a market in Iraq for forged regime documents. But I would go further and say that this one looks like an elaborate set-up. Consider the timing: it's released to the world on the eve of Saddam's capture. The journalist is Con Coughlin, previously accused of being a channel for disinformation from Britain's MI6 agency. It's touted as authentic by Ayad Allawi, who is not from Chalabi's much-criticised INC, but from the CIA's favorite, the INA.
So I surmise that this is in fact part of the campaign against an Iraq/AQ connection. But instead of casting doubt on the evidence (as was done with Atta's visit to Prague), here they're telling people what they want to hear, in spades... so that later, when the story is discredited, the idea of a connection will have even less traction. "Once bitten, twice shy."
When i see Dan Rather report it...then i'll believe it...uh yeah...ok...
It's like the Czech intel about Atta, the plane used for terrorist training, Abu Abbas and Abu Nidal in Bagdad, the Kay report acknowledging a far greater terrorist presence in Iraq than anyone ever thought, etc.
How much evidence is enough? VX gas in Jordan as an AQ plot to kill tens of thousands, VX probably from Iraq, the accepted 200 tons of yellow cake Saddam aquired prior to the Wilson fake yellow cake trip (he's got a company dealing in gold from Niger).
As for being released on the eve of Saddams capture, did we know we were going to find him in that hole? From all accounts actually finding him was a fluke.
DK
True or false, I don't think the story's timing can possibly be coincidental. It appears to have come out on the very day of Saddam's capture. And finding him was not a fluke, it was the result of hard work. The Abu Ghraib interrogations might even be what cracked the case - apparently most of them happened between October and December 2003.
If it really was VX in Jordan, that's interesting, because it was also supposed to be VX at the Sudanese "aspirin factory" which Clinton bombed in 1998.
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