Posted on 05/27/2004 5:51:50 AM PDT by OESY
One thing we've learned about Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein is that the former dictator was a diligent record keeper. Coalition forces have found -- literally -- millions of documents. These papers are still being sorted, translated and absorbed, but they are already turning up new facts about Saddam's links to terrorism.
We realize that even raising this subject now is politically incorrect. It is an article of faith among war opponents that there were no links whatsoever -- that "secular" Saddam and fundamentalist Islamic terrorists didn't mix. But John Ashcroft's press conference yesterday reminds us that the terror threat remains, and it seems especially irresponsible for journalists not to be open to new evidence. If the CIA was wrong about WMD, couldn't it have also missed Saddam's terror links?
... the name Ahmed Hikmat Shakir appears on three captured rosters of officers in Saddam Fedayeen, the elite paramilitary group run by Saddam's son Uday and entrusted with doing much of the regime's dirty work. Our government sources, who have seen translations of the documents, say Shakir is listed with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel.
... if Shakir was an officer in the Fedayeen, it would establish a direct link between Iraq and the al Qaeda operatives who planned 9/11. Shakir was present at the January 2000 al Qaeda "summit" in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, at which the 9/11 attacks were planned. The U.S. has never been sure whether he was there on behalf of the Iraqi regime or whether he was an Iraqi Islamicist who hooked up with al Qaeda on his own.
It is possible that the Ahmed Hikmat Shakir listed on the Fedayeen rosters is a different man from the Iraqi of the same name with the proven al Qaeda connections. His identity awaits confirmation by al Qaeda operatives in U.S. custody or perhaps by other captured documents. But our sources tell us there is no questioning the authenticity of the three Fedayeen rosters. The chain of control is impeccable. The documents were captured by the U.S. military and have been in U.S. hands ever since.
... at the time of the summit Shakir was working at the Kuala Lumpur airport, having obtained the job through an Iraqi intelligence agent at the Iraqi embassy. The four-day al Qaeda meeting was attended by Khalid al Midhar and Nawaz al Hamzi, who were at the controls of American Airlines Flight 77 when it crashed into the Pentagon. Also on hand were Ramzi bin al Shibh, the operational planner of the 9/11 attacks, and Tawfiz al Atash, a high-ranking Osama bin Laden lieutenant and mastermind of the USS Cole bombing. Shakir left Malaysia on January 13, four days after the summit concluded.
That's not the only connection between Shakir and al Qaeda. The Iraqi next turned up in Qatar, where he was arrested on September 17, 2001, four days after the attacks in the U.S. A search of his pockets and apartment uncovered such information as the phone numbers of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers' safe houses and contacts. Also found was information pertaining to a 1995 al Qaeda plot to blow up a dozen commercial airliners over the Pacific.
After a brief detention, our friends the Qataris inexplicably released Shakir, and on October 21 he flew to Amman, Jordan. The Jordanians promptly arrested him, but under pressure from the Iraqis (and Amnesty International, which questioned his detention) and with the acquiescence of the CIA, they let him go after three months. He was last seen heading home to Baghdad.
One of the mysteries of postwar Iraq is why the Bush Administration and our $40-billion-a-year intelligence services haven't devoted more resources to probing the links between Saddam's regime and al Qaeda. In his new book, "The Connection," Stephen Hayes of The Weekly Standard puts together all of the many strands of intriguing evidence that the two did do business together....
... The Baathists killing U.S. soldiers are clearly working with al Qaeda now; Saddam's files might show us how they linked up in the first place.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
The Rats keep telling us that there is no connection and so there must not be. If they say it, it is true.
"The President convinced a majority of the country that Saddam Hussein was responsible for attacking us on September 11th. But in truth he had nothing whatsoever to do with it. The President convinced the country with a mixture of forged documents and blatantly false assertions that Saddam was in league with Al Qaeda, and that he was "indistinguishable" from Osama bin Laden." - Al Gore, May 26, 2004
/off lithium
It's a shame, and a sign of the times, that it's so difficult to explain the details of the connections. It's very complicated for sure. Some Americans are so distracted by life that they don't seem to want to take the time to find the facts. The prez & company are going to have to figure out a way to simplify it all. My comments are all based on the incredible bias of the media, which will do anything to avoid telling the American people that Saddam and al Qaeda were tied regarding the 911 attack.
Algore needs to fade away and quickly! He should be brought up on charges of treason for his diatribe at the MorOn.org pow-wow. He's an embarassment to this country and has just given our enemies more fuel to add to their fires.
Now, the one thing I hope to see with this new information is SOMEONE from the GOP will start hitting the dims with this. I don't care if the networks ignore it, the message CAN get out there if someone in the GOP would have the balls to start hammering the dims with this information.
Ping
Umm, this isn't exactly a smoking gun.
Until the Administration finds a way to produce some evidence that is without the "could have" and "may show" qualifiers, the left will continue to have the upper hand and Americans will still doubt.
Remember, in the Muslim world allegiances and alliances and friendships shift with the wind. Udayy recruited all manner of scum for his Fedayyeen. It is entirely possible that Al Qaeda (and other) terrorist operatives were deep inside the Hussein regime without the regime's knowledge or explicit consent. Maybe that fact in itself is a good enough reason for us to have gone in and cleaned up the whole mess, but the Bush Administration is going to have to do a much better job of convincing people.
where are the polls that the Dims keep belittling and ridiculing, the one where "70% of the American public believes there was a connection between 9/11 and SH"?
Gosh, we were stupid then and we are stupid now.../s
LOL! I was just about to post this on our local board but figured it would be pointless. Without photos of this guy shaking Sadaam's hand and wearing a T-shirt that says "I'm with al Qaeda," SOME people still won't get it.
Bwahahahahahaha!!! I point to post #7 as Exhibit A. This guy is too much.
It's surprising how so many Dictators keep so many detailed records of their barbarism.
::shaking head, walking away::
The people who were "Fedeyeen" were taken from their families at an early age. They were raised as terrorists. There is no way someone could make it into the fedeyeen AFTER they were already Al-Qaeda. It just didn't work that way.
Just like WMD's. They won't believe til we find a warehouse that says "WMD's are Us".
The October surprise (after Kerry, Wrangel et al have totally overplayed their hands) will make the RATs unelectable for years to come.
It needs to be the July surprise.
But I do think that they are waiting for the Dem's to climb out a little further on that limb in order to make it easier to saw off.
You may be right. It will definitely be AFTER the 6/30 turnover. It may come out as part of Saddam's trial (hopefully coming to a theater near you soon after the turnover). However, with most families vacationing during the summer (slow knews absorption for the masses), sometime after Labor Day would make sense. Come to think of it, isn't the convention after Labor Day? That would be awesome because the alphabet media will be covering it. Food for thought.
And here you see the problem we face. Any attempt to link al Qaeda and Saddam will be met by the Juan Williams of the world with the simple putdown: "We all know that there was no connection and that George Bush lied when he said there was". End of argument. No further dissussion is allowed or even possible.
I really don't know how you get past this kind of hurdle. The Liberal Media's ability to write history any way they want and make lies into the truth is staggering indeed. Thank God for Free Republic, the Blogs and Talk Radio - they are the hope for the future.
Someone in this administration needs to stand up and show who the adults are.
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