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Posted on 10/04/2004 10:08:32 AM PDT by CT CONSERVATIVE
CNS News is a nice little right-of-center web-based wire service operating in Alexandria, Virginia. They seem like pretty solid reporters, and not likely to bite on, say, memos that are supposed to be from an Air National Guard office from 1972 that were created on Microsoft Word.
So it's kind of surprising to see this report:
Iraqi intelligence documents, confiscated by U.S. forces and obtained by CNSNews.com, show numerous efforts by Saddam Hussein's regime to work with some of the world's most notorious terror organizations, including al Qaeda, to target Americans. They demonstrate that Saddam's government possessed mustard gas and anthrax, both considered weapons of mass destruction, in the summer of 2000, during the period in which United Nations weapons inspectors were not present in Iraq. And the papers show that Iraq trained dozens of terrorists inside its borders. One of the Iraqi memos contains an order from Saddam for his intelligence service to support terrorist attacks against Americans in Somalia. The memo was written nine months before U.S. Army Rangers were ambushed in Mogadishu by forces loyal to a warlord with alleged ties to al Qaeda.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
I'm Rather skeptical.
If CNS is serious about this, they will convert the documents to pdf and post them online (just like CBS did) so everyone can vet them simultaneously.
BTTT
Let me be the first to say it - I question the timing of this.
I'm not seeing the cynicism. The source explained that these were not in the hands of the White House long ago because they're trying to get all these documents translated. It looks like they've gone to several sources to get a bead on the authenticity. If you read closer, you'll see that these aren't all the documents, that CNS has more that they haven't published.
Everyone's going to be extra careful, sure, and CNS can probably take a little more of a risk since they are not high-profile, but this is the crux of the entire War in Iraq. You can bet the White House is eager to find out if these are the real deal. If they are, then Bush is vindicated.
One thing is for certain, the MSM will have all the opportunities they want to look at the documents.
See you one ping and raise another.
We need to keep this at the top of the heap and make sure that any semi-conservative-friendly news organization reports this.
Kerry has probably soiled his Depends already over this.
This has nothing to do with the relection effort. To suggest it might is irresponsible on your part.
The timing is suspect...
I'm with you. There's no way the White House didn't know about this before CNS. This has been leaked to diffuse Bush/Cheney's planned use of it.
Here is just a image of the arabic version:
Ping. I'll be cautiously optimistic that the documents do exist and can be authenticated.
Problem is Bush and Powell have already agreed that Iraq doesn't have WMD ... or, at least any that can be found. More importantly, they also agreed that there was no credible evidence that Iraq (Saddam) had cooperated with Bin Laden and al Quida. I felt at the time, going back to earlier this year, the Bush and Powell (perhaps bending to the MSM) were premature in their judgment.
Eric Cartmam to John Kerry:
Ha ha...ha ha ha...ha! Ha ha...ha ha ha...ha!
Ping!
October Surprise when the proof is published??????
if you read further though, they attribute the 'delay' in reporting to the backing up of documents needing transcription. Makes sense to me.
I'm sorry, but I beg to differ with you on two key points. First, no one in this administration has said that there *were* no WMD. (They've said that there probably were no stockpiles to be found.) Second, no one in this administration has claimed that there was "no cooperation" between Iraq and Al Quida. (They've stated that there was no close working relationship regarding the 9/11 attacks.)
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