Posted on 09/11/2003 11:09:23 AM PDT by GeneD
On this second anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, there is much to think about, especially in New York City under pure blue skies so cruelly reminiscent of that day. One of many things for the press to think about today is a simple fact: more than two-thirds of all Americans, two years after the tragedy, continue to think that Saddam Hussein was personally involved in the attack, despite the fact that no credible evidence has surfaced which links him to the crime (and even his indirect al Qaeda associations are unproven or marginal at best).
Now, how much can we blame the media for this woeful misinformation? It's not a minor question, since surveys also show that avenging the 9/11 attacks proved to be the single most important reason Americans backed President Bush in his war on Iraq earlier this year -- and continue to support our presence in that country.
Surely, the media is at least partly to blame, but how much? We all know that this link has also been forged by the White House and its allies. And let us not forget polls have always shown that a sizeable number of Americans will believe anything -- that Elvis is alive, for example, or that racial prejudice is dead. Still, this does not get the media off the hook.
The latest survey was released by the Washington Post a few days ago. It showed that 69% of its sample said they believe it is likely the Iraqi leader was personally involved in the 9/11 attacks. A majority of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents believe this. An Associated Press account on this finding dryly noted, "The belief in the connection persists even though there has been no proof of a link between the two."
So not much has changed since earlier this year when polls found that most Americans believe one or more of the 9/11 hijackers hailed from Iraq, even though none of them did.
In follow-up interviews, Washington Post poll respondents were generally unsure why they believed Hussein was behind the Sept. 11 attacks, often describing it as stemming from news reports or their long-standing views of Hussein. For example, Peter Bankers, 59, a New York film publicist, said his belief that Hussein was behind the attacks "has probably been fed to me in some PR way," but he doesn't know how. "I think that the whole group of people, those with anti-American feelings, they all kind of cooperated with each other," he said.
Similarly, Kim Morrison, 32, a teacher from Plymouth, Ind., described her belief in Hussein's guilt as a "gut feeling" shaped by television. "From what we've heard from the media, it seems like what they feel is that Saddam and the whole al Qaeda thing are connected," she said.
I put no stock in non-scientific polls, such as the one AOL ran Wednesday night on this subject. Still it was interesting that at the time I voted on AOL, the Post's survey seemed to be holding up: about 40% felt it had been proven that Saddam was involved, another 35% thought it was likely and only 25% felt it unlikely.
Somehow the public doesn't have its facts down yet, and without blaming the media for everything, it is still worth pondering that surely it has done an inadequate job of illumination and education, a sentiment that E&P has been expressing since early spring. I saw a survey a few years ago that showed that 30% of Americans thought that it was the Russians who dropped the atomic bomb on Japan and another 20% thought the Japanese were the first to use the weapon. But that was a historical episode from more than half a century ago.
Well, certainly the administration has never claimed a connection, but is it that clear that it is definite there was not? For more on this, we turn now to FOX News foreign affairs analyst, Mansoor Ijaz, who joins us now from Berlin; the man with the best sources we know of anybody on these kinds of issues.
Mansoor, welcome. And tell us, first of all, your sense about whether it is…whether it can be definitively stated as a fact that there was no…9-11 connection to Iraq.
MANSOOR IJAZ, FOX NEWS FOREIGN AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, Brit, I'll first…I'll say to you that with regard to Howard Dean and Congressman Kucinich, you have to forgive them because they don't know any better. But I was surprised to hear Bob Graham say that since he sat in a senior position on the Senate Intelligence Committee during the course of these events.
The fact of the matter is that as early as 1994, but certainly proof positive as of 1998, the connection between Al Qaeda (search) and Saddam Hussein was very clear. In February and March of 1998, bin Laden's No. 2 guy visited Baghdad at the request of the intelligence services of Iraq.
And he was living in Khartoum at the time at the very moment that the Sudanese intelligence chief was begging the FBI in hand written notes that were carried back and forth to come to the Sudan and look at what the data was that they had, who they were dealing with, how bin Laden's people were moving around, which ones were moving where and what they were doing.
There is no and, if's, or but's about the fact that there was a connection between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein that early.
Now, the real question is what did they do in that two and a half weeks that they sat there and planned and plotted with each other?
We know that exactly six weeks after the meetings took place, a letter came from the FBI to the Sudanese saying we can't help you. We're not allowed to come and look at this stuff. And then six weeks after that, the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed and the Sudanese Embassy was cased.
So I would say that these people who make that kind of an argument have really no idea what the facts are. Nor do they understand what the mendacity of Saddam was to use al Qaeda for his benefit and his purposes in carrying out terrorist attacks in other parts of the world.
HUME: Well, certainly that makes pretty good circumstantial evidence on the attacks on those embassies. And it does suggest from what you have said that there have been contacts at a high level, important level, between al Qaeda and the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. But what about something that would suggest a connection to 9-11, is there evidence there of any consequence?
IJAZ: Absolutely, and now let's take it a step further after the 1998 bombings. We then know there was a training camp called Salman Pak, which we've been able to identify the aircraft that they trained, the hijackers on. We've been able to identify other contacts between Iraqi intelligence services and directly with the 9-11 hijackers.
People would love to shove that evidence under the carpet, but the fact of the matter is that the meetings did take place, planning was going on. The Iraqi diplomatic pouch was the tool of choice to pass al Qaeda's messages around the world in different parts of the world.
There was…we know for a fact that the Philippines' embassy of Iraq in manila was used for purposes of planning what was then a thwarted effort to try and hijack airplanes across the Pacific. We know that the Pakistani…I mean, the Iraqi Embassy in Islamabad was used to facilitate contact between the Taliban, bin Laden's people, and Iraqi senior scientists to collaborate on chemical and biological weapons. I know that for a fact myself that that was going on.
So, there is just no way that anybody can convince me that there is no connection. We have not yet found the forensic tie. That may be true. But to say that there's no connection whatsoever, that is absolutely not true.
HUME: Why is it that the Bush administration, in your view, has not stressed this terrorist connection more? It did for a while, but since the appeal that was made for the U.N. resolutions back last fall, you haven't heard much from the administration on this connection from.
IJAZ: You know, Brit, that's sort of a tough question to answer in one sense. But let me give you my opinion about that. That is, the Bush administration has their hands full trying to solve the problems on the ground in Iraq right now.
They did the best that they could to and try to lay everything out. They tried to make the case to the American people. I think they made a darn good case. And when they executed what they needed to and the evidence was there. The fact is that we found evidence after the war was over that this was going on.
And so for me, it's very clear what was happening. If the Democrats don't want to accept that, they're not going to win office next time if they keep this up, because the American people are too smart to let this go on forever.
HUME: Mansoor, thank you. Always a pleasure to have you.
Works for me.
Really? I have never heard "the White House" say that such a link existed at all. To the extent that I have even heard of the possibility of a link, it has been from independent researchers and the like.
Maybe that's what is meant by "its allies": independent researchers who happen to be trying to uncover facts which, if true, would help the White House achieve a policy aim. They, apparently, are the "allies" of the White House.
Which means that what this editorial is basically saying is that these independent researchers need to be squashed, marginalized, and shouted down, because (after all) "no credible evidence has surfaced which links him to the crime (and even his indirect al Qaeda associations are unproven or marginal at best)".
Of course, one is entitled to wonder how such "credible evidence" could possibly ever "surface", then, if the mainstream media is more interested in shouting down and marginalizing any independent researcher who might find some (in the interest of properly educating the public of course). It's also quite curious that this editorial speaks of "evidence" as something which simply "surfaces", as if by natural forces, a cork rising to the surface of an ocean, "well looky there". Gee, and you'd have thought that evidence can also arise as a result of actual investigation by people (such as, oh, I don't know, journalists) who are curious and inquisitive.
But apparently mainstream journalists are not all that curious and inquisitive when it comes to possible Iraq/Al Qaeda links. No evidence has "surfaced", so therefore there's automatically nothing to it, and what evidence there is, must be ignored and denounced as not "credible" and "marginal" - to this editor, that should be the top priority of the mainstream media. Waiting for evidence to "surface" (an act almost guaranteed to keep evidence marginal), and making sure the public understands how "marginal" existing evidence is.
All in the interest of educating the public, of course.
So not much has changed since earlier this year when polls found that most Americans believe one or more of the 9/11 hijackers hailed from Iraq, even though none of them did.
None of the IDs used by any of the hijackers were Iraqian, anyway. (Just correcting some possible misinformation....)
That’s plenty enough reason to take him out, whether or not he had prior knowledge of the specific plan for 911.
Yes. For example, I'm disturbed that there are people such as you who think that "there is none [no link between Hussein and Al Qaeda]" is a true and proven statement.
You know no such thing, of course. But in a functioning democracy it's important that you understand the basic outline of the issue.
If you have proof that there is no link between Saddam and 9/11, please get it to the White House ASAP.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,97063,00.html
Paraphrasing, the only connections between Saddam and 9/11 were: Al Qaeda attacked us on 9/11, Saddam supported Al Qaeda with meetings, coordination, training, facilities, weapons, research, funding and motivational encouragement. Other than that, I don't know what the Dems are talking about.
Huh?
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