I find it hilarious that some people think it's just inconceivable that Saddam could have supported the Ansar al-Islam base, logistically, and with personnel, etc., "because it was in the No-Fly Zone".
Last I checked, bases, and people on those bases, are usually situated on the *ground* not floating up in the air. Unless the "fly" in "No-Fly Zone" means something very strange, there's no reason whatsoever to doubt that Saddam could have blessed that base, supported it, etc. Also, any jihadis who went to train at that base, had to get there somehow. Did they fly into Kurdistan, and then go south? Or did they fly into Baghdad (with visa issued by Saddam) and go north? Which is more plausible?
The lefty talking-point that Saddam "didn't control" that region because it was in the "no-fly zone" needs to be retired. Obviously he didn't *fly* in that region but that wouldn't have prevented him, AT ALL, from setting up a base there - or at least supporting a base that *was* set up by AQ there. Do you think "no fly" also means "no drive"? Were our planes going to bomb some Jeep on the ground *driving* north to the camp, carrying a couple of jihadis who just flew in from Afghanistan? because it was a "no-fly zone"? Come on.
I don't know or claim that Saddam set that camp up himself, but if he *were* going to set up such a camp, the "no-fly zone" would have been the most logical place to do it. As Lex says, plausible deniability. In other words, he would know he could count on some fraction of useful... people in the West to shake their heads and say "that's not Saddam's fault! that base was in the No-Fly Zone!"
Kurdistan remains as isolated from the rest of Iraq as it was throughout the 1990s, when Baghdad withdrew from three Kurdish governorates, imposed an internal blockade and left them to fend for themselves. Today's isolation is more voluntary. The Kurds were allies of the US in their war against Saddam Hussein and when Baghdad fell on April 9. hundreds of thousands danced in the streets. "Now we are Iraqis," a young man had shouted in Sulaimaniyah over the celebratory honking of car horns. "I can study in Baghdad. I can travel. I can join the world," he added, echoing others who said they were celebrating not only the fall of a hated oppressor but the end of their seclusion. Seven months on there has been little reintegration. Prospering from increased security and trade, Kurdistan remains an entity unto itself, detached from the crisis gripping the rest of Iraq. Though the violence in the south is a topic of conversation, Kurds see it as "their" problem. Though less inclined to conspiracy theories than many Middle Eastern people, they ask if the Americans are stupid, or really want it to go so badly. "Us" meets "them" only in "newly-liberated" Kirkuk, Khanaqin, and to a lesser extent Mosul and the towns and villages in between. These traditionally Kurdish areas lay outside the "green line" separating the self-governing governorates from the rest of Iraq after 1991. But they were always seen as Kurdish, separated from the rest only by the force of the regime.
In a press conference Friday, Lt. Gen. David McKiernan, commander of land forces in Iraq, said that under the directive there "will be no militias inside of Iraq," but added that the Kurdish pesh merga forces "are a different story." "The pesh mergas fought with coalition forces and we look to leave them with some of their forces north of the green line." He was referring to the line that once divided the Kurds in two self-governing enclaves in the north from the Iraq that was under the control of Saddam Hussein.