Could the reason for this be that he did not have the resources available to cause mischief? After all he had just fought a very resource/manpower intensive 8 year war.
Sometimes one just has to finish their thought processes to find the answers.
Posted on 01/14/2003 10:05:20 AM PST by Wallaby
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Saddam and al Qaeda the link we've all missed; The conventional belief is that the Iraqi dictator and Bin Laden are still foes. Recent intelligence reports tell a different story
David Rose
The Evening Standard (London) Pg. 11
December 9, 2002
DESPITE their bitter divisions over possible war in Iraq, doves and many hawks on this side of the Atlantic share a common, often-stated belief: that there is "no evidence" of a link between Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network and Saddam Hussein's regime. In London and Washington, the Foreign Office, MI6, the State Department and the CIA have been spinning this claim to reporters for more than a decade, long before the attacks of 11 September last year.
Constant repetition of an erroneous position does not, however, make it true. Having investigated the denial of an Iraqi connection for more than a year, I am convinced it is false. The strongest evidence comes from a surprising source - the files of those same intelligence agencies who have spent so long publicly playing this connection down. According to the conventional wisdom, Saddam is a "secular" dictator, whose loathing for Islamic fundamentalism is intense, while Bin Laden and his cohorts would like to kill the Iraqi president almost as much George W Bush.
It is undisputed that Iraqi-sponsored assassins tried to kill George Bush senior on a visit to the Gulf in 1993. The same year, Abdul Rahman Yasin mixed and made the truck bomb which wrought destruction and killed six in the first New York World Trade Center attack - then coolly boarded a plane for Baghdad, where he still resides.
All reports of a link can be disregarded on this ground alone.
Though they may get scant attention, some of the facts of Saddam's involvement with Islamic terrorism are not disputed. Hamas, the fundamentalist Palestinian group, whose gift to the world is the suicide bomb, has maintained a Baghdad office - funded by Saddam - for many years.
"In the Cold War," says one of them, "often you'd draw firm conclusions and make policy on the basis of just four or five reports. Here there are almost 100 separate examples of Iraq-al Qaeda co-operation going back to 1992."
His intelligence service, the Mukhabarat, has a special department whose sole function is liaison with Hamas. In return, Hamas has praised Saddam extravagantly on its website and on paper.
SINCE his defeat in the Gulf War in 1991, Saddam's supposed secularism has looked decidedly thin.
Increasingly, he has relied on Islamist rhetoric in an attempt to rally the "Arab street". Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden's 1998 fatwa justified its call for Muslims to kill American and Jewish civilians on the basis of a lengthy critique of US hostility towards "secular" Iraq.
It is also undisputed that Iraqi-sponsored assassins tried to kill George Bush senior on a visit to the Gulf in 1993. The same year, Abdul Rahman Yasin mixed and made the truck bomb which wrought destruction and killed six in the first New York World Trade Center attack - then coolly boarded a plane for Baghdad, where he still resides.
There is strong evidence that Ramzi Yousef, leader of both the 1993 New York bombing and a failed attempt two years later to down 12 American airliners over the Pacific, was an Iraqi intelligence officer. All this was known in the Nineties. Nevertheless, the "no connection" argument was rapidly becoming orthodoxy.
The 9/11 attacks were, selfevidently, a failure of intelligence: no one saw them coming. Awareness of this failure, and its possible consequences for individuals' careers, are the only reasons I can find for the wall of spin which the spooks have fed to the media almost ever since.
Not only had Havel not phoned Bush, the Czechs remained convinced that Atta did meet Al-Ani. They had been tracking him continuously because his predecessor had been caught red-handed - in a plot to detonate a terrorist bomb.
Iraq must have been more intensely spied upon than any other country throughout the 1990s. If the agencies missed a Saddam-al Qaeda connection, it might reasonably be argued, then many heads should roll.
My own doubts emerged more than a year ago, when a very senior CIA man told me that, contrary to the line his own colleagues were assiduously disseminating, there was evidence of an Iraq-al Qaeda link.
He confirmed a story I had been told by members of the anti-Saddam Iraqi National Congress - that two of the hijackers, Marwan Al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah, had met Mukhabarat officers in the months before 9/11 in the United Arab Emirates.
This, he said, was part of a pattern of contact between Iraq and al Qaeda which went back years.
Yet the attempts to refute the link were feverish. The best known example is the strange case of the meetings in Prague between Mohamed Atta, the 9/11 plot's alleged leader, and Khalil Al-Ani, a Mukhabarat sabotage expert.
For at least the third time, The New York Times tried at the end of October to rebut the claim that the Prague meetings ever happened, reporting that the Czech President Vaclav Havel had phoned the White House to tell Bush that it was fiction.
Barely had the paper hit the streets before Havel's spokesman stated publicly that the story was a "fabrication".
Not only had Havel not phoned Bush, the Czechs remained convinced that Atta did meet Al-Ani. They had been tracking him continuously because his predecessor had been caught red-handed - in a plot to detonate a terrorist bomb.
As I reveal in Vanity Fair, earlier this year the Pentagon established a special intelligence unit to re-examine evidence of an Iraq-al Qaeda relationship. After initially fighting the proposal, the CIA agreed to supply this unit with copies of its own reports going back 10 years. I have spoken to three senior officials who have seen its conclusions, which are striking.
"In the Cold War," says one of them, "often you'd draw firm conclusions and make policy on the basis of just four or five reports. Here there are almost 100 separate examples of Iraq-al Qaeda co-operation going back to 1992."
All these reports, says the official, were given the CIA's highest credibility rating - defined as information from a source which had proven reliable in the past.
At least one concerns Bin Laden personally, who is said to have spent weeks with a top Mukhabarat officer in Afghanistan in 1998.
THIS week, attention remains focused on the UN weapons inspectors, and the deadline for Iraq's declaration of any weapons of mass destruction. But the recent Security Council resolution also noted Iraq's failure to abandon support for international terror, as it had promised at the end of the 1991 Gulf War. If there were the political will - rather a big if, admittedly - this could constitute a casus belli every bit as legitimate as Iraqi possession of a nuclear weapon.
Ignoring Iraq's support for terror is a seductive proposition, which fits pleasingly with democracies' natural reluctance to wage war. But if we are serious about winning the war on terror, self-delusion is not an option.
An attempt to achieve regime change in Iraq would not be a distraction, but an integral part of the struggle.
David Rose is a contributing editor to Vanity Fair magazine. His article on Saddam, al Qaeda and the Iraqis appears in the current issue.
Awareness of this failure, and its possible consequences for individuals' careers, are the only reasons I can find for the wall of spin which the spooks have fed to the media almost ever since.For those with an interest in protecting reputations of those previously in power, this explanation works. But it doesn't explain why those without that interest would go along. David Rose should consider this exchange reported in Woodward's Bush at War, p. 167 (citation from FR poster, The Great Satan):
"I'm not going to talk about a state sponsor [of anthrax letters]," Tenet assured them."It's good that we don't," said Cheney, "because we're not ready to do anything about it."
"It's good that we don't," said Cheney, "because we're not ready to do anything about it."
Thanks for bringing this to our attention. This makes sense. But of course, the press will tar Bush as being soft on terrorrism.
I can't imagine that the military buildup would be continuing apace without such certainty; and it's easy for me to imagine that a Saddam without hope would destroy himself, his country, and as many other people as he could touch with his suicidal swan-song.
Allowing for the positioning of the military while Saddam wonders if he can yet again delay his inevitable downfall, the public uncertainty serves the purposes of the good guys. I think that when all is ready, the naked truth will be made known to a doubting Western public.
What would be shocking to me is if Saddam and Al Qaeda were not cooperating.
Not for commercial use. Solely to be used for the educational purposes of research and open discussion.
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Bio-Terrorism.Info EXPANDED REPORTING; Pg. 4 January 13, 2003
"This contract builds on our preclinical data showing that CpG oligos protect mice against a broad range of pathogens, including anthrax, as well as our human clinical data showing enhancement of the Engerix-B Hepatitis B vaccine when combined with our immunostimulatory oligos," said Robert L. Bratzler, PhD, Coley president and CEO. "The DARPA contract and other development agreements with our partners, including Aventis and GlaxoSmithKline, give Coley the opportunity to realize the full potential of its immunostimulatory oligos to prevent or treat a broad range of diseases." The current anthrax vaccine requires six doses and 18 months to produce immunity. Coley's CpG oligos, used together with vaccines, have the potential to reduce the number of vaccine doses, induce protective antibody levels more quickly, produce higher affinity antibodies directed against a broader range of anthrax antigens, and to improve duration of protection. This research at Coley stems from a grant awarded in 1999 to Arthur Krieg, MD, then a professor of Internal Medicine at the University of Iowa, a Coley founder and currently the company's Chief Scientific Officer. Commenting on this new contract, Krieg said, "I am delighted that our progress since we began this program in 1999 has been so rapid, and that DARPA has selected this program to transition from the preclinical phase to the clinical phase as a high priority."
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Coley has specifically optimized CpG 10103, a B Class oligo for vaccine applications. CpG 10103, acting through the TLR9 receptor present in B-cells and plasmacytoid dendritic cells, potently stimulates human B-cell proliferation, enhances antigen-specific antibody production and induces Interferon-alpha production, Interleukin-10 secretion, and Natural Killer Cell (NK cell) activity. These broad immunostimulatory actions are required to improve the immune response to vaccines.
The approved dosing of Engerix-B requires three vaccinations over 6 months but fails to induce protective antibody levels in 5-10% of normal healthy individuals. In a clinical study conducted by Coley in normal healthy volunteers, individuals given the Engerix-B vaccine (without CpG 7909) rarely had any detectable antibody response within 2 weeks of the first vaccine dose, but almost 60% of subjects given the vaccine together with CpG 7909 had protective antibody levels within just 2 weeks of the first dose, and 100% of subjects receiving CpG 7909 did within 6 weeks. This article was prepared by Bio-Terrorism.Info editors from staff and other reports. http://www.NewsRx.net |
Perhaps people don't want to consider the fact that Bush Sr. sparked Saddam's enmity by stumbling into a war that could have been averted. Saddam was a de facto ally prior to 1990. Since 1991, he has been a great source of mischief and death for Americans.
And you can thank Bush Sr. for that.
Think back. Saddam attacked Iran in 1980 and siezed some of the oil refineries right across the border. He --thought-- the Iranians, racked by revolution, were an easy target. He was wrong. Eight years and as many as 500,000 KIA later, the war ended.
Remember this: The Reagan administration supported BOTH sides in this war. We gave Iraq satelite intelligence at least, and we, as is known, provided Iran with TOW anti-tank missiles, helicopter parts and other aid. Now, while we were helping Iraq fight off their their deadly and militant enemy, was Saddam attacking U.S. targets? I don't remember that, do you? The war ended in 1988 in a stalemate. Do you recall any attacks on U.S. interests by Iraq in 1988, 89 or 1990? I don't.
Walt
That is my wish too, but in the back of my mind is the dreadful warning that we must be careful what we hope for.
I can recall an attack on August 2, 1990.
Could the reason for this be that he did not have the resources available to cause mischief? After all he had just fought a very resource/manpower intensive 8 year war.
Sometimes one just has to finish their thought processes to find the answers.
Ashton, et al. v. al Qaeda, et al.: Complaint (PDF) Lawsuit claiming a 9/11 link between Iraq and al Qaeda. Sept. 3, 2002
The file is in slow loading .pdf format, but it is an interesting read.
The US should publicly ask/demand the extradition from Iraq of Abdul Rahman Yasin. That would certainly put the WTC bombing and a link to Saddam in the minds of the public.
I just read the other day that there is now a Koran written in Saddam's blood (donated over a period of years). I think he may be trying to find allies. I think people on FR don't want to find fault with the Bushes.
Walt
Could the reason for this be that he did not have the resources available to cause mischief? After all he had just fought a very resource/manpower intensive 8 year war.
Sometimes one just has to finish their thought processes to find the answers.
I don't think your thought process is quite complete.
Saddam was our de facto ally from 1980-1990. In 1993, he is trying to kill the president that humiliated him.
Was his military stronger in 1993 than 1989? No. There's more to it than you would allow.
Walt
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