Posted on 01/06/2006 3:22:52 PM PST by Para-Ord.45
THE FORMER IRAQI REGIME OF Saddam Hussein trained thousands of radical Islamic terrorists from the region at camps in Iraq over the four years immediately preceding the U.S. invasion, according to documents and photographs recovered by the U.S. military in postwar Iraq. The existence and character of these documents has been confirmed to THE WEEKLY STANDARD by eleven U.S. government officials.
The secret training took place primarily at three camps--in Samarra, Ramadi, and Salman Pak--and was directed by elite Iraqi military units. Interviews by U.S. government interrogators with Iraqi regime officials and military leaders corroborate the documentary evidence. Many of the fighters were drawn from terrorist groups in northern Africa with close ties to al Qaeda, chief among them Algeria's GSPC and the Sudanese Islamic Army. Some 2,000 terrorists were trained at these Iraqi camps each year from 1999 to 2002, putting the total number at or above 8,000. Intelligence officials believe that some of these terrorists returned to Iraq and are responsible for attacks against Americans and Iraqis. According to three officials with knowledge of the intelligence on Iraqi training camps, White House and National Security Council officials were briefed on these findings in May 2005; senior Defense Department officials subsequently received the same briefing.
(Excerpt) Read more at weeklystandard.com ...
"Many of the fighters were drawn from terrorist groups in northern Africa with close ties to al Qaeda, "
But,but..didn't the 911 Commission determine there were no ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq??
Overall, this article is great news but it won't sway the Cindy She-Mans of the world.
"Other officials familiar with the captured documents were less cautious. "As much as we overestimated WMD, it appears we underestimated [Saddam Hussein's] support for transregional terrorists," says one intelligence official.
Speaking of Ansar al Islam, the al Qaeda-linked terrorist group that operated in northern Iraq, the former high-ranking military intelligence officer says: "There is no question about the fact that AI had reach into Baghdad. There was an intelligence connection between that group and the regime, a financial connection between that group and the regime, and there was an equipment connection. It may have been the case that the IIS [Iraqi Intelligence Service] support for AI was meant to operate against the [anti-Saddam] Kurds. But there is no question IIS was supporting AI."
Hard to believe that the Weekly Standard is the only rag that has seen these documents... if they exist...
This appears to be a major story. Shouldn't this be breaking news? I won't hold my breath waiting for the evening news to report it.
That's because Cindy-Lou (who?) shares the same trait that other liberal have: Minds of Concrete! (Throughly mixed and permanently set)
"...transregional terrorists..."
Great. Just what we need. Yet another "Special Interest" group for the left to embrace. *Rolleyes*
Great news, but it will sadly be ignored far and wide, across the land.
The sheer volume of documents they had in one warehouse alone was overwhelming. Considering how difficult it is even for native speakers to read, translate, and transcribe, 50,000 documents doesn't seem all that bad.
And, fwiw, there were classrooms near Ramadi where offensive use of chemical weapon was in the training materials.
I believe they said there were no operational ties. Talk about splitting hairs!
Besides this Saddam was a good overall guy though, even Ramsey Clark says so.
/s/
Other officials familiar with the captured documents were less cautious. "As much as we overestimated WMD, it appears we underestimated [Saddam Hussein's] support for transregional terrorists," says one intelligence official.
I think in all fairness that what they say is there is no link between Iraq and 9-11.
But you say tomato and I say.........
I still hate libocrats
Stephen Hayes has done a heroic effort in getting out the truth about Saddam's connections to Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups while Democrats and their media lapdogs keep defending Saddam and claiming he was a little angel guilty of no wrong doing against America. Everyone should read Hayes' outstanding book "The Connection: How Saddam's Connections to Al Qaeda Endangered America." Great read. Thank you Mr. Hayes for working against the agendized media and getting the truth out about Saddam and terrorism.
Oh I mispoke. I should also have stated "Bush has no exit strategy" as an important component of the Demonrat mantra..
For your records!
They're prolly the only "rag" to bother looking.
The author, Stephen Hayes, is one of the best. The Weekly Standard is NOT a rag.
I'm sure the mainstream media will be all over this story.
Mr. Hayes deserves a medal (for sticking with this story) at least as much as Tenet did.
Rush, Hannity, Snow, et al should be talking about this in the coming days...
It won't change the mind of the most commited 'rats, but setting the record straight is the right thing to do regardless.
Interesting that these briefings never made it down to the Senate or House Intelligence Committees.
Hayes and Claudia Rossett (sp.?), who's been on top of the Oil for Food debacle, both deserve medals.
Do you know who are the editors of the Weekly Standard?
Not liars.
Soler claimed to be working on a similar project about Afghanistan. He said he intends to include film clips proving Saddam's support for bin Laden in the Afghan film.
If a young director could capture this type of incriminating evidence on his own -- I simply do not understand why this information is not public knowledge today. The CIA should have been all over this material.
The CIA is FAR too busy UNDERMINING The Administration.
The Lamestream media won't touch it with a ten foot pole because it blows there premise out of the water.
They are oil-grubbing Neocons, pawns in the Zionist conspiracy ... or something. ;)
The Sudanese trained in Iraq are probably among those now committing the genocide in the Dafur region of Sudan; where Muslim "tribes" are destroying the villages (and villagers) of the non-Muslim "African" tribes in Dafur.
Hopefully the administration will start talking about what they've found.
Evidence of 8000 terrorists trained in Iraq?
Yeah, I would say this is pretty important to SCREAM to the world.
We need the videos to slam this home.
Hopefully it will all come soon.
Democrats are deeply saddened.
Msm will try to bury.
Yes the 9-11 Commission did say no ties, well except on pages 125, 134 of the report where it is clear the Iraqis were in the Sudan making WMD's for Al quaeda.
if they exist?????
"Tensions in Darfur have simmered since the 1970s, when drought and competition over scarce resources sparked clashes between largely nomadic cattle and camel herders, who view themselves as Arabs, and the more sedentary farmers, who see their ancestry as African. Both groups are Muslim."
That's not the first story about Darfur being Islamic Arab versus Islamic African.
Well, we get plenty of BS about the Bush Administration with absolutely no evidence whatsoever.
There seem to be some serious allergies with regard to any information that might support the Iraq war.
20 years from now EVERYONE will have been a Terror Warrior in 2006, much as everyone who hindered our fight against the USSR later transformed themselves into longtime Cold Warriors.
In case you missed it, Mark Levin read from this Hayes piece on tonight's show.
Betcha no MSM reports this... bastardes. :(
I have heard from numerous and sundry leftist ignorami over and over again that "...there is not one scintilla of evidence that Saddam had anything to do with terrorism and 9/11." Well, you have to agree he is right, not one but 50,000 scintillas unearthed, so far. Did Saddam have anything to do with 9/11? Hey, leftist-freedom and American hating radical, wanna bet your life on that? 2 million documents to go!
These are worthless confessions. Put panties on their heads, they're liable to say anything.
bookmark
bttt
Yes, I suspect the media will try (very hard) to bury this story. Let's hope bloggers and some journalists on Fox, etc., can put this out there for the public to see.
The President needs to mention in some of his speeches--maybe it could be worked into the State of the Union speech?
You are correct that "farmers", who are mostly non-Arab, consider themselves Muslim, my error.
And you are correct that the situation in Darfur is not new.
What is new in the past five years, is oil in the Darfur region (and oils higher world market price) has brought in tons of foreign capital and technology into Darfur (mostly communist Chinese) and it appears that the government in Sudan has exploited the old rivalries in the area by directly arming and aiding the "Arab" tribes as their proxy militias to clear the "rebelious" farmers out of the oil rich region.
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