Posted on 03/28/2004 6:10:42 AM PST by truthandlife
Why did the Bush administration immediately suspect that Iraq was behind the 9/11 attacks when there was no evidence of any connection, as Richard Clarke and other Bush critics maintain?
Maybe it was because there was indeed evidence, very dramatic evidence, in fact - in the form of warnings in the state-run Iraqi press that such an attack was coming, along with praise for Osama bin Laden and his kamikaze hijackers in the days after the World Trade Center was destroyed.
Less than two months before 9/11, the state-controlled Iraqi newspaper "Al-Nasiriya" carried a column headlined, "America, An Obsession Called Osama Bin Ladin." [July 21, 2001] In the piece, Baath Party writer Naeem Abd Muhalhal predicted that bin Laden would attack the U.S. "with the seriousness of the Bedouin of the desert about the way he will try to bomb the Pentagon after he destroys the White House."
The same state-approved column also insisted that bin Laden "will strike America on the arm that is already hurting," and that the U.S. "will curse the memory of Frank Sinatra every time he hears his songs" - an apparent reference to the Sinatra classic, "New York, New York." [Two 9/11 families were awarded over $100 million last May by U.S. District Court Judge Harold Baer based on this and other evidence that Iraq was involved in 9/11]
Saddam's threats of a 9/11-style attack before 9/11 weren't limited to that single report. In 1992, his son Uday used an editorial in Babil, the newspaper he ran, to warn of Iraqi kamikaze attacks inside America, saying, "Does the United States realize the meaning of every Iraqi becoming a missile that can cross countries and cities?"
Then in the late 1990s, according to UPI, "a cable to Saddam from the chief of Iraqi intelligence was transmitted by Baghdad Radio. The message read, 'We will chase [Americans] to every corner at all times. No high tower of steel will protect them against the fire of truth.'"
Coincidence? Perhaps.
But after the 9/11 attacks, Saddam became the only world leader to offer praise for bin Laden, even as other terrorist leaders, like Yassir Arafat, went out of their way to make a show of sympathy to the U.S. by donating blood to 9/11 victims on camera.
The day after the attacks, in quotes picked up by Agence France Press, Saddam proclaimed that "America is reaping the thorns planted by its rulers in the world."
"There is hardly a place (in the world) that does not have a memorial symbolizing the criminal actions committed by America against its natives," AFP quoted the Iraqi dictator complaining, based on reports in the Iraqi News agency.
After excoriating the U.S. for ending World War II by using nuclear weapons, and for its involvement in Vietnam, Saddam gloated, "[He] who does not want to reap evil must not sow it, and [he] who considers the lives of his people precious must remember that the lives of the people in the world are precious also."
"The American peoples should remember that no one ever crossed the Atlantic carrying weapons to be used against them. They are the ones who crossed the Atlantic carrying death, destruction and ugly exploitation to the whole world."
A day later Saddam told visiting Tunisian Foreign Minister Habib ben Yahya, "America brought the hatred of the world upon itself."
For his part Uday flat-out praised the 9/11 attacks, saying, "These were courageous operations carried out by young Arabs and Muslims," according to quotes picked up by the Saudi daily Asharq al-Awsat.
As Richard Clarke and his fans in the Democrat-media complex report in ominous tones that President Bush ordered him to launch an unwarranted investigation into the 9/11-Iraq connection, it's worth remembering how much Iraq had done justify that order.
Clarke is an egomaniacal liar. The Dems backed a loser again.
Ahmed Shah Masood was aware of 9/11 attacks’ plan: CNN
Date: 2003-11-07 Posted By: Dan Sale
Topics: Ahmad Shah Masood : World Trade Center Attack : Afghanistan
Slain Afghan leader Ahmed Shah Masood had some reports of 9/11 attacks and he wanted to inform the west about it, a US TV channel, CNN reported. According to the Pentagon’s Defence Intelligence Agency, assassinated Afghan opposition leader Ahmed Shah Masood had "limited knowledge" of a planned attack against the United States and was warning the West of the threat.
Region: Americas Read It At: PakTribune (Mirrored Copy)
http://www.intellnet.org/news/2003/11/07/21477-1.html?PHPSESSID=5e8ac4cb58ca2c826edb0129ebeebc88
Ahmed Shah Masood was aware of 9/11 attacks’ plan: CNN
Friday November 07, 2003 (1515 PST)
ATLANTA, November 08 (Online): Slain Afghan leader Ahmed Shah Masood had some reports of 9/11 attacks and he wanted to inform the west about it, a US TV channel, CNN reported. According to the Pentagon’s Defence Intelligence Agency, assassinated Afghan opposition leader Ahmed Shah Masood had "limited knowledge" of a planned attack against the United States and was warning the West of the threat.
Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Massoud was slain on September 9, 2001 by hiding a bomb in video camera. Two Tunisian al-Qaeda members impersonated as journalists killed Masood in a suicide attack. A Pentagon report got from the US national security archives said that Ahmed Shah Masood had got some information about the 9/11 attack through secret reports and he wanted to inform the US about it.
The cable, written in November 2001, was obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by the National Security Archive at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. It was based on an interview with a classified source and reads:
"Through Northern Alliance intelligence efforts, the late commander Massoud gained limited knowledge regarding the intentions of the Saudi millionaire, Osama bin Laden and his terrorist Organisation, al-Qaeda, to perform a terrorist act against the U S, on a scale larger than the 1998 bombing of the U S embassies in Kenya and Tanzania."
The heavily edited DIA document does not specify what it meant by "limited knowledge," and the portion that follows the reference is blacked out. It continues by referring to a speech Massoud gave to the European Parliament in April 2001 in which the cable says he "warned the US government" about bin Laden. Massoud was on a diplomatic trip to Europe seeking financial support for his cause from the EU and individual countries.
The DIA report points out that Massoud was not a military threat to al Qaeda, even though his forces were fighting the Taliban for control of Afghanistan.
"Our investigators did look into the matter during their recent travels [to Afghanistan] and spoke to persons who might have some knowledge about the subject," said a spokesman for the independent commission set up by Congress to investigate the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The cable says the two fake journalists, who were killed in the bomb blast, were al Qaeda operatives.
According to an article in Voice of Jihad, an online magazine the Middle East Media Research Institute says is associated with al Qaeda, the terrorist group claimed responsibility for Massoud’s assassination.
The story appeared last week in a translated version of the magazine on the Web site of the Washington-based nonprofit independent institute, which provides translations of Arabic, Farsi and Hebrew media reports and analyses of trends in the region.
The article quoted an interview with a bin Laden bodyguard after word reached bin Laden’s camp of Massoud’s death:
"I remember asking him, ‘What happened?’ And he replied by saying that Sheikh Osama [bin Laden] asked the brothers: ‘Who will take it upon himself to deal with Ahmad [Shah] Massoud for me, because he harmed Allah and his sons?’ A few brothers volunteered to assassinate Massoud and be rewarded by Allah, and you heard the good news."
Several Tunisian men were convicted in Belgium in September of supplying false documents that Massoud’s assassins used to help them travel to Afghanistan.
1776?
1812?
1944?
2001?
The heavily edited DIA document does not specify what it meant by "limited knowledge," and the portion that follows the reference is blacked out. It continues by referring to a speech Massoud gave to the European Parliament in April 2001 in which the cable says he "warned the US government" about bin Laden. Massoud was on a diplomatic trip to Europe seeking financial support for his cause from the EU and individual countries.
Did this document ever cross Clarke's desk?
Report Details Saddam's Support for Terrorists Who Killed Americans
The above link is the FreeRepublic discussion thread.
The actual article is :
"Saddam Hussein’s Philanthropy of Terror"
It is a pdf document with substantial footnotes and put together by Dewey Murdock of the Hudson Institute.
Anyone have more info on this picture of a mural of the 9/11 tragedy that was taken in Iraq?
Bingo!
And this exposes the true scandal at the heart of Richard Clarke's revelations: Richard Clarke's own mind-set. He was ready to dismiss even the POSSIBILITY of Iraqi involvement, a single day after the attacks. He stood there on 9/12/2001 and told the President that because "Al Qaeda did this", looking for Iraqi fingerprints was unwarranted.
This arrogant, closed-minded man was a menace and I'm just glad he's out of public service.
But, they were a RELIGIOUS organization, and Saddam was SECULAR. I've always been told that Saddam therefore HATED Al Qaeda! /sarcasm
Saddam's behavior after 9/11, though, doesn't suggest anything to me. If he'd known, he would have either bragged or tried to hide that he knew.
Appears to have been the latter, doesn't it?
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