What a total crock of shit
Key word is "operational".
Should be "strategical" or "financial" or maybe just plain ol' "supportive" link.
prisoner6
“There’s no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat... Yes, he has chemical and biological weapons. He’s had those for a long time. — Wesley Clark on September 26, 2002
“Hussein has chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies.” - Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999
“If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction program.” - Bill Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998
“Saddam’s goal ... is to achieve the lifting of U.N. sanctions while retaining and enhancing Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction programs. We cannot, we must not and we will not let him succeed.” — Madeline Albright, 1998
“He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten time since 1983.” - Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb 18, 1998
Yeah, right. Saddam’s awarding of $25K checks to the families of suicide bombers who blew themselves up on Israeli busses never happened.
Bull.
We know Sadaam and many Al Queda presently share an “operational link” in hell, which is eaxactly where they belong.
A possible link between Saddam and Eliot Spitzer?
Who ever said there was an operational link between the two?!
No one has ever suggested or implied such a thing. Guess they tore that straw man to pieces!
Of course, they haven’t disproven the fact that al Qaeda did have at least one training camp in Iraq, that Zarqawi lived in Iraq, or that Saddam was paying suicide bombers.
I do not believe the administration ever claimed a specific Saddam/ Al Queda operation. They spoke of the danger of regimes like Saddam’s someday transferring the world’s most dangerous weapons to the world’s worst terror groups. This was based on a common hostility toward the United States.
Thought you might be interested in how they still deny any connection. Their keyword here might be "operational" though.
bump
What about links between Uday and AQ? The drive-by media are Clintonesque in their deception.
Shortly before the invasion, there was a lot of talk about Ansar-al-Islam and Zarqawi possessing RICIN.
Hmmmmm...is ricin a WMD or not? Does it depend on the definition of ‘is’?
‘direct operational link’
they are erroneously looking for a ‘smoking gun’ of a meeting where saddam, via interlocuters. engaged in command decisions with osama - as if saddam and osama were dumb enough to engage in their common interests - antipathy to the u.s. on the level of obsession - in such a direct manner and leaving a direct record as such - yea, right
one only need ask what level of co-operation with al queda was involved in an iraqi intelligence operative attending the last meeting of the 9/11 plotters in kuala lampur maylasia; an iraqi intelligence operative given his ‘job’ in maylasia - driver - by a ‘iraqi citizen’ living in maylasia; a job that finds him meeting one of the 9/11 plotters at the kuala lampur airport, driving him to the meeting, going into the meeting with him, returning him to the airport the same day and within days leaving maylasia for good himself, never to be located again by western intelligence
apparently, whatever cooperation was happening between saddam and al queda it was too sophisticated for our failed intelligence service to call it ‘direct’ or ‘operational’
http://www.meib.org/articles/0106_ir1.htm
Iraqi Complicity in the World Trade Center Bombing and Beyond
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1698239/posts
World Trade Center, 1993 Terrorist Attack (don't say it too loudly - Yousef had IRAQI passport)
http://www.fas.org/irp/world/iraq/956-tni.htm
THE WORLD TRADE CENTER BOMB:
Who is Ramzi Yousef? And Why It Matters
Hmmm, there seems to be enough Iraqi/WTC connections for me!
The weasel word is “operational”. If you can’t show a direct written command, if you can’t show an organization chart showing boxes and lines connecting Bin Ladin and Saddam, then there is no direct “operational” connection.
I know this is difficult for some people to understand, but this is why its called “espionage”. They know Saddam’s spooks met with Bin Ladin’s people several times over the years, the final meeting between an Iraqi agent and the 911 attackers taking place right before the attack.
That Uday knew about 911 before it happened.
That Iraqis were key players in the first World Trade Center attack.
That Saddam launched an assassination attempt against Bush senior. That Saddam’s people met with Bin Ladin himself in Sudan, and in Afghanistan, that there are memos translated indicating that Bin Ladin had been invited to Baghdad, that Saddam was training foreign civilian terrorists, and that when we went into Afghanistan, Bin Ladin was offered refuge in Iraq. Zarqawi accepted the offer.
We know that Saddam had connections to Philippine terrorism, as did Bin Ladin.
To say that there is no connection is clearly wrong, so they raise the bar, challenging us to find an org chart. Sorry, it doesn’t work that way. Only CIA would be so lame as to produce an org chart and then leak it to the New York Times. Tradecraft is a little tighter in most services.
Oh, please. If even Shi’ah & Sunnah can get it together to commit some terrorist acts, surely it’s not a stretch for al-Qaeda to work with Ba’athists.
wstrobel@mcclatchydc.com
Let this liar know the truth.