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Limbaugh to White House: What About Salman Pak?
Newsmax.com ^ | 8 30 2002 | Carl Limbacher

Posted on 08/31/2002 3:07:33 AM PDT by ovrtaxt

Friday Aug. 30, 2002; 11:16 p.m. EDT Limbaugh to White House: What About Salman Pak?

Is the Bush administration using all the ammunition at its disposal to convince the American people that war with Iraq is imperative?

Not according to conservative media giant Rush Limbaugh, who chastised the White House Thursday for not spotlighting the issue of Salman Pak, the hijacking school run by Saddam Hussein just south of Baghdad where the 9-11 hijackers likely trained to attack America.

"It's unbelievable that somehow this story remains sequestered," Limbaugh told his 20 million listeners. "I read this story last night and I was amazed."

"There is something called the Republican National Committee and there is the administration," the number one talk host complained. "And look, if I could find this on the Internet, I'm sure the web surfers in the basement of the White House or the Old Executive Office Building could find it too."

Limbaugh proceeded to read at length from a Nov. 11 report in London's Observer newspaper - one of the most respected broadsheets in Great Britain - detailing the accounts of two Salman Pak defectors along with corroborating testimony from a former UN weapons inspector.

Though the Observer's bombshell report has been largely ignored by both the press and the White House in recent months, the similarity between what transpired over the skies of New York and Washington, D.C. on Sept. 11 and the drills at Saddam Hussein's hijacking school offers clear evidence of Iraq's involvement in Osama bin Laden's attacks on America.

The facts uncovered by the Observer have yet to be refuted by any subsequent media investigation. And should they be invoked by the Bush White House, the story could form the basis for a solid argument that attacking Iraq isn't merely a preemptive strike to keep Saddam from getting the bomb, but instead direct retribution against the lone head of state who both financed and helped plan the worst attack on the United States in its history.

NewsMax.com first reviewed the Salman Pak story nearly three weeks ago in a report headlined: "Salman Pak: Iraq's Smoking Gun Link to 9-11."

Some excerpts:

With all the talk about how little evidence the Bush administration has tying Saddam Hussein to the 9-11 attacks, we're more than a little surprised at how quickly reporters, not to mention the White House, seem to have forgotten about Salman Pak.

That's the name of the Iraqi training camp located south of Baghdad where, according to the accounts of at least two Iraqi defectors quoted in the New York Times last November, terrorists from around the world rehearsed airline hijackings aboard a parked Boeing 707 that bore an eerie resemblance to what transpired on 9-11.

"We could see them train around the fuselage," one of the defectors, a five-year veteran of the camp, told the paper. "We could see them practice taking over the plane."

And that's not all.

A few days before the Times report, the London Observer revealed that one of the defectors, a colonel with the Iraqi intelligence service Mukhabarat, had drawn an even more direct link to 9-11.

The former Iraqi agent, codenamed Zeinab, told the paper that one of the highlights of Salman Pak's six-month curriculum was training to hijack aircraft using only knives or bare hands. Like the Sept. 11 hijackers, the students worked in groups of four or five, he explained.

Zeinab's story has since been corroborated by Charles Duelfer, the former vice chairman of Unscom, the U.N. weapons inspection team, who actually visited the Salman Pak camp several times.

"He saw the 707, in exactly the place described by the defectors," the Observer reported. "The Iraqis, he said, told Unscom it was used by police for counterterrorist training."

"Of course we automatically took out the word 'counter'," Duelfer explained. "I'm surprised that people seem to be shocked that there should be terror camps in Iraq. Like, derrrrrr! I mean, what, actually, do you expect?"

Unlike the other parts of Salman Pak, Zeinab told the Observer that there was a foreigners' camp that was controlled directly by Saddam Hussein.

"It was a nightmare! A very strange experience," the Iraqi agent said. "These guys would stop and insist on praying to Allah five times a day when we had training to do. The instructors wouldn't get home till late at night, just because of all this praying."

A second defector said that conversations with the hijacker-trainees made it clear they came from a variety of countries, including Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Algeria, Egypt and Morocco.

"We were training these people to attack installations important to the United States," he added chillingly. "The Gulf War never ended for Saddam Hussein. He is at war with the United States. We were repeatedly told this."

Though the Bush administration has been largely silent about Salman Pak, former CIA Director James Woolsey is apparently convinced it was used to rehearse Sept. 11-style hijackings.

In late November he told Fox News Channel's Laurie Dhue:

"We know that at Salman Pak, on the southern edge of Baghdad, five different eyewitnesses - three Iraqi defectors and two American U.N. inspectors - have said - and now there are aerial photographs to show it - a Boeing 707 that was used for training of hijackers, including non-Iraqi hijackers trained very secretly to take over airplanes with knives."

Another intriguing coincidence: Salman Pak's hijacking school reportedly opened for business in 1995, the same year al-Qaeda agents in the Philippines hatched a plot to hijack 12 airliners and slam some of them into U.S. landmarks. (End of NewsMax excerpt)

Despite the compelling case of Salman Pak, the shockingly flat-footed Bush public relations team remains mum on the most potent justification for hitting back at Baghdad.

No wonder support for Bush's Iraq attack has dropped to just 51 percent in the latest Gallup poll.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: alqaeda; iraq; rush; salmanpak
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To: ovrtaxt
I guess my question is, why do we assume that the White House doesn't know about this school, and isn't informing others who need to be in the know of it's existense? Sure the Dims are saying that a case needs to be made against Iraq. Why? Well if you believe the polls, it's to cast doubt in the minds of the American people, and it's to undermine the President. They are trying to have it both ways, and they're succeeding to a small extent- for now. One recent poll suggested that 43% of Americans approve, and 43% appose an attack on Iraq before the end of the year.

I personally believe that the White House knows just a little bit more than Rush and/or Newsmax, and that they do actually inform the people who need to know when the time is necessary.

I trust that President Bush is jumping at the chance to remove Hussein from power, if not for the simple fact that, as someone posted, he tried to have his father killed. That'd do it for me. But as we all have learned so well, timing is everything. Patience.
21 posted on 08/31/2002 8:04:18 AM PDT by admiralsn
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To: admiralsn
Ofcourse the white house knows about Salman Park, they also know that it is used by the Iraqi secret police, they are also bright enough to know that if they tell the world it is used for training terrorists when they know it isn't, it will only hurt their credibility and case for war on Iraq.
22 posted on 08/31/2002 8:07:48 AM PDT by ContentiousObjector
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To: ContentiousObjector
OK. Just out of curiosity, from where does your knowledge of this information come? I'm not being sarcastic, I really am curious.
23 posted on 08/31/2002 8:10:43 AM PDT by admiralsn
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To: admiralsn
It is very well documented, both British Inteligence and the UN Weapons Inspectors in addition to the Israeli's also say it is used by the Iraqi Police.
24 posted on 08/31/2002 8:14:07 AM PDT by ContentiousObjector
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To: ovrtaxt
Patience!
25 posted on 08/31/2002 8:19:05 AM PDT by bert
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To: ovrtaxt; ntrulock; Gary Aldrich; carenot; honway; Jim Robinson; glorygirl; B4Ranch; lawdog; ...
Thanks ovrtaxt for posting this.

The US has got to do something sooner rather than later about Iraq supplying WMD and terror training to ALQaeda, Taliban, Islamic Jihad,Hamas,Etc.

FACT: Sadam Hussein obtained a biological agent in the US via Ishan BArbouti in the late 1980s for poisoning US water supplies. A number of ALqaeda types have been arrested in the US (July 2002) and ME types from Florida have been observed (OKC, Aug 2002) preparing for strikes against municipal water supplies. Our innocents, women and children are at great risk from Sadam giving his chemical and biological poisons to Alqaeda types and training them how to use them in the US.

Bush's speech on Septmeber 11 2002 should be pivotal. Bill Krystol(sp?) of the Weekly Standard is predicting on Fox News, that Bush will take the gloves off and make the case in a series of speches in September. Cheney made four strong speches in August for doing someting about Iarq. Now it will be Bush's turn to turn up the heat, release evidence and make compelling arguments , and the final decsion to stop Sadam Hussein and Iraq.

We should all pray that Bush does the right thing, the right way and soon for the country. Calls to the WHite House and prayers in churches will help on this decision. Gods' will be done. We must pray for God's wisdom. We must turn to God in a time like this (really at all times).

I ask God in the name of His Son Jesus CHrist to save our country and to give our leaders divine wisdom to do God's will.

26 posted on 08/31/2002 8:27:08 AM PDT by OKCSubmariner
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To: ContentiousObjector
Well then, if you say so (I haven't seen the evidence myself) then this is another reason. Or the reason. But the President does know.
27 posted on 08/31/2002 8:29:11 AM PDT by admiralsn
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To: ovrtaxt
I have another news flash for the Bush Administration:

Iraq is responsible for the anthrax mailings.

28 posted on 08/31/2002 8:32:00 AM PDT by honway
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To: admiralsn
The US isn't going to attack the Iraqi police because THEY KILL TERRORISTS IN LARGE NUMBERS.

The same terrorists who hate America and Israel, Also hate Saddam.

But saddam doesn't have the western sensibilities we do

29 posted on 08/31/2002 8:32:29 AM PDT by ContentiousObjector
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To: admiralsn
I guess my question is, why do we assume that the White House doesn't know about this school, and isn't informing others who need to be in the know of it's existense?

You don't. You are correct about the Leftists needing proof and chances are Baker, Eagleburger, and Scowcroft tie into the same plan. They are there pushing agenda which Bush realizes is incorrect simply waiting for the right time to publically denounce it and affirm Bush's evaluations.

30 posted on 08/31/2002 8:33:59 AM PDT by Tumbleweed_Connection
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To: honway
The only way you would know that is if you personally gave the Iraqi's the American anthrax
31 posted on 08/31/2002 8:34:10 AM PDT by ContentiousObjector
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To: Ken H; thinden; Lion's Cub
I am not sure, but here's a link to a interesting former FR thread. Basicly, the thread mantains Iraq was connected to the hijackings,

THE VISIBLE HAND: The Iraqi Connection
From the Wall Street Journal Online

Nothing controversial here.
Any ideas why this was pulled?

32 posted on 08/31/2002 8:50:03 AM PDT by honway
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To: Jim Robinson; Ken H
Reviewing the archives it appears more than one thread linking Iraq to the hijackings was pulled. I do not want to violate any Freerepublic policy, if the subject is off limits. Was there any particular reason the threads addressing the Iraqi link to 9-11 were pulled in September 2001?
33 posted on 08/31/2002 9:12:18 AM PDT by honway
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To: All
All the threads I found pulled on the subject of connecting Iraq to the hijacking had one thing in common: They were posted by Spirit of Truth, so my guess is it was not the subject matter, but the poster that was pulled. I would like to know what he did wrong so I don't repeat it.
34 posted on 08/31/2002 9:27:22 AM PDT by honway
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To: OKCSubmariner; mssnoop
Thanks for the "heads up" !!!!

The Republican National Committee (RNC)has its on set of very serious special problems, to be announced in the coming weeks !!!!!!

"There is something called the Republican National Committee and there is the administration," the number one talk host complained. "And look, if I could find this on the Internet, I'm sure the web surfers in the basement of the White House or the Old Executive Office Building could find it too."

35 posted on 08/31/2002 9:33:50 AM PDT by Donald Stone
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To: OKCSubmariner; thinden
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/fr/fr010919_1_n.shtml

Link

19 September 2001
Who did it? Foreign Report presents an alternative view

Israel’s military intelligence service, Aman, suspects that Iraq is the state that sponsored the suicide attacks on the New York Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington. Directing the mission, Aman officers believe, were two of the world’s foremost terrorist masterminds: the Lebanese Imad Mughniyeh, head of the special overseas operations for Hizbullah, and the Egyptian Dr Ayman Al Zawahiri, senior member of Al-Qaeda and possible successor of the ailing Osama Bin Laden.

The two men have not been seen for some time. Mughniyeh is probably the world’s most wanted outlaw. Unconfirmed reports in Beirut say he has undergone plastic surgery and is unrecognisable. Zawahiri is thought to be based in Egypt. He could be Bin Laden’s chief representative outside Afghanistan.

The Iraqis, who for several years paid smaller groups to do their dirty work, were quick to discover the advantages of Al-Qaeda. The Israeli sources claim that for the past two years Iraqi intelligence officers were shuttling between Baghdad and Afghanistan, meeting with Ayman Al Zawahiri. According to the sources, one of the Iraqi intelligence officers, Salah Suleiman, was captured last October by the Pakistanis near the border with Afghanistan. The Iraqis are also reported to have established strong ties with Imad Mughniyeh.

"We’ve only got scraps of information, not the full picture," admits one intelligence source, "but it was good enough for us to send a warning six weeks ago to our allies that an unprecedented massive terror attack was expected. One of our indications suggested that Imad Mughniyeh met with some of his dormant agents on secret trips to Germany. We believe that the operational brains behind the New-York attack were Mughniyeh and Zawahiri, who were probably financed and got some logistical support from the Iraqi Intelligence Service (SSO)."

Mughniyeh was the only one believed to have tried it before. On April 12th 1997, he was reported to be only two hours away from achieving the highest goal of any terrorist organisation (until last week): blowing up an Israeli El-Al airliner above Tel Aviv. A man carrying a forged British passport with the name Andrew Jonathan Neumann was in a Jerusalem hotel preparing a bomb he was supposed to take on board an El-Al flight leaving Israel, when it accidentally went off. Andrew Jonathan Neumann was very badly injured but strong enough to reveal later to the Israelis that he was not British but Lebanese, and that his operation was supposed to be a special "gift" to Israel from Imad Mughniyeh.

‘A psychopath’

"Bin Laden is a schoolboy in comparison with Mughniyeh," says an Israeli who knows Mughniyeh . "The guy is a genius, someone who refined the art of terrorism to its utmost level. We studied him and reached the conclusion that he is a clinical psychopath motivated by uncontrollable psychological reasons, which we have given up trying to understand. The killing of his two brothers by the Americans only inflamed his strong motivation."

Experts on Iraq and Saddam Hussein also believe that Iraq was the state behind the two terror masterminds. "In recent months, there was a change, and Iraq decided to get into the terror business. On July 7th, they tried for the first time to send a suicide bomber, trained in Baghdad, to blow up Tel Aviv airport (Foreign Report No. 2651)."

Our sources believe that it will be very difficult to get to the bottom of this unprecedented terror operation. However, they believe the chief of the Iraqi SSO is Qusai Hussein, the dictator’s son, and his organisation is the most likely to have been involved.

Mughniyeh, 48, is a "sick man", says an intelligence officer who was in charge of his file. He is considered by Western intelligence agencies as the most dangerous active terrorist today. He is wanted by several governments and the Americans have put a $2m reward on his head.

36 posted on 08/31/2002 9:38:00 AM PDT by honway
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To: honway
"We’ve only got scraps of information, not the full picture," admits one intelligence source, "but it was good enough for us to send a warning six weeks ago to our allies that an unprecedented massive terror attack was expected

The warning was sent out prior to 9-11, yet the FBI Headquarters denied the Minneapolis field office request to look at Moussaoui's computer, even after Moussaoui had been connected to Al Qaeda by French Intelligence.

37 posted on 08/31/2002 9:42:00 AM PDT by honway
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To: ContentiousObjector
The America people as a whole are stupid, they will believe ANYTHING the government tells them, but the rest of the world isn't buying the Iraq terroism story.

That's how the Empire was created, and how it continues to grow. People simply believe what they are told. The media offers no alternative view (in spite of lack of enthusiasm for the "war" in some portions of the media), because they are too lazy to check facts or research anything.

Frankly, this story reminds me of the "baby incubator" story after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Oh, my, how people fell for that whopper. But they never learn: fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. But then, people want to be fooled.

The fact is that secular arab regimes like those in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Algeria, etc., are among the best things possible for US interests, as these regimes HATE moslem fundamentalists and do everything in their power to destroy them. This Iraq-Al Qaeda link is sheer fantasy, cooked up by those who want us to invade Iraq for reasons and purposes they do not want to talk about. Suffice to say, this is not in the best interests of the USA, but is, rather, in the best interests of an entirely different country.

38 posted on 08/31/2002 10:00:24 AM PDT by Vast Buffalo Wing Conspiracy
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To: ovrtaxt; Ken H; OKCSubmariner; thinden; Fred Mertz; Lion's Cub
http://209.157.64.200/focus/news/552346/posts

Link

The country's biological weapons programme is believed to have started in 1974 at Salman Pak in the al-Hazan Ibn al-Hathem Institute, where Dr Taha arrived in 1980.

Five years later, Salman Pak was taken over by the Technical Research Centre and, in 1987, Dr Taha moved her team into the new al-Hakem facility at Salman Pak, where construction of facilities for production of anthrax began, among other agents.

At the time of the Gulf war, Iraq later acknowledged the large-scale production of anthrax spores and to have filled 50 bombs and five missile warheads with anthrax.

However, even in its "full, final and complete declaration" regarding its BW programme, submitted in September 1997, Baghdad continued to present the UN weapons inspectors with a false picture.

Iraq approached Porton Down in Britain for the Ames strain of the anthrax bacterium, said Dr Spertzel. "That [request] was fortunately denied," he said.

Iraq obtained much of its anthrax supply from the American Type Culture Collection. Between 1985 and 1989, it obtained at least 21 strains of anthrax from ATCC and about 15 other class III pathogens, the bacteria that pose an extreme risk to human health.

One strain had a British military pedigree and three of the other strains were listed as coming from the American military's biological warfare programme.

39 posted on 08/31/2002 10:01:25 AM PDT by honway
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To: ovrtaxt; Ken H; OKCSubmariner; thinden; Fred Mertz; Lion's Cub; lawdog
It appears the reason that only Rush Limbaugh is linking the hijackers to Salman Pak is because Salman Pak was the center of the Iraqi biological warfare program, including the anthrax program.

Since the U.S. citizen, Dr.Hatfill, is the primary FBI "person of interest" in the antrax mailings, if the Bush Administration went forward with the claim that the hijackers trained at the facility where Saddam developed his anthrax program, some people may suspect Saddam is responsible for the anthrax attack.

40 posted on 08/31/2002 10:09:30 AM PDT by honway
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