TA-ANALYSIS: 9/11 Commission Wants Evidence From Cheney

Just days after President Bush insisted that there were real Ties between Iraq and Al-Qaeda "because there are ties between Iraq and Al-Qaeda". The 9/11 commission seems to be asking for proof. With the failure to date to produce the massive amounts of weapons of mass destruction expected to be found in Iraq, and the basis for war in that nation being set on false or misleading information. The 9/11 commission is now asking the Bush Administration specifically Dick Cheney for evidence to back up the Al-Qaeda Iraq connection. It would seem that some on the panel are not satisfied with just a claim from the current Administration...




At least in this country if you make a claim like this you can be "invited" to back it up with real evidence. Perhaps Cheney can make a convincing case with some evidence. I hope so because in my view if he or the Administration cannot back this claim up with real, hard and convincing evidence it will add even more credibility issues to an already battered Administration over a war that many are saying was started on false or misleading information. Combined with a prison abuse scandal that some believe may have gone all the way up through the chain of command.

This is the first and best chance for the Bush Administration to set the record straight on this matter. Lets hope they can now come through with the "goods".

Related ATSNN News/Discussion:

Bush Insists Ties Between Al-Qaeda and Saddam's Iraq


[edit on 6-20-2004 by Valhall]

Well, the UN now says they have proof that Saddam had WMD......but somehow it seems that the 9/11 commission is either ignoring this or they are playing dumb as to the accusations of the UN, with proof, and the admission from Russia.....

The Cheney request culminates a week in which the commission said it found no evidence of collaboration between Saddam's Iraq and al-Qaida, while the White House stuck by its position that the two had significant links.

I read the commisions preliminary report and wish the media would get their reporting right,

What they said in reference to no connection was in relation to 9/11, not that there was no connection whatsoever.

It could be that the administration wants its opponents and a biased media to go ahead and make fools of themselves awhile longer so that when they bust the bubble "their credibility" will tank. we'll just have to watch and see what transpires

[edit on 20-6-2004 by Phoenix]

The 9/11 panel aren't the only ones to point out the lack of evidence for the Iraq/Al Qaeda connection. Here's just a few others:

�While there have been contacts between Al Qaeda and the regime in the past it is assessed that any fledgling relationship foundered due to mistrust and incompatible ideology.�

- Report from the British Defense Intelligence Staff agency, February 2003.

�The most intensive searching over the last two years has produced no solid evidence of a co-operative relationship between Saddam Hussein�s government and al Qaeda.�

- Carnegie Endowment, January 2004.

�At various times Al Qaeda people came through Baghdad and in some cases resided there� But we simply did not find any evidence of extensive links with Al Qaeda.�

- David Kay, former head of Iraq survey group, June 14 2004.

�There�s absolutely no evidence that that Iraq was supporting al Qaeda, ever.�

- Former counter terrorism official Richard Clarke, March 21, 2004.

There is no evidence because there was no releationship. And Russia saying there was a link doesn't cut it. You can probably get a dozen people to say it. You still have to provide evidence. Where is the evidence that Saddam supplied these guys with tools, money, etc. Where is the paper trail? There has to be some kind of physical evidence.

There were plenty of people that funded Al Qaeda. 9/11 while massive wasn't that complex of an attack. A hand full of guys attended flight school. 19 people bought tickets for 9/11. And they brought the super high tech expensive weapons called box cutters to hijack the jets and using their little flight school training the flew the jets into their targets. It doesn't take a government to sponsor something like this. They have guys lined up around the block that are willing to do this. It really wasn't that complicated of an attack. The most impressive part in my opinion was how they blended in here for so long without neighbors noticing anything. Anyone with spare change could have funded this operation.

So I am to believe that Al Qaeda and its affiliates has/had operations in the following countries that even the democrats and liberals will freely acknowedge,

Afganistan, Cheknya, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philipines, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, United States, Canada, Mexico and 47 other nations.

But out of these 60 nations I am to believe Iraq was the one and only exception where there was no Al Qaeda presence before the invasion. That assertion stretchs the imagination to its outer limits.

Originally posted by Indy
Where is the evidence that Saddam supplied these guys with tools, money, etc. Where is the paper trail? There has to be some kind of physical evidence.
could have funded this operation.

Indy what Putin said was that Saddam and his forces were a terror threat to the US based on Russian intelligence.

Putin did not say Iraq and Al Qaeda were planning an attack together.

Phoenix, there most likely was an Al Qaeda presence in Iraq before the invasion, as there is with all the countries you mentioned and more. The point is there is no evidence that they were there by government invite, or supported by the government of Iraq. On the evidence there is on their relationship it�s as likely that they could have been working against Saddam as with him.

Their mere presence in the country is not enough of a reason to invade Iraq, the same as it wouldn't be for any of the other countries you mentioned. Hard evidence of government complicity is what the Bush admin need if they are going to present it as a reason for focusing on Iraq after 9/11 and the subsequent invasion, and it�s just not there.




[edit on 20-6-2004 by kegs]

Originally posted by Phoenix
So I am to believe that Al Qaeda and its affiliates has/had operations in the following countries that even the democrats and liberals will freely acknowedge,

Afganistan, Cheknya, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philipines, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, United States, Canada, Mexico and 47 other nations.

But out of these 60 nations I am to believe Iraq was the one and only exception where there was no Al Qaeda presence before the invasion. That assertion stretchs the imagination to its outer limits.

Phoenix... Al Qaeda had people in the US as well. Does that mean our government was involved? Simply having people in a country means nothing.

Several times the links between Al Qaeda and Iraq/Irak have been presented, and they can be found in these same forums, so this time I will not present the same information. But what would speak louder than any other evidence are the actions of Saddam himself before, during and after the war.

If Saddam had no relation with terrorist organizations why was it that he promised to give $25,000 to each family of suicide bombers? If providing money to families of suicide bombers is not proof of Saddam wanting to help and having a link with terrorism what is?

" Saddam Hussein now pays $25,000 to families of "successful" suicide bombers. Other Palestinians are compensated by the Iraqi dictator, too. Rawhiyya Ilayyan, mother of seven, said she received $10,000 from Iraq to renovate her home in Rafah refugee camp after her husband was killed last September during fighting in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian officials say Saddam Hussein has provided a total of $5 million in aid to Gaza families that have lost family members as "martyrs" in the intifada.

Excerpted from.
www.worldmag.com...

The below is an excerpt to more proof of the Al qaeda and Saddam/Iraq link.

" * Spanish investigators have uncovered documents seized from Yusuf Galan ? who is charged by a Spanish court with being "directly involved with the preparation and planning" of the Sept. 11 attacks ? that show the terrorist was invited to a party at the Iraqi embassy in Madrid. The invitation used his "al Qaeda nom de guerre."

* An Iraqi defector to Turkey, known by his cover name as "Abu Mohammed," told the Sunday Times of London that he saw bin Laden's fighters in Iraq in 1997. At the time, Mohammed was a colonel in Saddam's Fedayeen. He described an encounter at Salman Pak, the training facility southeast of Baghdad, where militants trained to hijack planes with knives ? on a full-size Boeing 707.

* In 1998, Abbas al-Janabi, a longtime aide to Saddam's son Uday, defected to the West. At the time, he repeatedly told reporters that there was a direct connection between Iraq and al Qaeda. "

Excerpted from.
boards.abcnews.go.com...

A different link with more information. Scroll down to the translated text in english.

www.delfi.ee...


" Sadam yes helped Al-Qaeda
Alberto Acereda
To print page Recomi�ndenos
The increasing manipulation that on the facts around Iraq comes making the anti-american left systematically has its last example in the manipulated information which they have occurred around the report of the National Commission on Terrorist Ataques in the United States, that is, the Commission of the 11-s. Through agencies of information more and more sectarian and directed against Bush and its government (Associated Press, Reuters), the practical totality of also Spanish world-wide mass media?y insisted on which this Commission had discarded the relation of Bin Laden with Sadam Husein.

Excerpted from.
Madrid: Libertad Digital. (Digital Freedom)

This is the original in Spanish.

" Sadam s� ayud� a Al-Qaeda
Alberto Acereda

La creciente manipulaci�n que sobre los hechos en torno a Irak viene realizando sistem�ticamente la izquierda antiamericana tiene su �ltimo ejemplo en las manipuladas informaciones que se han dado en torno al informe de la Comisi�n Nacional sobre los Ataques Terroristas en Estados Unidos, o sea, la Comisi�n del 11-S. A trav�s de unas agencias de informaci�n cada vez m�s sectarias y dirigidas contra Bush y su gobierno (Associated Press, Reuters�), la pr�ctica totalidad de los medios de comunicaci�n mundial �y tambi�n espa�oles- insist�an en que dicha Comisi�n hab�a descartado la relaci�n de Bin Laden con Sadam Husein."

Excerpted from.
www.libertaddigital.es...

The United States is not the only country that has found this evidence and others, for example the link of Al Jazeera with terrorism.

This is a link in Spanish where they say that Aljazeera is always on the side of terror.
In the opening statement it says as i translate it in English.
" Al Jazeera is always on the side of terror "

It can be found here for those members that can read Spanish. It also states the courage of an Italian prisoner in his statement before he was executed by Islamic extremists.
www.libertaddigital.com:83...

A plot by Saddam/Iraq against Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Iraq.

" Is it true that U.S. intelligence received no further evidence of Iraqi
involvement in terrorism after June 1993?

Answer:
No, U.S. intelligence, and own Clarke's counterterrorism unit,
received reports of Iraqi terrorist involvement. In 1998-199, for example,
both CIA and FBI reported Iraqi intelligence service's plan to use
terrorists to blow up America's Radio Free Europe facility in Prague (which
also housed Radio Free Iraq.)
Iraq tasked Jabir Salim, the Iraq consul in Prague, with the terrorist
job, and provided him with $150,000 in two payments to recruit free-lance
terrorists in 1998. The Iraqi plan failed because Salim, along with his
family and the money, defected in December 1998 to British intelligence and
revealed the plot plot to western intelligence services."

Excerpted from.
www.mail-archive.com...@erols.com/msg00281.html

BTW kegs....do post links to the excerpts or information you provided.

[edit on 21-6-2004 by Muaddib]

" * Spanish investigators have uncovered documents seized from Yusuf Galan ? who is charged by a Spanish court with being "directly involved with the preparation and planning" of the Sept. 11 attacks ? that show the terrorist was invited to a party at the Iraqi embassy in Madrid. The invitation used his "al Qaeda nom de guerre."

Was this guy convicted? If not his "charge" is meaningless.

* An Iraqi defector to Turkey, known by his cover name as "Abu Mohammed," told the Sunday Times of London that he saw bin Laden's fighters in Iraq in 1997. At the time, Mohammed was a colonel in Saddam's Fedayeen. He described an encounter at Salman Pak, the training facility southeast of Baghdad, where militants trained to hijack planes with knives ? on a full-size Boeing 707.

Still not credible evidence. Some guy claims he saw bin Laden fighters. First who is this guy? And what does a bin Laden fighter look like? Does he have any photographic evidence or just a story?

* In 1998, Abbas al-Janabi, a longtime aide to Saddam's son Uday, defected to the West. At the time, he repeatedly told reporters that there was a direct connection between Iraq and al Qaeda. "

Aid to Uday? Now there is a reliable source. Again where is proof. Just a he said/she said story. No physical proof. There are going to be all kinds of people coming forward for one reason or another with all kinds of stories but until physical proof is provided no one is going to buy it. However Saddam is a big supporter of Hamas. But he had nothing to do with bin Laden and 9/11.

Alright, so the first link has nothing to do whatsoever with al Qaeda.

The second link is the only viable evidence I see of an al Qaeda-Sadaam link. Although many of the points made in the article do not establish a connection between al Qaeda and Sadaam, there are still defectors who claim such. But even the Bush administration has critized information from defectors because there is no way to tell if they are just trying to be friends. I see the evidence from the Spaniards, paper evidence! One most definitely credible source. Also you may want to find something that is not a discussion board, how bout get the actual sources. Discussion boards aren't even allowed according to ATS rules, but I believe that the sources true despite.

The other definite source is the financial link. But as I have read the Bush family has also dipped into financial pools with Iraq and al Qaeda, I could point out some links if you are not familiar with it. Many countries in fact are involved that we do not bomb on a daily basis..that should not be basis for war, its a double standard.

Then the other sites are just 9-11 Commission bashers, the last one not even giving a source except for thats what they said, so those aren't credible as any kind of link. Just felt like bashing liberals, eh?

But anyway, assuming there was a link. It was obviously not a very strong one and I remain skeptical on whether there would be an exchange of WMDS. Assuming the info was true, it seems the Iraqis were wrapped up in their own terrorism ways anyway, and I doubt how much support was actually given to al Qaeda.

just remember we used terror to defeat terror. We killed countless more civilians than we killed even during the un-Iraqi-connected 9/11 bombings. But I guess that makes us right because we are America. Somehow I still fell sorry for all the innocent people killed in Iraq.

Now ... what does the Vice Chairman of the Panel say? Lee Hamilton says "There were connections between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's government. We don't disagree with that. What we have said is that we don't have any evidence of a cooperative or a collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein's government and these al-Qaeda operatives with regard to attacks on the United States."