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06.17.04
GONE GRENADE FISHING, PART II:
Thanks to everyone for sending in mixtape suggestions. I wish I had thought of several of them myself, especially the one proposed by reader M.F. Keep them coming, and I'll think of prizes for the best ones.
In the meantime, this blog will go on a brief vacation until Monday morning. I'm filling in for Josh Marshall over at Talking Points Memo for a couple of days while Josh enjoys some well-earned relaxation. The Iraq-related fun will continue at TPM, so I hope to see everyone there.
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06.16.04
BACKWARDS MASKING:
Now, it's probably the case that nothing will ever stop proponents of the Al Qaeda-Saddam link from subscribing to this fraudulent and refuted thesis. So, to gear up for revisiting the question in the future, this blog would like to propose a kind of online mixtape. What follows is an assortment of the best dubious Bush administration assertions that Iraq and Al Qaeda were allied against the United States. For those readers who care, I invite you to propose the best song we can match with each misleading statement. (Elastica's "Connection" is ruled out, however. Get creative.) Without further ado, IRAQ'D presents Unconnected Dots and Feedback Loops: The Best of the Iraq-Al Qaeda Link, Vol. 1.
Intro. 9/11 Commission Staff Statement No. 15, June 16, 2004:
Bin Laden also explored possible cooperation with Iraq during his time in Sudan, despite his opposition to Hussein's secular regime. Bin Laden had in fact at one time sponsored anti-Saddam Islamists in Iraqi Kurdistan. The Sudanese, to protect their own ties with Iraq, reportedly persuaded Bin Laden to cease this support and arranged for contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda. A senior Iraqi intelligence officer reportedly made three visits to Sudan, finally meeting Bin Laden in 1994. Bin Laden is said to have requested space to establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring weapons, but Iraq apparently never responded. There have been reports that contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda also occurred after Bin Laden returned to Afghanistan, but they do not appear to have resulted in a collaborative relationship. Two senior Bin Laden associates have adamantly denied that any ties existed between Al Qaeda and Iraq. We have no credible evidence that Iraq and Al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United States.
1. "Remember The E-Mail?" Exchange between President Bush and a reporter, June 15, 2004:
Q: The Vice President, who I see standing over there, said yesterday that Saddam Hussein has long-established ties to al Qaeda. As you know, this is disputed within the U.S. intelligence community. Mr. President, would you add any qualifiers to that flat statement? And what do you think is the best evidence of it?
PRESIDENT BUSH: Zarqawi. Zarqawi is the best evidence of connection to al Qaeda affiliates and al Qaeda. He's the person who's still killing. He's the person--and remember the email exchange between al Qaeda leadership and he, himself, about how to disrupt the progress toward freedom?
2. "Clearly Official Policy, All Right." Exchange between Vice President Cheney and Tim Russert, September 14, 2003:
MR. RUSSERT: The Washington Post asked the American people about Saddam Hussein, and this is what they said: 69 percent said he was involved in the September 11 attacks. Are you surprised by that?
VICE PRES. CHENEY: No. I think it's not surprising that people make that connection.
MR. RUSSERT: But is there a connection?
VICE PRES. CHENEY: We don't know. You and I talked about this two years ago. I can remember you asking me this question just a few days after the original attack. At the time I said no, we didn't have any evidence of that. Subsequent to that, we've learned a couple of things. We learned more and more that there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaeda that stretched back through most of the decade of the '90s, that it involved training, for example, on BW and CW, that al-Qaeda sent personnel to Baghdad to get trained on the systems that are involved. The Iraqis providing bomb-making expertise and advice to the al-Qaeda organization.
We know, for example, in connection with the original World Trade Center bombing in '93 that one of the bombers was Iraqi, returned to Iraq after the attack of '93. And we've learned subsequent to that, since we went into Baghdad and got into the intelligence files, that this individual probably also received financing from the Iraqi government as well as safe haven.
Now, is there a connection between the Iraqi government and the original World Trade Center bombing in '93? We know, as I say, that one of the perpetrators of that act did, in fact, receive support from the Iraqi government after the fact. With respect to 9/11, of course, we've had the story that's been public out there. The Czechs alleged that Mohamed Atta, the lead attacker, met in Prague with a senior Iraqi intelligence official five months before the attack, but we've never been able to develop anymore of that yet either in terms of confirming it or discrediting it. We just don't know.
MR. RUSSERT: We could establish a direct link between the hijackers of September 11 and Saudi Arabia.
VICE PRES. CHENEY: We know that many of the attackers were Saudi. There was also an Egyptian in the bunch. It doesn't mean those governments had anything to do with that attack. That's a different proposition than saying the Iraqi government and the Iraqi intelligent service has a relationship with al-Qaeda that developed throughout the decade of the '90s. That was clearly official policy.
3. "Sources of Varying Reliability." Letter from former DCI George Tenet to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, October 7, 2002:
Regarding Senator Bayh's question of Iraqi links to al- Qa'ida, Senators could draw from the following points for unclassified discussions:
Our understanding of the relationship between Iraq and al- Qa'ida is evolving and is based on sources of varying reliability. Some of the information we have received comes from detainees, including some of high rank.
We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and al-Qa'ida going back a decade.
Credible information indicates that Iraq and al-Qa'ida have discussed safe haven and reciprocal non-aggression.
Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of al-Qa'ida members, including some that have been in Baghdad.
We have credible reporting that al-Qa'ida leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities. The reporting also stated that Iraq has provided training to al-Qa'ida members in the areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.
Iraq's increasing support to extremist Palestinians, coupled with growing indications of a relationship with al- Qa'ida, suggest that Baghdad's links to terrorists will increase, even absent US military action.
4. "Any Given Day (Senior Al Qaeda Leader Medicinal Mix)." Televised primetime speech delivered by President Bush, October 7, 2002:
We know that Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist network share a common enemy--the United States of America. We know that Iraq and al Qaeda have had high-level contacts that go back a decade. Some al Qaeda leaders who fled Afghanistan went to Iraq. These include one very senior al Qaeda leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad this year, and who has been associated with planning for chemical and biological attacks. We've learned that Iraq has trained al Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases. And we know that after September the 11th, Saddam Hussein's regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America.
Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists. Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints.
5. "You Can't Always Distinguish What You Want." Remarks at the White House with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, September 25, 2002:
Q: Mr. President, do you believe that Saddam Hussein is a bigger threat to the United States than al Qaeda?
PRESIDENT BUSH: That's a--that is an interesting question. I'm trying to think of something humorous to say. (Laughter.) But I can't when I think about al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. They're both risks, they're both dangerous. The difference, of course, is that al Qaeda likes to hijack governments. Saddam Hussein is a dictator of a government. Al Qaeda hides, Saddam doesn't, but the danger is, is that they work in concert. The danger is, is that al Qaeda becomes an extension of Saddam's madness and his hatred and his capacity to extend weapons of mass destruction around the world.
Both of them need to be dealt with. The war on terror, you can't distinguish between al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror. And so it's a comparison that is--I can't make because I can't distinguish between the two, because they're both equally as bad, and equally as evil, and equally as destructive.
6. "Bulletproof." Remarks to the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, September 27, 2002:
Before I left for Poland I gathered some thoughts with a couple of people who work with me--Paul Wolfowitz and others. We said why don't we get this into the intelligence community, let them scrub it over the next week or so, see if they can find out what portion of it can be made public. They did, they came back, we ended up with five or six sentences that were bullet-proof. We could say them, they're factual, they're exactly accurate. They demonstrate that there are in fact al Qaeda in Iraq. But they're not photographs, they are not beyond a reasonable doubt, they in some cases are assessments from a limited number of sources. They're in some cases hard information that were we to release it would reveal a method of gathering it. And it seems to me that if our quest is for proof positive we probably will be left somewhat unfulfilled.
7. "Fundamental Concerns." Interview with Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz by Sam Tanenhaus, May 10, 2003:
There have always been three fundamental concerns. One is weapons of mass destruction, the second is support for terrorism, the third is the criminal treatment of the Iraqi people. ...
That second issue about links to terrorism is the one about which there's the most disagreement within the bureaucracy, even though I think everyone agrees that we killed 100 or so of an al Qaeda group in northern Iraq in this recent go-around, that we've arrested that al Qaeda guy in Baghdad who was connected to this guy Zarqawi whom Powell spoke about in his UN presentation. That second issue about links to terrorism is the one about which there's the most disagreement within the bureaucracy, even though I think everyone agrees that we killed 100 or so of an al Qaeda group in northern Iraq in this recent go-around, that we've arrested that al Qaeda guy in Baghdad who was connected to this guy Zarqawi whom Powell spoke about in his UN presentation.
8. "Interesting Observations." Press conference by Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, June 4, 2003:
In the course of its work, this team, in reviewing the intelligence that was provided to us by the CIA and the intelligence community, came up with some interesting observations about the linkages between Iraq and al Qaeda....
I don't think it's all that unusual or hard to understand. If a large amount of material is reviewed by fresh eyes--I mean, this--I think this would apply to--you know, any intelligent people sitting down with this pile of intelligence, looking it over, reading it over, has a chance of finding certain things in it. I mean, ask yourself why new history books get written about old events. I mean, people look over very often the very same material. But in light of experience or just because they see something that nobody had seen before, certain connections become clear or appear, and, you know, new hypotheses get developed and new facts surface. I mean, it's not that mysterious.
9. "Sinister Nexuses." Address to the United Nations Security Council by Secrerary of State Colin Powell, February 5, 2003:
What I want to bring to your attention today is the potentially much more sinister nexus between Iraq and the al-Qaida terrorist network, a nexus that combines classic terrorist organizations and modern methods of murder. Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi an associate and collaborator of Usama bin Laden and his al-Qaida lieutenants....
Baghdad has an agent in the most senior levels of the radical organization Ansar al-Islam that controls this corner of Iraq. In 2000, this agent offered al-Qaida safe haven in the region. After we swept al-Qaida from Afghanistan, some of those members accepted this safe haven. They remain there today.
10. "Long Established." Speech for the James Madison Institute by Vice President Cheney, June 14, 2004:
Saddam Hussein ... had long established ties with al Qaeda.
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WHEN OCCAM'S RAZOR SLITS YOUR THROAT:
There's only one conclusion to draw from today's report from the 9/11 Commission that Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden were unrelated threats: The Commission simply hates America. How else to explain its evident impulse to dismiss the irrefutable mountain of innuendo, wishful thinking and high-octane ideology that is the Saddam-bin Laden connection? Doesn't the Commission staff know that Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, has all along been a nefarious agent of the Iraqi dictator? Don't they know that one of bin Laden's best buddies is an Iraqi? Don't they know that Ahmed said Saddam was running a training camp for Al Qaeda terrorists at Salman Pak? Didn't they get the Feith memo? I mean, case closed!
It's like the 9/11 Commission wants Saddam Hussein to be back in power. My God: There it is. I never considered it, but maybe the 9/11 Commission and its staffers are agents of Saddam Hussein. There may not be evidence of this, but we know that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
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06.15.04
THEY HATE US, BUT NOT EACH OTHER:
Newsweek has obtained the first post-Abu Ghraib poll of Iraqi public opinion conducted by the CPA. (Asked about the torturers, 54 percent of Iraqis agreed that "all Americans are like this"; 61 percent believed no one will be punished for the abuse.) The poll basically excludes the Kurds--the furthest north pollsters traveled was Mosul--and as a result, anti-American sentiment pervades.
The CPA and coalition forces enjoy the support of about one Iraqi in ten. In January, CPA had the confidence of 32 percent of Iraqis, and coalition forces had 28 percent. By March that level was down to 14 and 13 percent respectively; the poll has a margin of error of 4.1 percent, so support hasn't appreciably eroded since then. (Considering that 71 percent of respondents said they were surprised by the abuse, it appears our support had bottomed out before the scandal broke.) As reflected by responses to other questions, there appears to be a consistent bedrock of 90 percent dissatisfaction with us. Ninety percent of Iraqis see our soldiers as occupiers and 87 percent of Iraqis think it either somewhat or very likely that Iraqi security forces will be able to keep the peace absent coalition forces entirely. Only 41 percent want us out immediately--but another 45 want us gone when there's a permanent elected government. (If we did leave immediately, 55 percent of Iraqis would feel safer, as opposed to 32 percent who'd feel less secure.) Eighty-nine percent somewhat or totally agree that "The violent attacks around the country have increased because people have lost faith in the [coalition]." In August of 2003, the poll notes, 85 percent of Iraqis asked by Gallup agreed that "if the U.S. were to pull out its troops any time soon, Iraq would fall into anarchy."
When it comes to security--at about 60 percent, still the highest concern of Iraqis across the six surveyed cities (Baghdad, Basra, Hilla, Mosul, Baqubah and Diwaniya)--Iraqis are split essentially evenly about whether they personally feel safe: 51 percent say they do, 38 percent feel "not very safe," and 11 percent feel "not safe at all." Asked what contributes to their sense of personal security, a breakaway plurality of 45 percent cite their neighbors and friends, while 26 percent, the next most popular answer, cited their family. (Militias were not an option, though "local neighborhood patrols" rated only four percent.) The coalition contributed to the sense of security of one percent of respondents.
It seems reasonable to conclude that Iraqis view the insurgency as a struggle for national liberation. Asked if those who attack the coalition "do not want democracy in Iraq," 45 percent disagreed outright and 38 either partially or fully agreed. Yet asked if the insurgents "want democracy, but do not believe the coalition will help democracy," only 15 percent disagreed, while 63 percent agreed partially or in full. Nearly 70 percent of Iraqis think the insurgents believe that "national dignity" demands the attacks. Only 32 percent think the insurgents are motivated by a loss of "privileges" under Saddam, and only 20 percent think they fight to return the dictator to power. Nearly 70 percent believe the insurgents are fighting a U.S. conquest of Iraq's natural resources, and nearly 60 percent believe, in whole or in part, that they fight to establish an "Islamic state with no outside influence"--and it's not clear from the poll if that statement is value-neutral to Iraqis.
Similarly, the percentage of Iraqis worried most about internecine bloodshed--either "between sects" or outright "ethnic war"--has declined since January. In January, 29 percent feared Sunni-Shia violence; now only 15 percent do. During that same period, fear of Kurdish-Arab hostilities dipped from eight to six percent. The big grain of salt is that the question is awkward: it asks what Iraqis fear most, not whether or not they fear these possibilities at all. However, 64 percent said that the dual Sunni-Moqtada insurgency has made the country more united.
Along with generally high marks generated for the Iraqi security institutions and ministries (above 60 percent confidence levels), the poll suggests that while Iraqis hate us, they don't hate each other. That's a not-inauspicious beginning for the interim government. The big question for Iraqi politics now is whether the continued presence of hated U.S. soldiers will taint the government or rally public support behind it. And that's a question the poll can't answer.
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THIS BLOG WILL HOLD A CANDLELIGHT VIGIL UNTIL PAUL WOLFOWITZ COMES CLEAN:
"We can do nothing about this chaos," said a policeman who declined to be identified by name. "These people would eat us if we tried to force them to leave. We have no authority, not enough weapons to protect ourselves. . . . They accuse us of being collaborators, so how can we convince them to obey us?"
--"Rage Explodes After Another Baghdad Blast; Bombing in Heart of Capital Kills 8 Iraqis and 5 Foreigners," Washington Post, today
Iraqis bring unique advantages against the kind of enemy we are fighting in Iraq today. Iraqis--who have a native knowledge of everything from city neighborhoods and regional accents to religious sensitivities and even local license plates--have advantages over any foreign force in confronting the security problems of Iraq today and its urban environments in particular. ... Over the next few months, our aim is to prepare Iraqi security forces to assume greater responsibilities from coalition forces--allowing Iraqis to take local control of the cities, even as coalition forces move into a supporting role and provide forces only as needed.
--"The Road Map for a Sovereign Iraq; Our Plan for Security and Democracy After June 30," Paul Wolfowitz, Wall Street Journal, June 9
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06.14.04
'IT DIDN'T NEED TO BE THIS WAY':
To get a better sense of how serious the situation in Iraqi Kurdistan is, I spoke with Richard A. Naab. Naab was regional coordinator for the CPA's northern outpost from May to December 2003. His credentials as a friend to the Kurds go back to the aftermath of the first Gulf War, when as an Army Colonel he played a leading role in Operation Provide Comfort. We spoke on Friday.
NAAB: I think they feel betrayed--again. [They feel that] our side is willing to sell them out for a cleric, a Shia cleric that won't even meet with Bremer, on the hope that they'll keep [hopes for] a democracy [alive]. We'll sell out a friend for that. I think they're very disappointed--extremely disappointed. There are demonstrations now going on. It forces them the other way, to consider options that aren't useful to the coalition, in my view. It forces them to consider, seriously, separatism and independence.
IRAQ'D: How serious do you think an option separation is right now?
NAAB: I don't think it ever was. I think the realistic politicians would not say it's a viable option. But the more they're pushed this way, the more they'll go this way, because they can't afford to commit to Baghdad and have Baghdad captured by somebody that's alien to them, like the Shia. Or the son-of-Saddam: a Baathist takeover. They see it, I think, as our side caving into the Shia--this recluse cleric who won't even meet with Bremer. So he regards Bremer as an infidel, the Kurds regard us as their friends. They can't understand why we're willing to sell them out for the Shia.
They've been calling me and asking, "What's going on?" I say I don't know. It's hard to justify. Now, they may be overreacting, because I think in the end, based on what [Interim PM Iyad] Allawi and others have said, they'll get [the federalism protections they seek]. But they're sure disappointed in the U.S. side.
IRAQ'D: How much of a reassurance does Allawi actually provide [the Kurds] when he says that the government will abide by the Transitional Administrative Law and its provisions on federalism?
NAAB: I think they regard the U.S. as their ally--still. They want to be like the U.S. They love the U.S. But they can't understand this betrayal. I mean, it's devastating to them. I don't exaggerate. Theyre all telling me that. They've been working hard in [Washington] to see what the heck is going on. They tell me that the U.S. has decided to send a special envoy to go talk to them. But nevertheless, it didn't need to be this way.
IRAQ'D: What are they looking forward to in terms of going into the constitution-writing assembly?
NAAB: Guarantees of minority rights. Guarantees for an equal chance at Kirkuk and a referendum [on its final status] after the property disputes have been settled. In other words, they are prepared to accept a central government with certain functions--taxation, foreign ministry, war powers and all that--but they want all their rights guaranteed.
IRAQ'D: To what extent do you think the Shia insistence on getting rid of these [federalism] provisions in the constitution changes the Kurdish position?
NAAB: It's a showstopper for them.
IRAQ'D: How do you think the Kurdish leadership will react in the next couple of weeks? Do you think they're going to call for quitting the central government?
NAAB: There have been some calls for that. There have been some calls for boycotting any future elections [and] withdraw[ing] their representation in the interim government. I've heard that. How it will go, I don't know. I think a lot of it depends on the kinds of reassurances, if they get any, from someone who understands the sensitivity of this issue to them.
IRAQ'D: Who's working this issue for the Coalition Provisional Authority right now?
NAAB: I assume that it's [U.S. Special Envoy Robert] Blackwill. But I'm not sure. I don't know that. But I assume it's Blackwill.
IRAQ'D: How satisfied are the Kurds going to be with administration statements supporting their federal rights without the provisions actually being in the text of the U.N. Security Council Resolution?
NAAB: They're very skeptical. The whole time, they know about the U.S. and how long our staying power is, and they really wanted it guaranteed by an international body. There was a great worry in '91, '92, when there was no U.N. guarantee of an autonomous region, in spite of the fact that the U.N., as an enforcer, is a very flaccid organization.
IRAQ'D: Do you think this annihilates the Allawi plan to demobilize militias?
NAAB: Surely it makes the argument for them [against demobilization]. You and I maybe disagree on the definition of a militia.
IRAQ'D: I don't just mean the pesh, I mean everyone.
NAAB: I think you could take the argument I just made for the Kurds and put it in each of the other two major camps, and then some of the other camps, where there are less powerful militias. But tribal chiefs intend to use [militias] in the stability piece. I don't think there's ever been, in the short term, a serious intent to demobilize them. In fact, we allowed some of them, and we encouraged some of them to take responsibility for certain parts of the infrastructure. They won't have a force large enough over there to do it otherwise, without their help.
IRAQ'D: What do the Kurds need to see from us, now, to get out of this mess?
NAAB: Strong reassurances that they will be allowed to have a degree of autonomy. [And that] they will be allowed to keep their democratic administration. That they're allowed to say yes or no to their constitution, and opt out of it, if it's based, for example, strongly on Shari'a. If there's a tendency [for Iraq] to become a strong Islamic state, they don't want that. And they didn't fight for that.
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