Despite a heavy barrage of media criticism of President Bush's claim that there were connections between Saddam Hussein and al Qaida, the president and Vice-President Cheney have remained adamant in their defense of their claims. The president seemed to back off a little but not much and the vice-president has insisted that the media criticism has been unfair on this as well as other matters.
When the preliminary 9/11 Comission staff report was released last month the media jumped all over the statement that there had been no evidence of a collaborative relationship between Iraq and al Qaida and accused the president of misleading the nation into thinking there was. Bush, however had only claimed that there were ties between the two, not that Iraq was directly involved in 9/11 or any other terrorist act against the U.S. Now the full report is out and the media has egg on their faces yet again. Like the coyote trying to snare the road runner, every stratagem they employ to discredit Bush simply backfires.
Byron York has done the pick and shovel work, digging through the voluminous product of the Commission's efforts to bring us their findings regarding Iraq's links to al Qaida. A couple of excerpts:
Now, with the release of the commission's final report, it is clear what Hamilton and Cheney were talking about. The final report details a much more extensive set of contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda than the earlier staff statement. It also modifies the original "no collaborative relationship" description, now saying there was "no collaborative operational relationship" (emphasis added) between Iraq and Al Qaeda. And it suggests a significant amount of contact and communication between the regime of Saddam Hussein and the terrorist organization headed by Osama bin Laden.
The details found in the report - which in footnotes are attributed to a variety of secret U.S government intelligence documents - suggest a new way of thinking about Iraq and al Qaeda. Bin Laden had been forced out of Sudan and into Afghanistan. When it appeared he might have trouble with the Taliban, he looked to Iraq as a possible source of assistance. Iraq, at the time interested in closer ties with the Saudis, said no. Later, as his troubles with the United States grew, Saddam reconsidered, and offered bin Laden a safe haven in Iraq. This time, bin Laden turned Saddam down, not because of any conflicts with Iraq but because he thought he had a better deal in Afghanistan.
With that background in mind, the reasoning employed by American policymakers in early 2002 as they planned the next step in the war on terrorism, comes into clearer focus. The U.S. had toppled the Taliban but had not caught bin Laden and some of his top aides. Without a friendly regime in Afghanistan to protect al Qaeda, where might bin Laden and his band of terrorists go next? One possibility - a quite reasonable possibility - would be a place that had offered them haven in the past: Iraq.
For the details behind this summary, and the evidence of the connection between bin Laden and Hussein, read the whole column. No one interested in Bush's justifications for OIF should miss it.
Viewpoint is thinking of taking up a pool, the proceeds to go to the reader who correctly guesses how long it will take for the media to apologize for treating the president as if he had the integrity of a Kerry foreign policy advisor.