Pentagon: No Saddam-Al Qaeda Link

(AP)  Saddam Hussein's government did not cooperate with al Qaeda prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the U.S. Defense Department said in a report based on interrogations of the deposed leader and two of his former aides.

Meanwhile, Vice President Dick Cheney repeated his assertions of al Qaeda links to Saddam's Iraq, contending that the terrorist group was operating in Iraq before the March 2003 invasion led by U.S. forces and that terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was leading the Iraqi branch of al Qaeda. Others in al Qaeda planned the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

"He took up residence there before we ever launched into Iraq, organized the al Qaeda operations inside Iraq before we even arrived on the scene and then, of course, led the charge for Iraq until we killed him last June," Cheney told radio host Rush Limbaugh during an interview Thursday. "As I say, they were present before we invaded Iraq."

However, a declassified Pentagon report released Thursday said that interrogations of Saddam and two of his former aides as well as seized Iraqi documents confirmed that the terrorist organization and the Saddam government were not working together before the invasion.

The Sept. 11 Commission's 2004 report also found no evidence of a collaborative relationship between Saddam and Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network during that period.

Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, had requested that the Pentagon declassify the report prepared by acting Defense Department Inspector General Thomas F. Gimble. In a statement Thursday, Levin said the declassified document showed why a Defense Department investigation had concluded that some Pentagon prewar intelligence work was inappropriate.

The report, which had been released in summary form in February, said that former Pentagon policy chief Douglas J. Feith had acted inappropriately but not illegally in reviewing prewar intelligence. Levin has claimed that Feith's intelligence assessment was wrong and distorted but nevertheless formed part of the basis on which President George W. Bush took the country to war.

Although Feith's assessment in mid-2002 offered several examples of cooperation between Saddam's government and al Qaeda, the report said, the CIA had concluded months earlier that no evidence supported the existence of significant or long-term relationships.

[j-whitman]

Hamiltongrad,,, The burden is on this President,, So far he's totally failed in the entire Mid-East... His Christian Zionism istn't what the region needs.

[randalds]

Saddam Hussein's government did not cooperate with al Qaeda, but al Qaeda was in Iraq and operated out of Iraq, so is Iraq to blame? This is the new problem, how do you blame an entire country and attack the terrorist contained within it? Is it fair to go to war with a country if its government claims ignorance?
Posted by tbweb at 08:52 AM : Apr 07, 2007

"Did not cooperate'? Saddam hated bin Laden's guts and the feeling was mutual. Abu Masub al-Zarqawi was in extreme Northern Iraq before the war, but he was not associated with al-Qaeda then and he was in the no-fly zone and out of Saddam's reach. That's because he knew Saddam would have had him shot on sight. Saddam was a secular dictator and didn't want to share power with any religious fanatics. He had terrorists killed just as often as he had Shiites killed, maybe more so as he hated them more.

[inventagod]

Calling the Bu$h oil-grab a 'war' does not make it one.
Congress never called it a war...
The UN never called it a war...
Only the PNAC traitors have called it that.

[starleo146]

George Bush, D*i*c*K Cheney, Karl Rove, Alberto Gonzales, they are all a government to themselves.They shun the Congress, CIA, FBI, and the people of this country they couldn't care less what we think Why do you think they passed a bill they could never be tried for war crimes the republican majority did that what kind of man elected in this country would walk up and vote for such a bill. I don't know how to clean it all up I have become so distrustful of all politicians, who is paying all this money to people to be the next president? As soon as we stop that maybe part of the problem will be solved, then get rid of the lobbyist.cheney's insistance with Rush is joke.

[plainjean]

*** Cheney on the Rush Limbaugh Show. Isn't that like hearing Herman Goering on Radio Berlin say about January 1945? Limbaugh fancies himself to be an intellectual, when in reality he and all the rest of those conservative radio shock jocks are nothing more than DEMAGOGUES! Go get em Katie and CBS. Don't let them off the hook.

[inventagod]

This issue speaks loudly for the entire Bu$h administration, the Liar's Parade just keeps going and going and...

[tbweb]

The real problem with this issue is the same as all the others, the world is not black and white, the world is many shades of grey. This new terrorist enemy knows no state, country or flag in the context that traditional enemies were identified. This means traditional governments can keep their hands clean while financing and supporting several bands of terrorist who roam the planet with their destructive deeds. Saddam Hussein's government did not cooperate with al Qaeda, but al Qaeda was in Iraq and operated out of Iraq, so is Iraq to blame? This is the new problem, how do you blame an entire country and attack the terrorist contained within it? Is it fair to go to war with a country if its government claims ignorance?

[zootallures2]

Levin and Feith, heh? First I wanna know which one eats shrimp or cheese burgers?

[zootallures2]

But a Shuttle mission dedicated to them buy Ronald Reagan might indicate a link between space aliens and Al Qaeda.

Cheney told that to UFO. He also talks to them Zetas ya know.

[pakaal]

"Feith's intelligence assessment was wrong and distorted but nevertheless formed part of the basis on which President George W. Bush took the country to war."

C'mon. Rumsfeld and Cheney created Feith's office precisely because they didn't like the intelligence they were getting from the CIA and Pentagon. The sentence shouldn't say it was wrong and distorted BUT it formed the part of the basis for war, the sentence should say it was wrong and distorted AND SO it formed part of Bush's basis for war. Distorting the intelligence was the goal of Feith's office, and they achieved that goal perfectly - at the cost of thousands of brave American lives from 2003 to today.