DeathBecomesYu wrote:
Bertster7 wrote:
DeathBecomesYu wrote:
Yes, some other idiotic politicians tried to tie the two...even many democrats and don't forget the campaign rhetoric that Gore and the democratic party was spewing that Bush was too soft on Saddam and spewing the same rhetoric about Saddam and WMD. Remember that?? Let's also not forget the dozens of international intelligence agencies who thought the same. The international community was just as much to blame as Bush or anyone else.
Which intelligence agencies?
As far as I've ever been able to tell, no intelligence agencies saw any sort of link between Saddam and Al Qaeda. There are very clear reports that are now declassified from the Pentagon and from the CIA, both in 2002 that were extremely clear that there was no link.
The JIC got in a lot of trouble for fabricating evidence (though eventually got cleared and the BBC were the ones to get in trouble for breaking the story), after they plagiarised a students university coursework and used it as an intelligence report. The PM made and then retracted several statements about Saddam having WMDs, most notably the 45 minute claim.
Hans Blix, the chief weapons inspector, said it was "highly unlikely" Saddam had any WMDs remaining and accused the US and UK governments of dramatising the threat.
So the US intelligence agencies had evidence there was no link between Al Qaeda and Saddam, yet the administration told the public the opposite (and according to polls, 30-50% believed them) and kept asking the inteligence agencies to provide them with evidence of the link. The British intelligence agencies made up evidence, made spurious claims proven to be untrue before the war began and the person who leaked all the information committed suicide under suspicious circumstances - though of course the following inquiry cleared anyone (except the BBC, the reporter lost his job, as did the DG) of any wrong doing. UN officials allege that they were bugged, they presume by the US over the period of build up to the war.
It's all far too suspicious to just come out and say the intelligence agencies said it - because there is clear evidence that the British and American governments were telling the intelligence agencies what to put in the reports. No other intelligence agencies seemed to agree. The UN opposed the war utterly. The weapons inspections teams opposed the war. Virtually every country around the world opposed the war. How can you blame it on the international community when the blame so obviously lies solely with the US and UK.
Actually, I am speaking of WMD and yes many agencies were fooled and believed he had WMD and he did actually use those types of weapons against his neighbors and his own people (yes, other countries sold this stuff to him, including the US). I am not talking about intelligence as far as a link to Al-Qaeda. That was a stretch made later by politicians on BOTH sides of the aisle. There were two gulf wars, liberation of Kuwait and then the attack because Saddam refused to cooperate with UN resolutions for years. Some politicians and agencies believed that weapons could get into the wrong hands if they were sold or technology was given to terrorists. Even Saddam himself in the OP news item said that he WANTED other countries to believe how powerful he MIGHT be to the detriment of his own country and he did everything he could to keep the veil of secrecy up and gave people the thought that he was hiding something.
Which agencies? Everything I've read (and read at the time) points towards the British and American security services fabricating evidence of WMDs in Iraq at the behest of their governments. The fact that the French intelligence services have published recordings of CIA conversations in which aides to George Tenet (then director of the CIA) are heard telling CIA officers that this is "not about intelligence, it's about regime change" - which supports exactly the line I've been going with since day one. I still have no clue why Iraq was invaded, but I am confident that the reason was not anything to do with Al Qaeda or WMDs.
Both sides of what aisle?
Which intelligence agencies outside the US and UK said Saddam had WMDs? The UN certainly didn't think they did. The IAEA after inspections "found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons programme in Iraq". The director of Iraqi intelligence (a British intelligence asset who had been passing information to MI6 for over a year before the invasion) met with MI6 operatives and told them there were no WMDs, the nuclear programme had ended in 1991 and the biological weapons programme in 1996. There are countless of these leaks (look up things like the Habbush report, Sabri report and Tawfik report - all providing strong, credible evidence to the British and American intelligence agencies that there were no WMDs) - there is a lot of speculation that the number of leaks are due to the fact the intelligence operatives don't like the government coming along and telling them what intelligence they should be finding.
The only publicised source that seems to have pointed to them having WMDs is someone codenamed curveball (a source whom the Pentagon said was "almost certainly peddling false information" - despite which the CIA presented this evidence to be used in the case for war (which points further to them not caring about the information being false but just wanting to make the case for war)) who claimed there were mobile chemical weapons labs. The other big source of evidence used in the case for war was the aluminium tubes. Tubes the CIA said could be used to enrich uranium - despite the fact the State Departments Intelligence Bureau and experts called in from atomic labs across the US said they were of insufficient quality for such a purpose. Most of this information is available in the post war Senate Committee on Intelligence report, published in July '04.
All this points to the CIA and MI6 either being totally incompetent (which I don't believe they are) or fabricating the intelligence at the request of their respective governments and then taking the blame for the poor intelligence.
At the time of course, all this was classified and the only real leak (in the UK at least) led to the person who leaked the information (Dr Kelly, a weapons expert) committing suicide under suspicious circumstances for telling people they'd been "sexing up" the intelligence.
DeathBecomesYu wrote:
I know Saddam was not friendly with Al-Qaeda but when people have a common enemy, sometimes they will cooperate. The North Korean situation is very similar except North Korea isn't afraid to talk trash and back it up with proof that they have those types of weapons. North Korea's main industry is selling weapons, selling the technology..etc. Do you think they care who buys it?
By the way, Saddam was speaking to people who had captured him. Do you think he is going to sit there and not paint rosey pictures on his behalf. I find it funny that now we are taking his word as gospel and truth. Who really knows what he is saying is true, he was a prisoner trying to save his own butt....look trials after WW2....most pointed blame every where else except themselves. Why would Saddam be any different in the same situation.
That's fairly speculative. I can't see that Al Qaeda would've dealt with Saddam even if he would've dealt with them. There's just too much at stake for both of them. So there are two groups of people that dislike the US on a sub-continent. You kind of need more than just that to make any sort of link between them. It's particularly dodgy when despite receiving multiple intelligence reports to the contrary Bush kept reasserting that this link was definitely there.
DeathBecomesYu wrote:
I don't disagree with many things said in this post...I just find it funny and hypocritical when people in these forums claim to have known all along what was happening. Politicians, intelligence agencies, leaders..etc, etc. were confused and mislead. Yes, some knew more than the rest but it was a huge debate and history has already been made. I find it hilarious that now, guys in BF2 forum claim to have known all the answers long ago and can say "I told you so" when they didn't know shit...especially because Saddam said so. If you knew so much....then you guys should run for office and save the world because you should all know about the North Korean situation, clearly what is going to happen and when. Better start campaigning so you can fix it. Somehow, you guys have access to all this information, agencies, photos, briefs, taps, spies etc.....what are you waiting for....tell Obama what to do.
I don't believe those politicians did believe it. I don't for a moment believe the international community at large was duped. It was extremely blatant that the reasons presented were not the real motivation for war from the very beginning. Why do you find it hilarious? It's not like anyone's been changing their story. Most who opposed the war from the start have stuck with exactly the same story all the way through.
I know I've always said the war had nothing to do with WMDs or Al Qaeda. But unlike many people who took/take that stance, I didn't/don't think it's about oil. I don't really have a clue. There's been a lot of speculation for a very long time. Was it oil, was it defence contract related, was it to set up a friendly regime in Iraq for some long term middle eastern thingumajig? Who knows? Certainly not me. But I do know it was never about WMDs or Al Qaeda and it's been patently obvious that was the case from the word go.