The proof that Saddam worked with bin Laden
By Inigo Gilmore
(Filed: 27/04/2003)
Iraqi intelligence documents discovered in Baghdad by The Telegraph have provided the first evidence of a direct link between Osama bin Laden’s al-Qa’eda terrorist network and Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Papers found yesterday in the bombed headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq’s intelligence service, reveal that an al-Qa’eda envoy was invited clandestinely to Baghdad in March 1998.
The documents show that the purpose of the meeting was to establish a relationship between Baghdad and al-Qa’eda based on their mutual hatred of America and Saudi Arabia. The meeting apparently went so well that it was extended by a week and ended with arrangements being discussed for bin Laden to visit Baghdad.
The papers will be seized on by Washington as the first proof of what the United States has long alleged - that, despite denials by both sides, Saddam’s regime had a close relationship with al-Qa’eda.
The Telegraph found the file on bin Laden inside a folder lying in the rubble of one of the rooms of the destroyed intelligence HQ. There are three pages, stapled together; two are on paper headed with the insignia and lettering of the Mukhabarat.
They show correspondence between Mukhabarat agencies over preparations for the visit of al-Qa’eda’s envoy, who travelled to Iraq from Sudan, where bin Laden had been based until 1996. They disclose what Baghdad hopes to achieve from the meeting, which took place less than five months before bin Laden was placed at the top of America’s most wanted list following the bombing of two US embassies in east Africa.
Perhaps aware of the sensitivities of the subject matter, Iraqi agents at some point clumsily attempted to mask out all references to bin Laden, using white correcting fluid. The dried fluid was removed to reveal the clearly legible name three times in the documents…exerpt
I wonder if a wounded Saddam is visiting ol’ Binny Laden somewhere?*
Nah no matter how bare faced lie’s stink of sh*t a mile away.
Don’t you think if this was true such documents would have been destroyed a long time ago…or maybe that they would have never existed.
I’m now waiting for the ** "US soldiers have found an atom bomb hidden in Tariq Aziz’ moustache, initial reports suggest further bombs are hidden in Asad’s sideburns and in the Khateimi’s turbin** headline.
Riddle me this boy wonder: Why wasnt this picked up before? If Saddam had ties with Al Qaeda why werent they spoken off 2001. Why 2 years later? Also what happened to all the proof the US said it had.
[QUOTE] Originally posted by CM: *
Riddle me this boy wonder: Why wasnt this picked up before? If Saddam had ties with Al Qaeda why werent they spoken off 2001. Why 2 years later? Also what happened to all the proof the US said **it* had.
[/QUOTE]
Why wasn't what picked up b 4? the link between Binny and Sohdum?
As far as the proof, I would imagine the answer to be that the proof refered to by the U.S. is classified. In other words, proof to the U.S. government that they don't think they can reveal to just anybody.
[QUOTE] Originally posted by Thap: *
I'm now waiting for the * "US soldiers have found an atom bomb hidden in Tariq Aziz' moustache, initial reports suggest further bombs are hidden in Asad's sideburns and in the Khateimi's turbin** headline.
[/QUOTE]
Why on stinking world will Saddam help Osama or Osama help Saddam when both hate each other and what they stand for?
Osama loves Saudi Arabia that’s why the sob hasn't killed a single Saudi shmunk! Saddam hates religious retards who tried to seek Saudis permission to cripple his regime.
Next thing you know Saddam and Osama will be found in tora bora doing the tanga tanga!
Why am I not surprised at theses straw clutching articles.
Unfortunately, Americas 'Truth' credibility is so low that even if anything true was to ever come out of America, it will be classed as a lie! A product of their own doing I'm afraid.
It will take centuries for this credibility to rebuild, and by then America will most probably be out of the G7.
This reminds me of the story concerning the 'shepherd and the wolf'. Keep crying wolf and ultimately no-one will believe you when the wolf actually comes to eat a chunk out your ass.
Someone needs to give the Telegraph an award! In 2 weeks they've proven themselves better able to find accurate, damnatory documents than all the Western intell agencies combined!
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by JusticeIsBlind: *
As far as the proof, I would imagine the answer to be that the proof refered to by the U.S. is classified. In other words, proof to the U.S. government that they don't think they can reveal to just anybody.
[/QUOTE]
Right. So you expect that we should just believe their statements blindly? Particularly subsequent to the misinformation (or lies) over Niger's exporting of uranium to Iraq. Why exactly should anyone trust the admin. on this particular issue?
Obviously the authors thought very carefully about the veracity of their documents:
There’s something here they don’t want us to see’
Clumsy efforts made to conceal name Document found in intelligence centreTranslators used to confirm content Reporters convinced
MITCH POTTER
MIDDLE EAST BUREAU
BAGHDAD—Amir, our trusted interpreter, sat on the end of my hotel room bed yesterday scratching away on what seemed just another top-secret sheaf in the endless paper chase of postwar Iraq.
But this document was different. In three different places on the third and final page, someone had clumsily dabbed corrective fluid to conceal what was written beneath. They even went so far as to conceal the corrective fluid itself, scrawling over top with a pen.
In someone else’s hands this vexing piece of paper might have been tossed aside on to history’s scrap heap.
Only a few hours earlier, after all, it lay on the floor of a room in the bombed-out headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq’s dreaded internal security service, left untouched by CIA operatives who had already combed the premises.
But Amir wasn’t finished.
“I need a blade,” he announced firmly, frustrated by his lack of progress by fingernail. “There’s something here they don’t want us to see.”
Intrigued, I broke into the war bag, handing him a scalpel knife blade from the med kit.
It did the trick.
The corrective fluid began to break off in tiny, tidy chunks, revealing letter by letter the Arabic name beneath.
As the mystery slowly unravelled, Amir’s eyes grew wider. Finally, he leapt from the bed in stunned disbelief. “What? What have you got,” I asked.
“It says bin Laden. It says bin Laden,” he bellowed, jumping in the air.
It was my turn to sit in stunned disbelief, as I watched Amir turn his head to the heavens and whisper “Thanks to God.”
In the minutes to come, we regained composure, biting our lips as Amir worked away at the rest of the document with the knife blade, as if performing open-heart surgery. A second blob of corrective fluid came off, revealing another “bin Laden.” And then a third.
Together with Inigo Gilmore, The Sunday Telegraph reporter with whom I have been working since we arrived together in Baghdad, we then gave ourselves a reality check.
No offence to Amir, we said, calling in another translator. And another. Each verified the words in our hands. A photographer was summoned and the images were digitally transmitted to our newspapers in Toronto and London, where another translator confirmed the text.
Next question to self: is this for real?
Opponents of war on Iraq, after all, had long dismissed the notion of an Osama-Saddam connection as the weakest of all canards, a late-breaking argument among the multiple-choice reasons for U.S. invasion designed for a domestic audience still traumatized by the Sept. 11 attacks.
In other words, is it a plant?
We thought not. And after hours of further consideration, we are certain of it. The document in question is in every way possible entirely like the hundreds of others we’ve been poring over in our spare hours these many nights in the safety of our hotel room while intermittent gunfire pops away in the distance.
The Mukhabarat was indeed a scary place, but it also suffered from the clogged approvals-in-quadruplicate bureaucracy that was endemic under Saddam’s Iraq.
The margin notes and counter-signatures throughout these pages from various mid- to high-level functionaries are virtually identical to the rest of the paper in our stack.
And the ham-fisted attempt to cover-up the link is entirely in keeping with the bumbling, chronically inefficient style of Iraqi officialdom so well known to those of us who spent time here in Saddam’s day.
It is no surprise to us, given the gargantuan scale of the Mukhabarat facility, with so many of its more than a dozen buildings a bombed, burned and looted wreck, that this little sheaf failed to be fed into the Iraqi shredding machines as the regime suddenly fell.
Nor is it a surprise that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, whose spooks were the first to comb through the rubble, managed not to come up with this one among literally hundreds of thousands of remnant papers blowing over its vast, tree-lined grounds.
Especially considering its exact location. The document was pulled from box folders scattered inside what we believe to be the second-floor accounting office of one of the worst hit buildings on the grounds.
The six-floor concrete structure was so badly damaged by American air strikes its front entrance is no longer accessible.
If someone wishing to plant such a document wanted it found, why would it be in such an unlikely setting.
And why indeed would anyone bother fussing over something that took so much painstaking work to uncover, when the next paper is only a short reach away?
Anyone but the dogged Amir, that is.
We conclude that it is what it is, no more and no less. An envoy of Osama bin Laden did indeed visit Baghdad for talks in March of 1998, as a guest of Saddam’s Iraq.
Whether those talks took place, or whether there were more to follow, it does not say.
Whether this is the tip of the iceberg — or, in fact, the whole of it — only time will tell.
Why wasn't what picked up b 4? the link between Binny and Sohdum?
As far as the proof, I would imagine the answer to be that the proof refered to by the U.S. is classified. In other words, proof to the U.S. government that they don't think they can reveal to just anybody.
[/QUOTE]
Well the boy wonder got one of the questions right. Yes that link. Why wasnt it used even before attacking Afghanistan? Saddam WMD with links to OBL. Hmm OBL might be in Afghanistan but it would be smarter to take out the WMD before he gets them.
Classified my ass. Powell said they would be declassified. For a govt that has lied to its people most of their lives you hold alot of faith in it.
British Intelligence officials have expressed doubt that Saddam Hussein established any working relationship with Al Qaeda despite the discovery of documents showing that an “envoy” for Osama bin Laden visited Baghdad in 1998.
The documents were found by The Sunday Telegraph at the bombed-out Baghdad headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq’s Intelligence service, and were hailed yesterday as positive proof of an Iraqi link to Al Qaeda. They mentioned the arrival of a confidant of bin Laden who had travelled to Baghdad from Khartoum in March 1998. Bin Laden was based in Sudan until 1996.
Officials told The Times that there had been intelligence indicators about that time of a possible visit to Baghdad by someone purporting to represent Al Qaeda. There had been no evidence of any follow-up meetings to suggest that Baghdad had forged a long-term partnership with Al Qaeda.
According to The Sunday Telegraph report, the purpose of the March 1998 meeting was to establish a relationship on the basis of Iraq and Al Qaeda’s mutual hatred of the United States and Saudi Arabia. Because of the sensitivity of the meeting, the Iraqi agents who wrote the documents had covered bin Laden’s name with correcting fluid. Once it was removed, the name was visible, the report claimed.
There is pressure on Western Intelligence services to provide governments with their own assessment of the thousands of secret files that were abandoned when Saddam’s regime collapsed.
On the Al Qaeda link to Saddam’s regime, Britain has taken a robust line against the Americans who insist there was a connection. Washington gave the link as one of the reasons for toppling Saddam. Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) has always rejected the idea of a link.
When did OBL leave Sudan and take refuge in Afghanistan? Wasn't it 1998? May be before moving to Afghanistan he weighed an option to move to Iraq as it was closer to Sudan??
Latest News: CNN has recently announced that Eye-raq was recently piling up chemical and biological weapons in Bag-Dad. It was found recently when one of Sad-aam’s right hand man captured by American forces accepted the fact that Saddam was farting too much.
Gimme a break, we all have link to something and the root of every link goes to Adam so what do you say "Adam also met OBL as proven by CIA, documents found near Afghanistan”.
If you are talking to me on this forum and you have links to Al-Qaida, is that gonna make a member too.
[QUOTE] Originally posted by salman_2you: *
**Latest News: CNN has recently announced that Eye-raq was recently piling up chemical and biological weapons in Bag-Dad. It was found recently when one of Sad-aam’s right hand man captured by American forces...*
[/QUOTE]
um... i think that's called 'give me a greencard and i'll tell you what you want to hear'.
Anyone who knows anything about Saddam hussein and Usama Bin Laden will tell you, UBL's split with Saudi's was over one fundemantal issue, when Saddam invaded Kuwait he told the Saudi's that he could organise the defence of the KSA and possibly remove Saddam from Kuwait.
Saddam would have contacted any country or group after 1991, in order to find a way to take on the US, he had even sent rep's to Serbia, to find out how they managed to shoot down a Stealth Fighter. Contact between Intelligence Agencies, even of opponents is not exactly uncommon.
