Responding to Kennedy on Iraq III: "Iraq & Al Qaeda"

3. Al Qaeda and Iraq

Kennedy said, "The 9/11 Commission has dismissed the al Qaeda connection"

"Dismissed" implies that according to the commission there was no connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq--but that is not what the report says.

In an article in the National Review, Andrew McCarthy quotes the commission's report, Statement No. 15:

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.

McCarthy points out:

Just taken on its own terms, this paragraph is both internally inconsistent and ambiguously worded. First, it cannot be true both that the Sudanese arranged contacts between Iraq and bin Laden and that no "ties existed between al Qaeda and Iraq." If the first proposition is so, then the "[t]wo senior Bin Laden associates" who are the sources of the second are either lying or misinformed.

The argument that the connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda is stronger and more formal than what the committee concludes can be found in the article "Case Closed:
From the November 24, 2003 issue: The U.S. government's secret memo detailing cooperation between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden"

See also:

Responding to Kennedy on Iraq I: "Imminent Threat"
Responding to Kennedy on Iraq II: "The Rush to War"
Responding to Kennedy on Iraq IV: "WMD"
Responding to Kennedy on Iraq V: "Niger"

Technorati Tag: Iraq War.