WASHINGTON,
D.C. – U.S. Representative Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Chief Deputy Whip, issued
today’s “Bush Administration’s Misstatement of the Day” on contacts between
Iraq and Al Qaeda:
In
a March 19, 2003 letter to Congress, President Bush declared that diplomacy
alone cannot solve the situation in Iraq and that he was authorized to
use force against “nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized,
committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11,
2001.”
However,
on 9/17/03, President Bush finally admitted:
“No,
we've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with September the
11th.” (Bush Disavows Hussein-Sept. 11 Link; Administration Has Been
Vague on Issue, but President Says No Evidence Found. Washington Post,
9/18/03)
Schakowsky
said, “One of President Bush’s leading justification for going to war in
Iraq has come tumbling down, but the true believers in the Administration
continue to mislead the American people. There is no evidence liking
Iraq to 9/11 or Al Qaeda.”
Even
after President Bush’s admission, members of his administration are still
trying to leave the impression that Iraq was involved in the terrorist
attacks of 9/11 by linking it to those really responsible for the tragedy
of 9/11. Deputy Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz, said on Sunday
(9/21/03) during a New School University Forum in New York:
“Iraq
did have contacts with Al Qaeda.” (New York Times, 9/22/03)
Yet,
once again, there is no evidence. As reported in the New York
Times on June 27, 2003, “The chairman of the monitoring group appointed
by the United Nations Security Council to track Al Qaeda told reporters
that his team had found no evidence linking Al Qaeda to Saddam Hussein.”
And
a story in the November 4, 2002 Los Angeles Times reported that
U.S. allies fighting Al Qaeda in Europe found no evidence of an Iraqi-Qaeda
connection. (See Below)
Allies
Find No Links Between Iraq, Al Qaeda
Evidence
isn't there, officials in Europe say, adding that an attack on Hussein
would worsen the threat of terrorism by Islamic radicals.
By
Sebastian Rotella
Times
Staff Writer
November
4, 2002
PARIS
-- As the Bush administration prepares for a possible military attack on
Iraq that it describes as the next logical step in its war on terror, some
of its strongest front-line allies in that war dispute Washington's allegations
that the Baghdad regime has significant ties to Al Qaeda.
In
recent interviews, top investigative magistrates, prosecutors, police and
intelligence officials who have been fighting Al Qaeda in Europe said they
are concerned about attempts by President Bush and his aides to link Iraqi
President Saddam Hussein to Osama bin Laden's terror network.
"We
have found no evidence of links between Iraq and Al Qaeda," said Jean-Louis
Bruguiere, the French judge who is the dean of the region's investigators
after two decades fighting Islamic and Middle Eastern terrorists. "And
we are working on 50 cases involving Al Qaeda or radical Islamic cells.
I think if there were such links, we would have found them. But we have
found no serious connections whatsoever."
Even
in Britain, a loyal U.S. partner in the campaign against Iraq, it's hard
to find anyone in the government making the case that Al Qaeda and the
Iraqi regime are close allies. In fact, European counter-terrorist veterans
who are working with American counterparts worry that an attack on Iraq,
especially a unilateral U.S. invasion, would worsen the threat of radical
Islamic terrorism worldwide and impede their work.
"A
war on Iraq will not diminish the terrorist threat. It will probably increase
it," said Baltasar Garzon, Spain's best-known investigative magistrate,
who is prosecuting Al Qaeda suspects in Madrid as alleged accomplices in
the Sept. 11 attacks. "It could radicalize the situation in the Middle
East.... As for the investigations of Sept. 11, doors would close in the
Arab world that have helped in the fight against Al Qaeda. And a war would
do nothing to bolster the investigation into the attacks in the United
States."
The
European critics aren't limited to the usual suspects: instinctively anti-American,
pro-Arab politicians and pundits whose voices are often the loudest in
the Iraq debate here. On the contrary, Bruguiere, Garzon and other investigators
have won praise from U.S. officials for their tough tactics and proven
willingness to lock up suspected terrorists during the past year.
Even
before Sept. 11, long-running cases in Europe were valuable resources for
U.S. investigators working to learn more about Islamic networks. Investigations
in France, Spain and elsewhere have helped build cases against Zacarias
Moussaoui, an alleged accomplice of the hijackers who awaits trial in Virginia,
and other suspects.
The
criticism in Europe reinforces the misgivings of some U.S. congressional
leaders and intelligence officials about hawks in the Bush administration
who allege that Iraq could have even played a role in the Sept. 11 attacks.
Critics say that the evidence is weak and that intelligence agencies are
feeling political pressure to implicate Iraq in terrorism.
In
the last two months, Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary
Donald H. Rumsfeld and others have periodically revived and expanded on
the allegations.
On
Friday, Bush specifically linked Hussein to the terrorist network. "We
know he's got ties with Al Qaeda," Bush said during an election rally in
New Hampshire. "A nightmare scenario, of course, is that he becomes the
arsenal for a terrorist network, where they could attack America and he'd
leave no fingerprints behind. He is a problem."
The
U.S. leaders have made much of a supposed meeting between Mohamed Atta,
the leader of the Sept. 11 hijackers, and an Iraqi spy in Prague, the Czech
capital, last year. They have cited "bulletproof evidence," in Rumsfeld's
words, of the recent presence of Al Qaeda members in Iraq and of contacts
between senior Al Qaeda figures and the Baghdad regime that allegedly go
back years. They have accused Iraq of training Al Qaeda terrorists in the
use of chemical weapons.
Premise
Called Flawed
European
experts say they haven't seen U.S. proof or been able to confirm the accusations
independently. The Europeans say the premise is flawed because Hussein
embodies the kind of secular Arab dictators whom Bin Laden has sworn to
bring down.
Talk
of an Iraq-Al Qaeda connection is "nonsense," said a high-ranking source
in the German intelligence community. "Not even the Americans believe it
anymore."
The
German government has resolutely opposed a potential war on Iraq, partly
out of domestic electoral calculations. And it has angered Washington in
the process. France has pursued a diplomatic offensive to tone down a proposed
U.S. resolution at the United Nations mandating aggressive weapons inspections
in Iraq, while asserting that it could accept military action approved
by the U.N.
In
contrast, Britain, Spain and Italy have indicated that they would support
a U.S.-led attack even if the U.N. process breaks down.
Yet
Spain's Garzon breaks ranks with his government when it comes to Iraq.
The famously independent judge considers himself a leftist and has criticized
the indefinite imprisonment of terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,
although his anti-corruption probes and battle against Basque separatist
terrorists have made him enemies on the left as well.
"I
have seen no link to Al Qaeda. No one has demonstrated it to me," Garzon
said. "And therefore we have to be very careful not to confuse the citizens.
One thing is that you don't like the Iraqi regime, that Saddam Hussein
is a dictator. But there are many terrible dictators. That's not a reason
to start a war with all the consequences it could have for millions of
innocents."
Of
all the intelligence services in the world, British agencies probably work
the closest with U.S. spies. The sharing of sensitive information appeared
evident in a British government dossier in September that laid out charges
about Hussein's program to develop weapons of mass destruction. The report
closely resembled Washington's accounts of Iraq's arsenal.
The
British have been much quieter when it comes to any alliance between Iraq
and Al Qaeda, however. Asked about the matter Wednesday, Foreign Secretary
Jack Straw sounded diplomatic.
"It
could well be the case that there were links, active links, between Al
Qaeda and the Iraqi regime before Sept. 11," Straw said. "What I'm asked
is if I've seen any evidence of that. And the answer is: I haven't."
No
Prague Meeting
Straw
said there is some evidence of such links during the past year but did
not elaborate. And on a crucial point, he and his aides made it clear that
the allegations of a meeting in Prague between Atta and an Iraqi intelligence
agent — Exhibit A for U.S. hawks who accuse Hussein of having a hand in
the Sept. 11 plot — have been disproved.
In
other countries with considerable expertise, investigators said they have
come across scattered examples of limited connections: An Iraqi member
of Al Qaeda turned up in an Italian case. There are signs of Al Qaeda suspects
moving through Iraq en route to other countries before and after Sept.
11, according to Spanish and French law enforcement.
But
European investigators said the Al Qaeda presence is stronger in Pakistan,
Syria, Yemen and Iran than it is in Iraq. Since the war in Afghanistan,
Iran in particular has become a busy refuge for Bin Laden's operatives,
according to French investigators.
And
Saudi Arabia, officially a U.S. ally, has been deeply involved in the worldwide
funding mechanism that helps sustain Al Qaeda operations as well as fundamentalist
ideologues active in recruitment of terrorists and the theology of violence,
European investigators said.
"If
connections to a country are going to be the rationale, the Americans would
have to bomb Saudi Arabia," a Spanish official said sarcastically.
Bruguiere,
the French judge, took issue with the idea that an invasion of Iraq would
make the world safer from terrorism.
The
main thing that Iraq and Al Qaeda have in common is enmity toward the United
States, according to Bruguiere and others. That is not enough to create
an alliance, but it could cause a resurgent Al Qaeda to exploit a U.S.
military operation that produced civilian casualties and an extended occupation
of Iraq, the same way Al Qaeda uses the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to
whip up resentment of the West.
A
U.S. military intervention in Iraq could "globalize anti-American and anti-Western
sentiment," Bruguiere said. "Attacking Iraq would intensify Islamic terrorism,
not reduce it." |