Examining the Iraq-al Qaeda Connection

Michael Goldfarb of the Weekly Standard has an interesting piece on the (perhaps intentionally) confusing picture sown by the media concerning al Qaeda ties to Iraq.

He specifically examines the nature and extent of any relationship the two may have had:

Let me make a more basic point. A relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda need not have been "operational" to have warranted military action to eliminate it. The Clinton Administration, for example, argued repeatedly that Iraq supplied assistance to al Qaeda on chemical weapons. Such as relationship, if that's as far as it went, would not have qualified as "operational," but certainly would have been -- and was -- cause for tremendous concern.

The piece reminds us that even 911 co-chair Tom Kean said, "There was no question in our minds that there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda."

Looking back at what the Clinton administration knew and believed, the Weekly Standard in 2004 says:

On February 17, 1998, President Clinton, speaking at the Pentagon, warned of the "reckless acts of outlaw nations and an unholy axis of terrorists, drug traffickers and organized international criminals." These "predators of the twenty-first century," he said, these enemies of America, "will be all the more lethal if we allow them to build arsenals of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and missiles to deliver them. We simply cannot allow that to happen. There is no more clear example of this threat than Saddam Hussein's Iraq."

Later that spring, the Clinton Justice Department prepared an indictment of Osama bin Laden. The relevant passage, prominently placed in the fourth paragraph, reads:

Al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the government of Iraq.

Patrick Fitzgerald, a U.S. attorney involved in the preparation of the indictment, testified before the 9/11 Commission. He said the intelligence behind that assertion came from Jamal al Fadl, a former high-ranking al Qaeda terrorist who before the 9/11 attacks gave the U.S intelligence community its first intimate look at al Qaeda. According to Fitzgerald, al Fadl told his interrogators that bin Laden associate Mamdouh Mahmud Salim (Abu Hajer al Iraqi) "tried to reach a sort of agreement where they wouldn't work against each other--sort of the enemy of my enemy is my friend--and that there were indications that within Sudan when al Qaeda was there,
which al Qaeda left in the summer of '96, or the spring of '96, there were efforts to work on jointly acquiring weapons."

The article continues on to say that after our two embassies were bombed in Africa, the Clinton administration cited an Iraq-al Qaeda connection as justification for the strike on the pharmaceutical plant in Sudan.

On August 24, 1998, the Clinton administration made available a "senior intelligence official" who cited "strong ties between the plant and Iraq." The following day, Thomas Pickering, undersecretary of state for political affairs and one of a handful of Clinton officials involved in the decision to strike al Shifa, briefed foreign reporters at the National Press Club. He was asked directly whether he knew "of any connection between the so-called pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum and the Iraqi government in regard to production of precursors of VX" nerve gas.

Yeah, I would like to consult my notes just to be sure that what I have to say is stated clearly and correctly. We see evidence that we think is quite clear on contacts between Sudan and Iraq. In fact, al Shifa officials, early in the company's history, we believe were in touch with Iraqi individuals associated with Iraq's VX program.

More on the connection:

Berger explained that al Shifa was a dual-use facility. "We had physical evidence indicating that al Shifa was the site of chemical weapons activity," Berger wrote. "Other products were made at al Shifa. But we have seen such dual-use plants before--in Iraq. And, indeed, we have information that Iraq has assisted chemical weapons activity in Sudan."

Richard Clarke, a former counterterrorism official under both Clinton and Bush, confirmed this in an interview with the Washington Post on January 23, 1999. Clarke said the U.S. government was "sure" Iraq was behind the VX precursor produced at the factory. The story continued, "Clarke said U.S. intelligence does not know how much of the substance was produced at al Shifa or what happened to it. But he said that intelligence exists linking bin Laden to al Shifa's current and past operators, the Iraqi nerve gas experts, and the National Islamic Front in Sudan."

The article also says that Clinton Defense Secretary William Cohen testified before the September 11 Commission on March 23, 2004 that an executive from the pharmaceutical plant "traveled to Baghdad to meet with the father of the VX program."

Still more from the 2004 Weekly Standard article:

But now the New York Times--a newspaper heretofore dismissive of the Iraq-al Qaeda connection--has revealed the contents of an Iraqi Intelligence document that discusses the Iraq-bin Laden "relationship" and plans for bin Laden to work with Iraq against the ruling family in Saudi Arabia. The document states that "cooperation between the two organizations should be allowed to develop freely through discussion and agreement."

So, we see a lot of information pointing to an Iraq-al Qaeda connection, whether it was an "operational" relationship or merely one of opportunity.

Yet, according to the anti-war Left, we are supposed to believe that President Bush is holding the bag? We are supposed to believe that Bush made the whole thing up because of some imperialistic neocon conspiracy? We are supposed to believe Bush fabricated an Iraq-al Qaeda connection that even they admitted was not substantiated as "operational" so they could plunder the oil fields of Iraq?

How is it we are to conveniently forget about all the officials from the previous, pre-911 administration, even Clinton himself, who had evidence of an Iraq-al Qaeda connection and believed in such a connection, even believing WMD activity was occuring?