1.) “RE: Iraq SCUD. If UNSCOM had evidence that Iraq had fired a SCUD at Saudi Arabia, they had ample time to present that evidence to the Security Council, likewise for the US and Saudi Arabia. That they didn’t suggests that the “unconfirmed” report is unconfirmed for a reason. As for Ritter and Rolf, both proved to be wrong about WMD (though Ritter later corrected himself), so if they want to wax on eloquently in their books about evidence of an Iraqi SCUD that they never produced they can go right ahead”

You can’t possibly be suggesting that Iraq accounted for all its SCUDs.

“RE: North Korea, It’s quite a different situation though as South Korea could invoke Article 51 if it were invaded by North Korea; if North Korea though say captures a US warship in international waters, and accuses the crew of spying and keeps the ship; then the US/South Korea would need additional authorization for the use of force.”

By the time South Korea could even invoke article 51, Seoul could have fallen, and the government seized. The point of a cease-fire is temporary. Everyone agrees that technically DPRK and ROK are still at war. Or are you trying to say that the Korean War was ended by a permanent cease-fire and the nations are not at war? This scenario is very much like the one between Iraq and the world though simpler. imo

There is some confusion regarding the need for a second resolution, most every international law expert agrees that a second resolution was needed and 678 did not carry over past the 1990 mandate. This is my stance as well. The State Department sees things differently, mostly because they are advocating a particular policy, and are carrying out the wishes of policy-makers. In the first of these articles Richard Perle states that he think the Iraq war was probably illegal under international law but still morally justified, and in the second article the authors outline why 678 was not applicable to the current situation.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1089158,00.html
http://www.globelaw.com/Iraq/Preventive_war_after_iraq.htm#_Toc41379597

“most every international law expert agrees”

….oh come on. There are no international law experts at the State Department? This “most every” comment is pure speculation and distortion aimed to bolster an argument that is oxymoronic at its core. To suggest or say that removing a dictator is immoral isn’t just incorrect, it’s an oxymoron for leaving one in power is what’s immoral (to say nothing of boosting them or directly putting them in power). I’m sure you can find international law experts who will say it was immoral, but I am equally confident of three things. First, the State Department probably has international law experts too. Second, 678 DID carry over past the 1990 mandate (particularly since Desert Storm took place in 1991 not 1990, and because most of the 17 subsequent resolutions reiterate 678 the authorization to use force). To be specific, the authorization to use force (“paragraph 2 resolution 678 (1990)”) was reaffirmed (see also UN949 October 15, 1994 for just one example: “reaffirming resolutions 678 (1990) of 29 November 1990, … and in particular paragraph 2 of resolution 678 (1990)”, [ie. Again specifically reaffirming the authorization to use force]). To reaffirm is to say it is still in effect. Lastly, cease-fires are temporary, and while they can be permanent if both sides maintain them, they are not inherently permanent.

“687 is completely different from 678, and no automatic trigger for war existed within its structure. The entire Security Council had to “remain seized” of the matter, meaning that only they could decide as a whole if a violation of 687 took place and if so what the punishment should be.”

You’re speculating. As there is no stated trigger for resumption of hostilities, there is also no stated need for a re-authorization. Instead, reiteration of the original authorization is repeated in the subsequent resolutions.

“687 only referred to the sanctions regime, and Iraq’s compliance with 687 would mean sanctions would be lifted, Iraq’s non-compliance means that sanctions would stay in place. So my evidence that the 1991 “cease-fire” was permanent is as follows.
1) The United Nations deemed the matter of 1990/1991 settled as the Security Council did not pass any resolution that authorized force against Iraq, nor did the UN offer its good offices to mediate a peace between the US and Iraq.”

Complete speculation as the war was between the UN and Iraq not the US and Iraq

“2.) The US was never put on a war footing with Iraq during the 1990s. President Clinton said some mean things about Saddam, and may not have liked him, but he never declared that we are still at war with Iraq, and never prepared the nation for any such war.

Sure it was. It was on a constant war footing. When Shia and Kurds rose up from 1991-1993, Iraq was certainly at a war footing as well as past that. There was never a peaceful stand down of Iraqi forces, and I’d love to see an example of a non-martial Saddam society. The conflict between the UN/US and Iraq was far from just “saying things” as I listed the hostile, combat actions and acts of war in the chronology link many posts earlier. Clinton certainly DID prepare the nation for war with Iraq on 4 different occasions. How exactly does that work…
Clinton bombs Iraq in 1993, addresses nation, says he bombed Iraq for violation of cease fire, but bombing isn’t an act of war?

Clinton sends brigades to Kuwait in 1994 because Iraq re-invaded Kuwait and ran away before UN could even pull a Monty Python, “Stop! Or I’ll say, ‘Stop!’ again”, tells press corps that Iraq isn’t complying with cease fire, gets nation ready to accept resumption of straight up open war, and it isn’t an act of war?

Clinton bombs Iraq in 1995, addresses nation, says he bombed Iraq for violation of cease fire, but bombing isn’t an act of war?

Clinton bombs Iraq in 1997, addresses nation, says he bombed Iraq for violation of cease fire, but bombing isn’t an act of war?

Clinton bombs Iraq in Spring 1998, addresses nation, says he bombed Iraq for violation of cease fire, but bombing isn’t an act of war?

Clinton threatens to bomb Iraq in November1998, addresses nation, recalled bombers while in flight, but somehow didn’t give the nation the impression to be ready for all out hostilities again?

Clinton bombs Iraq in December 1998, addresses nation, says he bombed Iraq for violation of cease fire, but bombing isn’t an act of war? (recall that this is what set the 911 plot in motion specifically carrying it from campfire brainstorm and rant to active, authorized plot per 911 Commission)

3.) Iraq was also never really on a war footing with the US. Sure Saddam said some things and he had AAA fire away at a few US planes (that were far out of range), but his priority was still on lifting sanctions, and not war with the US.

I agree and have said that he had learned his lesson and was waging a conventional war with the US. To have done so would have been insane as defined by trying the same thing over and over and getting the same results while expecting different ones.

2.) “Retirement is a good punishment for terrorists?”

Whatever fate befell Nidal (suicide, murder, cancer) he long ago became irrelevant. Some terrorists become politicians (Gerry Adams) others are still alive and were never brought to justice (Chin Peng), still others are very much relevant and active in terrorism (bin Laden), so Nidal’s fate is satisfactory to me.

“A Palestinian source in the West Bank city of Ramallah said Iraqi authorities had discovered Abu Nidal had opened channels to Iraqi guerrillas in Syria and Jordan opposed to President Saddam Hussein and wanted to put a stop to the activity before any US military operations against Iraq.
Other sources in Ramallah said Abu Nidal shot himself because he had cancer and was addicted to painkillers.”
http://www.caroptionsonline.com/2002news/08222002/world/20426.htm

I’m certain I heard something about staying away from unconfirmed single source reports. You’re still sticking to the idea that he shot himself several times to commit suicide?

3.) “I’m not going to get into a debate with you over FBI/CIA interrogations. I cited the FBI interrogation because it was cited in the ISG report and the SSCI report. I don’t know why the FBI and not the DIA interrogated Saddam, I only know he was classified as a POW by the DOD. I never stated the comments cane from non-prisoners but by regime figures not charged with crimes, including military commanders; not all of them were lying unless you believe all POWs lie, or all Iraqis lie.”

I don’t believe all POWs lie or that all Iraqis lie, but I do believe a free man’s words are more reliable than those of men proclaiming their innocence on death row, and this litany of corroborating sources you’ve pointed to remains mia. Trusting claims of innocence and compliance from Saddam Hussein is folly.

4.) “Each case is different; Saddam specifically told his staff he believed eventually the US would cut a deal with him because of his oil. Venezuela exports oil to the US despite its leader’s rhetoric (which makes you wonder how serious Chavez is).
http

Cool, we agree again. Each case IS different. Please show me where Saddam’s staff said he expected to cut a deal with the US because of oil. I’m interested.

5.) “I didn’t see any of those reports about foreign fighters during the invasion. Even if I had I would be dubious of any “initial” reports, seeing as we got burned regarding the WMD issue (barrels of uranium already marked and sealed by the IAEA were unsealed by the US Army and the Army then declared that Iraq had WMD). The IPP report didn’t specify what happened to the non-Iraqi “fighters”, there was no detail as to how many and where they came from and where they went in the IPP report. Indeed it doesn’t say if those fighters swore loyalty oaths to Saddam, given specific orders by Saddam, etc. so it’s mere speculation.”

If you didn’t see them, it might be because you didn’t want to and were looking for ways to dismiss pre-war claims rather than seeking confirmation of pre-war claims. The fact remains, very credible people who were there saw, fought, and many good men died fighting foreign fighters by the thousands in Saddam’s Iraq. I listed but a few of the sources earlier. Intelligence reporting, detainees, first hand accounts, even video documentaries on The History Channel, Discovery Channel, National Geographic Channel, CNN, Fox, etc…all show people on the scene describing how they encountered and fought foreign fighters at terrorist training camps. This is not something hidden, secret, or speculative. Real people died fighting them. Too many people too often clamp their eyes shut rather than being willing to open them and see the reports. If it doesn’t fit an anti-war perspective, then move on and keep looking for something that does or something that can be spun to fit.

“Ansar al-Islam was an Islamist Kurdish group that wanted to overthrow the secular Kurdish leadership, so of course it’s going to assassinate secular Kurdish generals; but they weren’t very good at it, it took them three tries to kill one general. Once the war started they were scattered to the four winds. One detainee stated that Abu Wael was an IIS agent (amazing how you’ll believe detainees when it suits your agenda), but the SSCI states that Iraq was gathering information against Ansar.”

Equally amazing how you too believe detainees when it fits your agenda. The difference here is that Wael’s testimony is corroborated, and while you’ve said that others believed Saddam believed he could cut an oil deal with the US, you haven’t provided any examples. Wael’s testimony is corroborated by at least 2 other detainees (possibly 3), captured documents, and first hand accounts of what the US SOF found at the Ansar camps. That Ansar shared the same objective as Saddam-overthrow the Kurds, supports the claims that they would work together (as intelligence pre and post war claimed and as confirmed immediately after the fall of Saddam). It also weakens the argument that Saddam (who constantly called for jihad and worked hard to feign his faux revived Islamiacism) would never work with jihadis (unless one trusts the word of a captured dictator proclaiming his innocence on death row in the presence of his lawyers).

6.) It seems to me you have trouble distinguishing what a terrorist is. This all goes back to the semantic debate we had earlier regarding insurgents. Bruce Hoffman, perhaps the world’s pre-eminent authority on international terrorism defines it thusly:

* ineluctably political in aims and motives;
* violent — or, equally important, threatens violence;
* designed to have far-reaching psychological repercussions beyond the immediate victim or target;
* conducted by an organization with an identifiable chain of command or conspiratorial cell structure (whose members wear no uniform or identifying insignia); and
* perpetrated by a subnational group or non-state entity.

However odious the tactics of Saddam Fedeyeen and like-minded militia, the tactics themselves were not borne from political motives but military, and the tactics were not perpetrated by a subnational or non-state entity; thus they cannot be terrorists. Like I said this goes back to the argument over what is or isn’t an insurgency. The MRLA was considered a terrorist group by the British Empire, but history remembers it as an insurgent group. Likewise were the PAGIC, MPLA, ZAPA, ANC terrorist groups or insurgencies? All these groups utilized what you would define as “terrorist” tactics yet all are now in power in Africa.

The Martyrs of Saddam used terrorist tactics and are by most accounts thus terrorists, but I’ll go further and ask if the definition of a terrorist is one who “ineluctably political in aims and motives” then what are the political motives of Al Queda or the thousands of foreign fighters encountered by the USMC and 3rd ID during the invasion of Iraq? If they had religious objectives instead of political (crying Allah Ahkbar instead of Long live Iraq), then they’re not terrorists? You’ve listed very clearly political terrorist groups to support the theory that all terrorists have political aims, but ignored completely any and all Islamic holy warriors. They’re HOLY warriors-not political warriors. They fight for the misperception of what their religion directs…not for politics.

7.) “I’m not the one that needs to be convinced regarding US support for Israel. There is however a perception on the so-called Arab street that the US has leverage over Israel or that the US could apply pressure to Israel, but the fact that the US doesn’t do these things (regardless of the reasons behind it), only makes bin Laden and his ilk angrier.”

An interesting argument. Seriously. By that same standard, one could say that since anti-war protesters protested against invading Iraq, they emboldened Saddam because they didn’t put pressure on Saddam. I’m of the mindset that the so-called Arab Street uses US support for Israel as an excuse, and even when the US does exert some pressure, it’s declared not enough. I would ask, where is the outcry against those who are terrorists and keep giving excuses for Israel to “defend itself” by attacking terrorists?

“As to Muslim “Holy” Lands, I am merely trying to reinforce the point that Al Qaeda, and the jihadists before them fight for Moslems against non-Moslems in (perceived) Moslem lands. Why did Osama go to Afghanistan in the 1980s, was it at the behest of Saddam, to fight Americans, or to fight non-Moslems on Moslem land? It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out why al Qaeda was formed, and what its’ ideology is all about, and thus why they hate America.”

America occupied Chechnya? America invaded Afghanistan? I understand that they claim it’s about occupying Moslem lands, but does that mean the US and the West should abandon all lands with Moslems? The US should leave Detroit? Spain should give up the South of its country? Nah, I think these guys are killers who use Islam as a cover and an excuse for their killing. The US doesn’t is not an occupier in Saudi, and wasn’t occupying Afghanistan or Iraq until long after UBL reformed AQ and went on his tirade about occupying Moslem lands. That “occupation” thing is just another excuse. They’re just killers.

8.) “That’s all very interesting and informative; I had not heard any of this before. There are two slight problems I have with it though. If Iraq only helped with the Sullivans attack (which failed) and used local (Yemeni) bomb-makers unaffiliated with AQ, and then backed away once the attack failed, leaving the Yemeni terrorists with only Al Qaeda to turn to, doesn’t that still make the Cole attack an Al Qaeda operation, and doesn’t really prove ties between Iraq and AQ (Iraq and local dumb Yemenis sure, but not AQ)? The second problem I have is that I am assuming all this information was known prior to the 2003 invasion so why wasn’t it used to bolster the case for war?”

There’s a perception among many that the Administration went on some sort of cherry-picking hunt to for info that could make up a war. I say that what’s more consistent isnt’ that they’re warmongering liars, but screwups. If they wanted to make a case or “bolster” a case for war, they could have just pointed to the anthrax attacks and spun those, or the ricin attacks at the time. Nah. They were given conflicting intel re Iraq and AQ, and having been charged with the security of the nation chose to look at the threatening intel and saw it as threatening. Why not include the Cole? In addition to the misperception that a war mongering admin was searching high and low for ‘excuses’ or ways to “bolster” a case for war, I think the Cole was far too much of a reminder to people that the Admin was a dove until post 911. The Cole, failure to prevent and failure to respond was a disaster, a huge embarrassment. It’s why people don’t talk about it today. That comparatively tiny event had massive strategic impact on Al Queda’s war against the US. It confirmed their belief that the US is a paper tiger with no will for a real fight. Lastly, there is a pattern of Russian involvement with Iraq that makes things very hard to address without creating at the very least an awkward situation with the Russians, and at the most a serious crisis. So, the list of reasons to sweep the Cole attack under the rug is longer than the list of reasons to bring it out beyond merely mentioning it from time to time. It’s just that simple.

9.) “RE: Iraq documents Well this is the reason I responded to your post because isn’t Iraq document exploitation addressed here:
“The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which is leading the exploitation of documents (DOCEX) uncovered in Iraq, told Committee staff that 120 million plus pages of documents that were recovered in Iraq have received an initial review for intelligence information. As of January 2006, 34 million pages have been translated and summarized to some extent and are available to analysts in an Intelligence Community database.”

That was a year and a half ago, and yes I’ve read Stephen Hayes’s piece in the Weekly Standard about how an “initial review” only means they read the cover page, etc. but how much detail to you need to go into before you figure out their talking about WMD or terrorists. So if the DIA is confident that no new documents will surface indicating a relationship, what basis do you have to argue with them?”

That quote says nothing at all about DIA claims that nothing new will be found in the remaining 90 million pages of docs. The Senate Intelligence Committee/agency makes that claim, and they’re no more an intelligence agency than Doug Feith’s OSP was.

“As for state-sponsorship my definition follows Daniel Byman’s: he worked for the CIA as a Middle East analyst, got his PHD from MIT, a 9/11 Commission adviser, and the head of Georgetown’s Security Studies program. Most if not all terrorist groups require strong or passive support from states in order to survive. Al Qaeda did have some passive support from the Taliban, but only in so far as allowing them safe haven. Operationally Al Qaeda was autonomous and remains so to this day, even more so since the collapse of the Taliban.”

Exactly. Earlier you said that, “A terrorist organization that is sponsored by a state cannot live without that state support.” And my point is that because AQ gets its support from multiple states and multiple other sources….it can survive without the active support of a single entity. You might want to re-read the part about passive support as well as I think that’s integral to the matter. Also, the part about AQ being operationally autonomous is incorrect as Iran and Syria help out Al Queda a great deal as do entities directly and indirectly in Saudi, Pakistan, and elsewhere; passively and actively. Terrorism is cheap, but it ain’t free.

10.) “Well okay AQ knows how to use RPG-7, Somalis know how to use RPG-7, AQ knows guerrilla tactics, Somalis know some guerrilla tactics, AQ knows how to use RPGs to shoot down helicopters (Afghanistan), Somalis need to be trained thusly, also 23mm was old style Soviet AAA guns, quite common in the Middle East. So I can see the AQ/Somalia connection, I don’t quite see the IIS/AQ/Somalia connection. What you think one little sentence from Saddam’s secretary to the Arab Bureau to generically “hunt Americans’ makes a connection; it’s still dubious to me. Like I said before Iraq needs to give “something” to al Qaeda, for it to qualify as state support. Al Qaeda already hated Americans, had the equipment, personnel, training, money, and access to locals to carry out the attacks; so I don’t think they really needed tacit “approval” from Uncle Saddam to do so.”

Something like:

Training (in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere)

Money ($300k at least)-multiple trips by AQ leaders to meet with Iraqi leaders…just to say, “Hi, hey, nice job with that soccer team Uday!”

Documents-passports, etc

Travel facilitation-Iraqi embassies were more IIS intel gathering stations than diplomatic stations

Safe haven-we’ve already established that terrorists had safe haven in Iraq

And most of all…public support (Iraq directly declares the greatness of AQ, and indirectly provides excuses to fight the US…like leaving Saudi, ending the US blockade of Iraq, and ending US war on Iraq-described to be a US war to protect Israel).

RE: Iraq SCUD. If UNSCOM had evidence that Iraq had fired a SCUD at Saudi Arabia, they had ample time to present that evidence to the Security Council, likewise for the US and Saudi Arabia. That they didn’t suggests that the “unconfirmed” report is unconfirmed for a reason. As for Ritter and Rolf, both proved to be wrong about WMD (though Ritter later corrected himself), so if they want to wax on eloquently in their books about evidence of an Iraqi SCUD that they never produced they can go right ahead

RE: North Korea, It’s quite a different situation though as South Korea could invoke Article 51 if it were invaded by North Korea; if North Korea though say captures a US warship in international waters, and accuses the crew of spying and keeps the ship; then the US/South Korea would need additional authorization for the use of force.

There is some confusion regarding the need for a second resolution, most every international law expert agrees that a second resolution was needed and 678 did not carry over past the 1990 mandate. This is my stance as well. The State Department sees things differently, mostly because they are advocating a particular policy, and are carrying out the wishes of policy-makers. In the first of these articles Richard Perle states that he think the Iraq war was probably illegal under international law but still morally justified, and in the second article the authors outline why 678 was not applicable to the current situation.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1089158,00.html

http://www.globelaw.com/Iraq/Preventive_war_after_iraq.htm#_Toc41379597

687 is completely different from 678, and no automatic trigger for war existed within its structure. The entire Security Council had to “remain seized” of the matter, meaning that only they could decide as a whole if a violation of 687 took place and if so what the punishment should be. 687 only referred to the sanctions regime, and Iraq’s compliance with 687 would mean sanctions would be lifted, Iraq’s non-compliance means that sanctions would stay in place. So my evidence that the 1991 “cease-fire” was permanent is as follows.

1.) The United Nations deemed the matter of 1990/1991 settled as the Security Council did not pass any resolution that authorized force against Iraq, nor did the UN offer its good offices to mediate a peace between the US and Iraq.

2.) The US was never put on a war footing with Iraq during the 1990s. President Clinton said some mean things about Saddam, and may not have liked him, but he never declared that we are still at war with Iraq, and never prepared the nation for any such war.

3.) Iraq was also never really on a war footing with the US. Sure Saddam said some things and he had AAA fire away at a few US planes (that were far out of range), but his priority was still on lifting sanctions, and not war with the US.

2.) “Retirement is a good punishment for terrorists?”

Whatever fate befell Nidal (suicide, murder, cancer) he long ago became irrelevant. Some terrorists become politicians (Gerry Adams) others are still alive and were never brought to justice (Chin Peng), still others are very much relevant and active in terrorism (bin Laden), so Nidal’s fate is satisfactory to me.

A Palestinian source in the West Bank city of Ramallah said Iraqi authorities had discovered Abu Nidal had opened channels to Iraqi guerrillas in Syria and Jordan opposed to President Saddam Hussein and wanted to put a stop to the activity before any US military operations against Iraq.
Other sources in Ramallah said Abu Nidal shot himself because he had cancer and was addicted to painkillers.

http://www.caroptionsonline.com/2002news/08222002/world/20426.htm

3.) “I don’t have a lot of faith in the FBI’s interrogations, and prefer CIA ones. As to the FBI determining if one is lying? Hansen is but one of many many many examples. Better question would be why cite an FBI interrogation instead of a CIA one of Saddam? As to Saddam only being a POW when interrogated by the FBI, then why did the FBI interrogate him instead of the DIA? The idea that Saddam wanted to be a friend of the US and that this comes from non-prisoners….hmmm, like whom?”

I’m not going to get into a debate with you over FBI/CIA interrogations. I cited the FBI interrogation because it was cited in the ISG report and the SSCI report. I don’t know why the FBI and not the DIA interrogated Saddam, I only know he was classified as a POW by the DOD. I never stated the comments cane from non-prisoners but by regime figures not charged with crimes, including military commanders; not all of them were lying unless you believe all POWs lie, or all Iraqis lie.

4.) “Oil….ahhhh, oil. The classic focal point. Sorry man, but if you’re gonna use the “he had oil/U.S. needs oil” theory as a substantive basis for being friends with the US, then please explain Iran and Venezuela to me for both have oil, and clearly don’t want to be friends with the US. The one thing about oil…it’s not just the US that wants it. There are bigger, better, customers (EU, India, China, etc). “

Each case is different; Saddam specifically told his staff he believed eventually the US would cut a deal with him because of his oil. Venezuela exports oil to the US despite its leader’s rhetoric (which makes you wonder how serious Chavez is).

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html

Iran is a different case; a country with not as much oil to export and beholden to radical ideology.

5.) “Why would Franks, retired, need to form propaganda in collusion with embedded reporters, other Marine generals on the scene, other Marine officers, and Marine enlisted personnel on the scene in 2003? That seems like a lotta people on the scene allegedly forming near identical propaganda with no reason to do so. Your comments re the IPP rpt claiming non-Iraqis in Martyrs of Saddam training camps seems at odds with your claim that there were no foreign fighters in Iraq during or before the invasion. Citing the Brookings rpt of what the situation was like in 1/04 is not representative of what the situation was like in 3/03. The claims of Ansar being a tool of Saddam’s are backed by several credible detainees, and the actions of Ansar against Kurdish forces in late 2002 and early 2003 were done in direct support of Saddam’s regime (assassinating generals etc).”

I didn’t see any of those reports about foreign fighters during the invasion. Even if I had I would be dubious of any “initial” reports, seeing as we got burned regarding the WMD issue (barrels of uranium already marked and sealed by the IAEA were unsealed by the US Army and the Army then declared that Iraq had WMD). The IPP report didn’t specify what happened to the non-Iraqi “fighters”, there was no detail as to how many and where they came from and where they went in the IPP report. Indeed it doesn’t say if those fighters swore loyalty oaths to Saddam, given specific orders by Saddam, etc. so it’s mere speculation.

Ansar al-Islam was an Islamist Kurdish group that wanted to overthrow the secular Kurdish leadership, so of course it’s going to assassinate secular Kurdish generals; but they weren’t very good at it, it took them three tries to kill one general. Once the war started they were scattered to the four winds. One detainee stated that Abu Wael was an IIS agent (amazing how you’ll believe detainees when it suits your agenda), but the SSCI states that Iraq was gathering information against Ansar.

6.) “Spin. I’ve been saying that the suicide attacks were done largely by Fedeyeen and foreign fighters making them terrorists. Did Japanese forces wage suicide attacks in WWII? Sure. Were they doing so in direct support for their ally Italy? Notachance. Were they wearing uniforms? Yep. Were they hiding behind women and children and deliberately targeting civilians (non-uniformed Fedeyeen and foreign fighters did in fact hide behind women and children and target anyone who worked with the Coalition forces-they never ever limited their attacks to just military forces).
I’m getting real REAL curious to hear your definition of terrorism or terrorist as it seems you’re too eager to dismiss any and all aspects of a terrorist. It almost sounds like you’re trying to say a few thousand Iraqis had a right to protect their dictatorial regime against the will of tens of millions of Iraqis.
Me, call me old fashioned, but I think people who never wear uniforms, routinely hide behind their own civilians, wear suicide vests, and drive VBIEDs are terrorists.”

It seems to me you have trouble distinguishing what a terrorist is. This all goes back to the semantic debate we had earlier regarding insurgents. Bruce Hoffman, perhaps the world’s pre-eminent authority on international terrorism defines it thusly:

* ineluctably political in aims and motives;
* violent — or, equally important, threatens violence;
* designed to have far-reaching psychological repercussions beyond the immediate victim or target;
* conducted by an organization with an identifiable chain of command or conspiratorial cell structure (whose members wear no uniform or identifying insignia); and
* perpetrated by a subnational group or non-state entity.

However odious the tactics of Saddam Fedeyeen and like-minded militia, the tactics themselves were not borne from political motives but military, and the tactics were not perpetrated by a subnational or non-state entity; thus they cannot be terrorists. Like I said this goes back to the argument over what is or isn’t an insurgency. The MRLA was considered a terrorist group by the British Empire, but history remembers it as an insurgent group. Likewise were the PAGIC, MPLA, ZAPA, ANC terrorist groups or insurgencies? All these groups utilized what you would define as “terrorist” tactics yet all are now in power in Africa.

7.) “US backing of Israel is my favorite of these misled accusations. US support for Israel has surely not been $100billion a year for the last 4 years, it has always been about the same as US support for Egypt, and US support for Israel is a tiny fraction of the financial and military support given to the Arab World as a whole (let alone the Muslim world as a whole). No, US support for Israel is hardly unjust and/or imbalanced, and the presence of the US in Muslim lands is mere excuse making since there are more Muslims in the US than there are in most any Moslem nation save perhaps 3-5. Should the US then leave the US? If it’s US presence in Moslem holy lands, then why not be happy that the US has basically left Saudi, Somalia, and all other Moslem holy lands save Iraq (which the US would love to leave except AQ has chosen to keep us there). Is Chechnya a Moslem Holy land? Are US forces there? How does that work exactly-call for a Holy War on the US because of the US invasion of Chechnya? Pretty sure Chechnya has nada to do with the US.”

I’m not the one that needs to be convinced regarding US support for Israel. There is however a perception on the so-called Arab street that the US has leverage over Israel or that the US could apply pressure to Israel, but the fact that the US doesn’t do these things (regardless of the reasons behind it), only makes bin Laden and his ilk angrier.

As to Muslim “Holy” Lands, I am merely trying to reinforce the point that Al Qaeda, and the jihadists before them fight for Moslems against non-Moslems in (perceived) Moslem lands. Why did Osama go to Afghanistan in the 1980s, was it at the behest of Saddam, to fight Americans, or to fight non-Moslems on Moslem land? It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out why al Qaeda was formed, and what its’ ideology is all about, and thus why they hate America.

8.) “It’s not too hard to get RDX, but to get hundreds of pounds of it, and be a moron….that’s questionable, and the guys who couldn’t manage to build the boat were morons. They didn’t get x-military help etc as you suggest (no evidence at all to support your claim per this particular attack). You need an engineer to make a shaped charge that big. According to my sources (only 2 of em), according to a fmr CIA guy on one of The History Channel’s shows re UBL, Iraqi IIS ”tutored” the bomb makers and helped them make it. The explosives (per 1 of my sources, and per Russian media reports at the time) Russia sold the RDX to Iraq. Iraqi IIS flew it to UAE and drove it from there to Yemen. After the failed attack on The Sullivans, Iraq refused to help again, and the bomb makers had to go to AQ. They went out to where the boat sank, got some of the explosives, flew (again to UAE then..) to Afghanistan to try out the explosives and get help making a new bomb using some of the original explosives. Fyi, USN intel and CIA uncovered the plot first as part of the uncovering of the Millennium plot, and despite specific reporting that UBL planned to hit a US ship in the 5th or 6th fleet area of ops, despite being briefed on the plot while in port in Slovenia before heading to Malta then Yemen, the crew was not prepared for it. USN intel docs support this specifically. The problem was it was treated as a “criminal threat” and not a military threat (specifically, see the USS Cole JAGC investigation where the NCIS lists “Criminal threats”). A standard boat filled with explosives would have damaged the ship (but not put a nice hole in it), and a mere boat loaded with explosives was a threat, but not a dire threat. It was the training and bomb design that made the bomb dire.”

That’s all very interesting and informative; I had not heard any of this before. There are two slight problems I have with it though. If Iraq only helped with the Sullivans attack (which failed) and used local (Yemeni) bomb-makers unaffiliated with AQ, and then backed away once the attack failed, leaving the Yemeni terrorists with only Al Qaeda to turn to, doesn’t that still make the Cole attack an Al Qaeda operation, and doesn’t really prove ties between Iraq and AQ (Iraq and local dumb Yemenis sure, but not AQ)? The second problem I have is that I am assuming all this information was known prior to the 2003 invasion so why wasn’t it used to bolster the case for war?

9.) “Several million documents captured (videos, audio tapes etc as well). Please, point me to a post-war intelligence investigation that has gone through all of those (or even more than 18% of them). The entire point of the article that started this thread was to point out that no intelligence agency has looked into this and formed a conclusion. Some have formed assessments, but those same assessments come with the caveats that the matter remain open, needs further examination, and at the time of the assessments there was incomplete collection and/or analysis. While opponents of the war would love to just carte blanche point to a political spin report and declare the matter closed, the intelligence community on the other hand admits that it was never adequately examined, and requests such an examination.
What’s really odd about your statement is that earlier in this same post you’ve described Iraq has having provided training. Additionally, the high level meetings that AQ/Iraq were having clearly included all the direction needed. The biggest problem with your misperception of state sponsorship of terror is that you’ve said the terror group cannot survive without its sponsor, and that’s not true at all. That’s a proxy not a mere state-sponsored terror group or act. By your own standard you’ve made Al Queda completely autonomous, and it’s not at all. It needs the support of governments to survive, but not just one as you so well point out, and I do agree there.”

RE: Iraq documents Well this is the reason I responded to your post because isn’t Iraq document exploitation addressed here:

“The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which is leading the exploitation of documents (DOCEX) uncovered in Iraq, told Committee staff that 120 million plus pages of documents that were recovered in Iraq have received an initial review for intelligence information. As of January 2006, 34 million pages have been translated and summarized to some extent and are available to analysts in an Intelligence Community database.”

That was a year and a half ago, and yes I’ve read Stephen Hayes’s piece in the Weekly Standard about how an “initial review” only means they read the cover page, etc. but how much detail to you need to go into before you figure out their talking about WMD or terrorists. So if the DIA is confident that no new documents will surface indicating a relationship, what basis do you have to argue with them?

As for state-sponsorship my definition follows Daniel Byman’s: he worked for the CIA as a Middle East analyst, got his PHD from MIT, a 9/11 Commission adviser, and the head of Georgetown’s Security Studies program. Most if not all terrorist groups require strong or passive support from states in order to survive. Al Qaeda did have some passive support from the Taliban, but only in so far as allowing them safe haven. Operationally Al Qaeda was autonomous and remains so to this day, even more so since the collapse of the Taliban.

10.) “It was more than just RPG-7s. There was also training in how to target an American helicopter, how to modify the warheads with proximity fuses taken out of 23mmAAA rounds, and lots lots more. I’m pretty confident that after a decade plus of war, most Somalis who had held an RPG-7 had learned the basics of how to use it, but at the request of the IIS, Al Queda went to Somalia and trained them in all kinds of ambush techniques, guerrilla warfare, and more. That’s pretty weak to just dismiss the IIS/AQ training as RPG 7 training that meant nothing (call it dismissive).”

Well okay AQ knows how to use RPG-7, Somalis know how to use RPG-7, AQ knows guerrilla tactics, Somalis know some guerrilla tactics, AQ knows how to use RPGs to shoot down helicopters (Afghanistan), Somalis need to be trained thusly, also 23mm was old style Soviet AAA guns, quite common in the Middle East. So I can see the AQ/Somalia connection, I don’t quite see the IIS/AQ/Somalia connection. What you think one little sentence from Saddam’s secretary to the Arab Bureau to generically “hunt Americans’ makes a connection; it’s still dubious to me. Like I said before Iraq needs to give “something” to al Qaeda, for it to qualify as state support. Al Qaeda already hated Americans, had the equipment, personnel, training, money, and access to locals to carry out the attacks; so I don’t think they really needed tacit “approval” from Uncle Saddam to do so.

This is all I could do in a short period of spare time. Apologies.

1.

“The SCUD report is still an unconfirmed report. No doubt the SCUD failed to reach its target if it ever was fired, so either the SCUD was never fired or it disintegrated into the air. It cannot be proven either way, bur I would tend to stay away from “unconfirmed reports “

For me, if an unconfirmed report is corroborated (as I demonstrated), then it’s better to keep it in mind than dismiss it. The SCUD is but one of the many cease-fire violations (CFVs) listed in that pdf I linked to earlier.

“Also go ahead and list the cease-fire “breaches” so I have a clearer understanding of what you are talking about; Iraq was held in material breach seven times by the Security Council and none since 1993. None of these breaches were considered serious enough to warrant a second resolution authorizing force, and the no-fly zone infractions were immaterial to the UNSC, and not relevant to the cease-fire/peace.”

“warrant a second resolution authorizing force” The reason no second resolution was needed was because a second resolution wasn’t needed, and instead the subsequent resolutions in response to the CFVs/material breaches all reiterated the original authorization. Why reiterate instead of offer a new one…because the cease fire was not a peace treaty, but a temporary agreement that once broken becomes invalid. If a soldier walks across the line in the sand with a white flag, and no one shoots at him, it’s a cease fire…not the kinda thing that requires a UN affirmation. If enemy forces-paused by a cease-fire agreement-suddenly invade (be it Kuwait or South Korea or whatever) there is no time to go back to the UN, get everyone together, write up a second resolution to basically reiterate the legitimacy and reauthorize the first authorization of force, and then tell commanders on the other side of the globe it’s ok to respond. No. If there’s no need for a second resolution to re-say what the authorization said, then all that needs be done is to reaffirm that the first authorization is still valid, and that’s exactly what the UN did-reaffirmed that 678 was still valid….again, and again, and again, and again. It’s easy to take a dozen resolution post 678 and cite sections of resolutions that reaffirm 678 was still active, but it’s impossible to find a single UN resolution ending the 1991 Gulf War that is not conditional. If it’s conditional, then when those conditions aren’t met, the resolution is not met/not in effect.

2.

“By its nature it was permanent codified into law by the very Resolutions you claim Iraq violated. There were 7 material breaches en total yet none
of them were a justification for the resumption of hostilities as the Security Council as a whole has to vote on the correct response. The US cannot just say “a ha Iraq was/is in material breach, UNSCR 678 is still in effect bombs away” even though that is what the US did. 678 was specific to the situation between Iraq and Kuwait, i.e. Iraq invading Kuwait, the same way UNSCR 82 was specific to the situation between North and South Korea, i.e. North Korea invading South Korea even though North
Korea has violated the cease-fire multiple times, South Korea and/or the US are not justified under international law to attack North Korea under UNSCR 82 even though they are technically in a “cease-fire”

Again, please show me something that says the 1991 war was over, and that Iraq was free to break the cease fire agreement as long as it wanted, as many times as it wanted, as grievously as it wanted until someone decided to get a second resolution?

It’s like this, you say a cease-fire is permanent. The minute a soldier walks across with a white flag, and the shooting stops, then there’s peace (until the UNSC decides to pass a new resolution).

I say that a cease-fire is temporary, that its permanence is dependent upon the conditions it contains, and that the reason it is temporary is to get one side or the other to comply with those conditions as fast as possible (12yrs?). Thus, if a cease-fire is temporary, and conditions based, if those conditions are not met, or if it is broken, then the fighting can resume at any time, and there is no need for a second resolution of authorization to just reaffirm the first. Reaffirming that the first authorization was in effect happens several times in the subsequent resolutions, and there is nothing in any of them that says a new resolution must be given to authorize force again.

Re North Korea, I’d say that if DPRK invaded S Korea (via their invasion tunnels for example), they could be in Seoul in an hour or two. They could kill a million or two in Seoul with arty alone within a few days. Should the UN assemble, right up a new resolution, debate it, vote, and THEN respond? Nah. I don’t think so. I think the right and depth to respond to cease-fire violations is in the hands of those who have been violated. If they want the war to restart, they can do it after being violated.

I went back and actually re-read the resolutions, and the State Dept claim that 678 was still active. I think where the confusion rests (as with almost all the debate on pre-war intelligence does) with the fact that no one stance, no conclusive point is made. There is no specific claim in any of the resolutions that a second resolution authorizing force would be needed as opposed to a reiteration of the first.

3.

“Well the doc comes from 1992 when ANO was still kind of active, but a lot can change in 10 years as both Nidal and his organization suffered terribly in the 1990s. By 2002 he was no longer an active terrorist, you claim to not believe him, that’s your choice. But his actions, or rather inactions, speak louder than your words”

Retirement is a good punishment for terrorists?

4.

“Well he was po’d about US forces in Saudi Arabia, he’s po’d about US forces in Iraq, po’d about US forces in Afghanistan, po’d about Russians in Chechnya, po’d about Indians in Kashmir, po’d about Serbs in Bosnia, po’d about Israelis in Palestine. He gets po’d a lot, about one thing in particular; foreign troops in Moslem lands, which leads to perceived mistreatment of Moslems. He’s not doing it because he liked Saddam Hussein he did it because he hated Americans. If Saddam was overthrown in 1991 and there was still a troop presence in the Gulf (as there still is), he would have still called for jihad against the US.”

http://www.floppingaces.net/2007/06/01/in-lawrence-wrights-book-the/

5.

“I was referring to the 1991 Gulf war when I stated that Jordan was an ally of the US, I thought that was the war you were also referring to since we were talking about Khafji.”

Jordan was a HUGE covert ally in the second invasion of Iraq in 2003. They allowed US fighters, bombers, etc to operate out of their bases. They did the same for US special forces, they even rescued US special forces on the eve of the invasion. Gen Franks and others now tell us that the King of Jordan even offered to allow the 4th ID to transit Jordan when it was refused in Turkey.

6.

It’s also what other regime officials say, especially those not charged with crimes. I’m sure the FBI interrogators can figure out if someone is lying. Saddam was never up for charges while he was being interrogated, the US just held him as a POW, so he may have held out hope that he could be released or at least not killed. Finally, it was always to Saddam’s benefit to become a friend of the US; he had lots of oil and the US needs lots of oil, but believe what you will.

I don’t have a lot of faith in the FBI’s interrogations, and prefer CIA ones. As to the FBI determining if one is lying? Hansen is but one of many many many examples. Better question would be why cite an FBI interrogation instead of a CIA one of Saddam? As to Saddam only being a POW when interrogated by the FBI, then why did the FBI interrogate him instead of the DIA? The idea that Saddam wanted to be a friend of the US and that this comes from non-prisoners….hmmm, like whom?

Oil….ahhhh, oil. The classic focal point. Sorry man, but if you’re gonna use the “he had oil/U.S. needs oil” theory as a substantive basis for being friends with the US, then please explain Iran and Venezuela to me for both have oil, and clearly don’t want to be friends with the US. The one thing about oil…it’s not just the US that wants it. There are bigger, better, customers (EU, India, China, etc).

7.

I missed that quote by Franks though he could be engaging in propaganda. In the link I provided which you instantly discounted, it cited references from field commanders and embedded reporters (foreign as well as American) and came away with fairly accurate conclusions regarding the level of Iraqi casualties during the invasion; there were almost no foreign fighters in
Iraq during that time. Even the Iraqi Perspectives Project, though it claims that Iraq trained non-Iraqi Arab volunteers in Fedayeen “training camps”, starting in 1998, it does not claim that these fighters were involved in the regime fight in early 2003. Brookings only lists 300-400 foreign fighters in Jan. 2004, which also includes Ansar al-Islam, and its
200-300 members. Ansar al-Islam was in Iraq, in the area of Kurdistan, but not at the invitation of the regime, nor did Ansar fight for the regime’s survival.

Why would Franks, retired, need to form propaganda in collusion with embedded reporters, other Marine generals on the scene, other Marine officers, and Marine enlisted personnel on the scene in 2003? That seems like a lotta people on the scene allegedly forming near identical propaganda with no reason to do so. Your comments re the IPP rpt claiming non-Iraqis in Martyrs of Saddam training camps seems at odds with your claim that there were no foreign fighters in Iraq during or before the invasion. Citing the Brookings rpt of what the situation was like in 1/04 is not representative of what the situation was like in 3/03. The claims of Ansar being a tool of Saddam’s are backed by several credible detainees, and the actions of Ansar against Kurdish forces in late 2002 and early 2003 were done in direct support of Saddam’s regime (assassinating generals etc).

As for suicide attacks, perhaps we are talking past each other. There have been only two suicide bombings by Iraqi security personnel dressed as civilians, directed by the regime, which took out US troops at checkpoints. A suicide attack on a tank, if that person is a legitimate combatant (Iraqi Army, or irregular) would not constitute terrorism; it would be a military attack on a military target; the Japanese did this sort of thing in WWII as well:

http://www.ww2pacific.com/suicide.html

Spin. I’ve been saying that the suicide attacks were done largely by Fedeyeen and foreign fighters making them terrorists. Did Japanese forces wage suicide attacks in WWII? Sure. Were they doing so in direct support for their ally Italy? Notachance. Were they wearing uniforms? Yep. Were they hiding behind women and children and deliberately targeting civilians (non-uniformed Fedeyeen and foreign fighters did in fact hide behind women and children and target anyone who worked with the Coalition forces-they never ever limited their attacks to just military forces).

I’m getting real REAL curious to hear your definition of terrorism or terrorist as it seems you’re too eager to dismiss any and all aspects of a terrorist. It almost sounds like you’re trying to say a few thousand Iraqis had a right to protect their dictatorial regime against the will of tens of millions of Iraqis.

Me, call me old fashioned, but I think people who never wear uniforms, routinely hide behind their own civilians, wear suicide vests, and drive VBIEDs are terrorists.

8.

It’s all intertwined and part of al Qaeda’s ideology; drive foreigners from Moslem lands. The US is just the most egregious violator of this policy, due to its backing of Israel and stationing of troops in other places. So I don’t think you can play up Osama’s words about US troops in Saudi Arabia and support for UN sanctions against Iraq, and downplay al Qaeda’s support for the Chechens struggle for independence against Russia.

US backing of Israel is my favorite of these misled accusations. US support for Israel has surely not been $100billion a year for the last 4 years, it has always been about the same as US support for Egypt, and US support for Israel is a tiny fraction of the financial and military support given to the Arab World as a whole (let alone the Muslim world as a whole). No, US support for Israel is hardly unjust and/or imbalanced, and the presence of the US in Muslim lands is mere excuse making since there are more Muslims in the US than there are in most any Moslem nation save perhaps 3-5. Should the US then leave the US? If it’s US presence in Moslem holy lands, then why not be happy that the US has basically left Saudi, Somalia, and all other Moslem holy lands save Iraq (which the US would love to leave except AQ has chosen to keep us there). Is Chechnya a Moslem Holy land? Are US forces there? How does that work exactly-call for a Holy War on the US because of the US invasion of Chechnya? Pretty sure Chechnya has nada to do with the US.

9.

“They’re certainly smart enough to build truck bombs without help, smart enough to learn how to fly jumbo jets into skyscrapers, so why not? RDX comes from lots of different places; Pakistan has it, Iran has it, Libya
has it, Egypt has it, and all these countries got weapons from Russia or China (who got their weapons from Russia). It seems circumspect to me that they would ask Iraq for RDX and bomb-making capabilities and then sink
their boat (Sullivans), and then go back to Iraq and state that they needed help in building a boat. It’s more logical to assume that they bought the RDX on the black market (easily available for the right price), utilized the expertise of some of the multiple ex-military jihadists in their employ (including US Army) and ta da you have yourself a shaped
charge. Here is an article on the attacks in India last year that also utilized RDX, and talks about how easy it is to get the material and to make a bomb.”

http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl2319/stories/20061006004101900.htm

It’s not too hard to get RDX, but to get hundreds of pounds of it, and be a moron….that’s questionable, and the guys who couldn’t manage to build the boat were morons. They didn’t get x-military help etc as you suggest (no evidence at all to support your claim per this particular attack). You need an engineer to make a shaped charge that big. According to my sources (only 2 of em), according to a fmr CIA guy on one of The History Channel’s shows re UBL, Iraqi IIS ”tutored” the bomb makers and helped them make it. The explosives (per 1 of my sources, and per Russian media reports at the time) Russia sold the RDX to Iraq. Iraqi IIS flew it to UAE and drove it from there to Yemen. After the failed attack on The Sullivans, Iraq refused to help again, and the bomb makers had to go to AQ. They went out to where the boat sank, got some of the explosives, flew (again to UAE then..) to Afghanistan to try out the explosives and get help making a new bomb using some of the original explosives. Fyi, USN intel and CIA uncovered the plot first as part of the uncovering of the Millennium plot, and despite specific reporting that UBL planned to hit a US ship in the 5th or 6th fleet area of ops, despite being briefed on the plot while in port in Slovenia before heading to Malta then Yemen, the crew was not prepared for it. USN intel docs support this specifically. The problem was it was treated as a “criminal threat” and not a military threat (specifically, see the USS Cole JAGC investigation where the NCIS lists “Criminal threats”). A standard boat filled with explosives would have damaged the ship (but not put a nice hole in it), and a mere boat loaded with explosives was a threat, but not a dire threat. It was the training and bomb design that made the bomb dire.

10.

But I think Iraq has to give something to AQ; direction, financing, weapons, training, etc. They cannot just say we would like the Americans to be driven from Somalia, and AQ says we also would like the Americans driven from Somalia; ok we have an agreement then. It doesn’t work that way. If AQ is going to drive Americans out anyway and has the means to do it and a strategy, what do they need Iraq for? A terrorist organization that is sponsored by a state cannot live without that state support; like Hezbollah or Hamas. AQ can live without state support, so it didn’t really need Iraq. Also there would be much more of a paper trail if Iraq was helping al Qaeda. Iraq has a bureaucracy; bureaucracies have to account for things, weapons cost money, training costs money, requisition orders have to be filled, approvals have to be gotten, follow-ups have to be done, etc. So far in the several million documents, we have the one document you mentioned about Somalia from CNS news and this new revelation that I just got to read, actually weakens the case of Iraqi support for al Qaeda.”

Several million documents captured (videos, audio tapes etc as well). Please, point me to a post-war intelligence investigation that has gone through all of those (or even more than 18% of them). The entire point of the article that started this thread was to point out that no intelligence agency has looked into this and formed a conclusion. Some have formed assessments, but those same assessments come with the caveats that the matter remain open, needs further examination, and at the time of the assessments there was incomplete collection and/or analysis. While opponents of the war would love to just carte blanche point to a political spin report and declare the matter closed, the intelligence community on the other hand admits that it was never adequately examined, and requests such an examination.

What’s really odd about your statement is that earlier in this same post you’ve described Iraq has having provided training. Additionally, the high level meetings that AQ/Iraq were having clearly included all the direction needed. The biggest problem with your misperception of state sponsorship of terror is that you’ve said the terror group cannot survive without its sponsor, and that’s not true at all. That’s a proxy not a mere state-sponsored terror group or act. By your own standard you’ve made Al Queda completely autonomous, and it’s not at all. It needs the support of governments to survive, but not just one as you so well point out, and I do agree there.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/05/more_evidence_of_saddamal_qaed.html

“The Al Qaeda operative mentions how he trained the Somalis in learning how to use RPG-7 (a very common and fairly easy weapon to use), and in basic
tactics. Everyone knew that the US had forces in Somalia, certainly al Qaeda knew, and needed no prodding from Iraq to attack America. “

It was more than just RPG-7s. There was also training in how to target an American helicopter, how to modify the warheads with proximity fuses taken out of 23mmAAA rounds, and lots lots more. I’m pretty confident that after a decade plus of war, most Somalis who had held an RPG-7 had learned the basics of how to use it, but at the request of the IIS, Al Queda went to Somalia and trained them in all kinds of ambush techniques, guerrilla warfare, and more. That’s pretty weak to just dismiss the IIS/AQ training as RPG 7 training that meant nothing (call it dismissive).

The SCUD report is still an unconfirmed report. No doubt the SCUD failed to reach its target if it ever was fired, so either the SCUD was never fired or it disintegrated into the air. It cannot be proven either way, bur I would tend to stay away from “unconfirmed reports”.

Also go ahead and list the cease-fire “breaches” so I have a clearer understanding of what you are talking about; Iraq was held in material breach seven times by the Security Council and none since 1993. None of these breaches were considered serious enough to warrant a second resolution authorizing force, and the no-fly zone infractions were immaterial to the UNSC, and not relevant to the cease-fire/peace.

2. “Your entire argument is dependent upon the unsubstantiated perception that the 1991 Cease fire was a “permanent cease-fire under international law” Can you show an example of that cease fire being described as permanent by the UNSC? As I can list at least 4 UNSC statements of material breach, and many more UNSC statements that 678 was still in effect.”

By its nature it was permanent codified into law by the very Resolutions you claim Iraq violated. There were 7 material breaches en total yet none of them were a justification for the resumption of hostilities as the Security Council as a whole has to vote on the correct response. The US cannot just say “a ha Iraq was/is in material breach, UNSCR 678 is still in effect bombs away” even though that is what the US did. 678 was specific to the situation between Iraq and Kuwait, i.e. Iraq invading Kuwait, the same way UNSCR 82 was specific to the situation between North and South Korea, i.e. North Korea invading South Korea…even though North Korea has violated the cease-fire multiple times, South Korea and/or the US are not justified under international law to attack North Korea under UNSCR 82 even though they are technically in a “cease-fire”.

3. “I do agree that the doc re Atta was not reliable, but I think the other reports that Nidal was more than just sitting around watching TV for years in Iraq would be equally unreliable. A retired terrorist legend is an oxymoron imo.”

Well the doc comes from 1992 when ANO was still kind of active, but a lot can change in 10 years as both Nidal and his organization suffered terribly in the 1990s. By 2002 he was no longer an active terrorist, you claim to not believe him, that’s your choice. But his actions, or rather inactions, speak louder than your words

4. “Again, my point is that UBL was po’d about US forces in Saudi that helped wage war on Saddam (a war which some have said was illegal and not sanctioned by the UN). In this rant, when he complains about military aid, I think he’s talking in past tense of that aid. That, or he didn’t get the memo that the US only had 261 people in Saudi. Maybe he thinks there’s some Saudi Area 51 where tens of thousands of US troops are controlling the Saudi govt?”

Well he was po’d about US forces in Saudi Arabia, he’s po’d about US forces in Iraq, po’d about US forces in Afghanistan, po’d about Russians in Chechnya, po’d about Indians in Kashmir, po’d about Serbs in Bosnia, po’d about Israelis in Palestine…. He gets po’d a lot, about one thing in particular; foreign troops in Moslem lands, which leads to perceived mistreatment of Moslems. He’s not doing it because he liked Saddam Hussein he did it because he hated Americans. If Saddam was overthrown in 1991 and there was still a troop presence in the Gulf (as there still is), he would have still called for jihad against the US.

5. “re the terror teams, there’s a lot on the 2003 IIS attacks out there (ironically from Dems like Sen Rockefeller and Levin), and while they were generally solely IIS, the ones in the PI were directly linked to Abu Sayef (sp?), and the PI even expelled the an Iraqi “diplomat” for having made repeated phone calls to AS’s leader on the eve of attacks. Iraqi embassy stuff is predominant in all kinds of ways”

I was referring to the 1991 Gulf war when I stated that Jordan was an ally of the US, I thought that was the war you were also referring to since we were talking about Khafji.

6. “We’re so close to agreeing here James. My point is that Saddam did more than just “not trust” the US-that he expected to be attacked, and it was his miscalculation that the attack would come in the form of more impotent air strikes in Desert Fox style. Now, you bring up a great point that seems at odds, but your missing the different settings which make a huge difference. When you asked how I can believe Saddam when he said he was an enemy of the US, and not believe it when he said he wanted to be closer…you forgot that in the latter case, he was a captive, facing death, and not anywhere close to being as free to say what he wanted as he was prior to the invasion.”

It’s also what other regime officials say, especially those not charged with crimes. I’m sure the FBI interrogators can figure out if someone is lying. Saddam was never up for charges while he was being interrogated, the US just held him as a POW, so he may have held out hope that he could be released or at least not killed. Finally, it was always to Saddam’s benefit to become a friend of the US; he had lots of oil and the US needs lots of oil, but believe what you will.

7. “See Franks’ quote above re foreign fighters. Re the suicide bombings, you cannot possibly be suggesting that there were no VBIED’s in the invasion? Please tell me you’re not going to suggest that every single personal account of the invasion, and all the documentaries showing these suicide attacks are unreal? There are literally THOUSANDS of witnesses to the suicide attacks against US tanks and other vehicles during the invasion, and personal suicide attacks against infantry, checkpoints etc. I’ve even got pictures of one of the suicide vest bomb factories at Baghdad University as well as pics of the hundreds of suicide bomb vests found there.”

I missed that quote by Franks though he could be engaging in propaganda. In the link I provided which you instantly discounted, it cited references from field commanders and embedded reporters (foreign as well as American) and came away with fairly accurate conclusions regarding the level of Iraqi casualties during the invasion; there were almost no foreign fighters in Iraq during that time. Even the Iraqi Perspectives Project, though it claims that Iraq trained non-Iraqi Arab volunteers in Fedayeen “training camps”, starting in 1998, it does not claim that these fighters were involved in the regime fight in early 2003. Brookings only lists 300-400 foreign fighters in Jan. 2004, which also includes Ansar al-Islam, and its 200-300 members. Ansar al-Islam was in Iraq, in the area of Kurdistan, but not at the invitation of the regime, nor did Ansar fight for the regime’s survival.

As for suicide attacks, perhaps we are talking past each other. There have been only two suicide bombings by Iraqi security personnel dressed as civilians, directed by the regime, which took out US troops at checkpoints. A suicide attack on a tank, if that person is a legitimate combatant (Iraqi Army, or irregular) would not constitute terrorism; it would be a military attack on a military target; the Japanese did this sort of thing in WWII as well:

http://www.ww2pacific.com/suicide.html

8. “AQ support for other insurgencies (ie, the AQ fight against other non-Moslems) is different because I’m talking about AQ’s fight against the US, and UBL’s excuse for that. One can hardly say that the reason AQ Spain is the same as the reason AQ fights the US. UBL is nice enough to come up with excuses for each nation, and so in discussing why he called for holy war on Americans, I prefer to discuss why he called for holy war on Americans. There are some across the board commonalities, but his war on this nation and that seems to have nation-specific reasons as well.”

It’s all intertwined and part of al Qaeda’s ideology; drive foreigners from Moslem lands. The US is just the most egregious violator of this policy, due to its backing of Israel and stationing of troops in other places. So I don’t think you can play up Osama’s words about US troops in Saudi Arabia and support for UN sanctions against Iraq, and downplay al Qaeda’s support for the Chechens struggle for independence against Russia.

9.”Are you saying that they were smart enough to make the largest shaped charge bomb ever, but not smart enough to make a boat big enough to carry the bomb? Perhaps you can tell us where the RDX came from, or who helped design the sophisticated bomb?

They’re certainly smart enough to build truck bombs without help, smart enough to learn how to fly jumbo jets into skyscrapers, so why not? RDX comes from lots of different places; Pakistan has it, Iran has it, Libya has it, Egypt has it, and all these countries got weapons from Russia or China (who got their weapons from Russia). It seems circumspect to me that they would ask Iraq for RDX and bomb-making capabilities and then sink their boat (Sullivans), and then go back to Iraq and state that they needed help in building a boat. It’s more logical to assume that they bought the RDX on the black market (easily available for the right price), utilized the expertise of some of the multiple ex-military jihadists in their employ (including US Army) and ta da you have yourself a shaped charge. Here is an article on the attacks in India last year that also utilized RDX, and talks about how easy it is to get the material and to make a bomb.

http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl2319/stories/20061006004101900.htm

10. “I beg to differ re the strategy. We can eliminate some pretty simply. It seems clear that by using the IIS and terrorist groups, the strategy wasn’t a conventional attack with fighter bombers, and it wasn’t a conventional naval attack or any other conventional attack. Given the simple combination of any intelligence service interacting with a terrorist group with the intent of taking X action in order to drive the an opponent from an area, it seems far more likely than not that X action is unconventional warfare, and given that we’re talking about a state intelligence service interacting with terrorists…we’re talking about state-sponsorship of terror. Since the terror group here is Al Queda and its affiliates, we’re talking about Iraqi sponsorship of Al Queda in attacks against the US for the mutual and individual benefits of Iraq and of AQ.”

But I think Iraq has to give something to AQ; direction, financing, weapons, training, etc. They cannot just say we would like the Americans to be driven from Somalia, and AQ says we also would like the Americans driven from Somalia; ok we have an agreement then. It doesn’t work that way. If AQ is going to drive Americans out anyway and has the means to do it and a strategy, what do they need Iraq for? A terrorist organization that is sponsored by a state cannot live without that state support; like Hezbollah or Hamas. AQ can live without state support, so it didn’t really need Iraq. Also there would be much more of a paper trail if Iraq was helping al Qaeda. Iraq has a bureaucracy; bureaucracies have to account for things, weapons cost money, training costs money, requisition orders have to be filled, approvals have to be gotten, follow-ups have to be done, etc. So far in the several million documents, we have the one document you mentioned about Somalia from CNS news and this new revelation that I just got to read, actually weakens the case of Iraqi support for al Qaeda.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/05/more_evidence_of_saddamal_qaed.html

The Al Qaeda operative mentions how he trained the Somalis in learning how to use RPG-7 (a very common and fairly easy weapon to use), and in basic tactics. Everyone knew that the US had forces in Somalia, certainly al Qaeda knew, and needed no prodding from Iraq to attack America.

1.) “Interesting theory, I could not bring anything up about a SCUD missile attack in 1993 on Google or lexisnexis. Certainly Saudi Arabia would have raised a stink about it, and Bush I would have reacted strongly to any SCUD missile attack. If you have a source I would like to see it. “

http://www.fas.org/man/crs/98-386.pdf
“according to a report not confirmed by the Pentagon, fired a Scud missile at the city of Dhahran in Saudi Arabia (January 18)”

I’ve seen other reports about this as well-not just the one. Never did follow up on it though. Scott Ritter’s book, Endgame mentions it as does UNSCOM Chairman Richard Butler’s, The Greatest Threat. It could be another case of multiple people reporting the same report, but it’s hard to see Ritter and Butler agreeing on much. Remember, the point here is that Iraq and the US were waging war upon each other between ODS and OIF. Whether that was justified via the UNSC is debatable, and semi-argumentative as: — if it were not authorized by the UNSC, then it makes it even more aggressive towards Iraq – if it were authorized by the UNSC, then it confirms that the official war remained.
Again, I can list many many examples of no-fly-zone and/or non-no-fly-zone combat, bombings, cease-fire breaches, etc. Literally thousands.

2.) “Send what you have”

Sorry, got confused. Send what I have re:?

3.) “At various times the condition between the US and Iraq post-1991 have been called a cease-fire, a permanent cease-fire, and a peace. Whatever you call it it was still under the auspices of the UN Security Council. Like any permanent cease-fire under international law the victim of any violations would have to present them to the Security Council and the Security Council would have to vote on if it did or did not constitute a violation, and what action would be appropriate. The no-fly zones were a separate matter that Iraq at first complied with and then ?defied?.
Compliance wasn?t required of Iraq under any SC resolution. I maintain that Saddam did not act as if he were at war with the US as there was minimal ?aggression? on the part of Iraq to defend against the no-fly zones. If Saddam truly believed himself at war he wouldn?t have done away with the SCUDs, and WMD, and would have maintained a more aggressive posture toward the US. Anyway we can close this point as well as neither of us will agree with the other.”

Your entire argument is dependent upon the unsubstantiated perception that the 1991 Cease fire was a “permanent cease-fire under international law” Can you show an example of that cease fire being described as permanent by the UNSC? As I can list at least 4 UNSC statements of material breach, and many more UNSC statements that 678 was still in effect.

4.) “Again you?ll have to show me those ?authenticated? docs regarding Abu NIdal. One document that turned out to be fraudulent stated that Atta was trained by Nidal in the summer of 2002 before his ?death?. The ANO group was dysfunctional after 1991 and had not hit a Western target since the mid-1980s, so I hardly think that Saddam was ?harboring? al-Bana in the hopes that he would lead a vanguard of terrorists against his enemies.”

I’m referring to the CNS docs again.
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Page=%5CNation%5Carchive%5C200410%5CNAT20041011a.html
I do agree that the doc re Atta was not reliable, but I think the other reports that Nidal was more than just sitting around watching TV for years in Iraq would be equally unreliable. A retired terrorist legend is an oxymoron imo.

5.) “Your Richard Clarke story is a nice anecdote but irrelevant as UBL wasn?t falcon hunting with Iraqis, and didn?t go to Iraq when the US had eyes on him. The alleged meeting happened in 1999 when the Clinton Administration thought other things about Iraq that proved to be wrong like WMD. So all that really means is both Clinton and Bush got bad intelligence, or didn?t believe the good intelligence that was given to them.”

I’m gonna show that one again….

“both Clinton and Bush got bad intelligence, or didn’t believe the good intelligence that was given to them”

This was exactly the point I was trying to make. Glad we can agree here.

6.) “Reporting about Activity at Salman Pak
[-----] The Salman Pak facility outside Baghdad was an unconventional warfare training facility used by the IIS and Saddam Hussein’s Fedayeen troops to train its officers for counterterrorism operations against regime
opponents. The facility contained a village mockup for urban combat training and a derelict commercial aircraft.
[...]
[-----] In Iraqi Support for Terrorism, the CIA provided additional
explanation of the sources of the information, noting that, “press and sensitive reporting about al-Qa’ida activity at Salman Pak ? ultimately sourced to three Iraqi defectors ? surged after 11 September.” The CIA determined, “that at least one of these defectors, whose story appeared in Vanity Fair magazine, had embellished and exaggerated his access.” Additionally, two other sources only repeated information provided by the [----] defector, and also lacked first-hand access to the information. Committee staff asked both CIA and DIA analysts whether any al-Qaida operatives or other sources have confirmed Salman Pak training allegations, and the unanimous response was that none have reported knowledge of any training. A DIA analyst told Committee staff, “The Iraqi National Congress (INC) has been pushing information for a long time about Salman Pak and
training of al-Qa’ida
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/serialset/creports/iraq.html
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2006/03/heroes_in_error.html?welcom
e=true”

Yeah, the Sen Intel Com Phase II rpt. I don’t even have to look it up to recognize it. My take on the Sen Intel Com Phase II rpt:
http://www.scottmalensek.com/PhaseIIrebuttalrpt.pdf

re camps Tommy Franks, American Soldier, pg 519

“And they [USMC] had encountered several hundred foreign fighters from Egypt, the Sudan, Syria, and Libya who were being trained in a camp south of Baghdad.”

The only camp on the S side of Baghdad that I know of is Salman Pak (unless there’s others), and Franks says they encountered hundreds of foreign fighters who’d been trained there. Just this week we’ve had fresh reporting on it.

http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/05/the_missing_link.php

How did Iraq help? “We helped them by building military camps in Salman Pak, in Khos, Khalis, Yusafiya. Iraq is expert in chemical weapons. We trained them in chemical weapons. We trained them about ground fighting, too.”

7.)”>From December, 2004:
“As for its interference in the foreign policy, the ruling families have obeyed America and are carrying out their role with their treacheries. Abdallah Bin-al-Sharif Husayn and his father began against Palestine. Here is his son Abdallah II who comes after him on the same path. Here is
Muhammad VI in Morocco, walking on the same path of treachery, which his father and grandfather previously treaded. Their implementation of Crusader colonies continues. There is no room to explore them in this message, but we will remind of some due to their importance. The government of Riyadh has entered into an international alliance with the infidel Crusaders lead by Bush against Islam and its people. This also took place in Afghanistan. Moreover, these conspiracies in Iraq have begun and not ended yet. They have opened their bases for the US forces so that they can invade Iraq, which assisted them and made it easier for them to occupy it. On that day, the Saudi foreign minister went out disparaging the religion, blood, and minds of Muslims, admitting that his country has opened its airports for the Americans for humanitarian purposes, as he alleged. Here they are today showing us a new link in the chain of conspiracies with America, which they called the initiative to send Arab and Muslim forces to safeguard security in Iraq. This is a great betrayal. They were not content with supporting the infidels in their occupation of the lands of Islam, so they came with this initiative to give legitimacy to the US occupation …”
http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/006101.php#dec16ultimatum

And lest we forget about Paul Johnson and Robert Jacobs among others:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-06/09/content_337892.htm”

Good quoting. It seems that after the US pulled out its forces (seriously, 261 is not mentionable as a military force), then UBL started raving about political affiliation with the US rather than direct military aid. Now, true enough he talks about Saudi letting the US use bases to attack Iraq (which I fully agree happened, and have been trying to make the case for since our first discussion), but in the 04 ranting he seems to have shifted his excuse to mere affiliation and conspiracy theories. Kinda ironic that so often we hear the left in this country complain that the Bush Admin is a puppet of the Sauds, and UBL’s complaining that the Sauds are puppets of the Bush Admin. Sorry, ot, but the irony is amazing. Again, my point is that UBL was po’d about US forces in Saudi that helped wage war on Saddam (a war which some have said was illegal and not sanctioned by the UN). In this rant, when he complains about military aid, I think he’s talking in past tense of that aid. That, or he didn’t get the memo that the US only had 261 people in Saudi. Maybe he thinks there’s some Saudi Area 51 where tens of thousands of US troops are controlling the Saudi govt?

Re Paul Jones and other contractors, this seems to back the idea that UBL’s rant shifted from being against inter-operation military support to non-military support once US forces (all but 261) left Saudi…unless Jones and other contractors are military?

9.) “The only IIS attack that I was aware of around the 1991 Gulf War was one in the Philippines that was fairly inept. According to this report Iraq dispatched 30 terror teams though none reached their targets (and none consisted of foreign terrorists).
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/980302/archive_003360.htm
What agency in DOD did the study on Khafji? Was it CAA (Vandiver?s outfit), Office of Net Assessment (Andy Marshall)? I had always heard it was a feint to test coalition strength or draw ground forces into battle, and considering they used 2-3 battalions, and not brigades I still tend to believe that.
http://www.afa.org/magazine/feb1998/0298epic.asp”

re the terror teams, there’s a lot on the 2003 IIS attacks out there (ironically from Dems like Sen Rockefeller and Levin), and while they were generally solely IIS, the ones in the PI were directly linked to Abu Sayef (sp?), and the PI even expelled the an Iraqi “diplomat” for having made repeated phone calls to AS’s leader on the eve of attacks. Iraqi embassy stuff is predominant in all kinds of ways.

re Khafji, I’d seen Gen Horner’s assessment that it was a feint attack in prep for a real mechanized attack by RG mech forces in Kuwait, and I’ve seen others-none that you’ve mentioned (never one that said it was battalions), but I think the best public account I’ve read of the battle was here:
http://www.amazon.com/Storm-Horizon-Khafji-Battle-Changed/dp/0345481534

10.) “You don?t believe Saddam?s words when he says he wanted to be an ally, yet believe his words when he claims to be an enemy of the US. It isn?t that easy for two countries to come together after a shared past animosity, both sides have to make accommodations. Saddam says he was willing to but didn?t trust the US. Lack of trust does not mean a state of war existed. I don?t trust the French but don?t think the US should go to war with them. Misunderstanding lead to the renewal of hostilities since Saddam didn?t think that the US would attack, or go all the way to Baghdad. Instead he thought the US would use him to make a point to the international community; it doesn?t mean they were enemies, otherwise Saddam may have believed he was truly in danger “

We’re so close to agreeing here James. My point is that Saddam did more than just “not trust” the US-that he expected to be attacked, and it was his miscalculation that the attack would come in the form of more impotent air strikes in Desert Fox style. Now, you bring up a great point that seems at odds, but your missing the different settings which make a huge difference. When you asked how I can believe Saddam when he said he was an enemy of the US, and not believe it when he said he wanted to be closer…you forgot that in the latter case, he was a captive, facing death, and not anywhere close to being as free to say what he wanted as he was prior to the invasion. I can easily envision how (for example) a policy maker in the Clinton Admin might rant and rave about the Bush Admin, the war, whatever, and then when jailed, claim that, “what I really meant to say was, I support the admin and wanted to help….” Nah, I just am not buying the words of yet another “innocent man on death row.” Had Saddam ranted and raved about being closer to the US when he was free, I’d be more inclined to believe him, but instead he constantly-almost daily-ranted about the Umm El-ma-arek, the mother of all fights. Here’s a better description. How often do police arrest a person who readily and consistently admits their malice once arrested? Me, I think most people claim innocence when arrested, and how often do we hear, “noooo, it wasn’t me. I was trying to break up the fight” etc.?

11.) See Franks’ quote above re foreign fighters. Re the suicide bombings, you cannot possibly be suggesting that there were no VBIED’s in the invasion? Please tell me you’re not going to suggest that every single personal account of the invasion, and all the documentaries showing these suicide attacks are unreal? There are literally THOUSANDS of witnesses to the suicide attacks against US tanks and other vehicles during the invasion, and personal suicide attacks against infantry, checkpoints etc. I’ve even got pictures of one of the suicide vest bomb factories at Baghdad University as well as pics of the hundreds of suicide bomb vests found there.

12.) “Then how do you explain Al Qaeda support for other Moslem insurgencies against non-Moslems (irrelevant to you, yet you claim you are so ?concerned? with the facts), or al Qaeda?s support for Islamic militants in SE Asia? Of course al Qaeda was angry about the sanctions on Iraq, and US troops in Iraq, but that doesn?t imply any sympathy or support for Saddam Hussein. You have yet to make that causal link. “

AQ support for other insurgencies (ie, the AQ fight against other non-Moslems) is different because I’m talking about AQ’s fight against the US, and UBL’s excuse for that. One can hardly say that the reason AQ Spain is the same as the reason AQ fights the US. UBL is nice enough to come up with excuses for each nation, and so in discussing why he called for holy war on Americans, I prefer to discuss why he called for holy war on Americans. There are some across the board commonalities, but his war on this nation and that seems to have nation-specific reasons as well.

13) “Everyone portrays themselves in the best possible light in their autobiographies, so I would take it with a grain of salt. Even if that is all true there is no indication that Iraq sold or gave RDX to al Qaeda. The problem with the Sullivans attack was too many explosives (almost all were retrieved and used in the Cole attack), and not that they couldn?t build a boat.”

Are you saying that they were smart enough to make the largest shaped charge bomb ever, but not smart enough to make a boat big enough to carry the bomb? Perhaps you can tell us where the RDX came from, or who helped design the sophisticated bomb?

14.) “I?ve read the docs they include a date but no strategy as to how to drive invaders from Somalia. I am familiar with Ray Robison, and well let?s just say he isn?t as cordial as you are if someone criticizes his posts, but fine no more character attacks.”

I beg to differ re the strategy. We can eliminate some pretty simply. It seems clear that by using the IIS and terrorist groups, the strategy wasn’t a conventional attack with fighter bombers, and it wasn’t a conventional naval attack or any other conventional attack. Given the simple combination of any intelligence service interacting with a terrorist group with the intent of taking X action in order to drive the an opponent from an area, it seems far more likely than not that X action is unconventional warfare, and given that we’re talking about a state intelligence service interacting with terrorists…we’re talking about state-sponsorship of terror. Since the terror group here is Al Queda and its affiliates, we’re talking about Iraqi sponsorship of Al Queda in attacks against the US for the mutual and individual benefits of Iraq and of AQ.

15.) “Interesting, I am not an author but I do work in the DC area in a related field. I?m not completely discounting your assertions just wondering why they haven?t been picked up in the MSM.”

Well, I’m not big believer in the liberal media idea as I think each outlet has its own tone to secure its own demographic. So, my bet is that my books and other writings don’t get picked up because I don’t market em. I HATE selling anything. I’ll inform, but I just can’t stomach the idea of selling or marketing. Something about it just doesn’t mesh with me. Don’t get me wrong, I’d LOVE to make some money off my books and writings, but my interest is more in research, discussion, and sharing of open source information. I should market, and I’ve done enough to realize that sales directly parallel marketing efforts, but I’d rather read, discuss, and share than spend time, effort, and money marketing. I dunno. Sometimes I think I should try getting an agent again, and at least give the traditional publishing method another try. A common thought in the vacuum between my ears. Still, please feel free to alert the media (hehehehe).

1.) “Yeah, Saddam fired a SCUD after the US bombed Iraq in the Jan 93 bombings “legitimate concerns”. Later, Iraq was found in “material breach” of UN resolutions at least 4 times, and clearly many more that were never addressed. He also fired illegal missiles into Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Saudi before the US invaded in 03. FYI, not all the SCUDs were ever accounted for. 24 remain missing to this day, and the ISG (as well as UNMOVIC) still have not been able to answer why Iraq was making fuel that could only be used in SCUDs right up into 2003, and why they were making airframe components, engines (which UNMOVIC turned up in Europe in 2004 or 2005), and more. In fact, I think if you search Global Security hard enough, you might find an interesting pic of a SCUD facility that had airframes around the outside before Powell’s UN address, and then no airframes the next day. The remain unaccounted for. The ISG report lists MOST issues as unresolved.”

Interesting theory, I could not bring anything up about a SCUD missile attack in 1993 on Google or lexisnexis. Certainly Saudi Arabia would have raised a stink about it, and Bush I would have reacted strongly to any SCUD missile attack. If you have a source I would like to see it.

2.) Send what you have

3.) “I disagree. Now earlier you cited Wikipedia. Let’s check what they say:

“A ceasefire is a temporary stoppage of a war or any armed conflict, where each side of the conflict agrees with the other to suspend aggressive actions.”
Dictionary.com… is a lot more vague as it says it can be a temporary or a permanent thing.
I maintain, that a cease-fire is a temporary agreement upon which permanence depends on conditions being met and maintained. In contrast, a peace agreement is just that, peace. Once a CFV or Cease Fire Violation occurs, the cease fire is broken, null, and void. Besides, as I said earlier subsequent UN resolutions re Iraq constantly reiterated that the resolution which authorized force was still in effect, and the resolution that stipulated the terms of the cease-fire specifically said it was conditions based. Iraq had several CFVs, never met all or even half of the terms of the cease fire agreement, and thus that agreement was null (ie, the use of force still authorized). Further, Saddam clearly believed he was still at war. He said so, and he acted as such. “

At various times the condition between the US and Iraq post-1991 have been called a cease-fire, a permanent cease-fire, and a peace. Whatever you call it it was still under the auspices of the UN Security Council. Like any permanent cease-fire under international law the victim of any violations would have to present them to the Security Council and the Security Council would have to vote on if it did or did not constitute a violation, and what action would be appropriate. The no-fly zones were a separate matter that Iraq at first complied with and then “defied”. Compliance wasn’t required of Iraq under any SC resolution. I maintain that Saddam did not act as if he were at war with the US as there was minimal “aggression” on the part of Iraq to defend against the no-fly zones. If Saddam truly believed himself at war he wouldn’t have done away with the SCUDs, and WMD, and would have maintained a more aggressive posture toward the US. Anyway we can close this point as well as neither of us will agree with the other.

4.) “Never heard the leukemia thing, and it’s completely irrelevant. The point here is that Saddam harbored a terrorists. And as to him being a retired terrorist, that’s not true at all as he still lead terrorists, and detainee as well as authenticated captured docs from the IIS say that he and his group were ready and willing to participate in continuing the Mother of all Battles (dated a decade past when you’ve claimed Saddam no longer believed he was at war with the US).”

Again you’ll have to show me those “authenticated” docs regarding Abu NIdal. One document that turned out to be fraudulent stated that Atta was trained by Nidal in the summer of 2002 before his “death”. The ANO group was dysfunctional after 1991 and had not hit a Western target since the mid-1980s, so I hardly think that Saddam was “harboring” al-Bana in the hopes that he would lead a vanguard of terrorists against his enemies.

5.) “The Guardian stories only adds the INC as one of the many sources confirming the story-others included the Clinton Admin. Richard Clarke, Madelline Albright, Tenet, the 911 Commission, and the House/Senate 911 Investigation all cite the meeting as having come from multiple sources, and all put credibility to it. The Free Republic post is great. I’ve got the video if you’d like to see it. I love to point to it when people suggest that the idea of Regime Ties is a Bush lie or a Feith fantasy. It too cites US (Clinton Admin) intel officials as well as other sources. So too do Newsweek, Time, US News, and the NYT in their reporting of the meeting. Clarke is perhaps the most specific because he’s the one who blew it in Feb 99. The US had an Afghan group with eyes on target in Feb 99 at UBL’s falcon hunting lodge. The ships and subs were in position to strike, and sat imagery showed a UAE C-130 transport there. Clarke (who was negotiating a multi-billion dollar scheme to sell special F-16 fighters to his friends in the UAE) called his friends, told them that they were looking at the C-130, and the next day, both the plane and UBL were gone. Did UBL go into hiding in Afghanistan, Pakistan or the tribal areas? Probably the tribal areas as it’s where he likes to hide the most (Tora Bora, NW of Wana, etc., Kunar Province in general, Milawa, you name it.).”

Your Richard Clarke story is a nice anecdote but irrelevant as UBL wasn’t falcon hunting with Iraqis, and didn’t go to Iraq when the US had eyes on him. The alleged meeting happened in 1999 when the Clinton Administration thought other things about Iraq that proved to be wrong like WMD. So all that really means is both Clinton and Bush got bad intelligence, or didn’t believe the good intelligence that was given to them.

6.)”Yeah, please if you don’t mind”

Reporting about Activity at Salman Pak

[-----] The Salman Pak facility outside Baghdad was an unconventional warfare training facility used by the IIS and Saddam Hussein’s Fedayeen troops to train its officers for counterterrorism operations against regime opponents. The facility contained a village mockup for urban combat training and a derelict commercial aircraft.

[...]

[-----] In Iraqi Support for Terrorism, the CIA provided additional explanation of the sources of the information, noting that, “press and sensitive reporting about al-Qa’ida activity at Salman Pak — ultimately sourced to three Iraqi defectors — surged after 11 September.” The CIA determined, “that at least one of these defectors, whose story appeared in Vanity Fair magazine, had embellished and exaggerated his access.” Additionally, two other sources only repeated information provided by the [----] defector, and also lacked first-hand access to the information. Committee staff asked both CIA and DIA analysts whether any al-Qaida operatives or other sources have confirmed Salman Pak training allegations, and the unanimous response was that none have reported knowledge of any training. A DIA analyst told Committee staff, “The Iraqi National Congress (INC) has been pushing information for a long time about Salman Pak and training of al-Qa’ida

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/serialset/creports/iraq.html

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2006/03/heroes_in_error.html?welcome=true

7.)”And when was the last time UBL raved about the US occupying Saudi? Before or after the US left with all its personnel (I’m sorry, but let’s be clear and agree that 261 people is not a significant military presence, barely mentionable since the embassy staff is probably double that)”

From December, 2004:

“As for its interference in the foreign policy, the ruling families have obeyed America and are carrying out their role with their treacheries. Abdallah Bin-al-Sharif Husayn and his father began against Palestine. Here is his son Abdallah II who comes after him on the same path. Here is Muhammad VI in Morocco, walking on the same path of treachery, which his father and grandfather previously treaded.

Their implementation of Crusader colonies continues. There is no room to explore them in this message, but we will remind of some due to their importance.
The government of Riyadh has entered into an international alliance with the infidel Crusaders lead by Bush against Islam and its people. This also took place in Afghanistan. Moreover, these conspiracies in Iraq have begun and not ended yet. They have opened their bases for the US forces so that they can invade Iraq, which assisted them and made it easier for them to occupy it.
On that day, the Saudi foreign minister went out disparaging the religion, blood, and minds of Muslims, admitting that his country has opened its airports for the Americans for humanitarian purposes, as he alleged. Here they are today showing us a new link in the chain of conspiracies with America, which they called the initiative to send Arab and Muslim forces to safeguard security in Iraq. This is a great betrayal.
They were not content with supporting the infidels in their occupation of the lands of Islam, so they came with this initiative to give legitimacy to the US occupation …”

http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/006101.php#dec16ultimatum

And lest we forget about Paul Johnson and Robert Jacobs among others:

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-06/09/content_337892.htm

8.) See above

9.) “Yeah, he attacked Jordan with IIS attacks before during and after 91, and backed terror attacks there. Jordan was not his ally in 91 either. Only Turabi and Arafat were. Jordan voted for all the UN resolutions and supported them, and aided the US via logistics, intel, etc. Not major contributions, but they didn’t want to be major contributors. Yes, I do refer to Khafji in 91 btw, and 3-5 brigades isn’t a feint. It was an attempt. In later years (not long before Pres Bush took office) the DoD did studies on the matter as they prepared to make a computer sim of the various battles in 91 as a means for training tank crews. They hired a group to go around, get detailed info from every single person involved, and compile it into a scenario (later did the same thing with the battle of 73 Easting and others). In the process, they discovered that the Khafji bit was an attempt to get to the water de-salinization plants and force Saudi to negotiate. They had no idea the power of the US, and grossly overestimated their own forces’ abilities. “

The only IIS attack that I was aware of around the 1991 Gulf War was one in the Philippines that was fairly inept. According to this report Iraq dispatched 30 terror teams though none reached their targets (and none consisted of foreign terrorists).

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/980302/archive_003360.htm

What agency in DOD did the study on Khafji? Was it CAA (Vandiver’s outfit), Office of Net Assessment (Andy Marshall)? I had always heard it was a feint to test coalition strength or draw ground forces into battle, and considering they used 2-3 battalions, and not brigades I still tend to believe that.

http://www.afa.org/magazine/feb1998/0298epic.asp

10.) “Again, I refuse to take Saddam’s claims of innocence as he sat on death row. The same (perhaps more) holds true for Aziz mainly because after reading the accounts of his dealing with UNSCOM Richard Butler, I am disgusted by the man, and convinced he’s an animal-certainly not a good source. Now, the third point is an interesting one. I’d seen a LOT on that before where there were claims of “this last minute offer” and “that”, but (again, multi-sourcing…in this case multi govt sourcing) shows that all of those last minute attempts were done by lower regime members seeking to stall for time. If Saddam wanted peace, he could have left Iraq and taken the offers of amnesty in other countries. If he wanted to work with the US and get in the good graces, he’d have stopped the rhetoric that was counter to that, and worked to build “confidence” during the inspection process instead of deliberately hiding things that removed or degraded confidence in his disarmament claims.”

You don’t believe Saddam’s words when he says he wanted to be an ally, yet believe his words when he claims to be an enemy of the US. It isn’t that easy for two countries to come together after a shared past animosity, both sides have to make accommodations. Saddam says he was willing to but didn’t trust the US. Lack of trust does not mean a state of war existed. I don’t trust the French but don’t think the US should go to war with them. Misunderstanding lead to the renewal of hostilities since Saddam didn’t think that the US would attack, or go all the way to Baghdad. Instead he thought the US would use him to make a point to the international community; it doesn’t mean they were enemies, otherwise Saddam may have believed he was truly in danger

11.) “So you’re saying that because you cite a report that is PACKED with vagueness and freely admits its assumptions based (and Baghdad focused), you’ll discount all the first hand accounts from soldiers and embedded media (even those who opposed the war and claim they were attacked by foreign suicide bombers)? Wow. Yes, LOTS of prisoners were taken too btw, and many were foreigners.
I’m stunned. Choosing to believe a single, vague, source that admits it’s almost entirely speculation rather than believe the words of a dozen first hand accounts. Man, History Channel, and Discovery Channels have documentary shows on every single day showing the assault on Iraq, and in every one you see troops talking about fighting suicide bombers, VBIEDs, and more. What about the suicide mosque bombings, or the Baghdad University bomb vest factory? None of that-even the pics-none of that is believed in lieu of a single, vague, source? In all sincerity, are you interested in facts or in debating because the facts, witnesses, video, prisoners, and more showing that thousands of terrorists (foreign fighters, etc) were in Iraq when the US invaded is grossly overwhelming to your single, vague, unreliable source.”

You’re talking to me about sourcing again? At least I post links, I have yet to see your verified source on thousands of foreign fighters, and multiple suicide bombers. I read all your little books you cited, and not one claimed that the “irregular” forces that the US faced were foreigners. Franks describes three types of irregular forces; Saddam Fedyaeen, Baathist Militias, and Saddam’s Cubs (young boys under the age of 16), they all had one thing in common; they were all Iraqis. Check that, they had two things in common; they were all Iraqis and didn’t use suicide bombers. Check the facts man, there were only two suicide bombings between March 19th and April 10th against US troops, and one in the Kurdish area. The next bombing wasn’t until August.

12.) “They disagree that EIJ took over 2/3 of AQ leadership roles in 2001, and point to 1996. Azzam and all the rhetoric about driving invaders from foreign lands is irrelevant to the discussion about AQ’s war on the US because the US had far more than 261 people in Saudi in 1990, and I’m interested in AQ’s war with the US-not their war in Chechnya or against other non-US enemies. Their war against the US started in 12/92, and the 3 reasons for their war on the US were all based in the US war on Iraq at the time. They surely didn’t fly planes into the world trade center because the Haliburton invaded Iraq 2 years later. Specifically, they said that they would retaliate for the US Desert Fox strikes, and immediately after that statement, the only plot that was set in motion was the 911 attacks they had been campfire fantasies until then, but authorized and set in motion after the vow to retaliate for the US attack on Iraq in 1998.”

Then how do you explain Al Qaeda support for other Moslem insurgencies against non-Moslems (irrelevant to you, yet you claim you are so “concerned” with the facts), or al Qaeda’s support for Islamic militants in SE Asia? Of course al Qaeda was angry about the sanctions on Iraq, and US troops in Iraq, but that doesn’t imply any sympathy or support for Saddam Hussein. You have yet to make that causal link.

13.)”I was doing back in 1990, and today, it’s just incredible. It’s like friggin Star Trek!
SO, Louis Freeh gets the bomb analysis from his FBI guys who investigated the bombing. They tell him it’s Russian RDX. He calls his counterpart, tells him, the analysis is correct. Now, the question remains…did these hack job moron engineers who couldn’t build a boat (ie, their attack on the USS Sullivans) manage to make the largest shaped charge ever, AND did Walid Bin Attassh buy the Russian RDX from Russia, or someone else?”

Everyone portrays themselves in the best possible light in their autobiographies, so I would take it with a grain of salt. Even if that is all true there is no indication that Iraq sold or gave RDX to al Qaeda. The problem with the Sullivans attack was too many explosives (almost all were retrieved and used in the Cole attack), and not that they couldn’t build a boat.

14.) “Ray’s expertise is not really all that important since he specifically references a US translator and Westpoint’s counter-terrorism docex translation dept. Btw, the docs DO include dates, and strategies. Plans would not be the kind of thing a state-sponsor would normally include, and money transfers are only proven by detainees and sometimes docs (which, as we’ve seen have been made and authenticated). Anything Ray does, he does with a guy named Sammi who does speak Arabic, does the translations, and has helped authenticate docs. Let’s avoid the character attack when multi sourcing is there and not single sourcing?”

I’ve read the docs they include a date but no strategy as to how to drive invaders from Somalia. I am familiar with Ray Robison, and well let’s just say he isn’t as cordial as you are if someone criticizes his posts, but fine no more character attacks.

15.) “Back in the 90’s I did my senior portfolio as a fictional novel. The intent was to demonstrate a sort of Tom Clancy, Red Storm Rising meets All Quiet on the Western Front. I wanted to show that war-particularly conventional war-was not gone, and even more mechanized, industrialized, and horrific than ever. In the late 1990’s I re-wrote it into a series, and tried to get it published. Traditional publishing is a bear unless you know someone or live in NYC. I got tired of trying to get an agent (cost too much money to send out all those queries), and decided to do the print on demand route just to get closure. Besides, this was 2000. Who wanted to read about war? Even Clancy’s books weren’t selling like they once had. In June 01, it was published, picked up by Amazon, I sold a lotta copies, made some money, and published the rest myself.
I’ve never tried traditional publishing since. I also don’t market my books. I mean, I’m proud of em, but I HATE being a salesman. It makes me feel like a pimp or something. So, I mention em in conversation, include em in bylines, and that’s about it. They just sell out of word of mouth, and I get beer money checks every month. Re the Sam Pender books, I used a pen name for a variety of reasons. I got some not-so non-violent comments from so-called non-violence advocates (one in particular who lived in Egypt). I notified the FBI, and the trouble ended, but when it came time to publish, I chose a pen name (my favorite character from my fiction books). I also wanted a pen name because those books are almost all chronologies from a huge list of other sources, and I wanted people to focus on the information-not me as a source. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. At least I know I compiled the info, put it out there, and did what I could to point fingers at both the left and the right for this war. To my knowledge, I was the first to publish a book in 2003 that specifically pointed blame at President Bush re WMD etc in Iraq. I didn’t say he lied, I said he was responsible for the inexcusable intelligence failures that lead to the Chinese seizure of a US spy plane, the 911 attacks, the spies at the FBI and CIA, and the failure to accurately determine the WMD capacity/threat from Saddam.”

Interesting, I am not an author but I do work in the DC area in a related field. I’m not completely discounting your assertions just wondering why they haven’t been picked up in the MSM.

Dignified & respectful for the most part, too… That’s too rare on partisan political blogs, where personal attack seems to be the rule.

I don’t know what happened with James in his last two posts, but I will say this; once I signed in to comment myself, the commentary page that came up ends back at May 15th, with no obvious link to go further. (I figured I’d add my comment before exploring to figure out how to get back to the rest…)

For the record, I’m currently on James’ side, and was directed here by Wordsmith, who posted this and a few other links over at Mike’s America. (& by the by… I recognized Mike’s comment as being his from the first sentence… Long form commentary containing evidentiary links isn’t his cup of tea… He’s more of a “You’re with us or with the turarists” kinda guy… 8>)

I’m far less well informed than either of these debaters (though I’m workin’ at it), and thus could never argue my case as thoroughly as either of ‘em has, up to now. I’m here to see the evidence, and I hope that the debate continues…

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