Gaff: I hoping that maybe you weren’t so naive to know all the info about this letter/memo and then come to the conclusion that it’s a fact.

That’s funny… I was hoping you weren’t so naive as to just assume a journalist’s sketchy “investigative reporting” was definitive… especially in light of the gaps in Atta’s travel schedule.

I guess that makes us even, yes?

Like or Dislike: 0  0

@MataHarley

Gaffa, were there “hard” and “strong” evidence… aka a smoking gun… there would be no need for debate or dissent. I did not “fail to take in the rest of your sentence”. I gave you the benefit of the doubt you weren’t that unbelievably stupid.

Leaving aside the stupid & the duh moments which add nothing to the debate…I believe there is plenty of debate over smoking guns or hard evidence. For instance I believe there is enough hard evidence to say that Al Qaeda caused 9/11 and yet there are plenty of people who believe that is what either caused by Bush or by Saddam!

Don’t care about Atta in Prague, nor was my intent to cast doubt on whether he was in Prague or not. What I find more interesting was his relationship with Abu Nidal and his terrorist organization.

Possibly but Abu Nidal is a sideshow – he isn’t part of Al Qaeda and I haven’t seen any decent evidence to connect him with Mohammed Atta.

First of all, IMHO, I find great differences between a “letter”… ala voluntary correspondence between individuals… and a “memo”… intra-agency communiques for business purposes. But perhaps that’s another of those “Queen’s English” moments….

Type in Habbush Letter and then type in Habbish Memo into Google – or your favourite search engine and you will see the hit rate is pretty much the same. I’m sure business and government can communicate via letter. To me that semantics and pretty much irrelevant. Main thing is that it is probably fake.

And surely you don’t believe that I’ve never seen this memo, nor explored this in the past… or even in the recent conversations. It’s not like it didn’t make the news, and I don’t have my archived bookmarks

lol – I was giving you the benefit of the doubt – I hoping that maybe you weren’t so naive to know all the info about this letter/memo and then come to the conclusion that it’s a fact.

Comparisons of national security and assessing intel… where there is rarely a smoking gun… with criminal lawsuits and evidence in a US court of law is so amazingly anal that I have no idea where to start… so I won’t. Were national security for any country to pivot on the “burden of proof” required by the US judicial system, we wouldn’t have make it past WWII.

In this regards I’m not talking about US court of law (we are not dealing with people being locked up without trial here) – but what you and I consider what evidence is likely to be true and verified by reputable sources and cross checked with collobrative evidence. It appears your threshold for beliving certain evidence as fact is pretty low – or at least when it comes to evidence which support your world view;)

Like or Dislike: 0  0

Gaffa, were there “hard” and “strong” evidence… aka a smoking gun… there would be no need for debate or dissent. I did not “fail to take in the rest of your sentence”. I gave you the benefit of the doubt you weren’t that unbelievably stupid.

Don’t care about Atta in Prague, nor was my intent to cast doubt on whether he was in Prague or not. What I find more interesting was his relationship with Abu Nidal and his terrorist organization.

In regards to the Habbush letter or memo (not sure why you are splitting hairs as it’s often refered to as a letter) – have it look at it – as it also talks about uranium shipment from Niger. Remember those other forged letters about yellowcake?

First of all, IMHO, I find great differences between a “letter”… ala voluntary correspondence between individuals… and a “memo”… intra-agency communiques for business purposes. But perhaps that’s another of those “Queen’s English” moments….

And surely you don’t believe that I’ve never seen this memo, nor explored this in the past… or even in the recent conversations. It’s not like it didn’t make the news, and I don’t have my archived bookmarks.

You’re just rackin’ up the “duh” moments here, aren’t you? LOL

And I certainly won’t be battling the Niger yellowcake argument yet again. Is there a “smoking gun” that Saddam did *not* try to acquire it? No. No more than there is a “smoking gun” that he did. Again, see first paragraph…. duh

But perhaps your quintessential “duh” moment is your comment:

The burden of proof lies with those making such positive allegations.

Comparisons of national security and assessing intel… where there is rarely a smoking gun… with criminal lawsuits and evidence in a US court of law is so amazingly anal that I have no idea where to start… so I won’t. Were national security for any country to pivot on the “burden of proof” required by the US judicial system, we wouldn’t have make it past WWII.

Like or Dislike: 0  0

@MataHarley

lol – you focus on the if any but you fail to take in the rest of the sentence I used – notably ‘HARD’ evidence and ‘STRONG’ connection.

In regards to the Habbush letter or memo (not sure why you are splitting hairs as it’s often refered to as a letter) – have it look at it – as it also talks about uranium shipment from Niger. Remember those other forged letters about yellowcake?

And don’t you smell a rat when an anonymous ‘leading member of Iraq’s governing council’ verifies the authenicity yet wont ‘reveal where and how they obtained it.’? Even Coughlin doesn’t know if it’s legitimate or a fake. lol. Isn’t it odd that this flimsy, most likely to be fake piece of ‘evidence’ is all there is? No photos, no flight info etc etc to link Atta being in Iraq. I’m sure you have read more on 9/11 than me – but the more I look into it – the more I find that the ‘experts’ like yourself treat dodgy disinformation like this as FACT.

As for Atta being in Prague in early April – well it could be possible that Atta used an alias, that he travelled internationally but his phone didn’t work internationally, that he gave his phone to someone else to use etc etc. But that’s not proof! That common old supposition. Lots of things COULD be possible. Bin Laden COULD have flown over himself to Prague that April, stripped naked and done a jig in Wenceslas Square at midnight as a part of a circus troupe. Doesn’t make it true. Or it could have been that the Czech security person was mistaken. Is every sighting of Atta, Bin Laden & Elvis true? Unlikely – so hence why collaborative evidence is so important. Again I’m surprise you spend anytime on such fluff. Do you really believe this to be true???

The burden of proof lies with those making such positive allegations. In the same way, the likelihood is that the Habbush Letter is faked unless there is convincing evidence otherwise – whether or not it was faked by the CIA on the orders of the White House as claimed by Ron Suskind is therefore up to Suskind to prove. Note I didn’t even bring up Susking until you did – as I’m yet to be convinced. Already ‘Former CIA officer Philip Giraldi alleged that the Pentagon was behind the forgery.’ but either way this isn’t enough proof.

Like or Dislike: 0  0

Wow, this is quite the marathon thread! It’s getting close to a record!

(necessary topic, though.)

Like or Dislike: 0  0

And yes, Lawrence Wright’s The Looming Tower is the definitive account of al Qaeda’s geneology; but it’s not the end all, be all on all things al Qaeda; especially in regards to the numerous contacts and ties to Iraq. Check out Scott’s book, which I cited in comment #58.

Like or Dislike: 0  0

Here’s another opinion regarding Mohammed Atta and Prague.

The thing to keep in mind, though, is that the claims regarding contact between al Qaeda and Iraq don’t hinge upon whether there was a meeting in Prague. The regime ties are numerous and I think the Administration was more cautious than the critics and political opponents will have you believe, in regards to whether or not the Administration over-emphasized those claims.

Gaffa #68:

As for Wikipedia – I find it generally more balanced with linked reference than the opinions expressed on here.

I find it specifically much more lacking in accurate information than many of the FA entries when it comes to the topic of Saddam/Iraq/al Qaeda/intell; especially when it uses media claims as a source for “facts” when some media claims are behind the Curveball.

The “few actual facts” Baer refers to have been debunked.

And what irks is Gaffa’s notion that the wiki entries are some sort of revelation and one-trumpmanship.

@MataHarley #67:

Which is the point Bush was making when he stated Saddam was a threat… being rich in resources, adept at underground/black market weapons acquisition, and a serious relationship with terrorists… who all seem to work together as needed. Thus it did not need to be only those carrying imaginary AQ badges that were defined as the enemy. The Taliban was not a member of AQ, but it is they who we attacked immediately after 911. Funny how no one complains about that…

“Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.”
-President Bush in an address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People, United States Capitol, Washington D.C., September 20, 2001.

How difficult is this for Gaffa to understand:

“We’ve had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the September 11th. There’s no question that Saddam Hussein had al Qaeda ties.” – Pres. Bush 9/17/03

Yup, not much has evolved since the last time much of this was hashed out.

Invading Saddam’s Iraq wasn’t a distraction, but part of the same war. I think he was a metastasizing threat. What is a distraction, is Gaffa’s quibbling over “al Qaeda” and misrepresentation of the Administration’s claims regarding the relationship between Saddam and al-Qaeda, and the justifications/reasonings used to remove Saddam.

One of the falsehoods critics used to push (and still do, although the argument should now be obsolete) was the notion that a secular Saddam would never align himself with religious fanatics, regardless of whether you want to label it “al Qaeda” or some other distinct Islamist terrorist organization. The CIA myth by lazy analysts and political opponents like Tyler Drumheller was to entrench their belief, that it was an impossibility. So documents that crossed their way that suggested links and cooperation between Saddam and Islamic terror became stones left unturned. Rather than re-examine and question their preconceived notions, they simply dismissed any challenge to that belief system as flawed data without actually looking into it.

Like or Dislike: 0  0

Gaffa: btw…where did I state that there were no ties between Saddam & Al Qaeda?

Correct. What you said was there was “little, if any” prior to 911. This leaves a comment trail that at 2:59 on August 7th, you believed there was “little, if any” ties… when you said:

Gaffa:…. yet little if any hard evidence of any strong connection between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein regime before 9/11. Certainly nothing of an operational relationship. As a lay person wading through such tangents isn’t helpful.

Technically, the “if any” means there was no ties, and “little” preceding it gave you an out just in case there was something you may run across that blows away your “if any/no ties” statement.

Since “if any” means you had not seen anything before, I had to run with your complete phrase as meaning you have seen nothing that makes you believe there was a Saddam/AQ tie…. and if something was presented it would be but a “little”.

After going thru the Iraqi Perspectives reports and ensuing conversation, we managed to see you budge from “little if any” to “pretty sparse” and “thin” (since you don’t consider Saddam’s relationship with Zawahiri/EIJ as the same as Zawahiri/AQ) with your August 10th comment at 8:43pm, when you said:

Yes I agree – you directed me to this to specifically show the relationship between Al Qaeda and Saddam. Which is actually pretty sparse compared to the other terrorist groups. And some of this doc is about Iraqi intel rather than than active two-way relationships. I’m sure the CIA has lots of intel of terror groups. This of course is not saying that Saddam wasn’t actively involved with some of these terror groups – just that his relationship with Al Qaeda specifically was thin compared to other groups or other countries.

That is, at least, and improvement over your “little, if any” prior opinions that there were no ties, or “little” at best if something came up in the future.

Like or Dislike: 0  0

There you go, depending upon Wiki again, Gaffa. Perhaps you should learn the concept of Wiki before you put so much faith in their anonymous editors and their power to morph the truth.

There is no “letter”. Atta was not being “funded” by Nidal. Nidal was living in a villa, courtesy of Saddam’s IIS. At that time, he was in the regime’s good graces. He did not exit the planet that way.

The memo, not a letter, from Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti… Saddam’s head of the IIS…. is not such a cut and dried issue.

I’m not sure what you think you have as “collaborative evidence” from Wiki based solely on their notion that the letter was a fake. First of all, many Iraqi governing council confirmed the handwriting, and are not suprised at Saddam’s nefarious associations.

What Suskind tried to use as his major discredit was based on journalist Michael Isikoff’s claim the memo was a fake, and citing supposed FBI records saying that Atta wasn’t anywhere near that area.

There’s two problems … and the first is found in the reporting by Con Coughlin, the Telegraph’s leading expert on both Saddam and on Middle East terror groups.

While it is almost impossible to ascertain whether or not the document is legitimate or a clever fake, Iraqi officials working for the interim government are convinced of its authenticity, even though they decline to reveal where and how they obtained it. “It is not important how we found it,” said a senior Iraqi security official. “The important thing is that we did find it and the information it contains.”

A leading member of Iraq’s governing council, who asked not to be named, said he was convinced of the document’s authenticity.

“There are people who are working with us who used to work with Habbush who are convinced that it is his handwriting and signature. We are uncovering evidence all the time of Saddam’s dealings with al-Qaeda, and this document shows the extent of the old regime’s involvement with the international terrorist network.”

~~~

Although Western intelligence agencies have attempted to trace Atta’s movements in the months preceding September 11, there remain several periods during which his precise whereabouts are unknown. Having moved to Florida from Hamburg in 2000, Atta is known to have made at least two trips from the US to Europe in 2001.

In early January he flew to Madrid for a few days. His next confirmed trip was to Zurich in early July. In between, American investigators have concluded from a detailed examination of Atta’s credit cards and phone records, that he spent most of the spring and early summer of 2001 in Florida, interspersed by occasional domestic trips. The only confirmed sighting of Atta during this period, however, was on April 26 when he was pulled over for a traffic violation in Florida.

This traffic offence, taken with other evidence collated by FBI agents, is one of the reasons that CIA officials have discounted the report that Atta met an Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague earlier in the month (the Czech authorities claim Atta was in Prague on April 8). Yesterday the New York Times reported that Ani, who was taken into US custody last July, had told American interrogators that he had not met Atta in Prague.

“The Prague meeting does not appear very convincing,” said Lorenzo Vidino, a terrorism analyst at The Investigative Project, a non-profit organisation that investigates international terrorism, in Washington. “But even if that meeting did not take place you have to remember that Atta used a large number of aliases when he travelled. It is not inconceivable that Atta slipped out of the US undetected sometime in the first half of 2001.”

The US Congressional report into the September 11 attacks states that Atta used 16 to 17 known aliases, although American intelligence experts concede that there may have been others.

It is entirely conceivable, then, that Atta secretly made his way to Baghdad to undertake training with Abu Nidal a few months before the September 11 attacks. But as long as Saddam and his senior intelligence operatives remain at large, it is impossible to assess just how much they knew about, and were involved in, the planning and execution of the September 11 atrocities.

The second can only add some confusion to the issue – the case of is the multiple Mohammed Atta’s… as revealed in the circa 2005 Able Danger exposure era.

All of this points to more than a few who collaborate the memo’s apparent authenticity, and cast question on whether or not Atta could have slipped out and into Bagdad (not Prague) under the intel radar.

For Suskind, who makes his living trying to expose the Bush admin as nefarious, his source data pronouncing the memo as an absolute fake comes into question.

Like or Dislike: 0  0

@MataHarley

2: Mohammed Atta, who originally proposed the 911 plot in 1996, underwent training in Iraq, courtesy of Abu Nidal… who had been Saddam’s “guest” in Iraq since 1999 – even occupying a villa supplied by Saddam’s secret service

Here’s another wikipedia page for you to chew on…

Investigative journalist Michael Isikoff spoke with current and former US officials, including an Iraqi document expert who was at that time reviewing thousands of Operation Iraqi Freedom documents, all of whom deemed the letter a probable fabrication.[9] “The problem with this, say U.S. law enforcement officials, is that the FBI has compiled a highly detailed time line for Atta’s movements throughout the spring and summer of 2001 based on a mountain of documentary evidence, including airline records, ATM withdrawals and hotel receipts. Those records show Atta crisscrossing the United States during this period—making only one overseas trip, an 11-day visit to Spain that didn’t begin until six days after the date of the Iraqi memo.”

Isikoff continued: “Ironically, even the Iraqi National Congress of Ahmed Chalabi, which has been vocal in claiming ties between Al Qaeda and Saddam’s regime, was dismissive of the new Telegraph story. ‘The memo is clearly nonsense,’ an INC spokesman told Newsweek.”

I know you have a vastly superior understanding than me – but do you REALLY believe that Atta was in Iraq being funded by Nidal? Are you just basing that on this discredited handwritten letter or do you have collaborative evidence to back this up?

btw…where did I state that there were no ties between Saddam & Al Qaeda?

Like or Dislike: 0  0