Darn it.... Why did Rumsfiled told this to press?




http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030917/ap_on_re_mi_ea/rumsfeld_iraq_3






Rumsfeld Sees No Link Between Iraq, 9/11
Tue Sep 16, 8:29 PM ET

By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday he had no reason to believe that Iraq (news - web sites)'s Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) had a hand in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.


At a Pentagon (news - web sites) news conference, Rumsfeld was asked about a poll that indicated nearly 70 percent of respondents believed the Iraqi leader probably was personally involved.


"I've not seen any indication that would lead me to believe that I could say that," Rumsfeld said.


He added: "We know he was giving $25,000 a family for anyone who would go out and kill innocent men, women and children. And we know of various other activities. But on that specific one, no, not to my knowledge."


The Bush administration has asserted that Saddam's government had links to al-Qaida, the terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden (news - web sites) that masterminded the Sept. 11 attacks. And in various public statements over the past year or so administration officials have suggested close links.


Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) said on Sunday, for example, that success in stabilizing and democratizing Iraq would strike a major blow at the "the geographic base of the terrorists who have had us under assault for many years, but most especially on 9-11."


And Tuesday, in an interview on ABC's "Nightline," White House national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) said that one of the reasons President Bush (news - web sites) went to war against Saddam was because he posed a threat in "a region from which the 9-11 threat emerged."


In an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press," Cheney was asked whether he was surprised that more than two-thirds of Americans in the Washington Post poll would express a belief that Iraq was behind the attacks.

"No, I think it's not surprising that people make that connection," he replied.


Rice, asked about the same poll numbers, said, "We have never claimed that Saddam Hussein had either direction or control of 9-11."


"What we have said," she added, "is that this is someone who supported terrorists, helped to train them, but most importantly that this is someone who, with his animus toward the United States, with his penchant for and capability to gain weapons of mass destruction, and his obvious willingness to use them, was a threat in this region that we were not prepared to tolerate."


Cheney said he recalled being asked about an Iraq connection to 9-11 shortly after the attacks, and he recalled saying he knew of no evidence at that point.


"Subsequent to that, we have learned a couple of things," he said. "We learned more and more that there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaida that stretched back through most of the decade of the '90s; that it involved training, for example, on BW (biological warfare) and CW (chemical warfare) — that al-Qaida sent personnel to Baghdad to get trained on the systems, and involved the Iraqis providing bomb-making expertise and advice to the al-Qaida organization."


At his Pentagon news conference, Rumsfeld reiterated his belief that U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq are making satisfactory progress in stabilizing the country.


He said it was an "open question" whether the United States would get the 10,000 to 15,000 additional international troops it seeks to create a third multinational division for security duty in Iraq. The Pentagon has been hopeful of getting at least that many additional troops from Turkey, Pakistan or other friendly countries to beef up security and possibly to allow some of the 130,000 U.S. troops there to go home next year.


"It would relieve some of the pressure on our forces," Rumsfeld said. "Whether or not there will be a (United Nations (news - web sites)) resolution and whether or not — even if there were a resolution — we would get that number of troops is an open question."


Rice acknowledged that if commitments for more troops are gained, it "could be months" before they were in place.



Gen. Peter Pace, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who appeared with Rumsfeld, said there are more than 210,000 coalition forces in Iraq: 130,000 American troops, 24,000 British and other international troops, and 60,000 Iraqi police, border guards and civil defense forces.

I
Nice nice...... old fart is speaking now...........little too late.





raq's WMD probably destroyed a decade ago: Blix
Wed Sep 17, 7:03 AM ET Add Mideast - AFP to My Yahoo!



SYDNEY (AFP) - Former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix said Iraq (news - web sites) had probably got rid of its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) at least 10 years ago but Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) pretended otherwise to deter any attack.


"I'm certainly more and more to the conclusion that Iraq has, as they maintained, destroyed all almost of what they had in the summer of 1991," Blix told Australian national radio.


Blix was chief UN weapons inspector on Iraq in the run-up to the war. His inspectors worked in Iraq for several months in late 2002 and early 2003 and failed to find conclusive evidence of the alleged weapons.


Their absence has become a major embarrassment for the United States and its allies, who used it to justify their invasion in March. The United Nations (news - web sites) refused to endorse the war.


Asked if it was likely Iraq has not had weapons of mass destruction for at least 10 years, Blix said: "Yup, that's right."


But the former Swedish diplomat said there had to be an explanation why the Iraqi authorities had created so many difficulties for his inspectors, suggesting it might have been a complex charade, designed precisely to prevent an invasion.


"You see, if they didn't have anything (WMD) after '91, there must be some explanation why they behaved as they did. They certainly gave the impression that they were denying access and so forth," Blix said.


"I mean, you can put up a sign on your door, Beware of the Dog, without having a dog."


Blix's suggestions, which he said were already known in the United States, called into question controversial intelligence used by Britain and the United States to justify the conflict in Iraq.


On December 7 last year, the government of then-Iraqi president Saddam Hussein made a submission to the United Nations in which it said it did not have chemical, biological or nuclear weapons.


It was quickly dismissed as false and incomplete by the United States and Britain, which accused Baghdad of failing to disarm as required by Security Council Resolution 1441. These charges were later used by Washington and London to justify the invasion of the country in late March.


Since then, British Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites) has been under fire for allegedly ignoring intelligence casting doubt on the case for war.


And Australian Prime Minister John Howard this week was accused of lying over a British intelligence report suggesting a strike on Baghdad would increase the likelihood of terrorist attacks against Western targets.


US officials have also been increasingly keen to downplay the significance of the search for weapons in Iraq. The US-controlled Iraq Survey Group has been scouring the country for evidence of weapons, but its hundreds of scientists have found very little.


Blix pointed out that the rhetoric of official descriptions of the hunt for weapons had been progressively weakened, doubting that any would now be found.


"The more time that has passed, the more I think it's unlikely that anything will be found," Blix said.


"In the beginning they talked about weapons concretely, and later on they talked about weapons programs, and maybe they'll find some documents of interest but that should have surfaced and, I think, explained."





Saddam's regime was repeatedly accused of using chemical weapons against his own people and during the long-running war against Iran in the 1980s. But after the 1991 Gulf war (news - web sites) his regime was isolated and starved of funds under UN sanctions.

The United States failed to bring down Saddam in 1991, despite calling on Shiite Muslims in the south of the country to rise up against him, a call that resulted in a heavy backlash against them by government forces.

Since its successful invasion, the US-led coalition has become increasingly bogged down in Iraq, facing strident calls to leave the country, a wave of attacks against its forces and a series of bombings, some blamed on al-Qaeda.

The neoconmen became obsessed with Al-Qaeda in Iraq, and now have made it happen. Everything they touch turns to shit. These irresponsible zealots are going to drive us into ruin, if we allow them to stay in power.

One may also be convinced that doctors cause disease because whenever you see them there is always a sick person nearby.

The enemy of lies it’s to keep them true to it!

la la la la la....

We knew all this before. Saddams son in law defected to Jordan or syria about 7 years ago, and told his debreiefers that he had personally been involved in the destruction of the nerve gas etc. They didnt release that part of the transcripts to us sheeple in the run up to the war on Iraq.

And it would have been nice if they had said Iraq wasnt connected to Al Qaeda a bit earlier. Instead they didnt, leaving it open for the connection to be suggested. So why do around 69% of Americans believe there is a connection?

Originally posted by guthrie
l So why do around 69% of Americans believe there is a connection?

Bush has , at the behest of his handlers, managed to brainwash one hell of a lot of people who can not think for themselves. By constantanly using the same terms; "evil doers" "haters of freedom" etc, to describe both the 911 terrorists and the Iraqi leadership, he has convinced the American public that the two groups must be one and the same.

This was all intentional of course.

No Evidence again!



No Evidence of Smallpox Found in Iraq
1 hour, 19 minutes ago Add Top Stories - AP to My Yahoo!


By DAFNA LINZER, Associated Press Writer

Top American scientists assigned to the weapons hunt in Iraq (news - web sites) found no evidence Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s regime was making or stockpiling smallpox, The Associated Press has learned from senior military officers involved in the search.



Smallpox fears were part of the case the Bush administration used to build support for invading Iraq — and they were raised again as recently as last weekend by Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites).


But a three-month search by "Team Pox" turned up only signs to the contrary: disabled equipment that had been rendered harmless by U.N. inspectors, Iraqi scientists deemed credible who gave no indication they had worked with smallpox and a laboratory thought to be back in use that was covered in cobwebs.


Fears that smallpox could be used as a weapon led the Bush administration to launch a vaccination campaign for some 500,000 U.S. military personnel after the Sept. 11 attacks, and to order enough vaccine to inoculate the entire U.S. population if necessary. President Bush (news - web sites) also was vaccinated against the disease, which kills about a third of its victims.


The negative smallpox findings reported to U.S. intelligence agencies come nearly six months after the administration went to war to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction that Saddam long denied having and the military hasn't been able to find.


Smallpox was declared eradicated worldwide in 1980. All samples of the virus were to have been destroyed except those held by special labs in Atlanta and Russia, but some experts fear Russian samples could have gotten into the hands of hostile nations.


Two of the six members of Team Pox — whose existence and work hasn't been previously disclosed — have left Iraq while the rest remain involved in other aspects of the weapons hunt, said the officers who described the smallpox pursuit for the first time.


Though Team Pox is no longer operational, having carried out their work between May and July, their findings don't dismiss the possibility that smallpox could still be discovered, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity.


However, there remains little to pursue in this area now.


"We found no physical or new anecdotal evidence to suggest Iraq was producing smallpox or had stocks of it in its possession," one of the military officers said.


When Team Pox searched key locations in Iraq, such as the defunct Darwah foot-and-mouth (news - web sites) disease center, they found the facility in the same condition U.N. inspectors left it in seven years ago.


In 1996, inspectors destroyed one fermenter, a storage tank and an inactivation tank at Darwah and poured concrete into the air conditioners while other equipment, including filter pressers and centrifuges were tagged for monitoring purposes.


The smallpox team found cobwebs covering much of the inside, although a CIA (news - web sites) National Intelligence Estimate said the Iraqis were refurbishing the facility.


U.S. satellite images had spotted trucks pulling up in the past year — an indication of renewed activity, the team was told. But investigations on the ground revealed the trucks belonged to black marketeers stealing scrap metal and other parts around the site.


In the run-up to the war, the CIA said chances were even that smallpox was part of an Iraqi biological weapons program, according to the National Intelligence Estimate.


Bush administration officials often cited smallpox when describing Saddam's intentions — and continue to do so despite the lack of evidence.


On Sunday, Cheney said two trailers discovered in Iraq could have been used to make smallpox. The vice president referred to the trailers as "mobile biological facilities" — a characterization that has been disputed by intelligence analysts within two U.S. government agencies that believe the trailers were used to fill weather balloons.





Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites), making the U.S. case for war last February at the United Nations (news - web sites), said Saddam "has the wherewithal to develop smallpox."

Despite those suspicions, Pentagon (news - web sites) planners didn't organize a specific search for smallpox when they put together a post-Saddam weapons hunt comprising hundreds of military personnel with expertise in missiles as well as chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

"There was some discussion about creating specialized teams but we didn't have enough people," said Lt. Col. Michael Slifka, who planned the weapons hunt for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.

The original search teams, which disbanded when a Pentagon-led effort known as the Iraq Survey Group took over in August, comprised military officers trained in detecting chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Those teams didn't have an investigative capability and didn't include experts in specific areas such as smallpox.

Surprised by the configuration, a handful of American biologists and virologists sent to Kuwait and then Baghdad with little instruction except to help, set up Team Pox on their own.

The team — which included two specialists who worked previously as U.N. inspectors in the 1990s — wrapped up their work midsummer mostly out of frustration with the Iraq Survey Group.

Those involved described missed opportunities caused by bureaucratic obstacles hampering the search effort.

In several instances, the team couldn't follow up tips because of transportation problems. The violence plaguing Iraq means such teams can operate only under military guidelines and travel only with military escort. So their mobility is dictated by the military's schedule and availability to move from them from one location to another.

Some Iraqi scientists interviewed clearly had the know-how and expertise to produce smallpox, honed through years of work with similar viruses.

But none of the Iraqi scientists — many questioned at their offices at Iraqi universities — said they had done work on smallpox or other viruses that could be used in biological weapons programs.

U.N. inspectors suspected Iraq could have been working on smallpox or already had it. There was an outbreak of smallpox in the country in 1972, and Iraq admitted it had been producing the vaccine into the 1980s.

"From the onset the evidence was strictly circumstantial," said Jonathan Tucker, a former U.N. inspector and the author of a recent book on smallpox. "There was a lot of smoke but not much fire there."

Tests on Iraqi soldiers captured during the 1991 Gulf War (news - web sites) found that some had been vaccinated for smallpox.

And Iraq admitted to U.N. inspectors in the 1990s that its biological weapons scientists worked with camelpox, a close relative of the smallpox virus. Working with camelpox would give Iraq a way to perfect techniques for making smallpox without endangering the research

One more....

Blix attacks Iraq weapons 'spin'
Thursday, September 18, 2003 Posted: 1:15 PM EDT (1715 GMT)



Blix said Iraq probably destroyed its WMDs 10 years ago.


LONDON, England (CNN) -- The U.N.'s former chief weapons inspector has attacked the "spin and hype" he says the United States and Britain used when warning about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.

Hans Blix's comments on Thursday came hours after U.S. President George W. Bush said there was no evidence that Iraq's ousted president was involved in the September 11, 2001 attacks -- disputing an idea held by many Americans.

"There's no question that Saddam Hussein had al Qaeda ties," Bush said. But he added: "We have no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with ... September 11." (Full story)

In the run-up to the Iraq war, Washington argued that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (WMD) posed an imminent threat and that Saddam's government had close links to al Qaeda -- the terrorist network run by Osama bin Laden.

However Blix told British radio Thursday that Washington and London "over-interpreted" intelligence about Saddam's weapons.

Comparing the two countries to medieval witch-hunters, Blix said the British and U.S. governments convinced themselves Iraq posed a threat based on evidence that was later discredited -- including forged documents about alleged attempts to buy uranium for nuclear weapons.

"In the Middle Ages when people were convinced there were witches they certainly found them. This is a bit risky," Blix said.

A pre-war British dossier on Iraqi weapons "led the reader to the conclusions that are a little further reaching" than was the case, Blix said.

"What in a way stands accused is the culture of spin, the culture of hyping," he said.

"We know advertisers will advertise a refrigerator in terms that we don't quite believe in, but we expect governments to be more serious and have more credibility."

He added that the coalition should have allowed U.N. weapons inspectors to continue working. They were pulled out on March 18 after three months -- two days before the U.S.-led invasion.

In the five months since Saddam's overthrow, the U.S.-led Iraq Survey Group -- composed of 1,400 scientists, military and intelligence experts -- has failed to uncover any banned weapons.

Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair have said the search will take time and that evidence will eventually be uncovered.

"The patience that they require for themselves now was not anything that they wanted to give to us," said Blix.

In the Middle Ages when people were convinced there were witches they certainly found them. This is a bit risky.
-- Hans Blix, former U.N. chief weapons inspector


Blix's comments come as the Hutton inquiry continues in London into the death of UK government scientist David Kelly, who apparently killed himself after he was named as a possible source for a BBC story that the government exaggerated the threat posed by Iraq. (Full story)

Blair's office has consistently denied misleading the public.

Bush and Blair have come under mounting pressure to prove that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, and both leaders have seen their popularity ratings fall in opinion polls.

In an interview on Australian radio on Wednesday, Blix said he believed that Iraq had destroyed most of its weapons of mass destruction 10 years ago but maintained the appearance it had them to deter a military attack. (Full story)

Current U.N. chief weapons inspector Demetrius Perricos has echoed his predecessor's comments, telling Reuters it was becoming "more and more difficult to believe stocks (of WMD) were there" in Iraq.