Pentagon: Saddam Supported Terrorists - NYT: No Saddam - al Qaeda link
So the Pentagon released a report that says, among other things:
One question remains regarding Iraq’s terrorism capability: Is there anything in the captured archives to indicate that Saddam had the will to use his terrorist capabilities directly against United States? Judging from examples of Saddam’s statements (Extract 34) before the 1991 Gulf War with the United tates, the answer is yes.
In the years between the two Gulf Wars, UN sanctions reduced Saddam’s ability to shape regional and world events, steadily draining his military, economic, and military powers. The rise of Islamist fundamentalism in the region gave Saddam the opportunity to make terrorism, one of the few tools remaining in Saddam’s “coercion” toolbox, not only cost effective but a formal instrument of state power. Saddam nurtured this capability with an infrastructure supporting (1) his own particular brand of state terrorism against internal and external threats, (2) the state sponsorship of suicide operations, and (3) organizational relationships and “outreach programs” for terrorist groups. Evidence that was uncovered and analyzed attests to the existence of a terrorist capability and a willingness to use it until the day Saddam was forced to flee Baghdad by Coalition forces.
The New York Times headline, meanwhile, says of the report:
Study Finds No Qaeda-Hussein Tie
Of course, the first line of the article qualifies the headline significantly:
There was no direct operational connection between Saddam Hussein’s government and Al Qaeda before the war in Iraq, says a Pentagon-sponsored study.
The study, meanwhile, found clear connections between Saddam Hussein's IIS security organization and, among others, Egyptian Islamic Jihad, which was run by none other than al Qaeda #2 Ayman al-Zawahiri.
Seems appropriate somehow for the media to be in such denial about the truth of Saddam's support for terrorists, given that denial's not just a river in Egypt.