Bomb in the Beehive

Predictably, the report stating that Saddam's Iraq had no real ties to Al Qaeda is, in Greater Wingnuttia, now being hailed as incontrovertible PRo0F!@!!!! that... Saddam's Iraq TOTALLY had ties to Al Qaeda.

This amuses not merely because the report shows no such thing -- you knew that -- but because the report, which I've read, was pretty clearly slanted to make the best case for collaboration some crappy evidence could support. But the evidence is so absurdly flimsy that it just can't be done. Take the bit from the conclusion where the authors ask (cue scary music):

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 States, the answer is yes.

The evidence for this? A statement from Saddam:

If America interferes we will strike. You know us, we are not the talkative type who holds the microphone and says things only, we do what we say. Maybe we cannot reach Washington but we can send someone with an explosive belt to reach Washington."
"We can send people to Washington... a person with explosive belt around him could throw himself on Bush's car."

Interestingly enough, this didn't happen. As it turned out, Saddam Hussein was a talkative type who blustered a lot. This is not evidence of "the will to use terrorist capabilities against the  US."  This is evidence that he was full of shit. And anyway, this was in 1991! As far as justifications for war in 2003 go, it's kind of a joke. As they say:

However, the evidence is less clear in terms of Saddam's declared will at the time of OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM in 2003. 108 Even with access to significant parts of the regime's most secretive archive, the answer to the question of Saddam's will in the final months in power remains elusive. Potentially, more significant documents and media files are awaiting analysis or are even yet to be discovered.

Good luck with that.

This is of course why the Pentagon decided to keep the report quiet, lest they end up looking silly. Right wing bloggers, of course, are not so easily intimidated.

Captain Ed huffs, for instance, that

Perhaps in the world of the mainstream media the big news from this would be "no smoking gun" connection to an actual attack, but for the rest of us, it shows that Saddam needed to go — and the sooner, the better.

Or not. "The evidence" he's relying on is an account of some group called the Army of Muhammad, which in the report is described as "under the wings of Bin Laden and shared the same objectives." From the context it seems as though Saddam was interested in them because they might have been willing to attack the Kuwaiti royal family, one of his pet projects. What support was provided to the AoM?

A later memorandum from the same collection to the Director of the IIS reports that the Army of Muhammad is endeavoring to receive assistance [from Iraq] to implement its objectives, and that the local IIS station has been told to deal with them in accordance with priorities previously established.

And, uh, that's it for the Army of Muhammad. As for the other big AQ connection, it's stuff dating from 1993.

This was a fucking casus belli? Good grief.

Homo fucking Wingnitticus. 

This is it. This is the retroactive justification for the worst foreign policy blunder in American history. The Army of fucking Muhammad. Something only Cap'n Ed and Andy fucking McCarthy will defend -- it's even past the shame level of the administration.

Feh.

I have a fucking report myself, right here...

Comments

[K. Ron Silkwood]

I don't think anything is past the shame level of the administration.

[spaghetti happens]

Hm-m-m, Black Grape. Sounds like they KICK FUCKING ASS. Thanks for the referral.

[Me]

I've thought for a while now that the "smoking gun" of WMDs or ties to Al Qaeda would eventually become the new JFK assassination theory. Rest assured, forty years from now there will still be a few diehards unwilling to accept the evidence, while furiously digging through ancient archives for the one tidbit that will finally prove them right.

[rev.paperboy]

Capt Ed huffs all right, usually model glue, but I think he's been branching out to paint thinner and gasoline fumes lately

[skewter]

...endeavoring to receive assistance [from Iraq] to implement its objectives...

Using Iraq's formidable arsenal of weapons of mass destruction-related program activities no less! If AoM was located anywhere North, South, East or West of Tikrit than this totally seals it for me. Evidence of which is surely contained on yet to be discovered media. Somewhere. Probably.