Saddam Hussein Directly Financed Al Qaeda Affiliate In Phillipines

No connection between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein, Part 8,594:

SADDAM HUSSEIN'S REGIME PROVIDED FINANCIAL support to Abu Sayyaf, the al Qaeda-linked jihadist group founded by Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law in the Philippines in the late 1990s, according to documents captured in postwar Iraq. An eight-page fax dated June 6, 2001, and sent from the Iraqi ambassador in Manila to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Baghdad, provides an update on Abu Sayyaf kidnappings and indicates that the Iraqi regime was providing the group with money to purchase weapons. The Iraqi regime suspended its support--temporarily, it seems--after high-profile kidnappings, including of Americans, focused international attention on the terrorist group.

The fax comes from the vast collection of documents recovered in postwar Afghanistan and Iraq. Up to this point, those materials have been kept from the American public. Now the proverbial dam has broken. On March 16, the U.S. government posted on the web 9 documents captured in Iraq, as well as 28 al Qaeda documents that had been released in February. Earlier last week, Foreign Affairs magazine published a lengthy article based on a review of 700 Iraqi documents by analysts with the Institute for Defense Analysis and the Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia. Plans for the release of many more documents have been announced. And if the contents of the recently released materials and other documents obtained by The Weekly Standard are any indication, the discussion of the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq is about to get more interesting.

Liberals are always complaining that we don't "debate" issues. They always say that it's impossible to have an actual "dialogue" on key questions.

Actually, we could, if not for their cowardice. They want a "debate" to occur, but they don't want to be a part of it. They fear the political consequences of announcing their real beliefts. That's why they only "raise questions" -- "questions" don't necessarily tie you to an answer that can be used against you. Well, sure, I mean we all know the answers they're hinting at. But they don't want to provide answers, just "raise questions" and "encourage debate."

Well, maybe it's about time we had a real debate about Saddam's support for Al Qaeda, huh?

posted by Ace at 01:08 PM

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