Ace of Spades HQ

« Dick Cheny Slices Like a F'n' Hammer | Main | Maybe This Explains Cheney's Anger at the NYT »

June 25, 2004

New York Times: Iraq Sought Al Qaeda Alliance (Who Said That? Oh Yeah: The New York Times)

WASHINGTON, June 24 — Contacts between Iraqi intelligence agents and Osama bin Laden when he was in Sudan in the mid-1990's were part of a broad effort by Baghdad to work with organizations opposing the Saudi ruling family, according to a newly disclosed document obtained by the Americans in Iraq.

Note the attempted spin right off the bat: This was merely an effort against Saudi Arabia, which just happened to be coincidentally directed against Saudi Arabia's allies.

Which allies might they be?

Doesn't really matter, does it? But let's read on.

American officials described the document as an internal report by the Iraqi intelligence service detailing efforts to seek cooperation with several Saudi opposition groups, including Mr. bin Laden's organization, before Al Qaeda had become a full-fledged terrorist organization.

Ah. "Before Al Qaeda had become a full-fledged terrorist organization." It was, during this period, an expansion franchise. They went 2-14 in their opening season and lost to the lowly Arizona Cardinals twice.

So, nothing to worry about here.

...The document states that Iraq agreed to rebroadcast anti-Saudi propaganda, and that a request from Mr. bin Laden to begin joint operations against foreign forces in Saudi Arabia went unanswered. There is no further indication of collaboration.

No further indication. Okay. Let's see if that conclusion, parked conveniently in the front of the article, is borne out by the details which follow.

...

The new document, which appears to have circulated only since April, was provided to The New York Times several weeks ago, before the commission's report was released.

Somehow the Times "forgot" to report it.

Since obtaining the document, The Times has interviewed several military, intelligence and United States government officials in Washington and Baghdad to determine that the government considered it authentic.

Right. They embargoed it for several weeks just to check up on it.

...

The task force concluded that the document "appeared authentic," and that it "corroborates and expands on previous reporting" about contacts between Iraqi intelligence and Mr. bin Laden in Sudan, according to the task force's analysis.

It is not known whether some on the task force held dissenting opinions about the document's veracity.

If they deemed it a fake, as a group, somehow I doubt the New York Times would be so curious to learn/speculate if there were dissenting opinions who felt it was authentic.

...

Iraq during that period was struggling with its defeat by American-led forces in the Persian Gulf war of 1991, when American troops used Saudi Arabia as the base for expelling Iraqi invaders from Kuwait.

This sounds an awful lot like "context" masquerading as a justification. The New York Times seems determined to suggest that Saddam was just doing what any defeated genocidal tyrant might do in his shoes.

The document, which asserts that Mr. bin Laden "was approached by our side," states that Mr. bin Laden previously "had some reservations about being labeled an Iraqi operative," but was now willing to meet in Sudan, and that "presidential approval" was granted to the Iraqi security service to proceed.

So, Saddam Hussein sought out an alliance with Al Qaeda.

Nothing to see here, folks. Move on.

...

Mr. bin Laden "also requested joint operations against foreign forces" based in Saudi Arabia, where the American presence has been a rallying cry for Islamic militants who oppose American troops in the land of the Muslim pilgrimage sites of Mecca and Medina.

But the document contains no statement of response by the Iraqi leadership under Mr. Hussein to the request for joint operations, and there is no indication of discussions about attacks on the United States or the use of unconventional weapons.

Um, a document from May 6th will not indicate what was decided on May 15th, morons.

Why would you expect a single document from a single day to contain further information about future events which had not yet occurred when the document was written?

This is like the New York Times stating that Kobe Bryant's accuser must be lying, because before she was raped she was not documenting the rape to come.

The document contains "no indications" of further meetings; but how is that evidence they didn't occur? Why would one expect a document to speak of future events?

Does the fact that a paystub records payments from the first two weeks of the month indicate, by its silence, that someone wasn't paid in the following two weeks?

Are they this stupid, or do they just think we are?

...

Members of the Pentagon task force that reviewed the document said it described no formal alliance being reached between Mr. bin Laden and Iraqi intelligence. The Iraqi document itself states that "cooperation between the two organizations should be allowed to develop freely through discussion and agreement."

Ah. No "formal alliance." Just "cooperation" to develop "freely."

No "corroborative relationship." Just a cooperative one. Nothing to worry about.

The heated public debate over links between Mr. bin Laden and the Hussein government fall basically into three categories: the extent of communications and contacts between the two, the level of actual cooperation, and any specific collaboration in the Sept. 11 attacks.

The document provides evidence of communications between Mr. bin Laden and Iraqi intelligence, similar to that described in the Sept. 11 staff report released last week.

"Bin Laden also explored possible cooperation with Iraq during his time in Sudan, despite his opposition to Hussein's secular regime," the Sept. 11 commission report stated.

So, Saddam is seeking ties with bin Ladin; and bin Ladin is also exploring possible cooperation with Saddam.

But, again, no "ties."

The Sudanese government, the commission report added, "arranged for contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda."

No contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda, except for those "contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda" arranged by a third-party terrorist-sponsoring government.

"A senior Iraqi intelligence officer reportedly made three visits to Sudan," it said, "finally meeting bin Laden in 1994. Bin Laden is said to have requested space to establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring weapons, but Iraq apparently never responded."

Apparently. And that, apparently, is based upon this single document. Because a document from an earlier date does not, precognitively, describe events which might have taken place in the future, it is therefore proof of the non-occurrence of such events.

Quod erat democratum.

...

A former director of operations for Iraqi intelligence Directorate 4 met with Mr. bin Laden on Feb. 19, 1995, the document states.

And what is "Iraqi intelligence Directorate 4"? The Times doesn't bother to say; that's where the article ends.

If they're not telling us what Directorate 4 might have been responsible for-- take a wild fucking guess what it was responsible for.

Anyone want to bet?

Anyone want to fucking bet that Directorate 4 just happened to own an airplane fuselage parked at Salman Pak?

Update: Well, I guessed that Directorate 4 was concerned with terrorism and such in foreign countries. I guessed this, of course, because the Times didn't say what its portfolio was.

Had its portfolio been something fairly innocuous like propaganda, they would have identified its purpose. The fact that they actively suppressed Directorate 4's mission meant, inevitably, it was up to no good.

Actually, it's sort of in between.

Directorate 4 was the "Secret Service, operating both at home and abroad," according to this site.

But the real Directorate of major concern to us was Directorate 14, which was responsible for the attempted assassination of President Bush the Elder, and which, yes, maintains the Salman Pak facility.

Directorate 4 would be the service expected to make contacts abroad, since they were present in every Iraqi embassy in the world. It is chiefly a spy service, collecting both signals and human intelligence.

It's not as juicy as Directorate 14. But the day is young.

And Directorate 4 isn't exactly benign. Although I can't find a cite yet proving it, I suspect that Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir Al-Ani, the intelligence officer who allegedly met with Mohammed Atta in Prague, was part of Directorate 4. I base this on the general responsibilities of Directorate 4. It's the foreign secret service, based in embassies around the world, and so that would seem to be the most Al-Ani's most likely assignment.

Whether Al-Ani met Atta or not, it seems pretty well settled that he was planning to bomb Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty towers.

posted by Ace at 01:37 AM

Comments

Whats with the Mr. bin Laden shit??? I was raised by my mother, and taught in the U.S. Navy that Mr. was reserved for positions of respect!! WTF????

Posted by: John on June 25, 2004 01:59 AM

Good fisking, Ace. Btw, that Radio Free Europe building is just a couple of blocks from my Prague apartment. I got the shivers when I first heard about that story.

Posted by: SWLiP on June 25, 2004 07:42 AM

Ace, you commented on the remark about al-Qaeda's not yet having become "a full-fledged terrorist organization." Did you notice the time period during which it was apparently still growing its feathers? Here's the paragraph.

"American officials described the document as an internal report by the Iraqi intelligence service detailing efforts to seek cooperation with several Saudi opposition groups, including Mr. bin Laden's organization, before Al Qaeda had become a full-fledged terrorist organization. He was based in Sudan from 1992 to 1996, when that country forced him to leave and he took refuge in Afghanistan."

Al-Qaeda made its first attempt to bring down a World Trade Center tower in 1993. I think the NYT reasons that al-Qaeda hadn't yet grown its wing feathers because their first try was a ground-based attack. Do you think we should let them have this one on a technicality?

Posted by: Doug on June 25, 2004 08:54 AM

"I was raised by my mother, and taught in the U.S. Navy that Mr. was reserved for positions of respect!!"

Perhaps the NYT does indeed respect bin Ladin. Seems to be the leftist thing to do these days.

Posted by: IdFaciam on June 25, 2004 09:15 AM

Ace,

With all due respect...As a fan of the Arizona Cardinals I can say with all certainty that the "Al-Qaeda expansion team" would have beaten us at least once.

After all, can't you imagine the fervor their players would get in when you realize that the "Moon God Squad" would be playing infidels in, of all places, "Sun Devil Stadium"?

Posted by: Senator PhilABuster on June 25, 2004 09:22 AM

Are they this stupid, or do they just think we are?

No, they are not stupid, and yes, they know we are.

By "we" I mean the broad base of American voters. They know that the vast majority of people get their opinions from soundbites on the nightly news, not from hyper-analytical blogs. They know that Americans respond to scandal and gossip more than they do to granular, pragmatic analysis. As someone recently said, people are more concerned with who got voted off the island than they are about the actual news. The left knows this and continually dumbs-down their arguments to appeal to the masses, whether they are accurate or not. For example:

1) When Clinton was impeached, the majority of people thought it was because he had sex with an intern, not because he commited perjury. The media knew this, but continued to opine about it being none of our business who he sleeps with, etc.

2) The intellectual "elite" who oppose the Iraq war actually grasp the Bush doctrine. They know that rogue nations who support terrorism are just as culpable as the terrorists themselves, and that the two are a common enemy in this new, complex war on terror. They continue, however, to argue that Iraq is a diversion from the "real" war in Afghanistan. They know that this argument will make more sense to the masses, and they continue to propagate this meme. If I ever have to hear Eleanor Clift say "Osama-been-forgotten!" on the McLaughlin Group again, it will be too soon.

3) Al Gore is not stupid. He knew that the 9-11 commission was speaking about the 9-11 attacks in particular when they concluded that there was no collaboration between Iraq and al Qaida. But he also knew that he could morph this into an "Iraq had no ties at all to al Qaida and Bush lied" argument, and the public would buy it. And he did.

I have no problem with a person in a position of influence making an argument for something in which they actually believe, even if it is contrary to mine.

I am disgusted and angered, however, by those politicians and journalists who opt out of a more complex argument that may run counter to their political alliances in favor of the dumbed-down (and incorrect) argument that will sway public opinion in their direction.

Sorry for the long comment, but this is one of those things that really gets under my skin.

Posted by: Longshanks on June 25, 2004 09:44 AM

Shanky, I think the obvious reason for that is that the only argument they can win is the knuckle-headed one.

Comments by Gore himself linking Saddam with international terror are all over the Web this morning, but you won't see that in any story about Gore's latest public meltdown.

Posted by: spongeworthy on June 25, 2004 11:25 AM

Amazon.com Widgets

Now Available!
The Deplorable Gourmet
A Horde-sourced Cookbook
[All profits go to charity]

Top Headlines

Alfred Hitchcock learns to talk with TJM

Ryan Long goes to the No Kings rally to pick up young liberal hotties and is greatly disappointed in the quality of the mish
thanks to stevey

You know we "joke" about the GOPe just "conserving" leftist things?
David French just posted:

Populists ask what conservativism has ever conserved?
Well its about to conserve birthright citizenship!
Posted by: 18-1

I couldn't hate this queen of the cuck-chair more if it paid seven figures and came with a corner office.

TJM definitively ranks the films of John Boorman.

Kid punks CNN chump by speaking truth to retard

Podcast: CBD and Sefton talk birthright citizenship, the 14th Amendment and SCOTUS, no boots in Iran, Artemis II and refocusing NASA, the NBA's hatred of everything non-woke, and more!

In more marketing for Project Hail Mary, scientists say they've found the biosigns indicating life growing on an alien planet. It's not proof, just signatures of chemicals that are produced by biological metabolism, and it could be nothing, but scientists think it's a strong sign that this planet is inhabited by something.

In a paper published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, a team of scientists announced the detection of dimethyl sulfide (along with a similar detection of dimethyl disulfide) in the atmosphere of an exoplanet called K2-18b. This is actually the second detection of dimethyl sulfide made on this planet, following a tentative detection in 2023.
Tons of chemicals are detected in the atmospheres of celestial objects every day. But dimethyl sulfide is different, because on Earth, it's only produced by living organisms.
"It is a shock to the system," Nikku Madhusudhan, first author on the paper, told the New York Times. "We spent an enormous amount of time just trying to get rid of the signal."

He means they tried to prove the signal was caused by things other than dimethyl sulfide but they could not.

Artemis moon shot a go, scheduled for 6:24 Eastern time tonight
Great marketing arranged by Amazon to promote Project Hail Mary. Okay not really but it does work out that way.

TJM talks John Boorman, director of Excalibur

Good rickroll

What? Skeleton of the most famous Musketeer, D'Artagnan, possibly discovered in Dutch church closet.
Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
The Gascon nobleman inspired Alexandre Dumas's hero in "The Three Musketeers" in the 19th century, a character now known worldwide thanks to the novel and numerous film adaptations.
D'Artagnan was killed during the siege of Maastricht in 1673, and there is a statue honoring the musketeer in the city. His final resting place has remained a mystery ever since.

A lot of Dumas's stories are based on bits of real history. The plot of the >Three Musketeers, about trying to recover lost diamonds from the queen's necklace, was cribbed from the then-almost-contemporaneous Affair of the Queen's Necklace. And the Man in the Iron Mask is based on real accounts of a prisoner forced to wear a mask (though I think it was a velvet mask).
* Oh, I should mention, Dumas says all this, about finding the names in an old book, in the prologue to his novel. But authors lie a lot. They frequently present fictions as based on historic fact. The twist is, he was actually telling the truth here. At least about these four musketeers having actually existed and served under Louis XIV.
Fun fact: You know the beginning of A Fistful of Dollars where the local gunslingers make fun of Clint Eastwood's donkey and Eastwood demands they apologize to the donkey? That's lifted from The Three Musketeers. Rochefort mocks D'Artagnan's old, brokedown farm horse and D'Artagnan is incensed.

A commenter asked which should be read first, The Hobbit of LOTR?
Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
LOTR is a very long story. Fifteen hundred pages or so. The Hobbit is relatively short and very punchy and easy to read. If you don't like The Hobbit, you can skip out on LOTR. If you do like it, you'll be primed to read LOTR.
Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
LOTR is written for adults. (It's said that Tolkien wrote both for his children, but LOTR was written 17 years later, when his children were adults.) Some might not like The Hobbit due to its sometimes frivolous tone. Me, I love it. I find it constantly amusing. Both are really good but there is a starkly different tone to both. LOTR is epic, grand, and serious, about a world war, The Hobbit is light and breezy, and about a heist. Though a heist that culminates in a war for the spoils.

The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
But the narrator -- who we will learn in LOTR was none of than Bilbo himself, who wrote the book as "There and Back Again" -- says this about Gollum's ring:
"But who knows how Gollum had come by that present [the Ring], ages ago in the old days when such rings were still at large in the world? Perhaps even the Master who ruled them could not have said."
In another passage, the ring is identified as a "ring of power."
I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

Finish the job, Mr. President!
Melanie Phillips lays out the case for the total destruction of the Iranian government and armed forces. [CBD]

TJM acts like he knows anything about John Wick and screenwriting. It's embarrassing, really.

Podcast: Sefton and CBD talk about how would a peace treaty with Iran work, Democrats defending murderers and rapists, The GOP vs. Dem bench for 2028, composting bodies? And more!

Oh, I forgot to mention this quote from Pete Hegseth, reported by Roger Kimball: "We are sharing the ocean with the Iranian Navy. We're giving them the bottom half."

Batman fires The Batman
Batman is disgusted by the Joachim Phoenix version of Joker
Batman tries to fire Superman
Batman is still workshopping his Bat-Voice

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click: Red Leather Suit and Sweatband Edition
And I was here to please
I'm even on knees
Makin' love to whoever I please
I gotta do it my way
Or no way at all

Tomorrow is March 25th, "Tolkien Reading Day," because March 25th is the day when the Ring is destroyed in the book. I think I'm going to start the Hobbit tomorrow and read all four books this time.
The only bad part of the trilogy are the Frodo/Sam chapters in The Two Towers. They're repetitive, slow, and mostly about the weather and terrain. But most everything else is good. Weirdly, the Frodo-Sam chapters in Return of the King are exciting and action-packed and among the best in the trilogy. (Though the chapters with everyone else in Return of the King get pretty slow again. Mostly people talking about marching towards war, and then marching towards war.)