The Pentagon Is Accusing Russia Of Giving Saddam American Invasion Plans Before War

Pentagon report says Russia gave Iraq intelligence

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsar...USA-RUSSIA.xml

Fri Mar 24, 2006 3:00 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Russia provided intelligence to Iraq's government in the opening days of the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, including information that fed Iraqi suspicions that the main U.S. invasion force coming from Kuwait was actually a diversion, a Pentagon report released on Friday stated.

The report said an April 2, 2003, document from the Iraqi minister of foreign affairs to President Saddam Hussein stated that Russian intelligence had reported information on American troops plans to the Iraqis through the Russian ambassador.

The intelligence, the document stated, was that the American forces were moving to cut off Baghdad from the south, east and north, that U.S. bombing would concentrate on Baghdad and that the assault on Baghdad would not begin before around April 15.

In fact, Baghdad fell about a week before that date.

"Significantly, the regime was also receiving intelligence from the Russians that fed suspicions that the attack out of Kuwait was merely a diversion," the report stated.

The revelations were contained in a report by the U.S. military's Joint Forces Command assessing the events in the opening months of the war.

Another of the newly released documents has them salivating over at the Wall Street Journal editioral pages. From the WSJ's OpinionJournal website:

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Who's Lying Now?
Those Saddam documents are coming out, and there are strong suggestions--not surprisingly to some of us--that the notion that he had nothing to do with al Qaeda is a myth. ABC News reports:

A newly released prewar Iraqi document indicates that an official representative of Saddam Hussein's government met with Osama bin Laden in Sudan on February 19, 1995, after receiving approval from Saddam Hussein. Bin Laden asked that Iraq broadcast the lectures of Suleiman al Ouda, a radical Saudi preacher, and suggested "carrying out joint operations against foreign forces" in Saudi Arabia. According to the document, Saddam's presidency was informed of the details of the meeting on March 4, 1995, and Saddam agreed to dedicate a program for them on the radio. The document states that further "development of the relationship and cooperation between the two parties to be left according to what's open [in the future] based on dialogue and agreement on other ways of cooperation." The Sudanese were informed about the agreement to dedicate the program on the radio.

The report then states that "Saudi opposition figure" bin Laden had to leave Sudan in July 1996 after it was accused of harboring terrorists. It says information indicated he was in Afghanistan. "The relationship with him is still through the Sudanese. We're currently working on activating this relationship through a new channel in light of his current location," it states.

As ABC notes, this does not prove "that the two parties did in fact enter into an operational relationship." But it does blow out of the water the silly notion that secular Saddam and fundamentalist bin Laden could not possibly find common ground.

This actually never made sense; history is replete with examples of ideologically opposed nations uniting against a common enemy. The Soviet Union did it with both Nazi Germany and the U.S. during World War II. The current Syrian regime is a secular Baathist thugocracy just like the old Iraqi one, but the Syrian dictators Assad & Son were bitter rivals of their Iraqi counterpart and strong allies of the mad mullahs who run Iran. "Saddam and al Qaeda could never have anything to do with each other" stands exposed as a Big Lie of the left and the isolationist right.

Daily Kos diarist "SusanG" offers an interesting window into the mentality of the anti-anti-Saddam left:

I also find it disingenuous that the right claims sole ownership of the "Saddam is a bad, bad man" banner. Please. Compared to the liberal left, they are decades late to that particular party. Progressives were screaming into the void about Hussein's human rights violations, his gassing of the Kurds, his terrorizing of political opponents long, long, long before it conveniently bubbled up into the consciousness of the neocon right. While Donald Rumsfeld was famously shaking hands with and arming Hussein, we were saying: Bad idea. Bad man. This is gonna come back and bite us in the ass.

It appears that the definition of a "progressive" is someone who believes the answer to any problem is "screaming into the void"--either against the problem or against anyone who does anything to solve the problem. How exactly this is supposed to lead to progress is a topic for another day.


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For a start, he leaves out the qualification that ABC's editors posted along with summary: "
(Editor's Note: This document is handwritten and has no official seal. Although contacts between bin Laden and the Iraqis have been reported in the 9/11 Commission report and elsewhere (e.g., the 9/11 report states "Bin Ladn himself met with a senior Iraqi intelligence officer in Khartoum in late 1994 or early 1995) this document indicates the contacts were approved personally by Saddam Hussein.

It also indicates the discussions were substantive, in particular that bin Laden was proposing an operational relationship, and that the Iraqis were, at a minimum, interested in exploring a potential relationship and prepared to show good faith by broadcasting the speeches of al Ouda, the radical cleric who was also a bin Laden mentor.

The document does not establish that the two parties did in fact enter into an operational relationship. Given that the document claims bin Laden was proposing to the Iraqis that they conduct "joint operations against foreign forces" in Saudi Arabia, it is worth noting that eight months after the meeting — on November 13, 1995 — terrorists attacked Saudi National Guard Headquarters in Riyadh, killing 5 U.S. military advisers. The militants later confessed on Saudi TV to having been trained by Osama bin Laden.)"

Of course, none of this is anything new at all - though the Op/Ed writer tries to make it appear so. He states: ""Saddam and al Qaeda could never have anything to do with each other" stands exposed as a Big Lie of the left and the isolationist right."

The Guardian, 6 Feb, 2003: "A top-secret defence intelligence staff report, dated January 12, states: "While there have been contacts between al-Qaida and the regime in the past, it is assessed that any fledgling relationship foundered due to mistrust and incompatible ideology".

and...

"Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden have explicitly opposed any kind of alliance," a senior Whitehall source told the Guardian. "We have not seen any clear evidence of an institutional link."

Yes, those bastions of the far-left and/or the isolationist right are none other than MI6 and Whitehall!

The WSJ is so full of shit.