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Banned
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I appreciate all of your advice... I'm leaning now to not sharing quotes of president Bush and vice-president Cheney referring to "Zarqawi was in Iraq.... before we got there" with my step-son, along with reports that the "poison camp" located in the "no fly zone", in northern Iraq should be "taken out":
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Military officials insist their case for attacking Zarqawi’s operation was airtight, but the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.
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Quote:
http://209.85.207.104/search?q=cache...lnk&cd=8&gl=us
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The, Feb 7, 2003
SHOWDOWN ON IRAQ
Why not hit terrorist camp?
Lawmakers question lack of military action
By GREG MILLER Los Angeles Times
Friday, February 7, 2003
<h3>Washington -- Secretary of State Colin L. Powell spent a significant part of his presentation to the United Nations this week describing a terrorist camp in northern Iraq</h3> where al-Qaida affiliates are said to be training to carry out attacks with explosives and poisons.
But neither Powell nor other administration officials answered the question: What is the United States doing about it?
Lawmakers who have attended classified briefings on the camp say that they have been stymied for months in their efforts to get an explanation for why the U.S. has not launched a military strike on the compound near the village of Khurmal. Powell cited its ongoing operation as one of the key reasons for suspecting ties between Baghdad and the al-Qaida terror network.
The lawmakers put new pressure on the Bush administration on Thursday to explain its decision to leave the facility unharmed.
"Why have we not taken it out?" Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) asked Powell during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. "Why have we let it sit there if it's such a dangerous plant producing these toxins?"
Powell declined to answer, saying he could not discuss the matter in open session.
"I can assure you that it is a place that has been very much in our minds. And we have been tracing individuals who have gone in there and come out of there," Powell said.
Absent an explanation from the White House,
some officials suggested <h3>the administration had refrained from striking the compound in part to preserve a key piece of its case against Iraq.
"This is it, this is their compelling evidence for use of force," said one intelligence official, who asked not to be identified. "If you take it out, you can't use it as justification for war."....</h3>
......A White House spokesman said Thursday he had no immediate comment on the matter.
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Quote:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/relea.../20060910.html
.....Q Then why in the lead-up to the war was there the constant linkage between Iraq and al Qaeda?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: That's a different issue. Now, there's a question of whether or not al Qaeda -- whether or not Iraq was involved in 9/11; separate and apart from that is the issue of whether or not there was a historic relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda. The basis for that is probably best captured in George Tenet's testimony before the Senate intel committee in open session, where he said specifically that there was a pattern, a relationship that went back at least a decade between Iraq and al Qaeda......
........we know that Zarqawi, running a terrorist camp in Afghanistan prior to 9/11, after we went into 9/11 -- then fled and went to Baghdad and set up operations in Baghdad in the spring of '02......
.........Zarqawi was in Baghdad after we took Afghanistan and before we went into Iraq. You had the facility up at Kermal, a poisons facility run by an Ansar al-Islam, an affiliate of al Qaeda......
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Quote:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/relea.../20070524.html
For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
May 24, 2007
Press Conference by the President
...David.
Q Mr. President, after the mistakes that have been made in this war, when you do as you did yesterday, where you raised two-year-old intelligence, talking about the threat posed by al Qaeda, it's met with increasing skepticism. The majority in the public, a growing number of Republicans, appear not to trust you any longer to be able to carry out this policy successfully. Can you explain why you believe you're still a credible messenger on the war?
THE PRESIDENT: I'm credible because I read the intelligence, David, and make it abundantly clear in plain terms that if we let up, we'll be attacked. And I firmly believe that....
...Failure in Iraq will cause generations to suffer, in my judgment. Al Qaeda will be emboldened. They will say, yes, once again, we've driven the great soft America out of a part of the region. It will cause them to be able to recruit more. It will give them safe haven. They are a direct threat to the United States.
And I'm going to keep talking about it. That's my job as the President, is to tell people the threats we face and what we're doing about it. And what we've done about it is we've strengthened our homeland defenses, we've got new techniques that we use that enable us to better determine their motives and their plans and plots. We're working with nations around the world to deal with these radicals and extremists. But they're dangerous, and I can't put it any more plainly they're dangerous. And I can't put it any more plainly to the American people and to them, we will stay on the offense.
It's better to fight them there than here. And this concept about, well, maybe let's just kind of just leave them alone and maybe they'll be all right is naive. These people attacked us before we were in Iraq. They viciously attacked us before we were in Iraq, and they've been attacking ever since. They are a threat to your children, David, and whoever is in that Oval Office better understand it and take measures necessary to protect the American people.....
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<h3>Considering the following, does what the president said, above, make any sense?</h3>
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http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/...s-release.html
Brian Ross and Rehab El-Buri Report:
Saudi Arabia has released 1,500 prisoners suspected of belonging to a radical Islamic group after the prisoners underwent what was described as a five-week counseling program, according to Middle Eastern newspapers.
Critics of the prisoner reform program worry it does nothing to seriously combat Islamic radicalism and releases dangerous extremists back into society.
"This is the sort of failure to recognize the threat and deal with it seriously that has characterized the Saudis for years," said former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke, an ABC News consultant.
Click Here for Full Blotter Coverage.
The released prisoners are described as followers of the rigid Takfir ideology and considered by many U.S. intelligence officials to be prime recruiting material for al Qaeda groups.
According to a Saudi newspaper, the Takfir group calls for establishing an Islamic state, kicking non-Muslims out of the Arabian Peninsula and considers other Muslim leaders, scholars and the general Muslim public disbelievers.
The Saudi newspaper, Al-Watan, publicized the massive prisoner release on Sunday, saying the Saudi Ministry of Interior spearheaded the effort in 2005 by holding 5,000 meetings with about 3,200 suspected Takfir members. The New York Sun first reported the development in the United States.
The Saudi Embassy and Ministry of Interior did not respond to repeated attempts for comment.
The committee charged with reforming Takfir suspects told Al-Watan it uses 100 Islamic law specialists and 30 social and psychological experts to counsel the prisoners. After the suspects met in groups of 20 for five weeks and completed an exam, the committee awarded the prisoners certificates -- and their freedom.
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Quote:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/22/wo...ghters.html?hp
Foreign Fighters in Iraq Are Tied to Allies of U.S.
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.
Published: November 22, 2007
BAGHDAD — Saudi Arabia and Libya, both considered allies by the United States in its fight against terrorism, were the source of about 60 percent of the foreign fighters who came to Iraq in the past year to serve as suicide bombers or to facilitate other attacks, according to senior American military officials.....
...The most significant discovery was a collection of biographical sketches that listed hometowns and other details for more than 700 fighters brought into Iraq since August 2006.
The records also underscore how the insurgency in Iraq remains both overwhelmingly Iraqi and Sunni. American officials now estimate that the flow of foreign fighters was 80 to 110 per month during the first half of this year and about 60 per month during the summer. The numbers fell sharply in October to no more than 40, partly as a result of the Sinjar raid, the American officials say.
Saudis accounted for the largest number of fighters listed on the records by far — 305, or 41 percent — American intelligence officers found as they combed through documents and computers in the weeks after the raid. The data show that despite increased efforts by Saudi Arabia to clamp down on would-be terrorists since Sept. 11, 2001, when 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi, some Saudi fighters are still getting through....
...In contrast to the comparatively small number of foreigners, more than 25,000 inmates are in American detention centers in Iraq. Of those, only about 290, or some 1.2 percent, are foreigners, military officials say....
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Quote:
http://web.archive.org/web/200707181...97,print.story
<br>Saudis' role in Iraq insurgency outlined Sunni extremists from Saudi Arabia make up half the foreign fighters in Iraq, many suicide bombers, a U.S. official says.
By Ned Parker
Times Staff Writer
July 15, 2007
BAGHDAD — Although Bush administration officials have frequently lashed out at Syria and Iran, accusing it of helping insurgents and militias here, the largest number of foreign fighters and suicide bombers in Iraq come from a third neighbor, Saudi Arabia, according to a senior U.S. military officer and Iraqi lawmakers.
<h3>About 45% of all foreign militants targeting U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians and security forces are from Saudi Arabia</h3>; 15% are from Syria and Lebanon; and 10% are from North Africa, according to official U.S. military figures made available to The Times by the senior officer. Nearly half of the 135 foreigners in U.S. detention facilities in Iraq are Saudis, he said.....
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But....I have to ask...if the information above does not rise to a high enough level to cause concern grave enough to risk putting it in front of my step-son, <h3>what information would be grave enough</h3> a contradiction to what he believes, vs. what actually seems to be happening, to risk the possible repercussions from exposing him to it?
This issue of whether to show him this information, or not, would not even exist if it were not for the fact that he vehemently blogs about the "traitorous left"....that criticism of the war in Iraq is (from his blog):
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The agenda of the anti-war crowd is to bring down the Bush administration and leave the accountability for the war's failure at his hands and those who supported it. Instead of going on the record and ending the war outright, they will do everything possible to make it impossible to win and even wage war. The bottom line is that they do not want to be responsible for losing the war. If they vote to bring the troops and end the war, it will all be on them.
When I say that they hate America I firmly mean that. I do question their patriotism. We are not debating whether or not we should have gone into Iraq. We are debating what to do right now, as we are there. To cut off support for the mission and therefore the troops and make them bleed a slow death until President Bush is forced to bring them back because Congress has so handcuffed our generals puts our troops in more danger. This is anti-American. America stands for freedom and liberty and honor. To cut and run and leave an ally is against all of those principles. To force an end to a war in this manner that would sacrifice more lives in order to achieve political advantage (by not being responsible for ultimately pulling the troops out when making achieving victory impossible) is evil.
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The posts of Mojo and ottopilot have been most persuasive in confirming to me that people who believe what my step-son articulated above, are probably beyond persuasion, no matter how persuasive I believe the information I can offer them, is or isn't.
Last edited by host; 12-11-2007 at 12:20 PM..
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