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Reprinted from NewsMax.com
Saturday, April 17, 2004 2:10 p.m. EDT
King Abdullah: Al-Qaida WMDs Came From Syria
Jordan's King Abdullah revealed on Saturday that vehicles reportedly containing chemical weapons and poison gas that were part of a deadly al-Qaida bomb plot came from Syria, the country named by U.S. weapons inspector David Kay last year as a likely repository for Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.
"It was a major, major operation. It would have decapitated the government," King Abdullah told the San Francisco Chronicle. Jordanian officials estimated that the death count could have been as high as 20,000 - seven times greater than the Sept. 11 attacks.
King Abdullah said that trucks containing 17.5 tons of explosives had come from Syria, though he took pains not to implicate Syrian President Bashir Assad in the al-Qaida plot, saying, "I'm completely confident that Bashir did not know about it."
In his testimony before Congress last year, weapons inspector Kay said U.S. satellite surveillance showed substantial vehicular traffic going from Iraq to Syria just prior to the U.S. attack on March 19, 2003.
While Kay said investigators couldn't be sure the cargo contained weapons of mass destruction, one of his top advisers described the evidence as "unquestionable."
"People below the Saddam-Hussein-and-his-sons level saw what was coming and decided the best thing to do was to destroy and disperse," said James Clapper in comments reported by the New York Times on Oct. 29. Clapper heads the National Imagery and Mapping Agency.
Israeli intelligence has long believed that after the U.S. delayed invasion plans to allow U.N. weapons inspectors time to search for Iraq's WMDs, Saddam moved the banned weapons to Syria, the only other country ruled by the Ba'ath Party.
On April 1, Jordanian officials announced the arrest of several terrorist suspects, saying they were still hunting for two cars filled with explosives.
Five days later, the State Department revealed that the attackers were linked to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian-based terrorist considered to be one of al-Qaida's most dangerous. One of Zarqawi's targets was the U.S. Embassy in Amman.
By Saturday morning European news services were quoting an unnamed Jordanian official, who revealed that the al-Qaida plotters planned to use weapons of mass destruction in the foiled attack.
"We found primary materials to make a chemical bomb which, if it had exploded, would have made nearly 20,000 deaths ... in an area of one square kilometre," the official told Agence France-Press.
Another operation planned by the network was to use "deadly gas against the US embassy and the prime minister's office in Amman," he added.
A car belonging to the al-Qaida plotters, containing a chemical bomb and poisonous gas, was intercepted just 75 miles from the Syrian border.
Reprinted from NewsMax.com
Saddam Confidant Linked to al-Qaida Group
NewsMax.com Wires
Thursday, Oct. 30, 2003
WASHINGTON — A top aide to Saddam Hussein is believed to be working with an al-Qaida-linked terrorist group to coordinate attacks in Iraq, says a senior defense official.
Two captured members of Ansar al-Islam have identified Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri as a force behind some of the attacks, the official said Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity.
It is the first solid evidence of links between remnants of Saddam's regime and the non-Iraqi fighters responsible for at least some of the attacks on U.S. forces and their Iraqi allies, the official said.
Pentagon officials say Ansar al-Islam, which operated in northern Iraq before its camp was destroyed during the war, poses one of the greatest threats in Iraq. Military commanders have said they believe hundreds of non-Iraqi fighters from Ansar have entered Iraq to fight the U.S.-led occupation, many of them through neighboring Iran.
Al-Douri is No. 6 on the most-wanted list of 55 Iraqis and was vice chairman of Saddam's Revolutionary Command Council. He was one of Saddam's few longtime confidants and his daughter was married to Saddam's son Odai, who was killed in a raid by U.S. forces in July.
NBC News first reported the al-Douri link to Ansar al-Islam Tuesday night. Asked Wednesday about the report, Pentagon spokesman Larry Di Rita said he did not know anything about it.
Attacks on American troops have surged this week to about 33 a day, up from 26 per day last week and 15 per day in early September. A series of car bombings in and near Baghdad this week killed more than three dozen people.
The New York Times reported Thursday that President Bush wanted to speed plans for putting Iraqi security forces on the streets of Baghdad and other areas where Americans have come under attack. The report, attributed to unidentified military and administration officials, said plan would mean arming 18- and 19-year-old Iraqis for security duty after only a few weeks of training.
U.S. officials have been searching for months for suspected links between Saddam loyalists and foreign fighters such as Ansar members. Bush and other U.S. officials have said they believe the bombings in Baghdad Monday were the work of Saddam loyalists, foreign fighters or both.
Pentagon officials say the Baghdad bombings, four explosions in different parts of the city in less than an hour, showed a level of sophistication they had not seen before. Di Rita said the bombings indicated coordination "at least at the regional level."
The defense official who discussed the al-Douri link said he did not know if the al-Douri-Ansar alliance was responsible for the Baghdad bombings. He said military officials don't know to what extent al-Douri was coordinating attacks with Ansar.
Earlier this month, American forces captured a top associate of al-Douri in the town of Baqouba north of Baghdad.
U.S. officials have said for at least two months they suspect al-Douri of coordinating attacks on Americans but had not previously linked him to Ansar.
Biowarfare
U.S. officials say Ansar al-Islam has links to al-Qaida and has experimented with producing crude biological and chemical weapons. The group operated in a small section of northern Iraq surrounded by Kurdish-controlled areas which were outside Saddam's control.
Kurdish officials have long alleged that Saddam's government helped Ansar, but U.S. officials have said they haven't yet found definitive proof of that.
2003 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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GOP lawmaker: Saddam linked to 9/11
N.C. representative says 'evidence is clear'
NEW YORK (CNN) -- A Republican congressman from North Carolina told CNN on Wednesday that the "evidence is clear" that Iraq was involved in the terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001.
"Saddam Hussein and people like him were very much involved in 9/11," Rep. Robin Hayes said.
Told no investigation had ever found evidence to link Saddam and 9/11, Hayes responded, "I'm sorry, but you must have looked in the wrong places."
Hayes, the vice chairman of the House subcommittee on terrorism, said legislators have access to evidence others do not.
Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said that Saddam was a dangerous man, but when asked about Hayes' statement, would not link the deposed Iraqi ruler to the terrorist attacks on New York, the Pentagon and Pennsylvania.
"I haven't seen compelling evidence of that," McCain, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told CNN.
On Tuesday night, President Bush mentioned the September 11 attacks five times during his address on the war in Iraq, prompting criticism from congressional Democrats. (Full story)
The 9/11 commission, appointed by Bush, presented its final report a year ago, saying that Osama bin Laden had been "willing to explore possibilities for cooperation with Iraq" at one time in the 1990s but that the al Qaeda leader "had in fact been sponsoring anti-Saddam Islamists in Iraqi Kurdistan, and sought to attract them into his Islamic army."
The 520-page report said investigators found no evidence that any "contacts ever developed into a collaborative operational relationship."
"Nor have we seen evidence indicating that Iraq cooperated with al Qaeda in developing or carrying out any attacks against the United States," it said.
President Bush said in September 2003 that "We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the September 11 [attacks]."
Nevertheless, Hayes insisted that the connection between al Qaeda and Saddam and "folks who work for him" has been seen "time and time again."
"Nobody disputes 9/11," Hayes said. "They would do it again if not prevented."
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