This site includes a UPI article quoting US officials who have seen the report of the joint congressional inquiry into 9/11. The report apparently says there’s no links whatsoever between Hussein and al Queda.
And, my reaction? Well, duhhh!
This report, btw, was supposed to come out in January. There’s an accusation that Bush delayed its release so that it wouldn’t interfere with the rush to war on Iraq.
Whether this report was delayed for this purpose or not, it shows that the Bush administration ignored the report and its findings on this, and just went ahead with the neocon line to sell the war.
Not to mention the juicyest parts being kept under wraps.
"The White House, meanwhile, resisted efforts to pin down Bush’s knowledge of al Qaeda threats and to catalogue the executive’s pre-Sept. 11 strategy to fight terrorists. It was justified largely on legal grounds, and Democrats said the secrecy was meant to protect Bush from criticism. "
Well, there’s gonna be some interesting theatre coming out of this, and plenty of diverting finger-pointing entertainment, given Congress’ dog-like rollover to administration wishes when the issue of invading Iraq came up in the first place.
Another interesting item coming out of the report is that based on the evidence examined by the Inquiry, it believes that not only did Saudi Arabia put various, so far unspecified roadblocks in the way of US efforts to dismantle the al_Quaida network, but Saudi officials may have, wittingly or unwittingly, provided financial support to the Septmber 11 hijackers. The possible direct connection to Saudi rulers is of course old news, but as I understand it, the US government has previously dismissed all such claims.
According to the news items I’ve seen on the subject (haven’t seen the report itself, of course) the Inquiry recommends that intelligence agencies carry out much deeper investigation of this issue. This apparently is taking place, but the agencies involved are saying that the process could take some time.
Using my Ouija board, I’m predicting a better than even chance of this further inquiry lasting till sometime after, uh, looks like November 2004.
According to Talking Points Memo, which broke this story, the story has been retracted. Which kinda makes sense, because I saw this a couple days ago and rather rushed to share it with my fellow Cecilians, and yet saw no other follow up or reaction to the story.
The retraction itself may prove to be interesting, but, for the nonce, all that we can be sure of is that the story is being withdrawn.