{"id":2688,"date":"2004-10-05T12:50:45","date_gmt":"2004-10-05T17:50:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/2688.html"},"modified":"2004-10-05T12:50:45","modified_gmt":"2004-10-05T17:50:45","slug":"so-much-for-those-saddam-zarqawi-ties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/so-much-for-those-saddam-zarqawi-ties\/","title":{"rendered":"So much for those Saddam-Zarqawi ties"},"content":{"rendered":"

With all of his pre-war claims having been debunked, Bush has relied on emphasizing Saddam Hussein’s alleged ties<\/a> to other terrorists, other than al Queda.<\/p>\n

U.S. President George W. Bush [in May] blamed al Qaeda supporter Abu Musab al-Zarqawi for beheading American Nicholas Berg and cited him as an example of Saddam Hussein’s “terrorist ties” before the U.S.-led war in Iraq. <\/p>\n

Bush’s revival of accusations linking Saddam to terrorism comes as the president faces growing doubts among Americans over his Iraq policy. <\/p>\n

At a fund-raising lunch in Bridgeton, Missouri, Bush said Zarqawi was an example of the threat posed by the ousted Iraqi leader. “We knew he (Saddam) had terrorist ties. The person responsible for the Berg death, Zarqawi, was in and out of Baghdad prior to our arrival, for example,” Bush said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First of all, every time Bush mentions Zarqawi, it’s a reminder that he could have eliminated this threat, but chose not to<\/a>. Second of all, the CIA has now explained that Bush is wrong about this claim<\/a>, too.<\/p>\n

A new CIA assessment undercuts the White House’s claim that Saddam Hussein maintained ties to al-Qaida, saying there’s no conclusive evidence that the regime harbored Osama bin Laden associate Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. <\/p>\n

The CIA review, which U.S. officials said Monday was requested some months ago by Vice President Dick Cheney, is the latest assessment that calls into question one of President Bush’s key justifications for last year’s U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Is it me, or is it just a coincidence that every time Bush and the CIA start fighting, as they are now<\/a>, the CIA seems to release damaging information debunking another bogus White House claim? You’d think Bush would have learned by now that the CIA has the upper hand here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With all of his pre-war claims having been debunked, Bush has relied on emphasizing Saddam Hussein’s alleged ties to other terrorists, other than al Queda. U.S. President George W. Bush [in May] blamed al Qaeda supporter Abu Musab al-Zarqawi for beheading American Nicholas Berg and cited him as an example of Saddam Hussein’s “terrorist ties” […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2688\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}