In '99, Clarke Saw Iraq-Al Qaida Link

[Viking]

In '99, Clarke saw
Iraq-al-Qaida link
But Bush critic told '60 Minutes' Sunday there was 'absolutely' no evidence 'ever'

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: March 23, 2004
11:10 a.m. Eastern



© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com

Richard Clarke, the former counterterrorism official promoting a book critical of the Bush administration, insists Saddam Hussein had no connection to al-Qaida, but in 1999 he defended President Clinton's attack on a Sudanese pharmaceutical plant by revealing the U.S. was "sure" it manufactured chemical warfare materials produced by Iraqi experts in cooperation with Osama bin Laden.


Clarke told the Washington Post in a Jan. 23, 1999, story U.S. intelligence officials had obtained a soil sample from the El Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, which was hit with Tomahawk cruise missiles in retaliation for bin Laden's role in the Aug. 7, 1998, embassy bombings in Africa.

The sample contained a precursor of VX nerve gas, which Clarke said when mixed with bleach and water, would have become fully active VX nerve gas.

Clarke told the Post the U.S. did not know how much of the substance was produced at El Shifa or what happened to it.

"But he said that intelligence exists linking bin Laden to El Shifa's current and past operators, the Iraqi nerve gas experts and the National Islamic Front in Sudan," the paper reported.

However, Sunday night in an interview with Lesley Stahl on "60 Minutes," Clarke denied Saddam had any connection to al-Qaida.

Stahl pressed Clarke further, asking, "Was Iraq supporting al-Qaida?"

Clarke replied: "There is absolutely no evidence that Iraq was supporting al-Qaida ever."

Clarke, who served under the Clinton and Bush administrations, has accused President Bush of ignoring threats to al-Qaida prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and focusing on Saddam Hussein at the expense of the war on terror.

In an interview with Rush Limbaugh yesterday, Vice President Dick Cheney dismissed Clarke's criticism as coming from an ineffective former official.

"He was the head of counterterrorism for several years there in the '90s, and I didn't notice that they had any great success dealing with the terrorist threat," Cheney said.

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice had a similar reply in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America."

"I really don't know what Richard Clarke's motivations are, but I'll tell you this: Richard Clarke had plenty of opportunities to tell us in the administration that he thought the war on terrorism was moving in the wrong direction and he chose not to."

Clarke, the author of "Against All Enemies," is scheduled to testify tomorrow before the independent federal commission probing the 9-11 attacks.

The "60 Minutes" interview Sunday has raised ethical concerns for not disclosing the connection between Clarke's book publisher, a subsidiary of Simon & Schuster, and CBS News. Both are owned by Viacom.

At the time of the 1999 Post interview, Clarke occupied the newly created post of national coordinator of counterterrorism and computer security programs under President Clinton.

The Post story concluded with Clarke affirming the U.S. strategy of fighting terror by legally prosecuting perpetrators of the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York.

"The fact that we got seven out of the eight people from the World Trade Center [bombing], and we found them in five countries around the world and brought them back here, the fact we can demonstrate repeatedly that the slogan, 'There's nowhere to hide,' is more than a slogan, the fact that we don't forget, we're persistent – we get them – has deterred terrorism," he said.


http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37704

[ELVIS]

Buy my book!

:rolleyes:

[John Ashcroft]

Wild how the Dems will glady subvert our national security to political gain, isn't it?

[FORD]

Originally posted by John Ashcroft
Wild how the BCE has glady subverted our national security to political gain, isn't it?

[John Ashcroft]

How many terrorist attacks have there been this year against Americans? And don't try to be clever by listing the shit in Iraq as it's a war zone.

[lucky wilbury]

bump

[Nickdfresh]

Desperation BUMP. The WorldnetDaily? Hand me one, I ran out of toilet paper--LMAO That's the best you got?

Gee. I bet the Bush Administration would never, ever do a hatchet job on somebody...




Last Update: Sunday, January 4, 2004. 1:21pm (AEDT)
FBI wants sources named in CIA agent leak case
US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents investigating the leaking of a CIA agent's identity to the press have asked members of the Bush administration to waive confidentiality agreements with reporters, Time magazine reports.

The requests, if signed, would give investigators new ammunition for questioning reporters who so far have kept mum about the case, Time said.

Former US ambassador Joseph Wilson has alleged that his wife's professional identity was leaked in retaliation for his high-profile opposition to the war in Iraq.

In an article for The New York Times on July 6 of this year, Mr Wilson said President George W Bush's administration had "twisted" evidence to exaggerate the case against Iraq.

He said the Bush administration sent him to Niger in early 2002 to look into a charge that Saddam Hussein sought uranium from Africa, and that he had reported back that it was false.

Even after a warning by the US State Department's intelligence service that the charge was "highly dubious," the accusation wound up in Bush's "State of the Union" address in January, sourced to the British Government.

A week later, conservative syndicated columnist Robert Novak cited "two senior administration officials" as telling him that the diplomat's wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA agent.

It is a criminal offence to name a covert CIA agent.

The scandal is the biggest to hit the administration since Bush took office in January 2001.

The US Justice Department opened a formal investigation on September 30 into "possible unauthorised disclosures" of the agent's identity by the Bush administration.

US Attorney-General John Ashcroft withdrew from the politically sensitive probe earlier this week, prompting authorities to name a special counsel to head the investigation in his place.

The requests could lead to the arrest of reporters who refuse to reveal the identities of their confidential sources.

"From the prosecutors' point of view, it is likely a precursor to subpoenaing journalists to testify before a grand jury, and then asking a judge to hold them in contempt if they refuse to do so," Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters' Committee for Freedom of the Press, told Time.

-- AFP

[Nickdfresh]

Worldnetdaily
"But he said that intelligence exists linking bin Laden to El Shifa's current and past operators, the Iraqi nerve gas experts and the National Islamic Front in Sudan," the paper reported.

That's the link? We have a name for this, it's called YELLOW JOURNALISM!

[lucky wilbury]

again you didn't read the article. if you read it you would see its his own words coming back to haunt him. the worldnetdaily article was quoting what clark told the paper in 1999. the what you were making fun of was clarkes own words. here is the washington post article:


Embassy Attacks Thwarted, U.S. Says; Official Cites Gains Against Bin Laden; Clinton Seeks $10 Billion to Fight Terrorism:[FINAL Edition]
Vernon Loeb. The Washington Post. Washington: Jan 23, 1999. pg. A.02
Full Text (859 words)
Copyright The Washington Post Company Jan 23, 1999


U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies have prevented Osama bin Laden's extremist network from carrying out truck-bomb attacks against at least two American embassies since the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania more than five months ago, the Clinton administration's senior counterterrorism official said yesterday.

Richard A. Clarke, who occupies the recently created post of national coordinator of counterterrorism and computer security programs, also said U.S. officials do not believe that bin Laden, a Saudi millionaire now living in the mountains of Afghanistan, has acquired chemical or biological weapons despite his contacts with experts in the production of nerve gas and biological toxins.

"I think we've made life extraordinarily difficult for {bin Laden}, but he's still there," Clarke said. "I think it is very difficult for him and his lieutenants to travel. I think it's very difficult for them to raise money or move money or move explosives."

Clarke's assessment came as President Clinton unveiled a $10 billion budget proposal for fighting terrorism and protecting the nation's computer infrastructure from attack. "The fight against terrorism is far from over, and now terrorists seek new tools of destruction," Clinton said.

In a speech at the National Academy of Sciences, Clinton said his fiscal 2000 budget proposal includes $1.4 billion for enhancing domestic readiness in the event of a chemical or biological terrorist attack, an increase of more than 50 percent since fiscal 1998, and $1.46 billion for protecting the nation's computer systems.

Clinton proposed an array of initiatives in both areas, from new vaccine research to creation of a "Cybercorps" of government computer experts. He said those programs would come on top of $7 billion in counterterrorism spending on intelligence, diplomatic security, military readiness and law enforcement, including a tripling of FBI resources since 1993.

"We are doing everything we can, in ways I can and ways that I cannot discuss, to try to stop people who would misuse chemical and biological capacity from getting that capacity," Clinton said. "This is not a cause for a panic. It is a cause for serious, deliberate, disciplined long-term concern."

Clinton, who took office one month before the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, has since issued three high-level directives making counterterrorism the nation's No. 1 priority.

The president's proposals drew immediate praise on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers have voted for large increases in spending on counterterrorism in response to the World Trade Center bombing, a sarin gas attack by the Japanese religious cult Aum Shinrikyo in 1995 and the bombing of the federal office building in Oklahoma City later that year.

Rep. Thomas J. Bliley Jr. (R-Va.), chairman of the House Commerce Committee, pledged his "full cooperation" but said that, if anything, Clinton's counterterrorism strategy does not go far enough, leaving "huge gaps in federal laws and regulations governing the possession, use and transfer of biological and chemical agents such as anthrax and sarin gas."

Clarke declined to go into detail on U.S. counterterrorism operations that he believes preempted the planned truck bombings at embassies in Africa and the Middle East. He would not say which embassies had been targeted, although U.S. officials previously disclosed that they had foiled an alleged attempt by bin Laden associates to blow up the U.S. Embassy in Uganda.

Clarke did provide new information in defense of Clinton's decision to fire Tomahawk cruise missiles at the El Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan, in retaliation for bin Laden's role in the Aug. 7 embassy bombings.

While U.S. intelligence officials disclosed shortly after the missile attack that they had obtained a soil sample from the El Shifa site that contained a precursor of VX nerve gas, Clarke said that the U.S. government is "sure" that Iraqi nerve gas experts actually produced a powdered VX-like substance at the plant that, when mixed with bleach and water, would have become fully active VX nerve gas.

Clarke said U.S. intelligence does not know how much of the substance was produced at El Shifa or what happened to it. But he said that intelligence exists linking bin Laden to El Shifa's current and past operators, the Iraqi nerve gas experts and the National Islamic Front in Sudan.

Given the evidence presented to the White House before the airstrike, Clarke said, the president "would have been derelict in his duties if he didn't blow up the facility."

Clarke said the U.S. does not believe that bin Laden has been able to acquire chemical agents, biological toxins or nuclear weapons. If evidence of such an acquisition existed, he said, "we would be in the process of doing something."

Assessing U.S. counterterrorism policy to date, Clarke said it's no accident that there have been so few terrorist attacks on American soil.

"The fact that we got seven out of the eight people from the World Trade Center {bombing}, and we found them in five countries around the world and brought them back here, the fact we can demonstrate repeatedly that the slogan, `There's nowhere to hide,' is more than a slogan, the fact that we don't forget, we're persistent -- we get them -- has deterred terrorism," he said.

Credit: Washington Post Staff Writer

[Big Train]

Lucky 2
Nick 0

[BigBadBrian]

Originally posted by Nickdfresh
Desperation BUMP. The WorldnetDaily? Hand me one, I ran out of toilet paper--LMAO That's the best you got?

Gee. I bet the Bush Administration would never, ever do a hatchet job on somebody...




We could cite the NYT or Washington Post or the UK's Guardian if you prefer. They are every bit as jaded. :gulp:

[Nickdfresh]

Originally posted by Big Train
Lucky 2
Nick 0

Maybe you should read posts more clearly. We can install instant replay if you are a little slow on the uptake? But if you really think posting useless articles that have nothing to do with the failures in Iraq, by all means keep countin.'

[lucky wilbury]

what nick is really trying to say is don't post something that disproves what he says. afterall he was proclaiming that richard clark said there was no connection between iraq and al qaida yet richard clark here in this article from 1999 makes the connection.

[Three Lock Rock]

Dickdfresh is a fucking stupid rothtard!

three rock lock (get back into the rothtard round up corral faggit!)

[Redballjets88]

no one cares about your opinions

[Nickdfresh]

Originally posted by lucky wilbury
what nick is really trying to say is don't post something that disproves what he says. afterall he was proclaiming that richard clark said there was no connection between iraq and al qaida yet richard clark here in this article from 1999 makes the connection.

Ahaha! Touche Lucky! Maybe you can dig up more right-wing phoney-baloney propaganda about WMD's in Iraq.

Pot->tea kettle!;)

[Nickdfresh]

Originally posted by Three Lock Rock
Dickdfresh is a fucking stupid rothtard!

three rock lock (get back into the rothtard round up corral faggit!)

**Sniff, sniff**...Do I smell something, oh, I see I have a pile of Three Inch Shit on my shoe, better go clean it off. I know, my VAN HAGAR CD will finally be useful as a scraper!:)

[lucky wilbury]

Originally posted by Nickdfresh
Ahaha! Touche Lucky! Maybe you can dig up more right-wing phoney-baloney propaganda about WMD's in Iraq.

Pot->tea kettle!;)


i can find you statements about wmd and iraq by almost any polticain pre jan 2001. all you have to do is check the congressional record and its all there. try it out:

http://thomas.loc.gov/home/thomas.html

just pick search congressioanl record and change the congress to 106 or earlier type in your key word and choose your congressmen or senator of choice. nothing right wing about it just their own words

[Nickdfresh]

You posted articles saying we actually found them. The Administration has long been since forced to admit there are none, or at least there is no evidence as such.

[lucky wilbury]

and some were found. our guys got hit hit a sarin lanced ied or the viles of botcholism that were found etc etc. when the reports say no wmd were found they mean large quanities. they found a and b components but since they weren't mixed "no wmd was found" and on and on. the full reports say more then what the meadia reports

[Nickdfresh]

Technicalities and subterfuge abound!:)

[lucky wilbury]

no under all resolutions sarin and botcholisim were outlawed in iraq

[DrMaddVibe]

Throw him on the pyre!

[Nickdfresh]

Originally posted by lucky wilbury
no under all resolutions sarin and botcholisim were outlawed in iraq

So since it has been virtually proven that the United States conducts illegal biological warfare research, that is ostensibly for self-defense, we should be invaded?

[lucky wilbury]

you know what i mean un resolutions on iraq