The only thing more astonishing than this explosive Weekly Standard scoop is the fact that it has not been picked up by the mainstream media. It quotes extensively from a leaked report sent by the US defence official Douglas Feith to the Senate Intelligence Committee. This report says that Osama bin Laden and Saddam had a relationship that involved training in explosives and weapons of mass destruction, logistical support for terrorist attacks, al Qaeda training camps and safe haven in Iraq, and Iraqi financial support for al Qaeda.

It lists in considerable detail contacts between Al Q'aeda and Saddam Hussein going back to 1990 and continuing until shortly before the start of the Iraq war this spring. Drawing, it says, on numerous intelligence contacts, it provides the kind of detail -- names, dates, places -- which leads one to think this is reliable information. Who knows, when one is dealing with intelligence, whether it is true or not? But passages like this have a ring of authenticity, as well as being jaw-dropping:

'Reporting from a well placed source disclosed that bin Laden was receiving training on bomb making from the IIS's [Iraqi Intelligence Service] principal technical expert on making sophisticated explosives, Brigadier Salim al-Ahmed. Brigadier Salim was observed at bin Laden's farm in Khartoum in Sept.-Oct. 1995 and again in July 1996, in the company of the Director of Iraqi Intelligence, Mani abd-al-Rashid al-Tikriti'.

And then later, from the same source:

'The Director of Iraqi Intelligence, Mani abd-al-Rashid al-Tikriti, met privately with bin Laden at his farm in Sudan in July 1996. Tikriti used an Iraqi delegation traveling to Khartoum to discuss bilateral cooperation as his "cover" for his own entry into Sudan to meet with bin Laden and Hassan al-Turabi. The Iraqi intelligence chief and two other IIS officers met at bin Laden's farm and discussed bin Laden's request for IIS technical assistance in: a) making letter and parcel bombs; b) making bombs which could be placed on aircraft and detonated by changes in barometric pressure; and c) making false passport [sic]. Bin Laden specifically requested that [Brigadier Salim al-Ahmed], Iraqi intelligence's premier explosives maker--especially skilled in making car bombs--remain with him in Sudan. The Iraqi intelligence chief instructed Salim to remain in Sudan with bin Laden as long as required'.

It gets even more devastating. 'During a custodial interview, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi [a senior al Qaeda operative] said he was told by an al Qaeda associate that he was tasked to travel to Iraq (1998) to establish a relationship with Iraqi intelligence to obtain poisons and gases training. After the USS Cole bombing in 2000, two al Qaeda operatives were sent to Iraq for CBW-related [Chemical and Biological Weapons] training beginning in Dec 2000. Iraqi intelligence was "encouraged" after the embassy and USS Cole bombings to provide this training'.

The implications of this report are vast. The anti-war mob has told us day in, day out that there were no links between Saddam and al Q'aeda. According to the Weekly Standard's account, they were entwined around each other for more than a decade. If this report is reliable, it shows that Bush told us the truth. It proves that the people who will take to London's streets tomorrow to proclaim fatuously that there never were any weapons of mass destruction are morons. It also tells us -- terrifyingly --that al Q'aeda has had at least some access to WMD training and material; and given that this material is now missing, raises the horrifying possibility that as a result of this relationship with Saddam, it may indeed have found its way into al Q'aeda's hands.

Of course, we don't know if the substance of Feith's report is reliable or not. But shouldn't our mainstream media be re-publishing this article and holding it up to the light of day? Because if this is true, it is immensely important, and horrifying proof of Bush's axis of terror.