Michael J Totten’s website links to an ABC News item in 1999 which reported evidence of substantial links between Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. Much of this has been reported by Stephen Hayes in his various books and articles (see previous posts), but it is helpful to hear audio proof that this connection was acknowledged back in the days of the Clinton administration.

If you ignore the over-excitable commentary which irritatingly punctuates this clip, you will hear the ABC reporter in 1999 reveal that Osama bin Laden was trying to obtain nukes for al Qaeda and went to Saddam Hussein, one of the few sources who was in a position to help, on the basis that ‘my enemy’s enemy is my friend’; that the relationship had started in the Sudan; that Sudanese officials acting on behalf of bin Laden asked representatives of Saddam Hussein for asylum and were told that bin Laden would be welcome in Baghdad; and that bin Laden observed that there were people who were prepared to commit terror in his name whom he did not control.

When is the British mainstream media going to start reporting any of this voluminous evidence of the connection (see earlier posts)? How long are they going to collude in the myth that there were no links between Saddam and al Qaeda?

Posted by melanie at July 18, 2005