Cheney said Gitmo detainees revealed link between Iraq, al-Qaida

[struggle4progress]

By JONATHAN S. LANDAY
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON -- Then-Vice President Dick Cheney, defending the invasion of Iraq, asserted in 2004 that detainees interrogated at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp had revealed that Iraq had trained al-Qaida operatives in chemical and biological warfare, an assertion that wasn't true.

Cheney's 2004 comments to the now-defunct Rocky Mountain News were largely overlooked at the time. However, they appear to substantiate recent reports that interrogators at Guantanamo and other prison camps were ordered to find evidence of alleged cooperation between al-Qaida and the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein - despite CIA reports that there were only sporadic, insignificant contacts between the militant Islamic group and the secular Iraqi dictatorship.

The head of the Criminal Investigation Task Force at Guantanamo from 2002-2005 confirmed to McClatchy Newspapers that in late 2002 and early 2003, intelligence officials were tasked to find, among other things, ties between Iraq and al-Qaida, which were a central pillar of the Bush administration's case for its March 2003 invasion of Iraq ... http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/AP/story/1050895.html

[Arkana]

1. Nice try, Dicko--your boss and many of your colleagues already admitted

that all that bullshit about a link between Saddam and al-Qaeda was exactly that--pure, uncut, grade-A bullshit.

[robinlynne]

2. unfortunately, the "admitter" of the link died just last week. How timely.

[elleng]

3. Yes, indeed.

In politics, there ARE NO coincidences.

[targetpractice]

4. The "now-defunct" Rocky Mountain News...

It just occurred to me... What will happen to all the newspaper archives as they go out of business. What a potential loss of history!