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lies and half truths... he had a good teacher.
Cheney's Latest Distortions By The Center for American Progress
Friday 23 January 2004
In January 2004, Vice President Dick Cheney did a round of media interviews with NPR and others in which he reinforced his claims of a connection between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. To back these claims up, he cited documents already discredited as “inaccurate” by the Bush Administration.
SADDAM-AL QAEDA CONNECTION
CHENEY CLAIM: "There's overwhelming evidence there was a connection between al Qaeda and the Iraqi government. I am very confident that there was an established relationship there." - Vice President Cheney, 1/22/04
FACT: According to documents, "Saddam Hussein warned his Iraqi supporters to be wary of joining forces with foreign Arab fighters entering Iraq to battle U.S. troops. The document provides another piece of evidence challenging the Bush administration contention of close cooperation between Saddam's regime and al Qaeda terrorists."
FACT: "CIA interrogators have already elicited from the top Qaeda officials in custody that, before the American-led invasion, Osama bin Laden had rejected entreaties from some of his lieutenants to work jointly with Saddam."
FACT: "Sec. of State Colin Powell conceded Thursday that despite his assertions to the United Nations last year, he had no 'smoking gun' proof of a link between the government of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and terrorists of al-Qaeda.'I have not seen smoking-gun, concrete evidence about the connection,' Powell said."
FACT: “Three former Bush Administration officials who worked on intelligence and national security issues said the prewar evidence tying Al Qaeda was tenuous, exaggerated and often at odds with the conclusions of key intelligence agencies.”
FACT: Declassified documents “undercut Bush administration claims before the war that Hussein had links to Al Qaeda.” .
FACT: "The chairman of the monitoring group appointed by the United Nations Security Council to track Al Qaeda told reporters that his team had found no evidence linking Al Qaeda to Saddam Hussein."
FACT: "U.S. allies have found no links between Iraq and Al Qaeda.'We have found no evidence of links between Iraq and Al Qaeda,' said Europe's top investigator. 'If there were such links, we would have found them. But we have found no serious connections whatsoever.'"
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