International:
U.S. Officials Discount Any Role by Iraq in Terrorist Attacks
---
Secularist Saddam Hussein
And Suspect bin Laden
Have Divergent Goals
----
By Hugh Pope and Neil King Jr.
Staff Reporters of The Wall Street Journal
Wednesday, September 19, 2001
The Wall Street Journal via Dow Jones
U.S. officials said there is no evidence Iraq had a role in last Tuesday's attacks in the U.S. or that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein helped prime suspect Osama bin Laden.
According to current and former U.S. intelligence authorities, Iraqi intelligence officials have met with bin Laden operatives at least two or three times since the late 1990s, including one meeting in 1998 in Turkey. There is also some evidence that Iraq may have provided some financial assistance as well as small arms to Al-Qaeda, Mr. bin Laden's organization.
But few U.S. officials believe that any real alliance between Iraq and Al-Qaeda ever emerged.
Figures such as former Central Intelligence Agency chief James Woolsey and Israeli intelligence experts have suggested Iraq may have been involved in the attacks. But U.S. officials say the two groups share few aims and have very different motivations.
"The reality is that Osama bin Laden doesn't like Saddam Hussein," said one former U.S. intelligence official familiar with Iraq. "Saddam is a secularist who has killed more Islamic clergy than he has Americans or any other foreigners other than Kuwaitis. They share almost nothing in common, except a hatred for the U.S."
Nor has Iraq ever been a real supporter of traditional terrorism. Even the 1993 plot to assassinate former President George Bush was an Iraqi military commando effort, not a job farmed out to terrorists. Iraq's inclusion on the U.S. list of terrorist-sponsoring states stems mainly from Mr. Hussein's willingness to give refuge to a few terrorist leaders such as Abu Nidal.
"Saddam is the ultimate control freak. For him, terrorists are the ultimate loose cannons," the former U.S. official said. "Abu Nidal is allowed to stay, but only if he keeps quiet."
Yesterday, Mr. Hussein said the U.S. was using the attacks on New York and Washington as a pretext to settle old scores. "Nobody has any doubt that the United States and the West have the capabilities to mobilize force and use it to inflict destruction on the basis of mere suspicions, or even whimsically . . . in a fit of anger, or pushed by Zionism," Mr. Hussein said.
The State Department includes Iraq on its list of states that support terrorism, along with Iran, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Cuba and North Korea.
Israel, for its part, sees a threat in the combination of Iraq's large population, its oil riches, its past nuclear and chemical weapons programs and its dedicated hostility.
Iraq is already frequently the object of attack by U.S. and British warplanes patrolling "no-fly zones" established alongside a U.N. sanctions regime in force against Iraq since the Gulf War in 1990. These no-fly zones, from which Iraqi aircraft are banned, aren't mandated by U.N. resolutions.
British Tornado warplanes bombed a southern Iraqi anti-aircraft missile site yesterday, retaliating against "hostile activities" from Iraq, a U.S. Air Force spokesman said. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told reporters the incident wasn't linked to last week's terrorist attacks, according to Reuters.
In the hours after the news of last week's attacks broke, Iraqi soldiers moved away from possible targets in their country, according to London-based defense analyst Neil Partrick.
"It's always been conceivable that Iraq would have an interest in being involved. But the only concrete support [that Iraq is known to give to outside causes] is that given to the families of martyrs in the West Bank and Gaza," said Mr. Partrick, referring to Iraqi payments of $10,000 to each group of relatives of Palestinians killed in the struggle with Israel.
Alone among the 22 Arab states, Iraqi television stations openly gloated as they screened the collapse of the twin towers of the World Trade Center -- against the background of a hymn with the refrain "Down with America."
"From a Baghdad perspective, having spent 10 years describing itself as a victim, to turn around would be extremely surprising. I don't think that that suggests any complicity. I think Baghdad would be very foolish to get involved in action of this kind," Mr. Partrick said.
Being held responsible for such a terrorist act would endanger the years of effort Iraq has made to restore foreign commerce, air routes, investment in oil production, relations with its neighbors, its much damaged infrastructure and its military capacity.