Just days after reports that Saddam was beginning to talk about weapons caches and money trails to interrogators, American forces in Iraq have found a stockpile of weapons, explosives and al Qaeda literature and videos 65 miles from Baghdad.
In addition to the al Qaeda literature and videos, the troops found nearly 8,000 rounds of ammunition; 160 mortar rounds and six mortar tubes; 43 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and 79 rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs); and 19 AK-47 assault rifles, as well as dozens of other weapons.
It’s only a matter of time before the Iraq-al Qaeda link is exposed, bits and pieces coming together now with some frequency. Two recent developments are worth mentioning.
A few weeks ago the Telegraph ran a story about a secret memo written to Saddam Hussein by the former head of Iraqi intelligence detailing Mohammed Atta’s–the head of the 9/11 hijackers–training in Baghdad prior to the September attacks. Similarly, a memo received by The Weekly Standard discussed Iraq-al Qaeda contracts dating from the 1990s until the 2003 Iraq war.
The case for an Iraq-al Qaeda link is slowly being built, and will surely over time show Iraq’s duplicity as far as international terrorism goes.
Update: Newsweek attempts to discredit Iraq-al Qaeda link.