Saddam's Terror Training Camps

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
21

[quote]thabigdon24 wrote:

Im sure that several of the middle eastern governments sponsor organizations that have terrorist branches. Palestine, Iran has em for sure, mabey even the Saudi’s. [/quote]

Unfortunately very true, although it is harder to link the Saudis, especially since many of the terrorists, Osama specifically, are against the Saudi government.

This is the first? Really? We have been debating this here since before the war. This is not the only information linking Saddam to terrorists. Zarkowi is not just the terrorist who is running the attacks in Iraq. He didn’t just suddenly pop over the boarder after the war. He has actually attacked us before the war, and was being protected by Saddam. He has went to Iraq before for medical procedures.

The information I posted may corroborate this Iraqi defectors assertions:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/gunning/interviews/khodada.html

(Warning, it is from the right wing organization PBS.)

I believe some have questioned his credibility, but I don’t think any proof he has lied has been shown either, just that there was no corroborating evidence. This may actually change, but again we will see.

That is why this is so important. That is the big argument, as even stated in that article, that Saddam and Al-Qaeda would never work together. Yet where is the proof that they didn?t?

There are plenty of times they have had talks, and that is a fact. If they were so opposed to working together, why would they even talk at all?

Here is some interesting information. But I should say it is circumstantial. Even though Osama is said to have a lot of money, Al-Qaeda was running out of money, then after having a meeting with Saddam, they suddenly had large amounts of cash at their disposal.

There are a lot of people attempting to discredit the links instead of looking deeper. Just because the 911 commission says there were no credible links proving Saddam worked with Al-Qaeda on the 911 terrorist attacks in no way means it didn’t happen, just that the links have not been proven. Unfortunately people have tried to twist this into there being no links whatsoever, and the 911 report clearly mentions these links as facts.

22

[quote]The Mage wrote:
There are a lot of people attempting to discredit the links instead of looking deeper. [/quote]

Like that doesn’t happen anytime a source is posted that is NOT Fox News? Please. All media everywhere is branded as Liberal if it disagrees with what conservatives want to hear and its content is immediately thrown out the window based on the source unless it is also supported by “conservative media”. Please don’t tell me you haven’t noticed this here. How convenient that when the tables are turned, the cry is, “look deeper at the content!!”.

23

Salman Pak had a 727 fusealage on it’s training grounds. The fusealage was used to train terrorists in how to hijack and demolish an airliner. They needed a lot of space, and a friendly government with cash, in order to provide this excercise and training ground.

Legitimate governments, not terrorists, can get counter terrorist training in how to rescue a hijacked airliner, using an aircraft fusealage for training, from first world governments. These first world governments also have special forces that know how to do this. Iraq did not. We trained Egyptian, Kuwaiti and other ME nations in counter terrorism. Salman Pak was used to train hijackers.

Satellite photo’s from the Sadaam days are avialable online and we captured Salman Pak with it’s training grounds when we invaded.

24

Zap,

Slapping the label terrorist onto people does make it wrong, but we don’t know at this point what was being taught or if the people involved were terrorists.

You have to realize, minus the terrorism slant, every country in the world can put civilians through military training for whatever purpose they want.

They key word there is military training, not terrorist training. If they were training terrorists to conduct acts of terror, there is no way I’d be condoning that.

Try to think clearly.

25

Hedo, that sounds pretty damning.

26

[quote]vroom wrote:
Salman Pak had a 727 fusealage on it’s training grounds. The fusealage was used to train terrorists in how to hijack and demolish an airliner.

Hedo, that sounds pretty damning.[/quote]

It also sounds pretty unsubstantiated.

27

[quote]Professor X wrote:
vroom wrote:
Salman Pak had a 727 fusealage on it’s training grounds. The fusealage was used to train terrorists in how to hijack and demolish an airliner.

Hedo, that sounds pretty damning.

It also sounds pretty unsubstantiated.[/quote]

The satellite shots are from a commercial satellite not a military one.
An Iraqi defector, Kohnar?, verified the info.

I don’t think they were training stewardesses.

Dozens of other links are available on google. People can draw thier own conclusions.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/866766/posts

http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iraq/salman_pak.htm

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/733893/posts

28

In order to make a decision on it I’d want to know…

  1. Who trained there.
  2. What they were trained for.
  3. When that training happened.

I know it can be very difficult to answer those types of questions, but without clear answers (instead of inuendo) we have circumstantial evidence.

Doesn’t mean I’m arguing against it, but it does mean everybody can argue about it and make up their own minds.

29

[quote]hedo wrote:
Professor X wrote:
vroom wrote:
Salman Pak had a 727 fusealage on it’s training grounds. The fusealage was used to train terrorists in how to hijack and demolish an airliner.

Hedo, that sounds pretty damning.

It also sounds pretty unsubstantiated.

The satellite shots are from a commercial satellite not a military one.
An Iraqi defector, Kohnar?, verified the info.

I don’t think they were training stewardesses.

Dozens of other links are available on google. People can draw thier own conclusions.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/866766/posts

http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iraq/salman_pak.htm

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/733893/posts

[/quote]

Question, are any of those Iraqi defectors the same ones now credited with the “faulty intel” we recieved? How much credibility do they have? I am being serious here. We have a picture of an aircraft. This is direct proof they were training for terrorist drills on our aircrafts? How many attacks were being planned and how long did they think it would take for us to respond by increasing security in airports? Wouldn’t that change the training needed and only be effective if they expected our routine to never change?

30

Prof X, is it right or wrong when right wingers disqualify information based on it’s source?

V

[quote]Professor X wrote:
The Mage wrote:
There are a lot of people attempting to discredit the links instead of looking deeper.

Like that doesn’t happen anytime a source is posted that is NOT Fox News? Please. All media everywhere is branded as Liberal if it disagrees with what conservatives want to hear and its content is immediately thrown out the window based on the source unless it is also supported by “conservative media”. Please don’t tell me you haven’t noticed this here. How convenient that when the tables are turned, the cry is, “look deeper at the content!!”.[/quote]

31

Unfortunately, this isn’t a court case in the US or canada vroom. Given the imperfect nature of the world we live in, sometimes we have to make decisions based on what we have, even if we don’t have ALL the answers. Actually we don’t even have to make a decision with this info, we really just need to validate if our decision to go to war was the right decision or not. When you have physical evidence of a plane fuselodge set up in an open area like this, located precisely where a known terrorist orginazation operates from, you can assume quite correctly that they are using it for training purposes.

And when you then have documentation that the former Iraq regime gave training to this exact orginazation, you can make a direct link to terrorism with that old regime. This is only really scratching the surface, with the resources we have at our disposal, i’m sure over the next 10 years much more info will be discovered as to just how important it was that we did what we did.

V

[quote]vroom wrote:
In order to make a decision on it I’d want to know…

  1. Who trained there.
  2. What they were trained for.
  3. When that training happened.

I know it can be very difficult to answer those types of questions, but without clear answers (instead of inuendo) we have circumstantial evidence.

Doesn’t mean I’m arguing against it, but it does mean everybody can argue about it and make up their own minds.[/quote]

32

Veg,

Thanks for the condescending lecture. I happen to disagree with you.

Why?

I’ll tell you why. Your country has lost over 2000 fine men and women to the cause already. I don’t believe that loss of life was the best option available to protect the lives of your citizens…

There are huge and significant principles at play in this entire issue. I find it very risky, for future world issues, to allow countries to simply throw up their hands and say, we aren’t sure, but it looks bad, so we’re going to wage war on everyone.

For after the fact analysis, which is precisely what this is, digging in and getting real answers, as opposed to using uncertain evidence to support past actions, is exactly the appropriate thing to do.

We need to know.

33

Yes, he who wins the war writes the history books, that much is true…

34

Professor

I don’t know the answer to that and I wouldn’t think records would have been kept of the training. Seems to me it would be dangerous to keep records like that with the danger being they fall into enemy hands.

A defector who is mentioned in the the PBS interview listed above was the most public source. He didn’t give any other intel that I am aware of that is public. His information is backed up by the photo’s. I don’t know if it was verified by other means.

35

[quote]Vegita wrote:
Prof X, is it right or wrong when right wingers disqualify information based on it’s source?
[/quote]

It is wrong if the only justification for ignoring knowledge or information is who told it unless they have been proven to be unreliable sources of information in majority.

36

[quote]hedo wrote:
Professor

I don’t know the answer to that and I wouldn’t think records would have been kept of the training. Seems to me it would be dangerous to keep records like that with the danger being they fall into enemy hands.

A defector who is mentioned in the the PBS interview listed above was the most public source. He didn’t give any other intel that I am aware of that is public. His information is backed up by the photo’s. I don’t know if it was verified by other means.

[/quote]

…and I am not saying it is absolutely false either. I am, however, wondering where many of you lose your skepticism at the info that comes across. Is it simply who gives you the info that makes up your mind? It seems mighty convenient to link the 9/11 tragedy DIRECTLY with Saddam because it basically excuses every act of war that got us to this point…even though the current administration will even claim publicly that there was no direct link. It seems like political football fans as far as the intensity some take what they choose to believe and what they choose to ignore. This small bit of info seems fishy at best because that particular military tactic makes little sense. You wouldn’t even need to train entire groups of men for this because it wouldn’t work forever. Anyone in charge who thought this could work beyond a one time shot would have to be insane and stupid.

37

P.S. How much training does it really take to blow up a plane? I mean, c’mon, it’s like a fucking pinto in the sky, just blow up any part of it and its a goner.

38

[quote]Vegita wrote:
Unfortunately, this isn’t a court case in the US or canada vroom. Given the imperfect nature of the world we live in, sometimes we have to make decisions based on what we have, even if we don’t have ALL the answers. Actually we don’t even have to make a decision with this info, we really just need to validate if our decision to go to war was the right decision or not. When you have physical evidence of a plane fuselodge set up in an open area like this, located precisely where a known terrorist orginazation operates from, you can assume quite correctly that they are using it for training purposes.

And when you then have documentation that the former Iraq regime gave training to this exact orginazation, you can make a direct link to terrorism with that old regime. This is only really scratching the surface, with the resources we have at our disposal, i’m sure over the next 10 years much more info will be discovered as to just how important it was that we did what we did.

V
[/quote]

Excellent points Veg.

Maybe, just maybe, the whole subject is a little more complicated than the “Bush Lied, People Died” scenario.

After 9/11, the administration shifted its focus to rogue regimes - specifically those regimes it believed were most likely to work with terrorists, and the biggest threats to supply terrorists with WMD. We went into Iraq for a combination of reasons, and you cannot understand (or knock down) the decision looking at them separately. That’s why such rhetorical questions as “If we cared about human rights, why didn’t we invade Central Africa,” or “If we cared about WMD, why not invade N. Korea,” miss the point entirely. We went in to Iraq because the administration believed all the reasons it gave, and those reasons worked together, along with particular geo-political circumstances that differentiated Iraq (its geographical position, especially as compared with Syria and Iran and the proximity to Afghanistan, the lack of a regional hegemon to control it (like North Korea with China, for example), the importance of the region’s stability to the world economy, etc.).

The ties to terrorism was one of those reasons. I think it’s quite obvious to see how a belief that Saddam had WMD, combined with the fact Iraq was working with terrorists, would be more problematic than either of those two facts by themselves.

In making these decisions, politicians don’t have courtroom standards of proof, nor would it be wise for them to demand them if they believe they face a real threat. They have intelligence, and projections, and they almost always have differing opinions about all the information they get. They weigh the possible severity of the threat against the likeliehood of the information’s accuracy, and they make their decisions.

Criticizing the implementation of Iraq is one thing, but I find all the simplistic arguments that hold it as a “known fact” the president lied, and that he just knew Iraq had no WMD and that they had no ties to terrorists, but he just wanted to get Saddam for his Daddy (or some other such tripe) amazingly inane.

39

[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
Criticizing the implementation of Iraq is one thing, but I find all the simplistic arguments that hold it as a “known fact” the president lied, and that he just knew Iraq had no WMD and that they had no ties to terrorists, but he just wanted to get Saddam for his Daddy (or some other such tripe) amazingly inane.[/quote]

Who has said this? In all truth, I don’t think it was much at all about Bush knowing they had no WMD…but much more like, “screw it, we have some info that they probably have them so let’s go to war!!!”. The crowd cheers, a few people throw up big foam fingers with “we are #1” written on it, we moon the UN and yell out, “kiss my ass biatches!”, and head on in to war. As the dust settles and we find no WMDs, don’t find Osama and more and more of our men get killed, the public begins FINALLY saying, “wait a second, I think we might have gone in based on emotion more than actual proof and I would really like to have my dad, husband, mother, sister, son, daughter back at home instead of in Iraq for another year”.

40

Just a note on the terror training – from the second paragraph of the article:

Many of the fighters were drawn from terrorist groups in northern Africa with close ties to al Qaeda, chief among them Algeria’s GSPC and the Sudanese Islamic Army. Some 2,000 terrorists were trained at these Iraqi camps each year from 1999 to 2002, putting the total number at or above 8,000. Intelligence officials believe that some of these terrorists returned to Iraq and are responsible for attacks against Americans and Iraqis. According to three officials with knowledge of the intelligence on Iraqi training camps, White House and National Security Council officials were briefed on these findings in May 2005; senior Defense Department officials subsequently received the same briefing.

The Italians recently arrested three terrorists from the GSPC, on charges they were plotting large-scale attacks on the U.S.

http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id=93048

Additionally, GSPC is a large problem in Europe. Just do a search on the Times of London website, or the BBC website, on that group.