Official US study denies Saddam had links with al-Qaida

The Guardian, March 13, 2008

Elna Schor in Washington

A US military study officially acknowledged for the first time yesterday that Saddam Hussein had no direct ties to al-Qaida, undercutting the Bush administration's central case for war with Iraq.

The study, based on more than 600,000 documents recovered after US and UK troops toppled Saddam in 2003, concluded there was "no 'smoking gun' [direct connection] between Saddam's Iraq and al-Qaida".

George Bush and his senior aides have made numerous attempts to link Saddam and al-Qaida in their justification for waging war against Iraq. The US defence department attempted to bury the release of the report yesterday.

The Pentagon cancelled a briefing on the study and scrapped plans to post its findings on the internet, ABC news reported. Unclassified copies of the study would be sent to interested individuals in the mail, military officials told the network.

Another Pentagon official told ABC that initial press reports on the study made it "too politically sensitive".

As early as 2002, military intelligence analysts discounted the administration's claim that the Iraqi government had trained al-Qaida members to employ chemical weapons. But Bush aides continued asserting that the intelligence they received showed a link.

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