Dear President George W. Bush,

SADDAM'S LINKS TO AL QUEDA AND 9/11

I must start out what will turn out to be a nasty letter on a high note. President Bush you have been an inspiration to nearly everyone in the country. Under your reasoned and firm guidance we moved forcefully and directly to remove the threats to the safety of our families and friends and I want to thank you. Your words on top of the rubble of the WTC were a clarion call to the nation, your words on September 20, 2001 stand to me as one of the best speeches ever given by a U.S. President, clear concise with no qualifications or hedging, it was a vision of our coming struggle that Americans could understand. This leads me into the reason for this letter.

Why has Mr. Russert’s question brought about the cover your ass mentality that so typified past administrations? MR. RUSSERT: The Washington Post asked the American people about Saddam Hussein, and this is what they said: 69 percent said he was involved in the September 11 attacks. Are you surprised by that? VICE PRES. CHENEY: No. I think it’s not surprising that people make that connection. He concludes his response to the question with “we just don’t know”. Now this is a sensible answer since you may not have the sort of proof that would stand up in a courtroom run by Maureen Dowd, but we certainly have some items that point to involvement. Course many of us in the public who have been studying the evidence believe there to be a lot more than just a possibility that Saddam was involved, we don’t need to be hit over the head with courtroom quality evidence, or what others call proof to understand who we need to attack. I along with others believe that there is a difference in the words evidence and proof. We have evidence that leads us to believe that Saddam may have been involved, just like the evidence of the smile on your face may mean you are happy. It doesn’t prove it, instead it’s merely evidence of happiness.

But even this vague answer by the Vice President brings this absolutely puzzling response from Sec. Rumsfeld when asked if there is a linkage. Rumsfeld: I've not seen any indication that would lead me to believe that I could say that. We know he was giving $25,000 a family for anyone who would go out and kill innocent men, women and children. And we know of various other activities. But on that specific one, no. Does the Sec of Defense actually believe that there is NO possibility of a link? Is all that circumstantial evidence developed by a number of very bright people a bunch of hooey, all those defectors lying?

Since the put down by Rumsfeld was not quite enough to please those who won’t ever mean you any good, you followed up by confirming that in your view there was no linkage between Saddam and 9/11, notwithstanding that 70% of your supporters believe that to be the case. Vice President Cheney didn’t say it was absolutely confirmed that the connection existed but that he could see why we might believe that to be the case. Exactly why was it so important to scotch even that possibility? The chattering classes only want to back you into a corner on the issue of the reason for the war against Saddam, and with this exchange they have managed to do it, and as you will see you aren’t the only one backed into a corner.

Saddam must be linked to the Al Queda, its why many of us who supported the war, did so. I know that your reasons to go to war revolved around three or four issues. For many of us it revolved around one main issue, the linkage between Saddam and Al Queda, with the dreadful possibilities that follow from that match. That you wanted to free the Iraqis people was certainly a way for us to feel good about the war, but we both know that had you tried to sell this war by just saying how great it would be to free the Iraqis we would have said fine send them money and arms, but no U.S. Armies. Had you tried to sell this war on just the fact that the Iraqis were ignoring the United Nations resolutions we would have laughed you out of the White House for all the respect we have for that free parking institution. And the fact that Saddam had an active WMD program certainly is a concern to us but fact is, there are a lot of crazies who have weapons of Mass destruction, I don’t/won’t support wars to depose all of them. No this war revolved around the dynamic of Saddam giving those weapons of mass destruction to the Al Queda or other terrorists intent on using them here, it revolved around the evidence of linkage.

Evidence of the linkage has existed in the public domain since at least 1999 with reports by various reporters linking Saddam with Bin Laden and the Al Queda. Certainly Dr. Laurie Mylroie had her eye on that linkage long before it was fashionable, and lately Richard Miniter's book on how Bin Laden was lost surely shows the extent of the possibilities for linkage between Saddam and Al Queda. But there is no need to go over all these and many other links, save to say that even for the common man there is plenty of evidence laying around that makes an awfully good case for the linkage. Did you think that we just took your word for the linkage? I honor and respect you beyond any President I have known but it was my duty as a citizen to educate myself to the best of my ability on the threats my country faced.

That the linkage is there is not disputed by your administration. But what is extremely puzzling and indeed a huge contradiction in your position is that you believe that all of this co-operation existed between Saddam and Al Queda even to the point that Saddam might let them use his most valued weapon of all, his bio weapons, and yet you assert that Saddam didn’t have anything to do with the largest terror attack the world has ever seen. Sure I can see the scenario right now. Saddam has given training, money, and intelligence support to Al Queda and Bin Laden call’s him and says “Hey Saddam guess what SURPRISE we just killed 3,000 people, we attacked, the center of New York knocking down BOTH the World Trade Towers, the Pentagon and we also tried to kill the President but we didn’t want to tell you because it was all a big surprise, ha ha”. So after Saddam has been supporting Al Queda for conservatively a period of 3 years, more likely since the 1993 WTC bombing, as papers that were just found in Iraq suggest, you consider it likely that Al Queda would have launched the world’s biggest terror attack without letting their benefactor in on it. Sheesh I mean I’m one of your strongest supporters and that strains the credibility line even for me. Either there is a linkage and Saddam knew or there is no linkage and Saddam didn’t know. You cannot have it that an organization getting support from the Iraqi Secret Service would launch an operation absolutely guaranteed to direct violent attention to Iraq and not say a word to their benefactor.

Sure I guess that Saddam could have been training his Counter Terror Squad on that Airliner in Salmon Pak, no doubt all those defectors were lying, yea the Czechs are hallucinating about Atta and I’m sure that someone in their basement could have produced the weapons grade anthrax that was spread about this country. But if all that is true then you had no reason to invade Iraq, because if there was no linkage between Al Queda and Saddam there was nothing to fear. This is the corner you are in and its all because you weren’t willing to stand up to the chattering classes and say that contrary to their most cherished beliefs we simply did not know for certain whether Saddam had anything to do with 9/11 or not, but that a lot of circumstantial evidence was pointing that way. This is exactly the truth and you did not state it.

The chattering classes are very happy that you have confirmed their most cherished belief that Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11 but you have swept the feet out from under your staunchest supporters. You may not realize this but your supporters are out in the wilderness arguing your case before their peers. We are helping you save all of us. But the statements by you and Sec. of Defense Rumsfeld have done incalculable damage to our arguments. It is simply not sensible that there is no linkage between Saddam and 9/11 if there is a linkage between Saddam and Al Queda. Furthermore it strains credibility to imagine that Saddam would lend his most fearsome weapons to those that don’t trust him enough to allow him to help them on the biggest blow against our country that anyone has struck since 1812. And without the possibility of his lending his weapons to the Al Queda there was no reason for the war.

Please do not go wobbly on me.

Respectfully,

Pierre P. Legrand