I also saw this letter to the editor of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel (the major newspaper for the Fort Lauderdale area) which I found remarkably close to my own views:

quote:
South Florida Sun-Sentinel, editorial page, Sunday, October 5, 2003, page 4-J:

BIG STORY WASN'T BUSH'S ADMISSION

A letter writer [in a previous editorial page] complained that the story in which President Bush acknowledged that there was no proof that Saddam Hussein was behind the September 11th attacks should have been on the front page.
Actually, that story was not big news because the administration never claimed such a connection in the first place.
Although there is no evidence that Saddam Hussein was directly involved in the planning of September 11th, there is considerable evidence of links between him, al Qaida, and Iraqi training camps for terrorists.

The Bushg critics are apparently unaware that in a May 7 ruling on a lawsuit brought against Iraq by the families of September 11th victims, George Eric Smith and Timothy Soulas, Manhattan District Judge Harold Baer ruled there was proof Baghdad played a role in facilitating the attacks. He considered evidence that radical Islamists were trained to hijack U.S. airliners at Salman Pak, an Iraqi terrorist training camp.

Evidence has also been found that in Iraq connecting al Qaida and an Iraqi to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Documents have now been found in Iraq that show Saddam Hussein provided monthly payments and a home to that Iraqi, whose name is Abdul Rahman Yasin.

It is clear that the administration has taken a conservative path in not claiming a direct tie between Iraq and September 11th, even though there is clear circumstantial evidence of such ties.
It is also clear that Saddam Hussein has supported terrorism in Israel, which has resulted in the deaths of many Israelis, and some Americans.

Thankfully, we have a president with the courage to do what is needed to combat terrorism's threat, which should be identified as World War III.

The real story that should be on the front pages is the large amount of evidence of links between Iraq and al Qaida.

For some reason, the major media are concentrating only on the negative aspects of the fight against terrorism, and not against the many positive aspects of it.

RICHARD CROFT
Lake Worth, FL
That's not even mentioning Saddam Hussein's plot to assassinate George Bush Sr.
Or that one of the 9-11 terrorists met in Prague (Czech Republic) with a Saddam Hussein official, in the weeks prior to 9-11.

The terrorist training camp inside Saddam Hussein's Iraq, with a grounded aircraft for hijacking training, is something I mentioned in a previous Iraq topic.
And several who trained in that camp have given information to U.S. intelligence about their training in that camp.


And I previously posted a January 2003 article from the New York Times, about al Qaida hired as mercenaries in Northern Iraq by Hussein, to kill Kurdish resistance fighters.

As I said, considerable evidence of a connection between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaida, even if a 9-11 "smoking gun" connection cannot be found.