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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH
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To: sandintoes who wrote (663252)12/1/2004 6:55:40 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof  Read Replies (1) of 769670
 
"Saddam spent billions"

On WHAT?

Are you talking about the $25,000 rewards he sent to the families of dead Palestinian 'martyrs' in the fight against Israel? If *that* is what you are referring to, I'd like to point out two things:

1) That's NOT al Qaeda. (We are talking Hamas or Fatah, NOT al Qaeda.)
2) Saddam was mostly 'keeping up with the Joneses' vis-a-vie the Saudis. Since the Saudi Arabia Royals give $50,000 (AND STIL DO!) to each family of a dead Palestinian suicide bomber (killed in action against Israel), Saddam was mostly using this program of his (started *after* the Saudis started theirs!) as a PR exercise... in his endless struggle with the Saudis for 'leadership' of the Arab world, and popularity with the 'Arab street'.

[Not on al Qaeda, they didn't!]

"OH YA?"

Yeah.

He regarded al Qaeda as a rival, an enemy. On several occasions he had members of al Qaeda killed who attempted to operate in his backyard. The CIA has reported that Iraq officially *rejected* a proposal from bin Laden to cooperate.

Whereas NOW (since the removal of Saddam), al Qaeda operates in all of Iraq's provinces... and is pretty much free to cross the borders willy-nilly (with no worries about being captured, tortured and executed secretly by Saddam's security forces.)
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