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http://www.madcowprod.com/index21.html
Mohamed Atta had connections with the Saudi Royal Family
That's established.
I'll assume Safire is pretty high up on the Armageddon
Cheerleaders list.
Mr. Atta Goes to Prague
May 9, 2002
By WILLIAM SAFIRE
WASHINGTON - In pro football, an adept offensive lineman
tricks his opponent in what is called a "misdirection
play." He blocks his man toward the center; as the defender
pushes back hard, the misdirecting lineman gives way,
seemingly overcome by the counter-charge - as his running
back scoots through the hole near the center left by the
defender.
A misdirection play is under way in the C.I.A.'s all-out
attempt to discredit an account of a suspicious meeting in
Prague a year ago. Mohamed Atta, destined to be the leading
Sept. 11 suicide hijacker, was reported last fall by Czech
intelligence to have met at least once with Saddam
Hussein's espionage chief in the Iraqi Embassy - Ahmed
al-Ani, a spymaster whom the Czechs were keeping under
tight surveillance.
If the report proves accurate, a connection would exist
between Al Qaeda's murder of 3,000 Americans and Iraq's
Saddam. That would clearly be a casus belli, calling for
our immediate military response, separate from the need to
stop a demonstrated mass killer from acquiring nuclear and
germ weapons. Accordingly, high C.I.A. and Justice
officials - worried about exposure of the agency's
inability to conduct covert operations - desperately want
Atta's Saddam connection to be disbelieved.
They are telling favored journalists: Shoot this
troublesome story down. In March, a Washington Post
columnist obliged with: "hard intelligence to support the
Baghdad-bin Laden connection is somewhere between `slim'
and `none.' " In April, Newsweek headlined: "A spy story
tying Saddam to 9-11 is looking very flimsy," and its
Michael Isikoff wrote: "the much touted `Prague connection'
appears to be an intriguing, but embarrassing, mistake."
Everybody jumped aboard the C.I.A. bandwagon. The
Washington Post's Walter Pincus followed up with a "senior
administration official's finding that eliminates a
once-suggested link between the terrorist attacks and the
government of President Saddam Hussein." Time magazine this
week labels the Czech report about Atta "discredited."
The C.I.A.-Justice misdirection is masterly; even White
House staff members have bought the Tenet-Chertoff line
about "serious doubts." The New York Times reported all too
accurately that "a senior Bush administration official
appeared to close the matter, saying F.B.I. and C.I.A.
analysts had firmly concluded that no meeting had
occurred."
Notice how this parade of pooh-poohing never has an
official's name attached to it. Rarely do you see such
skillful manipulation by anonymous sources whose policy
agenda is never revealed to readers.
I carry around a clipping of Atta's movements reported in
The Times of Oct. 26, 2001, attributed to federal law
enforcement officials: "On April 2 he was in Virginia
Beach. He flew to the Czech Republic on April 8 . . . by
April 11, Mr. Atta was back in Florida, renting a car."
Unreported (except on www.edwardjayepstein.com, the Web
site of my unfazed Angletonian friend) is this week's
response to the hidden policy-driven doubters by the Czech
interior minister, Stanislav Gross: "I believe the
counterintelligence services more than journalists." Did
his agents have new information that would cast doubt on
the Atta meeting they reported with Saddam's paymaster and
controller of agents in Prague? He checked with Jeri Ruzek,
his intelligence chief: "The answer was they did not.
Therefore, I consider the matter closed."
Whom do you believe - a responsible official on the scene
speaking on the record, with no ax to grind, or U.S. spooks
who may be covering up a missed signal from Prague about
Sept. 11 and are also fearful of revealing their weakness
in Iraq?
Hard-liners can play this background game, too. A "senior
Bush administration official" not in the protect-Saddam
cabal tells me: "You cannot say the Czech report about a
meeting in 2001 between Atta and the Iraqi is discredited
or disproven in any way. The Czechs stand by it and we're
still in the process of pursuing it and sorting out the
timing and venue. There's no doubt Atta was in Prague in
2000, and a subsequent meeting is at least plausible."
Someday, after Baghdad interrogations and tell-all memoirs,
we'll learn the truth about any Saddam connection with Al
Qaeda. In the meantime, why won't responsible officials
take public stands? In the C.I.A.'s misdirection play,
which way is the running back headed?
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/09/opinion/09SAFI.html?ex=1021990541&ei=1&en=bc16d728f2a6017a
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