Pentagon Tries to Squelch Report Showing No Link Between Iraq-Al QaedaDid you think that just because taxpayers funded a study that showed conclusively there was no operational link between Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and Al Qaeda that it would be released without a fuss? Well, this is the Bush administration we’re talking about here — a group who’ve shown themselves over the years to be masters at disappearing inconvenient information. It looks like we’ve got another addition to our ever-growing catalog.
The Bush Administration apparently does not want a U.S. military study that found no direct connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda to get any attention. This morning, the Pentagon cancelled plans to send out a press release announcing the report’s release and will no longer make the report available online.The report was to be posted on the Joint Forces Command website this afternoon, followed by a background briefing with the authors. No more. The report will be made available only to those who ask for it, and it will be sent via U.S. mail from Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia.
It won’t be emailed to reporters and it won’t be posted online.
I have to say, though, that this method of squelching leaves much to be desired. Maybe they’re losing their touch, but the way you squelch a report — as the Army showed with a 2005 RAND Corporation report that upbraided the administration for inadequately preparing for the postwar occupation — is to keep it really quiet. (Even better, as a cursory browse of our list will show, is to make sure the report never gets written at all.)
But McClatchy and ABC News have already published stories on the report’s findings. And ABC even has a link (pdf) to the report’s executive summary. And, really, some nosy reporter is just going to post a link to the entire report at some point if you’re mailing the darn thing out. So what gives? I expect more.