Candidate Notes on 04-SIC10

04-SIC10 on May 8, 2004

IRAQI LINKS TO TERRORISM
• Conclusion 90. The CIA's assessment that Saddam Hussein was most likely to use his own intelligence service operatives to conduct attacks was reasonable, and turned out to be accurate.
• Conclusion 91. The CIA's assessment that Iraq had maintained ties to several secular Palestinian terrorist groups was supported by the intelligence. The CIA was also reasonable in judging that Iraq appeared to have been reaching out to more effective terrorist groups and might have intended to employ such surrogates in the event of war.
• Conclusion 92. The CIA's examination of contacts, training, safehaven and operational cooperation as indicators of a possible Iraq-al-Qaida relationship was a reasonable and objective approach to the question.
• Conclusion 93. The CIA reasonably assessed that there were likely several instances of contacts between Iraq and al-Qaida throughout the 1990s, but that these contacts did not add up to an established formal relationship.

Conclusion 94. The CIA reasonably and objectively assessed that the most problematic area of contact between Iraq and al-Qaida were the reports of training in the use of non-conventional weapons, specifically chemical and biological weapons.

Conclusion 95. The CIA's assessment on safehaven—that al-Qaida or associated operatives were present in Baghdad and in northeastern Iraq in an area under Kurdish control—was reasonable.

Conclusion 96. The CIA's assessment that to date there was no evidence proving Iraqi complicity or assistance in an al-Qaida attack was reasonable and objective. No additional information has emerged to suggest otherwise.

Conclusion 97. The CIA's judgment that Saddam Hussein, if sufficiently desperate, might employ terrorists with a global reach—al-Qaida—to conduct terrorist attacks in the event of war, was reasonable. No information has emerged thus far to suggest that Saddam did try to employ al-Qaida in conducting terrorist attacks.