The report explained that, while the Bush administration was trying to convince the world that Saddam Hussein was connected to al-Qaeda, therefore responsible for the bombings on September 11, U.S. Intelligence analysts were disputing those links.

The report explained that, while the Bush administration was trying to convince the world that Saddam Hussein was connected to al-Qaeda, therefore responsible for the bombings on September 11, U.S. Intelligence analysts were disputing those links.

The Washington Post reported that, “Far from aligning himself with al-Qaeda and Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Hussein repeatedly rebuffed al-Qaeda’s overtures and tried to capture Zarqawi.”

The report also stated that Tariq Aziz, the detained former Deputy Prime Minister, has told the FBI that Hussein “only expressed negative sentiments about [Osama] bin Laden.”

After the report was released, The Washington Post reported that senior Senate Democrats immediately seized on the findings, using some of their strongest language yet to say the President continues to willfully and falsely connect Saddam Hussein to al-Qaeda. The Post also reported that as recently as Aug. 21, Pres. Bush suggested a link between Mr. Hussein and the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed by U.S. forces this summer.

But according to the Senate report, a CIA assessment in Oct. 2005 concluded that Mr. Hussein’s government “did not have a relationship, harbor, or turn a blind eye toward Zarqawi and his associates.”

According to the report, the government accepted as gospel information from paid informants that were exiles from the Iraqi National Congress (INC). These informants, according to the Post, tried to influence U.S. foreign policy by providing, through defectors, false information on Iraq’s nuclear, chemical and biological weapons capabilities.

After skeptical analysts warned that the group had been penetrated by hostile intelligence services, a 2002 White House directive ordered that U.S. funding for the INC be continued, the newspaper further informed.

In his first letter to Pres. Bush, dated December 1, 2001 Minister Farrakhan warned that the President was blind in his relentless pursuit of Saddam Hussein and followed the destructive history of presidents before him.

“I am writing this to show a consistent pattern of behavior of America’s presidents, administrations, and the press with respect to those Muslim leaders and other leaders that America has chosen to denounce as rogues, and to use as a justification for military action to cover their real purposes.”

He continued, “Mr. President, you have now inherited that which Presidents Reagan, Carter, your father and President Clinton were not able to complete. What I have been shown is that you have decided to fulfill their unrealized expectations.”

In that letter, Minister Farrakhan offered this advice to the President: “There is no need for a clash of civilizations. The Muslim World has much to learn from the West and the West has much to learn from the Religion of Islam. Creating the climate for dialogue will make a great future for America, and under her rule, a peaceful world can come into existence.”

With the ensuing occupation of Iraq fueling the boiling tension in the Middle East and its ripple effects throughout other nations, the world is only witnessing the beginning of the suffering consequences of Pres. Bush’s refusal to accept such sound caution.