John LeBoutillier
Thursday September 13, 2001

Back then the American - and Coalition - team was run by Bush, Cheney and Powell.

Today our government - again busily assembling a new Coalition - is comprised of Bush, Cheney and Powell.

Saddam Hussein has been laying in wait to get back at the USA for our overwhelming victory over him back in 1991.

Indeed, he may have hired Osama bin Laden - as was mentioned in an Inside Cover item yesterday - to carry out the actual operational details of this massive act of terrorism. But all intelligence experts now seem to agree that a only state intelligence service could have provided the logistics, the 'inside information' - including White House codes mentioned by "White House sources" in the press today - to run such an effective operation.

And Saddam certainly has the motive.

Let us remember a few things:

1) In the early 1980's - while Reagan was President and G.H.W. Bush was Vice President - we were allied with Saddam against the Iranians. We had a military alliance with Baghdad. We had very good and friendly relations with Saddam.

2) When Bush became President in 1989, his State Department dispatched a woman as Ambassador to a Muslim country - April Glaspie. (This in itself was a terrible mis-judgement.) Ms. Glaspie had a communications failure with Saddam on the fateful days leading up to the invasion of Kuwait. (She was subsequently recalled.)

3) The invasion caused Desert Shield and then Desert Storm. Iraq's military was destroyed - but its weapons of mass destruction research capabilities remained somewhat intact.

4) Bush, Powell and Cheney had their foot on Saddam's jugular - but they let him get off the ground and rebuild himself. This was a fatal error that led to this week's carnage in New York and at the Pentagon.

5) When Bush lost the election in 1992 Saddam was not finished with him. He tried to assassinate our former President by destroying a private jet that Bush was to use to fly to Kuwait to celebrate the anniversary of our victory.

6) The eight years of Clinton were wonderful, too, for Saddam because Clinton withdrew our UN inspectors and relaxed some sanctions. Clinton also 'looked the other way' as Saddam began selling oil again to accumulate cash to finance suicide missions like this week's.

7) The election last year of his nemesis' son - G.W. Bush - was the perfect way for Saddam to close the circle against his enemy - the Great Satan .

8) Saddam most likely hired Osama bin Laden - or partnered with him - and selected as targets the very symbols he most despises: the White House, the Pentagon, the Capitol and the World Trade Center - the symbol of financial stability and wealth, from which Saddam has been cut off by the first Bush's sanctions!

So Saddam ordered this diabolical plan.

Now comes the key question of all: is W. Bush going to be satisfied with pinning all the blame of Osama bin Laden? Or will he - and the very men who mistakenly allowed Saddam to survive 10 years ago - his father, Powell and Cheney - have the guts to admit their tragic error and now go get Saddam?

This is the key to this awful mess. This whole war is Saddam versus the Bushes. Will the Bush Team admit they made a mistake 10 years ago and now go correct it? Or will they once again let this son-of-a-bitch live to terrorize us again?