“Following the al-Qa’ida attacks in Riyadh [Saudi Arabia] in May 2003, the Saudis captured several top al-Qa’ida leaders responsible for planning the assaults. Arrested along with them was Shaykh Nasir bin Hamid al-Fahd [who had declared the fatwa allowing al-Qa’ida to use weapons of mass destruction against infidels]. After about six months in custody [November […]
11/14/2003
“Senator Chuck Hagel [NE], the second-ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, declared in frustration in November [14] 2003, ‘We so underestimated and underplanned and underthought about a post-Saddam Iraq that we’ve been woefully unprepared. Now we have a security problem. We have a reality problem. And we have a governance problem. …And time is […]
11/12/2003
On November 12, 2003, “a CIA report leaked to the press stated that a growing number of Iraqis, confident that the United States could be defeated and driven out of the country, were joining the insurgency.” – Larry Diamond, Squandered Victory, Page 26 […]
11/11/2003
“A new, top-secret CIA report from Iraq warns that growing numbers of Iraqis are concluding that the U.S.-led coalition can be defeated and are supporting the resistance. The report paints a bleak picture of the political and security situation in Iraq and cautions that the U.S.-led drive to rebuild the country as a democracy could […]
11/11/2003
Regarding a briefing to top Bush Administration officials by the CIA’s Iraq analysts on November 11, 2003, Iraq mission manager Robert Grenier said: ” ‘We were trying to convey that this was a full-blown insurgency. I kept saying that it was sort of the functional equivalent of civil war.’ Grenier says the mood of the […]
11/11/2003
In a luncheon speech on November 11, 2003, President Bush said: ” ‘The will and resolve of America are being tested in Afghanistan and in Iraq. We are not only containing the terrorist threat, we are turning it back.’ ” – Bob Woodward, State of Denial, Page 265 […]
11/10/2003
“On November 10 [2003], [Director of the Coalition Provisional Authority L. Paul] Bremer wrote a letter to [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld, copied to [National Security Advisor] Condi Rice and [Secretary of State] Colin Powell: ‘Based on my conversations with the Governing Council last week, I have concluded the time has come to readjust our […]
11/8/2003
In Iraq, “On November 8 [2003], the Red Cross announced that it would close its Baghdad and Basra offices because of the increasing violence.” – Larry Diamond, Squandered Victory, Page 13 […]
11/8/2003
Author Peter Lance developed a source on the 9/11 Commission staff. According to an interview on November 8, 2003: “The source insisted that evidence [of the 9/11 plot] was being ‘cherry-picked’ in order to fit the limited story the commission staff was prepared to tell. It was a story that left no room for [World […]
11/7/2003
” ‘Iraqi democracy will succeed,’ he [President Bush] declared in a November [7] 2003 speech to the National Endowment of Democracy, ‘and that success will send forth the news, from Damascus [Syria] to Tehran [Iran]–that freedom can be the future of every nation. The establishment of a free Iraq at the heart of the Middle […]