Iraq & al-Qaeda

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Shahab, the imprisoned mercenary, claimed that in 1999 Iraqi officials paid him to smuggle several dozen liquid-filled refrigerator canisters into Afghanistan for the Taliban. Did they contain chemical agents or bio germs? Shahab does not know, and U.S. intelligence has been unable to confirm the report. Officials question whether the idea makes sense. Documents recovered in Afghanistan show al-Qaeda had its own blueprints for cooking up chemical weapons.

The hard-liners seem to think that by repeating this kind of unsubstantiated speculation, they can force Bush to stick to his vow to take on Saddam--even though, as White House aides insisted last week, he still does not have a plan for doing so. "Some people are, by design, trying to put him into a corner on this," says an official who works on Iraq policy. "They're arguing that if we don't attack, Saddam will win yet again because of the harm that will do to American credibility."

It's only prudent for U.S. intelligence to track any hint that Saddam may try to enlist a terrorist network in his battle against America. But the hawks are doing damage to their own cause by trumpeting unproved allegations of Saddam's links to bin Laden that could undermine more substantial reasons for taking down a dangerous dictator. The al-Qaeda connection looks too tenuous now to justify war with Iraq. If the President is truly concerned about preserving American credibility, he needs to do a more persuasive job explaining why another war against Iraq is worth the effort.

--Reported by Mark Thompson, Karen Tumulty and Douglas Waller/Washington and Andrew Purvis/Suleimaniya