Vito wrote:

"Marines found an old airline hulk and burned out buses. Since then,
not a
word. No mention in the 9/11 report."

EXCERPTS OF THE 9/11 COMMISSION REPORT

Bin Ladin was also willing to explore possibilities for
cooperation
with Iraq, even though Iraq's dictator, Saddam Hussein, had
never
had an Islamist agenda-save for his opportunistic pose as a
defender
of the faithful against "Crusaders" during the Gulf War of
1991.
Moreover, Bin Ladin had in fact been sponsoring anti-Saddam
Islamists in Iraqi Kurdistan, and sought to attract them into
his
Islamic army.53
To protect his own ties with Iraq, Turabi reportedly brokered
an
agreement that Bin Ladin would stop supporting activities
against
Saddam. Bin Ladin apparently honored this pledge, at least for
a
time, although he continued to aid a group of Islamist
extremists
operating in part of Iraq (Kurdistan) outside of Baghdad's
control.
In the late 1990s, these extremist groups suffered major
defeats by
Kurdish forces. In 2001, with Bin Ladin's help they re-formed
into
an organization called Ansar al Islam. There are indications
that by
then the Iraqi regime tolerated and may even have helped Ansar
al
Islam against the common Kurdish enemy.54
With the Sudanese regime acting as intermediary, Bin Ladin
himself
met with a senior Iraqi intelligence officer in Khartoum in
late
1994 or early 1995. Bin Ladin is said to have asked for space
to
establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring
weapons, but there is no evidence that Iraq responded to this
request.55 As described below, the ensuing years saw additional
efforts to establish connections.
Similar meetings between Iraqi officials and Bin Ladin or his
aides
may have occurred in 1999 during a period of some reported
strains
with the Taliban. According to the reporting, Iraqi officials
offered Bin Ladin a safe haven in Iraq. Bin Ladin declined,
apparently judging that his circumstances in Afghanistan
remained
more favorable than the Iraqi alternative. The reports describe
friendly contacts and indicate some common themes in both
sides'
hatred of the United States. But to date we have seen no
evidence ====NOTE
that these or the earlier contacts ever developed into a
collaborative operational relationship. Nor have we seen
evidence
indicating that Iraq cooperated with al Qaeda in developing or
carrying out any attacks against the United States.76