Let’s Talk Terrorist Links:

There is a new article by Stephen Hayes in the Weekly Standard that could help quash the now oft cited “fact” that there was no link between Saddam Hussein and terrorists. Hayes says Bush Administration critics have based their claim on outdated and flawed Defense Intelligence Agency analyses. He chastises the Administration for not setting the record straight by releasing a collection of two million “exploitable items” captured in postwar Iraq and Afghanistan. “Nearly three years after the US invasion of Iraq, only 50,000 of these two million ‘exploitable items’ have been thoroughly examined,” writes Hayes. At this rate, former DIA official Michael Tanji, tells Hayes, “Our great-grandchildren will still be sorting through this stuff.” In a turnabout, Hayes says that Donald Rumsfeld now is pressing for release of the documents. Sources told Hayes that one of the chief opponents to their release was Rumsfeld’s close aide and now Defense Undersecretary for Intelligence Stephen Cambone.