Bill Delahunt: “can I interrupt, because I think that is very important because that has been an assertion that I think is extremely…”

“can I interrupt, because I think that is very important because that has been an assertion that I think is extremely misleading to the American people. My colleague referenced the no fly zone; yet I imagine that there are many of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle and a number of Americans that are watching this conversation tonight that we are having and if you hear it without understanding some of the nuances, you hear al Qaeda was in Iraq, but as that famous radio commentator, I think his name was Paul Harvey, said, there is another half of that story. Yes, there was a group that had some nebulous link to al Qaeda, and they were in Iraq; but they were not in Iraq in the part that Saddam Hussein had sway over. They were not in the part of Iraq where Saddam Hussein had influence. They were not in the part of Iraq that Saddam Hussein had any control. They were in the part of Iraq, as my colleague mentioned, in the so-called Kurdish area up in these mountains. There was a group of some 200 or 300, and they were not directly linked to al Qaeda; but, yes, they were a terrorist group and one that we should not in any way countenance. They were a threat, if you will, to people of goodwill all over this world; but they were not a part or had any relationship, collaborative or otherwise, with Saddam Hussein.”