I know several people personally who would respond to the question 'Did Saddam have a hand in 9-11' with a a hearty 'You bet your ass he did.' So yes they exist, but I do not believe the view is widespread. I think however you would probably get a great deal of responses to the question 'Did Saddam have an indirect role in supporting the terrorists who carried out 9-11' Thats a very different question that would likely yield a larger sampling.

Nope, not a one.

(It's only tangentially related, but in the book Bush at War, it was mentioned that such connections can often take over a decade to find out about, and gave as an example something which happened before I was born.)

I doubt that he directly was, but I don't have any doubts that he would have given access to traning camps, etc. to those people who he knew were targeting Americans.

I doubt he planned it, or knew the details. Probably jsut that Al Qaeda was training for hijackings, that's all.

I'm confident that Hussein was behind the first WTC attack. Not that it was necessarily done under his orders, but that it was done with his full knowledge, support and cooperation. I have no trouble beleiving he was connected to 9/11 in the same way.

I'm not inclined to think that it was done at his order, per se, but I am not sure if that is what you are asking.

I don't know anyone who believes the statement you presented.

Last poll I saw, the plurality of respondents answered in the affirmative, something like 42-36. Large number of undecideds.

Dunno what it looks like now.

More interesting question: Do you think Bush believes it? Because, with a wink and a nod, he sends that message often. Most recently he said this from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln:

"With those attacks (of 9-11), the terrorists and their supporters declared war on the United States. And war is what they got."

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Yes, but then again one guy I known thinks that Saddam was the one who planned it and financed it and that OBL was just a useful patsy. He also thinks that we have missile killing laser satellites circling the earth and have since Reagan announced the "star wars" initiative. Faithful listener of Rush Limbaugh. Look there are crackpots on all sides.

Dean, I personally know a great number of people who believe that Saddam provided at the very least, material support for the 9/11 attackers, and a significant number who believe that his intel people may have assisted in the planning.

I do not know a single person who thinks or feels Saddam had a hand in the 9-11 attacks.

I know several people who believe Saddam had foreknowledge and possible provided material support and intelligence, and therefore bears complicity.

I don't know anybody who thinks he was directly involved in any planning, direction or orchestration of the event.

Nope. No one.

Fascinating responses.

As I say, I don't know anyone who believes it. Now, if you asked, do I believe he may have given material resources to people who wound up involved in those attacks, I'd say that's entirely possible. Or, did I believe if givena chance that he'd provide groups like Al Qaeda with money or weapons? Yes, I believe that to be highly likely.

I never cared much about the WMD issue, except that this was the obvious route to take in getting UN support for the attacks. Saddam was acting like he was hiding something, was clearly in defiance of his surrender conditions. That had to be the focus of the argument at the UN.

At home the focus was more on terrorism and the potential long-term threat if we didn't take care of the guy. No problem there too.

But then, I've always believed that cleaning up the Middle East is our real motivation, but that the administration can't say that out loud. I know a lot of people who believe that one.

I don't know, it's just that I hear a lot of people talking disparagingly about how Americans are stupid and believe Saddam was behind the 9/11 attacks. I've heard quite a few people say this. Yet I find it odd that I don't seem to know any such people. Looks like a few of you do, and a few of you don't.

I'd like to see a poll, depending on how the question is asked.

directly = no
indirectly = yes

I don't know anyone who thinks that. But, then, I know very few people who even supported invading Iraq.

There's a now-famous poll seeming to indicate that many Americans believed he was, often cited to support the thesis that Americans supported the war because Bush duped them into believing this.

Maybe he did somehow, though he never directly claimed this as far as I know-- there were many attempts to insinuate a more direct connection between Saddam and al Qaeda than seems to have actually existed (as far as we know).

But I think it says more about the power of leading questions in polls, and the fact that many people everywhere are pretty ignorant. Seems to me it's no stupider to say Saddam was behind Sept. 11 than to blame it on Bush or the Jews.

I'm not sure I know anyone who would say "Yes" to that question. However, I work in the news business, and so are most of the people with whom I talk about the war and Iraq, etc. That doesn't mean they're any more right or wrong... just that they're often more skeptical to these leaps on logic.

Personally, I doubt he was behind the attacks, but I don't have much doubt about the Saddam-al Qaida connection in general

I don't know anyone who thinks this. For the most part, though, the folks I know well enough to discuss such things with believe that he was supporting al Qaeda and could thus be held indirectly responsible. Well, except for the one guy who keeps sending me links to stories that claim we made it all up...

No one.

I'm pretty surprised that no one has brought up the Salman Pak installation. Never heard of it? It's a dusty camp just outside Bahgdad where Iraqi intelligence services trained non-Iraqi jihadis to comandeer aircraft with nothing but small knives, a tactic never seen before 9-11. Before anyone snorts and dismisses this fact, look into it, Googlewise. It is well established that Ramzi Yusef, one of the main architects of the WTC truck bombing was an Iraqi intelligence vet. Yes, I believe Sadam had a hand in it and many others do too. The big question to me is the resistance to this notion. Was he above such acts?

Does "I don't know, but if evidence of it turned up it wouldn't really surprise me" count as a yes?