President Bush appeared in the Rose Garden Thursday with members of Congress who support him on Iraq and accused Iraqi President Saddam Hussein of essentially the same crime he charged the Taliban with: harboring al Qaeda terrorists.

"The regime has long-standing and continuing ties to terrorist organizations. And there are al Qaeda terrorists inside Iraq," he said.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said "Iraq and al Qaeda have discussed safe haven opportunities in Iraq, reciprocal nonaggression discussions."

And, he added, al Qaeda is looking for specific assistance from Baghdad.

"We have what we consider to be credible evidence that al Qaeda leaders have sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire weapons of mass destruction capabilities," Rumsfeld said.

A New Scenario

Up until now, the president has described that scenario - an Iraq-al Qaeda alliance where Baghdad provides biological or chemical weapons to terrorists - as only a "possibility."

But al Qaeda prisoners are talking, the administration says, and drawing a very different picture.

"In particular some high ranking detainees, have said that Iraq provided some training to al Qaeda in chemical weapons development. So, yes, there are contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda," said National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

Senior White House officials said the new intelligence information is a few weeks old, and emerged from interrogations of detainees last month. They said the reason they are making it public now is that it took that long to verify it to their satisfaction.

But some public officials are still doubtful.

On Wednesday, Vice President Dick Cheney and CIA director George Tenet briefed a group of senators. Thursday, one of those who attended said she was surprised by the administration's claims.

"Exactly how solid that evidence is, I'm not certain. Some of the evidence we have comes from interviews with detainees. And it's a little difficult to draw a pattern from some of the individual interviews that have been done," said Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican from Maine.

No Smoking Gun

A senior intelligence official told ABCNEWS that there is "no smoking gun - not even an unfired gun" when it comes to linking Iraq with al Qaeda, even though intelligence officials have been trying to find a strong connection between Saddam and al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden since Sept. 11.

Even after six months of searching, the CIA could see only contact, not cooperation.

In March 2002, Tenet said of Iraq and al Qaeda: "Their ties may be limited by divergent ideologies, but the two sides mutual antipathies toward the United States and the Saudi royal family suggests that tactical cooperation between them is possible."

At one point the Bush administration argued that Sept. 11 hijacker Mohamed Atta had met in Prague with an Iraqi intelligence agent. But the administration never found hard evidence and dropped the subject.

A Changed Trend

The suggestions of a connection between al Qaeda and Iraq re-emerged strongly this summer, when the administration began speaking publicly about "regime change" in Iraq.

In August, Rumsfeld told reporters: "If you're asking, are there al Qaeda in Iraq, the answer is yes, there are. It's a fact, yes." Intelligence officials do believe there are al Qaeda members in Northern Iraq, where Saddam is not in control. But Rumsfeld's assertion today that al Qaeda has recently operated in Baghdad is new.

Appearing on Capital Hill Thursday, Secretary of State Colin Powell said there is no visible link between Iraq and Sept. 11, but said it can't be dismissed.

(China Daily September 27, 2002)