Rating: 
Summary: how could you be against the war
Review: all the reason to go to war are in here. i know some anti-war people read this book and still believe it wasnt enough to go to war. at the very least, this says that Hayes didn't go over board with his facts. he doesnt make baseless claims or concoct conspiracy theories. its 100 fact and still debatable. i personally believe that the case for war is overwhelming and that is despite not finding any WMD...and this book helps illustrate that.
Rating:
Summary: CASE CLOSED (10 stars out of 5!!!)
Review: Anyone who actually read this book would have no qualms about giving it five stars. I was a doubter. I opened this book believing that Saddam was bad but, as I had read daily in the New York Times and Boston Globe, had no real ties to al-Qaeda. How wrong that wisdom was.
Either U.S. Intelligence from the Clinton era was somehow in on the Bush conspiracy to invade in 2003 (time machine???), or Saddam and bin Laden worked together in more ways than one. The Clinton administration even shot missiles into Sudan based on the knowledge that Iraq was supplying chem weapons to al-Qaeda in 1998.
Anyone who doubts that Saddam Hussein was an imminent threat to U.S. security because of the combined combination of weapons of mass destruction and terrorism, a combination Powell called "lethal", is blinded by a liberal bias. 10 stars!
Rating:
Summary: Get your heads out of your asses.
Review: I give this book 5 stars to even out the ridiculous 1 star reviews given by the dimwits who obviously did not read the book. Don't listen to these people. Just look at the knee-jerk non substantive reviews. They have an allergic reaction to any form of justification to depose Saddam. They wallow in half-a** conspiracy theories spoon fed to them by the likes of moveon.org and other brainless lefties. I recently watched Stephen Hayes on the Jon Stewart show and witnessed some of the worst grandstanding and smothering of a guest. He let Hayes speak about 7% of the interview while 93% of the time was Stewart stuttering and regurgitating his true bias and showed the left allergic reaction I spoke about. He came off as the typical liberal drone with no points and just pointless blabber. In response to the complete fallacy that Saddam was "secular" and Bin Laden hated Saddam and therefore wouldnt cooperate: Why did Saddam have "God is Great" put on the Iraqi flag after the Gulf War, why was Saddam building the most expensive and largest mosques in the world in Iraq, people haven't been paying attention to Saddam's speeches int he last decade where he references the Koran and spoke highly of Jihadists as well as showing Saddam pray daily on Iraqi TV. Obviously Saddam was appeasing the Jihadists and it worked bc it was proven TRUE that Bin Laden reached out to Iraq for training camps (Salman Pak) and Chem/bio intel and equipment (Sudan). Face it, people who never read the book and write reviews, you know nothing about this topic and choose your poltical viewpoints over common sense. Iraq and Al Queda were connected and have made efforts to collaborate which where confirmed by even Clinton admin and the 9/11 commission. However, did they collaborate in an attack against the United States? We will soon find out. Saddam supports terrorism, plain and simple and where he lacks on conventional means of war against the U.S., he sure as hell makes up for unconventional means as in WMD and the equipment to make it as well as terrorist ties INCLUDING AL QUAEDA. This war is justified in every way, like or not. Seriously, its time for people to get their heads out of their asses. READ THE BOOK without your political blinders.
Rating: 
Summary: read imperial hubris, then, tell me about the connection.
Review: I would like all of these reviewers, who believe the trash in this book to read one by someone, a 22 year veteran of the CIA, who makes George W. Bush look more left than John Kerry (supposedly) is. This person refutes, most vociferously, the connection; which, if any, was minor, between Saddam and Osama.
Osama considers Saddam as much the "infidel", as a secular Middle Easterner, who's abandoned Islam, or uses it as a manner of convenience. See also the Iraq War by John Keegan. [The latter gives a pretty good overview of Iraqi history.]
Rating:
Summary: A Book That's Cruicial for Understanding the Iraq War
Review: In order to understand why the removal of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq was an integral part of the War on Terror, people should read Stephen Hayes' book.
The Bush Administration made a very compelling case against Hussein which was comprised on three justifications: weapons of mass destruction (which all the world's intelligence agencies presumed were there), human rights violations, and links to terrorist networks. This book discusses the latter in great detail.
Stephen Hayes argues what the establishment media has long denied, namely the links between Saddam Hussein's Iraq, and Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda. His findings DO NOT contradict the bipartisan 9/11 Commission report which did, in fact, conclude that there was a series of high-level contacts between officials from the Ba'athist regime, and Al Qaeda (including bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri).
Most of the information in Hayes' book comes from credible sources, corroborated by many intelligence agencies and human operatives. The Bush Administration's unwillingness to continue to stress the links between Iraq and Al Qaeda is ill advised, and it does so at its peril. A three-legged stool is more stable than a one-legged one. It would be in the Administration's best interest, with the election fast approaching, to embellish upon the Iraq-Al Qaeda connection.
The Bush Administration NEVER claimed to have irrefutable evidence of Iraqi complicity with the 9/11 attacks. NEVER. However, it presented compelling evidence of Iraqi support for Al Qaeda, and Palestinian terrorism, when it made its case for war against Iraq. Hayes goes even further, discussing not only the links between Iraq and Al Qaeda, but providing the reader with very tantalizing evidence (not incontrovertible evidence, but evidence nonetheless) implicating Saddam Hussein with the September 11th attacks.
Stephen Hayes does the American people a great service by writing about this critical issue in the highly politicized election year. He cogently argues why overthrowing Saddam Hussein was not a diversion from the War on Terror, as Democratic Sen. John Kerry contends (let's see how long THIS position lasts), but an integral component of this struggle. It is required reading for all those interested about Iraq, who have an open mind. After reading this book, the reader will understand, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that President George W. Bush was right to remove the most tyrannical regime in Middle Eastern history.
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Summary: The Connection : How al Qaeda's Collaboration with Saddam Hu
Review: In The Connection, Stephen Hayes draws on CIA debriefings, top-secret memos from our national intelligence agencies, and interviews with Iraqi military leaders and Washington insiders to demonstrate that Saddam and bin Laden not only could work together, they did - a curious relationship that stretches back more than a decade and may include collaboration on terrorist acts, chemical-weapons training, and sheltering some of the world's most wanted radicals." "Stephen Hayes's bombshell Weekly Standard piece on this topic was cited by Vice President Cheney as the "best source of information" about the Saddam-al Qaeda connections. Now Hayes delves even deeper, exposing the inner workings of America's deadliest opponents and providing a corrective to reams of underreported, politicized, and just plain wrong information
Rating:
Summary: A matter of life and death
Review: It is absolutely mystifying and maddening that the Democratic party leadership steadfastly refuses to admit the many connections between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein, and the fact that Hussein was a key part of the global terror nexus. Both the 9/11 Commission and the Senate Intelligence reports--and many other non-partisan, objective intelligence reports--have concluded that there were defintely connections. They did NOT conclude that there was or was not a definitive connection between Saddam and 9/11--they just said they could not prove one. The failure of Liberals in politics and in the media to draw a distinction and to note the true connections that did exist is worse than naive...it is bordering on treasonous. Let me put it in terms that even a Liberal should be able to understand: just because we cannot prove that Saddam Hussein participated in planning or executing the 9/11 attacks does NOT mean that he did not support al-Qaeda and other like-minded terror organizations. Hayes' book is a damning document against Liberal naivte that is must reading for any American concerned about our national security and the true nature of the global war on terror. Understanding these connections, rather than denying them, is a matter of life and death. For the person who has read this book, and understands the connections, the present line of argument by John Kerry & Co. is horrifying and infuriating.
Rating: 
Summary: The connection is there
Review: Mr Hayes does a good job of showing the connections between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. Most of the evidence is in plain sight in the reporting of the US media. Up until George Bush was elected president, all of the mainstream news media was certain of the connection and reported on it in story after story. Mr Hayes dredges up many of these stories, which are often in direct conflict with what the same people are saying now.There is also ample evidence from former regime memebers, foriegn intelligence services, interrogated captives and former US government sources. Saddam and Osama were clearly cooperative and Saddam almost certainly provided funds and state support (passports and other documents) to assist the cause. The evidence may be mostly circumstantial, but when the same connections, the same circumstances, show up over and over and over, the pattern becomes pretty clear. The book also makes it abundantly clear that Saddam was deeply committed to terrorism as a tool of state. The Iraqi intelligence service was mixed up in bombings and kidnappings all over the world, including many that were prevented ahead of time by various intelligence services. While the Iraqi's were diligent, they were often incompetent, as in the case of a bomb planted in the garden of a US embassy (26 sticks of dynamite!) that failed to go off because the battery in the timer was dead. In another case, Saddam sent out dozens of pairs of agents, one political and one technical, to seek targets of opportunity against the US around the world. Fortunately for the US, all of them had passports numbered sequentially and when the first pair was caught and the sequence noted, the others picked up, two by two, all over the world. Your prejudices will lead you to believe or not believe the Osama connection, but you can't read this book and fail to realize that Saddam presented a deadly and ongoing threat to US interests all over the world, al Qaeda or no.
Rating:
Summary: OBVIOUS TO ALL EXCEPT HALF WITS
Review: Mr. Hayes has done a phenomenal job of true, honest investigative journalism. In this extremely timely book, which completely and irrevocably debunks the distortions of the mainstream anti-Bush/Left wing press (i.e., NY Times, LA Times, Wash Post, BBC, CNN, Reuters, etc), Hayes proves with near certainty that Sadaams regime was working with international terrorists, and probably had some involvement not only in the 9-11 attacks, but also in the 1993 trade center bombing. Yes, there were ties between the al Qaeda network and Sadaam's regime, particularly his highly covert, highly secretive intelligence agency, the Mukhabarat. Whiny, simpering liberals like those posting on this review make the absurd claim that Hayes cannot claim that there were links in the absence of direct, smoking gun style evidence. Pal, you ain't going to find it. Sadaam was crazy but he wasn't stupid. Now go back to watching Romper Room and let the big boys discuss world affairs. Hayes demonstrates that not only was Muhammed Atta meeting with an Iraqi intelligence agent on at least two occasions in the months leading up to 9-11, but this was recently CONFIRMED by Czech police search of the Iraqi embassy in Prague. The FIVE Czech officials have NEVER backed down from their claims. This has NOT been debunked, contrary to what the naive and silly on the left would claim. Further, Hayes shows that a member of Sadaams Fedayeen was assisting TWO MORE of the 9-11 hijackers shortly before the attacks in Koala Lumpur- Al Midhar and Al Hamzi. Alot of the evidence is murky. It isnt "smoking gun" (that exists only on McGyver and in the mushy brains of people who are going to vote for Kerry). But when there is enough smoke, there is probably fire. Ignore at your own risk.
Rating:
Summary: Rummy says Hayes is wrong!
Review: Now that Donald Rumsfeld has admitted that he has never seen any strong evidence linking Saddam Hussein with Al Qa'ida, perhaps Mr Hayes will acknowledge that it was always a lie. Anyway, why would a secular ruler like Saddam trust Al Qa'ida, who see him as a traitor to Islam? Why would Saddam risk everything, to give WMD (which he hadn't got) to his mortal enemies? Al Qa'ida attacked the USA; Saddam never did. So the right US response was to counter-attack against Al Qa'ida. They should have put ground troops into the areas of Afghanistan where bin Laden and his cronies were hiding, surrounded them and killed them. Instead of which, fool Bush attacked Iraq, where bin Laden wasn't! Doh.
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