For those who believe Saddam's Iraq had no connection to terrorism, it would behoove you to look a little deeper at the issue. Saddam had well known and well documented connections to terrorists:

There was a state-sanctioned terrorist training center at Salman Pak.

The Fedayeen Saddam was a domestic force that can be arguably called a terrorist organization for the tactics they employed. They were entirely above the law and they were used to control the population by fear (and now involved in the insurgency).

Saddam's Iraq sheltered Abu Abbas and his terrorist organization the Palestine Liberation Front, which hijacked the ship Achille Lauro and murdered US citizen Leon Klinghoffer (who was disabled and in a wheel-chair, making it all that much more horrifying and cowardly).

Also sheltered were Abu Nidal and his group, the Abu Nidal Organization, which killed over 900 people in 20 different countries, including the US.

The Mujahedin-e-Khalq Organization, which directed terrorist violence against Iran and the US, was yet another terrorist organization that was sheltered by Saddam's regime. All the above organizations received financial aid from and training from the government of Iraq.

Iraqi Intelligence Service attempted to assassinate former President Bush and the Emir of Kuwait in 1993, an attempted act driven by no tactical or strategic consideration, merely a lust for revenge. In fact, the IIS had an organized assassination squad that had at least 66 successful operations between 1998 and 2000.

Saddam encouraged terrorism by paying $25,000 to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.

In his Tech Central Station article, author Richard Miniter describes the extensive links between the Iraqi Intelligence Service and al Qaeda. It has also been reported that President Clinton had linked al Qaeda and Iraq. Unfortunately, any time evidence of links are raised, it gets spun or glossed over by the opponents of the war in Iraq.

That last paragraph will no doubt raise objections that the 9/11 commission found no link between Saddam and the September 11th attack. This, in and of itself, is a true enough statement but it glosses over the large amount of evidence that they had a cooperative relationship. For Saddam, terrorism was just an extension of foreign policy and we are safer with him out of power. Those who argue otherwise are, sad to say, either misinformed or not being honest with themselves.