More evidence that one of our “partners” in the “war on terror” has had a nice side business going on:

“Inquiry Suggests Pakistanis Sold Nuclear Secrets”
A lengthy investigation of the father of Pakistan’s atomic bomb, Abdul Qadeer Khan, by American and European intelligence agencies and international nuclear inspectors has forced Pakistani officials to question his aides and openly confront evidence that the country was the source of crucial technology to enrich uranium for Iran, North Korea and possibly other nations.

Oh, and Pakistan has also been a refuge for a number of al Qaeda players, perhaps including bin Laden.
But it’s non-nuclear Iraq that’s the central front in the “war on terror” and poses the greatest danger to the U.S., right?

“We Got Him: Kurds Say They Caught Saddam“

The Western media in Baghdad were electrified by the Iranian agency’s revelation, but as reports of the arrest built, they relied almost exclusively on accounts from US military and intelligence organisations, starting with the words of the US-appointed administrator of Iraq, Paul Bremer: “Ladies and gentlemen: we got ‘im”.
. . .
Little attention was paid to a line in Pentagon briefings that some of the Kurdish militia might have been in on what was described as a “joint operation”; or to a statement by Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraq National Congress, which said that Qusrat and his PUK forces had provided vital information and more.

I link; you decide. There’s certainly a lot of smoke here, though.

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• “Democrats Declare Nader Enemy Combatant.”

• Google fun.

Merry Christmas:

The United States raised its terror threat level from yellow (elevated) to orange (high) on Sunday, citing a “substantial increase” in intelligence pointing to threats during the holidays season that are “perhaps greater now than at any point” since 9/11.

Let’s hope the color coordinators need not raise it to red to match the season.
Are you Ready?

More reporting suggesting the capture of Saddam Hussein wasn’t what it was made out to be:

Saddam Hussein was captured by US troops only after he had been taken prisoner by Kurdish forces, drugged and abandoned ready for American soldiers to recover him, a British tabloid newspaper has reported.
Saddam came into the hands of the Kurdish Patriotic Front after being betrayed to the group by a member of the al-Jabour tribe, whose daughter had been raped by Saddam’s son Uday, leading to a blood feud, reported the Sunday Express, which quoted an unnamed senior British military intelligence officer.
The newspaper said the full story of events leading up to the ousted Iraqi president’s capture on December 13 near his hometown of Tikrit in northern Iraq, “exposes the version peddled by American spin doctors as incomplete”.
A former Iraqi intelligence officer, whom the Express did not name, told the paper that Saddam was held prisoner by a leader of the Kurdish Patriotic Front, which fought alongside US forces during the Iraq war, until he negotiated a deal.
The deal apparently involved the group gaining political advantage in the region.
An unnamed Western intelligence source in the Middle East told the Express: “Saddam was not captured as a result of any American or British intelligence. We knew that someone would eventually take their revenge, it was just a matter of time.”

You’d think the Jessica Lynch saga, among others, would teach the media to be a little more critical in its reporting and not simply run with the U.S. military version of events. But I suppose that’s the easiest thing to do. And it makes for the best flag-waving coverage.
UPDATE: Scotland’s Sunday Herald has a much more detailed account.
At this point, I’m not sure what happened. But I have plenty of reasons to be skeptical of accepting the government account at face value.