Saddam Hussein's campaign advice to Chirac

It hardly sounds like an inducement, but The Telegraph (UK) reports today on a rather puzzling offer made to the Elysee.

Thanks to Steve Piranha, man of mystery, for alerting ¡No Pasaràn! to this comic pearl. It says a few things - Chirac DOES have some common sense, or at least some political sense, and knows when a blackmailer is trying to work him, but it also tells one just how high and how close the conversation went. Realize that we're talking about 2002 - a decade after the Gulf war. Sadaam is still in the U.N. doghouse, and theoretically out of the good graces of anyone in the west. (shxfptfff!!!!)

«Saddam Hussein's spies planned a wide-ranging scheme to bribe members of the French political elite in the run-up to the Anglo-American invasion, including an offer to help fund President Jacques Chirac's 2002 re-election campaign.

That bid failed, according to Iraqi secret service papers seen by The Daily Telegraph, when Mr Chirac's aides allegedly said they did not need the cash.»

Hey, why not make some new friends who can embarass an entire government or maybe even a political class! There are people who have tin-foil in their hats and sleep under wire-frame pyramids who think that there are Yermulka wearing mites crawling around in Bush's head, right?

«Saddam Hussein's spies planned a wide-ranging scheme to bribe members of the French political elite in the run-up to the Anglo-American invasion, including an offer to help fund President Jacques Chirac's 2002 re-election campaign.

That bid failed, according to Iraqi secret service papers seen by The Daily Telegraph, when Mr Chirac's aides allegedly said they did not need the cash.»

Cheap, predictable, and very basic intelligence work. The only problem is that it actually works most of the time. Thank heavens it only went as far as it did.