JAMES WOOLSEY WRITES in The New Republic that it’s entirely possible that Saddam is behind Osama bin Laden:

Does it not seem curious that bin Laden issues fatwas, pushes videotapes, quotes poems, and orders his followers to talk loudly and often about his role in attacks on us? Does someone want our focus to be solely on bin Laden’s hard-to-reach self, and not on a senior partner?

Compare Woolsey’s observation with this post from InstaPundit, September 17,2001:

When we discussed this in one of my classes, many students pointed out that the evidence pointing toward Osama bin Laden seemed almost too good, too pat. Boasts in bars the night before, IDs and literature left behind in hotel rooms, etc., etc. Of course, it could be possible that bin Laden is either stupid, or just doesn’t care whether we connect it to him. But consider these other two possibilities: (1) Somebody else is fingering him — perhaps as an involved-but-not-central “cut out” or as a complete bit of misdirection — so that we won’t look past him to the real mastermind; or (2) this is disinformation being fed to the media by our own government to put the real culprits (Iraq or whoever) off guard. Keep your eye on this one.

I think there’s little doubt now that Osama was involved. But that doesn’t mean that he was the sole, or even the prime, mover, and there’s plenty of reason to suspect that he’s not.

UPDATE: From the I’m-an-idiot department. I found this via Lileks, and didn’t notice that the Woolsey piece is from last year, before mine.

The analysis still holds, though.