False.
Al Qaeda DID exist in Iraq prior to our removal of that fucking murderous prick, Hussein.
Did ol' Saddam have a trusting relationship with al qaeda? Clearly, no.
But that is not the same thing as al qaeda not existing in Iraq before we got Saddam the fuck out.
Right ...
A perfect example of them being AFRAID of Saddam and not of the US because we will spank them and put them up in hotels rather than give them what they deserve.
al-Qaeda had a minor presence in Iraq before the war, became much larger during the war as they exploited the chaos wrought by the American invasion, then became almost irrelevant after the population became sickened by their terrorizing and killing the civilian population and the American commanders convinced local militias to turn on them.
by convinced you mean armed and paid off. which will come back to bite us bad in the future as does all our of short term thinking