|
[Previous entry: "Everything is ultimately the Americans' fault"] [Main Index] [Next entry: "Modified URL"] 04 August 2004: "Much ado about nothing"
It is a continuing source of amazement to me that there is no shortage of people in the United States dedicated to keeping the "Wilson/Plame affair" on artificial life support. One of these people is Mary Jacoby of Salon, who recently wrote two articles relating to the subject, "Joseph Wilson vs. the right-wing conspiracy" (16-Jul-2004) and "The strange cases of the Berger memoranda and the Wilson mission" (22-Jul-2004). In the (unlikely) event that you're not familiar with the whole schemozzle, I'll start with a summary of the affair.
The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.These sixteen words became the subject of controversy when, on 06-Jul-2003, the New York Times ran an op-ed piece by former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV titled "What I didn't find in Africa". In this piece, Wilson stated he had travelled to Niger on behalf of the CIA in early 2002 to investigate reports that Iraq had purchased, or attempted to purchase uranium ore, and that he had come up empty-handed. In Wilson's own words (taken from his book The Politics of Truth, published last April, of which more later), In [the NYT piece], I stated that the Bush administration had been informed a year and a half earlier that their claims of Iraqi attempts to purchase uranium from Niger were false.This revelation kicked up quite a storm at the time, and sales of bumper sticker, posters, etc. bearing the legend "BUSH LIED!" soared. After much to-ing and fro-ing, George Tenet, the Director of Central Intelligence at the time, stated that the intelligence on which the statement had been based "did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for Presidential speeches." Assertions that president Bush misled, or even knowingly lied to, Congress flew thick and fast. Adding additional heat to the controversy was the publication on 14-Jul-2003 of a column by Robert Novak in which he asserted that "two senior administration officials" had told him that Wilson had been sent to Niger at the suggestion of his wife, Valerie Plame, who, Novak added, "is [a CIA] operative on weapons of mass destruction." Wilson responded by asserting that his wife's "outing" as a CIA operative was a retaliatory measure against him for criticising the administration. Various critics of the administration called for an investigation of the leak, citing the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982 which prohibits the disclosure of the identity of any "covert agent." They appear, however, to be blissfully unaware of the actual definitions of the Act (US Code Title 50, Section 426), which read: (4) The term "covert agent" means -As far as I can ascertain, Plame did not meet these requirements. Rather than a "covert agent," she was a "covered agent," i.e. her workplace was not at CIA headquarters in Langley, VA, and her status as a CIA employee was not a matter of public record. She did not, however, meet the requirements to qualify as a "covert operative" per the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982. Nevertheless, the CIA requested that the FBI look into whether a violation of the Act had been committed (and to arrest and prosecute those responible in the event that it had). In due course, a Department of Justice special prosecutor was appointed to the case. Please hold that thought, as I will return to it later. This is where things get convoluted. Tenet stated at the time that Wilson had met an unnamed former Nigerien* official who claimed that "in June 1999 a businessman approached him and insisted that the former official meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss 'expanding commercial relations' between Iraq and Niger. The former official interpreted the overture as an attempt to discuss uranium sales." Wilson confirmed this in his book The Politics of Truth: Inside the Lies that Led to War and Betrayed My Wife's CIA Identity, published last April, stating that "[the former official] hesitated and looked up to the sky as if plumbing the depths of his memory, then offered that perhaps the Iraqi might have wanted to talk about uranium." This implies that the former official met not only the businessman, but actually met a member of the Iraqi delegation as well. Furthermore, Wilson states that he was in touch with the former official last January, at which point the former offical told Wilson that the Iraqi in question had been none other than Mohammed Said al-Sahhaf, aka "Baghdad Bob," the Iraqi minister of information during Operation "Iraqi Freedom." Given that, according to the CIA World Factbook, Niger's primary exports are, in order of importance, "uranium ore, livestock, cowpeas, onions," and that the latter three are more readily available to Iraq from other sources (Niger is landlocked), it's no stretch of the imagination that the Iraqi delegation was, indeed, interested primarily in purchasing uranium ore. The Senate Intelligence Committee's "Report on the U.S. intelligence community's prewar intelligence assessments on Iraq reflected a CIA report based on the debriefing of Wilson upon his return from Niger. Page 43 has the goods: The intelligence report [based on Wilson's debriefing] indicated that former Nigerien Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki was unaware of any contracts that had been signed between Niger and any rogue states for the sale of yellowcake while he was Prime Minister (1997-1999) or foreign Minister (1996-1997). Mayaki said that if there had been any such contract during his tenure, he would have been aware of it. Mayaki said, however, that in June 1999, [redacted] businessman, approached him and insisted that Mayaki meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss "expanding commercial relations" between Niger and Iraq. The intelligence report said that Mayaki interpreted "expanding commercial relations" to mean that the delegation wanted to discuss uranium yellowcake sales. The intelligence report also said that "although the meeting took place, Mayaki let the matter drop due to the UN sanctions on Iraq.Comparing the various versions, the most straighforward conclusion is that the "former official" to whom Wilson spoke in 2002 was Mr. Mayaki. Moreover, the composite picture suggests that Mayaki told Wilson (NB in 2002) that he, Mayaki, had indeed been approached by the Iraqi government, most likely with an eye to purchasing uranium ore. It would appear, then, that the specific claim made in the 2003 State of the Union address—that Iraq had sought uranium from Africa—was, by and large, correct; moreover, the veracity of that claim was, contrary to Wilson's assertion that the claim was false, actually supported by his own findings. Arguably, the administration was remiss in omitting to mention that the attempted purchase had, as far as could be ascertained, been unsuccessful, but that depends to a large degree on the context in which the claim was made. If one's primarily concern is whether Iraq's pursuit of WMD might have, within the foreseeable future, have presented a direct threat to the United States, then, yes, the omission is highly relevant. However, if one focuses on the question whether Iraq was in violation of UN Security Council resolutions 687 (1991) and following, the failure of the attempt is immaterial; what matters is that the attempt was made in the first place. Be this as it may, however, the germane point to this discussion is that, if one accepts that president Bush misled Congress by obfuscating the fact that the attempt to purchase uranium was ultimately unsuccessful, it follows that Wilson committed the same transgression in his op-ed piece in the NYT (and numerous subsequent media appearances) by stating only that no transaction had taken place, while withholding the information that he knew, and had personally provided confirmation to the administration, that the attempt had taken place. In short, it turns out Wilson's behaviour was hypocritical in the extreme, and the hullaballoo which resulted from his op-ed piece was just so much pointless partisan bickering. Remarkably, few of the parties involved in the earlier squabbles appear to have drawn any lessons from it, or had the decency to be embarrassed. Wilson, and his hangers-on, now prefer to focus on the "outing" of Valerie Plame as an employee of the CIA. Jacoby and many other journalists parrot the phrase "covert agent" with blithe disregard for the legal definition of the term. Oddly, despite a fact that a federal grand jury has been investigating the matter since January, it has not yet even been established whether a violation of the law occurred. There has been an astounding amount of heat generated concerning this matter, and I for one wouldn't mind if everyone would back off until such time that some actual light can be shed instead. * - Stet. Nigerians are from Nigeria, people from Niger are Nigerien. |
Navigation: home archives backgrounder Blogs:
au currant Miscellanea:
Care to contribute |
