Former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, primary debunker of the "Niger yellowcake" story, is much in the news this weekend. A mid-September article in Slate, reporting that Wilson has blamed the White House for leaking the identity of his wife as a CIA operative, was noted by Donald Sensing, who made this observation:
I happen to have been a seminar attendee in 1993 in which Wilson was a speaker one day. There were only about two dozen attendees, some of us military and others civilian government factotums from all branches of government. So we had very informal and engaging discussions with the daily speakers.I found Wilson to be expertly knowledgeable on the Middle East and quite sober-minded. I rate his credibility extremely high, so I find the charges he has made very credible and very disturbing.
Wilson's accusation was given further credence by a story in today's Washington Post stating that the CIA has requested an investigation by the Justice Dept.
At CIA Director George J. Tenet's request, the Justice Department is looking into an allegation that administration officials leaked the name of an undercover CIA officer to a journalist, government sources said yesterday.The officer's name was disclosed on July 14 in a syndicated column by Robert D. Novak, who said his sources were two senior administration officials.
Yesterday, a senior administration official said that before Novak's column ran, two top White House officials called at least six Washington journalists and disclosed the identity and occupation of Wilson's wife. Wilson had just revealed that the CIA had sent him to Niger last year to look into the uranium claim and that he had found no evidence to back up the charge. Wilson's account touched off a political fracas over Bush's use of intelligence as he made the case for attacking Iraq.
"Clearly, it was meant purely and simply for revenge," the senior official said of the alleged leak.
All this attention makes an inquiring mind want to know more, and a bit of Internet digging turns up more information about Ambassador Wilson.
While he is obviously an experienced and knowledgeable diplomat, he may not be exactly unbiased about the Bush administration and its policy towards Iraq. NRO published an article in July that discussed Wilson's political background, and the author outright called him: "a pro-Saudi, leftist partisan with an ax to grind."
The Slate article itself is pegged around remarks made by Wilson at "a forum about intelligence failures on Iraq held by Rep. Jay Inslee, a fervently anti-war Democrat."
Condoleeza Rice was asked about the flap this morning on Fox News Sunday and she said this:
I know nothing of any such White House effort to reveal any of this, and it certainly would not be the way that the president would expect his White House to operate.My understanding is that, in matters like this, as a matter of routine, a question like this is referred to the Justice Department for appropriate action, and that's what's going to be done... it was well known that the president of the United States does not expect the White House to get involved in such things.
Now Monday's Washington Post reports that the inquiry is underway, and the Democrats think they have a fresh political opportunity.
President Bush's aides promised yesterday to cooperate with a Justice Department inquiry into an administration leak that exposed the identity of a CIA operative, but Democrats charged that the administration cannot credibly investigate itself and called for an independent probe.White House officials said they would turn over phone logs if the Justice Department asked them to. But the aides said Bush has no plans to ask his staff members whether they played a role in revealing the name of an undercover officer who is married to former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, one of the most visible critics of Bush's handling of intelligence about Iraq.
Democratic lawmakers and presidential candidates seized on the investigation as a new vulnerability for Bush.
This may be something or may turn out to be not much. However, two things are clear. First, some weak-kneed figures in the Bush administration are beginning to turn on each other now that the President's poll numbers are down, and using leaks to do so. This always seems to happen when the going gets tough -- similar nonsense happened during the early, difficult days of the Iraq invasion. Frankly, more discipline and fortitude is needed to prevail in this time of war.
Second, the Democrats will run with this as far as they can, and beyond, with little regard to the truth. Sadly, the truth might turn out to be both irresponsibility on the part of White House staff AND misleading opportunism by Bush's opponents.
UPDATE: The omnisicient InstaPundit has some thoughts and a gaggle of links to other ruminators.
Posted by Alan at September 29, 2003 12:05 AM