For some reason I subjected myself to this snooze material despite a general dislike for PDF files. The report presents the following as fact:
1) Berger knew the documents were copies.
2) No handwritten post-it notes were on the docs (this is still not crystal clear to me).
3) He took copious notes and removed most of them without permission. He was asked to produce them later but there's no way to know whether he did, since nobody knows how many he created.
4) We don't know how many documents he swiped since Archive staff only got suspicious and set traps after his third trip.
Here's one curious thing, found on page 22:
Earlier in the report on page 6 it says an Archive staffer saw Berger fiddling with something white around his ankle that could have been paper. This blurb, filled with more detail, seems to drop out of nowhere like an orphaned paste erroneously left in the document by mistake. It really doesn't matter--he's admitted to taking docs--but the socks bit goes nicely towards the bumbling spy caricature bolstered by the construction trailer caper.
That brings us to a final "why"? We're told Berger knew he was pilfering copies, but did he know which batch was going to the commission? Perhaps he thought the copies he was working off were going. That would be only way to cleanse the record without actually changing the archive. Such a thing is easily disproved but not by the likes of me.
But let's assume he wasn't trying to cleanse the record. To act in such a way speaks to character and suggests incompetence in the least and immense pressure from somebody to make sure the bases were covered at the most. Let's see what the experts say.
CLARIFICATION 12/23/06
Berger was quoted on page 27:
This comment was in relation to his September 2003 visits and the Millennium After-Action Report he took then destroyed. He claims he didn't know whether copies or originals were to be sent to the Commission, making it seem like his theft was a clumsy attempt to remove reference material to his office, not cheat the Commission. Apparently that's what the IG and DOJ believed.
The interesting part of this report was the stated reason for his May 2002 visit--a response to the Goss commission inquiry regards Usama bin Laden and the government of Sudan. Bill Clinton was already on tape telling an audience that Sudan offered UBL but we couldn't take him, therefore this would seem a more likely target of pilferage for Berger.
Archives officials admit he was provided numbered NSC packets of information during the May visit, but that individual documents inside those packets were not traceable. They admitted it was impossible to know whether any of these documents were stolen. There's no evidence he did, but it was interesting that in the report Berger offers an opinion on the Sudan-bin Laden offer--it was 'an urban legend'.
MORE 12/23/06
Dan Reihl has more, which focuses mainly on the MAAR and Berger's then association with the Kerry campaign. The Archive staff and the DOJ must have believed Berger didn't successfully cleanse the record, since he took copies not originals. Reihl suggests the mission was to wipe away any failures of terrorism policy and the fact the info wasn't passed to the incoming Bush regime. If that was goal, Berger was more of an idiot than we thought.
It's fun to note that around the same time Berger was reviewing documents in DC Joe Wilson was up the road op-ed'ing in the NY Times about Niger. He was also forced to resign from the Kerry campaign after the Senate Intelligence committee found him to be less than truthful, just like Berger.
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