The Senate "Intelligence" report, part trois

This is already stale but I wanted to cover it anyway.

Recapping, in Phase I we learned that Joe Wilson was "confused" about whether his wife sent him to Africa. Then Democrats pressured the majority for a Phase II, which suggested the WMD question wasn't nearly as cut and dried as they had warned us about during the Clinton years.

Now we've got a Phase II.5 (actually part of part 2), which claims the CIA predicted mass chaos (with dogs and cats living together) in Iraq after any invasion, which our stupid evil genius Christo-fascist Commander Guy Monarch Decider simply ignored. Or thereabouts.

To be completely fair it's too bad Bush didn't take look closer at some of these recommendations but it's just foul water under the bridge at this point. Continuing the fairness, the report also mentioned that some of the rather dire warnings didn't materialize. Just guessing, but maybe they included WMDs bursting amidst the invading troops or war-triggered terrorist attacks here in America.

But despite the obvious 20/20 hindsight pablum provided for MSM consumption the Minority Addendum of the report regards Valerie Plame's testimony is where the action is. You may ask, "why should we still care?" Tom Maguire asked and answered:

Waxman is investigating Republicans on a number of fronts. If he does not follow up on this apparently misleading testimony from a friendly witness it is evidence that he is staging partisan show trials rather than probing for the truth.

Right. So we have a question at hand--did Mrs. Wilson lie when she spoke in front of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, the same bipartisan panel who had issued a unanimous conclusion on the matter? Byron York points to an interesting conundrum:

The conventional wisdom has always been that she suggested her husband's name in response to an inquiry from Vice President Dick Cheney about the Iraq Niger uranium story. But her memo, written on February 12, seems to show that she suggested her husband's name before the vice president asked his question on February 13.

This apparent discrepancy might shine some light on why this entire ball of wax unfurled the way it did. Keeping the sequence straight, first 1) Plame told the Phase I SSCI panel she couldn't remember who recommended Joe for Niger, then 2) She told the CIA Inspector General that she herself offered up his name, and 3) She got on TV and told Henry Waxman and America that she didn't recommend him, but while consoling a heretofore unknown staffer who'd been treated mean by the White House she recalled a colleague walking by and recommending they send Joe! Is that good enough for Waxman?

But hold on, the screaming message has consistently been lost in all of this, which was that CIA analysts were not impressed by Wilson's trip in the least bit. Now granted, it's an open question as to whether this was due to their heavy investment in previous assessments about the Butcher to the point of being immovable by the ambiguous conclusions from a junket by a low level former Ambassador or whether it was more substantial.

But it wouldn't take a CIA analyst to understand that if Naimey WAS trying to make under the table uranium deals with Saddam or other tinhorns they certainly wouldn't blab it to representatives from the United States. The analysts also knew well Saddam's propensity for surprising the world over such stuff and also the level to which some entities will go to obfuscate smuggling deals. Libya was proof positive of that.

Check out the Report, beginning on page 210 quoting Officer Valerie Wilson's email to a superior detailing why her husband was suited to spring into action. I'm particularly interested in the redacted part:

"So, where do I fit in? As you may recall [redacted] of CP/{office 2] recently [2001] approached my husband to possibly use his contacts in Niger to investigate ........... [a separate Niger matter]. After many fits and starts, [redacted] finally advised that the Station wished to pursue this with liaison. My husband is willing to help if it makes sense, no problem if not. End of story.

"A separate Niger matter". Hmm. What other matter besides yellowcake would warrant sending agent Joe Wilson across the ocean on government per diem? Since this is only a blog we can make wild guesses, so here goes...perhaps something about Abdul Qadeer Khan's visit to Niger? Or perhaps the visit Iraq's Ambassador to the Vatican Wissam al-Zahawie made in 1999? Or maybe it was figuring out why a Nigerien representative had recently visited Baghdad?

One of the crimes of this matter is that the Plames, er, Wilsons have managed to leave a false impression about the uranium trade and Africa, not just about Iraq but in general. By all accounts Henry Waxman is a bloodhound for the truth so hopefully he'll hold the appropriate follow-up hearings and clear up any perplexities before Mrs. Wilson hits the book signing circuit or appears in Hollywood at the Grand Premiere of her movie.

UPDATE 5/30/07

Mac Ranger was upset with the latest on twist in the Plame affair, outlined here. His contention is that Harlow, CIA spokesman, would have told Novak that Plame was NOC and not to publish when they spoke prior to his infamous column. I'm confused as to whether Harlow, by telling Novak that Plame was covert, would himself be breaking the law or not? He's testified that he tried to dissuade the column, which might be all he can do under the circumstances but then again, the protocol during backgrounds might be different.

Mac thinks Valery was already in the doghouse by that time for sending Joe to Niger in the first place and had been defrocked of her cover. That would mean Harlow was purposefully obtuse with Novak, which would suggest the whole thing was a trap.

We could refer to Tenet's novel for details since it was co-written by Harlow, but they stayed away from the subject for some strange reason. My contention--just a WAG--if she were working in the Iraq WMD counter-proliferation division what was occurring when her name was released in June 2003? Nothing! We had already deposed Saddam's government and David Kay's ISG was looking for the weapons on the ground.