Novak names names in Plame leak case

[kluge]

<p>Well, and if you had bothered to understand what I was saying, maybe you would not have been disappointed. My point - plain and clear, in my opinion - is that asserting that a certain decision was made for certain reasons based solely on people’s later recollections of conversations, with no contemporaneous written record, is placing too much credence on that type of source. This is a classic example: The two sources contradict each other, change their stories, and one finds that one thing he said is plainly contradicted by documentation. Not about every aspect of the conversation - that would be too sloppy. But would you want to see a Duke student convicted on the basis of that kind of testimony? It might be true, it might be post hoc self serving “shading” of the truth; it might be an out-and-out invention as to some points. What it isn’t is reliable, solid evidence - and the Senate Committee made no finding on this point, you’ll note.</p>

<p>I was limiting myself to the Senate report, since that’s what you were quoting from, but George Tenet’s explanation for how the 16 words were OK’d by the CIA, written in July, 2003 - see post 279, above - also conflicts with the post hoc explanations of the WINPAC Director and NSA assistant - and directly contradicts your assertion that “there was no concern with the credibility of the data.” </p>

<p>The Senate Report has red flags regarding “full honesty” issues of its own. The report was “artfully” drafted in some other very pertinent respects as well.</p>

<p>You quote Conclusion 26:

To date, the Intelligence Community has not published an assessment to clarify or correct its position on whether or not Iraq was trying to purchase uranium from Africa as stated in the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE). Likewise, neither the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) nor the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which both published assessments on possible Iraqi efforts to acquire uranium, have ever published assessments outside of their agencies which correct their previous positions.

But the CIA in fact did publish its assessment which corrected its previous position: “since learning that the Iraq-Niger uranium deal was based on false documents earlier this spring we no longer believe that there is sufficient other reporting to conclude that Iraq pursued uranium from abroad.” (June 17, 2003) And the Senate committee knew about it, because the CIA briefed them about that specific conclusion on June 18, 2003. So how do you reconcile the last part of Conclusion 26 with that fact? Well, pretty much the same way Tenet explains how the 16 words got into the SOTU address. The assessment was not published "outside the agency." Technically, it was a memo from the CIA to the Director of the CIA. So while Conclusion 26 is technically true, in the “meaning of ‘is’” sense, just like the 16 words were technically true - the Brits did say that, even if our guys were dubious - it is certainly misleading about the actual subsequent conclusions of the CIA. (And don’t forget - the State Department didn’t have to publish a reassessment - it was on record from 2002 as not finding the Iraq-Niger claim credible.)</p>

<p>Again, FF, it’s not a matter of sincerity of belief, it’s a matter of using artful language and dubious sources to advance questionable premises, without disclosing that the basis for the claim is shaky, to say the least. That’s where the lack of candor appears.</p>

[fundingfather]

<p>

Again, FF, it’s not a matter of sincerity of belief, it’s a matter of using artful language and dubious sources to advance questionable premises, without disclosing that the basis for the claim is shaky, to say the least. That’s where the lack of candor appears.

I assume, based on your artful language and dubious sourcing from your previous post that you are addressing yourself???</p>

[gla]

<p>FF:
Perhaps my questions were not erudite enough to warrant your attention, but I would really like to know. Where in Africa was Saddam trying to obtain yellowcake, if not from Niger?</p>

[fundingfather]

<p>gla, I’ll have to get back to you on that - we have company coming over for a cookout any minute.</p>

[fundingfather]

<p>gla, regarding “Africa”, here are some conclusions from the report:

Throughout the time the Niger reports were being disseminated, the =CIA Iraq nuclear analyst said he had discussed the issue with his INR colleague and was aware that INR disagreed with the CIA’s position. He said they discussed Niger’s uranium production rates and whether Niger could have been diverting any yellowcake. He said that he and his INR counterpart essentially “agreed to disagree” about whether Niger could supply uranium to Iraq. The CIA analyst said he assessed at the time that the intelligence showed both that Iraq may have been trying to procure uranium in Africa and that it was possible Niger could supply it. He said his assessment was bolstered by several other intelligence reports on Iraqi interest in uranium from other countries in Africa.

</p>

<p>

On January 17,2003, eleven days before the State of the Union address, WINPAC published a current intelligence paper (Regue****r Evidence of Iraq ’sNuclear WeaponsProgram Other Than the Aluminum Tube Procurement Effort, SPWRO11703-01) in response to a request from the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff for information, other than the aluminum tubes, that showed Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program. Regarding uranium acquisition, the paper said, “fragmentary reporting on Iraqi attempts to procure uranium from various countries in Africa in the past several years is another sign of reconstitution.

</p>

<p>

WINPAC analysts told Committee staff that, even though they were still in the process of analyzing the documents, their analytic position had not changed, so they believed it would have been premature to publish concerns about the documents without having investigated those concerns for themselves. One analyst said that if he were presenting CIA’Sbest evidence on reconstitution he would not have included the uranium information, but when asked what else we had besides the tubes, he “ratcheted” down the threshold of what was appropriate to include. He also indicated that the reference in the paper about efforts to acquire uranium from Africa were broader than the alleged Niger contract in that it included the reports on Iraqi attempts to acquire uranium from Somalia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.</p>

<p>Other WINPAC analysts told Committee staff that by January, they had come to believe that if Iraq was in fact attempting to acquire uranium from Africa, it would bolster their argument that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program because Iraq had no other use for uranium. Most of the other elements of the reconstitution case, the tubes, magnets, machine tools and balancing machines, were all dual-use materials, while for Iraq, uranium had only one potential use -a nuclear weapons program.

</p>

<p>

On January 24,2003, in response to a request from the NSC for additional details regarding IC input to “the case for Saddam possessing weapons of mass destruction,”the NIO for Strategic and Nuclear Programs faxed a packet of background information to the NSC. The fax contained the information from the October 2002 NIE on Iraq’s vigorous attempts to procure uranium ore and yellowcake from Niger and other countries in Africa. The information was used to prepare for Secretary Powell’s presentation of intelligence to the UN in February 2003.

</p>

<p>

On February 10,2003, the U.S. Defense Attache in Abidjan (the capital of the African country, Ivory Coast) reported that its reports officer examined two warehouses in Benin suspected of storing uranium on route to Iraq on December 17,2002. The visit was conducted almost a month after a Navy report indicated uranium destined for Iraq was transiting through the warehouses. (See page 59) The report indicated that the warehouses appeared to contain only bales of cotton. A CIA operations cable on the inspection noted, however, it was not possible to determine if the cotton bales concealed the uranium shipment and that no radiation detection equipment had been used during the inspection.

</p>

<p>Note that the suspected yellowcake in the last quote would have initiated from Niger but the investigation was botched by not doing a thorough inspection of the warehouse and the Navy never followed up with the businessman who allegedly brokered the deal even though they had his name and telephone number.</p>

[kluge]

<p>Why am I suddenly reminded of the story of the Optimistic Boy and the room full of horse manure?</p>

[fundingfather]

<p>No need to search for a pony when it is presented in full clarity:</p>

<p>“CIA Iraq nuclear analysts and the Director of WINPAC told Committee staff that at the time of the State of the Union, they still believed that Iraq was probably seeking uranium from Africa”</p>

<p>Plus other gems which unambiguously show that the consensus of the IC was that the nuclear program was being reconstituted. And even a full discussion of your main “sticking point” about why they referred to the British intelligence rather than the US intelligence. </p>

<p>There’s not just a single pony but a whole herd of them, all saddled up and ready to romp with those having an open mind.</p>

<p>I guess I’m at a rhetorical loss to match your analogy, but 3 Blind Mice may have to do to describe those like yourself with self-applied blinders that prohibit them from seeing the truth. </p>

<p>kluge, it’s a shame that bitterness can cloud the mind to such an extent. When I see your posts on the Duke thread I see a very intelligent lawyer. Unfortunately, on this thread, you are reduced to having no facts to support your view so you resort to the only tool that a lawyer can fall back upon - attempt to discredit the report and the person delivering the report. However, with no facts to do even that, you create your own.</p>

[rorosen]

<p>kluge and fundingfather, you guys are both great, what energy,…i’m thinking you would be antagonistic lighthousekeepers, smoking pipes, playing chess and arguing at the foggy shore,…</p>

[fundingfather]

<p>But then who would be tending to the lighthouses? Doesn’t matter, because I’m sure that if the ship runs aground, it would be Bush’s fault.</p>

[kluge]

<p>FF - If Bush had said in the SOTU that “Most of our intelligence agencies believe that Iraq is probably seeking uranium from Africa, but they’re not sure enough to commit to that statement at this point” - or anything with an equivalent level of confidence - that would have been an honest statement. But in fact the language of the speech was presented so as to give the impression of far more than a tentative belief that something “probably” was happening. This is an example of the type of “We know…” and “There is no doubt…” and "We know for a fact…"statements made by administration representatives that I referenced earlier in this thread as evidence of “lying” regarding the degree of certainty or confidence the government had in the claims it was making. If you’ve even tried to keep up that is the point I’ve been making all along.</p>

<p>Let’s go back to the original statement I made which so enraged you:

…there’s a lot of reports that some parts of the intelligence community bought into various parts the WMD story - although others didn’t. And the Administration had access to both sides. With regard to the infamous “16 words”, for example - our own intelligence people wouldn’t support the claim, so it was phrased in a weasely manner laying it off on the Brits.

Here’s the formal written statement of George Tenet, then Director of the CIA, a few months after the SOTU address:

[CIA] officials who were reviewing the draft remarks on uranium raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues. Some of the language was changed. From what we know now, Agency officials in the end concurred that the text in the speech was factually correct - i.e. that the British government report said that Iraq sought uranium from Africa. This should not have been the test for clearing a Presidential address. This did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for Presidential speeches, and CIA should have ensured that it was removed.

Where’s the pony there?</p>

<p>You insist that the “the consensus of the IC was that the nuclear program was being reconstituted” but we know that State never bought into any part of the Niger uranium story. Neither State nor the DOE fell for the “aluminum tubes” fantasy (which also made its way into the SOTU speech in equally carefully weasled wording.) And of course, the fact that as soon as the forged documents were exposed as phony, the CIA’s official position became

“since learning that the Iraq-Niger uranium deal was based on false documents earlier this spring we no longer believe that there is sufficient other reporting to conclude that Iraq pursued uranium from abroad.”

… which suggests that the basis for the CIA’s support of the nuclear program reconstitution delusion was a set of forged documents and nothing else of substance. </p>

<p>No rhetoric, no spin. No after-the-fact careerist ass-covering in “interviews.” Just the formal written statements of actual members of the “Intelligence Community.” </p>

<p>I don’t believe that Bush & Co. knew or believed that the nuclear claims were bogus - and it’s not part of my concern with the whole question of whether or not the Bush Administration “lied” about Iraq prior to the war. What I do believe that unless they are all totally incompetent they had to be aware that the IC had serious reservations - as George Tenet clearly outlined in statement quoted above - about the reliability of those claims, to the point where the CIA and the State Department repeatedly recommended deleting them from speech after speech because they lacked confidence in the evidence which supposedly supported them. Even if Stephen Hadley personally actually “forgot” that he had been repeatedly cautioned against having the Adminstration make that claim by the CIA Director, it’s the kind of detail I expect that some executive-level person in a competent organization would remember.</p>

<p>Fundingfather, The real problem you have with my posts is that in fact I approach this subject in exactly the same way I approached the Duke prosecution - dispassionately and without bias. I read the statements made by people with a critical eye. I weigh the crcumstances, motivations, and formality of their statements, and check the evidence they cite when possible. I’m not a knee-jerk proponent or opponent of any position; I don’t care if “my team” supports it or not. Your inability to see that is something for your mirror. Your need to accuse anyone who disagrees with you of being blinded by “bitterness” or an overwhelming hatred of George Bush is your issue, not mine. I don’t “hate” or “love” George Bush or any other political figure, and recoil at the thought of having my emotions involved in any way with political debate. I’m not a politics junkie - I’m just an interested, concerned, and reasonably well informed American. (But not that well-informed. I ran across a couple of references to “Fitzmas” recently and had to google it to find out what it was. Anyone who actually had a contemporaneous awareness of the concept of “Fitzmas” needs to get out more, in my opinion.) You should try to honestly assess whether you can say the same.</p>

[fundingfather]

<p>For someone so dispassionate, you seem to forget some key points:</p>

<p>1) It was not the George Tenet of several months after the fact giving the SoTU speech - it was George Bush who was told by Tenet that the information was a “slam dunk”. So Bush is supposed to look into Tenet’s sole and see that it really wasn’t a slam dunk? </p>

<p>2) As to “the CIA and the State Department repeatedly recommended deleting them from speech after speech because they lacked confidence in the evidence which supposedly supported them.”, this is what that “uncertain” CIA said on the day of the Cincinnati speech:

On October 7, 2002, President Bush delivered the speech in Cincinnati without the uranium reference. On the same day, the CIA prepared comments on a draft White House paper, A Grave and Gathering Danger. The comments suggested a change to the draft language saying “better to generalize the first bullet as follows: Sought uranium from Africa to feed the enrichment process.” The original text from the White House had said “sought uranium oxide, an essential ingredient in the enrichment process, from Africa.” The White House did not publish the paper.

So, go ahead and conjure up whatever nefarious thoughts that you want concerning the CIA trying to send up warning flares about the uranium information and the SoTU speech writers ignoring them, it is clear that as of October, 2002 as well as the day of the SoTU, they were still sticking with their basic story.</p>

[gla]

<p>Who was held accountable for the innaccurate information given to the President?
Why was Tenet given the Presidential Medal of Freedom?</p>