It depends on what the meaning of "name" is...

[Happy Monkey]

Even granting all that, what does Wilson's wife being CIA and getting him the assignment have to do with anything? What was the point of mentioning it? How does that affect the quality of the report?

[mrnoodle]

I think Rove was implying (maybe he said it directly -- I need to do some more reading on this, if my gall bladder will let me) that Wilson had been sent to Niger by his wife specifically to discredit the WH claim of an Iraq/Niger/uranium connection, and not to do actual fact-finding.

[Happy Monkey]

So he was saying that the CIA was actively working against the administration on WMD issues?

[mrnoodle]

I don't think he went that far. I think he was implying that Wilson was a partisan attention whore, and his wife used her position to be an accessory. I'm cutting you off from X-Files reruns for 3 days. :P

edit: and flagellating myself for being a sloppy writer around HM. You guys are really chomping at the bit on this one, aren't you?

[Happy Monkey]

She wasn't in a position to send him to Niger. All she could do was recommend him, so someone higher than her in the CIA would have had to sign on.

[mrnoodle]

I'll have to take your word on it.

[richlevy]

The main point is, to leak the identity on a CIA agent under cover, especially one without diplomatic immunity, is to place that agent at risk if their identity is leaked while they are outside the US, say in Africa or the Middle East. While Cooper had the class to choose not to publish, Novak did.

Here is one take on this.

Outing a NOC is dangerous for them and the people who help them. There are already 83 stars at the CIA headquarters for fallen agents. Some of them understand the consequences of having a cover revealed. Agents have had their covers revealed before, but this might be the first time in history such a leak came from the White House.

Way to take care of national security, guys.

[mrnoodle]

Actually, a (2004?) British report on prewar intelligence indicated that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999 (even Wilson concurs), and found that several intelligence sources indicated the purpose of the trip was to make a uranium deal. The same intelligence also indicated similar deal-making with the republic of Congo and (I think) one other African nation.

A U.S. senate report said that the CIA (who, I thought, were supposed to be against Bush? anyway.) didn't give Wilson's claim much credibility, particularly since their intelligence showed that uranium was the one ingredient Iraq needed to have full nuclear capability.

Wilson defended himself by pointing to a set of forged documents that were either created to "prove" a link between Iraq/Niger, or, specifically created and leaked to Wilson in order to discredit any other intelligence pointing to same link. Of course, the documents' purpose depends on which side of the congressional aisle you're talking to.

The upshot being, Wilson is a proven partisan; that, combined with a good deal of American and European pre-war intelligence (admittedly, much of it circumstantial or based on conversations) that Iraq wanted yellowcake uranium,

[inhale]

undermines his credibility. The left is carrying his water because he's anti-Bush.

[bluecuracao]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

Actually, a (2004?) British report on prewar intelligence indicated that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999 (even Wilson concurs)

I'm confused...did Wilson concur because he found that out on his trip?

[BigV]

Yep, the story's solid, mrnoodle. If you've got these other sources, cite them or drop it.

Wilson's Iraq Assertions Hold Up Under Fire From Rove Backers

The main points of Wilson's article have largely been substantiated by a Senate committee as well as U.S. and United Nations weapons inspectors. A day after Wilson's piece was published, the White House acknowledged that a claim Bush made in his January 2003 state of the union address that Iraq tried to buy "significant quantities of uranium from Africa" could not be verified and shouldn't have been included in the speech.

[Happy Monkey]

Ah, the Butler Report.

[Undertoad]

Page 46 of the Senate Intelligence Report on the US Intelligence Community's Pre-War Intelligence on Iraq. My notes in red.

[Happy Monkey]

Wilson discounted rumors of an abortive transaction between Niger and Iraq. The documents suggesting the transaction turned out to be forgeries - an early set that the Italians provided summaries of to England and the US, and copies of to the US, and a later, extremely poorly forged set that mrnoodle already mentioned. Wilson's report said that there was no such transaction, but Nigerien (is that really how it's spelled?) officials assumed that an Iraqi delegation four years earlier was hoping to talk about uranium. The consensus in the intelligence community was that the Niger story wasn't strong enough to use, evidenced by the speeches from which it was deliberately excised. And in hindsight, after inspection of the actual nuclear capabilities in Iraq, that consensus turned out to have been correct.

In any case, all this is really irrelevant to the Plame issue. It's interesting back story and a fun debate, but it has no bearing on the case. No matter how politically biased Wilson was, no matter how involved Plame was in getting him sent, no matter how competently he handled the mission, the proper way to handle it is not to break the cover of a CIA agent to a journalist.

[Undertoad]

The forged documents appeared in October 2002. Wilson's trip happened in February/March 2002.

[Happy Monkey]

There were multiple sets of forged documents.