Joseph Wilson, Niger, Uranium and Bush’s Famous Sixteen Words: Evolution of a Confused Story

April 16, 2004

[Shermy]

Here is some background on Wilson, items not usually related in articles about him.

Here’s one bio:An Official Wilson Bio

Wilson has a website dedicated to him www.restorehonesty.com. The website is operated by the John Kerry campaign. It was registered October 22, 2003.

Here’s a French language article regarding a 1998 trip by Gabon President Omar Bongo to the United States. Apparently, the Gabonese hired Wilson’s second wife Jacqueline as a lobbyist in support of the trip. Another who worked with her was the famous Pierre Salinger, known for many things, eg he was JFK’s press secretary and for his TWA 800 theories. But even more lobbyists were engaged, they apparently had a “too many cooks in the kitchen” kind of conflict, and the trip didn’t come off well Joseph Wilson was “very present” at the events of the visit.

Salinger wrote a book on the first Gulf War, “Dossier.” In it are about ten pages of a recounting of conversations between Saddam and Wilson. I can only guess Wilson was the source.

Wilson was apparently an adviser to the Al Gore presidential campaign. In these two November 2000 Belgian television transcripts it’s stated he is an adviser, at least according to the interviewer. I can find no other links describing Wilson as an adviser.

Adviser to Al Gore

Foreign affairs adviser to Gore Campaign

On a humorous note, and perhaps explaining his affinity with John F. Kerry, the French media likes Wilson. The Parisian newspaper “Liberation” described Wilson as a “francophile” and “When it rains, he wears a beret.” (“Quand il pleut, il porte un béret.) Liberation article, almost half way down this page

[Shermy]

Ping.

[Shermy]

My thread here contains many media reports and interviews in an attempt to trace the evolution of the linkage some have postulated between Bush's State of the Union reference to "Africa" and ruminations about the African country of Niger, including Joseph Wilson's.

Long read.

[Dog]

Good research Shermy.

Shermy what if the country Bush mentioned and the Brit's cite........is LIBYA......not Niger.

[Shermy]

Could be several of the countries. Or none.

What form of uranium was sought is unsure too.

FYI - There are media reports out there, if one connects the fragments, that indicate the "memorandum" that instigated Wilson's trip to Niger was NOT the fake documents but something else. The fake documents, reportedly, appeared later.

[Wolfstar]

Absolutely brilliant and valuable job of research, Shermy. I fully agree with your assessment of the key questions someone should ask Joseph Wilson. In addition, with revelations about the corrupt Iraqi oil-for-food program continuing to simmer, I'm beginning to wonder just how far Saddam's money reached in Washington during the 1990's.

I'm beginning to think that all of the peculiar, but seemingly unrelated events we've witnessed in recent years may not be so unrelated after all. Just some of the mysteries that may, just may, have their answers in the oil-for-food scam: the way Scott Ritter seemed to turn on a dime; the mysterious now-they're-there, now-they're-not Iraqi WMD; Saddam seemingly content with the sanctions rather than opening his doors wide to UN inspections; the forged Iraq-Niger documents; the peculiar choice of Joseph Wilson to check out the Niger story; and much more.

[Dolphy]

Good work, Shermy. I was especially interested to learn of Wilson's activities in the 80s. No pun intended but it seems to me that Wilson and others have been mining government-made relationships for both political and personal gain for several decades now.

I am going to go through your links more carefully a little later. There are a number of interesting questions raised.

[Miss Marple]

Excellent research, Shermy! I wonder whatever happened to Jaqueline Wilson. Who is she working for now? And when did Wilson divorce her, and when did he hook up with Plame?

[Fedora]

Excellent work!--very enlightening to have that all pulled together in one place and organized like that. I've only had a chance to skim it so far, but what jumps out at me is a pattern of anti-Bush collusion between:

1. Saddam's regime.

2. Saddam's supporters in the UN, esp. Blix and Al-Baradei.

3. Anti-Bush elements in the British and US intelligence community, e.g. Wilson.

4. Anti-Bush elements in the British government (I'm reminded of the Galloway scandal) and US State Department (as you note regarding the December 20, 2002 instance of State keeping in the reference to Niger).

5. Anti-Bush elements in the British and US media, with a couple specific names mentioned here being Walter Pincus and Seymour Hersh, both of whom have long-standing connections to left-wing elements in the intelligence community. With respect to the question you raise about Pincus' November 10, 2002 article regarding how Pincus knew the contents of the unreleased British intelligence report, I'd be very interested to identify Pincus' source there, which I'm inferring must be linked to Blix at the UN and the British elements of the anti-Bush collaboration mentioned above. Along those lines, I'd likewise be interested to identify which British papers and reporters were key in leading the spin on this story.

[Fedora]

Excellent research, Shermy! I wonder whatever happened to Jaqueline Wilson. Who is she working for now? And when did Wilson divorce her, and when did he hook up with Plame?

Great question! Also, who was Jacqueline's superior at the French embassy at that time, and who got her appointed to that position?

[Just mythoughts]

Thank you so much for this, I will have to wait until later to read through.

[Shermy]

Many things struck me. It's quite a web to digest.

After you read the excerpts above re-read Wilson's editorial in full. Puts everything in a new light...

[Shermy]

Ping to you guys too.

[okie01]

"With respect to the question you raise about Pincus' November 10, 2002 article regarding how Pincus knew the contents of the unreleased British intelligence report, I'd be very interested to identify Pincus' source there, which I'm inferring must be linked to Blix at the UN and the British elements of the anti-Bush collaboration mentioned above."

Pincus apparently has a social relationship with the Wilsons. According to research done by another FReeper (Wolfstar or dirtboy, I can't recall), Pincus has dined with the Wilsons at their home -- several times in close proximity to the publication of Wilson's op-ed.

But, thanks to Shermy's research, one thing becomes very clear -- the familiarity that Wilson, Pincus, et al have with purported intelligence matters concerning the uranium market in Africa, apparently as understood by both the CIA and MI-6.

In retrospect, there can be only one source for this purported knowledge: Valerie Plame. Wilson's current wife was employed by the CIA, doing what...??? Was it not "covert work on nuclear proliferation"?

Plame IS the leaker. And is, thereby, herself a security risk.

Moreover, one cannot escape the conclusion that this has been a political operation from the get-go. It was not an opening or accidental oversight that Wilson, Plame, Pincus, et al decided to exploit. Instead, the issue was created out of whole cloth for the sole purpose of their exploitation.

Moreover, the media has been fully complicit -- Walter Pincus, Andrea Mitchell and all those who willfully ignore the statements by the administration (and British intelligence, indeed Wilson himself) that the "forged documents" and "Niger" are, neither one, part of the evidence.

Initially, Wilson was careful to qualify this evidence himself -- but his interrogators simply ignored it, in order to serve their mutual agenda.

And, once again, I am left wondering just exactly what Alan Foley's role in all this was. Was he the CIA "source" for Novak (and Newsday)?

The stench at CIA and State is stifling.

[okie01]

Magnifico.

[Fedora]

Good analysis--I will mull that over. On Pincus, there was a good "subthread" on him at the end of one of the recent live threads, starting around Post #1,912:

Live 9/11 Commission Thread [testifying today Freeh, Reno, Ashcroft]

Post 1,976 is a good summary of the gist. For my own comments on Pincus, see Posts 2,041 and following. Among other things I learned that Pincus was in Army counterintelligence in the 1950s; joined the CIA in the late 50s and had his cover blown c. 1967; since the Watergate era has been linked to people like Daniel Ellsberg and Bob Woodward and Anthony Lake and organizations like the Institute for Policy Studies; and played a key role in the media coverage of Vince Foster's death. I've been meaning to start another thread summing up the info on him; will try to do that over the weekend.

[marron]

Excellent work.

Wilson is a liar. That is not in question. Dissection of his op-ed reveals as much, and you don't even have to go to Niger to prove it.

The easiest lie is his sleight of hand, switching the word "sought"in the Bush address for the word "sale" in his piece. Another is his reference to IAEA monitoring of the mines in Niger, when IAEA says they weren't monitoring them.

But really, the whole thing is a fake controversy, because the Iraqi trade mission to Niger in 1999 is public knowldege. Why Bush and Rice and Wilson et al keep referring to British intel and forged documents is a mystery to me, because the trade mission is not a secret, nor is it controversial. Niger, of course, has only one export of note.

The information that dates his enlistment in the Kerry campaign is worth the price of admission, as is his relationship with the other various pundits. As you point out, Mrs. Wilson is an obvious source for much of their inside knowledge, which means that in the question of who outed Mrs Wilson the answer is that she did.

[Shermy]

BTW, here's the most comprehensive Wilson bio.

CPSAG Our Team It says...

"...Additionally, he has been decorated as a Commander in the Order of the Equatorial Star by the Government of Gabon and as an Admiral in the El Paso Navy by the El Paso County Commissioners.

El Paso Navy? Admiral? LOL!

[Wolfstar]

El Paso Navy, LOL! I wonder if whoever typed the bio left out a word, like League — Navy League.

[okie01]

"El Paso Navy? Admiral? LOL!"

Perhaps, he too commanded a Swift boat.

On the Rio Grande...