Can you help swilhelm73 with a question about Joe Wilson?
Someone who opposed the Bush administration's Iraq policy, on the face of it. But beyond that? No idea.
Freedom of Information Request can be free.
Doesn't matter who sent him.
I blame Bush for keeping ANOTHER Clinton holdover in his administration. He should have swept them all out ASAP, if not ASAPier. Same thing for Richard Clark.
"...There was fragmentary intelligence gathered in late 2001 and early 2002 on the allegations of Saddam's efforts to obtain additional raw uranium from Africa, beyond the 550 metric tons already in Iraq. In an effort to inquire about certain reports involving Niger, CIA's counter-proliferation experts, on their own initiative, asked an individual with ties to the region to make a visit to see what he could learn. ..."
Excerpt:
There was fragmentary intelligence gathered in late 2001 and early 2002 on the allegations of Saddam's efforts to obtain additional raw uranium from Africa, beyond the 550 metric tons already in Iraq. In an effort to inquire about certain reports involving Niger, CIA's counter-proliferation experts, on their own initiative, asked an individual with ties to the region to make a visit to see what he could learn. He reported back to us that one of the former Nigerien (sic) officials he met stated that he was unaware of any contract being signed between Niger and rogue states for the sale of uranium during his tenure in office. The same former official also said that in June 1999 a businessman approached him and insisted that the former official meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss "expanding commercial relations" between Iraq and Niger. The former official interpreted the overture as an attempt to discuss uranium sales. The former officials also offered details regarding Niger's processes for monitoring and transporting uranium that suggested it would be very unlikely that material could be illicitly diverted. There was no mention in the report of forged documents -- or any suggestion of the existence of documents at all.
Because this report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution, but we did not brief it to the President, Vice-President or other senior Administration officials. We also had to consider that the former Nigerien officials knew that what they were saying would reach the U.S. government and that this might have influenced what they said.
In the fall of 2002, my Deputy and I briefed hundreds of members of Congress on Iraq. We did not brief the uranium acquisition story.
~snip~
The "individual with ties" is Joe Wilson. Note not only did the WH not send Wilson, Tenet didn't either, but this sub-group "on their own initiative". Note Tenet eventually did find out about the trip, but found it so lacking that the WH was never briefed, nor was Congress.
Notice Tenet references fragmentary intelligence from 2001 and early 2002. This is NOT the forged documents. They did not appear on the scene until October of 2002 and our people did not analyze them until after the SOTU address was given.
And finally, note that even Wilson himself at one point in time stated he thought Iraq was *seeking* to purchase uranium from Niger. He has developed amnesia on this aspect.
#6
Horse's mouth.
Had nothing to do with Cheney.
Excerpts:
The British government has said repeatedly it stands by intelligence it gathered and used in its controversial September 2002 dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programmes. It still claims that Iraq had sought uranium from Niger.
~snip~
Until now, the only evidence of Iraq's alleged attempts to buy uranium from Niger had turned out to be a forgery. In October 2002, documents were handed to the US embassy in Rome that appeared to be correspondence between Niger and Iraqi officials.
When the US State Department later passed the documents to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, they were found to be fake. US officials have subsequently distanced themselves from the entire notion that Iraq was seeking buy uranium from Niger.
However, European intelligence officers have now revealed that three years before the fake documents became public, human and electronic intelligence sources from a number of countries picked up repeated discussion of an illicit trade in uranium from Niger. One of the customers discussed by the traders was Iraq.
~snip~
"He says that most things he has read list the NSC as sending Wilson."
There's a lot of misinformation about Wilson, for example, he never claimed he was sent to Niger due to the "forged documents" - though he doesn't correct anybody on this myth.
Have you seen my thread?
Thanks guys, much appreciated.
"Counter proliferation experts" at the CIA sent Joe Wilson, an individual. Wasn't Valerie Plame a "counter proliferation" agent? I'm almost positive that was her job. She was probably the one who suggested him for the trip.
...a question I have wanted answered