In February 2002, George W. Bush's Administration sent me to Africa
Actually, that isn't quite true. The administration asked the CIA to look into the matter. Wilson's wife volunteered him for the mission.
The Bushes would not have sent him, and did not send him.
. In early March, I provided a detailed briefing to the C.I.A;
According to his earlier statement, he never issued anything more than a verbal statement to someone at the agency. The only written account of his trip was his op-ed piece in the Times. Would that qualify as another lie?
It would be only one more of a whole series of lies. Wilson lies when he said he investigated the matter. He did not, self-admittedly so. Read his account.
He never left the capital of Niger. He asked the government if they were engaged in illegal sales; they said no. He asked the mining company the same question; same answer. That is the basis for calling Bush a liar.
But he never audited the company's books, he never interviewed any of the drivers, he never followed the trucks to see where they go, he never staked out the port to see which ships they loaded in to, and he never checked to see where the ships went.
He never tapped mine communications, or government communications.
There was no investigation. Does that qualify as another lie?
He said that there could not have been any illegal sales, because the IAEA monitors the mines so closely as to make it impossible. But the IAEA says that they do not have the personnel to properly monitor the mines, and they furthermore are asking for laws to be placed into effect to permit them to monitor the mines. Meaning that the laws are not in effect, meaning that they are not monitoring the mines at all.
Does that qualify as another lie?
But in the end, his charge itself is a verbal sleight of hand. Bush said Iraq "sought" uranium in Africa. Wilson says there were no "sales", answering a charge that Bush never made. Does that qualify as another lie? And he answers a charge Bush did not make, testifying to something that based on his non-investigation he could not possibly know.
But Bush's charge, that they "sought" uranium, is not even controversial. Iraq's trade mission to Niger in 1999 is not even secret, it is public knowledge. All of the discussion as to whether the information came from MI6, or French intel, or Italian intel, overlooks the fact that the trade mission was public knowledge. It is not in dispute.
Does Wilson's omission of any mention of that fact qualify as another lie?
And, finally, it seems important to note that, if he was in Niger at the CIA's behest, he was acting as an agent of the agency. In publishing his op-ed piece in the New York Times, he outed himself as an agent. And he exposed something that perhaps the agency should have to answer for. If the agency had to send him to investigate the matter, why did they accept his non-investigation as authoritative? Why do they not have any of their own personnel on the ground, in a country that is of interest to Al Qaeda as possible refuge, a country that is a uranium producer, which has made past sales to Iraq... Wilson's op-ed piece exposes the agency's nakedness in the region.
Wilson is a serial liar, and the press has yet to call him on it.
And they never will. Instead, while brave mean and women work in harms' way in Iraq, the press will bleat about the "mortal danger" to Valerie Plame, apparently as a result of being married to this maroon.
And they never will. Instead, while brave mean and women work in harms' way in Iraq, the press will bleat about the "mortal danger" to Valerie Plame, apparently as a result of being married to this maroon.