Joe Wilson’s Creative Fiction (On CNN, Wilson Continues To Spin False Tales With “Literary Flair)

Republican National Committee ^ | July 18, 2004

[RWR8189]

JOE WILSON’S CREATIVE FICTION
On CNN, Wilson Continues To Spin
False Tales With “Literary Flair”
________________________________________________

JOE WILSON: “Well, I don't know. Obviously, there's been this orchestrated campaign, this smear campaign. I happen to think that it's because the RNC, the Republican National Committee's been involved in this in a big way …”  CNN’S WOLF BLITZER: “But they weren't involved in the Senate Intelligence Committee report.”  WILSON: “No, they weren't.”  (CNN’s “Lade Edition,” 7/18/04)

»»»»

WILSON’S FALSE CLAIM

Wilson Claims His Wife Did Not Suggest He Travel To Niger To Investigate Reports Of Uranium Deal; Instead, Wilson Claims It Came Out Of Meeting With CIA To Discuss Report.  CNN’S WOLF BLITZER: “Among other things, you had always said, always maintained, still maintain your wife, Valerie Plame, a CIA officer, had nothing to do with the decision to send to you Niger to inspect reports that uranium might be sold from Niger to Iraq. … Did Valerie Plame, your wife, come up with the idea to send you to Niger?”  JOE WILSON:  “No. My wife served as a conduit, as I put in my book. When her supervisors asked her to contact me for the purposes of coming into the CIA to discuss all the issues surrounding this allegation of Niger selling uranium to Iraq.”  (CNN’s “Lade Edition,” 7/18/04)

THE FACTS

In Fact, Senate Intelligence Committee Received Not Only Testimony But Actual Documentation Indicating Wilson’s Wife Proposed Him For Trip.  “Some [CIA Counterproliferation Division, or CPD,] officials could not recall how the office decided to contact the former ambassador, however, interviews and documents provided to the Committee indicate that his wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip.  The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador’s wife ‘offered up his name’ and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002, from the former ambassador’s wife says, ‘my husband has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity.’”  (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

And Trip To Niger Did Not Come Out Of Meeting With CIA But Was The Purpose Of The Meeting To Begin With.  “On February 19, 2002, CPD hosted a meeting with the former ambassador [Wilson], intelligence analysts from both the CIA and [State Dept. Bureau of Intelligence and Research, or INR], and several individuals from the [CIA Directorate of Operations’] Africa and CPD divisions. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the merits of the former ambassador traveling to Niger. An INR analyst’s notes indicate that the meeting was ‘apparently convened by [the former ambassador’s] wife who had the idea to dispatch [him] to use his contacts to sort out the Iraq-Niger uranium issue.’ The former ambassador’s wife told Committee staff that she only attended the meeting to introduce her husband and left after about three minutes.”  (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

»»»»

WILSON’S FALSE CLAIM

Wilson Claims CIA Thought To Ask Him To Make Trip Because He Had Previously Made Trip For Them In 1999, Not Because Of His Wife’s Suggestion.  CNN’S WOLF BLITZER:  “Who first raised your name, then, based on what you know? Who came up with the idea to send you there?”  JOE WILSON:  “The CIA knew my name from a trip, and it's in the report, that I had taken in 1999 related to uranium activities but not related to Iraq. I had served for 23 years in government including as Bill Clinton's Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council. I had done a lot of work with the Niger government during a period punctuated by a military coup and a subsequent assassination of a president. So I knew all the people there.”  (CNN’s “Lade Edition,” 7/18/04)

THE FACTS

In Fact, His Wife Suggested Him For 1999 Trip As Well.  “The former ambassador had traveled previously to Niger on the CIA’s behalf … The former ambassador was selected for the 1999 trip after his wife mentioned to her supervisors that her husband was planning a business trip to Niger in the near future and might be willing to use his contacts in the region …”  (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

»»»»

WILSON’S FALSE CLAIM

Wilson Claims It’s “Wrong” To Say He Misspoke To Washington Post Reporter.  CNN’S WOLF BLITZER:  “At issue here, an article in The Washington Post in which you were the source, you acknowledged being the source, you spoke of forged documents long before anyone ever knew that there were forged documents.”  JOE WILSON:  “No, that's wrong. First of all, I was one of several sources. Secondly, that article appeared in June, and in fact on March 7th of that year Dr. El Baradei had described to the U.N. that these documents were forgeries. In addition to that, on March 24th, I think, for the March 30th issue of New Yorker, Seymour Hersh wrote a long article about it …”  (CNN’s “Lade Edition,” 7/18/04)

THE FACTS

In Fact, Washington Post Story Makes Clear Wilson Is The Source And That He Claimed To Have Seen Forged Documents Before Making Trip.  “During his trip, the CIA's envoy spoke with the president of Niger and other Niger officials mentioned as being involved in the Iraqi effort, some of whose signatures purportedly appeared on the documents. After returning to the United States, the envoy reported to the CIA that the uranium-purchase story was false, the sources said. Among the envoy's conclusions was that the documents may have been forged because the ‘dates were wrong and the names were wrong,’ the former U.S. government official said.”  (Walter Pincus, “CIA Did Not Share Doubt On Iraq Data,” The Washington Post, 6/12/03)

But Forged Documents Did Not Come To Light Until Eight Months After Wilson’s Trip.  “On February 26, 2002, the former ambassador [Wilson] arrived in Niger. … [T]here were no ‘documents’ circulating in the [Intelligence Community] at the time of the former ambassador’s trip, only intelligence reports from [foreign] intelligence regarding an alleged Iraq-Niger uranium. … On October 9 2002, an Italian journalist from the magazine Panorama provided U.S. Embassy Rome with copies of documents pertaining to the aleeged Iraq-Niger uranium transaction.”  (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

And Wilson’s Report Of His Trip Actually Reinforced Previous Intelligence For Some Analysts.  “[CIA’s Deputy Chief of Counterproliferation Division] said he judged that the most important fact in [Wilson’s] report was that the Nigerien officials admitted that the Iraqi delegation had traveled there in 1999, and that the Nigerien Prime Minister believed the Iraqis were interested in purchasing uranium, because this provided some confirmation of foreign government service reporting.”  (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

[cyncooper]

Hey there! Glad to see you found the thread.

The BIGGEST lie Wilson told, the lie that formed the premise for his accusation against Bush's 16 words in the State of the Union speech, was Wilson's accusation against Cheney has been exposed.

It's even more maddening. We've known since July 11, 2003 that Cheney, Bush, WH and Congress never were briefed on Wilson's trip. The media ignored Tenet in favor of the liar Joe:

Text of CIA Director George Tenet's statement

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~

All of this information that came out in the Senate report has been out there. All the report did was supply *more* documentation to the state of the already public record. Same with the timeline of when the forgeries appeared on the scene. That was all reported in various outlets, but no reporter tied it all together as we did here. Yes, maddening!

[ijcr]

BLITZER: All right. So now we have you, your future, Valerie Plame's future. What's next for both of you?

WILSON: Well, I don't know. Obviously, there's been this orchestrated campaign, this smear campaign. I happen to think that it's because the RNC, the Republican National Committee's, been involved in this in a big way...

BLITZER: But they weren't involved in the Senate Intelligence Committee report.

WILSON: No, they weren't. But they've certainly seized upon it as a way of smearing, sort of perpetuating the smear campaign against me. I think Valerie and I will fight back. If they think that I'm going to go away on this issue, they're wrong. And we will see where we go from there.

Poor Joe a victim of the VRWC. ROFLAO. It is evident that his wife is involved in this and by now she should agent in charge oif restroom security in Langley.