CIA's Tenet was 'furious' over leak, Schumer says

I guess he didn't too good of a job "analyzing" the Intelligence.

Could it have been worse.

Dr. David C. MacMichael

David MacMichael is a former CIA Analyst who started The Association of National Security Alumni. ANSA is an organization that seeks to expose and curtail covert actions because they “are counterproductive and damaging to the national interest of the United States, inimical to the operation of an effective national intelligence system, corruptive of civil liberties... and they contradict the principles of democracy, national self-determination and international law to which the United States is publicly committed.” David MacMichael resigned from the CIA rather than falsify his reports for political reasons. MacMichael graduated with an MA and Ph.D. in History from the University of Oregon.

Ray McGovern

Ray McGovern was a CIA analyst from 1964 to 1990, and regularly reported to the vice president and senior policy-makers on the President's Daily Brief from 1981 to 1985. McGovern is a member of the steering group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) which is a non-partisan group of retired intelligence professionals who believe that the Bush Administration lied about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and inappropriately pressured the CIA to "cook the books" on the matter.

Joseph C. Wilson

Joe Wilson is the former Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Iraq. More recently, Wilson served as the Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council. At the behest of Vice President Cheney, Wilson went to Niger to determine the credibility of documents claiming that Sadaam Hussein had purchased "yellow cake" uranium from that country. Wilson debunked the claims as false yet the accusation appeared in President Bush's State of the Union address. Wilson claims the White House deliberately leaked his wife's identity as a covert CIA operative after he wrote an article for the NY Times revealing that the Niger-uranium claims made by the White House were false. Wilson is currently on tour for his recently published New York Times best-selling book, "The Politics of Truth: Inside the Lies That led to War and Betrayed My Wife's CIA Identity."

Peter Zimmerman

Peter Zimmerman served as the Chief Scientist of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from August 2001 until January 2003. Before assuming his duties in the U.S. Senate, he was a senior fellow in arms control and verification at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a former technical adviser to the U.S. delegation to the START talks.

Rand Beers

Rand Beers is a former Special Assistant to President Bush and Senior Director for combating terrorism. Beers is a 30 year-plus intelligence veteran who has held various positions in the State Department's Bureau of Political Military Affairs. Additionally, he has served three times on the National Security Council staff and was Deputy Political Advisor to the Supreme Allied Commander, Europe. Beers resigned in March of 2003, five days before the start of the Iraq War, and is currently the National Security Advisor for John Kerry's campaign. Beers received a BA from Dartmouth and an MA from the University of Michigan.

Bill Christison

Bill Christison worked for the Central Intelligence Agency for over 28 years. He ended his CIA career as the Director of the Office of Regional and Political Analysis, an office of over 200 experts on all nations and global problems of the world.

I found this...

Well, folks, I received this from an active duty officer with experience in the field. Just how stupid can we become? Eliot Cohen has an OP/ED in the W Post today in which he “examines his conscience” on the whole subject of the “thinking” that has governed the war. The occasion for this is the imminent deployment of his infantry officer son to the war that he helped create AND screw up. He has learned something. It is clear that others have not.

Pat Lang

“To: Patrick Lang
Subject: RE: Anyone like Juan Cole in the FBI?

Sir:

I am in

.

FYI- Juan Cole's site is being blocked at Ft

and other installations by the thought police.

.
Fred”

From: Patrick Lang [mailto:ismoot@turcopolier.com]
Sent: Sat 7/9/2005 3:25 PM
To: Patrick Lang
Subject: Anyone like Juan Cole in the FBI?

I think it's important to make note of it. Certain people are averse to having soldiers know what's really going. Me oh my, war never changes.

2003-05-12

W. Patrick Lang, the former chief of Middle East intelligence at the D.I.A., said, “The Pentagon has banded together to dominate the government’s foreign policy, and they’ve pulled it off. They’re running Chalabi. The D.I.A. has been intimidated and beaten to a pulp. And there’s no guts at all in the C.I.A.”

W. Patrick Lang

President, Global Resources Group, Inc.; formerly the Defense Intelligence Officer for the Middle East

04-Jul-05

W Patrick Lang, now with Global Resources Group, but formerly the Pentagon’s top expert as Defense Intelligence Officer for the Middle East, and Lang takes the view that the Bush administration did not invade the real Iraq “but the Iraq of our dreams.” The U.S. now finds itself stuck in the middle of a civil war it neither acknowledges nor comprehends, that will end with Tehran dominating a weak and embattled “Iraqi Shi’a government that) will have choice whether they wish to be subordinated to the Iranians or not.”

“In my opinion there was a real failure and perhaps a continuing failure of leadership in the intelligence community,” Lang went on, in a powerful condemnation of his old chiefs. “I have been in many situations in which the director of DIA or some other senior officer has told the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the secretary of Defense or some powerful Senator, no, we will not say that. We will not say that. We know what the truth is. We will tell the truth. It is our duty. Now, you can't tell me that that's what happened in the run-up to this latest war in the ranks of the leadership of the intelligence community, because if these guys had stood their ground and refused to allow their people to be pushed around, then in fact, we would not have gone into a situation in which we completely misinterpreted what the realities were in the real world.”

thank you for your # 127

More stuff:

Washington Diplomat-2003

Excerpt:

Yet the media continue with their eagerness to unveil the truth about the uranium documents, mostly to shed light on why the British and U.S. governments were so willing to accept a shockingly bad forgery as fact.

A British Telegraph journalist in Niger recently reported that the former U.S. assistant secretary of state for African affairs, Herman Cohen, had told Niger’s president to stay quiet on the uranium issue. Diatta is quick to address the potentially damaging media report, pointing out that Cohen is also a lobbyist for the Nigerien government and frequently travels to Niger to brief the government on his work in Washington.

“I know Ambassador Cohen very well,” Diatta said. “Ambassador Cohen went as a private person, not as an official of the U.S. government. It is normal for him to go to Niger and speak about his job with my government.”

The former U.S. ambassador to Gabon, Joseph Wilson, is another key player who helped debunk the claim that Niger sold uranium to Iraq. In 2002, he was sent by the U.S. government to check out the uranium allegations, and he reported back that it was highly unlikely that any such transaction had taken place—a fact apparently not absorbed by the White House until after the president’s State of the Union address.

“I know [Wilson] very well also,” said Diatta. “And you know, something very strange—when he went to Niger in February 2002, I was myself in Niger and we had a meeting in my house and we spoke about this matter. So, it was not a secret mission. Everyone spoke about this secret CIA mission. I don’t understand why there is so much noise about this visit to Niger.

“Ambassador Wilson was requested by the CIA to go to Niger, yes, but he accomplished this for his government without any problem. He told everyone that he was sent by the U.S. government on the uranium issue, without any secrecy,” Diatta said.

Above all, Diatta is keen to explain that Niger is “not just uranium.”

“Niger is also this beautiful desert we have, it is the beautiful views we have along the River Niger, it is ancient cities with a beautiful mosque built in the 16th century. We invite you to come there and see for yourselves. We want Americans to know that the recent controversy has not affected the good relations between our two countries.”

Diatta said that when the media rushed toward the uranium controversy, they overlooked one important point: Niger was one of only two African nations to send troops to help with the liberation of Kuwait during the first Gulf War.

“I think people have forgotten this, but our participation was appreciated by the U.S. government at the time,” Diatta said. “This should not be forgotten. We were allies of the U.S. and we remain so now. That is what is most important.”

=================================

Even then, everyone was distorting W's words .. "sought" greencake uranium.........and so the spin and lies still persist to today ......jeesh.

==================================

Former wife, Jacqueline Wilson, lived in Bethesda, MD, as of '01

DOJ-Foreign Agent Registry

===================================================

The Africa Channel

Executives of the Africa Channel, a new cable service, talk to Jacqueline Wilson, an adviser to the president of Gabon. (6-23-05)

More than 2,000 people, including six African presidents, gathered in Baltimore yesterday in the second day of a four-day summit on trade with the struggling continent.

The Marriott Waterfront Hotel in Baltimore's Inner Harbor East was host to the fifth U.S.-Africa Business Summit, sponsored by the Corporate Council on Africa. The gathering also included other high-ranking government officials and representatives from U.S. companies already investing in or interested in doing business in Africa.

Armando Emilio Guebuza, president of Mozambique, one of the African nations leading the promotion of trade with the United States, described the event as "a significant achievement."The summit comes at a time of increasing focus on the problems of poverty and the need for economic development in Africa.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair met with President Bush in Washington this month to urge a doubling of aid from industrial nations to Africa.

Some of the world's most famous rock stars are joining in a Live 8 series of concerts next month to turn a spotlight on the need for aid to the continent. And Bono, of the Irish rock group U2, is spearheading a campaign called One to fight poverty and AIDS in Africa and elsewhere. Assistance for the continent also will be discussed at the Group of Eight summit in Scotland next month.

The council chose Baltimore for the event because of the city and state's pursuit of economic opportunities in Africa, including last year's visit to Ghana and South Africa by a contingent led by Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele.

"There's been a unique level of involvement with the state and the city," said Stephen Hayes, president and chief executive officer of the Corporate Council on Africa

"This is the first time a city has been so heavily involved" in the goals of the organization, said Hayes, who noted increased attendance this year at the biennial summit.

The summit continues through tomorrow with workshops on business, agriculture and tourism. It also provided an opportunity for African artists to showcase colorful handmade blankets, clothes, jewelry and candles.

Outside the host hotel, about 100 people holding bright neon green and yellow signs and American flags protested the presence of the president of the Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagbo, who spoke during the conference. He faces an election Oct. 30 in a nation torn by ethnic violence.

Inside, the German automaker DaimlerChrysler AG presented a $500,000 check to President Guebuza of Mozambique. The money was donated by DaimlerChrysler as sponsor of Club 21 USA, an organization that pushes for park preservation, tourism and employment opportunities in Africa.

The initiative is meant to spur tourism, because studies have concluded that for every eight visitors to Mozambique and surrounding countries one job is created. DaimlerChrysler is the first sponsor of the organization, which aims to find 20 additional sponsors next year.

Guebuza also announced the launch of a partnership between a Mozambican cashew company and SunTree, a California-Arizona company. SunTree will package and distribute a new brand of cashews, Zambique, in major grocery chains in the United States, including Safeway, Costco and Trader Joe's.

"It gives substance to the goals to promote trade and agribusiness," Guebuza said.

Other presidents of African countries attending the summit were from Zambia, Madagascar, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.

Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. and the lieutenant governor yesterday also announced the establishment of a sister ports' agreement between Maryland and the port of Banjul in Gambia and the port of Takoradi in Ghana to promote transcontinental trade.

Also at the summit, Marathon Oil Corp. presented results from the first phase of an $8.3 million investment to eradicate malaria and disease-carrying mosquitoes in Equatorial Guinea. The Houston energy company's initiative, called the Bioko Island Malaria Control Project, is part of a five-year plan to benefit the country and also serve as a model for other organizations.

The Corporate Council on Africa was founded in 1993 and represents about 200 companies that make up 85 percent of U.S. investment in Africa. The last biennial summit took place in Washington in 2003.

Bump - pic of Jacqueline Wilson above.

Rasmussen Weblog-2004

Excerpt

Further Reflections on Joseph Wilson's Career Here's a fuller bio than I had in my earlier post, based on information mostly from PBS (I am not quoting them) 1988 to 1991: Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. During "Desert Shield" he was the acting Ambassador and was responsible for the freeing of several hundred American hostages. He was the last official American to meet with Saddam Hussein before "Desert Storm.

He was number two, in charge of administrative matters, to April Glaspie, the career diplomat who it seems in July 1990 made Saddam think the U.S. would not mind if he invaded Kuwait and has not held an ambassador-level job since. She left on vacation later that month, leaving Wilson in charge, and after Saddam invaded Kuwait a few weeks later she didn't return to Iraq. The Air Phase of the First Gulf War started in January 1991.

1992-1995: U.S. Ambassador to the Gabonese Republic and to the Democratic Republic of Sao Tome and Principe from 1992 to 1995 (one ambassador for those two countries is standard) 1995-1997: Political Advisor to the Commander-in-Chief of United States Armed Forces, Europe

June 1997 - July 1998: Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council

Just looking at this record, without Clifford May's anonymous sources, it isn't clear that he left the Foreign Service involuntarily. Maybe he just wanted to move into political appointments with the Clinton Administration, whose politics were more congenial to him than the administrations from 1980 to 1992.

The January 2001 Vanity Fair article contains lots of useful information, especially if you connect it to what else we know. There is mention of Wilson's Turkish connection:

He had met Plame in February 1997 at a reception at the Washington home of the Turkish ambassador.

We learn that he is rich and that he was having an affair with Valerie Plame in or before the year he divorced the second of his three wives. The article says "On the third or fourth date, he says, they were in the middle of a 'heavy make-out' session" and from the following excerpt we see that they were looking at houses and discussing marriage in 1998, the same year he was divorced:

The Wilsons live in the Palisades, an affluent neighborhood of Washington, D.C., on the fringe of Georgetown. In winter, when the trees have no leaves, the back of their house has a stunning view of the Washington Monument. They'd first seen the house in 1998, when it was still being built, and they had instantly fallen in love with it. Even so, Plame took some persuading before they made an offer. "She's very frugal," explains Wilson. "My brother who's in real estate had to fly in from the West Coast and explain that a mortgage could cost less than our rented apartment in the Watergate."

Plame also told Wilson that she'd be moving with him into the new house only as his wife. Records show that Wilson and his second wife, Jacqueline, to whom he was married for 12 years, were divorced in 1998. By the mid-90s, Wilson says, that relationship had pretty much disintegrated. "Separate bedrooms-and I was playing a lot of golf," he says.

Note, too, that exactly as I speculated in my earlier post, he was playing a lot of golf in the 1990's-- not the sign of a successful career.

(snip)

The Vanity Fair story tells us more about Wilson's background, including how his first wife got fed up with him:

Wilson is the son of freelance journalists who lived in California and then moved around Europe while he and his brother were growing up. He went to the University of California at Santa Barbara and characterized himself as a "surf dude" with some carpentry skills.

In person, he gives off a charismatic, relaxed air, and someone who was with him in Baghdad said it's easy to underestimate him. In 1974 he married his college sweetheart, Susan Otchis, and in 1976 went to work for the State Department. His postings included Niger, Togo-where his wife became pregnant with the first set of Wilson twins, Joseph and Sabrina, now 24-South Africa, and Burundi. It was in Burundi that Susan "decided she'd had about enough of me" and left him, he says. He remains on good terms with the family.

Also in Burundi, Wilson met his second wife, then the cultural counselor at the French Embassy there. They spent a year back in Washington on a congressional fellowship, during which time he worked for Al Gore, then a senator from Tennessee, and Tom Foley, then House majority whip.

"It was," Wilson says, "happenstance" that he worked for two Democrats. Then he returned to Africa as deputy chief of mission in the Congo Republic, where he helped Assistant Secretary of State Chester Crocker set up the process that led to negotiations for the withdrawal of the Cuban and South African troops from the Angolan Civil War.

bttt

Herman Cohen was Assistant Secretary of State for Africa during the Bush administration. He’s currently a senior adviser to the Global Coalition for Africa and Intergovernmental Policy Forum promoting economic growth. Peter Rosenblum is the project director of Harvard University’s Human Rights Program. Since 1989 he’s worked with various organizations, including the United Nations, in setting up field offices in Zaire.

******

USA: African Governments Spend Millions on Lobbying

by Jim Lobe, Inter Press Service
May 20th, 2001

snip

Favoured lobbyists include former high-ranking State Department and other government officials, such as Herman Cohen, who served as Assistant Secretary of State for Africa under former President George Bush and whose partner, James Woods, held the equivalent position at the Pentagon.

Lobbyists also include former high-ranking members of the intelligence community. Milton Bearden, a senior Central Intelligence Agency officer who specialised in Muslim countries and served as station chief in Pakistan when Washington was backing the mujahideen in Afghanistan, has just been hired by a wealthy Sudanese businessman reported to be close to the Khartoum government.

Gabon has also maintained a three-year-old relationship with Jacqueline Wilson, the ex-spouse of a senior US diplomat. According to her filings, Wilson receives tens of thousands of dollars for special projects and reports to President Omar Bongo's daughter, Pascaline Mferri Bongo.

In her latest filing, Wilson reported that she was paid 60,000 dollars between August and November 2000 to ''support action of president of Gabon to fight AIDS pandemic (and) develop a strategy.'' As to work performed, she reported sending ''letters to the office of National AIDS policy at the White House.''

******

He had met Plame in February 1997 at a reception at the Washington home of the Turkish ambassador.

The Wilsons live in the Palisades, an affluent neighborhood of Washington, D.C., on the fringe of Georgetown. In winter, when the trees have no leaves, the back of their house has a stunning view of the Washington Monument. They'd first seen the house in 1998, when it was still being built, and they had instantly fallen in love with it. Even so, Plame took some persuading before they made an offer. "She's very frugal," explains Wilson. "My brother who's in real estate had to fly in from the West Coast and explain that a mortgage could cost less than our rented apartment in the Watergate." Plame also told Wilson that she'd be moving with him into the new house only as his wife. Records show that Wilson and his second wife, Jacqueline, to whom he was married for 12 years, were divorced in 1998. By the mid-90s, Wilson says, that relationship had pretty much disintegrated. "Separate bedrooms-and I was playing a lot of golf," he says.

In 1992, Wilson was rewarded with the ambassadorship to Gabon, where, he says, he helped persuade President Omar Bongo-"the most clever politician in African politics," according to Wilson-to have free and open elections.

After only one year in the job Wilson decided to retire and go into the private sector because "we wanted to have kids, and felt that it had become very difficult to live off two government salaries." He set up a consultancy, J. C. Wilson International Ventures, with an office in downtown Washington at the headquarters of the Rock Creek Corporation, an investment firm of which little is known.

"I have a number of clients, and basically we help them with their sort of investments in countries like Niger," explains Wilson. "Niger was of some interest because it has some gold deposits coming onstream. We had some clients who were interested in gold.... We were looking to set up a gold-mine company out of London."

Wilson is the son of freelance journalists who lived in California and then moved around Europe while he and his brother were growing up. He went to the University of California at Santa Barbara and characterized himself as a "surf dude" with some carpentry skills. In person, he gives off a charismatic, relaxed air, and someone who was with him in Baghdad said it's easy to underestimate him. In 1974 he married his college sweetheart, Susan Otchis, and in 1976 went to work for the State Department. His postings included Niger, Togo-where his wife became pregnant with the first set of Wilson twins, Joseph and Sabrina, now 24-South Africa, and Burundi. It was in Burundi that Susan "decided she'd had about enough of me" and left him, he says. He remains on good terms with the family.

Also in Burundi, Wilson met his second wife, then the cultural counselor at the French Embassy there. They spent a year back in Washington on a congressional fellowship, during which time he worked for Al Gore, then a senator from Tennessee, and Tom Foley, then House majority whip. "It was," Wilson says, "happenstance" that he worked for two Democrats. Then he returned to Africa as deputy chief of mission in the Congo Republic, where he helped Assistant Secretary of State Chester Crocker set up the process that led to negotiations for the withdrawal of the Cuban and South African troops from the Angolan Civil War.

Tenet should be in federal prison. What a buffoon.

September 18, 2003

Wilson gives an interview to the TalkingPointsMemo.com

“...TPM: And, just to be clear, at this time (--when he traveled to Niger in 2002--), you hadn't seen these documents that turned out to be forgeries?

WILSON: No, I hadn't. I had just been briefed on a memorandum of agreement covering the sale. Now, my understanding is that there are all sorts of other documents that have since come to light and Andrea Mitchell showed me some documents which I had not seen and frankly, I did not have my glasses, so I didn't even get a chance to read them, and I have not seen them since. The uranium participation in this consortium is done through a parastatal, which means that the Niger government owns the corporate identity that is a member of the consortium.”

January 2004
Vanity Fair

-In 1982 until 1985 Wilson was deputy chief of the US mission in Burundi in 1982. There he met his second wife, Jacqueline. Jacqueline was a “Cultural Counselor” attached to the French Embassy.

-In 1985 Wilson returned to the USA to work in Tom Foley’s and Al Gore’s offices. He married Jacqueline in 1986.

-Wilson later was stationed in Iraq. He recounts that on the eve of Saddam’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait he and Jacqueline dined with “Saddam’s principal arms buyer in Paris...”

-After leaving government service around 1998 Wilson started consulting. One pursuit included “looking to set up” a gold-mine company “out of London”, to mine for gold in Niger at some unidentified time.

According to Wilson:

"...Additionally, he (Joe Wilson) 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.

Are we really supposed to believe a word Charles Schumer says?

Text of CIA Director George Tenet's statement

Excerpt:

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.

******

The retired US ambassador said it was all but impossible that British intelligence had not received his report - drawn up by the CIA - which revealed that documents, purporting to show a deal between Iraq and the west African state of Niger, were forgeries. When he saw similar claims in Britain's dossier on Iraq last September, he even went as far as telling CIA officials that they needed to alert their British counterparts to his investigation.

******

Excerpt:

The U.S. Embassy in Rome obtained the documents -- which purported to show contacts between officials in Iraq and Niger over the transfer of uranium -- from a journalist there in October 2002, officials said

You do know how to tell when Chuckie is lying?

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.

http://www.bdpgabon.org/ancien_site/bdp/revelationspol1.html