Nov 02 2005
Wilson In Niger, 1999
In a previous post I noted the strange coincidence that the Niger Forgeries were possibly made in the 1999-2000 timeframe (before Bush was even elected), which was also coincidental with the Iraqi trade commission trip to Niger, and Joe Wilson’s first trip to Niger for the CIA. Joe Wilson had just left the US government and started JCWilson International Ventures, Inc – which specialized in trade with African countries.
Countries including Niger, which only had one real product to export: uranium.
In that post I postulated that the Niger Forgeries would be a real good way to divert western intelligence services away from any nefarious activities by pointing them at international bad guy Saddam Hussein. I speculated that if – and this is a big if – Joe Wilson was working with rogue CIA elements to make some money on the side, covered by Valerie’s cover employer supposedly chartered to keep an eye on this kind of WMD trade, then the Niger Forgeries would be a classic CIA method of diversion away from an illegal money making scheme.
Some of this speculation was confirmed when these reports surfaced claiming that the Niger Forgeries were created by Libya to divert suspicions from a Libya-Iraq-Egypt alliance, where Libya purchased the yellowcake for Saddam and others.
New attempts are being made by officials from Niger to obfuscate the political picture with regard to the supply of Niger-originating uranium to Iraq. However, there is now a growing possibility that the reality that Niger supplied uranium to Libya, and that Libya hosted the Iraqi strategic weapons programs from about 1998 onwards, will be openly acknowledged by US and UK governments in the near future.
I have no clue to the veracity of these claims or where this group comes from. But the fact that we found a nuclear weapons capability in Libya shortly after Saddam’s regime fell is consistent with the scenario were we traced Saddam’s weapons to Libya and Libya gave up the ghost when we confronted them.
But how could this play with Wilson?
Here is an interesting timeline of events that is the most common chronology of events in 1999:
1999 – Joseph Wilson takes a trip to Niger at the behest of the CIA to investigate “uranium-related matters†separate from Iraq . (Wilson, Politics lv-lvi). According to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report on pre-war intelligence, Wilson “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.†(Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Report on Prewar Assessment of Iraq Intelligence, 39, July 2004).
April 22, 1999 – Valerie Wilson lists “Brewster-Jennings & Assoc.â€â€”later revealed to be a CIA front company—as her employer when making a donation to the Gore campaign. ( Gore FEC filing).
June 1999 – Niger ’s former prime minister Ibrahim Mayaki meets with an Iraqi delegation wanting to discuss “expanding commercial relations.†Mayaki interprets this as an interest in uranium, Niger ’s main export, and later tells Wilson that he did not discuss it because Iraq remained under UN trade sanctions. (Senate Intelligence Cmte., Iraq 43-44, July 2004).
Nowhere was I able to find out when Joe Wilson went to Niger. If he went when the Iraqi delegation did, it would be truly interesting. To recap, Wilson was considered a candidate for the 2002 tea sipping trip to Niger because Valerie had proposed him once before for a CIA mission to Niger in 1999.
The committee found Wilson had made an earlier trip to Niger in 1999 for the CIA, also at his wife’s suggestion.
The entire story in 1999 was it made sense for him to assist because he was going to Niger for business anyway. But you would have to understand how crazy that should be – given Niger had just been through a coup d’etat in May 1999
The armed forces are maintaining their grip on power in Niger following the assassination of the country’s president, Ibrahim Bare Mainassara, on Friday.
Mark Doyle in Niamey: “Long struggle ahead for civilian politicians”
The prime minister, Ibrahim Assana Mayaki, said the military would remain in power until the formation of “a government of national unity” in a few days.
Details of the president’s assassination remain sketchy.
…
French news agency AFP said that two possible successors have been mentioned – Major Daouda Mallam Wanke, who commands the first military region and the presidential guard, and Colonel Moussa Moumouni Djermakoye, the army chief of staff.It reported Togolese sources as saying that Major Wanke had been directly involved in the assassination and had been slightly wounded.
…
American diplomats said he was killed at Niamey airport by members of his personal guard after trying to sack his chief of military staff, Musa Mumuni Djermoukoi.
Yes, this is the same Mayaki Joe Wilson will name when he comes back in 2002 and report that Mayaki had been approached by the Iraqi delegation – which we can see from the above time line was June, only a month after a coup. It is safe to assume the new goverment needed money and possibly military support. So would you go to do business in a country just racked by a coup? Did he go before the coup?
Joe Wilson was a big player in Africa. The year before he was the coordinator for Clinton’s Africa Trade trip – which probably was Wilson’s golden parachute effort for getting out of the Federal Government so young and with a future. The timing of his departure is truly interesting. It would make sense to ride some Clinton coat tails into a new business.
Was Wilson in Niger around the time of the coup d’etat? Well in the old days when he would blather on and on, Wilson talked a bit too much in October, 2003 at UVA event when discussing his pertinent experience for the 2002 trip:
I was asked to go because I have a unique set of experiences to bring to the table on this issue. I had served there in the mid 1970’s. I had retained many ties and friendships including with the Niger Ambassador to the United States for the subsequent twenty-five years. When I was senior director for Africa at the National Security Council in the mid 1990’s, the government that was in place at the time of these purported documents covering the memorandum of agreement for the sale of Uranium from Niger to Iraq, that was the government that was in place when I was in the White House. I had worked very closely with them to try and move what was at the time a military’s dictatorship back to the Democratic side of the ledger.
This is all well and good and makes sense. But it also covers his time in the government, not when he went into private practice. That description followed next [emphasis mine]:
So, I knew these guys intimately. They were in Washington all of the time. I was out there both in government and in African government helping them.
There’s the transition point. He was using his contacts from his government job to launch his business. Moreover, his clients were the African governments he used to be a US representative to, including Niger. It is clear from the ‘in African Government’ wording that Joe was hired by Niger to help with trade (and they only had one thing to trade). Then he spills some info on the timing of his trip:
In fact after the President, the military dictator had been assassinated, I went to see his successor and at the request of some of my friends there and some of the colleagues with whom I had been working, I went to see the new military dictator and I told him in no uncertain terms, that the only way he was going to get out of this mess, not just alive, but perhaps with a chance to restore his own personal honor, and the honor of his organization, the Presidential guard that had been responsible for the assassination of his predecessor.
Well, that jives 100% with the May 1oth, BBC article referenced above. Was “the request of some of my friends there and some of the colleagues with whom I had been working†a request from the CIA? Did he accidentally let slip more on how he viewed these ‘requestors’?
Niger did go on to have elections in October and November of 1999. ‘Ol Ego-Joe took a lot of credit for the results when reminiscing at the UVA event:
The only chance he had was to get out and effect a change back to democratic rule as quickly as possible. I told him, I said, that you need to understand from my experience in Africa that your successor president probably will not be very comfortable with you standing watching his back after you have effected the transition. After all, your organization was responsible for the assassination of your predecessor shooting him in the back. Therefore, I said to him, I think that you probably ought to leave the country for a while. Those are pretty strong words to walk into a military barracks and tell a guy who has assassinated his predecessor and has assumed responsibility for his country.
I came back a year later during the course of the transition and the president met me at the airport.
OK. While Joe pat’s himself on the back, like he often does, he has given us a window in 1999 for his visit for the CIA. It had to be between the coup and the elections: April and October 1999. But we can whittle this window down a lot. Here is that time period in Niger history from Wikepedia:
In April 1999, Baré was overthrown in a coup led by Maj. Daouda Malam Wanké, who established a transitional National Reconciliation Council to oversee the drafting of a constitution for a Fifth Republic with a French style semi-presidential system. In votes that international observers found to be generally free and fair, the Nigerien electorate approved the new constitution in July 1999 and held legislative and presidential elections in October and November 1999. Heading a coalition of the National Movement for a Developing Society (MNSD) and the Democratic and Social Convention (CDS), Mamadou Tandja won the presidency.
Again, back to Ego-Joe for some clarification:
The only chance he had was to get out and effect a change back to democratic rule as quickly as possible.
The new democratic rule did not come into existence until July with the constitution. It is clear from Niger’s history and Joe’s own words that Wilson was more than likely in Niger, meeting with Mayaki and Wanke, when the Iraq delegation attempted to make contact for trade in June. Joe was there for trade as well. What are the chances he first learned of the Iraqi meeting in 1999 and not 2002 as he claims?
Was Joe working a CIA front? Or were some of the folks at the CIA working a rogue effort in Niger? How is it the wife of a CIA WMD expert, charged with monitoring trade in uranium yellowcake, is married to someone who works for Niger establishing trade with that one-product country? Were the forged documents and the 2002 trip meant to cover tracks that could be discovered if Niger was investigated too deeply? Was there reason to be concerned about missing uranium in 1999 from Niger (there had been a coup d’etat)?
Too much coincidence for me. I wonder if anyone with real resources will investigate this angle.
Absolutely first class logic and reasoning, AJ. And while I have no idea what it ultimately means – could be coincidence after all – it would certainly be interesting to get someone like a conservative Seymour Hirsch on this.
WOW !!
Unbelievable information on Joe Wilson & CIA wife !!
This information could be BIG to the whole picture !!
Can’t believe Reid would pull his temper tantrum yesterday if this information is in the Senate Intelligence record ………just could blow up in the the face of the Democrats and their hero Mr Joe “always tell the truth” Wilson !!
Very very very interesting ……..hmmmmmm !!
Love this blog site …..GREAT STUFF ALWAYS !!
W-Girl,
Thanks. I doubt the democrats did enough background checking to know what they are getting into. They typically don’t. That is why the blogosphere pummels them time and time again.
But be warned – this is all speculation at this point. It does work all the information together into a coherent story. But who knows if it is true.
Might be worth a few minutes to take a look at a Zell Miller guest commentary in the Nov. 2 (today/yesterday’s) Atlanta Journal Constitution
edited – AJStrata
Sorry the link address is so long – it’s a copy and paste from my browser.
Merry
AJ – I noticed that Ego-Joe went with Sandy Berger and Team Clinton to Africa in 1998 and played a key role. Passengers on AF One still posted on WH website and had a very interesting mix of individuals…. Once Ego-Joe left the gov’t, was he required to register as a Lobbyist?
I found the below from FreeRepublic…Joseph Wilson’s Silent Partners…… (I tried to keep short/concise without repeating your data-Please shorten if needed) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1256475/posts
…… Wilson, a lifetime Francophile, had spent the bulk of his diplomatic career in former French African colonies like Niger.7 His second wife from 1986 to 1998, Jacqueline, had served the French embassy in Burundi as a “cultural counselor” (a function often used as a cover by French intelligence).8 From Wilson’s experience in Niger he was familiar with the Niger uranium industry…. After the Gulf War he had helped provide support to US/UK/Turkish operations in northern Iraq, while stationed as political advisor to the United States European Command in Germany during the Kosovo War. In 1998 he left the State Department and began putting his diplomatic contacts to business use. He formed J.C. Wilson International Ventures Corporation, a business development and management company which ventured in gold, oil, and telecommunications and served clients in Africa, Western Europe, and Turkey…. Wilson’s African investment interests included oil markets in several parts of Africa and the gold market in Niger. Wilson also kept abreast of the gold market in Iraq, where the price of gold was exceptionally cheap, as Wilson observed in one of his lectures.10 Meanwhile his then-wife Jacqueline, whom he would soon leave for Valerie Plame, became a registered lobbyist for the Presidency of Gabon, where Wilson had a good relationship with President Omar Bongo.11
….. Wilson ran his company out of the offices of an investment company called Rock Creek Corporation. Rock Creek was controlled by Mohammed Alamoudi….. the Alamoudi-affiliated company Delta Services–a Swiss subsidiary of the Saudi company Delta Oil–handled Iraqi oil export contracts in 2000 and 2001 and was revealed in 2003 as a recipient of Iraqi Oil-for-Food vouchers channeled through Abu Abbas, a Palestinian terrorist with Iraqi connections….. Also, while in Germany, Wilson had worked on Iraqi-related issues with Turkish General Cevik Bir, a critic of US policy towards Iraq.16 Wilson and Bir expressed similar views on Iraq when they spoke together at events held by the American-Turkish Council (ATC), a Turkish-American business association headed by Brent Scowcroft,17 …….. Wilson’s contact with the ATC also brought him into contact with his future wife, Valerie Plame, whom he met while receiving an ATC award during a reception at the Turkish embassy in Washington.20 …. While Wilson was pursuing his foreign investment ventures, he also served as a foreign policy advisor to the 2000 Presidential campaign of Al Gore. A company the Gore family had a long-term relationship with, Occidental Petroleum, shared business interests with Alamoudi-affiliated companies in Africa and the Middle East, and employed as Vice President for Middle East business Odeh Aburdene,24 who shared a complex network of relationships with Rock Creek’s Elias Aburdene and Joseph Wilson–notably, all three contributed to Arab-American Congressional Caucus leader Nick Rahall,25 who supported Muslim lobbying groups linked to terrorists and opposed military action in Iraq.26
… Gore’s speeches were then being sponsored by the antiwar group Moveon.org, which Wilson would support in September 2003 in an attempt to petition Congress against appropriating funds for Iraq operations.28 Moveon.org was financed by billionaire George Soros,29 who had business interests encompassing, among other things, the BTC Pipeline that Mohammed Alamoudi’s Delta Oil was helping build.30 Later, after Gore announced in December 2002 that he would not be running in the 2004 campaign,31 Moveon.org began supporting John Kerry’s campaign.32 Wilson began advising Kerry’s campaign on foreign policy matters around May 2003, several months prior to his public entry into the Niger uranium controversy.33 …… Another question that might be raised is why Wilson and the CIA’s investigation did not explore at least the possibility of the French-led company COGEMA covertly allowing Niger to sell uranium to Iraq. In Wilson’s book, while explaining the method that led him to conclude the report of Niger selling uranium to Iraq was false, Wilson explains that he ruled out the possibility of an off-the-books transaction partly because “COGEMA, as the managing partner, would have had to know and be complicit.”37 This seems to rule out a priori the very thing Wilson was sent to investigate, and in the process, to rule out the possibility of French complicity in arming Saddam Hussein’s regime, which seems a hasty exoneration in light of the fact that France had a long history of selling Iraq military equipment and resisting UN sanctions against Iraq.38 It is now known that in fact French companies were helping Iraq skirt UN sanctions.39 …….. It is high time that the media broadened its focus beyond what Wilson didn’t find in Africa, and started looking into what Wilson didn’t say about Africa…..
Joe Wilson is like the proverbial onion; you just keep pulling back layer upon layer upon layer.
Seems every Politician has a sordid past. Please, somebody, find me a clean one… you can’t. And they all have friends, friends who have helped them along the way, friends who are still with them, wannabe friends in the Media, who will do their lying and bidding for them.
It seems small that we pick at this one piece of Wilson. His current set of “friends” need him right now more then he needs them. Why all of a sudden is he back on the Talking Head shows, when at the time he was discredited they and John F’n Kerry dropped him like a hot potoato? Because now “they” have a use for him.
Cripes AJ, you know all this better then I do. This is why most Americans just don’t follow Politics closely. They [Politicians] are all dirty. If Americans were interested in AGENDAS, they would follow.
{spit}
Hide The Cake
It seem’s to me that Harry Reid’s recent escapades on the Senate floor, demanding further inquiry into the Iraqi intelligence may come back to bite him in the a**.
…
Reading all this I think Scooter Libby will claim Federal Whistleblower status….
He was blowing the whistle on a rogue CIA trying to take down the president, Fitzy was charged with an investigation to protect this rogue CIA and the request to investigate came from the CIA itself…
Look at the leak about the secret CIA prisons… Clearly outed to hurt the president… This is rogue CIA for sure…
Ok, let’s be clear about this stuff before we start jumping to conclusions:
1. “…My bona fides justifying the invitation to the [CIA] meeting were the trip I had previously taken to Niger [in 1999] to look at other uranium related questions…” [Wilson,7/19/04, letter to SSCI]
http://www.alternet.org/stories/19271
2. “…The former ambassador had traveled previously to Niger on behalf of the CIA, also at the suggestion of his wife, to look into another matter not related to Iraq…” [SSCI report: Additional Views, P. 443]
3. There were at least two meeting in 1999 between Iraq and Niger:
Meeting A: Iraq’s Vatican ambassador visited Niger on 2/8/1999 as an envoy of the then President of Iraq to Mr. Ibrahim Bare, the then President of Niger. At the time Mayaki was Niger’s Prime Minister.
Meeting B: Iraqi official [Baghdad Bob?] and former Niger Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki meet in Algiers during the Organization of African Unity (OAU) conference in June 1999. For this meeting the SSCI report says: “[Wilson] said that Mayaki did meet with the Iraqi delegation but never discussed what was meant by “expanding commercial relations.” (Senate Intelligence report, page 44).
Speculation:
I had thought the first CIA/Wilson trip to Niger was probably to investigate a possible 1998 uranium deal between Iran/Niger [see p.44, SSCI report]. But it could very well be- as the UVA speech seems to imply- the Wilson went to Niger to due to the coup. As to the Wilson’s “to look at other uranium related questions” comment maybe the CIA was concerned about post-coup uranium security?
Thoughts?
Reg,
Thanks a load!
[…] Meanwhile AJ Strata who is the third part of the PLAMEGATE HOLY TRINITY – the other two being Mac’s Mind and Tom Maguire, talks some more about Joe Wilson, in Niger, in 1999, and you have to read it all. Seriously, read it all. Here is an excerpt: […]
Really great information, thanks. Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world, a landlocked Sub-Saharan nation, whose economy centers on subsistence crops, livestock, and some of the world’s largest uranium deposits. Drought cycles, desertification, a 3.3% population growth rate, and the drop in world demand for uranium have undercut the economy.
In late 2002, the administration was soliciting support for a policy of military force to disarm Iraq of weapons. The U.S. government had for some time alleged that Iraq both possessed and was continuing to develop weapons of mass destruction including nuclear, biological, and chemical arms. Among the allegations was that Iraq had attempted to purchase yellowcake.
in February 2002, three different American officials had made efforts to verify the reports. The deputy commander of U.S. Armed Forces Europe, Marine Gen. Carlton Fulford, went to Niger and met with the country’s president. He concluded that, given the controls on Niger’s uranium supply, there was little chance any of it could have been diverted to Iraq. His report was sent to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard Myers. The U.S. Ambassador to Niger, Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick, was also present at the meeting and sent similar conclusions to the State Department. At roughly the same time, the CIA sent Ambassador Joseph Wilson to investigate the claims himself. Wilson had been posted to Niger 14 years earlier, and throughout a diplomatic career in Africa he had built up a large network of contacts in Niger.
Wilson interviewed former prime minister of Niger, Ibrahim Assane Mayaki, who reported that he knew of no sales to Iraq. Mayaki did however recall that in June 1999 an Iraqi delegation had expressed interest in “expanding commercial relations”, which he had interpreted to mean yellowcake sales.[5] Ultimately, Wilson concluded that there was no way that production at the uranium mines could be ramped up or that the excess uranium could have been exported without it being immediately obvious to many people both in the private sector and in the government of Niger. He returned home and told the CIA that the reports were “unequivocally wrong”. The CIA passed this conclusion on to the White House, the FBI, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Defense Intelligence Agency.
In early October 2002, George Tenet called Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, asking Hadley to remove reference to the Niger uranium from a speech Bush was to give in Cincinnati on Oct. 7. This was followed up by a memo asking Hadley to remove another, similar line. Another memo was sent to the White House expressing the CIA’s view that the Niger claims were false; this memo was given to both Hadley and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
Further in March 2003, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released results of his analysis of the documents. Reportedly, it took IAEA officials only a matter of hours to determine that these documents were fake. Using little more than a Google search, IAEA experts discovered indications of a crude forgery, such as the use of incorrect names of Nigerian officials. As a result, the IAEA reported to the U.N. Security Council that the documents were “in fact not authentic.”
By late 2003, the trail of the documents had been partially uncovered. They were obtained by a “security consultant” (and former agent of the precursor agency to SISMI, the SID), Rocco Martino, from Italian military intelligence (SISMI).
Martino later recanted and said he had been misquoted, and that SISMI had not facilitated the meeting where he obtained the documents.
Martino, in turn, offered them to Italian journalist Elizabetta Burba. On instructions from her editor at Panorama, Burba offered them to the U.S. Embassy in Rome in October, 2002.
It is as yet unknown how Italian intelligence came by the documents and why they were not given directly to the U.S. In 2005, Vincent Cannistraro, the former head of counterterrorism operations at the CIA and the intelligence director at the National Security Council under Ronald Reagan, expressed the opinion that the documents had been produced in the United States and funneled through the Italians: “The documents were fabricated by supporters of the policy in the United States. The policy being that you had to invade Iraq in order to get rid of Saddam Hussein ….”
In an interview published April 7, 2005, Cannistraro was asked by Ian Masters what he would say if it was asserted that the source of the forgery was former National Security Council and State Department consultant Michael Ledeen. (Ledeen had also allegedly been a liaison between the American Intelligence Community and SISMI two decades earlier.) Cannistraro answered by saying: “you’d be very close.” [10]
In an interview on July 26, 2005, Cannistraro’s business partner and columnist for the “American Conservative” magazine, former CIA counter terrorism officer Philip Giraldi, confirmed to Scott Horton that the forgeries were produced by “a couple of former CIA officers who are familiar with that part of the world who are associated with a certain well-known neoconservative who has close connections with Italy.” When Horton said that must be Ledeen, he confirmed it, and added that the ex-CIA officers, “also had some equity interests, shall we say, with the operation. A lot of these people are in consulting positions, and they get various, shall we say, emoluments in overseas accounts, and that kind of thing.”
In a second interview with Horton, Giraldi elaborated to say that Ledeen and his former CIA friends worked with Ahmad Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress. “These people did it probably for a couple of reasons, but one of the reasons was that these people were involved, through the neoconservatives, with the Iraqi National Congress and Chalabi and had a financial interest in cranking up the pressure against Saddam Hussein and potentially going to war with him.”
In an explosive series of articles in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, investigative reporters Carlo Bonini and Giuseppe d’Avanzo report that Nicolo Pollari, chief of Italy’s military intelligence service, known as Sismi, brought the Niger yellowcake story directly to the White House after his insistent overtures had been rejected by the Central Intelligence Agency in 2001 and 2002. Sismi had reported to the CIA on October 15, 2001, that Iraq had sought yellowcake in Niger, a report it also plied on British intelligence, creating an echo that the Niger forgeries themselves purported to amplify before they were exposed as a hoax.
Pollari met secretly in Washington on September 9, 2002, with then–Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley. Their secret meeting came at a critical moment in the White House campaign to convince Congress and the American public that war in Iraq was necessary to prevent Saddam Hussein from developing nuclear weapons. What may be most significant to American observers, however, is La Repubblica’s allegation that the Italians sent the bogus intelligence about Niger and Iraq not only through traditional allied channels such as the CIA, but seemingly directly into the White House. That direct White House channel amplifies questions about the 16-word reference to the uranium from Africa in President Bush’s 2003 State of the Union address — which remained in the speech despite warnings from the CIA and the State Department that the allegation was not substantiated.
[…] Folks, I am so fortunate to celebrate our 100k visitor yesterday with a smashing 16+K visitors (thanks to World Net Daily) that same day. I am also cursed with all day meetings at NASA today Tuesday, November 8th). For all the wonderful folks who came by to visit yesterday, may I suggest some time in our archive? We have followed the Plame investigation for a while and the recent posts on uranium and the Wilson, plus Joe Wilson’s 1999 visit are a good start. There is also the theory Wilson divulged the very short lived cover fore Valerie at Brewster and Jennings, not to mention the speculation about a Wilson-CIA cover up. […]
Our CIA Has Done U.S. Wrong
The Plame Kerfuffle is the CIA’s Kerfuffle Amok!
It is not only “Kerfuffles” who believes that the CIA is an agency run amok, but also “Opinion Journal” at “The Wall Street Journal” – “I Spy With My Lit…
Hey Peeps im new. Great site. Based on those directly involved in pre-war assessments. I have to share
Iraq Pre-War Intelligence Report: Additional Views of Chairman Pat Roberts joined by Senator Christopher S. Bond, Senator Orrin G. Hatch
“The former Ambassador (Joe Wilson), either by design or through ignorance, gave the American people and, for that matter, the world a version of events that was inaccurate, unsubstantiated, and misleading. Surely, the Senate Intelligence Committee, which has unique access to all of the facts, should have been able to agree on a conclusion that would correct the public record. Unfortunately, we were unable to do so.”
Butler Report:
” It is accepted by all parties that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999. The British Government had intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium. Since uranium constitutes almost three-quarters of Niger’s exports, the intelligence was credible.”
I concur 100% with the beginning piece from AJ, was his name?
I found this site researching Joe Wilson and French connections. Following up on articles i posted below. My research lead me here. I like what i see and thought i would join in.
Thanx muxh
(In depth article of Wilson’s lies and more)
Podhoretz in Commentary Magazine
( French connection made)
American Thinker article
National Review article
BIG DOG,
Welcome.
Thanx for the welcome. Oh and thanx for fixing my nasty looking addresses into nice link descriptions…:)
I will be visiting daily to opine. Great site BTW. It looks as if you spend alot of time here. Nice job.
[…] Well, the Strata-Sphere has Wilson, in his own words, contradicting that fiction during a UVA event in 2003 where he clearly indicates he was in Niger after the coupe d’etat that year, but before the new President was elected. Wilson also says clearly he was working for the Niger government (his business trip) when he met with the prime minister who had taken control of Niger at the time: The only chance he [the prime minister] had was to get out and effect a change back to democratic rule as quickly as possible. I told him, I said, that you need to understand from my experience in Africa that your successor president probably will not be very comfortable with you standing watching his back after you have effected the transition. After all, your organization was responsible for the assassination of your predecessor shooting him in the back. Therefore, I said to him, I think that you probably ought to leave the country for a while. Those are pretty strong words to walk into a military barracks and tell a guy who has assassinated his predecessor and has assumed responsibility for his country. […]
Plame, Wilson, Saddam, Nuclear Weapons, Yellowcake
Just spent a good 2 hours reading a lot of terrific posts on the Plame Affair