Reading Novak

by emptywheel

I got into a rather unproductive discussion with Cecil about whether Novak's original leak article refuted Wilson's claims. The real point I was trying to make was that Novak's article had some remarkably balanced statements (as well as some really outlandish ones). In an effort to demonstrate what I mean--and perhaps discover more about the roles of Novak's sources--I'm going to separate the claims he makes according to their source, then speculate on the source for the remaining claims.

I will argue two points below:

• Novak received a total of three classified leaks (details about the Italian forgeries, details from Wilson's trip report, and Plame's identity); I think Armitage is responsible for the first of these leaks
• Armitage almost certainly provided extensive background challenging the Niger claims--which suggests his conversation with Novak was an attempt to refute White House spin, and certainly not to smear Plame

Click more to read my attempt to reconstruct Armitage's and Rove's conversations with Novak. All of these lines come directly from Novak's column, though I have shuffled the order. Keep reading to see how I derived these reconstructions and see more analysis.

Armitage's Reconstructed Novak Conversation

Wilson's mission was created after an early 2002 report by the Italian intelligence service about attempted uranium purchases from Niger, derived from forged documents prepared by what the CIA calls a "con man." This misinformation, peddled by Italian journalists, spread through the U.S. government. Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report.  [Bush's SOTU] attributed reports of attempted uranium purchases to the British government ... the British relied on forged documents

Rove's Reconstructed Novak Conversation

The CIA's decision to send retired diplomat Joseph C. Wilson to Africa ... was made routinely at a low level without Director George Tenet's knowledge. Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. ... Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger ...

The story, actually, is whether the administration deliberately ignored Wilson's advice, and that requires scrutinizing the CIA summary of what their envoy reported. Wilson's report ... was regarded by the CIA as less than definitive, and it is doubtful Tenet ever saw it. After eight days in the Niger capital of Niamey (where he once served), Wilson made an oral report in Langley that an Iraqi uranium purchase was "highly unlikely," though he also mentioned in passing that a 1988 Iraqi delegation tried to establish commercial contacts. The CIA report of Wilson's briefing remains classified. The Agency never before has declassified that kind of information, but the White House would like it to do just that now -- in its and in the public's interest.

All this was forgotten until reporter Walter Pincus revealed in the Washington Post June 12 that an unnamed retired diplomat had given the CIA a negative report. Not until Wilson went public on July 6, however, did his finding ignite the firestorm. Messages between Washington and the presidential entourage traveling in Africa hashed over the mission to Niger.

---

My Analysis

In other words, this totally unscientific exercise suggests that Armitage's conversation dismissed the Niger claims because they were always based on the crappy Niger forgeries. If I'm right, it seems that Armitage was trying to dismiss the importance of Wilson to disproving the Niger claims altogether. The story, for Armitage, was largely the same as Wilson's (that Bush had to have known better), but that they should have known from the start, when "con man" Rocco Martino, who had already been discredited by the CIA, delivered forgeries to an Italian journalist.

Note, by the time Armitage would have had this discussion (presumably July 7 or 8) he probably would have had a copy of the INR memo (he is named on the July 7 distribution cover sheet). The information about Italy and Niger might be the redacted information in the third and sixth paragraph. But there doesn't appear to be a place in the memo relating to the role of Rocco Martino (the first redaction appears out of context, while the second appears after the discussion of how the forgeries came into State). In other words, if I'm right about the content of Armitage's side of the conversation, he was relying on information beyond what was included in the INR memo.

Rove, on the other hand, appeared to be attempting to turn the story into one about Wilson's trip report, and the Mayaki allegation. He appears to have been leaking directly from the report. Certainly, he got Novak to make a case for the declassification of the trip report.

Rove also appears to have offered more details about the leak history. I attribute the messages from Africa comment to him since he is suspected to have spoken to Novak second (which makes it more likely that the differences of opinion within the Administration would be discussed). But Rove almost certainly provided Novak with a false story (though Rove may not have known that) about the genesis of the White House attack on Wilson.

---

How I Reconstructed the Conversations

Okay, here's how I cam up with those reconstructed conversations. First, here are the claims that are easy to tie to one of Novak's sources.

Richard Armitage and Karl Rove

Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report.

Karl Rove

The story, actually, is whether the administration deliberately ignored Wilson's advice, and that requires scrutinizing the CIA summary of what their envoy reported. The Agency never before has declassified that kind of information, but the White House would like it to do just that now -- in its and in the public's interest.

Joe Wilson

"I will not answer any question about my wife," Wilson told me.

"The story was never me," he told me, "it was always the statement in (Bush's) speech."

Bill Harlow

The CIA says its counter-proliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him. (Novak confirmed this was Harlow in 2005.)

---

And here are the Novak claims that are not definitively from one source or another.

Unknown Source

1. The CIA's decision to send retired diplomat Joseph C. Wilson to Africa ... was made routinely at a low level without Director George Tenet's knowledge.
2. Wilson's report ... was regarded by the CIA as less than definitive, and it is doubtful Tenet ever saw it.
3. [Bush's SOTU] attributed reports of attempted uranium purchases to the British government ... the British relied on forged documents
4. Messages between Washington and the presidential entourage traveling in Africa hashed over the mission to Niger.
5. Wilson's mission was created after an early 2002 report by the Italian intelligence service about attempted uranium purchases from Niger, derived from forged documents prepared by what the CIA calls a "con man." This misinformation, peddled by Italian journalists, spread through the U.S. government.
6. The White House, State Department and Pentagon, and not just Vice President Dick Cheney, asked the CIA to look into it.
7. After eight days in the Niger capital of Niamey (where he once served), Wilson made an oral report in Langley that an Iraqi uranium purchase was "highly unlikely," though he also mentioned in passing that a 1988 Iraqi delegation tried to establish commercial contacts.
8. CIA officials did not regard Wilson's intelligence as definitive, being based primarily on what the Niger officials told him and probably would have claimed under any circumstances.
9. The CIA report of Wilson's briefing remains classified.
10. All this was forgotten until reporter Walter Pincus revealed in the Washington Post June 12 that an unnamed retired diplomat had given the CIA a negative report. Not until Wilson went public on July 6, however, did his finding ignite the firestorm.

Before I discuss the likely sources for these claims, let me suggest there may be one more source for this article. In his October 1 column, Novak references an additional CIA source on Plame's identity:

While the CIA refuses to publicly define her status, the official contact says she is "covered" -- working under the guise of another agency. However, an unofficial source at the Agency says she has been an analyst, not in covert operations.

And in a 2005 column, he said:

According to CIA sources, she was brought home from foreign assignments in 1997, when Agency officials feared she had been "outed" by the traitor Aldrich Ames.

So by October 2003, Novak had talked to someone else at the CIA, and by August 2005, he may have talked to at least one more. There is nothing in either of these columns, however, that indicates he spoke to his "unofficial source" before the initial leak. (Also note, the October 1 column is where he used Valerie Flame, which may have come from this unofficial source.) I presume that this source is a CIA person friendly to--and perhaps implicated in--OVP's smear program.

Also note, for the purposes of this post, I will set aside my suspicion that Scooter Libby spoke to Novak about the Niger claim on July 2, but suffice it to say, if that suspicion is correct, some of the information I attribute to Rove may come from Libby.

Okay--here's my argument about the sources for the remaining claims:

The CIA's decision to send retired diplomat Joseph C. Wilson to Africa ... was made routinely at a low level without Director George Tenet's knowledge.

This is exactly what Tenet said in his mea culpa. Given that Rove's leakers have claimed he was involved in drafting Tenet's statement, I'll attribute this to Rove, though it could be the unofficial CIA source. This seems to slightly contradict Harlow's story, which is why I don't think he is the source.

Wilson's report ... was regarded by the CIA as less than definitive, and it is doubtful Tenet ever saw it.

This could be either Rove, Armitage, or the unofficial CIA source. Rove presumably would have learned of it via Libby's collection of all the CIA documents. Armitage would have learned about the CIA's response via the INR. Because of the comment about Wilson's trip report clearly attributed to the White House, however, I will assume Rove is the source.

[Bush's SOTU] attributed reports of attempted uranium purchases to the British government ... the British relied on forged documents

This one is really curious. Ari had admitted on July 7 that the SOTU claim was based on the Niger claim, so if Novak extrapolated from there, he may have concluded on his own that the British claim was sourced to the forged documents, too.

The President's statement was based on the predicate of the yellow cake from Niger.  The President made a broad statement.  So given the fact that the report on the yellow cake did not turn out to be accurate, that is reflective of the President's broader statement, David.  So, yes, the President' broader statement was based and predicated on the yellow cake from Niger.

Q  So it was wrong?

MR. FLEISCHER:  That's what we've acknowledged with the information on --

Q  The President's statement at the State of the Union was incorrect?

MR. FLEISCHER:  Because it was based on the yellow cake from Niger.

But Novak's argument is slightly different. He validates the claim that the SOTU derived from British claims. And the White House was still, at this time, asserting the British claim was valid. So this detail probably comes from someone else. It might come from an unofficial CIA source, though that source seems to be rather friendly to the OVP spin, so I doubt it. Which suggests that the assertion that the British claim derived from the forged documents probably came from Armitage.

Messages between Washington and the presidential entourage traveling in Africa hashed over the mission to Niger.

I'm more curious about why Novak included this than its source. The source could be either Rove or Armitage ... or both. Whoever shared this detail, it suggests an awareness on Novak's part that there was a squabble within the administration that involved those on Air Force One. Which might suggest (or might not) that the versions Armitage and Rove gave differed dramatically.

Wilson's mission was created after an early 2002 report by the Italian intelligence service about attempted uranium purchases from Niger, derived from forged documents prepared by what the CIA calls a "con man." This misinformation, peddled by Italian journalists, spread through the U.S. government.

Now, as I've pointed out before, this is a second leak of classified information. At least at the point the SSCI was declassified, the Italian source for the forgeries was still classified. The Italian connection had been made publicly by this point ... sort of, in this March 2003 WaPo article.

U.S. intelligence officials said they had not even seen the actual evidence, consisting of supposed government documents from Niger, until last month. The source of their information, and their doubts, officials said, was a written summary provided more than six months ago by the Italian intelligence service, which first obtained the documents.

But Novak's column appeared months before Seymour Hersh's Stovepipe provided substantive details of the Niger forgeries. And Novak is not just revealing that the original Niger intelligence came from Italy and from the forged documents, but he's suggesting he knows about Rocco Martino's role in peddling the forgeries. And that someone knew Martino to be a con man already in 2003. This is a leak revealing sources and methods--both Rocco and the SISMI connection.

This claim could come from Rove, the unofficial CIA source, or Armitage. But I strongly suspect it comes from Armitage. He would have more reason than Rove to know this level of detail about the forgeries. And this detail totally undermines the White House claims that the Niger claim was still (or ever) credible.

The White House, State Department and Pentagon, and not just Vice President Dick Cheney, asked the CIA to look into it.

As Cecil pointed out to me (thanks Cecil--it wasn't totally unproductive), this is precisely what the SSCI claims.

Officials from the CIA's DO Counterproliferation Division (CPD) told Committee staff that in response to questions from the Vice President's Office and the Departments of State and Defense on the alleged Iraq-Niger uranium deal, CPD officials discussed ways to obtain additional information.

And the SSCI cites CPD for this claim. Given that Harlow seems to have asked CPD about the genesis of Wilson's trip, I suspect this comes from Harlow (though it is not a detail Novak mentions in his spat with Harlow).

After eight days in the Niger capital of Niamey (where he once served), Wilson made an oral report in Langley that an Iraqi uranium purchase was "highly unlikely," though he also mentioned in passing that a 1988 Iraqi delegation tried to establish commercial contacts.

The first part of this claim likely came from Wilson's op-ed, citing as it does the eight days (and to Novak's credit, he doesn't emphasize the sweet mint tea that all the other wingnuts latch onto). But the second part of the claim--referring to the Mayaki part of his report--is another example of Novak having been leaked classified information, in this case from the CIA report on Wilson's trip.

Several people have asked my why Novak gets the detail here so wrong. He attributes the Mayaki comment to 1988 rather than the 1999 that we know the report describes. Given that Novak admits within this article that Wilson's report remains classified (see the last claim below), I suspect the date is mis-stated to hide its provenance.

This detail, like all of those relating to Wilson's trip, I attribute to Rove. Novak notes that the White House is trying to declassify "the CIA summary of what their envoy reported" so I assume that all references to the CIA trip report come from Rove. 

CIA officials did not regard Wilson's intelligence as definitive, being based primarily on what the Niger officials told him and probably would have claimed under any circumstances.

This might come either from the CIA report on Wilson's trip, or from the INR, so it may come from either Armitage or Rove (or even Harlow).

The CIA report of Wilson's briefing remains classified.

This seems to directly relate to the CIA report, so I attribute it to Rove.

All this was forgotten until reporter Walter Pincus revealed in the Washington Post June 12 that an unnamed retired diplomat had given the CIA a negative report. Not until Wilson went public on July 6, however, did his finding ignite the firestorm.

This is another really intriguing detail. It attempts to claim that Wilson's trip was totally forgotten until June 12, which we know not to be the case. Someone in the Administration used Wilson's trip report to support the Niger claim in February 2003. Further, Novak's comment suggests the White House reaction (or rather, the "firestorm"--curiously, Judy uses the same word to describe the leak) started only in response to Wilson and not, as we now know to be the case, in response to Pincus' article.

Now, this almost certainly comes from Rove, given the detail of White House reactions to Wilson. You could argue, I suppose, that Rove was just ignorant of the February use of Wilson's trip report and of the June work-up on Wilson (indeed, that is precisely what Rove seems to have argued in his testimony). But given the direction of the case, so far, I find it interesting that Rove is trying to spin its response to Wilson as just a legitimate response to his op-ed. In some ways, Wilson's op-ed provided the White House the post hoc excuse for attacking an Administration critic. And in this case, that's the story Rove was telling.

Updated: Totally reorganized the post, but the content remains the same.

Updated: Some tweaks in the order of the reconstructed conversations.

Comments

[emptywheel]

I'd like to move discussion of today's NYDN article on Armitage up here, so I'm going to copy Jeff's comment from the last Plame thread:

It's weird and unpersuasive. First off, you know this is bs coming from Team Powell:

Unlike Rove and Libby, Armitage appears to have tried to dissuade reporters from writing about her.

This is total bs, unless the idea is that Armitage realized he had screwed up and went back to Novak to try to get him not to publish. Or it's misleading casuistry explaining away the to me damning fact that he talked with Woodward twice in 2004-2005 and refused to let Woodward publish on the matter - which is totally irrelevant to blowing Plame's cover in 2003. Furthermore, the case can be made that Rove was trying to dissuade Cooper from writing about Wilson at all and hence about Plame by extension - that was at least part of the point of privately discrediting Wilson to Cooper. Furthermore, it's quite clearly the motivation of Pincus' White House source. So this is some kind of Armitage-friendly slant, nothing more.

Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald recently had to sneak Armitage into a Washington courthouse to get past reporters - a sign of his value in the case, according to one source.

Well, that's interesting. But I was under the impression that that wasn't allowed, that the judge had ruled that grand jury witnesses and subjects had to walk up the front steps. Maybe - and I'm not kidding here - Armitage walked up the front steps at 2 a.m. and then hung out in Fitzgerald's office until 9:30, then left at 7 p.m. or some such. Or maybe it's more bs.

"Rich has been cooperating with Fitzgerald since day one," said another source, who has close ties to Armitage. "He was one of the first people to offer his testimony."

Yeah, he offered his testimony and it was fulle of holes and possibly lies, as he didn't tell Fitzgerald about outing Plame to Woodward until after Libby was indicted. Again, maybe Armitage forgot - though I seriously doubt it. If he didn't forget, this is pure and simple bs.

But then here's the most intriguing item:

Even if Rove escapes indictment, he could still be forced to resign for talking about Plame with a Time magazine reporter.

"People don't seem to want to talk about the possibility that Karl could be named an unindicted co-conspirator," a third source close to the case said. "Can an unindicted co-conspirator remain at the White House? Personally, I don't think so."

Since the amount of bs in this article is large, I'm keeping my powder dry, as Steve Clemons likes to say and not always do. And this just may be another move in the ongoing war between now-former State folks and the White House. But if Rove is an unindicted co-conspirator, who's the indicted one? Again, I don't put a lot of stock in this part of this bs report. But it will be fun to see what else reporters come up with.

Posted by: Jeff | May 20, 2006 at 11:54

[emptywheel]

I agree that some of this reads like Armitage's friends spinning. And I agree that the "co-conspirator" argument is kind of bogus, unless it relates to the cover-up conspiracy, in which case it would almost certainly not relate to Armitage or the leak to Cooper.

But I do think, given my reconstruction here, that it's possible that Armitage went to Fitz and said, "I spoke to Novak, mentioned Plame, and leaked information on sources and methods relating to the Niger documents. I'd like to deal."

We obviously still don't know details about how damaging the Woodward conversation was.

[Jeff]

My quick current take on Armitage: the NYDN makes it sound like he has testified twice since LIbby's indictment. I think he went in after Woodward came to him, and Fitzgerald basically had him on the hook, and Armitage is cooperating. At least that saves my hypothesis that Armitage may be in legal trouble.

[emptywheel]

Agree. If the sneak the source in recently is right, then my double March testimony is wrong.

[obsessed]

1) How much validity does each of you ascribe to the theory that Armitage would not have taken a high level position with a large corporation unless he knew he wasn't in legal jeopardy and that his public reputation would emerge from the Plame affair largely unscathed?

2) The term "Team Powell" is intriguing. What would you say are its goals and liabilities?

[emptywheel]

I believe the point is he could not. Securities law says felons can't be board members or something like that, so they would have had to make sure he wasn't about to be a felon.

I don't think Armitage is in legal jeopardy. I don't think it's that difficult to explain his delayed reporting on Woodward (particularly since the only claims about Woodward's earlier attempts to go public seem to relate to publication, not legal release. And I thin if Armitage came forward and said, "I leaked sources and methods information about Niger" then Fitz might be really willing to deal.

Also note, I wouldn't be surprised if part of the referral from CIA had to do with the declassification of Wilson's trip report, particulalry if CIA refused to declassify it, and the WH declassified it anyway; Fitz would have a pretty significant interest in hiding the interest in the trip report, as the chain of conspiracy is almost certainly more clear with taht.

[Snive]

>'Because it was based on the yellowcake from Niger.'

Some points that may have played into 'the speech' thing:

Wilson was a Peace Corps volunteer.

Chris Matthews was a Peace Corps Volunteer

Plame was leaked by Aimes, a Peace Corps Volunteer and operations officer for CIA.

Plame married a returned Peace Corps volunteer.

Bush mentioned he had doubled the size of the CIA and planned the same for Peace Corps.

Peace Corps laws regarding the five year law banning the volunteer from intelligence employment may or may not have been changed before and after the speech. Aimes' trainer at CIA may or may not have retired into a Peace Corps Volunteer position.

The Director of CIA quit right after the The Director of Peace Corps announced he was moving on the UN work.

>'Wilson's mission was created after an early 2002 report by the Italian intelligence service about attempted uranium purchases from Niger, derived from forged documents prepared by what the CIA calls a "con man." This misinformation, peddled by Italian journalists, spread through the U.S. government'

Wilson was a paid contractor sent by the Direcorate of Operations. Plame admitted she was an operations officer, paramiliarily trained at 'the farm' in "Vanity Fair." The intent, beyond spreading disinformation into the US government, may have been to use Wilson further after he submitted his report. The 'threat,' at that point, would have been from the Directorate of Operations, who had used others like Wilson in the past. Other motivations in the Directorate of Operations would have been considered unimportant and his wife did work there.......that would be insurance. Plame was leaked again, but not by any of the intended targets, it was a goal to out others in the community as seen by her admission with this intent having failed everywhere, except, maybe, advisors - Plame was known for this.

>So, it was'nt really an advisor and I doubt it's Libby.

>Fitz is a crminial conspiracy prosecutor who passed on his job, 'looked the other way.'

[&y]

Great post. Random thought: Does anyone like Fleitz as Novak's "unofficial CIA source?" Fleitz was both CIA and Bolton CoS at the time, right?

[emptywheel]

&y

I always like Fleitz in the role of the smarmy CIA guy doing Dick's bidding for him. And yes, he was WINPAC and Bolton's COS. Though now he has apparently moved to the House Intelligence Committee.

[Jim E.]

Is Armitage now represented by Luskin? Cuz that NY Daily News piece reeks of spin upon spin, as Jeff demonstrated. Reminds me of the Rove-friendly leaks of months past--as in putting lipstick on a pig. Something is weird with that story, particularly if there's any truth to the claim that Armitage was snuck into the GJ room. Is Fitz that concerned about protecting an innocent accused? Sounds strange to me.

I wonder why we are hearing about Armitage in today's NYDN. Did Steve Clemons's posts shake the tree, and inspire reporters to chase after Armitage? Or does Armitage's team know that Fitz is going to disclose some peculiar information (in a legal brief, a new indictment?) that might raise a few more eyebrows in Armitage's direction? (And if not from Fitz, maybe it is an upcoming Waas article that could cause Armitage some embarrassment?) People following this case closely already assume Armitage was Novak's and Woodward's source, but I wonder if Armitage's team is pre-emptively pushing him into the story now in anticipation of an upcoming news cycle in the near future. After all, Team Armitage has been notably tight-lipped until this week.

[Marilyn Garis]

Doesn't letting US taxpayers foot the bill while Karl Rove, a White House staffer works for the Republican Party to maintain their majorities comprehensively violate the Hatch Act?

The way his new position is described it sure sounds that way?

Who, is paying Karl Rove’s legal bills?
Is it the American taxpayers?
Has anybody looked into that - or is it classified too?

[emptywheel]

I think in this case Armitage is represented by Wilkerson. Don't know why, but both Clemons' rebuttal and this sound like him--a little ham-handed with the media but oh so earnest.

There's also a little confusion with sources (go figure--on the Plame case?) It says two people were the source for the general "Armitage was trying to dissuade people from writing about her." Then the one I think is Wilkerson, who refers to Armitage as Rich (though don't some of his friends call him Dick?). And then it cites one more as the "third" source.

I think it may be largely correct (except the unindicted co-conspirator). I think Armitage has cooperated (leaving aside the gaping Woodward hole) and I think he was trying to get people to stop writing abotu Plame (though I think he was trying to get them to write about something else--the Niger forgery story).

I also have been wondering in the last two days--who is Pincus' source, Dick or Rich?

[&y]

emptywheel -- smarmy CIA guy doing Dick's bidding

Love it. That quote holds the essence of my thought process: "Hmm... yeah. Emptywheel is right--Novak talked to some sort of smarmy-sounding, Dick-friendly guy at the CIA... and WINPAC are the smarmiest, Dick-friendliest ones in the CIA heap... so umm, how about Fleitz? Oooh--and by calling him a "CIA source" at the time of a dual-posting with Bolton (Bolton!) lends a delightful odor of 'former hill staffer' to whole thing. Not to mention that whole business about the CPD secure-documents vault. Must ask the wizards of TNH about this."

Snive -- What are you driving at with all the Peace Corps stuff? Am I jumping in on the continuation of a discussion that started elsewhere? Because I don't follow. And as a returned Peace Corps volunteer, I try to keep up on the charges leveled against us. (I also remain miffed that the CIA never tried to recruit me--not while in country, not after one year, and, as of today, not after 5+ years--despite the well-above-average contacts I'd developed with the Russian criminal underworld.) And where did you hear that the 5-year ban might have changed?

[emptywheel]

Damnit, &y, do you have to sic the NSA on us two days in a row?

And in case they ask, it's rhubarb pie.

[emptywheel]

Marilyn

It's a good question. Though mostly he's paying for Luksin to leak.

But Rove has a fair amount of money on his own (as distinct from, as I understand it, Libby). So he may be footing his own bill ... so far.

[&y]

My thinking is, now that I've sicced them on TNH once, I have to keep it up forever. Otherwise the not-mining, not-trolling, not-confirmed, not-denied, very-limited algorithm will detect my lack of suspicious activity and flag it as even suspiciouser activity. Up is the new down, dontcha know.

And with that, I apologize. I'm sorry. No more suspicious talk from this IP address, tovarishi er... comrades er... folks er... my fellow Americans.

[Jeff]

I defer to emptywheel on all questions having to do with corporations. She clearly knows much more about them than I do.

I am intrigued by the suggestion that Armitage confessed early on to the Niger stuff but emphasized the Plame thing really was a casual aside, and so in the context of this investigation, Fitzgerald let him slide early on, with Armitage being cooperative. (And I find the broad lines of who said what to Novak here persuasive, though I've got some specific different suspicions.) But if that's so, and if Armitage has testified twice since Libby was indicted - even just the latter fact alone - suggests to me that Armitage had, shall we say, extra incentive to tell what he knows this second set of grand jury appearances around. Now, it's possible that Armitage went in just to talk about his own role in outing Plame to Woodward, then Woodward was in, then Fitzgerald wanted Armitage back in to follow up. But I doubt that was all there was to it. On my scenario, Armitage was in trouble, he came in, told about his leak to Woodward, and then came back to provide more helpful evidence to the grand jury about the roles of others.

I'm just not getting this:

I don't think it's that difficult to explain his delayed reporting on Woodward

So what's the explanation? The significance of Woodward talking to Armitage about going public twice in 2004-2005 has nothing to do with whether it was about publishing or going to Fitzgerald. The point is that it means Armitage cannot claim he forgot about the conversation with Woodward, which would be one easy explanation. What else is there as an explanation? Fitzgerald didn't ask about telling other reporters? I find that inconceivable. Perhaps he limited his questioning to post-July 6? Less inconceivable, though I still doubt it; if that's it, it may mean Armitage is out of legal jeopardy, it certainly doesn't qualify him for being real helpful with the investigation. The only other explanation I can imagine, not for why Armitage didn't disclose the Woodward conversation, but for why Armitage is not facing perjury charges, is that Armitage went in to Fitzgerald on, say, November 1, told his tale, and explained to Fitzgerald that he was doing this voluntarily, not for fear of being revealed by Woodward, because, after all, we're talking Bob Woodward here, and if Armitage had commanded Woodward to keep quiet about their conversation, the guy on the receiving end of Deep Throat certainly would have.

Other than that, I think Armitage went into Fitzgerald, Fitzgerald put the legal screws to him, and Armitage got a lot more cooperative.

Team Powell? I take it their main goal right now is to pin the blame for Iraq on DoD and Cheney, and make their main man look as little like the willing stooge he was. With regard to the Plame case right now, I agree with Jim E's suggestion. I think they obviously knew at some point that the fact that Armitage blew Plame's cover with not one but two reporters, including the Prince of Darkness himself, would come out, and they had a media strategy for dealing with that eventuality. (If there's one thing Team Powell has been good at, it's media strategy, except when it counted, and I think that shows where they really stood on the war.) Why they chose Clemons' post as that moment, when TNH and JOM had both pretty definitively shown that Armitage was Woodward and Novak's source, is not clear to me, and after that WaPo story on the Vanity Fair story that included Bradlee's fingering Armitage, is not entirely clear to me, but the obvious explanation is that this was the first time that there was real buzz that Armitage was in legal trouble. That would need to be shut down asap.

As for Pincus' source, unless he's pulling a Woodward and just flat out lying in his characterization of the source, Pincus has said s/he's White House. So it's not Armitage. I've lost track of the reasons for my probability ranking, but I think the leading candidates have to be Cathie Martin, Dick Cheney, and Ari Fleischer (who has risen as a candidate recently, since it looks like he had something to be worried about). The advantage to it being Fleischer is that that would salvage at least the tiniest bit of what was easily the most ingenious hypothesis regarding 1x2x6 - Swopa's.

[tnhblog]

Novak is being disingenuous:

So, what was "wrong" with my column as Harlow claimed? There was nothing incorrect. He told the Post reporters he had "warned" me that if I "did write about it, her name should not be revealed." That is meaningless. Once it was determined that Wilson's wife suggested the mission, she could be identified as "Valerie Plame" by reading her husband's entry in "Who's Who in America."

Harlow said to the Post that he did not tell me Mrs. Wilson "was undercover because that was classified." What he did say was, as I reported in a previous column, "she probably never again would be given a foreign assignment but that exposure of her name might cause 'difficulties.'" According to CIA sources, she was brought home from foreign assignments in 1997, when Agency officials feared she had been "outed" by the traitor Aldrich Ames.

I have previously said that I never would have written those sentences if Bill Harlow, then CIA Director George Tenet or anybody else from the Agency had told me that Valerie Plame Wilson's disclosure would endanger herself or anybody.

In other words, nowhere does Novak deny that he was warned not to reveal Plame's name. He merely contends that such a warning was "meaningless" because anyone could look up Wilson's name in Who's Who, a blatant attempt to obfuscate the issue because, of course, Who's Who does not mention that Plame was an undercover CIA agent. What Novak does claim is that Harlow informed him, perhaps in addition to warning him, that publishing the information would cause "difficulties." But he published the information anyways because he did not think it would endanger anyone after having been explicitly given the warning not to reveal her identity and being told that it would cause difficulties. Obfuscation is consciousness of guilt. In my opinion Novak should be prosecuted.

[Mimikatz]

Chatty Cathie Martin certainly talked willingly to Seymour Hersh in that period, per the stovepipe article. I was surprised when EW recently related those parts of the article, because I didn't really appreciate her significance when I first read the article.

[Tom Maguire]

On behalf of Jim E, I have to read the original post under protest - Robert Novak on July 14 practically plagiarizes Andrea Mitchell from July 8, which really ought to be addressed.

Andrea, July 8:

MITCHELL: Well, people at the CIA say that it's not going to be George Tenet; and, in fact, that high-level people at the CIA did not really know that it was false, never even looked at Joe Wilson's verbal report or notes from that report, didn't even know that it was he who had made this report, because he was sent over by some of the covert operatives in the CIA at a very low level, not, in fact, tasked by the vice president.

Novak, lead paragraph:

WASHINGTON -- The CIA's decision to send retired diplomat Joseph C. Wilson to Africa in February 2002 to investigate possible Iraqi purchases of uranium was made routinely at a low level without Director George Tenet's knowledge. Remarkably, this produced a political firestorm that has not yet subsided.

And eventually, Novak uses the word "operative".

And Mitchell claims a CIA source.

I will hold my breath until blue until this gets reflected in the analysis. On behalf of Jim E, of course, he noticed this.

[emptywheel]

Okay, you can have it Tom. Do you want me to update the post?

The reason I put it in Rove's camp is because that is exactly what Ari Fleischer was saying. It was a talking point. Was it a talking point Tenet or McLauglin bought off on? Who knows? But I assume anything out of Ari's mouth that week (with the exception of some of his admissions on 7/7) was a talking point that Rove was involved in.

[pollyusa]

On Woodward's attempt get a release from his source. Three points

1. Woodward says he called his source after the indictment, but I think its possible Woodward called his source sometime during indictment week as well (he told his editor on Monday 10/24, indictment on Friday) when he was in "incredibly aggressive reporting mode". It's also possible that Woodward's source talked to Fitzgerald during indictment week.

Another reason I think Woodward probably called his source during indictment week is the comment from Isikoff on CNN on 11/27/05. "I talked to a source at the White House late this afternoon who told me that Bob is going to have a bombshell in tomorrow's paper identifying the Mr. X source who is behind the whole thing".

The WH knew that Woodward was running amok.

2. There are several references to Woodward reminding his source about the timing of their conversation, which makes me think that when Woodward tried to get his source's release the timing wasn't an issue.

3. Woodward says in the CNN interview that he wanted his source "to give me some information about this so I could put something in the newspaper or a book". Woodward says he wanted information, not that he wanted to tell about his conversation with the source.

I didn't want to clutter your thread EW. The links to Woodward's comments about his source are here. There are a couple I don't think Jeff found.

[pollyusa]

What I have on the public record regarding Woodward's source's testimony.

Powell could be talking about Armitage or Grossman here regarding "And some of us in the State Department had some knowledge of this matter".

POWELL: I only know right now what I read in the paper. I appeared before the grand jury, the State Department. . And we all immediately made ourselves available to the Justice Department and the FBI even before the prosecutor was...
CNN 10/17/05

Asked if this was the first time his source had spoken with Fitzgerald in the investigation, Woodward said "I'm not sure. It's quite possibly not the first time."
TIME 11/18/05

A lawyer in the case said Woodward's source had not previously testified before a grand jury in the leak case.
Reuters 11/18/05

Woodward, who was questioned by Fitzgerald on Monday, has refused to reveal the source's name publicly, but a person familiar with the investigation said the source had testified earlier in the case.
WaPo 11/19/05

Crazy link for the WaPo...all there is.

Doesn't really clear up how many times Woodward's source tesified, but the Powell comment is interesting.

[pollyusa]

Tom,

Mitchell had this " at a very low level, not, in fact, tasked by the vice president."

You really think the CIA was covering for Cheney? No way. It more likely Mitchell is spilling everything she knows and conflating sources. In fact the very low level part and the not Cheney part are in the same breath.

Novak himself in his 7/14/03 column gives the CIA version as

The CIA says its counter-proliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him

Pincus has it that

Over the past months, however, the CIA has maintained that Wilson was chosen for the trip by senior officials in the Directorate of Operations counterproliferation division (CPD)
WaPo 8/11/05

[QuickSilver]

Great Plameology from emptywheel, Jeff, pollyusa, and Tom Maguire.

pollyusa, I agree that the White House knew Bob Woodward was running amok in the week before the indictment, and he was set up on Larry King Live with that "bombshell" challenge.

Tom Maguire, I did not know before what Andrea Mitchell said on July 8th, and what she said was telling. Anyone have a good reason why Cheney couldn't be her sole source?