At What Price?
In late 2002 and early 2003, Vice President Dick Cheney pressed the case for a war with Iraq. His reasoning: Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was building a nuclear weapon, and the security of the United States, and the world, could not tolerate a nuclear Iraq. Cheney, and other members of the Bush administration including Secretary of State Colin Powell; presented a devastating case to prove that Iraq was close to having nuclear bombs. It was clear and convincing; and it was false.
The evidence included Iraq acquiring “yellow cake” uranium from Nigeria. Yellow cake uranium can be quickly processed into weapons grade uranium. Cheney and Powell used the acquisition of yellow cake by Iraq as prime evidence, with Powell sharing it in a high profile presentation to the United Nations. Joseph Wilson, an American diplomat with career experience both in Africa and in Iraq, was sent to Nigeria to investigate. He returned with a clear conclusion: Iraq had NOT acquired yellow cake uranium.
This did not go along with Vice President Cheney’s program. Wilson followed his conclusions up with an article in the New York Times, “What I didn’t Find in Africa.” This was the first chink in the armor of the Bush rationale for the second Iraq War, a war the current President has stated shouldn’t have happened.
Cheney and his Vice Presidential Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, were “hardball” politicians. When Colin Powell began to have doubts about the information he used to make the US case for invasion of Iraq at the United Nations, he was pushed out of the decision-making loop. Powell ultimately resigned, and the more amenable National Security Advisor, Condolezza Rice became Secretary. But what would they do about Wilson?
He had done some work for Democratic administrations. But his real vulnerability was his wife, Valerie Plame. She was a career CIA agent, but her career and identity were undercover. How to get to Wilson? “Out” his wife, and destroy her career.
A call was made to syndicated journalist Robert Novak (of the famous Evans and Novak pair that published for forty-five years) from a White House official. While no one was ever convicted of the crime of revealing the covert agent, Scooter Libby was convicted of making false statements, obstructing justice, and perjury. He was fined $250,000 and sentenced to thirty months in jail. His sentence was later commuted by President Bush, and just recently he was fully pardoned by President Trump.
Novak claimed that while he was given Plame’s name as a CIA operative, he was not told that she was a “NOC” (an agent with Non-Official Cover.) Novak never revealed his source other than saying “high White House offiicals.”
In the spring and summer of 2016, the FBI received information that members of the Trump campaign were reaching out to Russian intelligence. While we don’t know all of the FBI’s sources of information, we do know how they gained information about two of the four campaign members. Foreign policy advisor Carter Page was being wiretapped under a FISA warrant. While the wiretap order is still secret, it is known that Page had been involved with a Russian spy ring in New York in 2013. Page was interviewed by the FBI at that time, and was never charged. However, the information that Page was questioned found it way to Russian intelligence, raising questions about whether Page was still in contact with them. This served as one of the grounds for the investigation.
George Papadoupolos was also an advisor to the campaign. In a drunken evening with the Australian Ambassador in London, Papadoupolos bragged about the Russians having Clinton and Democratic National Committee emails. This is prior to the FBI, Clinton, or the DNC even knowing they’d been hacked, and months before the first emails were released on the web. The Australian Ambassador notified the FBI about the comments, and two FBI agents were sent to interview him. As part of the investigation, the FBI (and CIA) had a confidential informant make contact and gain more information from both Papadoupolos and Page.
In the current melee, with the FBI and Special Counsel Mueller investigating the Trump campaign and the President; some are making every effort to discredit their results. As part of the campaign, identifying information about the confidential informant has been leaked, enough information for some to name him, breaking his “cover.”
The FBI was investigating to see if a major US Presidential campaign was being infiltrated by Russian Intelligence. They used national security investigative tools, including FISA warrants and National Security subpoenas to find out what, if any, impact Russian Intelligence was having. The confidential informant was part of that investigation.
Had Russian been trying to infiltrate the Clinton campaign, there would be outrage. Had they gained a foothold, and perhaps even cooperation by the Clinton campaign, there would have been “hell to pay.” We would expect law enforcement to do what was needed to find out. But because Trump has created a false narrative about an FBI “cabal” trying to de-legitimatize the Presidency, there is a portion of the American electorate who are allowing them to “get away” with possible Russian cooperation.
But more importantly, they are getting away with de-legitimatizing the FBI and other intelligence agencies, weakening public trust in their findings and their abilities. And now, there is acceptance of “outing” covert agents; without concern about the other investigations that could be compromised. The damage done may well last far beyond this administration.
