2003 - 2004
January 2003 - ElBaradei of the IAEA tells UN Security Council (UNSC) there is no new info regarding Iraq's nuclear weapons program. IAEA says tubes are for rockets. Tubes story appears on page A10 of NYT and says IAEA is "challenging" key evidence behind rationale for going to war, also reports INR & DOE view that tubes were for rockets. Gallup poll shows support for war is at 52%. 1/28 - SOTU and the 16 words. WH working on Powell's speech tells Intel agencies it seems weak on nukes, Myers asks agencies for more evidence, WINPAC doubles effort on Niger, speech gets heavy input from NSC and Libby. CIA spokesperson, Harlow, tells Sy Hersh that CIA did not get actual forged documents until early 2003.
Early 2003 - Patrick Tyler of NYT hires Sarah Khalil to be NYT office manager in Kuwait. Kahlil is Chalabi's neice. Kahlil is dismissed on May 20, 2003.
February 2003 - 2/4 - IAEA given oral briefing on Niger documents. 2/5 - Powell's Powerpoint presentation to the UNSC. Tubes (WINPAC line, not DOE or his own State Dept line), magnets, anthrax, and evil are the main themes. Uranium from Niger is not mentioned. 2/6 - IAEA given Niger documents. 2/7 - UK dossier quoted by Powell is reported to have been plagiarized, some info more than a decade old. 50,000 UK troops are in Kuwait. 2/11 - Goldsmith, UK Atty Gen, meets with Gonzales, Ashcroft, William Taft, and US SAO (Powell, Rumsfeld, Rice) legal advisers where it is determined a 2nd resolution is not necessary.
March 2003 - 3/7 - ElBaradei tells the UNSC that the Niger documents are forged [IAEA says had been requesting documents since Fall of 2002 when UK released dossier]. 3/16 - Cheney on MTP says ElBaradei is wrong, and goes on to attack IAEA credibility, adding "We believe [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted his nuclear weapons program.". State Dept offficial who had seen the documents is asked to comment about the forgeries, and replies simply "We fell for it."
[This is the statement that sets Wilson off. Wilson is asked about the tubes and the forgeries during an appearance on CNN. Wilson says US needs to look at their files.]
US invades Iraq. Jay Rockefeller asks FBI to investigate the Niger forgeries. Some IAEA officials suspect M16 involved in forgeries through their contacts in Rome [M16 had been part of anti-Iraq PR campaign wars in late 1990s, said to have funneled info into UK press and elsewhere. A Senate Intelligence Committee staffer claimed UK initially circulated the forgeries].
Wilson spent the weeks following the Novak article talking to members of the press in an attempt to figure out what was going on. Many of the reporters spoke to him off the record. Wilson was told that Libby or the VP's office had started a "workup" on him following this CNN appearance. He was told Elliot Abrams may have been involved in the workup. He was told Libby began speaking openly about Wilson, calling him a fucking "playboy", that he's gone on a "boondoggle arranged by his CIA wife" and that he was a Dem and Gore supporter to boot. According to the reporters the info was shared with Rove, who then began to circulate it through the administration and neocon circles. Two of the reporters told Wilson that when Rove learned of the Corn article outlining the illegalities Rove turned on Libby and Cheney, saying they were responsible for the mess. In October when WH rules out Rove and leave Abrams and Libbby only semi-covered as leakers in October the reporters tell Wilson this indicates the WH is trying to narrow their defense in order to shield Rove, i.e. that Rove didn't know so it wasn't a crime.
Wilson speculates in the book that the leakers may be Hannah or Wurmser.
On July 8th a friend of Wilson's runs into Novak on the street. Novak doesn't know person is a friend of Wilson's. Friend asks Novak about Niger trip and Novak says it's a bunch of nothing. Friend asks what he thinks of Wilson, and Novak says Wilson's "an asshole. The CIA sent him. His wife, Valerie, works for the CIA. She's a WMD specialist. She sent him." Friend tells Wilson of the conversation immediately. Wilson left a message for Novak, which Novak returned on July 10th. Wilson explained he'd heard from this friend, and didn't like Novak speaking of his wife to complete strangers. Novak apologized then asked if Wilson would confirm what Novak had heard from the CIA (that Plame was CIA). Wilson said no. Novak apologized again, and the conversation ended. When Wilson read Novak's 7/14 article and saw he'd used 2 SAOs as sources he called Novak for clarification of the discrepency. Novak said he'd misspoken on the 10th.
Wilson fielded numerous calls from reporters during the next week -- all citing WH sources saying the story wasn't about the 16 words, but really about Plame and Wilson.
April 2003 - Baghdad falls.
May 2003 - 5/1 - "Mission Accomplished" banner. 5/? - Kristof and Wilson are panelists at a Dem Policy Committe where Wilson briefly discusses Niger without revealing he was Ambassador. Kristof asks if he can write story about it, Wilson agrees. 5/6 - Nicholas Kristof writes about Niger, not naming Wilson, but describing his trip. John Warner, Durbin, and Graham call for public hearings.
June 2003 - 6/4 - Warner backtracks from holding public hearings after Cheney visits a GOP senate luncheon. 6/12 - Wapo reports on Wilson's trip without naming him. 6/12 - CIA rejects blame for "16 words" in SOTU. 6/13 - Wapo reports the CIA cabled the White House and other government agencies in March 2002 that said the claim had been denied by officials from the central African country. "Maybe someone knew down in the bowels of the agency," Rice said on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday, "but no one in our circles knew that there were doubts and suspicions that this might be a forgery." 6/19 - John Judis & Spencer Ackerman write scathing article in The New Republic (TNR), mentions Niger without naming Wilson.
July 2003 - 7/6 - Wilson op-ed. 7/7 - WH admits SOTU and 16 words were wrong. 7/10 - Rumsfeld dismisses concerns over intel. 7/11 - Powell on CNN says too much being made over SOTU. 7/11 - Cliff May (NRO) writes about Wilson and Plame, but doesn't mention Plame is with the CIA, instead focusing on the political angle of how Wilson was chosen. 7/11 - Tenet claims responsibility for 16 words getting into SOTU. 7/14 - Rice on CNN says 16 words dispute is enormously overblown. Rice says VP and SAO were NOT briefed on Niger findings. 7/14 - Novak column. 7/17 - Corn column. 7/17 - Cooper's article in Time. 7/17 - Timothy Noah in Slate says Robert Joseph responsible for the 16 words. 7/22 - Tim Phelps & Knut Royce quote a SIO - there are people elsewhere in gov't trying to make the story about Plame & Wilson. 7/27 - Wapo reports that SAO says Rice did not read NIE. INC contract with Burson-Marsteller PR firm expires.
August 2003 - 8/4 - Jack Straw acknowledges that CIA told UK that no evidence Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger. UK Ministers insist UK has separate intel on this issue. 8/9 - Guardian - The FBI may launch an inquiry into whether the White House revealed the identity of a covert CIA official to punish her husband for blowing the whistle on President Bush for making misleading claims about the Iraqi nuclear programme, officials in Washington said yesterday. 8/10 - Gellman and Pincus of Wapo report on the WHIG.
WHIG ordered a series of white papers, the first of which was not published. Its title - "A Grave and Gathering Danger: Saddam Hussein's Quest For Nuclear Weapons". According to Wapo the preparation of this white paper was done primarily by Wilkinson. Gathered intel and press clippings and conferred with NSC and VP's office. Drafts were circulated. Later stages of this white paper coincided with the NIE. Wilkinson said Joseph and Rice felt WP not strong enough. The 5th draft of the WP was obtained by Wapo. Language is similar to speeches and talking points used by Bush and AO. The Draft WP precedes other known instances in which the administration claims Irag is seeking uranium. Other errors & exaggerations were repeated or had their first mention in the WP.
September 2003 - 9/26 - CIA requests DOJ investigate the outing of Plame. Ashcroft requires FBI to sign non-disclosure agreements. Ashcroft begins to receive briefings on the investigation (Christopher Wray and John Dion), including Libby's notes detailing the inner workings of the WHIG (Murray Waas - some of these notes are said to describe the effort to discredit Wilson). 9/27 - SAO tells Wapo that leaker contacted 6 other reporters after Novak column, says leak was purely for revenge against Wilson. 9/29 - Cliff May writes that Plame's name was "common knowledge" and points back to his July article as proof. 9/29 - Novak claims on Crossfire that no one in administration called him, says he was interviewing admin official about Wilson's trip when official told him Plame inspired trip & another SAO said same thing. Wurmser (AEI, part of OSP, INC supporter) is moved from State Dept under Bolton to VP's office under Libby.
October 2003 - 10/1 - Novak admits CIA asked him not to name Plame. 10/2 - WH says nothing illegal was done, Plame's name was common knowledge. 10/2 - Investigation extended to State and DoD. 10/3 - (FRIDAY) White House Staff Given Until Tuesday to Turn in CIA Leak Information. [or in other words, ladies and gentlemen, start your shredders] 10/4 - Novak reveals name of front company Plame worked for, and pushes the partisan political aspect of the story. 10/7 - WH rules out Rove - McClellan states"it's not true at all" that Rove was invloved, he rules out Libby, and Elliot Abrams also but not at emphatically. 10/8 - WH lawyers screen documents sent to FBI. Some 2,000 White House employees were asked to turn over telephone records, notes, correspondence, diary entries and other information that might help the FBI learn who leaked the identity of undercover CIA operations officer Valerie Plame.
10/12 - Wapo reports the FBI is looking into the month before the leak "going back to at least early June" - link.
November 2003 - 11/20 - TNR: What Dick Cheney Really Believes
The OVP didn't just generate this information for themselves. They tried to pump it back into the intelligence pipeline on visits to Langley. "Scooter and the vice president come out there loaded with crap from OSP, reams of information from Chalabi's people" on both terrorism and WMD, according to an ex-CIA analyst. One of the OVP's principal interlocutors was Alan Foley, director of the CIA's Nonproliferation Center. Cheney's office pelted Foley with questions about Iraq's nuclear weapons program-- especially about Saddam's alleged attempts to purchase uranium from Niger. According to a colleague, Foley "pushed back" by "stressing the implausibility of it." Months earlier, after all, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson had gone to Niger at the behest of the CIA--a visit that had itself been instigated by questions raised by Cheney in an Agency briefing-- and concluded that the sale almost certainly did not occur. But Cheney kept pressing, and it took its toll on Foley. "He was bullied and intimidated," says a friend of Foley.
December 2003 - 12/26 - Wapo - The Justice Department has added a fourth prosecutor to the team investigating the leak of an undercover CIA officer's identity, while the FBI has said a grand jury may be called to take testimony from administration officials, sources close to the case said.
CIA is angry about the circulation of a still-classified document to conservative news outlets suggesting Plame had a role in arranging her husband's trip to Africa for the CIA. The document, written by a State Department official who works for its Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), describes a meeting at the CIA where the Niger trip by Wilson was discussed, said a senior administration official who has seen it.
January 2004 - 1/2 - Time Magazine - FBI investigators looking into the criminal leak of a CIA agent’s identity have asked Bush Administration officials including senior political adviser Karl Rove to release reporters from any confidentiality agreements regarding conversations about the agent. 1/4 - Rush Holt, NJ Representative introduced legislation on that would authorize an independent inquiry by the House. 1/23 - Grand Jury testimony begins.
February 2004 - 2/5 - UPI - Federal law-enforcement officials said that they have developed hard evidence of possible criminal misconduct by two employees of Vice President Dick Cheney's office related to the unlawful exposure of a CIA officer's identity last year. The investigation, which is continuing, could lead to indictments, a Justice Department official said.
According to these sources, John Hannah and Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, were the two Cheney employees.
Scott McClellan, Karl Rove and Lewis Libby testify before the Grand Jury.
Charges that the 9/24/02 UK dossier were "sexed" up were unfounded - Butler report. 2/12 - Murray Waas (TAP) wries that Novak told not to name Plame according to 2 gov't officials who were interviewed by FBI . One official turned over notes of conversation with Novak.
March 2004 - Murray Waas (TAP) says Rove circulated info about Plame after Novak's article.
FBI investigating Plame say they are looking at whether anyone has lied to investigators, and it there was mishandling of classified documents. They are looking at e-mail and phone records. Want to know if Plame's name taken from classified document. Newsday reports phone records of Air Force One have been requested, as have the July records of the WHIG. The subpoena added records for contacts with journalists from The Washington Post, Time magazine, NBC's "Meet the Press," MSNBC's "Hardball," and The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Associated Press.
April 2004 - 4/30 USA Today - Vice President Cheney was aware of a meeting held by his staff that started a chain of events that ended with the "effective betrayal of our country," former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson charged Thursday. 4/30 - Investigators Remain Mum on CIA Leak.
May 2004 - 5/26 - Tim Russert, host of NBC's "Meet the Press," and Time Magazine columnist Mathew Cooper received subpoenas from investigators.
Early Summer 2004 - Bob Drogin (LAT) report Intel sources suspect the INC fed info/Iraqi defectors to at least 8 foreign intel agencies. July - Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report. GOP succeeds in muddying story about Plame and Wilson. Report is followed by Susan Schmitd article reinforcing the GOP line that Wilson had lied. Also in the report - Cheney read a 2/12/02 DIA report about Iraq's attempt to purchase 500 tons of yellowcake from Niger [this may or may not be the report from General Fulton. This is also around the time Wilson was being asked to go to Niger].
June 2004 - Bush announced a decision to seek private counsel regarding a federal investigation 6/18 - Alberto Gonzales testifies before grand jury. 6/24 - Bush interviewed by Fitzgerald (Special Prosecuter). 6/28 - Financial Times claims intel from "a number of countries" corroborated Niger claim.
July 2004 - 7/17 - Josh Marshall promises story to shift teutonic plates under Washington (later turns out Marshall and Laura Rosen have been investigating the origins of the Niger forgeries).
August 2004 - 8/1 - Times of London reports SISMI forged documents.
September 2004 - Walter Pincus of Wapo reveals he's had talks with investigators about his July 12th source, and answers FBI questions about Libby. 4 other reporters have spoken to FBI at Libby's urging. 9/16 - Wapo - In his Sept. 9 order denying Miller's request to quash the subpoena, U.S. District Chief Judge Thomas F. Hogan said that the reporter's discussions with anonymous sources are not protected, either by the First Amendment or by common- law privilege. Miller's attorney, Floyd Abrams, said the Times would appeal the decision.
October 2004 - 10/15 - Karl Rove testifies to the Grand Jury.
Early 2003 - Patrick Tyler of NYT hires Sarah Khalil to be NYT office manager in Kuwait. Kahlil is Chalabi's neice. Kahlil is dismissed on May 20, 2003.
February 2003 - 2/4 - IAEA given oral briefing on Niger documents. 2/5 - Powell's Powerpoint presentation to the UNSC. Tubes (WINPAC line, not DOE or his own State Dept line), magnets, anthrax, and evil are the main themes. Uranium from Niger is not mentioned. 2/6 - IAEA given Niger documents. 2/7 - UK dossier quoted by Powell is reported to have been plagiarized, some info more than a decade old. 50,000 UK troops are in Kuwait. 2/11 - Goldsmith, UK Atty Gen, meets with Gonzales, Ashcroft, William Taft, and US SAO (Powell, Rumsfeld, Rice) legal advisers where it is determined a 2nd resolution is not necessary.
March 2003 - 3/7 - ElBaradei tells the UNSC that the Niger documents are forged [IAEA says had been requesting documents since Fall of 2002 when UK released dossier]. 3/16 - Cheney on MTP says ElBaradei is wrong, and goes on to attack IAEA credibility, adding "We believe [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted his nuclear weapons program.". State Dept offficial who had seen the documents is asked to comment about the forgeries, and replies simply "We fell for it."
[This is the statement that sets Wilson off. Wilson is asked about the tubes and the forgeries during an appearance on CNN. Wilson says US needs to look at their files.]
US invades Iraq. Jay Rockefeller asks FBI to investigate the Niger forgeries. Some IAEA officials suspect M16 involved in forgeries through their contacts in Rome [M16 had been part of anti-Iraq PR campaign wars in late 1990s, said to have funneled info into UK press and elsewhere. A Senate Intelligence Committee staffer claimed UK initially circulated the forgeries].
Wilson spent the weeks following the Novak article talking to members of the press in an attempt to figure out what was going on. Many of the reporters spoke to him off the record. Wilson was told that Libby or the VP's office had started a "workup" on him following this CNN appearance. He was told Elliot Abrams may have been involved in the workup. He was told Libby began speaking openly about Wilson, calling him a fucking "playboy", that he's gone on a "boondoggle arranged by his CIA wife" and that he was a Dem and Gore supporter to boot. According to the reporters the info was shared with Rove, who then began to circulate it through the administration and neocon circles. Two of the reporters told Wilson that when Rove learned of the Corn article outlining the illegalities Rove turned on Libby and Cheney, saying they were responsible for the mess. In October when WH rules out Rove and leave Abrams and Libbby only semi-covered as leakers in October the reporters tell Wilson this indicates the WH is trying to narrow their defense in order to shield Rove, i.e. that Rove didn't know so it wasn't a crime.
Wilson speculates in the book that the leakers may be Hannah or Wurmser.
On July 8th a friend of Wilson's runs into Novak on the street. Novak doesn't know person is a friend of Wilson's. Friend asks Novak about Niger trip and Novak says it's a bunch of nothing. Friend asks what he thinks of Wilson, and Novak says Wilson's "an asshole. The CIA sent him. His wife, Valerie, works for the CIA. She's a WMD specialist. She sent him." Friend tells Wilson of the conversation immediately. Wilson left a message for Novak, which Novak returned on July 10th. Wilson explained he'd heard from this friend, and didn't like Novak speaking of his wife to complete strangers. Novak apologized then asked if Wilson would confirm what Novak had heard from the CIA (that Plame was CIA). Wilson said no. Novak apologized again, and the conversation ended. When Wilson read Novak's 7/14 article and saw he'd used 2 SAOs as sources he called Novak for clarification of the discrepency. Novak said he'd misspoken on the 10th.
Wilson fielded numerous calls from reporters during the next week -- all citing WH sources saying the story wasn't about the 16 words, but really about Plame and Wilson.
April 2003 - Baghdad falls.
May 2003 - 5/1 - "Mission Accomplished" banner. 5/? - Kristof and Wilson are panelists at a Dem Policy Committe where Wilson briefly discusses Niger without revealing he was Ambassador. Kristof asks if he can write story about it, Wilson agrees. 5/6 - Nicholas Kristof writes about Niger, not naming Wilson, but describing his trip. John Warner, Durbin, and Graham call for public hearings.
June 2003 - 6/4 - Warner backtracks from holding public hearings after Cheney visits a GOP senate luncheon. 6/12 - Wapo reports on Wilson's trip without naming him. 6/12 - CIA rejects blame for "16 words" in SOTU. 6/13 - Wapo reports the CIA cabled the White House and other government agencies in March 2002 that said the claim had been denied by officials from the central African country. "Maybe someone knew down in the bowels of the agency," Rice said on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday, "but no one in our circles knew that there were doubts and suspicions that this might be a forgery." 6/19 - John Judis & Spencer Ackerman write scathing article in The New Republic (TNR), mentions Niger without naming Wilson.
July 2003 - 7/6 - Wilson op-ed. 7/7 - WH admits SOTU and 16 words were wrong. 7/10 - Rumsfeld dismisses concerns over intel. 7/11 - Powell on CNN says too much being made over SOTU. 7/11 - Cliff May (NRO) writes about Wilson and Plame, but doesn't mention Plame is with the CIA, instead focusing on the political angle of how Wilson was chosen. 7/11 - Tenet claims responsibility for 16 words getting into SOTU. 7/14 - Rice on CNN says 16 words dispute is enormously overblown. Rice says VP and SAO were NOT briefed on Niger findings. 7/14 - Novak column. 7/17 - Corn column. 7/17 - Cooper's article in Time. 7/17 - Timothy Noah in Slate says Robert Joseph responsible for the 16 words. 7/22 - Tim Phelps & Knut Royce quote a SIO - there are people elsewhere in gov't trying to make the story about Plame & Wilson. 7/27 - Wapo reports that SAO says Rice did not read NIE. INC contract with Burson-Marsteller PR firm expires.
August 2003 - 8/4 - Jack Straw acknowledges that CIA told UK that no evidence Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger. UK Ministers insist UK has separate intel on this issue. 8/9 - Guardian - The FBI may launch an inquiry into whether the White House revealed the identity of a covert CIA official to punish her husband for blowing the whistle on President Bush for making misleading claims about the Iraqi nuclear programme, officials in Washington said yesterday. 8/10 - Gellman and Pincus of Wapo report on the WHIG.
WHIG ordered a series of white papers, the first of which was not published. Its title - "A Grave and Gathering Danger: Saddam Hussein's Quest For Nuclear Weapons". According to Wapo the preparation of this white paper was done primarily by Wilkinson. Gathered intel and press clippings and conferred with NSC and VP's office. Drafts were circulated. Later stages of this white paper coincided with the NIE. Wilkinson said Joseph and Rice felt WP not strong enough. The 5th draft of the WP was obtained by Wapo. Language is similar to speeches and talking points used by Bush and AO. The Draft WP precedes other known instances in which the administration claims Irag is seeking uranium. Other errors & exaggerations were repeated or had their first mention in the WP.
September 2003 - 9/26 - CIA requests DOJ investigate the outing of Plame. Ashcroft requires FBI to sign non-disclosure agreements. Ashcroft begins to receive briefings on the investigation (Christopher Wray and John Dion), including Libby's notes detailing the inner workings of the WHIG (Murray Waas - some of these notes are said to describe the effort to discredit Wilson). 9/27 - SAO tells Wapo that leaker contacted 6 other reporters after Novak column, says leak was purely for revenge against Wilson. 9/29 - Cliff May writes that Plame's name was "common knowledge" and points back to his July article as proof. 9/29 - Novak claims on Crossfire that no one in administration called him, says he was interviewing admin official about Wilson's trip when official told him Plame inspired trip & another SAO said same thing. Wurmser (AEI, part of OSP, INC supporter) is moved from State Dept under Bolton to VP's office under Libby.
October 2003 - 10/1 - Novak admits CIA asked him not to name Plame. 10/2 - WH says nothing illegal was done, Plame's name was common knowledge. 10/2 - Investigation extended to State and DoD. 10/3 - (FRIDAY) White House Staff Given Until Tuesday to Turn in CIA Leak Information. [or in other words, ladies and gentlemen, start your shredders] 10/4 - Novak reveals name of front company Plame worked for, and pushes the partisan political aspect of the story. 10/7 - WH rules out Rove - McClellan states"it's not true at all" that Rove was invloved, he rules out Libby, and Elliot Abrams also but not at emphatically. 10/8 - WH lawyers screen documents sent to FBI. Some 2,000 White House employees were asked to turn over telephone records, notes, correspondence, diary entries and other information that might help the FBI learn who leaked the identity of undercover CIA operations officer Valerie Plame.
10/12 - Wapo reports the FBI is looking into the month before the leak "going back to at least early June" - link.
Wilson said he told Kristof about his trip to Niger on the condition that Kristof must keep his name out of the column. When the column appeared, it created little public stir, though it set a number of reporters on the trail of the anonymous former ambassador. Kristof confirmed that account.
The column mentioned the alleged role of the vice president's office for the first time. That was when Cheney aides became aware of Wilson's mission and they began asking questions about him within the government, according to an administration official.
.....
In early June, Wilson told his story to The Washington Post on the condition that his name be withheld. On June 12, The Post published a more complete account than Kristof's of Wilson's trip. Wilson has now given permission to The Post to identify him as one source for that article.
By that time, officials in the White House, Cheney's office, the CIA and the State Department were familiar with Wilson and his mission to Niger.
Starting that week, the officials repeatedly played down the importance of Wilson's trip and its findings, saying it had been authorized within the CIA's nonproliferation section at a low level without requiring the approval of senior agency officials. No one brought up Wilson's wife, and her employment at the agency was not known at the time the article was published.
November 2003 - 11/20 - TNR: What Dick Cheney Really Believes
The OVP didn't just generate this information for themselves. They tried to pump it back into the intelligence pipeline on visits to Langley. "Scooter and the vice president come out there loaded with crap from OSP, reams of information from Chalabi's people" on both terrorism and WMD, according to an ex-CIA analyst. One of the OVP's principal interlocutors was Alan Foley, director of the CIA's Nonproliferation Center. Cheney's office pelted Foley with questions about Iraq's nuclear weapons program-- especially about Saddam's alleged attempts to purchase uranium from Niger. According to a colleague, Foley "pushed back" by "stressing the implausibility of it." Months earlier, after all, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson had gone to Niger at the behest of the CIA--a visit that had itself been instigated by questions raised by Cheney in an Agency briefing-- and concluded that the sale almost certainly did not occur. But Cheney kept pressing, and it took its toll on Foley. "He was bullied and intimidated," says a friend of Foley.
December 2003 - 12/26 - Wapo - The Justice Department has added a fourth prosecutor to the team investigating the leak of an undercover CIA officer's identity, while the FBI has said a grand jury may be called to take testimony from administration officials, sources close to the case said.
CIA is angry about the circulation of a still-classified document to conservative news outlets suggesting Plame had a role in arranging her husband's trip to Africa for the CIA. The document, written by a State Department official who works for its Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), describes a meeting at the CIA where the Niger trip by Wilson was discussed, said a senior administration official who has seen it.
Ashcroft recuses himself, and briefings are stopped.
Hosenball of Newsweek writes that the ICP has given congress memo outlining their work (108 articles shoved into media).January 2004 - 1/2 - Time Magazine - FBI investigators looking into the criminal leak of a CIA agent’s identity have asked Bush Administration officials including senior political adviser Karl Rove to release reporters from any confidentiality agreements regarding conversations about the agent. 1/4 - Rush Holt, NJ Representative introduced legislation on that would authorize an independent inquiry by the House. 1/23 - Grand Jury testimony begins.
February 2004 - 2/5 - UPI - Federal law-enforcement officials said that they have developed hard evidence of possible criminal misconduct by two employees of Vice President Dick Cheney's office related to the unlawful exposure of a CIA officer's identity last year. The investigation, which is continuing, could lead to indictments, a Justice Department official said.
According to these sources, John Hannah and Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, were the two Cheney employees.
Scott McClellan, Karl Rove and Lewis Libby testify before the Grand Jury.
Charges that the 9/24/02 UK dossier were "sexed" up were unfounded - Butler report. 2/12 - Murray Waas (TAP) wries that Novak told not to name Plame according to 2 gov't officials who were interviewed by FBI . One official turned over notes of conversation with Novak.
March 2004 - Murray Waas (TAP) says Rove circulated info about Plame after Novak's article.
FBI investigating Plame say they are looking at whether anyone has lied to investigators, and it there was mishandling of classified documents. They are looking at e-mail and phone records. Want to know if Plame's name taken from classified document. Newsday reports phone records of Air Force One have been requested, as have the July records of the WHIG. The subpoena added records for contacts with journalists from The Washington Post, Time magazine, NBC's "Meet the Press," MSNBC's "Hardball," and The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Associated Press.
April 2004 - 4/30 USA Today - Vice President Cheney was aware of a meeting held by his staff that started a chain of events that ended with the "effective betrayal of our country," former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson charged Thursday. 4/30 - Investigators Remain Mum on CIA Leak.
May 2004 - 5/26 - Tim Russert, host of NBC's "Meet the Press," and Time Magazine columnist Mathew Cooper received subpoenas from investigators.
Early Summer 2004 - Bob Drogin (LAT) report Intel sources suspect the INC fed info/Iraqi defectors to at least 8 foreign intel agencies. July - Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report. GOP succeeds in muddying story about Plame and Wilson. Report is followed by Susan Schmitd article reinforcing the GOP line that Wilson had lied. Also in the report - Cheney read a 2/12/02 DIA report about Iraq's attempt to purchase 500 tons of yellowcake from Niger [this may or may not be the report from General Fulton. This is also around the time Wilson was being asked to go to Niger].
June 2004 - Bush announced a decision to seek private counsel regarding a federal investigation 6/18 - Alberto Gonzales testifies before grand jury. 6/24 - Bush interviewed by Fitzgerald (Special Prosecuter). 6/28 - Financial Times claims intel from "a number of countries" corroborated Niger claim.
July 2004 - 7/17 - Josh Marshall promises story to shift teutonic plates under Washington (later turns out Marshall and Laura Rosen have been investigating the origins of the Niger forgeries).
August 2004 - 8/1 - Times of London reports SISMI forged documents.
September 2004 - Walter Pincus of Wapo reveals he's had talks with investigators about his July 12th source, and answers FBI questions about Libby. 4 other reporters have spoken to FBI at Libby's urging. 9/16 - Wapo - In his Sept. 9 order denying Miller's request to quash the subpoena, U.S. District Chief Judge Thomas F. Hogan said that the reporter's discussions with anonymous sources are not protected, either by the First Amendment or by common- law privilege. Miller's attorney, Floyd Abrams, said the Times would appeal the decision.
October 2004 - 10/15 - Karl Rove testifies to the Grand Jury.
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