I want to discuss what has happened so far in the Scooter Libby trial. You can scoot over to firedoglake to read the paraphrased testimony of the last two days. I’m here to put it into a little perspective. To do that, we have to revisit the timeline.
The whole Valerie Plame Wilson affair got rolling on May 6, 2003. We had toppled Saddam’s statue on April 9th. Bush declared ‘major combat operations’ over on May 1st. But we had not found any WMD. And the IAEA had discovered that part of our case for war (the Niger documents) were based on crude Italian forgeries. So, on May 6th, when Nicholas Kristof wrote an editorial in the New York Times, he was touching on a sensitive issue. Kristof claimed:
I’m told by a person involved in the Niger caper that more than a year ago the vice president’s office asked for an investigation of the uranium deal, so a former U.S. ambassador to Africa was dispatched to Niger. In February 2002, according to someone present at the meetings, that envoy reported to the C.I.A. and State Department that the information was unequivocally wrong and that the documents had been forged.
Actually, Wilson didn’t report that the documents were forged. Wilson never even saw the documents. Wilson also didn’t tell Kristof that he told the CIA and the State Department that the Niger documents were forged. Kristof screwed this part of his editorial up and later apologized for his error. But it was a very consequential error because it made it look like the U.S. Government had known the Niger documents were forgeries all the way back in February 2002 and yet continued to rely on them for the State of the Union address in 2003, and even tried to pass them off to IAEA as legitmate on February 4, 2003.
Thus, Kristof’s column made the government look very bad…worse than was actually the case. In addition, it placed the blame squarely in warmonger-in-chief Dick Cheney’s lap. It was Cheney, after all, that had gone on Meet the Press in March of 2003 (on the eve of the war), and stated unequivocally “We know [Saddam is] out trying once again to produce nuclear weapons and we know that he has a long-standing relationship with various terrorist groups, including the al-Qaeda organization.”
Kristof was suggesting that Cheney should have known better. It was even worse that this (as would only become evident later) because Ambassador Wilson’s report to the CIA did not actually state that the information in the Niger documents “was unequivocally wrong”. In fact, Wilson reported that Niger had been approached by Iraq about building better business relations and that an individual in the Niger government had interpreted that contact as an effort to purchase uranium.
So, needless to say, Kristof’s column not only caught the eye of the Office of the Vice-President (OVP) but it severely rankled them. But it doesn’t appear that much happened until roughly three weeks later when Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus began asking the OVP questions about the anonymous ambassador’s trip.
Things heated up on May 29, 2003 when Scooter Libby pulled the State Department’s number three, Marc Grossman, aside after a deputy’s meeting. He wanted to know what Grossman knew about this ambassador’s trip. Grossman was embarassed to admit that he didn’t know anything about it and promised to get some answers. He went and talked to the State Department’s number two, Richard Armitage, who also knew nothing. Grossman then contacted Carl Ford, the State Department’s chief of the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR). Ford knew about the trip and he agreed to prepare a memo about it for delivery to Scooter Libby. That memo would reveal that Valerie Plame Wilson worked at the CIA and would place responsibility with her for the decision to send her husband on the trip. Grossman received the memo on June 10th after he returned from a trip abroad and he delivered it to Libby on the 11th or 12th.
This is the first piece of evidence that Libby knew about Valerie Wilson long before he allegedly learned of her in a conversation with Tim Russert on July 10th or 11th.
The second piece of evidence was introduced by Robert Grenier, a 27-year veteran of the CIA and the Iraq mission manager in the lead-up to the war. Grenier testified that he received a phone message from Scooter Libby on June 11, 2003. This was probably the same day that Libby received the report from Grossman. Grenier had met Libby before in interagency meetings, but he had never received a phone call from him before. Libby wanted to know about Wilson’s trip. Grenier looked into it and confirmed for Libby that Wilson had gone on the trip and that the trip was instigated, at least in part, as a result of the expressed interest in the Niger documents of the OVP. This could not have pleased Libby, who Grenier described as somewhat ‘aggreived’. Grenier also testified that he was not 100% sure but that he believes he told Libby that Wilson’s wife worked in the department responsible for sending him. The defense was able to raise some questions about Grenier’s memory because Grenier did not initially indicate to the grand jury that he told Libby about Wilson’s wife. But this was the second indication that Libby heard about Plame prior to July.
A third witness testified today. In 2003, Craig Schmall was the morning intelligence briefer for
Libby, and sometimes for Cheney as well. Schmall explained in great detail how he performed his duties. He explained that he prepared briefing books each day and that he used the table of contents to note down action items instigated at the briefings. He testified about a June 14th table of contents notation that read “Why was the Amb told this was VP office question? Joe Wilson Valerie Wilson.”
Under that notation there was a ‘T’ with a circle around it which, Schmall explained, indicated that it was a ‘task’ for him to resolve. This was the third piece of evidence that Libby was aware of Valerie Wilson before July…long before July.
There was another damning piece of evidence provided by Schall and it went to motive. After the Novak column appeared Schmall discussed its potential impact with Cheney and Libby. Here is emptywheel’s paraphrased testimony.
Fitz: What was said about Novak article.
Schmall: Invited to offer opinion about leak
F: Did you know Plame
S No
F Have you ever met her?
S No
F Had no idea about damage caused by her being named.
S Noted that the press and pundits talking about Valerie Wilson and her career, People were saying this was no big deal. I thought there was very grave danger to leaking name of CIA officer. Now that Valerie Wilson’s name in press foreign intell in countries she worked have an opportunity to investigation all the people she worked with can be harrassed, lose their jobs, arrested, tortured, or killed.
F did anyone say anything in response?
S No
After two days of testimony Fitzgerald has successfully introduced three pieces of evidence that Libby had knowledge of Valerie Wilson prior to talking to Tim Russert. He has also established that Libby was warned that the leak of Plame Wilson’s identity might get American assets killed. Obviously he had an incentive to lie about the OVP’s role in outing Valerie Plame.
There is a lot more to discuss. Libby’s attorneys appear to be pursuing a defense that the CIA is setting up their client and lying about what they told him…and when. I’ll have more to say about that as the trial progresses.
I still don’t know why Libby is trying to beat this rap. He has no real defense for lying. And spinning a vast CIA conspiracy is going to be more of a headache for the administration than it is worth.
