The WSJ has a lengthy article in its Op-Ed pages by Judith Miller, a “former NYT journalist and a writer in Manhattan” about the “undeniable and unheralded non proliferation success of the Bush administration”.
It begs for a careful deconstruction, which is beyond my courage, as it is, unsurprisingly, an ode to the intelligence, diplomatic and military competence of Bush and Blair. It also reeks of casual name-dropping of the various players that she met:
Col. Gadhafi’s hip, 34-year-old son, Saif-al-Islam, told me in Vienna–where he earned an M.B.A. and lives when he’s not carrying out tasks for his father, or studying for a doctorate in political philosophy at the London School of Economics–that his father changed course because he had to. “Overnight we found ourselves in a different world,” said Saif, referring to the Sept. 11 attacks. “So Libya had to redesign its policies to cope with these new realities.”
But a review of confidential government records and interviews with current and former officials in London, Tripoli, Vienna and Washington suggest that other factors were involved. Prominent among them is a heretofore undisclosed intelligence coup–the administration’s decision in late 2003 to give Libyan officials a compact disc containing intercepts of a conversation about Libya’s nuclear weapons program between Libya’s nuclear chief and A.Q. Khan–that reinforced Col. Gadhafi’s decision to reverse course on WMD.
The context is of course the restoration of full diplomatic ties between the US and Lybia, and the need to prop up the Bush administration.
But can we at least agree that this proves beyond any remaining doubt that Judith Miller is a PR flak and not a journalist?
