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Joseph Charles Wilson IV (born November 61949) was a United States foreign service diplomat between 1976 and 1998. He has achieved his recent notoriety from an op-ed essay published on July 62003, in the New York Times in which he revealed his February 2002 trip investigating whether Iraq purchased or attempted to purchase Yellowcake from Niger in the late 1990's. In his op-ed piece, published 4 months after the war began, he accused the Bush Administration of "exaggerating the Iraqi threat" in order to justify war. Shortly thereafter, while musing on the choice of Wilson for the Niger mission, columnist Robert Novak noted the fact that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, worked for the CIA. For information on this, see the Plame Affair. The information was published in a July 142003 column in which he said, "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." Deputy Attorney General James Comey (then Attorney General John Ashcroft having recused himself from the case) named Patrick J. Fitzgerald as a special prosecutor to determine who was involved in disclosing the identity of a CIA operative. As of October 28th, 2005, this investigation has resulted in two indictment related to alleged misconduct that hindered the investigation. These indictments charge Lewis Libby with making false statements to investigators & a federal grand jury.

See: Plame affair and Plame scandal timeline.

Education

Wilson is a 1972 graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara. He joked that he majored in "history, volleyball, and surfing" , maintaining a "C" average, but became much more serious about his education after graduating. He learned to speak French fluently, and entered the Foreign Service in 1976, specializing in African affairs.

Career

Wilson was a member of the U.S. Diplomatic Service from 1976 through 1998. From 1988 to 1991, he was the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. He was hailed as "truly inspiring" and "courageous" by George H. W. Bush after sheltering more than one hundred Americans at the embassy, despite Saddam Hussein's threats to execute anyone who refused to hand over foreigners. As a result, in 1990, he also became the last American diplomat to meet with Saddam Hussein (Wilson, 2003).

Wilson later served as U.S. ambassador to Gabon and São Tomé and Príncipe under President George H. W. Bush and helped direct Africa policy for the National Security Council under President Bill Clinton.

Wilson manages JCWilson International Ventures, Corporation, a consulting firm specializing in strategic management and international business development.

Wilson is a speaker represented exclusively by Greater Talent Network.

Political ties

Wilson was a supporter and donor to the Kerry/Edwards campaign for the presidency and served as an unpaid advisor and speechwriter for the Kerry campaign in 2003 and 2004. In 2000, he donated both to Vice President Gore’s and to George W. Bush's presidential campaigns. In the mid-eighties, Wilson worked for Gore as a congressional staffer. He has made contributions to the campaigns of Democratic candidates such as Hillary Clinton and Ted Kennedy, and to Republicans such as California Rep. Ed Royce and Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter. He has in the recent past spoken to activist groups like Win Without War, a nonpartisan coalition of groups which oppose the War in Iraq.

The trip to Niger

In late February of 2002, Wilson had been sent to Niger on behalf of the CIA to investigate the possibility that Saddam Hussein had attempted to buy enriched uranium yellowcake. Wilson concluded then that there "was nothing to the story".

But he also reported that, although former Nigerien prime minister Ibrahim Assane Mayaki was unaware of any pending sales contract with Iraq, an Iraqi delegation had approached him in June 1999, expressing an interest in "expanding commercial relations." Mayaki believed this may have meant that they wanted to purchase yellowcake uranium, one of Niger’s few exports. Mayaki claimed he refused to discuss any trade issues at all due to active UN sanctions on Iraq, and so steered the conversation in another direction. Wilson's critics claim that this evidence provides further confirmation that Iraq may have been trying to purchase uranium in Africa, and that he failed to include this information in his op-ed.

An article in the 25 October, 2005 edition of the Italian newspaper La Repubblica indicates that some of Wilson's statements about Niger were correct. The article states that Nicolo Pollari, head of the Italian Intelligence Service, SISMI, knew the Niger documents were forgeries, but tried to go around the CIA to get them into the public eye in the US. The documents contained several misspelled French words and contained signatures from Nigerien officials who hadn't even been in office at the time they were signed, although Wilson did not see any of these documents during his trip to Niger.

La Repubblica also claims that Pollari met with Stephen Hadley, previously the Deputy National Security Advisor, on 9 September, 2002, to discuss the documents without going to the CIA, who had reservation about the documents. That meeting was before President Bush gave his major speech on 7 October, 2002 saying, "The Iraqi regime.... possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons". An effort was made to include in that speech the specific claim that uranium was sought from Niger, but the CIA had that claim removed from the speech (source). The National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002 said, "the claims of Iraqi pursuit of natural uranium in Africa are, in INR's assessment, highly dubious".

On 11 December 2005, the Los Angeles Times reported that French intelligence had warned the Bush Administration repeatedly that there was no evidence that Saddam sought uranium from Niger. The Times reported that "The French conclusions were reached after extensive on-the-ground investigations in Niger and other former French colonies, where the uranium mines are controlled by French companies, said Alain Chouet, the French former official. He said the French investigated at the CIA's request.... he essence of Chouet's account — that the French repeatedly investigated the Niger claim, found no evidence to support it, and warned the CIA — was extensively corroborated by former CIA official and a current French government official, who both spoke on condition of anonymity."

The op-ed

The controversy surrounding Wilson began with President Bush's 2003 State of the Union Address , in which he stated that "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." Two months later, documents suggesting that Iraq had tried to buy 500 tons of uranium from Niger, were judged to be "obvious" forgeries by the IAEA. However, it is suggested the documents that the IAEA judged to be forgeries were not the same documents that the British based their original assessment on. Two British Parliamentary reports confirmed the original intelligence. One of these reports (the Butler Report) suggested that the forged documents were distributed with the knowing goal of being discovered as obvious forgeries so as to discredit the intelligence. The revelations in La Repubblica (above) seem to counter this allegation. Furthermore, although other sources for the uranium claim are mentioned no evidence of their existence has been advanced. The documents were obtained by the U.S. Embassy in Rome on October 92002, and distributed throughout the U.S. intelligence community shortly thereafter, but not passed on to the IAEA until February 32003. The IAEA released its report a month later, just weeks before the start of the Iraq war.

On July 62003, Wilson authored an op-ed essay in the New York Times in which he accused the Bush administration of "exaggerating the Iraqi threat" in order to justify war. In the article, Wilson states: "The vice president's office asked a serious question. I was asked to help formulate the answer." Critics of Wilson have contended that he falsely claimed to have been sent by the vice president personally. However, in the quotation above and other instances Wilson has said only that he was sent by the CIA in response to questions asked by the vice president's office. Then CIA director George Tenet has said that the administration was not directly briefed on Wilson's report.

"Because this report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution (within the intelligence community), but we did not brief it to the President, Vice-President or other senior Administration officials. "

The day after Wilson's editorial, titled "What I Didn't Find in Africa" appeared, White House aides said that the State of the Union Address should not have contained the reference. And Secretary of State Colin Powell, then traveling with the President in Africa, gave a press conference addressing the issue, saying "There was sufficient evidence floating around at that time that such a statement was not totally outrageous or not to be believed or not to be appropriately used. It's that once we used the statement, and after further analysis, and looking at other estimates we had, and other information that was coming in, it turned out that the basis upon which that statement was made didn't hold up, and we said so, and we've acknowledged it, and we've moved on."

The administration still maintains that other intelligence that Iraq may have attempted to acquire uranium in Africa may have been correct. Many supporters of the theory point to the Butler Report, which found, without showing evidence for it, there was credible intelligence that Iraq had attempted to acquire uranium from Niger in 1999, but not 2002, and less certain intelligence that Iraq had attempted to acquire uranium from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Critics of the theory view the evidence relating to the Democratic Republic of Congo as suspect, and point out that while the President's speech mentioned only Africa, press secretary Ari Fleischer explicitly affirmed that this was a reference to Niger.

The Senate Intelligence Committee Report

A Senate Intelligence Committee report issued on July 7, 2004 challenged some of the statements made by Wilson.

The report suggests that Wilson's wife was involved in his selection for the mission. As reported by the Washington Post:

The report states that a CIA official told the Senate committee that Plame "offered up" Wilson's name for the Niger trip, then on Feb. 12, 2002, sent a memo to a deputy chief in the CIA's Directorate of Operations saying her husband "has good relations with both the PM and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity." The next day, the operations official cabled an overseas officer seeking concurrence with the idea of sending Wilson, the report said.

However, several CIA officials have since stated that the person who wrote this memo was not present at the meeting where Wilson was chosen. Accounts of Valerie Plame's involvement in her husband's selection differ significantly. Wilson has claimed that she simply contacted him on the agency's behalf and escorted him to the meeting before leaving. The evidence cited above, if accurate, would indicate that Plame may also have recommended her husband and/or written a summary of his qualifications when he was being considered. In contrast, Matthew Cooper's e-mail records that Karl Rove told him that Plame had actually authorized the trip.

Wilson's report has also come under fire for inconsistency. As reported in the same Washington Post article:

The report also said Wilson provided misleading information to The Washington Post last June. He said then that he concluded the Niger intelligence was based on documents that had clearly been forged because "the dates were wrong and the names were wrong."

"Committee staff asked how the former ambassador could have come to the conclusion that the 'dates were wrong and the names were wrong' when he had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports," the Senate panel said. Wilson told the panel he may have been confused and may have "misspoken" to reporters. The documents -- purported sales agreements between Niger and Iraq -- were not in U.S. hands until eight months after Wilson made his trip to Niger.

Here are the facts as determined by the Senate Select Committee's investigation (pages 39-44):

• The U.S. embassy in Niger issued a cable reporting that the alleged Iraq-Niger uranium deal warranted a hard look.
• Valerie Plame suggested her husband travel to Niger to look into it.
• A WINPAC analyst sent an email saying the results "from this source" will be suspect and not believable but CIA decided to send Wilson anyway.
• In February 2002, Wilson arrived in Niger and met with former officials of Niger, no current officials.
• On March 1, 2002 the CIA published an intelligence assessment, Niger: Sale of Uranium to Iraq is Unlikely, unrelated to Wilson's trip. This assessment was not provided to Vice President Cheney.
• On March 8, 2002 an intelligence report based on Wilson's trip was disseminated. The report indicated the former Prime Minister of Niger had said no contracts to sell uranium to Iraq were signed during his tenure. However, an Iraqi delegation had approached him in June 1999 to discuss "expanding commercial relations." The Prime Minister took this to mean uranium yellowcake sales. The PM let the matter drop due to UN sanctions on Iraq.

The Senate Report was critical of Wilson because his description of his findings differed from the DO intelligence report and his description of the information provided to him by the CIA differed from the CIA's account. Wilson told the Senate his findings refuted the notion Iraq had sought uranium from Niger. The intelligence report actually confirmed that Iraq had approached Niger for increased trade, which was interpreted by the PM as seeking uranium. Wilson claimed the CIA told him about documents pertaining to an alleged uranium sale to Iraq. The CIA reports officer denied giving Wilson any such information and noted there were no "documents" circulating at the time. (Pages 44-45)

Many further details of the trip can be found in the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Report on the U.S. Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq, which contains a 48-page section dealing with intelligence related to Niger.

Criticism of Wilson

Wilson was criticized recently for allegedly talking about his wife's CIA job prior to the column by Novak. Retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul E. Vallely claimed on the John Batchelor radio show that Wilson had spoken to him about his wife's role with the CIA while they were waiting together in the green room before appearing together on FOX News. He said this occurred on three to five occasions, first in February or March of 2002. Vallely also said Wilson was proud to routinely introduce his wife as a CIA employee at cocktail parties per a tabloid source.

Wilson has since demanded that Vallely retract these allegations, calling them "patently false." Wilson wrote to his attorney in an email included in his demand for a retraction: "This is slanderous. I never appeared on TV before at least July 2002 and only saw him maybe twice in the green room at FOX. Vallely is a retired general and this is a bald faced lie.... I never laid eyes on till several months after he alleges I spoke to him about my wife."

On November 7, 2005, Lt. General Tom McInerney (USAF Retired) also said that Joe Wilson bragged to him about his wife's job with the CIA while waiting in the green room at FOX News.

A compendium of the times that Wilson and Vallely appeared on FOX has revealed that there is only one possible date, September 12, 2002, during which the two would have been in the green room within hours of each other.

Former CIA officer Larry C. Johnson questions the credibility of both men, noting "I too was a Fox News Contributor in 2002 and spent a lot of time in the Green Room with both Vallely and McInerney. I saw them but never saw Joe Wilson. What is really curious is that I know I spent more time with Vallely and McInerney than Joe Wilson ever did and the subject of my wife (or their wives) never came up."

Book: The Politics of Truth

In 2004, Wilson published a book, The Politics of Truth, with the subtitle, "Inside the Lies that Led to War and Betrayed my Wife's CIA Identity". The book gives is an autobiographical account of over two decades of foreign service, in addition to giving his personal account of the events leading to his decision to go public with his criticisms of the Bush administration, and what he views as an orchestrated attack by administration officials in retaliation for his coming forward. The book also provided fuel for many of Wilson's critics, who perceived an increasingly partisan tone and who found in it what they believed were inconsistencies with some of Wilson's prior statements. Some also saw the book as both financially and politically opportunistic, particularly given its release in an election year.(May, Schmidt, 2004).

See also

• Yellowcake forgery
• Downing Street memo

External links and references

• Bush, George W (January 28, 2003) State of the Union Address whitehouse.gov
• Wilson, Joseph (July 6, 2003). What I didn't find in Africa. New York Times reprinted at Common Dreams News Center
• Powell, Colin (July 7, 2003) Press Conference in Africa pbs.org
• Fleischer, Ari (July 7, 2003). Press gaggle. The White House.
• Wilson, Joseph (September 14, 2003). Seeking honesty in U.S. policy. San Jose Mercury News reprinted at Common Dreams News Center.
• Bedard, Paul (October 20, 2003). Wilson adds ammo to hit war credibility gap. USNews.com “Washington Whispers”
• Wilson, Joseph (May 2, 2004). 'Administration went after me and my wife'. Miami Herald reprinted at Common Dreams News Center.
• U.S. Senate Select Committee (July 7, 2004) Report on the U.S. Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq intelligence.senate.gov
• Roberts, Pat (July 9, 2004). Press release. Basis for the Susan Schmidt, Clifford May, Robert Novak, and Matthew Continetti articles below.
• Schmidt, Susan (July 9, 2004). Plame's input is cited on Niger mission. washingtonpost.com, p. A09
• May, Clifford D. (July 12, 2004). Our man in Niger. National Review Online.
• Hitchens, Christopher (July 13, 2004). 'Plames Lame Game'. "Slate"
• Novak, Robert (July 15, 2004). Errant former ambassador. Townhall.com
• Wilson, Joseph (July 19, 2004). Response to Pat Roberts Reprinted at Alternet.
• Wilson, Joseph (July 21, 2004). A right-wing smear is gathering steam. Los Angeles Times reprinted at Common Dreams News Center.
• James Petras. Israel and the Neocons: the Libby affair, Counter Punch, November 3, 2005.

• Current events
• 1949 births
• Plame affair
• Targets of alleged Bush Administration reprisals