U.S. accused of intimidation in Iraq uranium flap
1 hour, 27 minutes ago
By Tabassum Zakaria
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a key figure in the Iraq (news - web sites)-Niger uranium controversy, accused the Bush administration on Monday of using intimidation tactics to stifle criticism about its handling of prewar intelligence on Iraq.
Wilson was sent by the CIA (news - web sites) to Niger in 2002 to investigate a report that Iraq was trying to obtain uranium from the African country, but returned to say it was highly doubtful such a transaction had occurred.
President George W. Bush (news - web sites) made the Iraq-uranium claim in his January State of the Union speech. Critics have said the Iraq-Niger assertion, which later was found to be based partly on forged documents, showed the administration had tried to hype intelligence to make a case for going to war.
Wilson, on a panel of speakers at the National Press Club, said there had been several attempts to discredit him, but mainly through an article by Chicago columnist Robert Novak that said two senior administration officials said Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the uranium report. Novak's column named Wilson's wife and said she was a CIA operative on weapons of mass destruction.
Wilson would only speak about his wife's employment in hypothetical terms without confirming her place of work. But he said if Novak's column was true, then the Bush administration had breached national security by revealing the name.
"Any time that a senior administration official leaks the name of a CIA operative, even one in the weapons of mass destruction business, what that senior administration official is doing is a breach of national security," Wilson said.
'INTIMIDATE OTHERS'
"The reason for it was not to smear me or to even smear my wife," Wilson said. "The reason was to intimidate others from coming forward."
He said when intelligence analysts see attempts to discredit him and the suicide of David Kelly, a British weapons expert on Iraq, they will be reluctant to step forward.
Kelly became embroiled in the biggest political crisis for British Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites)'s government after the BBC used the former U.N. weapons inspector as its main, anonymous source for an explosive report that the British government had exaggerated the case for war in Iraq.
Democrat senators Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Charles Schumer of New York last week called for an investigation into who exposed Wilson's wife.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan, during a briefing last month, dismissed claims administration officials had revealed a CIA operative's identity.
"That is not the way this president or this White House operates," he said in addressing a question about the Novak column. "There is absolutely no information that has come to my attention ... that suggests that there is any truth to that suggestion. No one in this White House would have given authority to take such a step."
Wilson said that analysts seeing stories about him and his wife and about Kelly would question whether to talk to lawmakers who might hold investigations on the Iraq war.
Congressional sources have said the Senate Intelligence Committee has not received complaints from analysts about the administration's handling of prewar intelligence on Iraq.
"So that's what it was designed to do, it was clearly designed to intimidate," Wilson said.
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