by isachar » Sun Apr 09, 2006 1:00 am
Well, now. We now know, and the WH has implicitly if not explicitly acknowledged that the above culprits and possibly a few others) were responsible for leaking Plame's name and NOC status.<br><br>We know from Raw Story that Plame was actively involved in WMD monitoring and possibly ran field ops and had a team of ops, agents, informers, and assets in this matter, particularly as it relates to Iran.<br><br>Now, if her cover was blown, then all those who worked for/with her (including all foreign assets and informers) would have been placed at risk. Some have undoubtedly disappeared and been eliminated by their respective foreign governments - or others.<br><br>So, it would appear that if any one of these individuals ended up dead on account of Bush/Cheney/Rove/Libby, etc. declassifying parts of the NIE, they may be guilty of murder and/or negligent homicide.<br><br>Would the murder of a foreign agent or asset overseas be a prosecutable offense in the U.S.<br><br>Where are you citizen spook? You are needed!!!!<br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://rubdmc.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/7/17/22429/1711">rubdmc.dailykos.com/story...22429/1711</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>Sun Jul 17, 2005 at 07:04:29 PM PDT<br>Whenever there is a major intelligence f*ck-up, such as Aldrich Ames or Robert Hanssen, the CIA performs an exhaustive, meticulous damage assessment of the harm inflicted on our intelligence operations and national security.<br><br>Let's remind ourselves of the 18 month-long damage assessment the CIA conducted after catching Aldrich Ames:<br><br>pontificator's diary :: :: <br><br>For the past year and a half, an independent team of Intelligence Community analysts and operations officers has conducted a Damage Assessment of the actions of Aldrich Ames, who, while a CIA Directorate of Operations officer from 1985 to 1994, committed espionage for Soviet (and later Russian) intelligence. This Damage Assessment, commissioned by my predecessor, is now complete.<br><br>[snip]<br><br> The damage which Aldrich Ames did to his country can be summarized in three categories:<br><br>-- By revealing to the Soviet Union the identities of many assets who were providing information to the United States, he not only caused their executions, but also made it much more difficult to understand what was going on in the Soviet Union at a crucial time in its history;<br><br>-- By revealing to the Soviet Union the way in which the United States sought intelligence and handled assets, he made it much more difficult for this country to gather vital information in other countries as well;<br><br>-- By revealing to the Soviet Union identities of assets and American methods of espionage, he put the Soviet Union in the position to pass carefully selected "feed" material to this country through controlled assets;<br><br>The damage done by Aldrich Ames is documented in the Damage Assessment Report which I have submitted to the intelligence committees. I endorse the Report. I have also made this painstaking work of many months available to other agencies of government so that damage control actions can be taken. <br><br><br>You can bet your bottom dollar that the CIA has conducted a painstaking, meticulous damage assessment of the harm caused by Rove and his co-conspirators, which led to the loss not just of Valerie Plame as an agent, but of Brewster-Jennings as a front company and the use of any agent ever who worked for that Brewster Jennings front.<br><br>This damage assessment report is presumably still classified. But you can bet Fitzgerald hauled its authors into the grand jury room, and whatever harm was done to our national security because of Rove's malignancy -- Fitzgerald knows about it.<br><br>There is dark talk that people have disappeared. And when I say people -- I mean sources who Brewster Jennings CIA agents were running. Imagine that a Brewster Jennings NOC operating in Libya cultivated a source in the Libyan military, and was frequently seen in the company of this Libyan military official. Well I've been hearing dark talk that people such as that Libyan military official are missing.<br><br>If this is true, you can bet it's in the CIA damage assessment report on the Plame matter. And you can bet Fitzgerald knows about it.<br><br>Which could mean people like Rove and Libby might be in for a criminal sentence along the lines of what is typically reserved for people like Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen.<br><br>There's a lot more of this story yet to be told. The potential seriousness of this matter could go well beyond even the darkest speculation. <br><br>Update [2005-7-17 23:40:50 by pontificator]: Perhaps it helps to think about it this way. Most mainstream media people don't take the espionage angle seriously because Karl Rove's motive is so unusual. The typical motive for espionage is financial reward -- as it was with Aldrich Ames, whose Russian handlers made him rich. Here, on the other hand, the motivation is a political vendetta, which is certainly not the usual case.<br><br>But if you think about it, it really is irrelevant what the improper motive was for compromising classified information. If Rove had outed Valerie Plame in order to get a big payday, it would make no difference. Espionage is espionage. That's the big picture. <br><br>Update [2005-7-17 23:48:49 by pontificator]: Jawbone in comments notes that Larry Johnson has also raised the possibility that the damage assessment report is damning:<br><br><br>Last week Larry Johnson on To The Point told Warren Olney (sp?) that some Congressional members of intelligence oversight committees would have access to the Plame damage assessment and that since there were no leaks it meant the news was bad. That if there had been no humint losses, Rethugs would have leaked that to help the WH.<br>Update [2005-7-18 0:11:53 by pontificator]: And check out this diary by freelixer pointing out the relevance of the Larry Franklin Espionage indictment. The more I think about this, the more I believe the Intelligence Identities Protection Act is a red herring. This is an Espionage case. John Dean reminded us of the relevant legal precedent almost two years ago: <br><br>The Espionage Act of 1917<br>The Reagan Administration effectively used the Espionage Act of 1917 to prosecute a leak - to the horror of the news media. It was a case that was instituted to make a point, and establish the law, and it did just that in spades.<br><br>In July 1984, Samuel Morrison - the grandson of the eminent naval historian with the same name - leaked three classified photos to Jane's Defense Weekly. The photos were of the Soviet Union's first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, which had been taken by a U.S. spy satellite.<br><br>Although the photos compromised no national security secrets, and were not given to enemy agents, the Reagan Administration prosecuted the leak. That raised the question: Must the leaker have an evil purpose to be prosecuted?<br><br>The Administration argued that the answer was no. As with Britain's Official Secrets Acts, the leak of classified material alone was enough to trigger imprisonment for up to ten years and fines. And the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit agreed. It held that the such a leak might be prompted by "the most laudable motives, or any motive at all," and it would still be a crime. As a result, Morrison went to jail.<br><br>The Espionage Act, though thrice amended since then, continues to criminalize leaks of classified information, regardless of the reason for the leak. Accordingly, the "two senior administration officials" who leaked the classified information of Mrs. Wilson's work at the CIA to Robert Novak (and, it seems, others) have committed a federal crime. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=isachar>isachar</A> at: 4/8/06 11:03 pm<br></i>