Saturday, February 07, 2004
John Hannah Allegedly Focus of Plame Probe
Richard Sale, respected intelligence reporter for UPI, has given credibility to a story that had been rumored for several weeks . It is that the FBI investigation into the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame is increasingly focusing on two officials in the office of Vice President Dick Cheney, Lewis "Scooter" Libby and John Hannah. Sale assures me that the information is solid.
Last summer, former ambassador Joseph Wilson went public about his 2002 report refuting the allegation that Saddam tried to buy Niger uranium. Someone in the Bush administration attempted to punish him by identifying his wife, Valerie Plame, as a CIA operative involved in trying to prevent proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. The information was given to the press, but only one reporter, CNN commentator Robert Novak, was sleazy enough to publish it. (Outraged readers should please email CNN demanding that they fire Novak for having wilfully damaged US national security). Novak did not commit a crime. But whatever Bush administration official leaked the information to him did.
Libby and Hannah form part of a 13-man vice presidential advisory team, sort of a veep NSC, which helps underpin Cheney's dominance in the US foreign policy area. Hannah is a neoconservative and old cold warrior who is really more of a Soviet expert than a Middle East expert. But in the 90s he for a while headed up the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), a think tank that represents the interests of the American Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC). Hannah is said to have been behind Cheney's and consequently Bush's support for refusing to deal with Yasser Arafat. But he was also deeply involved in getting up the Iraq war.
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http://juancole.com/
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