Josh's Weblog

Mr. Wilson's original claims about what he found on a CIA trip to Africa, what he told the CIA about it, and even why he was sent on the mission have since been discredited. What a bizarre irony it would be if what began as a politically motivated lie by Mr. Wilson nonetheless leads to indictments of Bush Administration officials for telling reporters the truth.

Discredited how? Wilson was right, his findings were correct, and virtually nobody including British Intelligence is disputing his conclusions. The Senate report on Wilson was a hatchet job to offset the impact of the initial allegations.

Wilson said there was no evidence justifying an assured conclusion that Iraq had attempted to purchase enriched uranium in Niger. I supported, and continue to support the Iraq war, but like I said, Wilson's findings have been vindicated by the facts.

Discredited by a bipartisan Senate committee looking into the matter.

The panel found that Wilson's report, rather than debunking intelligence about purported uranium sales to Iraq, as he has said, bolstered the case for most intelligence analysts. And contrary to Wilson's assertions and even the government's previous statements, the CIA did not tell the White House it had qualms about the reliability of the Africa intelligence that made its way into 16 fateful words in President Bush's January 2003 State of the Union address.

Yesterday's report said that whether Iraq sought to buy lightly enriched "yellowcake" uranium from Niger is one of the few bits of prewar intelligence that remains an open question. Much of the rest of the intelligence suggesting a buildup of weapons of mass destruction was unfounded, the report said.

The report turns a harsh spotlight on what Wilson has said about his role in gathering prewar intelligence, most pointedly by asserting that his wife, CIA employee Valerie Plame, recommended him.

Wilson had no evidence supporting his statements, and he lied about his own report. Whether or not facts are better understood now, his actions then discredited him.

Especially because of this:

"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.

Also,

According to the former Niger mining minister, Wilson told his CIA contacts, Iraq tried to buy 400 tons of uranium in 1998.

So, perhaps his official findings in his classified report were correct, but his public statements, intended to cause damage to the administration, were not.