From the New York Times:
“The F.B.I. is investigating a Pentagon official on suspicion of passing secrets to Israel, according to government officials.
The espionage investigation has focused on an official who works in the office of Douglas Feith, the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, officials who have been briefed about the investigation said on Friday. The F.B.I. has gathered evidence that the Pentagon official passed classified policy documents to officials at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a major pro-Israeli lobbying group, who in turn provided the information to Israeli intelligence, the officials said.
The bureau has evidence that the Pentagon official has provided the Israelis with a sensitive report about American policy toward Iran, along with other materials, according to the officials.”
The Israeli Embassy and AIPAC deny the allegations.
The story gets more interesting, though.
According to the Washington Post, “the official being investigated works under William J. Luti, deputy under secretary of Defense for Near East and South Asian Affairs. Luti oversaw the Pentagon’s “Office of Special Plans,” which conducted some of the early policy work for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.” The Office for Special Plans was the in-house intelligence unit tasked to provide alternative analyses of intelligence to those provided by the CIA when the CIA was regarded as being too skeptical of claims that there were ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. Seymour Hersh quotes an unnamed administration source: “According to the Pentagon adviser, Special Plans was created in order to find evidence of what Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, believed to be true—that Saddam Hussein had close ties to Al Qaeda, and that Iraq had an enormous arsenal of chemical, biological, and possibly even nuclear weapons that threatened the region and, potentially, the United States.” The Office of Special Plans has been described by a number of sources as ‘cherry-picking’ the pieces of intelligence that supported the conclusions it wanted to reach, and then funneling them to senior administration officials without adequate context or analysis.
In addition to developing intelligence about Iraq before the war, it was also responsible for planning for postwar Iraq. (It’s pretty amazing how many serious mistakes it has been involved in.) According to Knight-Ridder,
“The officials didn’t develop any real postwar plans because they believed that Iraqis would welcome U.S. troops with open arms and Washington could install a favored Iraqi exile leader as the country’s leader. The Pentagon civilians ignored CIA and State Department experts who disputed them, resisted White House pressure to back off from their favored exile leader and when their scenario collapsed amid increasing violence and disorder, they had no backup plan.”
That “favored Iraqi exile leader” was, of course, Ahmed Chalabi, who seems to have passed classified information to Iran. According to Eric Boehlert in Salon,
“A distinguishing characteristic of the office seemed to be the extraordinary access and influence given to Ahmad Chalabi, the exiled leader of the Iraqi National Congress. A darling of Beltway neocons, Chalabi has been viewed over the years with suspicion by the State Department and the CIA, which recognize the obvious political agenda behind his desire for the U.S. to overthrow Saddam — he’d be installed as Saddam’s successor. The CIA and State Department have also been wary of some of the Iraqi defectors Chalabi produced who allegedly detailed Saddam’s deadly arsenal. By contrast, Chalabi reportedly enjoyed unprecedented access at the Pentagon’s office. According to some reports, the information and allegations he and his fellow defectors made about Saddam were passed up to Rumsfeld and Bush, with no review by outside intelligence professionals. The information was often shared with the press as well, helping to build a public case for war.”
Finally, the OSP’s close relations with Israeli officials had been noticed before this story broke. According to the Guardian
“The OSP was an open and largely unfiltered conduit to the White House not only for the Iraqi opposition. It also forged close ties to a parallel, ad hoc intelligence operation inside Ariel Sharon’s office in Israel specifically to bypass Mossad and provide the Bush administration with more alarmist reports on Saddam’s Iraq than Mossad was prepared to authorise.
“None of the Israelis who came were cleared into the Pentagon through normal channels,” said one source familiar with the visits. Instead, they were waved in on Mr Feith’s authority without having to fill in the usual forms.
The exchange of information continued a long-standing relationship Mr Feith and other Washington neo-conservatives had with Israel’s Likud party.
In 1996, he and Richard Perle – now an influential Pentagon figure – served as advisers to the then Likud leader, Binyamin Netanyahu. In a policy paper they wrote, entitled A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm, the two advisers said that Saddam would have to be destroyed, and Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Iran would have to be overthrown or destabilised, for Israel to be truly safe.”
Which is why, as CBS says (referring to the alleged spying): “This put the Israelis, according to one source, “inside the decision-making loop” so they could “try to influence the outcome.” The case raises another concern among investigators: Did Israel also use the analyst to try to influence U.S. policy on the war in Iraq?”
These are all only allegations now. My purpose in writing about them is not to imply that they are true; just to provide some background against which to judge how serious it would be if there were, in fact, a spy working with the Office of Special Plans.
http://www.warandpiece.com
Was Franklin, in the coffeeshop, with the policy paper.
Dunno if this part snuck in under your radar:
Next it’ll be claimed that the OSP was not in a position to have significant influence over US policy.
I don’t think that’s the story anyway. Personally I think we’re so joined at the hip with Israel that the word “spying” hardly makes sense.
Waiting to see if this is a tentacle of Josh Marshall‘s “tectonic plates” story linking up to the Plame affair…
Slart — I read that, but tended to discount it on several grounds. First, the Pentagon seemed to me to have a clear interest in minimizing the damage. This is of course not a reason to think they’re wrong, but it is a reason to look further. Second, the OSP has generally been described as being very small — the Guardian says around 10 full-time people, plus consultants, for instance. Given the rather large tasks they were given, it’s hard to see how someone in such a small group could not be in a position to influence policy. Third, the group itself clearly did influence policy, so again, I’m not sure how this individual could not have been. Unless he was e.g. an administrative assistant; but (fourth) he’s described (on praktike’s excellent link) as being the Pentagon’s top Iran analyst. Thus my skepticism.
Rilkefan: Apparently so.
First, the Pentagon seemed to me to have a clear interest in minimizing the damage.
Yeah, I’d considered that. Still, it doesn’t do to omit relevant data, even if it’s relevant for the purpose of excoriating the Pentagon when the whole story comes out. If it ever does.
I don’t think that’s the story anyway. Personally I think we’re so joined at the hip with Israel that the word “spying” hardly makes sense.
Well, in one sense it clearly does. Industrial security briefings routinely stress the need for safeguarding government and company proprietary information while on travel, and Israel is one of those places to watch out for. As is just about every nation in the world that’s got a large defense industry. That’s not relevant to this case, but I’m thinking there are things we’d keep from Israel, even if they are in on things in re our Middle East policy than may be appropriate.
But that’s not the point here, is it? The point is that Israel may have been getting unauthorized information from us. Else, why the FBI investigation?
“I don’t think that’s the story anyway. Personally I think we’re so joined at the hip with Israel that the word “spying” hardly makes sense.”
Huh? Maybe you should clarify.
What I meant was, it may be illegal but personally it doesn’t bother me, given the subject area (policy on Iran, a country we consider a threat) and the leakee (a close ally/vassal state I happen to support directly threatened by Iran).
“Else, why the FBI investigation?”
The answer may depend on the size of the octopus I alluded to above. Why leak about an investigation into something which (if I as a partisan Democrat don’t care about and won’t hold against Bush [as the story stands]) most people won’t care about?
What I really don’t understand is why the Niger documents were so badly forged, and how this could connect to Plame.
Above in reply to Slart.
Sebastian, re “spying”, my take is that one leak hardly counts as espionage. Plus the concert of purpose between us and Israel isn’t consistent with “spying” – it’s like saying a guy in the FBI who tells something (which nominally he should keep to himself) to a guy in the CIA is a spy.
Anyway, Josh promises an update soon.
Recent update from warandpiece:
“Here’s my latest thought on this: As I understand, Franklin wasn’t motivated to pass the information to Aipac to give it to the Israelis. He wanted our own government to act. He wanted to get it to the NSC and the White House.
I’m not joking. From what I understand from my sources, Franklin was desperately trying to get the US government to act on this intelligence. Aipac was just a tool for getting influence in Washington and the White House.”
Slart: “Still, it doesn’t do to omit relevant data.” — You’re right; I was worried about how long the piece was getting, and omitted this bit for this reason plus those I mentioned above, but I probably should have put it in.
Rilkefan: I read that on War and Piece, and I tend to trust her, but that makes so little sense. I mean: was there no one in our government who could have helped to push this information forward? If he had approached all the people in our government who had the relevant clearance and might have helped, and all of them turned him down, shouldn’t he have wondered a bit about whether he was right before trying to go through a foreign government? What Laura says may be true, but I have a hard time wrapping my mind around it.
hilzoy: say the info in question indicated something that the OVP didn’t like. Since (presumably) that’s the real power nexus in this admin, and in some ways in his chain of command, Franklin might have trouble finding anyone willing to push the info (esp. since e.g. State might not trust Feith’s man) – so it had to be shopped out of the admin.
Ok, I’m too ignorant to speculate on this stuff, will just read the reporting.
rilkefan (great name, btw): what puzzled me was the thought: clearly he’s willing to go outside normal channels on this one. Going to e.g. a rival agency within the US government would be a lot less “outside normal channels” than going to the government of another country, and it has the added benefit of not being illegal. So was there no one he could use? And if not, didn’t that tell him anything? — That’s what confused me.
Hmm, I’m willing to believe a lot of things, but you would have a tough time convincing me that an American intelligence worker was forced to give information to Israel in the hopes that it would draw the attention of other US intelligence workers.
“Agent of influence” is the classic term here, not “spy.”
I think Laura Rozen is getting spun here, because her source met with her recently — as in, after finding out that Franklin was in deep doo-doo — and concocted this cute little story.
Meanwhile, the FBI has been investigating Franklin for months, and had wiretaps and so forth.
We’ll see.
Plus the concert of purpose between us and Israel isn’t consistent with “spying.”
It was certainly enough to send Jonathan Pollard to prison.
Hey — Josh Marshall’s article is up.
“Hey — Josh Marshall’s article is up.”
Hmm. I’m a long way from being impressed. They’ve got miles to go before they can say it’s “Iran-Contra II”. And why bother to quote Ghorbanifar, who even credulous people like the CIA consider a liar?
And there’s this, via Atrios. Sample:
Also:
rilkefan — yeah, I just read it, and the title is way overblown. On the other hand, taking the article on its merits, I found it quite interesting. The idea that people in the government are opening a back channel to Ghorbanifar, of all people, gives me this horrible sense of deja vu.