Intelligence and the Bush administration

The exposure of CIA operative Valerie Plame, by Lewis "Scooter" Libby is old news, whereas it relates to the Bush-Cheney administration's war "policy" on Iran.

The Bush administration cites the Mujahideen-e Khalq (MEK) as a reputable source of intelligence on Iran. I previously reported that the MEK was Soviet-created in the 1960's. MEK participated in the Iran hostage crisis and the Iran-Iraq war, and it is postured to accept a leadership role in Iran. Congressman Kucinich mentioned the MEK when he recently introduced articles of impeachment against Vice President Cheney.

What's wrong with this situation is Bush-Cheney and America could receive intelligence from Valerie Plame and her team, instead of the MEK, if the president's administration did not expose her. Plame was assigned to the CIA's Counter-proliferation Division, whose responsibility was to prevent nuclear proliferation. Plame and her team operated under elaborate cover, which included Brewster-Jennings and Associates, whose fictitious operations brought CIA operatives into contact with foreign nuclear operations.

In Plame's words, "18 years of meticulously crafted cover were gone in an instant." Every CIA operative who was associated with Brewster-Jennings was exposed as a spy, and their lives were endangered. The CIA Memorial Wall and The Book of Honor have a star of a fallen agent in 2003, approximately at the time of Plame's exposure. I don't believe anymore that Cheney exposed Plame to silence her husband, Joseph Wilson. Plame's intelligence competed with the Bush administration's policies on both Iran and Iraq.

Daniel Hutchins
Acampo