The Leaker & Al-Shifa
The word is out that CIA agent Mary McCarthy has been fingered as one source of information for The Washington Post's Dana Priest. McCarthy apparently provided Priest with information for her Pulitzer Prize winning coverage of the CIA's alleged secret terror prisons throughout Europe. (AJ Strata, via Power Line, provides a great run down of information concerning McCarthy. She is referenced several times in the 9-11 Commission's final report.)
McCarthy served on the National Security Council with Richard Clarke [edit: et al.] from 1998 to 2001. And I find one nugget of information concerning her time there to be especially interesting. McCarthy was, at first, apparently opposed to the Clinton administration's strike on al-Shifa in August 1998. Al-Shifa, you will remember, was one of Clinton's chosen retaliatory targets following the embassy bombings earlier in the month. Steve Hayes, more than anyone, has brought the intelligence surrounding al-Shifa back into the public's consciousness. This is very important because the intelligence surrounding al-Shifa said that it was one of several facilities in Sudan where Iraq and al Qaeda were working jointly on chemical weapons projects.
In any event, McCarthy didn't think much of al-Shifa as a target back in August 1998. According to the 9-11 Commission's report (p. 117):
Two days before the embassy bombings, Clarke's staff wrote that Bin Ladin "has invested in and almost certainly has access to VX produced at a plant in Sudan." Senior State Department officials believed that they had received a similar verdict independently, though they and Clarke's staff were probably relying on the same report. Mary McCarthy, the NSC senior director responsible for intelligence programs, initially cautioned Berger that the "bottom line" was "we will need much better intelligence on this facility before we seriously consider any options." She added that the link between Bin Ladin and al Shifa was "rather uncertain at this point." Berger has told us that he thought about what might happen if the decision went against hitting al Shifa, and nerve gas was used in a New York subway two weeks later. [Emphasis Added.]
But as Daniel Benjamin, another former NSC staffer, wrote in October of 2004, McCarthy had changed her tune by April 2000:
The report of the 9/11 Commission notes that the National Security staff reviewed the intelligence in April 2000 and concluded that the CIA's assessment of its intelligence on bin Laden and al-Shifa had been valid; the memo to Clinton on this was cosigned by Richard Clarke and Mary McCarthy, the NSC senior director for intelligence programs, who opposed the bombing of al-Shifa in 1998. The report also notes that in their testimony before the commission, Al Gore, Sandy Berger, George Tenet, and Richard Clarke all stood by the decision to bomb al-Shifa.
Now, of course, Clarke and Benjamin argue that: (a) the decision to strike al-Shifa was justified because (b) the intelligence connecting Iraqi chemical weapons experts to al Qaeda's chemical weapons efforts was sound, but (c) this doesn't mean that Iraq and al Qaeda had a significant relationship because (d) somehow this collaboration occurred without either party realizing that it was working with the other! Sound bizarre? It is.
This "sound" logic and reasoning has apparently been enough, however, to convince the major media outlets not to discuss al-Shifa. My bet is that McCarthy has probably adopted this line of "thinking" as well. All of the available information points to her being one of Richard Clarke's cronies. But Clarke has a hard time keeping the facts straight, to say the least.
In fact, Clarke at one point saw al-Shifa as a direct result of a collaborative agreement between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda. Clarke was familiar with a litany of intelligence reports surrounding Iraqi involvement with al Qaeda in Sudan. The 9-11 Commission notes (p. 128):
On November 4, 1998, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York unsealed its indictment of Bin Ladin, charging him with conspiracy to attack U.S. defense installations. The indictment also charged that al Qaeda had allied itself with Sudan, Iran, and Hezbollah. The original sealed indictment had added that al Qaeda had "reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq." This passage led Clarke, who for years had read intelligence reports on Iraqi-Sudanese cooperation on chemical weapons, to speculate to Berger that a large Iraqi presence at chemical facilities in Khartoum was "probably a direct result of the Iraq-Al Qida agreement." Clarke added that VX nerve precursor traces found near al Shifa were the "exact formula used by Iraq." [Emphasis Added]
The 9-11 Commission's report then says that the information concerning Iraq-al Qaeda was excluded from the superseding indictment, which dealt specifically with the August 1998 embassy bombings.
In the coming days there will be a lot of ink spilled on McCarthy's story. Is there any doubt that the media will lionize her as a patriot? I don't think so. But, it would be nice if someone in one of the major media outlets paused to reflect on the leaker's role in analyzing the intelligence surrounding al-Shifa. The tension in the arguments put forth concerning al-Shifa by McCarthy's circle are easy for anyone to see. Yet, the mainstream media outlets haven't bothered to challenge the likes of Richard Clarke on this matter in the past.
The Washington Post (which ran Clarke's defense of the intelligence connecting Iraq and al Qaeda in Sudan in January 1999) itself has been and would continue to be remiss if it didn't pick up on this angle of the story.
There was a time when Mary McCarthy knew about the connection between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda. Just as Richard Clarke did. Will The Washington Post explore this topic? Probably not.
Why? That's not what Mary McCarthy was leaking to them.
McCarthy served on the National Security Council with Richard Clarke [edit: et al.] from 1998 to 2001. And I find one nugget of information concerning her time there to be especially interesting. McCarthy was, at first, apparently opposed to the Clinton administration's strike on al-Shifa in August 1998. Al-Shifa, you will remember, was one of Clinton's chosen retaliatory targets following the embassy bombings earlier in the month. Steve Hayes, more than anyone, has brought the intelligence surrounding al-Shifa back into the public's consciousness. This is very important because the intelligence surrounding al-Shifa said that it was one of several facilities in Sudan where Iraq and al Qaeda were working jointly on chemical weapons projects.
In any event, McCarthy didn't think much of al-Shifa as a target back in August 1998. According to the 9-11 Commission's report (p. 117):
Two days before the embassy bombings, Clarke's staff wrote that Bin Ladin "has invested in and almost certainly has access to VX produced at a plant in Sudan." Senior State Department officials believed that they had received a similar verdict independently, though they and Clarke's staff were probably relying on the same report. Mary McCarthy, the NSC senior director responsible for intelligence programs, initially cautioned Berger that the "bottom line" was "we will need much better intelligence on this facility before we seriously consider any options." She added that the link between Bin Ladin and al Shifa was "rather uncertain at this point." Berger has told us that he thought about what might happen if the decision went against hitting al Shifa, and nerve gas was used in a New York subway two weeks later. [Emphasis Added.]
But as Daniel Benjamin, another former NSC staffer, wrote in October of 2004, McCarthy had changed her tune by April 2000:
The report of the 9/11 Commission notes that the National Security staff reviewed the intelligence in April 2000 and concluded that the CIA's assessment of its intelligence on bin Laden and al-Shifa had been valid; the memo to Clinton on this was cosigned by Richard Clarke and Mary McCarthy, the NSC senior director for intelligence programs, who opposed the bombing of al-Shifa in 1998. The report also notes that in their testimony before the commission, Al Gore, Sandy Berger, George Tenet, and Richard Clarke all stood by the decision to bomb al-Shifa.
Now, of course, Clarke and Benjamin argue that: (a) the decision to strike al-Shifa was justified because (b) the intelligence connecting Iraqi chemical weapons experts to al Qaeda's chemical weapons efforts was sound, but (c) this doesn't mean that Iraq and al Qaeda had a significant relationship because (d) somehow this collaboration occurred without either party realizing that it was working with the other! Sound bizarre? It is.
This "sound" logic and reasoning has apparently been enough, however, to convince the major media outlets not to discuss al-Shifa. My bet is that McCarthy has probably adopted this line of "thinking" as well. All of the available information points to her being one of Richard Clarke's cronies. But Clarke has a hard time keeping the facts straight, to say the least.
In fact, Clarke at one point saw al-Shifa as a direct result of a collaborative agreement between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda. Clarke was familiar with a litany of intelligence reports surrounding Iraqi involvement with al Qaeda in Sudan. The 9-11 Commission notes (p. 128):
On November 4, 1998, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York unsealed its indictment of Bin Ladin, charging him with conspiracy to attack U.S. defense installations. The indictment also charged that al Qaeda had allied itself with Sudan, Iran, and Hezbollah. The original sealed indictment had added that al Qaeda had "reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq." This passage led Clarke, who for years had read intelligence reports on Iraqi-Sudanese cooperation on chemical weapons, to speculate to Berger that a large Iraqi presence at chemical facilities in Khartoum was "probably a direct result of the Iraq-Al Qida agreement." Clarke added that VX nerve precursor traces found near al Shifa were the "exact formula used by Iraq." [Emphasis Added]
The 9-11 Commission's report then says that the information concerning Iraq-al Qaeda was excluded from the superseding indictment, which dealt specifically with the August 1998 embassy bombings.
In the coming days there will be a lot of ink spilled on McCarthy's story. Is there any doubt that the media will lionize her as a patriot? I don't think so. But, it would be nice if someone in one of the major media outlets paused to reflect on the leaker's role in analyzing the intelligence surrounding al-Shifa. The tension in the arguments put forth concerning al-Shifa by McCarthy's circle are easy for anyone to see. Yet, the mainstream media outlets haven't bothered to challenge the likes of Richard Clarke on this matter in the past.
The Washington Post (which ran Clarke's defense of the intelligence connecting Iraq and al Qaeda in Sudan in January 1999) itself has been and would continue to be remiss if it didn't pick up on this angle of the story.
There was a time when Mary McCarthy knew about the connection between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda. Just as Richard Clarke did. Will The Washington Post explore this topic? Probably not.
Why? That's not what Mary McCarthy was leaking to them.
posted by Thomas Joscelyn at 9:14 AM
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