How Important Is It To Protect CIA Agent Identity?

[J. J.]

I disagree with your statement that Plame is irrelevant.

You guys have repeatedly said that her neighbors knew she was a CIA agent but no one can produce something to back that claim up.  In fact as I do more and more digging online it is looking like that just isn't true.

Wakie, I've been very careful to say that I don't know what her status is.

I've also raised that possibility that Plame could potentially be at Langley and still be under cover (though that makes "knowingly" blowing her cover a bit harder to prove).  I have also raised the possibility that she was within the "5- year" time limit.  I don't have the answers.

If, however, she gave her children's school a work number that, when dialed, was answered as, "Hello, Central Intelligence Agency," if she gave out business cards that said "Analyst, Central Intelligence Agency,"  if she listed her job as being with the CIA with her Alumni Association, or if, when asked, she told her neighbors that she worked at the CIA, she wasn't undercover.  Now, we don't know if she was or wasn't undercover, but Fitzgerald is looking at this aspect, correctly, IMO.

Yes, I feel that it is exceptionally important to protect a covert operative's identity, but Plame may not have been, and whomever leaked it might have not known that she was undercover.

[J. J.]

Plame was clearly, at least at some point, a covert operative.  How do we know?  Because she used Brewster Jennings & Associates as an employment cover.  Denying this or failing to recognize it is stubborn blindness at best.

"At some point," does not cut it.  It has to be within that 5 year period.  As I've pointed out, I had an attorney who was a covert operative with the CIA; he's no longer under cover and he's been out long enough that it can be discussed.  His law partner could say, "He's an ex-CIA covert operative," because he's no longer undercover or covered by the law.

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I tend to agree, if Plame was covert and if the leakers knew she was covert.

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No, we're not talking about treason, but a potential violation of Federal law. 

As for comparisons, one charge floating around is possibly disclosing classified information, for which Sandy Berger plead guilty.  Both are as serious, though we don't if it happened with Plame.  I can remember a few of the leftist here lamenting the guilty plea (and fine).

Keep in mind what we don't know:

1.  If Plame was undercover since 1997.  (And I don't have an answer either.)

2.  If anything leaked was classified.

[J. J.]

Let's see, that is one of the big topics of discussion isn't it?  It sounds like you have already made your conclusion.  I'd love to see what you base your conclusion on. 

Clearly she was, at one point, a covert CIA operative.  Whether or not she was still a CIA operative is unknown but it turns out (contrary to what some of you guys on here are claiming) her neighbors DID NOT know she worked for the CIA.  As recently as 2001 she was known to be listing Brewster Jennings as her employer (indicating that at that time she was still an active CIA operative).  There is, I believe, a 5 year window of protection wherein a covert CIA agent's identity CANNOT be revealed.  2001 + 5 years would be 2006.  Since it isn't 2006 yet clearly a crime WAS committed.

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http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode50/usc_sec_50_00000426   ----000-.html

Notice these two clauses:

"(i) whose identity as such an officer, employee, or member is classified information, and
(ii) who is serving outside the United States or has within the last five years served outside the United States;"


Simply "listing Brewster Jennings as her employer" is not sufficient.  That she is in the CIA must be classified and she has to have been serving outside the US.  The statute also exempts one person, the covert agent, from this, so if Plame talked to someone that isn't holding a security clearance and they tell the Press, guess what, it's not a violation.


Interestingly, she does not post anything on her Alumni Association profile about her employment; we graduated the same year.  Ah, I may have met her and I'd bet we have mutual friends, but I don't remember her. 

[J. J.]

Interestingly, Brewster Jennings is not believed to be the cover job for what Plame was doing.  See:  http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2003/10/10/apparent_cia_front_didnt_offer_much_cover/

[J. J.]

Of course, national security is far less important than marital fidelity.  A lie about compromising national security interests in no  big thing, unlike adultery which is one of the ten commandments.

Glad to see we have our priorities straght.

</sarcasm>

Let's be clear here.  There may have been no violation of any law dealing with national security. 

I take it that you feel perjury is okay, James?  I don't.

[J. J.]

There is another problem with Wakie's logic.  One of the sources for Novak's report that Plame worked for the CIA was the Central Intelligence Agency.

Here is the link to the Column:

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/robertnovak/2003/07/14/160881.html

Here is quote from the WP story:

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/26/AR2005072602069_pf.html

Undercover operatives should be protected; the CIA should not be giving their names to reporters.  They cover should not be that they work at CIA headquarters.