It’s Richer vs. CIA on Suskind ChargesIn the wake of the CIA’s offical denial of Ron Suskind’s explosive claim that the White Houe ordered the agency to fabricate a letter suggesting a Saddam- al Qaeda link, the blogger Laura Rozen makes a couple interesting points.
First, the CIA’s statement seems to come close to contradicting Richer’s own denial. According to the CIA statement, “our government considers Habbush [Saddam’s former intelligence chief] to be a wanted man,” implying that they don’t know where he is. But Richer makes clear that the Bush administration was actively discussing how to use Habbush, writing of his conversations with Suskind: “I do speak to discussions regarding using Habbush, which were frequent during that period, but what I was talking about was the possibility of using him to tamp down the insurgency - not to influence western public opinion.”
Richer also writes: “I was asked to respond to documents regarding the potential use of Habbush upon his defection … I was also involved in many queries from elements of the Administration trying to document an Al-Qa’ida and Saddam government link.” As Rozen notes, the Senate Intelligence Committee investigation doesn’t appear to have seen these documents. Did the CIA fail to turn them over?
Looks like this is far from over…