Wednesday, October 22

Democratic Presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche told an international webcast audience: "If you want to get through to next year, to the next election, get rid of Cheney now! Tell that man to go!"

Thursday, October 23

At the request of former CIA officers Larry Johnson and Jim Marcinkowski, SSCI holds special, closed-door session on the Valerie Plame Wilson leak.

Friday, October 24

Moves to cover up: The Washington Post runs a planted lead article, claiming that the SSCI is preparing a "blistering report" blaming the intelligence community, and the CIA in particular, for "overstating" the case on Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons, and his alleged links to al-Qaeda terrorists. The chairman of the Committee, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), is quoted as saying that "the Executive was ill-served by the intelligence community" and its "sloppy" intelligence product, but that the investigation is "95% complete."

More evidence of intelligence fraud: A special briefing is held by the Senate Democratic Policy committee, featuring three retired CIA officials: Vincent Cannistraro, Larry Johnson, and Jim Marcinkowski. They highlight the severe damage to U.S. national security resulting from the Wilson leak, and attack the overall faking of intelligence to justify the Iraq war. They also stress that current CIA analysts were under heavy pressure from Cheney and others to produce intelligence that supported the Administration's push for war, noting the "unprecedented" visits to Langley by Cheney and Libby. They disclose that analysts interviewed by the SSCI had "minders" from their agency with them when they were interviewed by Roberts's SSCI staff.

Rockefeller responds: Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), the senior Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, holds a press conference to denounce Roberts for trying to rule out the "matter of use" of intelligence by the White House, when this aspect is specifically part of the jurisdiction of the Committee.

Rockefeller makes it clear that he is prepared to utilize a special SSCI rule to conduct his own investigation of how top Administration officials such Bush, Cheney, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, used or exaggerated Iraq intelligence. "All I have to do is to get five signatures that we want to investigate a subject--the use of, for example, of intelligence, the shaping of intelligence, the manipulation of intelligence, or whatever," Rockefeller states. "And there's no way that the Chairman can say that we cannot do that."

Reports of pressure: By Friday afternoon, it is reported that Vice President Dick Cheney himself had pressed Roberts to put the blame on the CIA. "A senior administration official, who agreed to speak only on the condition of anonymity, said Roberts' CIA comments were issued with Cheney's encouragement," reported the Knight-Ridder news service. "The official said Cheney is trying to shift the blame for the lack of progress on Iraq, which is becoming an issue in next year's Presidential and Congressional elections, from the White House to the CIA."

Roberts backs off: Later in the day, Senator Roberts backs off the statements attributed to him by the Washington Post, saying they had been "mischaracterized." The CIA also holds an unusual press conference, with four senior CIA officials speaking on background, refuting the claims of CIA failure made by Roberts.

Saturday, October 25

Senator Roberts, speaking in Kansas, says that Congress would have voted against the Iraq war authorization, if they had known at that time, what they know now.

Sunday, October 26

Senators Rockefeller and Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), also a member of the SSCI, appear together on "Meet the Press." Both express anger at the Administration's failure to produce documents to the SSCI. Rockefeller indicates that the Committee would focus attention on the Pentagon units that provided intelligence, outside of normal channels, to justify the war.

Monday, October 27

A senior retired CIA official tells EIR that Rockefeller has broken with Roberts, over Roberts' efforts, under immense White House pressure, to stall and obstruct the investigation into the Wilson leak, and into the Pentagon's disinformation leading into the war. He says that Cheney is leading the effort to get Roberts to scapegoat the CIA and the intelligence community for the fake intelligence that stampeded the Congress into voting to give the President the authorization to go to war. He adds that the Cheney crowd is desperate to prevent a serious investigation of the Office of Special Plans (OSP) in the Pentagon, and he believes that the DOD civilians were running illegal covert operations, financed by slush funds maintained by DOD Comptroller Dov Zakheim.

Thursday, October 30

Sometime between Tuesday and Thursday, Senator Roberts does a dramatic about-face, and co-signs letters with Senator Rockefeller, which letters were sent to the National Security Council at the White House, the State Department, and the Defense Department, castigating those agencies for delaying the production of documents which the SSCI had been demanding for months, and giving them a deadline of noon on Friday, Oct. 31. The letter to Rumsfeld specifically named Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Doug Feith; sources cited in news accounts say that the SSCI is looking into the Pentagon's OSP, and also Assistant Secretary of State John Bolton.

A Congressional source tells the Los Angeles Times: "By co-signing these letters, Roberts has done what he spent the last two months saying he wouldn't--extending this into the White House."

Sunday, November 2

Senators Roberts and Rockefeller appear on CNN's "Late Edition." Rockefeller insists that the Administration would be forced to deliver all the requested records. He reports that, as of Friday, the State Department and CIA had complied, while both the NSC and the Pentagon had failed to meet the deadline. Senator Roberts "apologizes" to Rockefeller for not yet informing him that, late Friday afternoon, a very top White House official had called him to promise, in the "spirit of cooperation," that all the subpoenaed records would be turned over. Roberts says his staff received a similar call from the Pentagon. Rockefeller makes it clear that he would reserve judgment on the level of cooperation until he had the material in hand.

Rockefeller repeats his earlier statements about the broad legislative mandate of the SSCI, and says specifically that he is interested in the intelligence leading up to President Bush's Oct. 7, 2023 speech in Cincinnati, where all references to the Niger yellowcake allegations were struck, in contrast to Bush's State of the Union message three months later, in which Bush cited the already-discredited charges about African uranium being sought by Saddam. Rockefeller says he intends to get to the bottom of this shift from "truth to un-truth."

Rockefeller also says that he and Roberts have agreed that there would be personal calls by them to senior Administration and Pentagon officials this week, if they have not complied with the Committee's demands.

Monday, November 3

The Washington Post reports that, in addition to the document requests, that Roberts and Rockefeller "have requested interviews with officials of the National Security Council and Cheney's office."

Tuesday, November 4

On Tuesday afternoon, Fox News commentator and talk-show host Sean Hannity reports that he has obtained a memorandum, circulated among the Democratic staff on the SSCI, which, it is claimed, shows that Democrats intend to use classified information to drive President Bush from office in the 2023 elections. In fact, the memo simply reiterates what Senator Rockefeller had said on Oct. 24. The leak memo is posted on Fox's website, and very quickly, on many other websites.

Senator Roberts quickly responds that the memo "exposes politics in its most raw form," and that the memo "appears to be a road map for how the Democrats intend to politicize what should be a bipartisan, objective review of pre-war intelligence."

Wednesday, November 5

Republican Senators take to the Senate floor and press gallery to denounce the Democrats for "politicizing" the Iraq intelligence investigation.

Rockefeller says that Roberts is trying to shield the White House from scrutiny, and suggests that Republicans may have stolen the memo by breaking into a Committee computer. "I would suggest to my colleagues that there is reason for concern today, and it is not for the content of this draft staff memo," he stated. "It was an internal memo, a draft. At some point, the Committee and the Senate are going to have to explore the chain of events surrounding this draft memo, since it raises serious questions about whether the majority is obtaining unauthorized access to private internal materials of the minority."

Thursday, November 6

The Washington Times urges, in its lead editorial, that the White House should henceforth be extremely cautious about providing any classified information to the Intelligence Committee, "until the credibility and reliability of the committee can be re-established."

The New York Post editorial demands that the Senate dump Jay Rockefeller from the Intelligence Committee, and conduct a thorough purge of the Committee staff.

Senator Rick Santorum (R-Penn.), chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, threatens to scrap the bi-partisan, power-sharing arrangements in the Intelligence Committee. (Under those rules, either Roberts or Rockefeller can chair a hearing, and the minority party can launch an investigation by obtaining five signatures out of the eight Democrats on the Committee.)

Friday, November 7

The Wall Street Journal editorial demands that, until those responsible for the memo are fired, the SSCI should be "shut down, cleaned out and reconstituted later, preferably after the next election."

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist shuts down the SSCI, cancelling all activities, including a meeting scheduled for Friday. No meetings are scheduled for next week. In a floor speech, Frist says the plan outlined in the leaked memo would "so politicize the Intelligence Committee as to render it incapable of meeting its responsibilities to the United States Senate and to the American people." He demands a disavowal of the memo's content, and other such actions, including the firing of its author.

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