If so, will anyone be prosecuted for it?
It depends on why her name (well, her employment status as an undercover agent for the CIA) was leaked. The relevant statute (Pub.L. 97-200, 50 U.S.C. § 421-426) states that:
The relevant requirements “intentionally” and “knowing that the information disclosed so identifies”. It would likely be difficult to prove either of these things without some sort of firm declaration in an email or something. And, indeed, when Patrick Fitzgerald convened a grand jury to investigate the leak, no indictments were handed out on that charge.
Yep part of it is knowing that the person is a covert agent. There are plenty of people who work at the CIA. Most of them are not covert agents. Just saying that someone works at the CIA is not enough to break the law. Just saying a covert agent works for the CIA is not enough break the law if you don’t know that they were covert. On top of that you have to prove it.
This is the way the court looked at it. Scroll down to mid page to see the specific questions for determing if a crime was committed. Also note that Cheney claimed the power to declassify information.
The frustrating thing about this case is that the special prosecutor declined to answer questions about why he concluded no crime had been committed. There are a number of possible reasons, some of which have already been mentioned in this thread. We’re left to speculate.
Here’s what Fitzgerald had to say about applying the IIPA:
In order to establish a violation of Title 50, United States Code, Section 421 [the Intelligence Identities Protection Act], it would be necessary to establish that Libby knew or believed that Plame was a person whose identity the CIA was making specific efforts to conceal and who had carried out covert work overseas within the last 5 years. To date, we have no direct evidence that Libby knew or believed that Wilson’s wife was engaged in covert work.
So the issue is a lack of direct evidence that he knew. The issue was not that she wasn’t covert but that it couldn’t be proved that Libby knew.
page 28 [30 of 38] footnote # 15
Just to expand on that,
CMC fnord!
So, once again the Republican Party’s best defense is, “We aren’t criminals, we are just really stupid and incompetent! That’s not illegal!”
And the sad part is that it works so well with their voter base.
Tris
I’m pissed they outed her. I saw her on TV tonight and all I could think was, "She’s hot! 
But Scooter says she likes girls. 
"
Edited to add:
But NPR got it wrong. She’s not a “platinum blonde.” She’s a “BOTTLE blonde.”
According to the Waxman Hearings at the House today, the man in charge of seeing that this sort of thing DOESN’T happen at the White House said that if someone at the White House knows that an agent is with the CIA, then it is the responsibility of the person at the WH to find out if the agent is covert/undercover before passing any information along. So an aide couldn’t just say that he “didn’t know” that she was undercover – “oops, sorry!”
To be fair he [iirc it was Leonard, not Knodell] said if there was any doubt then there was a positive obligation on behalf of the recipient to find out.
All that has to happen is for the WH to say they had no reason to suspect that she was undercover.
I thought that the whole thing with Knodell was pretty funny. I did feel sorry for him a little.
Kinda’ strains the credibility to believe that neither Cheney, nor Libby, would publically discuss something like this, especially given the secrecy surrounding this administration. But knowing something’s fishy and proving it are two different things.
It will never be known what fallout was created by the Plame disclosure, one can only speculate on the damage done. Certainly it destroyed any future usefulness of an experienced operative, at a time when the U.S. sorely needs such assests so desperately.
Given who her husband is and the circles she moves in, it is likely that most people had a good idea who she worked for.
Also, being a ‘known operative’ is not necessarily a disadvantage.
Outing her was spiteful, also rather stupid as it backfired, but I doubt it has done her or the CIA any harm.
She testified before congress today, she stated that, before she was ‘outed’, she could “count on one hand” the people who knew her CIA connection. Presumably she was excluding gov’t. officials, who had a legal and moral obligation to protect classified information.
As I stated above, we’ll probably never know for sure, but I think your very wrong in your assesment of the potential harm done.
My post complete with cites was eaten. Nevermind.
President Bush came out publicly in 2004 and said whoever leaked Plume would be fired from his administration. Then about a year later when it first started looking like someone related to the White House would get nailed for it, he changed to whomever broke the law.
Bush the senior was head of the CIA. The CIA has liason people in the White House. If Tom Clancey is to be believed, the head of the CIA has daily or weekly briefings in the White House. there’s no way anyone with a title greater than intern is unaware you don’t publicly disclose CIA identity. I’m sure they are also clear on the weasel factor outlined in a previous post where it must be proven that one knowingly spilled the beans.
Also, let’s not forget those Cheney declassifications. Remember the ones where Cheney declassified whatever unilaterally at really convenient times for spin control.
I’m with ARCane, this sure didn’t help TWAT no matter how it’s spun.
That was all just “words”:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003559300
I’ve rubbed against that world (amended to more than) twice in my life, it is kind of funny, but you know but you aren’t sure - so you assume.
It is not at all combatative, if anything it is quite friendly, it is a bit like being given private telephone numbers by people who can help if you have a problem.
While I think it was stupid, I doubt that it has done any harm, there are layers of espionage that are overt rather than covert - and it is pretty obvious that she was ‘connected’.
One day it prob’ly will be known. Classification expires eventually.
Your conjecture is appreciated for what it’s worth.
Note that you are essentially accusing Plame of perjury.
No, I’m not, she could genuinely believe what she said
- what I’m saying is that people around her probably had a very good idea who she was
For example in the early nineties a couple of us spent some time on business crawling round a Moscow airport. The ‘head of protocol’ was a seriously nice and competent guy - the Irish wanted to employ him at Shannon and offered him a good salary. He thought the money was so high that they were joking, but they were not - and everyone knew that he, Boris and Natasha were KGB or whatever they called themselves then.
Similarly, they were not sure whether we were ‘connected’, which was very convenient as we just had to step outside for an unmarked car to pull up, with a conveniently English speaking driver. At first we thought it a coincidence 