The Spy stuff seems to have, at its heart, the OSP

[liveoaktx]

Some things seem very fishy about Franklin. If what Buchanan said is accurate, the investigation may have been leaked in order to throw Franklin to the wolves and perhaps short-circuit the investigation to higher ups, buying time till after the elections to deal with those higher.

I keep thinking about how the Senate Intelligence Committee purposely is putting off investigating Bush and the OSP until AFTER the election as well.

[EST]

1. Actually, ths OSP, though at the center, is only one head of this

hydra; there are many more. Remember the frustration and anger that Rockefeller has been displaying, until the forced vacation? Probably had some top-secret labels slapped on some things he really wanted to talk about. Also both the SIC and the 911 commish did a huge white wash and everybody knows it. This was just too big for them to handle.

[Tamyrlin79]

2. yeah...

that really gets my goat... It is a shame that people aren't up in arms about this, especially the Democrats. They could make some real political hay out of this for the election. Of course, I'm not sure that the calculus hasn't changed. Before, no one wanted to be seen as being overly partisan... But with a spy involved and criminal investigations going on, it becomes a whole other issue. Now, the dems can pursue it and claim to be defending the nation while doing so.

[lazarus]

3. from what I've read

This was leaked to put pressure on Franklin. They're trying to get him to cooperate.

That means they're looking higher up the chain, at Feith and Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld.

[liveoaktx]

4. Looks like Josh Marshall's article also centers on Feith and OSP

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2004/0410.marshallrozen.html

[janx]

5. From the link above:

The FBI has intensified its investigation of senior members of what was formerly known as the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans on suspicion that one of them passed highly classified U.S. military information to the government of Israel, according to federal law enforcement officials.

In some cases, colleagues, former associates and members of other government agencies have been interviewed as many as four times by teams of FBI agents, FBI officials told United Press International.

Two of the people interviewed are Bill Luti, former chief of OSP, and Harold Rhode of the Near East/South Asia office, according to participants in the investigation.

The OSP, an intelligence unit, was set up by the No. 3 man in the Pentagon, Douglas Feith, undersecretary of defense for policy, according to retired Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski, who was a staffer in the office from June 2002 through March 2003.

(MUCH more at link)

[buycitgo]

6. seen this, from a year ago? links to franklin, rhode, ledeen, and...

Published on Friday, August 8, 2003 by the Long Island, NY Newsday
Secret Talks With Iranian Arms Dealer
by Knut Royce and Timothy M. Phelps


''A spokesman for Feith's Near East, South Asia and Special Plans office, the controversial intelligence office that sources said played a key role in the Ghorbanifar contacts, did not respond yesterday to an e-mailed inquiry about those contacts. Newsday's inquiry was e-mailed at the spokesman's request.

The senior administration official identified two of the Defense officials who met with Ghorbanifar as Harold Rhode, Feith's top Middle East specialist, and Larry Franklin, a Defense Intelligence Agency analyst on loan to the undersecretary's office.

Rhode recently acted as a liaison between Feith's office, which drafted much of the administration's post-Iraq planning, and Ahmed Chalabi, a former Iraqi exile disdained by the CIA and State Department but groomed for leadership by the Pentagon.

Rhode is a protege of Michael Ledeen, a neo-conservative who was a National Security Council consultant in the mid-1980s when he introduced Ghorbanifar to Oliver North, a National Security Council aide, and others in the opening stages of the Iran-contra affair.

A former CIA officer who himself was involved in some aspects of the Iran-contra scandal said that current intelligence officers told him it was Ledeen who reopened the Ghorbanifar channel with Feith's staff. ''
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0808-12.htm