Meet the Press. I missed it myself, but am told that in his interview with Rep. Curt Weldon this morning, Meet the Press's Tim Russert cited rather extensively from two recent articles published in The American Prospect by Jeet Heer and myself. The issue: Rep. Curt Weldon's new book on his secret Iranian intelligence source. Our contribution: uncovering that Weldon's source "Ali" is in fact a cut-out for the Iran Contra arms dealer Manoucher Ghorbanifar, deemed a fabricator by the CIA more than two decades ago.

Here's the relevant portion of this morning's transcript:

MR. RUSSERT: One of the legitimate issues raised about Iraq, however, was: Was the information given to us about weapons of mass destruction credible and accurate? The American Prospect, a liberal magazine, has been reading your book and analyzing it and talking to people. "The Prospect has learned that the true identity of `Ali' is Fereidoun Mahdavi, formerly the shah's minister of commerce and, more importantly, the close friend and business partner of Ghorbanifar, legendary arms dealer, infamous intelligence fabricator, and central figure in the Iran-Contra scandal that almost brought down the Reagan administration. It was `Gorba,' as he was known back then to Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, the rogue National Security Council officer, who lured the Reagan administration into secretly selling U.S. missiles to the Islamic regime in exchange for the release of Western hostages.

... Mahdavi says that he has this network in Iran that he gets information from,' says Akbar Etemad [a former minister in the shah's government.] `Each time, he says his information will come true in two months' time. But all that information is fake. Ghorbanifar and Mahdavi work very closely together. Ghorbanifar is unreliable. In that sense, he might be dangerous. The CIA shares that harsh assessment of Ghorbanifar. If the intelligence community had any clue to Mahdavi's association with Ghorbanifar, it is scarcely surprising that its officials rebuffed Weldon's overtures on behalf of `Ali.' Many years ago, the CIA issued an unusual `burn notice' on Ghorbanifar, instructing its personnel not to deal with him and warning that he was known to spread false information to advance his own interests."

REP. WELDON: Well, the CIA created Ghorbanifar, so they don't have to come to me about that. They have to look internally. The CIA created Chalabi. Those are creations of the CIA. I'm not asking them to create anyone. My source is Ali, and it's more the process that we need to have to be able to have the CIA come back and tell us, "Give us the backup of your information. If Ali's lying, show me where he's lying." That's not what their memo last June said to me.

And so all I want to do is make sure that we're properly testing the agency, because I lost some good friends on 9/11. One of the pilots in one of those planes, wife and two kids still live in my district five miles from me. She teaches school. Her two kids, we built a playground in his honor. I have a very good friend, Ray Downing, who was the fire chief of all rescue on 9/11. He was killed. I'm not going to take a back seat. We're going to prevent the next terrorist attack only by aggressively challenging our intelligence community. Porter Goss is doing that. Porter Goss needs support. We need to change the way we do red teaming, group think, as Jim Woolsey has said and he endorsed my book, so did Jack Caravelli, a 20-year veteran of the CIA. They understand. If it makes some people feel some heartburn, so be it. That's my job.

MR. RUSSERT: One more point on the book. "'Many information that I have given to Weldon is coming from Ghorbanifar,' said [Fereidoun] Mahdavi, who was reached in Paris by telephone on June 6. `Because Ghorbanifar used me, in fact, to pass that stuff because I know he has problems in Washington.' ... `Someone is using me for their purpose,' he raged. `How is it possible that something like that book comes out and the people who publish it don't inform me?'"

REP. WELDON: Well, Ali knew what was happening. I'm not even confirming who Ali was, but Ali knew what we were doing clearly. What his association with Ghorbanifar, I have no idea, but I can tell you every Iranian in exile in Paris knows Ghorbanifar.

Ghorbanifar has been at this since the CIA first graded him. The CIA is clearly
embarrassed over Ghorbanifar. They told me that and clearly they think he's a liar and he may be, but I'm not asking the way of that information.

The information I gave the CIA has been proven to be true. We gave them a series of actions in every case. When they say he was getting it from open sources, we did a search through the Congressional Research Service of all those allegations and predictions. In every case, I gave the information to the CIA before any media worldwide reported it. I think that's worthy of further investigation.

MR. RUSSERT: The CIA says that Ali asked for $150,000 which they refused to give him.

REP. WELDON: Well, I wouldn't give him any money. That's not the goal. The goal is to research and see whether or not--the CIA has wasted more than $150,000 on routine payments they make on a regular basis around the world. What I want is the system tested. They could have come back to me and they could have said, "This is the reason why we think the information you've been given is invalid." They haven't done that. The only letter I got a year ago, two pages, which the CIA is refusing to release and I asked for it for this show and they refused to release it, says that the CIA still wants information from Ali. Now, why would they want information from someone who they say is fabricator? It doesn't make sense to me.

MR. RUSSERT: Will Ali share in the profits of this book?

REP. WELDON: The profits? There will be no profits to the book, but Ali will--I will take care of whatever needs he has including his family in Iran that I've told him I would assist in getting them out.

It's curious that Weldon claims here he knew nothing about Mahdavi's association with Ghorbanifar. He describes just such an association in his book on page 4. Furthermore, according to three sources, Weldon himself met with Ghorbanifar and Mahdavi in April 2004 (a meeting he failed to report to the US embassy in Paris), in the Sofitel hotel around the corner from the US embassy. So it's hard to understand how Weldon claims not to know of any connection between the information he was getting from Mahdavi and Ghorbanifar.

As to Weldon's claim that the CIA created Ghorbanifar, it's not clear how he could have concluded that. From as early as 1982, Ghorbanifar was the subject of a rare CIA burn notice. It was the Reagan White House/National Security Council that pursued working with Gorba on Iran Contra in 1985-1986, not the CIA, which later issued a second burn notice on Ghorbanifar.

Several other points are also baffling. "Ali" -- Mahdavi, was the minister of commerce in the Shah's government, overthrown by the Islamic Revolution in 1979. For Weldon to offer that he will use the book's profits to get "Ali's" family out of Iran is perhaps well meaning, but Mahdavi and his family haven't been in Iran since 1979, and there isn't anyone who needs rescuing now who didn't already get out 26 years ago or suffer the consequences then. And I can offer a first hand account that Mahdavi had no idea that Weldon was writing a book based on his information.

If you missed the show this morning, you can catch the Meet the Press rerun at 10 pm and 1 am EST on MSNBC...

Monday Update: What's the issue here? The US certainly needs intelligence on Iran, as Iran aspires to have a nuclear program, supports terrorism and constitutes a potential regional threat to US national security interests. But as Iraq is a case study of, the US certainly can't afford another Curveball, another fabricator, or indeed, another Ghorbanifar himself, inputting fabrications into the system, to serve their own agenda, and that of their American supporters. Some of the Iran hawk scuttlebutt I'm hearing suggests that some small percent of the information provided by "Ali" may not have been fabrications. That hardly constitutes the standard for a credible or reliable intelligence source. Flip through Weldon's book -- available today -- yourself -- all of "Ali's" information is there, including hundreds of fantastic and colorful predictions which never materialized. It would be harmless or comical if influential American political forces were not trying to make this the intelligence basis for US policymaking on Iran.

Posted by Laura at June 12, 2005 04:27 PM