I have uncovered evidence in a Walter Pincus article dated July 6, 2003 that suggests that the Bush administration knew that Wilson's trip to Niger was arranged by the CIA's "clandestine service." Let's take a look at the article:
July 6, 2003
Ex-Envoy: Nuclear Report Ignored. . .
Richard Leiby and Walter Pincus; The Washington Post
WASHINGTON Joseph Wilson, the retired U.S. ambassador whose CIA-directed mission to Niger in early 2002 helped debunk claims that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium there for nuclear weapons, has said for the first time publicly that U.S. and British officials ignored his findings and exaggerated the public case for invading Iraq.
[snip]
A senior administration official said yesterday that Wilson's mission originated within the CIA's clandestine service after Cheney aides raised questions during a briefing.
link
To me, it seems plausible that this "senior administration official" also knew that Wilson's wife was CIA, and therefore knew that she was "clandestine." Six days later, on July 12, 2003, a senior administration official, perhaps the same one, told Pincus that Plame was CIA and set up the trip:
[L]ittle attention has been paid to what The Post reporter, Walter Pincus, has recently described as a[n]. . . exchange on July 12, 2003.
In that exchange, Mr. Pincus says, "an administration official, who was talking to me confidentially about a matter involving alleged Iraqi nuclear activities, veered off the precise matter we were discussing and told me that the White House had not paid attention" to the trip to Niger by Joseph C. Wilson IV "because it was a boondoggle arranged by his wife, an analyst with the agency who was working on weapons of mass destruction."
Can we put two and two together and assume, if this is the same senior administration official, that this official knew Plame was in the "clandestine service," and therefore was an undercover operative? What do you think?
Update [2005-7-29 23:32:6 by pontificator]: This diary has been revised to correct errors in the original version.