Curiously, the
New York Times did not assign 'WMD expert' Judith Miller to cover the issues that immediately arose in response to the July 6, 2003, Joseph Wilson op-ed. The first article written by Judith Miller regarding the disputed uranium claim makes no mention of the former Ambassador's mission to Niger.
Instead, her July 23, 2003, New York Times article supports the Bush administration by casting doubt on the credibility of George Tenet and the CIA. The concluding paragraphs of the story serve to deflect the blame from National Security Council deputy advisor Stephen Hadley:
Mr. Hadley, a lawyer and veteran of the first Bush administration who has a reputation for fanatical attention to detail, did not say if he had offered to resign when he talked to President Bush earlier today. But Dan Bartlett, the White House communications director, said Mr. Bush, who was briefed about the discovery of the memorandums on Monday at his ranch in Texas, ''expressed the utmost confidence'' in Mr. Hadley and his boss, Condoleezza Rice, whose name was listed as a recipient on one of the C.I.A. warnings.
But Mr. Hadley's account, given in a meeting with reporters at the White House, raised new questions about Mr. Tenet and the C.I.A.
According to the outline of events the White House gave today, Mr. Tenet's warnings to the National Security Council that the information was unreliable came only six days after the intelligence director published it in the ''National Intelligence Estimate,'' the gold-standard of intelligence documents circulated to the highest levels of the administration and to Congress.
''I can't explain that,'' Mr. Hadley said, referring the issue back to Mr. Tenet. Three months later, on Jan. 24, another senior C.I.A. official, Robert Walpole, sent Mr. Hadley and other White House officials another memorandum that again said Iraq had sought to obtain the uranium, citing the language in the Oct. 1 intelligence estimate.
That memorandum, which was not part of the White House discovery this weekend, was intended to aid Secretary of State Colin L. Powell as he prepared to make the case against Saddam Hussein at the United Nations. But it arrived at the White House just four days before the State of the Union speech, and seemed to support the president's now disputed statement. It contained none of the cautions that Mr. Tenet had voiced by phone to Mr. Hadley and in the two memorandums sent just before the president's speech in Cincinnati on Oct. 7, laying out the case against Mr. Hussein.
Miller's last New York Times article written prior to the Wilson op-ed appears to include some exclusive (possibly classified) information on anthrax attack suspect Stephen Hatfill's involvement with mock mobile germ laboratories. The July 2, 2003 New York Times article served to (1) amplify the threat of alleged mobile laboratories and (2) imply that the administration with making progress in finding the perpetrator of the anthrax attacks.
A ProQuest news database search revealed no earlier articles offering the same data on Hatfill and the secret mock laboratory program. This apparent exclusive may provide one example to support the possible theory that Miller received exclusives from administration officials in exchange for acting as an intermediary to pass other exclusive leaks on to her colleagues.
A search of the New York Times archive for Judith Miller by-lines between 06/01/2003 and 07/31/2003 produced the results listed below. No New York Times articles were published under Miller's byline during the crucial time period between 07/03/2003 and 07/18/2003.
FOREIGN DESK | July 23, 2003, Wednesday
AFTER THE WAR: THE QUARRY; For Brutality, Hussein's Sons Exceeded Even Their Father
By JUDITH MILLER (NYT) 931 words
NATIONAL DESK | July 23, 2003, Wednesday
AFTER THE WAR: INTELLIGENCE; National Security Aide Says He's to Blame for Speech Error
By DAVID E. SANGER with JUDITH MILLER (NYT) 763 words
FOREIGN DESK | July 21, 2003, Monday
AFTER THE WAR: INTELLIGENCE; Scientist Was the 'Bane of Proliferators'
By JUDITH MILLER (NYT) 848 words
FOREIGN DESK | July 20, 2003, Sunday
AFTER THE WAR: UNCONVENTIONAL ARMS; A Chronicle of Confusion in the U.S. Hunt for Hussein's Chemical and Germ Weapons
By JUDITH MILLER (NYT) 1961 words
FOREIGN DESK | July 19, 2003, Saturday
AFTER THE WAR: INTELLIGENCE; British Arms Expert at Center of Dispute on Iraq Data Is Found Dead, His Wife Says
By WARREN HOGE with JUDITH MILLER (NYT) 1520 words
NATIONAL DESK | July 2, 2003, Wednesday
AFTER THE WAR: BIOLOGICAL WARFARE; Subject of Anthrax Inquiry Tied to Anti-Germ Training
This article was reported and written by William J. Broad, David Johnston and Judith Miller. (NYT) 1830 words
FOREIGN DESK | June 7, 2003, Saturday
Some Analysts Of Iraq Trailers Reject Germ Use
By JUDITH MILLER and WILLIAM J. BROAD (NYT) 1498 words