This story ran on UPI in Jan of 2004. It hasn't gotten much mention lately as far as I can see, but it contains some tantalizing tidbits that might point to where, other than Rove, Fitzgerald's investigation may have been leading:
Cheney's Staff Focus of Probe
Federal law-enforcement officials said that they have developed hard evidence of possible criminal misconduct by two employees of Vice President Dick Cheney's office related to the unlawful exposure of a CIA officer's identity last year. The investigation, which is continuing, could lead to indictments, a Justice Department official said.
"Hard evidence." Does this relate to the INR memo?
According to these sources, John Hannah and Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, were the two Cheney employees. "We believe that Hannah was the major player in this," one federal law-enforcement officer said. Calls to the vice president's office were not returned, nor did Hannah and Libby return calls.
We've heard Libby's name a lot recently, but what about Hannah? Might he have turned? Read on:
The strategy of the FBI is to make clear to Hannah "that he faces a real possibility of doing jail time" as a way to pressure him to name superiors, one federal law-enforcement official said.
So, did they succeed? Does Fitgerald have cooperating witnesses within the Administration? If so how many? Who?
Recall that John Hannah was "one of two 'U.S. governmental recipients' for reports generated by an intelligence program being run by the INC and which was then being funded by the State Department."
So he was close to the Chalabi-Miller axis. Did he tell Miller? Did she tell him?
The mind reels...