June 9, 2003-July 6, 2003: Joseph Wilson Indicates He Wants Corrrection of Incorrect Statements by Rice

Former ambassador Joseph Wilson is infuriated by Condoleezza Rice’s June 9 claim (see June 8, 2003) that top officials were unaware of doubts over the Niger uranium claim. He contacts friends in the government and asks them to pass on the message that if Rice does not correct the record, he will (see May 29, 2003). [Vanity Fair, 5/2004, pp. 282] One of the people Wilson contacts is State Department official Marc Grossman (see June 10, 2003 and 12:00 p.m. June 11, 2003), who will later describe Wilson as “really mad” over Rice’s comments. Wilson tells Grossman that he is considering “going public.” [Marcy Wheeler, 1/24/2007] Wilson, according to his wife Valerie Plame Wilson, is so outraged at Rice’s assertions that they become “the final straw for Joe. He was angry that his government was lying.” [Wilson, 2007, pp. 138] He calls David Shipley, the editorial page editor of the New York Times, who offers him 1,500 words to tell his story (see July 6, 2003). Wilson will later write of Rice: “How does somebody whose job it is to track nuclear weapons developments, especially in rogue states, receive such critical information and then proceed to forget it? This was not a grade school homework assignment. The short answer is that they don’t forget it, unless they are derelict. Regrettably, disingenuousness is another possibility. Condoleezza Rice may be many things, but she is hardly derelict.” [Wilson, 2004, pp. 331-332]