The Politics of Truth

In 1991, President George H. W. Bush called Ambassador Joseph Wilson a “True American Hero.” In 2003, senior officials in President George W. Bush’s White House tried to intimidate critics and punish Wilson for what he knew—and finally made public—about the administration’s lies before the invasion of Iraq.The disclosure of the undercover identity of Wilson’s wife, CIA operative Valerie Plame, was an unprecedented and potentially criminal act. The Politics of Truth tells the revealing story of this courageous American diplomat and his pivotal career in foreign policy, from telling Saddam Hussein to leave Kuwait to confronting the White House leaks that have breached national security. With fearless insight and disarming candor, Wilson recounts more than two decades in the U. S. Foreign Service. As the acting ambassador to Iraq, Wilson was the last American official to meet with Saddam before Desert Storm in 1990. He successfully parried the dictator’s threats to use American hostages as human shields against U.S. bombing and was given a patriot’s welcome by President George H. W. Bush on his homecoming. Yet today he finds himself in a battle with his own government.