Johnny Dwyer on the Boston Globe retraction of the Taylor-CIA story:

Taylor’s relationship with U.S. officials was long and complex, but was he a spy?

In the thousands of pages of documents I’ve reviewed, hundreds of hours of interviews I’ve conducted in the U.S. and Liberia, nothing I’ve seen or heard suggests that.

Was he a “source”? Well, what does that mean?

Lost in this is the political geography of Monrovia. There are two centers of political power there: the Executive Mansion and the U.S. Embassy. They’re about a five minute drive from one another. The Defense Attache at the Embassy is an employee of DIA–the attache and their underlings are responsible for being connected and fluent with those in power in the country they’re posted to. In Taylor’s Liberia–which I’ll date to 1992, even though he was elected in 1997–the core political players were limited to a few dozen people, stretched out over a city considerably smaller than Brooklyn, who generally ate at that the same restaurants, frequented the same nightclubs and took their meetings at the same hotels. So did Charles Taylor, in the course of his 14-year political career, discuss information with the Defense Attache or another DIA employee that warranted inclusion in a cable? I know he did. Does that make him a source? Yes, I guess so. Does that mean he “worked” for the United States? Not in my book.

Excellent article in the Boston Globe by Bryan Bender about US ties to Charles Taylor.  Six years ago the Globe filed a Freedom of Information Act request to get information about this relationship.  It seems most of the request was denied, but the Defense Department has admitted they received intelligence from Taylor beginning in the early 1980s.

The Pentagon’s response to the Globe states that the details of Taylor’s role on behalf of the spy agencies are contained in dozens of secret reports – at least 48 separate documents – covering several decades. However, the exact duration and scope of the relationship remains hidden. The Defense Intelligence Agency said the details are exempt from public disclosure because of the need to protect “sources and methods,’’ safeguard the inner workings of American spycraft, and shield the identities of government personnel.

Bender cites anonymous security experts who think it was likely Taylor was most useful for information he was providing about Ghadaffi.

A small thing: The article says Taylor’s lawyer, Courtenay Griffiths, did not return calls to comment.  This is shocking.  I suspect they did not contact the right people, or perhaps Griffiths is ill.  I imagine he would be eager to respond to this particular issue, and he is not one to resist an interview.