Before we move on to the latest in the latest spy mystery, Old War Dogs' resident Russian historian just posted two great background pieces you don't want to miss: Who is to blame? What is to be Done?, Putin and Poison. Go read 'em and come back.
Spymania: Suspicions swirl around … everyone
Allahpundit
I bet this is how Tom Maguire ended up on the Plame beat. He wrote a few posts about it when the story first broke, felt obliged to keep up with it as other righty bloggers dropped out, and before he knew it he was three years older and had 100 posts about Joe Wilson in his archives.
If I’m still blogging about Litvinenko three years from now, I’ll be looking for polonium for myself.
The plot’s so thick it’s practically ossified. The FBI’s involved now as it seems a former KGB major who lives in Virginia and knows Scaramella may or may not have compiled a dossier showing incriminating links between the Kremlin and the Yukos oil company, and may or may not have given that dossier to Litvinenko, who may or may not have been planning to blackmail the people involved. Scaramella’s connection to the plot is unclear, but he’s turning out to be one shady customer. The papers have been describing him as an “academic” and “magistrate,” but … hmmmm:
Mr Litvinenko accused Mr Scaramella of poisoning him from the day he first fell ill: as the Italian told me, his name was all over Russian and Chechen websites as the main suspect in the poisoning of the former FSB agent long before the story hit the British press. Mr Litvinenko retained his suspicion right up to his death. Speaking of the Itsu meeting, he said: “Mario didn’t want anything, he gave me the email printouts … I said to myself, he could have sent these emails by computer. But instead he wanted to come and give them to me in person: why, and why in such a hurry? He was very nervous.”
The cops seem pretty sure Litvinenko was poisoned at the sushi place, and funny thing — Scaramella was the one who requested the meeting:
According to Litvinenko’s friend and co-author Felshtinsky, who spoke to him soon afterwards: “Alexander told me the meeting was very sudden. They weren’t meant to meet that particular day. Then Mario suddenly called and said he had to meet him immediately…”
Felshtinsky thinks he’s innocent. Is he? Back to the Independent:
Mr Scaramella claims to be many things, including a professor at Naples University, an honorary magistrate, and consultant to something called the Environmental Crime Protection Programme (ECPP). But Naples University has not heard of him. The ECPP has no fixed office. The post as magistrate is non-paying. The only job he has had in recent years over which there is no doubt is with the Mitrokhin Commission. [The commission was formed to investigate KGB influence in Italian politics. — ed.] ...
