The Iraq-al-Qaeda link memo must be real because it's generating some high placed chatter:

Senate Intelligence Committee leaders plan to ask the Justice Department (news - web sites) to investigate who leaked a top-secret Pentagon (news - web sites) memo sent to the committee.

The Oct. 27 memo from Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith provided details of intelligence linking Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s al-Qaida network and the toppled Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites). Details of the memo were published in the Nov. 24 issue of The Weekly Standard, a conservative magazine.

Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., said he expected to ask the Justice Department and the Pentagon to determine if the leak constituted a crime. If it did, a criminal investigation should be conducted, he said.

"That's highly classified material and an egregious leak of classified material," he told reporters.

He said committee staff drafted a letter to the Justice Department and but was waiting to consult with the panel's top Democrat, Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, before sending it.

A spokeswoman for Rockefeller, Wendy Morigi, said he would support sending the letter.

Roberts said he did not believe that the leak came from the committee.

Why did the DoD say anything? The administration should have just said nothing.