“There’s some truth out there that people don’t want us to know about,” West told me after the memorial. “The simple question that has to be asked is: Why was Ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi, Libya, in the heart of radical Islamist territory, on 9/11, being guarded by Islamic militias? Is it true that we were running guns? The ambassador was meeting with a representative from Turkey. We know that Turkey is behind the Islamist forces [in Libya]. Were they talking about getting guns that we provided to the rebels there, who turned out to be al-Qaida, Muslim Brotherhood-backed, and then getting them up into Turkey to come down into Syria? Now today we have al-Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood training Islamist fighters in Libya to go to Syria.”
Also, this little nugget...
Any liberal who rolls his eyes at the B-word should try to understand this. It was excruciating for them, in 2001 and 2002, to be accused of treason whenever they asked for a fuller story of 9/11. Asking what “Bush knew,” or making fun of him for ignoring memos about Bin Laden, didn’t make them Truthers. The killers in Benghazi haven’t been found. Getting furious about that doesn’t make you a kook.
Finally I would just like to summarize by saying.... this will be bigger than Watergate!
I have to disagree, nothing will come out of this. Nothing official came out of Watergate either...rather I should say Nixon wasn't impeached and still advised several Presidents for years afterwards. If you're trying to imply that Obama will be impeached I'd like to point out that Clinton wasn't and there was far more evidence of wrongdoing than there is here.
mrwhoop wrote: If you're trying to imply that Obama will be impeached I'd like to point out that Clinton wasn't and there was far more evidence of wrongdoing than there is here.
I still say that the White House owes the American people a full accounting of the failures in Benghazi...
What I don't understand is that why they haven't cooperated with Congress post election. Either it's something so egregious embarrassing and/or there's still some covert operations in effect.
Or because the people in Congress looking for answers all ready have a preconceived notion of twhat the answers are, and anything provided other than their preconceived notion is inherently not the answer to them.
Easy E wrote: Or because the people in Congress looking for answers all ready have a preconceived notion of twhat the answers are, and anything provided other than their preconceived notion is inherently not the answer to them.
mrwhoop wrote: If you're trying to imply that Obama will be impeached I'd like to point out that Clinton wasn't and there was far more evidence of wrongdoing than there is here.
President Clinton was, in fact, impeached.
Yes and no, I understand that to impeach someone is just like an indictment at court but I was referring more to the act of dismissal from office that most associate with it. Clinton was acquitted of the impeachment charges and I'd like to add that it seems most Presidents get a call for impeachment over something they do.
mrwhoop wrote: If you're trying to imply that Obama will be impeached I'd like to point out that Clinton wasn't and there was far more evidence of wrongdoing than there is here.
President Clinton was, in fact, impeached.
Yes and no, I understand that to impeach someone is just like an indictment at court but I was referring more to the act of dismissal from office that most associate with it. Clinton was acquitted of the impeachment charges and I'd like to add that it seems most Presidents get a call for impeachment over something they do.
Nope... The House actually impeached Clinton. (in a sense, he was convicted).
The Senate voted whether to remove him from office, which they didn't. But that doesn't mean "he was acquitted" of impeachment charges.
mrwhoop wrote: If you're trying to imply that Obama will be impeached I'd like to point out that Clinton wasn't and there was far more evidence of wrongdoing than there is here.
President Clinton was, in fact, impeached.
Yes and no, I understand that to impeach someone is just like an indictment at court but I was referring more to the act of dismissal from office that most associate with it. Clinton was acquitted of the impeachment charges and I'd like to add that it seems most Presidents get a call for impeachment over something they do.
He was not acquitted of the impeachment charges. Impeaching the president is separate from removing from office and in fact they are done by two different bodies. The impeachment vote succeeeded in the house of representatives; the subsequent vote to remove him from office failed in the senate. You can read more about it here.
Normally I'm not a big fan of pedantry for pedantry's sake, but these words have specific meaning.
So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
cincydooley wrote: So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
Well four Americans died in Benghazi, but thousands of potential Americans were arguably denied life thanks to Clinton's actions
cincydooley wrote: So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
He didn't get impeached for a having a BJ, he got impeached for lying about it under oath. Perjury, oddly, is not to be taken lightly.
cincydooley wrote: So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
Well four Americans died in Benghazi, but thousands of potential Americans were arguably denied life thanks to Clinton's actions
I was wondering how this thread would get to wonderful places.
cincydooley wrote: So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
Well four Americans died in Benghazi, but thousands of potential Americans were arguably denied life thanks to Clinton's actions
cincydooley wrote: So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
He didn't get impeached for a having a BJ, he got impeached for lying about it under oath. Perjury, oddly, is not to be taken lightly.
Perjury is ridiculously difficult to prosecute...so, there were pretty damning evidences against Clinton.
I'll say it again... I really don't believe what happened in Benghazi is an "impeachable" offence.
I think the whole thing is a clusterfeth and the administration was embarrassed. Hence the ridiculous initial response to blaming the attacks on that Youtube director.
"Impeachment in the United States is an expressed power of the legislature that allows for formal charges against a civil officer of government for crimes committed in office. The actual trial on those charges, and subsequent removal of an official on conviction on those charges, is separate from the act of impeachment itself."
Yes, it is a separate process but Clinton was acquitted of the impeachment charges as wikipedia states: Acquitted on February 12, 1999[9].
It's like saying you were arrested but you won't have a criminal record. He was impeached but he wasn't removed which was what I was saying as the opening comment (last one) was relating this to Watergate. Now that I think about it wasn't there some tomfoolery about there being an Obamagate in his first term?
Whatever, the point I was going for was "Weehoo gonna git dat black man outta da white man's office" isn't going to happen.
cincydooley wrote: So...are we really going to liken Clinton's impeachment for getting a BJ to this? I mean, maybe I'm just a simpleton, but getting some illicit oval office head seems a bit more tame than anything that happened in Benghazi.....
He didn't get impeached for a having a BJ, he got impeached for lying about it under oath. Perjury, oddly, is not to be taken lightly.
Perjury is ridiculously difficult to prosecute...so, there were pretty damning evidences against Clinton.
I'll say it again... I really don't believe what happened in Benghazi is an "impeachable" offence.
I think the whole thing is a clusterfeth and the administration was embarrassed. Hence the ridiculous initial response to blaming the attacks on that Youtube director.
Whembly has the way of it. I would have liked to have seen some people fired. The trophies that were "reassigned" have already been brought back.
Sorry, I really don't like comparing 4 dead to 'bigger than Watergate' or that "The killers in Benghazi haven’t been found. Getting furious about that doesn’t make you a kook. " I think it does make you a kook. Or rather ignorant of how many Americans die in the U.S. because of the crap we do to each other. And no I don't think it's any different whether it's 'us' or 'them' who's doing the harm.
I choose to never forget the Alamo. When Sam Huston rode out on Shadowfax with the hobbits to confront the Klingons he did so knowing that he was most likely going to die, but he inspired a new state that would go on to invent the chimichanga.
Ahtman wrote: I choose to never forget the Alamo. When Sam Huston rode out on Shadowfax with the hobbits to confront the Klingons he did so knowing that he was most likely going to die, but he inspired a new state that would go on to invent the chimichanga.
Ahtman wrote: I choose to never forget the Alamo. When Sam Huston rode out on Shadowfax with the hobbits to confront the Klingons he did so knowing that he was most likely going to die, but he inspired a new state that would go on to invent the chimichanga.
mrwhoop wrote: Sorry, I really don't like comparing 4 dead to 'bigger than Watergate' or that "The killers in Benghazi haven’t been found. Getting furious about that doesn’t make you a kook. " I think it does make you a kook. Or rather ignorant of how many Americans die in the U.S. because of the crap we do to each other. And no I don't think it's any different whether it's 'us' or 'them' who's doing the harm.
mrwhoop... the watergate reference in the OP was definitely dripping with saracasm.
It would help if some of the politicians clamoring for information and heads to roll had spent more time acting in good faith in regards to the governance of the nation rather than conducting themselves in a less dignified fashion.
It strikes me as very 'boy who cried wolf'; even if there was something to investigate further, many of these same politicians have been on Fox and other outlets demanding investigations into THIS allegation or THAT allegation or OMG DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THIS that even some who listen to them and believe them grow weary of it all.
I'm not someone who hesitates to admit when I'm wrong, but I don't think I am. That being said, I no longer think you were wrong either; I think it depends on some - appropriately enough, clintonesque parsing of what acquitted means - I will certainly concede he was in fact partially acquitted.
I used to have this BFF, and I'd always be at his house. Anyway, I also was friendly with his dad: his dad was a writer and had plenty of money, and I was able to help him publish his web pages; something which in 1997 was less than intuitive. I'd be over there a few nights a week, and man; we would get into these incredible debates about Clinton. I'd rant on about how a guy who can't keep it in his pants can't be trusted with The Button, and just the absolute most... insufferable, self-righteous garbage that only someone in their early 20's can spew. God, I cringe every time I think back on that.
Now of course that I am an adult, I think how right his dad was. I don't think Mr. Clinton should have lied to congress, but I think the original right answer should have been "get fethed - it's a private matter between my wife and I".
An oversight report was just released that accuses the State Department of willfully obstructing the Congressional investigation into the attack and the actions of the Obama administration...
If the Benghazi exactly as the White House claims, then these materials should easily be turned over. Instead, the administration has dragged its heels in every concieveable way...
This ordeal has the proverbial It Will Not Die (IWND) rule... o.O
whembly wrote: An oversight report was just released that accuses the State Department of willfully obstructing the Congressional investigation into the attack and the actions of the Obama administration...
I could release a report that you were involved in the Lindberg baby kidnapping, it doesn't mean you were; it is accusatory, not definitive.
whembly wrote: If the Benghazi exactly as the White House claims, then these materials should easily be turned over.
Why hello there false dilemma fallacy, my old friend.
whembly wrote: This ordeal has the proverbial It Will Not Die (IWND) rule... o.O
You are a necromancer that complains about the increased number of undead attacks in the area; if you wouldn't keep bring it back up you wouldn't have to complain about it not dieing.
whembly wrote: An oversight report was just released that accuses the State Department of willfully obstructing the Congressional investigation into the attack and the actions of the Obama administration...
I could release a report that you were involved in the Lindberg baby kidnapping, it doesn't mean you were; it is accusatory, not definitive.
whembly wrote: If the Benghazi exactly as the White House claims, then these materials should easily be turned over.
Why hello there false dilemma fallacy, my old friend.
whembly wrote: This ordeal has the proverbial It Will Not Die (IWND) rule... o.O
You are a necromancer that complains about the increased number of undead attacks in the area; if you wouldn't keep bring it back up you wouldn't have to complain about it not dieing.
No he's far to young to have kidnapped the Lindberg baby. he hasn't said where he was when the Hindenburgh went down. POLICE ARREST THAT MAN!
Here's the Bengazi deal. The President was incompetent and didn't care because it wasn't about his election. After it happened they covered up "terrorist" to make it look better. Now they are covering for that.
Is it impeachable? Nope. Are they trying to get the killers? Nope. Not at all. Can you do anything to the President about it? Nope.
whembly wrote: An oversight report was just released that accuses the State Department of willfully obstructing the Congressional investigation into the attack and the actions of the Obama administration...
I could release a report that you were involved in the Lindberg baby kidnapping, it doesn't mean you were; it is accusatory, not definitive.
Now where is it in there that's this is definitive?
I'd be curious what report you can submit with my involvement of the Lindberg baby kidnapping...
whembly wrote: If the Benghazi exactly as the White House claims, then these materials should easily be turned over.
Why hello there false dilemma fallacy, my old friend.
So why is State making excuses for not cooperating with Oversight? As Congress has both a right and a duty to do so.
whembly wrote: This ordeal has the proverbial It Will Not Die (IWND) rule... o.O
You are a necromancer that complains about the increased number of undead attacks in the area; if you wouldn't keep bring it back up you wouldn't have to complain about it not dieing.
Here's the Bengazi deal.
The President was incompetent and didn't care because it wasn't about his election.
After it happened they covered up "terrorist" to make it look better. Now they are covering for that.
Is it impeachable? Nope.
Are they trying to get the killers? Nope. Not at all.
Can you do anything to the President about it? Nope.
I'll be honest. I don't care very much.
I agree... 'cept for your last sentence.
I care, and I want some sort of accountability... that's all.
Frazzled wrote: Here's the issue: What sort of accountability do you think you're going to get? To be clear: what LEGAL punishment would you mete out, and to whom?
How about an honest accounting on the following:
-Who gave the stand-down order, and why?
-Is anyone being held accountable for having no resources close enough to reach this high-threat area within 8+ hours on Sept. 11?
-Was the President and SoS made aware of the classified cable that stated that the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi could not survive a sustained assault from one or more of the threatening militia groups that were operating in eastern Libya? If so, were there any efforts to mitigate that? If not, why not?
-Where was President Obama and what was he doing?
-Where's the paper trial of orders from the WH on the night of the attack? Obama said at a press briefing he gave orders... those are transcribed on paper and is generally easy to get.
-Who changed the talking points, and who made the decision to blame a movie?
-More importantly, where are the Benghazi survivors and why have we (especially Congress) not heard from them?
There's a gak ton of other questions...
As for "punishment"... it's too late for that now.
What I want is an honest account. Also, assurances that something like this is mitigated in the future AND that this ordeal is "politically" uncomfortable for the current administration such that the future administrations thinks thrice about pulling this gak in the future.
Frazzled wrote: Lets assume Obama gave the order.
Lets assume Obama put the rap on the survivors.
Now what?
Then he's lost all credibility (yes, he currently has some).
Make his presidency uncomfortable.
Impeachment is out of the question as even then, I don't think that's an impeachable offense.
FWIW Frazz, I don't believe he did those things... I believe it was simply incompetence somewhere along the chain of command and during the re-election campaign, someone thought it was prudent to cover it up as much as they can.
Are you suggesting that we'd just lay off and sweep the whole thing under the rug?
I'm suggesting absolutely nothing will happen to anyone involved. the worst thing that is going to happen is maybe it impacts Hillary's political prospects.
Frazzled wrote: I'm suggesting absolutely nothing will happen to anyone involved. the worst thing that is going to happen is maybe it impacts Hillary's political prospects.
Unfortunately... I'd bet you're right.
I'm telling ya'll... the Clintons are Teflon. If she's running... she'll win. I don't see anyone on the (R)'s that can beat her.
Unless folks will refuse to vote for Clinton because they don't want a presidential "Dynasty", or something silly like that.
You will never let this die until we have a giant congressional witch-hunt that will result in nothing else except possibly make a guy you don't like look bad.
You will never let this die until we have a giant congressional witch-hunt that will result in nothing else except possibly make a guy you don't like look bad.
Did I summarize that correctly?
Well... the supposed "witch-hunt? is still ongoing.
The only thing that Obama "will look bad" is their immediate reaction... ie, blaming it on a fething ridiculous youtube video that most of the media ate up... when they immediately knew it was an attack.
Other than that... I think it's a serious institutional problem.
You will never let this die until we have a giant congressional witch-hunt that will result in nothing else except possibly make a guy you don't like look bad.
Did I summarize that correctly?
Well... the supposed "witch-hunt? is still ongoing.
The only thing that Obama "will look bad" is their immediate reaction... ie, blaming it on a fething ridiculous youtube video that most of the media ate up.
Other than that... I think it's a serious institutional problem.
I don't think it's AT ALL unreasonable to expect, as an American citizen, a full accounting of the U.S. governments screw up. I don’t care who is in office, it's irrelevant. The government of the United States is in service to the state aka the people of the united states. The American people employ these politicians and by extention the bureaucrats they appoint, if they screw up they should get fired. What political party they belong to means nothing.
A CIA employee who refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement barring him from discussing the Sept. 11, 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, has been suspended as a result and forced to hire legal counsel, according to a top House lawmaker.
Rep. Frank Wolf (R., Va.) revealed at an event on Monday that his office was anonymously informed about the CIA employee, who is purportedly facing an internal backlash after refusing to sign a legal document barring him from publicly or privately discussing events surrounding the Benghazi attack.
The revelation comes about a month after several media outlets reported that CIA employees with knowledge of the terror attack had been forced to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDA) and submit to regular polygraph tests.
“The reports on the NDA are accurate. We’re getting people who call,” Wolf said Monday during an event marking the launch of the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi, a panel of former military and intelligence officials who are investigating unanswered questions surrounding the Benghazi incident.
Wolf’s office first received the anonymous call earlier in the summer, soon after CNN and Fox News reported on the NDAs and polygraph tests.
The caller told Wolf’s staff that an unnamed CIA employee has been suspended after refusing to sign a Benghazi-related NDA.
“My office received a call from a man saying that he knew a CIA employee who has retained legal counsel because he has refused to sign an additional NDA regarding the Sept. 11, 2012, events in Benghazi,” Wolf said in Sept. 9 remarks at a panel discussion hosted by Judicial Watch.
“I called the law firm and spoke with CIA employee’s attorney who confirmed that her client is having an issue with the agency and the firm is trying to address it,” Wolf said. “Based on my past experiences with the CIA, which is headquartered in my congressional district, I am not at all confident that these efforts will be successful.”
The NDA agreements are meant to instill fear in employees and stop them from speaking “to the media or Congress,” Wolf said on Monday.
The CIA declined to comment directly on Wolf’s charges, but forwarded the Washington Free Beacon a letter sent to Congress from CIA Director John Brennan in which he denies charges that the agency has forced employees to sign NDAs and submit to polygraph tests.
“I want to assure you that I will not tolerate any effort to prevent our intelligence oversight committee from doing their jobs,” Brennan hand wrote at the bottom of the letter.
The CIA reiterated its denial in a Tuesday call to a Free Beacon reporter, calling Wolf’s allegations “categorically false.”
Monday’s Benghazi discussion came on the same day that House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R., Calif.) released a report detailing multiple shortcomings in the State Department’s internal investigation into failures related to the Benghazi attack.
Issa says that the State Department “obstructed” congressional investigators, was “not comprehensive” in nature, “did not conduct thorough interviews,” and that more senior officials were not held to account.
“The ARB was not fully independent,” Issa said in a statement. “The panel did not exhaustively examine failures and it has led to an unacceptable lack of accountability.”
“While Ambassador [Thomas] Pickering and Admiral [Michael] Mullen have honorably served their country, the families of victims and the American people continue to wait for more conclusive answers about how our government left our own personnel so vulnerable and alone the night of the attack,” Issa said.
The newly formed Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi has similar goals as congressional investigators but is not confined by rules governing the legislative body, speakers at the event said.
Retired Air Force Col. Richard Brauer, cofounder of the group Special Operations Speaks, said the committee would aim to find out why U.S. military assets were ordered to “stand down” during the Benghazi attack.
“We’re tired of the lies and the cover-up that continues to this day,” Brauer said. “Who gave the order” to stand down, “to remain in place in Tripoli and the other locations and do nothing. When was this order given and why?”
“Forces were available on that very night, likely champing at the bit, but they were told to stand down,” he said. “These are words that will live in infamy.”
Welcome to our world people European leaders have been doing this for hundreds of years. Us Brits and old Frenchie are right at the top of the charts when it comes to shafting and back stabbing
During the second portion of a House Oversight and Government Reform hearing about Benghazi Thursday on Capitol Hill, the majority of Democrats on the Committee left the room and refused to listen to the testimony of Patricia Smith and Charles Woods. Ms. Smith is the mother of Sean Smith, an information management officer killed in the 9/11 Benghazi attack. Charles Woods is the father of Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods, who was also killed.
PHOTO: @OversightDems excuse themselves from testimony of #Benghazi heroes' family members #PJNet pic.twitter.com/NP9u2I2noC
— Darrell Issa (@DarrellIssa) September 19, 2013
The far side of the room, shown empty in the photo, belongs to the Democrats. The only Democrats who stayed were Ranking Member Elijah Cummings and Rep. Jackie Speier.
I hope those committee members have valid conficts... like needing to attend other meetings. o.O
I don't get what testimony people who weren't there can give, apart from 'I miss my son because he's dead'. Anything they know would be known by everyone else who watches the news. It's not like someone came home to tell them what went down.
But maybe I'm misunderstanding what they are testifying about.
motyak wrote: I don't get what testimony people who weren't there can give, apart from 'I miss my son because he's dead'. Anything they know would be known by everyone else who watches the news. It's not like someone came home to tell them what went down.
But maybe I'm misunderstanding what they are testifying about.
It's an attempt to give this whole ordeal a higher profile... usually that means getting such an emotional appeal on record.
And also more troubling, Admiral Mike Mullen also took some time out to advise Clinton on her testimony to Congress, WHILE he was pursuing this reveiw...
motyak wrote: I don't get what testimony people who weren't there can give, apart from 'I miss my son because he's dead'. Anything they know would be known by everyone else who watches the news. It's not like someone came home to tell them what went down.
But maybe I'm misunderstanding what they are testifying about.
It's an attempt to give this whole ordeal a higher profile... usually that means getting such an emotional appeal on record.
So it was just to get emotional stuff on the record so that the Rs can go 'see, this is important'? Why on earth would a) the Democrats stay for that and b) you expect them to if it serves no actual purpose in finding out what happens?
motyak wrote: I don't get what testimony people who weren't there can give, apart from 'I miss my son because he's dead'. Anything they know would be known by everyone else who watches the news. It's not like someone came home to tell them what went down.
But maybe I'm misunderstanding what they are testifying about.
It's an attempt to give this whole ordeal a higher profile... usually that means getting such an emotional appeal on record.
So it was just to get emotional stuff on the record so that the Rs can go 'see, this is important'? Why on earth would a) the Democrats stay for that and b) you expect them to if it serves no actual purpose in finding out what happens?
Because... something fugly happened... the administration, more specifically the states dept was caught with their pants down.
motyak wrote: I don't get what testimony people who weren't there can give, apart from 'I miss my son because he's dead'. Anything they know would be known by everyone else who watches the news. It's not like someone came home to tell them what went down.
But maybe I'm misunderstanding what they are testifying about.
It's an attempt to give this whole ordeal a higher profile... usually that means getting such an emotional appeal on record.
So it was just to get emotional stuff on the record so that the Rs can go 'see, this is important'? Why on earth would a) the Democrats stay for that and b) you expect them to if it serves no actual purpose in finding out what happens?
Because... something fugly happened... the administration, more specifically the states dept was caught with their pants down.
Someone fethed up.
I'm not getting into a debate on whether that happened or not, but how on earth is someone's mother crying and making accusations (or whatever 'emotional stuff' is, because its certainly nothing that will reveal anything not yet known) something worth sticking around for when you could be anywhere else? I mean if they even signed one thing, had one meeting, even if it was with the most useless committee/senator/whatever, if they ticked a box/signed something saying 'we'll change my desk around in my office so I can get more work done because at the moment its too cluttered for me to work', then leaving was more productive than staying and listening to 'emotional stuff'.
If it had been 'CIA member presents new information to committee' then I'd agree, but as it is, the emotional stuff benefits no one but the people who want to make this a big deal, and they would be better off getting testimony from people who actually have things to reveal/inform them about, rather than people who know nothing beyond the news and are just making an emotional case.
motyak wrote: I don't get what testimony people who weren't there can give, apart from 'I miss my son because he's dead'. Anything they know would be known by everyone else who watches the news. It's not like someone came home to tell them what went down.
But maybe I'm misunderstanding what they are testifying about.
It's an attempt to give this whole ordeal a higher profile... usually that means getting such an emotional appeal on record.
So it was just to get emotional stuff on the record so that the Rs can go 'see, this is important'? Why on earth would a) the Democrats stay for that and b) you expect them to if it serves no actual purpose in finding out what happens?
Because... something fugly happened... the administration, more specifically the states dept was caught with their pants down.
Someone fethed up.
I'm not getting into a debate on whether that happened or not, but how on earth is someone's mother crying and making accusations (or whatever 'emotional stuff' is, because its certainly nothing that will reveal anything not yet known) something worth sticking around for when you could be anywhere else? I mean if they even signed one thing, had one meeting, even if it was with the most useless committee/senator/whatever, if they ticked a box/signed something saying 'we'll change my desk around in my office so I can get more work done because at the moment its too cluttered for me to work', then leaving was more productive than staying and listening to 'emotional stuff'.
If it had been 'CIA member presents new information to committee' then I'd agree, but as it is, the emotional stuff benefits no one but the people who want to make this a big deal, and they would be better off getting testimony from people who actually have things to reveal/inform them about, rather than people who know nothing beyond the news and are just making an emotional case.
Right... understand that the investigation is still ongoing.
Also understand, that these Representatives WORK FOR US. If we wanted to bitch about the Colt's giving up a 1st rounder for Cleveland's Trent Richardson IN FRONT of some sort of committee, we can. (we had one about steroid for cripe sake).
Consider that the Senate and President are all Democrats... it's not hard to understand why they want to whitewash this as much as they can.
My point is... MAKE. THEM. OWN. IT.
Someone fethed up royally that put these folks in danger...
So... if it takes some crying mother crying publically in front of this committee to keep the pressure on... go for it. Because, the really strange thing here is that the administration could've nipped this in the bud in numerous ways a looooong time ago... but, instead, we're getting nothing but stonewalling efforts from the administrations.
Their actions is shouting loudly... it's saying "we have something to hide".
Just wanted to chime in - Sean Smith, one of the people who died in that attack, was a player I really looked up to in EVE Online. I've always thought it sad that even I knew things were going south before our government even had briefings on it, merely through the grapevine that is Jita Local.
Regardless of whose fault it is, and I would really like for there to be some sort of accountability in our government, we should as a default be overly cautious in defending our diplomats - these are the guys who will in the long run save us lives and money by improving relations with nations/regions. If we can't protect them, why bother even having diplomats?
Their actions is shouting loudly... it's saying "we have something to hide".
I think its saying "emotional testimony is a waste of time when the committee should be hearing from people with actual facts'.
But then I really don't care about this case, so I'm out.
I agree with you dude...
"Facts" has been really difficult to acquire... but Sen. Issa is hell bent to get 'em.
He's not interested in facts, he's interested in producing the most politically embarrassing narrative regarding Obama, personally, just as the Democrats are interested in avoiding that narrative to the greatest extent possible. I would say both sides are as bad as each other, but they really aren't, because as usual instead of trying to prevent similar problems from happening in the future, the Republicans are interested almost exclusively in their bitter policy-stalling agenda. Look at the reaction to this recent Syria situation; weeks of certain R pundits blubbing away on the news about how Obama needs to be stronger on foreign policy, then as soon as he threatens military action, you get R pundits blubbing that Obama is dragging America into another pointless middle eastern war, and as soon as the diplomatic option is floated(in a really daft way, admittedly) and moves forward, those exact same people are back on the screen with their Vitriol Holes gaping open to claim that Obama has somehow surrendered the Cold War retroactively to Putin.
Feck knows, there are plenty of legitimate reasons to get on Obama's case(he's a bigger betrayer of his core electoral base than Nick Clegg, and you have to work pretty damn hard to take that crown from ol' Cleggers) without constantly using the 24-hour news cycle to build this Daemon Obama narrative where he's personally responsible for every ill in the world.
Their actions is shouting loudly... it's saying "we have something to hide".
I think its saying "emotional testimony is a waste of time when the committee should be hearing from people with actual facts'.
But then I really don't care about this case, so I'm out.
I agree with you dude...
"Facts" has been really difficult to acquire... but Sen. Issa is hell bent to get 'em.
He's not interested in facts, he's interested in producing the most politically embarrassing narrative regarding Obama, personally, just as the Democrats are interested in avoiding that narrative to the greatest extent possible. I would say both sides are as bad as each other, but they really aren't, because as usual instead of trying to prevent similar problems from happening in the future, the Republicans are interested almost exclusively in their bitter policy-stalling agenda. Look at the reaction to this recent Syria situation; weeks of certain R pundits blubbing away on the news about how Obama needs to be stronger on foreign policy, then as soon as he threatens military action, you get R pundits blubbing that Obama is dragging America into another pointless middle eastern war, and as soon as the diplomatic option is floated(in a really daft way, admittedly) and moves forward, those exact same people are back on the screen with their Vitriol Holes gaping open to claim that Obama has somehow surrendered the Cold War retroactively to Putin.
Feck knows, there are plenty of legitimate reasons to get on Obama's case(he's a bigger betrayer of his core electoral base than Nick Clegg, and you have to work pretty damn hard to take that crown from ol' Cleggers) without constantly using the 24-hour news cycle to build this Daemon Obama narrative where he's personally responsible for every ill in the world.
Uh... then you really haven't been paying attention...
Issa requested very simple, very basic "questions" on this whole ordeal. He's being stonewalled...
What's he supposed to do? Take every answer he receives up the arse?
You're right about the political nature that's in Washington. I'd argue that Issa's actions is the right thing to do in Washington, as it attempts to treat everyone like an adult and HOPEFULLY makes it so uncomfortable for the administration such that, the next administration doesn't pull this sort of gak again.
When Chris Stevens was killed in Benghazi, Libya, on the anniversary of September 11th last year, it was only the sixth time that the United States had lost an ambassador to its enemies. The events of that night have been overshadowed by misinformation, confusion and intense partisanship. But for those who lived through it, there's nothing confusing about what happened, and they share a sense of profound frustration because they say they saw it coming.
Tonight, you will hear for the first time from a security officer who witnessed the attack. He calls himself, Morgan Jones, a pseudonym he's using for his own safety. A former British soldier, he's been helping to keep U.S. diplomats and military leaders safe for the last decade. On a night he describes as sheer hell, Morgan Jones snuck into a Benghazi hospital that was under the control of al Qaeda terrorists, desperate to find out if one of his close friends from the U.S. Special Mission was the American he'd been told was there.
Morgan Jones: I was dreading seeing who it was, you know? It didn't take long to get to the room. And I could see in through the glass. And I didn't even have to go into the room to see who it was. I knew who it was immediately.
Lara Logan: Who was it?
Morgan Jones: It was the ambassador, dead. Yeah, shocking.
Morgan Jones said he'd never felt so angry in his life. Only hours earlier, Amb. Chris Stevens had sought him out, concerned about the security at the U.S. Special Mission Compound where Morgan was in charge of the Libyan guard force.
Now, the ambassador was dead and the U.S. compound was engulfed in flames and overrun by dozens of heavily armed fighters.
Although the attack began here, the more organized assault unfolded about a mile across the city at a top secret CIA facility known as the Annex. It lasted more than seven hours and took four American lives.
Contrary to the White House's public statements, which were still being made a full week later, it's now well established that the Americans were attacked by al Qaeda in a well-planned assault.
Five months before that night, Morgan Jones first arrived in Benghazi, in eastern Libya about 400 miles from the capital, Tripoli.
He thought this would be an easy assignment compared to Afghanistan and Iraq. But on his first drive through Benghazi, he noticed the black flags of al Qaeda flying openly in the streets and he grew concerned about the guard forces as soon as he pulled up to the U.S. compound.
Morgan Jones: There was nobody there that we could see. And then we realized they were all inside drinking tea, laughing and joking.
Lara Logan: What did you think?
Morgan Jones: Instantly I thought we're going to have to get rid of all these guys.
Morgan Jones' job was training the unarmed guards who manned the compound's gates. A second Libyan force -- an armed militia hired by the State Department -- was supposed to defend the compound in the event of an attack. Morgan had nothing to do with the militia, but they worried him so much, he could not keep quiet.
Morgan Jones: I was saying, "These guys are no good. You need to-- you need to get 'em out of here."
Lara Logan: You also kept saying, "If this place is attacked these guys are not going to stand and fight?"
Morgan Jones: Yeah. I used to say it all the time. Yeah, in the end I got quite bored of hearing my own voice saying it.
Andy Wood: We had one option: "Leave Benghazi or you will be killed."
Green Beret Commander, Lieutenant Colonel Andy Wood, was one of the top American security officials in Libya. Based in Tripoli, he met with Amb. Stevens every day.
The last time he went to Benghazi was in June, just three months before the attack. While he was there, al Qaeda tried to assassinate the British ambassador. Wood says, to him, it came as no surprise because al Qaeda -- using a familiar tactic -- had stated their intent in an online posting, saying they would attack the Red Cross, the British and then the Americans in Benghazi.
Lara Logan: And you watched as they--
Andy Wood: As they did each one of those.
Lara Logan: --attacked the Red Cross and the British mission. And the only ones left--
Andy Wood: Were us. They made good on two out of the three promises. It was a matter of time till they captured the third one.
Lara Logan: And Washington was aware of that?
Andy Wood: They knew we monitored it. We included that in our reports to both State Department and DOD.
Andy Wood told us he raised his concerns directly with Amb. Stevens three months before the U.S. compound was overrun.
Andy Wood: I made it known in a country team meeting, "You are gonna get attacked. You are gonna get attacked in Benghazi. It's gonna happen. You need to change your security profile."
Lara Logan: Shut down--
Andy Wood: Shut down--
Lara Logan: --the special mission--
Andy Wood: --"Shut down operations. Move out temporarily. Ch-- or change locations within the city. Do something to break up the profile because you are being targeted. They are-- they are-- they are watching you. The attack cycle is such that they're in the final planning stages."
Lara Logan: Wait a minute, you said, "They're in the final planning stages of an attack on the American mission in Benghazi"?
Andy Wood: It was apparent to me that that was the case. Reading, reading all these other, ah, attacks that were occurring, I could see what they were staging up to, it was, it was obvious.
We have learned the U.S. already knew that this man, senior al Qaeda leader Abu Anas al-Libi was in Libya, tasked by the head of al Qaeda to establish a clandestine terrorist network inside the country. Al-Libi was already wanted for his role in bombing two U.S. embassies in Africa.
Greg Hicks: It was a frightening piece of information.
Lara Logan: Because it meant what?
Greg Hicks: It raised the stakes, changed the game.
Greg Hicks, who testified before Congress earlier this year, was Amb. Stevens' deputy based in Tripoli - a 22-year veteran of the Foreign Service with an impeccable reputation.
Lara Logan: And in that environment you were asking for more security assets and you were not getting them?
Greg Hicks: That's right.
Lara Logan: Did you fight that?
Greg Hicks: I was in the process of trying to frame a third request but it was not allowed to go forward.
Lara Logan: So why didn't you get the help that you needed and that you asked for?
Greg Hicks: I really, really don't know. I in fact would like to know that, the answer to that question.
In the months prior to the attack, Amb. Stevens approved a series of detailed cables to Washington, specifically mentioning, among other things, "the al Qaeda flag has been spotted several times flying over government buildings".
When the attack began on the evening of September 11, Amb. Stevens immediately called Greg Hicks, who was back in Tripoli.
Greg Hicks: Ambassador said that the consulate's under attack. And then the line cut.
Lara Logan: Do you remember the sound of his voice?
Greg Hicks: Oh yeah, it's indelibly imprinted on my mind.
Lara Logan: How did he sound?
Greg Hicks: He sounded frightened.
In Benghazi, Morgan Jones, who was at his apartment about 15 minutes away, got a frantic call from one of his Libyan guards.
Morgan Jones: I could hear gunshots. And I-- and he said, "There's-- there's men coming into the mission." His voice, he was, he was scared, you could tell he was really scared and he was running, I could tell he was running.
His first thought was for his American friends, the State Department agents who were pinned down inside the compound, and he couldn't believe it when one of them answered his phone.
Morgan Jones: I said, "What's going on?" He said, "We're getting attacked." And I said, "How many?" And he said, "They're all over the compound." And I felt shocked, I didn't know what to say. And-- I said, "Well, just keep fighting. I'm on my way."
Morgan's guards told him the armed Libyan militia that was supposed to defend the compound had fled, just as Morgan had predicted. His guards -- unarmed and terrified -- sounded the alarm, but they were instantly overwhelmed by the attackers.
Morgan Jones: They said, "We're here to kill Americans, not Libyans," so they'd give them a good beating, pistol whip them, beat them with their rifles and let them go.
Lara Logan: We're here to kill Americans.
Morgan Jones: That's what they said, yeah.
Lara Logan: Not Libyans.
Morgan Jones: Yeah.
About 30 minutes into the attack, a quick reaction force from the CIA Annex ignored orders to wait and raced to the compound, at times running and shooting their way through the streets just to get there. Inside the compound, they repelled a force of as many as 60 armed terrorists and managed to save five American lives and recover the body of Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith. They were forced to fight their way out before they could find the ambassador.
Not long afterwards, Morgan Jones scaled the 12-foot high wall of the compound that was still overrun with al Qaeda fighters.
Morgan Jones: One guy saw me. He just shouted. I couldn't believe that he'd seen me 'cause it was so dark. He started walking towards me.
Lara Logan: And as he was coming closer?
Morgan Jones: As I got closer, I just hit him with the butt of the rifle in the face.
Lara Logan: And?
Morgan Jones: Oh, he went down, yeah.
Lara Logan: He dropped?
Morgan Jones: Yeah, like-- like a stone.
Lara Logan: With his face smashed in?
Morgan Jones: Yeah.
Lara Logan: And no one saw you do it?
Morgan Jones: No.
Lara Logan: Or heard it?
Morgan Jones: No, there was too much noise.
The same force that had gone to the compound was now defending the CIA Annex. Hours later, they were joined by a small team of Americans from Tripoli. From defensive positions on these rooftops, the Americans fought back a professional enemy. In a final wave of intense fighting just after 5 a.m., the attackers unleashed a barrage of mortars. Three of them slammed into this roof, killing former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty.
Lara Logan: They hit that roof three times.
Andy Wood: They, they hit those roofs three times.
Lara Logan: In the dark.
Andy Wood: Yea, that's getting the basketball through the hoop over your shoulder.
Lara Logan: What does it take to pull off an attack like that?
Andy Wood: Coordination, planning, training, experienced personnel. They practice those things. They knew what they were doing. That was a-- that was a well-executed attack.
We have learned there were two Delta Force operators who fought at the Annex and they've since been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross and the Navy Cross -- two of the military's highest honors. The Americans who rushed to help that night went without asking for permission and the lingering question is why no larger military response ever crossed the border into Libya -- something Greg Hicks realized wasn't going to happen just an hour into the attack.
Lara Logan: You have this conversation with the defense attache. You ask him what military assets are on their way. And he says--
Greg Hicks: Effectively, they're not. And I-- for a moment, I just felt lost. I just couldn't believe the answer. And then I made the call to the Annex chief, and I told him, "Listen, you've gotta tell those guys there may not be any help coming."
Lara Logan: That's a tough thing to understand. Why?
Greg Hicks: It just is. We--, for us, for the people that go out onto the edge, to represent our country, we believe that if we get in trouble, they're coming to get us. That our back is covered. To hear that it's not, it's a terrible, terrible experience.
The U.S. government today acknowledges the Americans at the U.S. compound in Benghazi were not adequately protected. And says those who carried out the attack are still being hunted down.
Just a few weeks ago, Abu Anas al-Libi was captured for his role in the Africa bombings and the U.S. is still investigating what part he may have played in Benghazi. We've learned that this man, Sufian bin Qumu, a former Guantanamo Bay detainee and long-time al Qaeda operative, was one of the lead planners along with Faraj al-Chalabi, whose ties to Osama bin Laden go back more than 15 years. He's believed to have carried documents from the compound to the head of al Qaeda in Pakistan.
The morning after the attack, Morgan Jones went back to the compound one last time to document the scene. He took these photos which he gave to the FBI and has published in a book he has written. After all this time, he told us he's still haunted by a conversation he had with Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith, a week before the attack.
Morgan Jones: Yeah, he was worried. He wasn't happy with the security.
Lara Logan: And you didn't tell him all your worries?
Morgan Jones: No. No, didn't want to--
Lara Logan: Why not?
Morgan Jones: I didn't want to worry him anymore, you know? He's a nice guy. I sort of promised him he'd be OK.
Lara Logan: You think about that?
Morgan Jones: Every day, yeah.
The U.S. pulled out of Benghazi and al Qaeda has grown in power across Libya. When a member of our team went to the U.S. compound earlier this month, he found remnants of the Americans' final frantic moments still scattered on the ground. Among them Amb. Stevens' official schedule for Sept.12, 2012, a day he didn't live to see.
So...watch these videos, and tell me how could they keep blaming on a video when they simply knew it wasn't true:
It was all for political purpose... which makes it disgusting.
On the right, there's bitter celebration over a 60 Minutes report on Benghazi that includes more than a year of reporting. The report "confirms Benghazi is a real scandal, and you've been lied to," according to William Jacobson, for example.
The report tells us more about what we've known for a year, and known in detail since the spring of 2013. Lara Logan's big coup is an interview with a British security officer who uses a psuedonym; her other on-camera sources, Andy Wood and Gregory Hicks, had testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. What we learn from the report:
- The new source reports that "on his first drive through Benghazi, he noticed the black flags of al Qaeda flying openly in the streets and he grew concerned about the guard forces as soon as he pulled up to the U.S. compound." This was echoed in a later cable from Chris Stevens: "the al Qaeda flag has been spotted several times flying over government buildings."
- Online chatter provided clues as to what was coming. "Al Qaeda -- using a familiar tactic -- had stated their intent in an online posting, saying they would attack the Red Cross, the British and then the Americans in Benghazi."
- Wood, a chief security officer in Libya, told the country team that "the attack cycle is such that they're in the final planning stages."
This colors in some of the story, but it doesn't advance the scandal. The Stevens cables that warned State about what might happen were revealed almost a year ago, sparking off some minor head-rolling at State but not much else. What conservatives want to know—and when I go to conferences or political rallies, I hear this—is what Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were doing on the night of the attack, and whether they heard earlier warnings but ignored them.
Conservatives are apoplectic about Clinton's public statements after the attack, which continued to mention the "Innocence of Muslims" video, and did not lead with how terrorists had actually planned an executed an attack. "They lied to the victims’ coffins and then strolled over to lie to the bereaved," wrote Mark Steyn after the Issa hearings. The new report doesn't provide much ballast for any of this, but it does assure conservatives that the media hasn't stopped caring about the story.
What's the next scheduled turn in Benghazigate? I'd say it's the forthcoming release of Hillary Clinton's second memoir.
So just to recap from watching the 60 Minute clip;
- State Department hired a local militia as security, in spite of warnings to the contrary. During the attack the militia fled rather than engage the attackers
- The security team (lead by former Special Forces) passed warnings to State and DoD that an attack was planned, and was imminent and "obvious" as AQ were making good on their threats
- Al-Libi was in country and charged with setting up an AQ cell, and who had a history of attacking US targets
- two requests for more security assets from a 22 year veteran were denied. A third request was prevented "from going forward". The reasons for these denials are still not publicly known
- the Ambassador sent warnings to Washington via cables that AQ were openly operating in Libya
- no relief forces were to be dispatched to assist the besieged annex. American personnel were being abandoned
So if you aren't going to protect your people in a hostile country why send them into harm's way?
So if you aren't going to protect your people in a hostile country why send them into harm's way?
Libya's not a hostile country, the US spent considerable energy into regime change to effect a more stable nation. To suggest otherwise would be tantamount to saying that American foreign policy was incompetent and that the government had helped raise up anti-western, anti-american forces in Libya.
As the closing of various no-cost elements of the national park service during the recent stand off should show, the current regime are very petty and put politics before anything else.
So if you aren't going to protect your people in a hostile country why send them into harm's way?
Libya's not a hostile country,
Amb. Stevens would like a word with you...
the US spent considerable energy into regime change to effect a more stable nation.
We have? Relative to what exactly?
To suggest otherwise would be tantamount to saying that American foreign policy was incompetent and that the government had helped raise up anti-western, anti-american forces in Libya.
That's what I'm suggesting.
As the closing of various no-cost elements of the national park service during the recent stand off should show, the current regime are very petty and put politics before anything else.
And that's is what's wrong with their response to Benghazi.
cadbren wrote: Libya's not a hostile country, the US spent considerable energy into regime change to effect a more stable nation.
So having a terrorist group that is hostile to you operating openly and without sanction is a friendly country?
cadbren wrote: To suggest otherwise would be tantamount to saying that American foreign policy was incompetent and that the government had helped raise up anti-western, anti-american forces in Libya.
If you'd rather I'll just come out and say that they they were incompetent
Automatically Appended Next Post:
cadbren wrote: the current regime are very petty and put politics before anything else.
Oh! You mean like downplaying the event and trying hard to distract from it and all the warnings before the attack during a Presidential race?
My respect for Chris Matthews went up a few notches. o.O
“The president is the best security agency, people are sitting in the White House 24/7, there are officers on deck, they are getting an instantaneous report on what’s happening there,” Matthews began. “What were they looking at in forms of assets that could have been sent? Where was the U.S. Cavalry, to use an American image. Where were the people that could’ve come or tried to get there within how many hours it took to save the lives of the people still living? Where were they and why weren’t they called to do it? I’m going to ask that question until I get an answer.”
Brandon Webb, a former Navy SEAL and editor-in-chief of SOFREP.com, told Matthews that “there’s some blame on the Secretary of Defense.”
“So, I think a lot of people in the military are wondering that were sitting there standing by ready to go, why wasn’t the call sent down to send those folks in?” he added. “But a lot of people need to understand, you know, when you add the CIA and the heroes that went on their own, took their own initiative–”
“That’s what I’m impressed by, then you hear about the guys who got in there, grabbed their uniform, grabbed their weapons, got on a plane and they were stopped en route,” Matthews interrupted. “I mean, that’s unbelievable! People who were like volunteer fire department racing to save their colleagues, and what happened to them?”
Matthews went on to call Benghazi “a hot opportunity for the Republicans,” but claimed: “My interest is on facts, and the questions I have about this are what was the State Department’s role in real-time, not beforehand, but at the time of the attack in defending the lives of their people, especially the U.S. ambassador, who was a friend, a friend of the Secretary of State’s, Hillary Clinton? What was their actions, what was the tick-tock? What did they do when they got the warning of the attack?”
TIME’s Jay Newton-Small argued that the Benghazi attack came in waves, “so they thought that, you know, after the first wave that things were quieting down.”
“That’s when they said, well, maybe we don’t need to send help, and help was really far away,” she added. “It wasn’t like it was next door. It was several hours away in Italy, so –”
Matthews again interrupted, reminding her that the fight went on for seven hours.
“Yeah, but then if you’re doing it in waves, you think the attack is over and sending somebody is not going to help anymore, right? Then all of a sudden, they attack again,” Newton-Small replied.
Surprisingly, Matthews pressed even harder.
“I’m going to ask you something,” the MSNBC host began. “If that what your brother or father in there, would you say that’s an acceptable response? ‘Oh, it’s probably over by now, it’s no good to send anybody.’ Or would you say, ‘I don’t care if it’s over or not, I’m going to collect the bodies if nothing else. I’m going to get there and show I cared.’ That’s what I’d do.”
“These are questions that Hillary will have to answer if she runs for president in 2016,” Newton-Small responded.
“These are questions that Hillary will have to answer if she runs for president in 2016,” Newton-Small responded.
Np, those are questions that she needs to answer because the Ambassador (who worked under the aegis of the State Department) was killed while she was Secretary of State
In the months following the Benghazi Embassy siege I learned the fuller picture of what happened during that fateful night, both at the Mission itself and at the Annex, which was only a short drive away from the Mission. Tensions were running high that evening, because of a recce mission that a Libyan policeman—or more likely a bad guy posing as a policeman—had carried out that morning. We’d caught him taking photos of the Mission’s front gate and grounds, and we feared it was in preparation for some kind of an attack.
I had served at the Mission for six months as the security manager overseeing the Libyan guard force, one employed by Blue Mountain Group, a British private security company. My role was to recruit, train, and oversee the guards, but due to my extensive experience of such security operations I also worked closely with the Americans stationed at the Mission, in an effort to improve its wider security. As we were all painfully aware, the defenses at the embassy were woefully inadequate, plus the city of Benghazi itself was becoming ever more dangerous, especially for Americans and/or their allies. As a result, the Benghazi Mission had become a place of fear for just about everyone stationed there, and especially on the day when we had what we suspected were recce photos taken of the Mission.
When I first deployed to Benghazi, I had not the slightest inkling about the nightmare that was coming.
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Even Sean Smith, the IT guy who was only days into his posting, and whose mind I had recently tried to put at rest by telling him we’d never had any real trouble at the Mission—even he was fearful. A couple of hours prior to the attack Sean was online with his friends, and one of them emailed, “see you tomorrow.” Sean replied: “If I’m still here tomorrow; our security manager caught a guy taking photos of the Embassy front gate; so I hope I make it through the night.” It was ominous, his foreboding of the imminent attack.
Sean was a big online computer gamer, and he was actually online as the attack began. He typed in real time: “I hear shots; we’re being attacked ... I hope I will be able to speak to you again tomorrow.” Of course he never would, because Sean would die in the assault that was even then unfolding.
This is how it went down.
Shortly after nightfall 50 gunmen from the Shariah Brigade—a Libyan militia tied to al-Qaida—rushed the Mission, and were able to gain access via the pedestrian entrance set to one side of the main gate. They did so by threatening the Blue Mountain guards with assault rifles and RPGs. Basically, the guards—who were unarmed and defenseless, because the State Department contract dictated that they be unarmed and defenseless—were ordered to open the side gate or else be killed.
The one thing my unarmed guard force did do was raise the alarm—either via their radios or by pressing the duck-and-cover alarm (it remains unclear which occurred). Alerted to an attack, Alex, the lead regional security officer (RSO), could see via the CCTV monitors in the Tactical Operations Center (TOC) what was unfolding. Scores of heavily armed gunmen were streaming into the darkened compound.
Ambassador Stevens had retired to the VIP Villa approximately 30 minutes before the attack, having finished an evening meeting with the Turkish ambassador to Libya. At the time of the attack Stevens was alone in the VIP Villa, apart from Sean, who was also billeted there, and one of the ambassador’s close protection guys, who was watching a video in the villa’s common area.
The two RSOs, Dave and Scotty, were relaxing at the rear of the VIP Villa, in the outside seating area, along with the second of the ambassador’s close protection (CP) guys. Dave and Scotty heard explosions and gunfire coming from the front entrance, and a warning of the attack was radioed through to them by the Blue Mountain guard force. Realizing they were under armed attack, the three of them raced to their respective positions, exactly as had been planned in the event of such an attack.
Scotty headed into the VIP Villa to secure the ambassador and Sean. He grabbed his weaponry—a combat shotgun, M4 assault rifle, plus a SIG Sauer pistol—and got the ambassador and Sean to don their body armor. He got them into the safe area and locked and secured it, with the three of them inside. That done, Scotty radioed through a confirmation of their whereabouts to Alex in the TOC. He then took up a defensive position inside the safe area, with a view through the steel gates covering any route of ingress of any potential enemy.
Meanwhile the ambassador’s CP guy who’d been watching the video in the Villa had sprinted for his room—in Villa B, opposite the TOC—wherein his weaponry was held. Scotty had passed his cellphone to the ambassador, who began making calls to the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli and to other local contacts, requesting assistance. Just moments into the attack the third RSO, Alex, was also able to put a call through to the Annex, which was just a short drive away, alerting them to what had happened and asking for their help: “We’re under attack. We need help. Please send help now ...”
The dozen-strong CIA security team at the Annex—consisting of ex–Special Forces (SEALs and Delta Force) and other elite operators—were the cavalry that were called to the Mission’s aid. That call was made at approximately 9:40 p.m.—so barely minutes after the attack had been launched—and similar calls were put through to the Diplomatic Security team headquarters, in Washington, alerting them to the fact that the Benghazi Mission was under attack.
Dave and the other CP guy sprinted toward the TOC and the nearby Villa B to arm themselves. Dave was that night’s “TOC officer”—meaning he would sleep at and man the TOC—and his weaponry was located there. Dave linked up with Alex in the TOC, at which point the imperative was to break out the M4 carbines, shotguns, and ammo held there and don their body armor. Before doing so, they locked and barred the door to the TOC, and they could already hear the attackers trying to break in.
The ambassador’s two CP guys were now in Villa B, pulling on body armor and readying weaponry. That done, they attempted to return to the VIP Villa, where the ambassador was locked into the safe area. As they turned onto the dirt track leading to the VIP Villa they came up against a mass of the Shariah Brigade fighters. In the ensuing firefight they quickly realized how heavily they were outnumbered and outgunned. They were forced back into Villa B, together with one of my guard force. They barricaded themselves into a back room and took up defensive positions.
But by now the Shariah fighters had blown up the guardroom at the main gate and torched the QRF Villa which lay adjacent to the main gate and housed the Quick Reaction Force made up of a local Libyan militia. They captured two of my guard force and made them kneel inside the front gate, where they beat them and carried out mock executions. Guns were put to the guards’ heads, and triggers pulled on empty chambers—hence initial reports that I heard that my guards had been shot in the head and executed. Having made it clear they were “only here to kill Americans,” the attackers shot one of the guards in both kneecaps before turning to their main task—the hunt.
They spread out through the wider compound searching for American targets. At around 9:50 p.m.—10 minutes after the attack began—Ambassador Stevens managed to place a call through to Tripoli using a cellphone. He managed to speak to the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, his warning triggering the mustering of a small, ad hoc Quick Reaction Force (QRF), which was apparently all the Tripoli Embassy could manage due to the lack of available airframes to fly them to Benghazi.
The Shariah Brigade fighters converged on the VIP Villa and broke into its interior. Unable to penetrate the steel security gate barring off the safe area, they started banging on it and yelling violently and firing. Scotty made the decision not to return fire, in an effort to hide the fact that he, the ambassador, and Sean were locked inside. He warned the ambassador and Sean to prepare for explosions and blasts when the Shariah fighters tried to break their way through the security barrier.
Instead the Shariah fighters decided to try to burn the occupants out. They fetched cans of diesel fuel that were going to be used to power the Mission’s generators—ones that were not yet in service—and were stored near the QRF Villa. They torched the Mission’s armored SUVs parked by the QRF Villa before turning back to the VIP Villa itself. They went inside and threw the diesel around the villa’s interior, soaking furniture with the fuel. They then set the building on fire.
As the fire took hold, the villa’s interior filled with thick black diesel smoke and the fumes thrown off by the burning furniture. Scotty first realized the villa was on fire when the light became dim, as the smoke seeped into the safe area. Realizing that the villa had been firebombed, he got the ambassador and Sean to retreat into a room at the rear—a bathroom. The three men got down on their hands and knees in an effort to avoid the thick black diesel smoke that was billowing into the safe area.
Scotty tried to seal the bathroom door using wet towels, but the smoke kept seeping inside. He next tried opening the bathroom window, in an effort to ventilate the place, for all three of them were having problems breathing and visibility was down to near zero. But opening the window only served to create a through-flow of air in the wrong direction, drawing more smoke into the small, cramped room, which in turn made it even more difficult to breathe. The toxic fumes were building to intolerable and potentially deadly levels.
Scotty realized they couldn’t last in there, and he yelled for the others to follow him as he made his way onto the roof of the villa. This involved moving into an adjacent bedroom, from where a window opened onto a patio and from there onto the roof. Crawling on his hands and knees and unable to see properly, he yelled for the others to follow. He showed them the way, banging on the floor to guide the ambassador and Sean to the exit. Scotty managed to make the window, open the security grille, and clamber outside, collapsing onto the small patio area.
As soon as he was visible to the Shariah fighters Scotty came under fire. Realizing that neither the ambassador nor Sean was with him, Scotty went back into the smoke-filled villa to search for them. He did this several times, each time trying to take in fresh air from outside to enable him to continue the search, and still taking fire from the enemy. But on each attempt the thick smoke and the boiling heat forced him to retreat outside in an effort to recover. He kept doing this until he was close to being rendered unconscious, at which stage he staggered up onto the villa roof and radioed for help.
In the TOC, Dave and Alex heard his radio call, but Scotty was so badly affected by the smoke that he was almost unintelligible. They finally realized what he was trying to tell them: that he didn’t have the ambassador or Sean with him, and that they were trapped in the Villa’s smoke-filled interior. Outside the TOC the Shariah fighters had tried to burn the SUVs parked there, but their jerry cans of diesel were empty. They also tried to break into Villa B, where the ambassador’s two CP guys and the Libyan guard were holed up, but failed to do so.
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Dave and Alex had watched all of this on CCTV. Leaving Alex in the TOC to man communications, Dave managed to fight his way across to the nearby Villa B—using a smoke grenade to cover his movements—and he reunited himself with the two CP guys. Together the three of them made their second foray into the grounds of the embassy, trying to get from the TOC to the VIP Villa. Driven back by ferocious enemy fire, they grabbed an armored SUV parked outside the TOC and used it to break through the hordes of fighters now occupying the compound.
Dave and the two CP guys made it to the VIP Villa, whereupon they debussed and headed for the roof to put down fire onto the enemy. There they discovered Scotty, who was vomiting from severe smoke inhalation and in danger of losing consciousness. One of Scotty’s last acts had been to smash open a skylight in the VIP Villa’s roof in an effort to ventilate the interior and help the ambassador and Sean trapped inside, but it didn’t appear to have had much of a positive effect.
Dave and the CP guys took up positions on the villa roof, so they could put down aimed shots onto the scores of heavily armed Shariah fighters now converging on their position. This was the fallback defense plan if the compound itself was taken—the idea being to hold the VIP Villa long enough for reinforcements to arrive and break the siege, and drive off the attackers. But as Dave would make so clear in a cellphone call to me, they had little hope of any force getting to their aid in time, due to the massive numbers of enemy surging into the compound.
All three of them—Dave and the ambassador’s two CP guys— made repeated forays into the interior of the villa, using the same route through the window that Scotty had employed, searching for the ambassador and Sean. If anything, the conditions inside were even worse. They were forced to snake along on their bellies, to try to keep below the thick and suffocating smoke. In spite of their efforts all they achieved was to make themselves violently sick, and all three ended up on the verge of losing consciousness.
While the Americans at the Mission had been fighting this desperate battle, I was doing all in my power to make good on my promise—to stand with them if the bad guys attacked. I was billeted away from the Mission compound, but just as soon as I’d got the warning call from my guards, I’d got my driver, Massoud, to head over to my place with weapons. We’d set out across the city, intent on launching a one-man rescue mission—for I doubted very much if Massoud was coming with me, and in any case I needed him to stay with the vehicle. If I did manage to rescue the trapped Americans, we’d need a driver and set of wheels to make our getaway.
Meanwhile, at the nearby Annex, the CIA’s head of security had heard explosions echoing from the direction of the Mission. According to some media reports the call for help from the Mission was initially denied by the Annex CIA chief of base (COB), though this is disputed by the CIA. Either way, a seven-man team led by ex–Navy SEAL Tyrone S. Woods assembled—grabbing weaponry, ammunition, and night vision equipment in preparation for leaving the Annex to go to the aid of those under siege at the Mission.
Tyrone Woods was a member of the Annex’s Global Response Staff, former elite forces members contracted to provide security to CIA agents operating out of the Annex. Woods had served with the U.S. Navy’s SEAL Team Three and had won the Bronze Star with a Combat V for valorous duty in Iraq. He’d led 10 reconnaissance missions leading to the capture of 34 insurgents in the volatile Al Anbar Province of Iraq. He’d also completed multiple tours of Afghanistan during 20 years of service with the U.S. military.
In 2007 he’d left the military and was working in the Annex as a Global Response Staff member, and he was hugely respected in that role. Ty Woods and his team were going to the Mission’s aid, with or without the COB’s blessing. It took 25 minutes from their first being alerted to the attack for the team from the Annex to be ready to go to the Mission’s rescue.
It was just after 10:00 p.m. when they set out driving two armored Toyota Land Cruisers. There were six of them, as one operator had been left to man radios—a vital role. In the time it had taken them to prepare to leave they had tried to muster support from various pro-government militias in Benghazi—which in part accounts for the delay—but none seemed willing to come to their aid.
It took that six-man team a good 25 minutes to drive the short distance to the Mission compound. This is largely because they would run into the same kind of resistance that Massoud and I would encounter—namely, scores of Shariah gunmen and their gun trucks, equipped with heavy weaponry. Roadblocks had been put in place to stop any relief force getting to the Mission, and—unlike Massoud and myself driving a local vehicle— the Annex team in their armored SUVs were highly distinctive from some distance away.
At one point the Annex team stopped to try to convince militia members—most likely 17th February Militia, who were massed around the battleground—to join them in their efforts to retake the Mission. Those requests were denied by the militias, and the QRF team were forced to move ahead with no help and taking savage fire as they drew closer to the Mission compound.
The sheer level of hostile fire that had engulfed the Mission was fearsome, but there was no way that Ty Woods and his fellows were turning aside from their tasking. At the same time, Massoud and I were converging on the battleground. After working there for so long I figured I knew of a secret route into the compound, and I was intent on launching my own rescue attempt.
This was the start of a night of sheer hell. It was a night upon which Americans would die in the most horrific of ways, and for reasons that to this day both escape and enrage me. It was a night upon which I would fight my way into the besieged Benghazi Mission three times over, largely against orders, in an effort to find my American brothers-in-arms and to stand with them against the terrorist horde. It was a night on which I should have died many times over, along with my American buddies.
This was the blackest of nights—one that would lead me to find the American ambassador to Libya lying dead and without a fellow American by his side. I’d discover him with a tiny cut to his forehead, but otherwise looking more or less unharmed—yet he had been murdered in the most inhuman of ways. In short, this was a night of criminal failure, of individual acts of unrivaled heroism, and of untold savagery and murderous intent on the part of America’s enemies.
But when I first deployed to Benghazi, I had not the slightest inkling about the nightmare that was coming.
This is going to turn into the Fast and Furious of the M.E.
No mention yet of the hundreds of arms (including Surface to Air missles) that were taken that night by the militias?
Also, the head of AFRICOM was called to DC for meetings and was at the Pentagon during the attack. Strange happenstance that the commander of the theater was absent the night of the attack.
LOL! Turns out the rambo who wrote about going in to save the ambassador actually filled out a report to his employers at the time saying that he was at the beach!
But in a written account that Jones, whose real name was confirmed as Dylan Davies by several officials who worked with him in Benghazi, provided to his employer three days after the attack, he told a different story of his experiences that night.
In Davies’s 21 / 2-page incident report to Blue Mountain, the Britain-based contractor hired by the State Department to handle perimeter security at the compound, he wrote that he spent most of that night at his Benghazi beach-side villa. Although he attempted to get to the compound, he wrote in the report, “we could not get anywhere near . . . as roadblocks had been set up.”
He learned of Stevens’s death, Davies wrote, when a Libyan colleague who had been at the hospital came to the villa to show him a cellphone picture of the ambassador’s blackened corpse. Davies wrote that he visited the still-smoking compound the next day to view and photograph the destruction.
Masked from public view, two of the U.S. military’s elite special operations commandos have been awarded medals for bravery for a mission that further undercuts the Obama administration’s original story about the Benghazi tragedy.
For months, administration officials have claimed no special operations forces were dispatched from outside Libya to Benghazi during the Sept. 11, 2012, al Qaeda terrorist attacks on the U.S. diplomatic mission and CIA annex because none was within range.
The Pentagon, under intense public criticism for not coming to the aid of besieged Americans, published an official timeline in November that carefully danced around the issue.
It said time and distance prevented any commandos outside Libya from reaching a CIA compound under attack. The timeline disclosed that a reinforcement flight 400 miles away in Tripoli contained two “DoD personnel” but did not describe who they were. Later, the official State Department report on Benghazi said they were “two U.S. military personnel” — but provided no other details. It made no mention of special operations forces.
But sources directly familiar with the attack tell The Washington Times that a unit of eight special operators — mostly Delta Force and Green Beret members — were in Tripoli the night of the attack, on a counterterrorism mission that involved capturing weapons and wanted terrorists from the streets and helping train Libyan forces.
When word of the Benghazi attack surfaced, two members of that military unit volunteered to be dispatched along with five private security contractors on a hastily arranged flight from Tripoli to rescue Americans in danger, the sources said, speaking only on the condition of anonymity because the special operations forces’ existence inside Libya was secret.
The two special operations forces arrived in time to engage in the final, ferocious firefight between the terrorists and Americans holed up in the CIA annex near the ill-fated diplomatic mission in Benghazi, the sources added.
The two special operators were awarded medals for valor for helping repel a complex attack that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stephens, another American diplomat and two former Navy SEALs, but spared many more potential casualties.
“Yes, we had special forces in Tripoli, and two in fact did volunteer and engaged heroically in the efforts to save Americans,” one source told The Times. “The others were asked to stay behind to help protect Tripoli in case there was a coordinated attack on our main embassy.
“The remaining [special operations forces] were ready to dispatch the next morning, but by that time American personnel had been evacuated to the airport, local militias had provided additional security and it was determined there was no need for them to be dispatched at that point,” the source added.
Pressed why the Pentagon and administration officials did not publicly acknowledge the special operations forces’ contribution that tragic night, the sources said officials decided that their anti-terror work inside Libya was sensitive and closely guarded. In addition, U.S. officials did not have a Status of Forces Agreement in place that would have authorized the troops’ presence, the sources said.
The history of the Benghazi attack is infamous in part for what the White House and Pentagon did not do: no warplanes and no rescue troops from outside Libya.
The revelation that some special operations forces did make it to Benghazi the night of the attack is the latest to undermine a carefully crafted story line put out by the president and his aides in the weeks leading into the 2012 election. The administration has since acknowledged that parts of that story line were misleading.
“On the one hand, it is an indictment of the lack of contingency planning by both CIA and DoD, especially given the rising threat profiles in Libya that were well understood — and appropriately reported back to D.C. by agency reps on the ground,” said retired Army Col. Ken Allard. “So why weren’t there more than just two Delta Force guys to send? Above all: Where were the air and naval resources that should have routinely been included in any contingency planning worthy of the name?”
The original account misled the public about the role of al Qaeda. The White House falsely asserted that the attacks arose from a spontaneous riot spurred by an anti-Islam video, when the intelligence community had evidence almost immediately that the assault was planned by al Qaeda-linked terrorists.
The administration has blamed editing of “talking points” for the misleading accounts, the most famous of which was given on national television by Susan E. Rice, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations at the time, five days after the attack.
But a second thread of the administration’s story line was that no U.S. special operations forces were deployed to Benghazi because none was within range to arrive during the eight-hour onslaught.
“The bottom line is this: that we were not dealing with a prolonged or continuous assault which could have been brought to an end by a U.S. military response,” Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta told Congress this year. “Very simply, although we had forces deployed to the region, time, distance, the lack of an adequate warning, events that moved very quickly on the ground prevented a more immediate response.”
Mr. Panetta, who has since left office, eventually acknowledged that two soldiers were involved in the firefight, but he offered little detail.
“The quickest response option available was a Tripoli-based security team that was located at the embassy in Tripoli.,” he told the Senate Armed Services Committee in February. “And to their credit, within hours, this [seven]-man team, including two U.S. military personnel, chartered a private airplane, deployed to Benghazi. Within 15 minutes of arriving at the annex facility, they came under attack by mortar and rocket-propelled grenades.”
What Mr. Panetta left unspoken in public, however, was why those troops were in Tripoli and who else accompanied them.
At the time of the al Qaeda attacks, the military was setting up a terrorist-hunting unit in Tripoli that included U.S. Special Operations Command’s super-secret Delta Force and Green Berets, the sources say.
Gregory Hicks, who was deputy chief of station in Tripoli, sent the reinforcements in conjunction with the CIA. On a night when Mr. Panetta decided he did not have enough information to commit troops, Mr. Hicks decided he did.
Delta Force is nation’s premier counterterrorism unit, along with the Navy’s SEAL Team 6, controlled by Joint Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, N.C. Delta has been working with the CIA to nab wanted terrorists in Libya.
More than a year after the Benghazi attack, on Oct. 5, Delta soldiers in Tripoli captured fugitive al Qaeda terrorist Abu Anas al Libi, the alleged mastermind of the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya
and Tanzania.
CBS’ “60 Minutes” reported Sunday that the annex was defended by two Delta soldiers. The Washington Times confirmed the information last week and learned that they were part of the small reinforcement flight from Tripoli. They were awarded medals for valor. The CIA also has bestowed medals to its employees who defended the mission and annex.
The charter flight proved ill-fated. After terrorists stormed the U.S. mission in Benghazi at 9:45 p.m. local time, killing Stevens and communications aide Sean Smith, surviving diplomats and State Department security personnel made a mad dash. In armored vehicles, they arrived just after midnight at the annex commanded by a retired Army officer turned CIA operative. A rescue team from the annex also brought back survivors from the mission.
The Hicks-ordered flight arrived in Benghazi in time to help at 1:15 a.m. — but they could not get various Libyan militias to provide transportation to the annex.
The annex inhabitants had plenty of weapons to hold off a direct assault, like the one that breached and burned the U.S. mission. Huddled there was a mix of CIA officers and security personnel, such as former SEAL Tyrone Woods, and employees of Britain’s Blue Mountain personal security team.
The Tripoli team finally arrived at about 5 a.m. Sept. 12. Exactly what the two Delta soldiers did is not contained in any public account. But it is known that ex-SEAL Glen Doherty, who was on the flight, joined Woods on the roof to man machine guns. Within minutes, five mortar rounds hit on or near the annex. Three hit the roof, killing both former SEALs and badly wounding State Department security officer David Ubben.
The State Department’s official account said men went to the roof and carried the dead and wounded defenders below.
A source said annex defenders killed at least 20 terrorists during an on-and-off firefight that lasted nearly eight hours. The terrorists who planned the mission attack also knew of the annex and were able to place mortars within striking range.
More broadly, Mr. Stevens, like his bosses in Washington, believed that the United States could turn a critical mass of the fighters it helped oust Colonel Qaddafi into reliable friends. He died trying.
The story is too long to post, but basically it says that the D's have it wrong, and the R's have it wrong. Only the New Yoirk Times has it right apparently.
However, they seriously doubt an Al-Qeada link to Benghazi and insted blame local militia leaders, local Islamists, and unaligned rioters.
So why would local leaders launch a major attack against US installations, when the US had just helped them overthrow the previous government? its not logical.
Also, the report notes one guys as potentially behind the attack. Why is he still breathing? Why has there been no attacks against anyone who did this?
However, that doesn't mean they love the West and the US just because they are not Al Qaeda. Is it really that hard to understand?
Again,
Why attack the guys who just helped you and were interested in still helping you?
Because they want a democracy and you want theocracy. Your goals are no longer aligned and any help they give will be detrimental to your cause. However, just because you want Theocracy doesn't mean you are aligned with Al-Qaeda. You may not share their vision of a new caliphate, their waahibism, or whatever dogmatic/doctinal dispute you want.
More importatnly to me, why are the attackers still alive?
That's a good question. I'm guessing because it isn't exactly clear who those "responsible" are. The article in the NY Times makes a thing out of the fog-of-war going on.
More broadly, Mr. Stevens, like his bosses in Washington, believed that the United States could turn a critical mass of the fighters it helped oust Colonel Qaddafi into reliable friends. He died trying.
The story is too long to post, but basically it says that the D's have it wrong, and the R's have it wrong. Only the New Yoirk Times has it right apparently.
However, they seriously doubt an Al-Qeada link to Benghazi and insted blame local militia leaders, local Islamists, and unaligned rioters.
Heh... the rehabilitation of Hillary Clinton has begun!
Easy E, the attackers flew that black Al Qeada flag throughout this region. Also, keep in mind that "Al Qeada" isn't the same organization that orchastrated the 9/11 attack in NY. It's much more decentralized...
More broadly, Mr. Stevens, like his bosses in Washington, believed that the United States could turn a critical mass of the fighters it helped oust Colonel Qaddafi into reliable friends. He died trying.
The story is too long to post, but basically it says that the D's have it wrong, and the R's have it wrong. Only the New Yoirk Times has it right apparently.
However, they seriously doubt an Al-Qeada link to Benghazi and insted blame local militia leaders, local Islamists, and unaligned rioters.
Heh... the rehabilitation of Hillary Clinton has begun!
Easy E, the attackers flew that black Al Qeada flag throughout this region. Also, keep in mind that "Al Qeada" isn't the same organization that orchastrated the 9/11 attack in NY. It's much more decentralized...
QFT
The NYT is rewritting history for the sake of the ignorant in order to white wash Billary Clintons role in this coverup.
Libyan militants tell the New York Times that al Qaeda is not behind the 2012 Benghazi attack. Some members of Congress have intelligence that says otherwise.
On Sunday, The New York Times published an investigation that concluded al Qaeda played no role in the September 11, 2012 attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi. For Democrats, this was welcome news considering the bruising investigations into the attack from Republicans in Congress. The piece was trumpeted by the progressive non-profit, Media Matters in a blast email as “bad news for Benghazi Hoaxers.”
But two members of the House intelligence committee, Republican Mike Rogers and Democrat Adam Schiff, told Fox News on Sunday that U.S. intelligence assessments concluded al Qaeda did play a role in the attack. While no Republicans have asserted the Benghazi attacks were planned in a manner similar to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, evidence has emerged in the last year that does show the participation of militias and fighters with known ties to al Qaeda.
Abu Khattala: The Times focuses its reporting on Ahmed Abu Khattala, a militia leader who spoke to reporter David Kirkpatrick, last year and claimed to be at the scene of the Benghazi assault with no apparent worry that he would be abducted or killed by U.S. authorities. In his piece Sunday, Kirkpatrick fills in the rest of Abu Khattala’s story, revealing that he was a part-time construction worker who was publicly associated with the abduction and murder of a rival militia commander supported by NATO. In interviews with the Times, Abu Khattala denies any connection to al Qaeda. He does however say he admires the group’s vision. The Times also discloses that Abu Khattala was close to a leader of the militia the U.S. had entrusted to protect its facilities in Benghazi in light of an attack. But Abu Khattala was by no means the only person who participated in the attack.
The Jamal network: Some fighters who attacked the U.S. diplomatic compound and CIA annex in Benghazi are believed to be from a group headed by a former top lieutenant to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the current leader of al Qaeda. When Egyptian authorities raided the home of Mohammed al-Jamal, who was an operational commander under al-Zawahiri’s terrorist group in the 1990s known as Egyptian Islamic Jihad, it found messages to al Qaeda leadership asking for support and plans to establish training camps and cells in the Sinai, creating a group now known as the Jamal Network. In October, the State Department designated Jamal Network as a terrorist group tied to al Qaeda. The Wall Street Journal was the first to report the participation of the network in the Benghazi attacks, and the group’s participation in the attacks has also been acknowledged in the Times. The New York Times Benghazi investigation makes no mention of the Jamal Network in their piece.
What militants say when they think no one is listening. On Fox News Sunday, Schiff, a Democratic member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said the intelligence indicated that al Qaeda did play a role in the attack. The intelligence community knows this, he said, from insights gleaned from eavesdropping on the night of the attack. Speaking of the Times report, Schiff said “they did not have the same access to people who were not aware they were being listened to. They were heavily reliant obviously on people they interviewed who had a reason to provide the story they did.” But Schiff also said sometimes eavesdropping has its limits as well. “Sometimes though the intelligence which has the advantage of hearing to people when they don’t know they are being listening to, that can be misleading as well, when people make claims, they boast of things they were not involved in for various purposes,” he said. The Daily Beast first reported that an intercepted phone conversation from one of the attackers to a person connected to al Qaeda’s north Africa affiliates boasting of the attack. The Times says this intercept was the “only intelligence connecting al Qaeda to the attack,” a claim disputed this weekend by two U.S. intelligence officials. The Times reports the phone call showed the person connected to al Qaeda sounded “astonished,” suggesting he had no prior knowledge of the assault.
Ansar al-Sharia: No one has disputed the participation of a local Islamist militia known as Ansar al-Sharia. The Times describes Ansar al-Sharia in Libya as a group formed in 2012 to protest the support other militias had for elections but an organization separate and distinct from al Qaeda. An August 2012 report commissioned by a Pentagon terrorism research organization found that Ansar al-Sharia “has increasingly embodied al Qaeda’s presence in Libya, as indicated by its active social-media propaganda, extremist discourse, and hatred of the West, especially the United States.” Not everyone however agreed. As The Daily Beast reported last year, Ansar al-Sharia was not a priority for U.S. intelligence collection in Libya The Times also drew a distinction between the Benghazi branch of Ansar al-Sharia and the Dernaa branch of the group that was led by a former Guantanamo detainee Sufian Ben Qhumu. Others however see Ansar al-Sharia’s activities in Libya more coordinated with al-Qaeda’s regional affiliates. In October, Tunisia’s Prime Minister told Reuters that “there is a relation between leaders of Ansar al-Sharia, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Ansar al-Sharia in Libya.” The Times also states, “the Republican arguments appear to conflate purely local extremist organizations like Ansar al-Shariah with al Qaeda’s international terrorist network.” On Fox News Sunday Rogers stuck to his guns. “Do they have differences of opinions with al Qaeda core? Yes,” he said. “Do they have affiliations with al Qaeda core? Definitely.”
The the Times’ reporting doesn’t even begin to answer the larger and more important questions about the Obama administration’s actions before, during, and after the attack: (questions stolen from twitter link)
1) The State Department was repeatedly warned about the chaos in Benghazi and the increasing aggressiveness of the Islamist militias and terror networks in the area after the US-prompted NATO mission decapitated the Qaddafi regime — including escalating demands for security from the US mission in Libya. Why did State ignore these demands?
2) Other Western nations bailed out of Benghazi because of increasing terrorism. Why did the US stay put when even the UK pulled out? Especially without increasing security?
3) The attack took place on the eleventh anniversary of 9/11 in an area with active al-Qaeda affiliates, as well as terrorist networks with murkier alliances. Why wasn’t the US prepared to respond to an attack on its most vulnerable diplomatic outpost?
4) Where was Barack Obama and what was he doing after his 5 pm meeting with Leon Panetta at the beginning of the attack?
5) If the YouTube video was such an issue, why didn’t anyone in Benghazi or Tripoli know it, and why did the White House end up retracting that claim after a couple of weeks?
6) Who told the Accountability Review Board to ignore the actions of higher-ranking State Department officials such as Patrick Kennedy, who ignored the pleas for more security, and focus blame on lower-ranking career officials for the unpreparedness of State for the attack?
7) What was the CIA doing in Benghazi, and how did they miss the rise of Ansar al-Shariah? Kirkpatrick notes that no one seemed aware of its danger until after the attack.
If nothing else... we know by now that the administration knew that this didn't happen because of that video from the get-go. And yet, Clinton at the funeral of those killed Americans:
Told the father of Seal Tyrone Woods that they were going to "arrest and prosecute" the man that made the scapegoated youtube video critical of Islam.
Is that someone you would like to be your next President?
More broadly, Mr. Stevens, like his bosses in Washington, believed that the United States could turn a critical mass of the fighters it helped oust Colonel Qaddafi into reliable friends. He died trying.
The story is too long to post, but basically it says that the D's have it wrong, and the R's have it wrong. Only the New Yoirk Times has it right apparently.
However, they seriously doubt an Al-Qeada link to Benghazi and insted blame local militia leaders, local Islamists, and unaligned rioters.
Heh... the rehabilitation of Hillary Clinton has begun!
Easy E, the attackers flew that black Al Qeada flag throughout this region. Also, keep in mind that "Al Qeada" isn't the same organization that orchastrated the 9/11 attack in NY. It's much more decentralized...
They cover that in the story. The various militias likely involved had a parade earlier (the exact timeframe escapes me at the moment) that used the black flag of militant Islam that is associated with Al-Qaeda. However, the main guy suspected of orchestrating the attack was not/is not associated with Al-Qaeda but is a militant Islamist.
Keep in mind, Al-Qaeda is decentralized, but not every militant Islamist is Al-Qaeda. The guy the Times is pointing at after their investigation is not connected to Al-Qaeda.
Even if you believe that Al-Qeada wasn't involved. What difference does it make (TM)?
A militant group attacked us.
This administration's response to this was deplorable.
The Times’ claim that the Benghazi attack “was fueled in large part by anger” at the video about Islam is purely fantasy.
Again, this is nothing more to rehabilitate Clinton's image. The sad thing here... it'll probably work. Face it guys, if she runs, she's in... I don't foresee any Republican candidate that can take her down.
More broadly, Mr. Stevens, like his bosses in Washington, believed that the United States could turn a critical mass of the fighters it helped oust Colonel Qaddafi into reliable friends. He died trying.
The story is too long to post, but basically it says that the D's have it wrong, and the R's have it wrong. Only the New Yoirk Times has it right apparently.
However, they seriously doubt an Al-Qeada link to Benghazi and insted blame local militia leaders, local Islamists, and unaligned rioters.
Heh... the rehabilitation of Hillary Clinton has begun!
Easy E, the attackers flew that black Al Qeada flag throughout this region. Also, keep in mind that "Al Qeada" isn't the same organization that orchastrated the 9/11 attack in NY. It's much more decentralized...
The black flag you referenced is called rayat al-sawda and has a long history, and has been frequently used by groups not associated with AQ or its affiliates.
More broadly, Mr. Stevens, like his bosses in Washington, believed that the United States could turn a critical mass of the fighters it helped oust Colonel Qaddafi into reliable friends. He died trying.
The story is too long to post, but basically it says that the D's have it wrong, and the R's have it wrong. Only the New Yoirk Times has it right apparently.
However, they seriously doubt an Al-Qeada link to Benghazi and insted blame local militia leaders, local Islamists, and unaligned rioters.
Heh... the rehabilitation of Hillary Clinton has begun!
Easy E, the attackers flew that black Al Qeada flag throughout this region. Also, keep in mind that "Al Qeada" isn't the same organization that orchastrated the 9/11 attack in NY. It's much more decentralized...
The black flag you referenced is called rayat al-sawda and has a long history, and has been frequently used by groups not associated with AQ or its affiliates.
Yeah... I know that. But I wouldn't totally discount that either.
*shrugs* I still don't understand what difference does it makes (TM).
whembly wrote: This administration's response to this was deplorable.
What response would you have preferred?
Last edit: wrong quote.
A) Sent whatever resources to the site as a show of force. (send those planes in the area, drop the special forces into the midst, etc...)
B) Don't fething blame it on that youtube director.
C) Man up to the situation rather than attempting to deflect blame during the election season.
A) Sent whatever resources to the site as a show of force. (send those planes in the area, drop the special forces into the midst, etc...)
B) Don't fething blame it on that youtube director.
C) Man up to the situation rather than attempting to deflect blame during the election season.
You're not answering the question, you're listing grievances.
I was starting to forget Benghazi, but thank goodness this came back up. Now, of course, I am not quite sure what the Alamo was or why we were supposed to remember that at one point.
Ahtman wrote: I was starting to forget Benghazi, but thank goodness this came back up. Now, of course, I am not quite sure what the Alamo was or why we were supposed to remember that at one point.
Silly, Alamo is a line of excellent drafthouse movie theaters. I like the new one in Lakeline full of posters from the Planet of the Apes and a full bar.
Frazzled wrote: So why would local leaders launch a major attack against US installations, when the US had just helped them overthrow the previous government? its not logical.
You should read the article you are commenting on, because your question is the main thrust of it. I mean, we can disagree whether their version of events is right or wrong, but it's not like they don't cover the material you're unclear on.
1. Don't get involved in the region, ever. It took us multiple wars and conflicts to finally figure that one out (Afhganistan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia etc etc etc), and the American people had to shout NO to a another (Syria) before anyone listened.
2. Inversely, Alamo Drafthouse is excellent.
A) Sent whatever resources to the site as a show of force. (send those planes in the area, drop the special forces into the midst, etc...)
B) Don't fething blame it on that youtube director.
C) Man up to the situation rather than attempting to deflect blame during the election season.
You're not answering the question, you're listing grievances.
Those aren't grievances dogma. o.O
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Ahtman wrote: I was starting to forget Benghazi, but thank goodness this came back up. Now, of course, I am not quite sure what the Alamo was or why we were supposed to remember that at one point.
Don't blame me... ya'll already know where I stand.
Frazzled wrote: I read it. It just says he didn't like the west.
I think the moral of the story is:
1. Don't get involved in the region, ever. It took us multiple wars and conflicts to finally figure that one out (Afhganistan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia etc etc etc), and the American people had to shout NO to a another (Syria) before anyone listened.
2. Inversely, Alamo Drafthouse is excellent.
Yes. On the Syria thing I agree completely. If there is anything we should take away from our foreign adventures, I say it's that we don't always have to fight (Iraq) and when we do have to fight (Afghanistan) we need to to have a decision as to what constitutes "victory" before the first soldier starts lacing his boots and loading his mag.
They opened an Alamo Drafthouse in New York not far from where I lived recently. I have to say I am 100% jell. I think it would be fair to say I need to enroll in jelly school, even.
Ahtman wrote: I was starting to forget Benghazi, but thank goodness this came back up. Now, of course, I am not quite sure what the Alamo was or why we were supposed to remember that at one point.
? Did you miss it? I'll restate:
A) Send whatever resources to the site as a show of force. (send those planes in the area, drop the special forces into the midst, etc...)
B) Don't fething blame it on that youtube director.
C) Man up to the situation rather than attempting to deflect blame during the election season.
Those aren't fething grievances... those are things they've could've done differently.
Also: please answer the initial question.
Just did. If you don't thing so, then please restate your question differently.
Did you miss it? I'll restate:
A) Send whatever resources to the site as a show of force. (send those planes in the area, drop the special forces into the midst, etc...)
B) Don't fething blame it on that youtube director.
C) Man up to the situation rather than attempting to deflect blame during the election season.
Can you tell me a bit more about A and C?
How do you envision it going down in those two categories?
Did you miss it? I'll restate: A) Send whatever resources to the site as a show of force. (send those planes in the area, drop the special forces into the midst, etc...) B) Don't fething blame it on that youtube director. C) Man up to the situation rather than attempting to deflect blame during the election season.
Can you tell me a bit more about A and C?
How do you envision it going down in those two categories?
A) If any of our embassy/consulate was attacked... you simply send your resources into the region as a show of force. Full Stop. There's no need reason to ask, "will we make it in time?". That's the wrong philosophy to take.
We know the whole incident went on for hours... There were resources in Italy raring to go... We have units specifically designed for these sort of incident called FEST(Foreign Emergency Support Team)... Send 'em in. . General Ham from Africom was ready to send his resources (but was ordered not to... he resisted and thus was released from his command).
This does at least two simple things: #1 Maybe provide help to those continuing the fight... they might've made it in time, or might not. We don't know... but, those Embassy/CIA folks deserve that chance. #2 Telegraphs to the whole world that this won't be tolerated, it needs to be treated as if it's an "Act of War" and not as a "normal criminal incident".
Most glaring thing that I can remember is that we still don't know who issue the command to NOT send in FEST. Reports stated that they were ready to go and were very surprised that they didn't get the order (it's their job after all).
C) First, can we agree that this Administration's response evolved the way it did because it was during the election season? Lemme know if you disagree with that.
I'd like to think their response would be vastly different if it occured at any other time.
Remember, Obama was trouncing Romney on Foreign Policy issues at this time... at every speech he'd say something like we have "the terrorist on the run" spiel. The event's that transpired on some part in Cairo and largely in Benghazi became very problematic for Obama during the campaign.
Here's what I would've done in Obama's place. Realize that it isn't his fault, but it happened under his watch, so he should be The Executive and bear the responsibilty to ascertain what happened. 1) during the attack, order all and necessary resources to engage/extract in Benghazi 2) start an investigation to determine why we were attacked, were there enough security operatives, etc... DON'T WAIT FOR THE fething NEWS CREW TO DO YOUR INVESTIGATION! 3) it's likely that that any errors or missteps were caused by incompetence rather than malice. Remove/Fire those people deemed incompetence. Conduct full review of the entire department to ensure something like this doesn't happen again. Update protocols so that if your own fething Ambassador is lamenting the security issue, make sure the right folks get that request and act upon it. 4) all this time, I'd communicate to the American people of the status... instead of subliminally/accusing the youtube director or the evil Republicans (TM). 5) lastly, I'd ask for Hillary Clinton resignation.
And if a crazy group attacked the Russian consulate in the USA and the Russians send a full scale military response to protect "their" embassy and sends jets and helicopters into the US everybody would crap their pants and scream bloody murder about a foreign country conducting military attacks here.
d-usa wrote: And if a crazy group attacked the Russian consulate in the USA and the Russians send a full scale military response to protect "their" embassy and sends jets and helicopters into the US everybody would crap their pants and scream bloody murder about a foreign country conducting military attacks here.
Of course not... The US is expected to defend/protect embassies here, just like everwhere else.
Nice try to derail this conversation.
The Libyan government was in not in position to help the consulate.
The Libyan government gave the green light for us to send whatever we need.
Remember, Obama was trouncing Romney on Foreign Policy issues at this time... at every speech he'd say something like we have "the terrorist on the run" spiel. The event's that transpired on some part in Cairo and largely in Benghazi became very problematic for Obama during the campaign.
They really didn't, and I remember many commentators lamenting that fact, but the reality is that the majority of Americans don't particularly care about attacks on Americans abroad.
Remember, Obama was trouncing Romney on Foreign Policy issues at this time... at every speech he'd say something like we have "the terrorist on the run" spiel. The event's that transpired on some part in Cairo and largely in Benghazi became very problematic for Obama during the campaign.
They really didn't, and I remember many commentators lamenting that fact, but the reality is that the majority of Americans don't particularly care about attacks on Americans abroad.
That may be true, but the Obama Campaign certainly thought so... and thus acted accordingly.
Are you really comparing the USA, a first world country with a fully functional government, and Libya which had just come out of a civil war and had no established government or state controlled security infrastructure?
And now I remember why I started to ignore you on this topic to begin with.
What? I feel like you wanna nitpick in order to derail...
Sending forces pronto to Libya in response to an attack is NOT the same as Russian sending their forces if their Russian Embassy in US is attacked.
The host nation has an obligation to protect their guest embassy... which Libya stated they couldn't.
Would YOU change anything? Or, do you think this administration's response was as good it's going to get?
I think we should have given them the security they asked for instead of a systematic issue of cutting funding at the legislative level and denying increased security at the DOS level.
I also think we should look at every embassy attack since 2000 and try to figure out what makes Benghazi so special that more feths are given over that attack than any other attack during that time frame, taking into account that we had 13 attacks on US diplomatic facilities under Bush resulting in the deaths of 55 people and that we had 1 earlier attack under Obama in 2010 that resulted in the deaths of 8 people.
So in the 12 years prior to Benghazi we had 14 embassy attacks resulting in 63 deaths and zero feths were given.
But a couple months before the election an embassy attack results in 4 deaths and now we suddenly give all the feths.
So why, after 63 deaths, do we suddenly care so much?
Is it because #64-67 is where we drew the line? After 12 years of people attacking our embassy and killing people we suddenly have enough?
14 attacks and 63 deaths, and nothing.
Attack #15 and deaths #64-67 during the peak of the election, and now we care.
But Obama is the guy that played politics with Benghazi.
And that is why anybody can see what is really happening here, and that is why nobody cares except people that can't stand Obama.
Dreadclaw69 wrote: Are you really comparing the USA, a first world country with a fully functional government, and Libya which had just come out of a civil war and had no established government or state controlled security infrastructure?
Which won't matter one bit if the country whose embassy is attacked feels that the "host country cannot provide adequate security" or decides to start playing politics for their people at home to flex their military muscle.
I knew that US diplomatic missions had been attacked in the past d-usa but I never knew it was on that level. Certainly makes this complaint look a lot sillier.
And now I remember why I started to ignore you on this topic to begin with.
What? I feel like you wanna nitpick in order to derail...
Sending forces pronto to Libya in response to an attack is NOT the same as Russian sending their forces if their Russian Embassy in US is attacked.
The host nation has an obligation to protect their guest embassy... which Libya stated they couldn't.
Would YOU change anything? Or, do you think this administration's response was as good it's going to get?
I think we should have given them the security they asked for instead of a systematic issue of cutting funding at the legislative level and denying increased security at the DOS level.
Good...
I also think we should look at every embassy attack since 2000 and try to figure out what makes Benghazi so special that more feths are given over that attack than any other attack during that time frame, taking into account that we had 13 attacks on US diplomatic facilities under Bush resulting in the deaths of 55 people and that we had 1 earlier attack under Obama in 2010 that resulted in the deaths of 8 people.
So in the 12 years prior to Benghazi we had 14 embassy attacks resulting in 63 deaths and zero feths were given.
But a couple months before the election an embassy attack results in 4 deaths and now we suddenly give all the feths.
So why, after 63 deaths, do we suddenly care so much?
Is it because #64-67 is where we drew the line? After 12 years of people attacking our embassy and killing people we suddenly have enough?
14 attacks and 63 deaths, and nothing.
Attack #15 and deaths #64-67 during the peak of the election, and now we care.
But Obama is the guy that played politics with Benghazi.
And that is why anybody can see what is really happening here, and that is why nobody cares except people that can't stand Obama.
Where do you draw the line D?
You do know what you are doing... don't ya D? You're not really ADDRESSING this administration's response to Benghazi. Tell me you're not trying to deflect it by pointing out past events.
Frankly... it's about two issues:
#1) Yes, all those other attacks/death prior to Benghazi does need more accounting. I'm hoping there were given the proper accounting... and if not, someone needs to answer.
#2) The Obama administration's response to this event was deplorable. C'mon D... are you buying everything they've told us? That's it was largely because of that anti-Islam video? You know what? I can dislike the President's policies and agenda... but, that's okay because I know our President will only be in office for 4/8 years. I can easily live with that. But you know get's in my craw? It's the fact that, during the election season, the Obama campaign thought it was in their best interest to lay blame to that youtube director and deflect it as long as possible, than to tell the American people the hard truths.
This ordeal burns me up waaaay more than the PPACA or any other things Obama did...
Kanluwen wrote: Which won't matter one bit if the country whose embassy is attacked feels that the "host country cannot provide adequate security" or decides to start playing politics for their people at home to flex their military muscle.
You seem a tad confused. There isn't a country on earth that could do that to the United States in the manner the United States could do that to Libya.
It's fun to pretend that everybody's equal, but the only superpower in the world can get away with far more than anybody else.
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motyak wrote: I knew that US diplomatic missions had been attacked in the past d-usa but I never knew it was on that level. Certainly makes this complaint look a lot sillier.
While it's certainly true that our diplomatic missions were attacked plenty under Bush, that administration's response was never to blame an American and have the Secretary of State get on TV in foreign countries apologizing for the possibility that said American individual might have offended someone.
motyak wrote: I knew that US diplomatic missions had been attacked in the past d-usa but I never knew it was on that level. Certainly makes this complaint look a lot sillier.
While it's certainly true that our diplomatic missions were attacked plenty under Bush, that administration's response was never to blame an American and have the Secretary of State get on TV in foreign countries apologizing for the possibility that said American individual might have offended someone.
motyak wrote: So it doesn't matter that people died, just how the administration at the time reacted to it?
Weren't you just saying that in light of previous attacks, this doesn't seem that bad?
I was saying that the 'this is the worst thing since unsliced bread' response is silly in light of previous attacks, because I thought you yanks were getting up in arms about the deaths. Now its been made clear that many only cared about the response of the administration, it makes more sense.
motyak wrote: So it doesn't matter that people died, just how the administration at the time reacted to it?
Weren't you just saying that in light of previous attacks, this doesn't seem that bad?
I was saying that the 'this is the worst thing since unsliced bread' response is silly in light of previous attacks, because I thought you yanks were getting up in arms about the deaths. Now its been made clear that many only cared about the response of the administration, it makes more sense.
The entire situation was fethed up. The fact that they weren't provided with the security they needed, despite repeated requests for it, the fact that all armed responses were seemingly told to not respond, and the fact that the admin went into full blown up-coming election cover-up mode the second this went down.
There was nothing about this that we shouldn't be angry about. Just because we're discussing one aspect of it does not mean the rest means nothing.
The ambassador was killed, that's what matters... I can't believe we have done so little to deter such a thing happening again / find the attackers / etc...
RiTides wrote: The ambassador was killed, that's what matters... I can't believe we have done so little to deter such a thing happening again / find the attackers / etc...
Except as D-USA pointed out, as many as 63 people were killed over a 12 year period of attacks on embassies and other diplomatic installations. What makes the death of Stevens so special and worth getting riled up over but those 63 people were not? The fact that the administration "blamed it on a video"?
All honesty though, if someone wants to attack an installation all the preparation in the world will not matter one damn bit if someone is determined to actually carry out an attack.
RiTides wrote: The ambassador was killed, that's what matters... I can't believe we have done so little to deter such a thing happening again / find the attackers / etc...
Except as D-USA pointed out, as many as 63 people were killed over a 12 year period of attacks on embassies and other diplomatic installations. What makes the death of Stevens so special and worth getting riled up over but those 63 people were not? The fact that the administration "blamed it on a video"?
All honesty though, if someone wants to attack an installation all the preparation in the world will not matter one damn bit if someone is determined to actually carry out an attack.
Well if you'd stop ignoring all the posts pointing out what makes it important, you'd know.
RiTides wrote: The ambassador was killed, that's what matters... I can't believe we have done so little to deter such a thing happening again / find the attackers / etc...
Except as D-USA pointed out, as many as 63 people were killed over a 12 year period of attacks on embassies and other diplomatic installations. What makes the death of Stevens so special and worth getting riled up over but those 63 people were not? The fact that the administration "blamed it on a video"?
All honesty though, if someone wants to attack an installation all the preparation in the world will not matter one damn bit if someone is determined to actually carry out an attack.
Well if you'd stop ignoring all the posts pointing out what makes it important, you'd know.
Maybe if you'd actually make a real point about "what makes it important" rather than parroting the Fox and Friends Benghazi Outrage Checklist®, you and the rest of the Dakka Fox Friends would be worth listening to.
RiTides wrote: The ambassador was killed, that's what matters... I can't believe we have done so little to deter such a thing happening again / find the attackers / etc...
Except as D-USA pointed out, as many as 63 people were killed over a 12 year period of attacks on embassies and other diplomatic installations. What makes the death of Stevens so special and worth getting riled up over but those 63 people were not? The fact that the administration "blamed it on a video"?
All honesty though, if someone wants to attack an installation all the preparation in the world will not matter one damn bit if someone is determined to actually carry out an attack.
Well if you'd stop ignoring all the posts pointing out what makes it important, you'd know.
Maybe if you'd actually make a real point about "what makes it important" rather than parroting the Fox and Friends Benghazi Outrage Checklist®, you and the rest of the Dakka Fox Friends would be worth listening to.
*rolls eyes* So basically your saying that because you don't like our reasoning for it being important, it doesn't matter.
djones520 wrote: And for the record, those 63 deaths, were usually bystanders.
Istanbul 2008, 6 dead. 3 attackers, three Turkish Police.
Karachi 2002, 12 dead, all Pakistani's.
Karachi 2003, 2 dead, Pakistani police.
Jeddah, 2004 9 dead, all attackers or Saudi's.
4 of those attacks, half the number of the dead, not a single American casualty.
So stop pushing that number around please.
Oh, so it only matters when Americans die?
You're the one making an issue about it only being 4 dead Americans.
Actually I'm "making an issue about it" because where the hell was your outrage when our diplomatic installations were being attacked for 12 years?
Why were you not FURIOUS about that? Where was your call for "more security" then? Why were there not hearings being held over those incidents as well?
It's hypocritical nonsense and despicable for the Republicans to continually harp about this as though it is some kind of atrocity and personal affront.
There have been American casualties, but the circumstances were completely different in all cases. One of the higher profile was a large VBIED that caught a diplomat as he was leaving his hotel and heading to the Consulate which was across the street. I just skimmed through some of the higher totals when I dug through that. Other instances, like an attack in Syria that left 4 dead, 3 of them were the attackers. I'm pulling all of this from the list of 63 that I beleive D-USA dug that up from in Wiki. A large number of those casualties were the attackers themselves, which completely skews that argument.
djones520 wrote: And for the record, those 63 deaths, were usually bystanders.
Istanbul 2008, 6 dead. 3 attackers, three Turkish Police.
Karachi 2002, 12 dead, all Pakistani's.
Karachi 2003, 2 dead, Pakistani police.
Jeddah, 2004 9 dead, all attackers or Saudi's.
4 of those attacks, half the number of the dead, not a single American casualty.
So stop pushing that number around please.
Oh, so it only matters when Americans die?
You're the one making an issue about it only being 4 dead Americans.
Actually I'm "making an issue about it" because where the hell was your outrage when our diplomatic installations were being attacked for 12 years?
Why were you not FURIOUS about that? Where was your call for "more security" then? Why were there not hearings being held over those incidents as well?
It's hypocritical nonsense and despicable for the Republicans to continually harp about this as though it is some kind of atrocity and personal affront.
Our missions are attacked all over the place. In nearly all cases they are afforded the security they deserve, which shows in the limited number of casualties inflicted. Those attacks were for the most part not affairs that lasted for hours on end, with situations in which we could have responded and affected the outcome. The CLOSEST situation was an attack in Yemen that had the Yemen military immediately respond and free hostages. None of these attacks were on poorely gaurded embassies in a country that had no central government, torn by war.
Your demanding outrage for things that don't warrant it.
motyak wrote: I knew that US diplomatic missions had been attacked in the past d-usa but I never knew it was on that level. Certainly makes this complaint look a lot sillier.
While it's certainly true that our diplomatic missions were attacked plenty under Bush, that administration's response was never to blame an American and have the Secretary of State get on TV in foreign countries apologizing for the possibility that said American individual might have offended someone.
Yep, there was no reason at that time that anyone could possibly think the video was involved in an attack on a diplomatic mission.
Egypt
In Egypt, the protest was organized by Wesam Abdel-Wareth, a Salafist leader and president of Egypt's Hekma television channel, who called for a gathering on September 11 at 5 pm in front of the United States Embassy, to protest against a film that he thought was named Muhammad's Trial.[44][45] However, Eric Trager, an experts at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, has said that the protest was in fact announced on August 30 by Jamaa Islamiya, to release Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman.[46] After the trailer for the film began circulating, Nader Bakkar, the Egyptian Salafist Nour Party's spokesman, and Muhammad al-Zawahiri, the brother of al-Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawihiri, called for Egyptians to assemble outside of the American embassy.[47]
About 3,000 demonstrators, many of them from the ultraconservative Salafist movement, responded to his call. A dozen men were then reported to have scaled the embassy walls, after which one of them tore down the flag of the United States of America and replaced it with a black Islamist flag with the inscription of the shahada: "There is no god but God and Muhammad is the messenger of God". Some of the protesters also wrote "There is no God but Allah" on the compound walls. According to Sherine Tadros of Al Jazeera, the protestors demanded that the film be taken "out of circulation" and that some of the protestors would stay at the site until that happens. Thousands of Egyptian riot police were at the embassy following the breach of the walls; they eventually persuaded the trespassers to leave the compound without the use of force. After that, only a few hundred protesters remained outside the compound.[25] Reports that the United States Marines were not allowed to carry live ammunition by the State Department were later proven to be incorrect.[48]
Egypt's prime minister Hesham Kandil said "a number" of protesters later confessed to getting paid to participate.[49] He did not say whether the government knew or suspected who paid the protesters.
On September 14, in the town of Sheikh Zuwayed in the Sinai Peninsula, protesters stormed a compound of the Multinational Force and Observers, designed to monitor the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. The peacekeeping force opened fire on the protesters. Two members of the peacekeeping force were wounded.[50][51]
Ahmad Fouad Ashoush, a Salafist Muslim cleric, issued a fatwa saying: "I issue a fatwa and call on the Muslim youth in America and Europe to do this duty, which is to kill the director, the producer and the actors and everyone who helped and promoted the film."[52] Another Muslim cleric, Ahmed Abdullah (aka Abu Islam) tore up the Bible and threw the torn pages on the ground during the September 11 embassy attack.[53][54]
Yemen
In Yemen, the protests started on September 13, after Abdul Majid al-Zindani, a cleric and former mentor to Osama bin Laden, called on followers to emulate the attacks in Egypt and Libya.[55]
Hours later, protesters had stormed the grounds of the U.S. embassy in Sana'a. Police fired into the air in an attempt to hold back the crowds, but failed to prevent them from gaining access to the compound and setting fire to vehicles. Guards in Sana'a used tear gas and a water cannon to drive back the crowd. At least 4 protesters were killed and 11 others injured; 24 guards were also injured.[5][56]
The U.S. responded by sending a Marine FAST unit to Yemen.[57]
Greece
About 600 Muslim protestors in Athens tried to march on the U. S. Embassy, but were stopped by Greek police. No injuries were reported, although three cars were damaged and three storefronts were smashed. The protestors chanted "we are all with Osama" and called on the US to hang the filmmaker.[58]
Sudan
In anticipation of protests, Sudanese authorities deployed "many, many riot police" near the American embassy. Nevertheless, on September 14, protesters breached the outside wall of the compound and clashed with guards; three people were killed.[59]
Also after Friday prayers on September 14, protesters started fires and tore down the flag in the German embassy. Demonstrators hoisted a black Islamic flag at the German embassy, which read in white letters "there is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his Prophet".[60] Although it was initially assumed that the attacks were to a target of opportunity related to the protests against the film Innocense of Muslims, the incident is now reported as a long-planned deliberate attack against Germany; preachers encouraged the riots by referring to Germany's defending Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard in 2012 during the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy.[61] Referring to a demonstration in August 2012 by right-winged German protesters during which pictures of Mohammed were shown, the Sudanese foreign minister justified the attacks by saying that German chancellor Angela Merkel had allowed these demonstrations to proceed and had thereby encouraged "an insult to Islam and clearly violated all rules of religious coexistence and tolerance."[60]
The neighboring British embassy was also attacked,[62] with two people killed in clashes with the police.[63]
Tunisia
In Tunis, on September 14, protesters entered the compound of the U.S. embassy after climbing the embassy walls and set trees inside the compound ablaze. The protesters attacked the American Cooperative School of Tunis and set it on fire.[59] At least 4 were killed and 46 injured during protests near the embassy on September 15. The U.S. government pulled out all non-essential personnel and urged its citizens to leave the city.[6][64]
India
On September 14, the U.S. consulate in Chennai, India, was attacked, with protestors throwing stones and footwear at the consulate. Police dispersed the crowd, causing minor injuries to 25 protesters. The Consulate asked American citizens to enroll in the STEP program, asked American citizens to follow the local news and media and ceased the consulate's operation temporarily. Additional Police protection for the consulate was also granted by the Tamil Nadu Government.[14][65]
Indonesia
On September 17, up to 500 protesters, many of whom were part of the Islamic Defenders Front and Majelis Mujahideen Indonesia attacked the United States embassy in Jakarta by throwing stones and loose pavement, some reports also state that petrol bombs were used in the attacks. In addition to attacking the embassy, protesters attacked the local police force and embassy guards.[66]
Pakistan
Pakistan has witnessed widespread protests all across the country.[67] On September 14, security forces clashed with demonstrators outside the U.S. embassy in Islamabad over the anti-Islam film.[68] Protesters called for the execution of the filmmaker and urged Islamabad to close the US Embassy and expel its diplomats.[69] In the eastern city of Lahore, demonstrators burned the US flag outside the U.S. consulate and shouted slogans against the United States and Israel. On September 16, Voice of America News reported that police fired tear gas and water cannon at hundreds of demonstrators as they approached the heavily guarded consulate in the southern city of Karachi.[70] On September 19, a businessman who was unwilling to participate in the protests was charged for blasphemy.[11] On September 20, CNN reported that protests continued in Karachi, where according to a police official about "100 small children" repeated anti-American slogans during a protest.[71] Video showed children repeating an adult voice, "Death to America" and "Any friend of America is a traitor." The children, between the ages of 6 and 8, demonstrated across from the Karachi Press Club, led by "at least four teachers."[72] In Islamabad, police used tear gas and fired warning shots into the air to disperse the crowd. Islamabad Police Chief Bin Yamin said eight police were injured.[citation needed] On September 21, a public holiday was held in Pakistan as protests under the banner of "Love our prophet" were held across the country. The newspaper Dawn reported that at least 23 people were killed during the day.[73][74] In Karachi, a crowd of 15,000 torched "six cinemas, two banks, a KFC and 5 police vehicles" whilst some fired on police, killing two police officers.[75] It was further reported that 10 of the protesters were shot dead afterwards.[75] Meanwhile in Peshawar, four protesters and a policeman were killed.[3] Ghulam Ahmed Bilour, a Pakistani cabinet minister has announced a $100,000 bounty for killing Nakoula Basseley Nakoula. The Pakistani government has sought to distance itself from this award. Some British MPs have called for a ban on Bilour's visits to Britain.[76] On September 23, a rampaging mob of protesters in Mardan reportedly "set on fire the church, St Paul's high school, a library, a computer laboratory and houses of four clergymen, including Bishop Peter Majeed." and went on to rough up Zeeshan Chand, the pastor's son.[12][77]
no reason at all.
Honestly, the Benghaziphiles are becoming hilariously deluded, seeing how far they'll try to bend the situation to make a scandal out of it. "It's the response and blaming it on the Video that's the problem !!! IT'S A COVERUP!!11!ELEVENTY!!". Yeeeeeeaaaaah, Obama decided to "cover up" an attack by Al Qaeda by blaming on it a video tape to help his polls before the election. That makes perfect sense if you have no grasp of reality, and didn't understand that as the President who is very well known for killing Osama Bin Laden (not personally, but you know what I mean) he could run with it being an Al Qaeda attack easily enough without worry, and probably could have done even better out of the situation ("We'll track down and kill these bastards like we did Osama!", ect). There's no good reason for him to try to deliberately mislead anyone on the matter - it gains him nothing. That's the thing that they miss - zero motivation, but like conspiracy theorists everywhere they ignore that, as it gets in the way of their imagined cover-up. Was the information on the attack somewhat mangled and unclear to start with? Yep, but that's what happens when stuff goes down in a clusterfruk like this, and saying it was related to the video, which had been directly linked to many other attacks at the same period of time, wasn't an outlandish claim made on a whim, nor a deliberate cover up.
motyak wrote: Not really. US people died, no uproar. US people die, slightly different atmosphere, uproar. Just seems silly.
I'd say the uproar has little to do with the casualty lists and much more to do with the form of the response. Call me old-fashioned, but I believe in putting heads on spikes if you attack our gak, rather than trying to get you to not do it again through saying sorry.
Give peace a chance.
When that doesn't work, there's always guys willing to fly a strike package.
@Whembly, considering point A about sending all resources in, are their any other factors that should be considered before deciding the resource response, or should it be an automatic standing order type situation?
Easy E wrote: @Whembly, considering point A about sending all resources in, are their any other factors that should be considered before deciding the resource response, or should it be an automatic standing order type situation?
All resources would probably be over the top, considering everything we could bring to bear. We probably could have had cruise missiles levelling the place if we had wanted.
I still think not scrambling fighters from Aviano was a horrible call. They could have been there in time to save lives, and would have been a solid response, and limited the risk of sending in ground personel who are blind to the situation.
Easy E wrote: @Whembly, considering point A about sending all resources in, are their any other factors that should be considered before deciding the resource response, or should it be an automatic standing order type situation?
All resources would probably be over the top, considering everything we could bring to bear. We probably could have had cruise missiles levelling the place if we had wanted.
I still think not scrambling fighters from Aviano was a horrible call. They could have been there in time to save lives, and would have been a solid response, and limited the risk of sending in ground personel who are blind to the situation.
E... basically this. I'd go even further that if the host country can't step in.... like Libya had already said. Then, at THAT point, it becomes a very viable option.
djones520 wrote: I still think not scrambling fighters from Aviano was a horrible call. They could have been there in time to save lives, and would have been a solid response, and limited the risk of sending in ground personel who are blind to the situation.
Yup. Even if there was an extremely remote chance they could've done anything useful, you still send 'em. Worst case scenario, you burn several thousand pounds of JP-8 and get eyes on the scene. Plus, people tend to lose their enthusiasm for even ranting against the imperialist western pigdogs and decide it's time to quietly go indoors and be unnoticeable when there are JDAMs getting toted around overheard.
Dunno if that call can realistically be attributed to Obama, though.
djones520 wrote: I still think not scrambling fighters from Aviano was a horrible call. They could have been there in time to save lives, and would have been a solid response, and limited the risk of sending in ground personel who are blind to the situation.
Yup. Even if there was an extremely remote chance they could've done anything useful, you still send 'em. Worst case scenario, you burn several thousand pounds of JP-8 and get eyes on the scene. Plus, people tend to lose their enthusiasm for even ranting against the imperialist western pigdogs and decide it's time to quietly go indoors and be unnoticeable when there are JDAMs getting toted around overheard.
Dunno if that call can realistically be attributed to Obama, though.
Obama has repeatedly stated at the night of the event, he said he ordered "all and necessary means to defend and rescue" those mens.
Is it true that when a President (or high ranking officer?) issues an order like that, there's a paper trail?
If there is a paper trail like that... is it accessible to the public?
The reason I'm asking is that, to my knowledge, no one has providee the paper "proof" that such order was given.
Dunno. No idea, in fact.
And I'm not sure it matters all that much. Ramming the former secret squirrel guys sitting in Tripoli into the fray could very well have turned the tide, for example, but no one could have known that at the time. And, even with the benefit of hindsight, we don't know for sure it would have done any such thing. Telling six or whatever guys to go into a chaotic situation completely blind is not something that's generally considered good decision-making, in most circumstances. It's still probably even odds they just would've wound up dead, too.
And even though I absolutely think the Air Force should've gotten the go to tear ass out of Italy, the realistic assessment is that, if buzzing the site didn't scare everybody off, there's not much else they could have done. It's a populated area, with a confused mess of people doing gak on the ground. Those are not pleasant circumstances to dump ordnance into. Even with a forward air controller on the ground who knows who everybody is and where they are, there's still a lot of white-knuckle "Jesus Christ I hope I'm not about to strafe our guys" terror when you're shooting into that sort of situation. They wouldn't have had that, and it's extremely unlikely they would've gotten clearance to engage even if they were dead certain of what they were looking at through a LITENING pod or whatever.
Most of my criticism's in the post-eight hours after response. The stuff that happened or didn't happen during the duration of the attack I can understand.
whembly wrote: ....5) lastly, I'd ask for Hillary Clinton resignation.
I never quite got this. Why would you do that? I wasn't really paying attention to the news at the time so I'm quite sure what she didn't/did do. Please enlighten me.
whembly wrote: ....5) lastly, I'd ask for Hillary Clinton resignation.
I never quite got this. Why would you do that? I wasn't really paying attention to the news at the time so I'm quite sure what she didn't/did do. Please enlighten me.
She's was the Secretary of State... meaning, she's in charge and bears all responsibility.
Fortunately, she did say it's her respsonsibility, (during an interview in South America if I remember right), so give her kudos for that. But, it's one thing to say "it's my fault" and keep the job, than to say... "I fethed up and here's my resignation letter".
That one good thing you can say about Donald Rumsfeld... he TRIED to submit is resignation after the Abu-Gharib incident knowly that it falls to him,.. but, Bush wouldn't accept it (which was a huge mistake imo).
In many ways, I feel like Hillary (and Kerry) is treating this position as " a stepping stone " and not treating it with the respect it deserves.
whembly wrote: ....5) lastly, I'd ask for Hillary Clinton resignation.
I never quite got this. Why would you do that? I wasn't really paying attention to the news at the time so I'm quite sure what she didn't/did do. Please enlighten me.
She's was the Secretary of State... meaning, she's in charge and bears all responsibility.
Fortunately, she did say it's her respsonsibility, (during an interview in South America if I remember right), so give her kudos for that. But, it's one thing to say "it's my fault" and keep the job, than to say... "I fethed up and here's my resignation letter".
That one good thing you can say about Donald Rumsfeld... he TRIED to submit is resignation after the Abu-Gharib incident knowly that it falls to him,.. but, Bush wouldn't accept it (which was a huge mistake imo).
In many ways, I feel like Hillary (and Kerry) is treating this position as " a stepping stone " and not treating it with the respect it deserves.
Thanks, I always like to know why people feel the way they do before passing judgement.
That one good thing you can say about Donald Rumsfeld... he TRIED to submit is resignation after the Abu-Gharib incident knowly that it falls to him,.. but, Bush wouldn't accept it (which was a huge mistake imo).
It could be argued that the refusal of the Rumsfeld resignation was an assertion of civilian control over the military.
I lost my sympathy for Benghazi's "victims" when my Civil War battery did a a memorial for the seals that died there and the wife of the commander called me the "cancer that was killing America" in front of a crowd.
I know how to play a trumpet pretty well, so at the event I played taps, and was invited to attend the after party for the memorial, I then was able to speak to attendee's which was cool (cause navy seal vets were attending), but then after I mentioned video games while speaking with father this lady refereed to me as noted earlier "The cancer thats killing America", she also went on to give a speech above how evil video games and big government is.
Me and my father promptly left. So yeah, if the widows of this "tragedy" want to use there husbands deaths to push political points then they can feth off.
So if your pissed at Obama or Hillary for the handling of these deaths, be even more pissed the so called victims familys are using there loved ones deaths to push political issues all the same.
Thats exactly what I thought when the wife of a dead soldier used her husbands death as a soap box.
Take it as you will, this story among others is why when these things happens I reserve judgement.
Nothing new about that. Doesn't mean you stop being sympathetic.
Was Riley Sheehans death any less horrible because his mom went full flying rodent gak crazy?
Coming from a military family Iv been more groomed to just see soldiers dying just as a "thing that happens" when it comes to war zones, so I don't really feel that angry about navy seals dying in the line of duty, since, well, that's the job description.
tragedy comes into play when you say, have a vet who comes home to no work or doesn't get the proper mental healthcare. but again, soldiers dying in the field, nothing new under the sun.
That one good thing you can say about Donald Rumsfeld... he TRIED to submit is resignation after the Abu-Gharib incident knowly that it falls to him,.. but, Bush wouldn't accept it (which was a huge mistake imo).
It could be argued that the refusal of the Rumsfeld resignation was an assertion of civilian control over the military.
O.o really?
Never thought of it in that way...
Still think it was a mistake for Bush to not accept is resignation as it also because a huge political liability.
Alexzandvar wrote: Coming from a military family Iv been more groomed to just see soldiers dying just as a "thing that happens" when it comes to war zones, so I don't really feel that angry about navy seals dying in the line of duty, since, well, that's the job description.
tragedy comes into play when you say, have a vet who comes home to no work or doesn't get the proper mental healthcare. but again, soldiers dying in the field, nothing new under the sun.
Alexzandvar wrote: Coming from a military family Iv been more groomed to just see soldiers dying just as a "thing that happens" when it comes to war zones, so I don't really feel that angry about navy seals dying in the line of duty, since, well, that's the job description.
tragedy comes into play when you say, have a vet who comes home to no work or doesn't get the proper mental healthcare. but again, soldiers dying in the field, nothing new under the sun.
Sorry if I sound nihilistic but Iv never really been all that upset over it. I just see getting mad at soldier dying like getting mad at the wind for blowing or the sun for shining.
Alexzandvar wrote: Sorry if I sound nihilistic but Iv never really been all that upset over it. I just see getting mad at soldier dying like getting mad at the wind for blowing or the sun for shining.
Well, they were Vets, they weren't active duty. And secondly, even if they are active service members, you still get "worked up" about it, especially if the perception is they were just left there to die. That is not how we treat our own.
Alexzandvar wrote: Sorry if I sound nihilistic but Iv never really been all that upset over it. I just see getting mad at soldier dying like getting mad at the wind for blowing or the sun for shining.
Well, they were Vets, they weren't active duty. And secondly, even if they are active service members, you still get "worked up" about it, especially if the perception is they were just left there to die. That is not how we treat our own.
They died in service of there country, a good death. I shall quote Montgomery, "To lead soldiers you must accept that soldiers die, its our way of life, or rather, way of death". And they were not left to die, they were put in a hard situation and lost but I very much doubt there was a decision among high command to the effect of "Who cares let them die" more likely why they were left to there fate was miscommunication and bureaucracy.
EDIT: Oh and if your uppity about being left to die not being how we treat our own, then you have had your head in the sand if its nesscary some must be left to die for long term success we do it, this has been demonstrated multiple times in US Military history.
Alexzandvar wrote: Sorry if I sound nihilistic but Iv never really been all that upset over it. I just see getting mad at soldier dying like getting mad at the wind for blowing or the sun for shining.
It doesn't sound nihilistic. It does sound rather dismissive of a sacrifice a lot of people consider to be something approaching sacrosanct.
You're obviously welcome to your views, of course. That's the great thing about this country. A grieving mother said something you consider flying rodent gak about you at a memorial service for her son, so you no longer feel victims deserve sympathy? Fair enough, I guess, though I think that's a reaction born of an emotional response to being slighted rather than a logical position.
For my part, I'd happily let the mother of a SEAL killed doing his job - or the mother of an aviation electrician's mate who died in an accident during a peacetime float, for that matter - throw rotten eggs at me in town square at high noon, if it made her feel better. Everybody's got loony relatives. Who knows? Maybe she simply objected to you bringing up video games at a memorial service. I wasn't there.
I was discussing what I was going to do when we got home to my father, and this was after the service, at the after party.
And this was a wife, not a mother.
And no Im not going to let her throw hate speech at me if it makes her feel better, losing your husband doesn't excuse you from society rules on conduct.
and I do regard a soldiers sacrifice as a sacred one, but as one that is not new under the sun. My family has died for this country since the revolutionary war, I do not regard my ancestors deaths lightly, but I also understand they did what they did as there duty, not as something the were unfairly subjected to.
A soldier dying is not "unfair" and it isnt "tragic" its just how life works.
Wait, you were a student and she jumped on you? Either what you were discussing was inappropriate given the setting, or she's nuts due to her grief. There's more to the story methinks.
The U.S. government is trying to apprehend an al Qaeda terrorist wanted for his role in the 2012 Benghazi terrorist attack that killed four Americans.
The suspect, Muhammad Jamal, was imprisoned in Egypt last fall and in September was being held by the Egyptian government. His current whereabouts could not be confirmed, said U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. One official said Jamal remains in Egyptian custody, contrary to reports that he was in Yemen.
Jamal was labeled a designated terrorist by the United Nations Oct. 18, identifying him and the group he formed, the Muhammad Jamal Network, as linked to the Sept. 11, 2012, Benghazi attack.
Four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, were killed during an assault on a diplomatic compound and a nearby CIA facility in the Libyan port city.
The identification of Jamal as an al Qaeda member linked to the Benghazi attack contradicts a recent New York Times investigative report that concluded there was no evidence al Qaeda or foreign terrorists were behind the Benghazi attack that is currently the subject of several congressional inquiries.
A CIA spokesman declined to comment when asked if al Qaeda is linked to the Benghazi attack.
Thats exactly what I thought when the wife of a dead soldier used her husbands death as a soap box.
Take it as you will, this story among others is why when these things happens I reserve judgement.
Nothing new about that. Doesn't mean you stop being sympathetic.
Was Riley Sheehans death any less horrible because his mom went full flying rodent gak crazy?
Coming from a military family Iv been more groomed to just see soldiers dying just as a "thing that happens" when it comes to war zones, so I don't really feel that angry about navy seals dying in the line of duty, since, well, that's the job description.
tragedy comes into play when you say, have a vet who comes home to no work or doesn't get the proper mental healthcare. but again, soldiers dying in the field, nothing new under the sun.
Just out of curiosity, what kind of military service have you seen? When you were talking video games were you talking about how cool some death scenes were in a military style game? It just seems like you're leaving a lot out in your story of treating soldiers dying as another day at the office, or as you put it "the wind blowing or the sun shining".
Alexzandvar wrote: Coming from a military family Iv been more groomed to just see soldiers dying just as a "thing that happens" when it comes to war zones, so I don't really feel that angry about navy seals dying in the line of duty, since, well, that's the job description.
tragedy comes into play when you say, have a vet who comes home to no work or doesn't get the proper mental healthcare. but again, soldiers dying in the field, nothing new under the sun.
Alexzandvar wrote: I know how to play a trumpet pretty well, so at the event I played taps, and was invited to attend the after party for the memorial, I then was able to speak to attendee's which was cool (cause navy seal vets were attending), but then after I mentioned video games while speaking with father this lady refereed to me as noted earlier "The cancer thats killing America", she also went on to give a speech above how evil video games and big government is.
I'm not calling you a liar, but the abrupt and harsh shift in tone strongly suggest that this woman probably has a different recollection of the conversation immediately previous to her comments than you do.
Alexzandvar wrote: I know how to play a trumpet pretty well, so at the event I played taps, and was invited to attend the after party for the memorial, I then was able to speak to attendee's which was cool (cause navy seal vets were attending), but then after I mentioned video games while speaking with father this lady refereed to me as noted earlier "The cancer thats killing America", she also went on to give a speech above how evil video games and big government is.
I'm not calling you a liar, but the abrupt and harsh shift in tone strongly suggest that this woman probably has a different recollection of the conversation immediately previous to her comments than you do.
I am thinking you are correct on this. I believe he's just trolling.
According to these... the real scandal is that both the DoD and States Department woefully prepared...
This confirms those at the highest levels of the Obama administration KNEW that this was a terrorist attack within minutes... No one seriously thought it was a demonstration that had turned into a riot, despite the blatant spin offered in the days after the attack...
The real question becomes, what was the reasonings to claim it was a demonstration that got out of control?
Again, the real scandal is that both agencies knew that Benghazi was sitting duck, and yet the State Department did nothing to bolster security... and further more, the DoD did nothing to bolster readiness on the anniversary of 9/11. This is sheer incompetence stacked on more incompetence.
EDIT: who wants to bet that these were declassified in blunt the PPACA coverages?
EDIT: who wants to bet that these were declassified in blunt the PPACA coverages?
Well, I haven't read them yet, but if says what you claim they say it doesn't seem to make much sense to try to "blunt" one scandal with another big scandal. That just creates the perception that NOTHING can be done right.
Obama has already been reelected and he only has 2 years left, Hillary is no longer part of the state department and she isn't running for president, not yet anyway.
Calm yourself, trust me I bet a large amount of state department staff got roasted over this scandal, someone always gets roasted when things like this happen. Just not often the higher ups, which is bad Ill give that to you.
Alexzandvar wrote: Obama has already been reelected and he only has 2 years left,
So? I'm not asking for impeachment here... get real.
Accountability is all I'm asking for...
Hillary is no longer part of the state department and she isn't running for president, not yet anyway.
Buck stops with her... but, then again, I'm completely convinced she'll run and win. Republicans ain't got no one who can take down the Clinton Machines.
Calm yourself, trust me I bet a large amount of state department staff got roasted over this scandal, someone always gets roasted when things like this happen. Just not often the higher ups, which is bad Ill give that to you.
Two States Dept employees where put on "paid administrative leave" and then quietly were reinstated.
Its not, because Iran-contra was a massive thing in the white house.
My dad worker there when he was a colonel, he met several of the people involved. What punishment do those responsible deserve?
And Hillary is probably not running, the Clinton family is tired of politics.
Its bad more people were not held responsible. and if Clinton does run it Bengazhi will be used against her to no end.
The seals are buried, the ambassador is buried. Libya is stable, or atleast not falling apart anymore, sometimes endless witch hunts can cause more harm than good.
I know you say that because you don't really know them personally but there family does not like politics, they might enjoy there positions but they don't like politics.
My dad worked as Assistant security of the navy for the Clinton administration (If you doubt me I can like his wikipedia page), he also worked on Hillary's campaign.
Hillary is a no nonsense kind of women, she hates politics and the stress of running against people in party, she always disliked having to run against Obama.
Alexzandvar wrote: I know you say that because you don't really know them personally but there family does not like politics, they might enjoy there positions but they don't like politics.
Again, you're saying this about a family who's three people were a President, wannebe President and daughter considering politics. Whatever you're smoking I want some.
Alexzandvar wrote: I know you say that because you don't really know them personally but there family does not like politics, they might enjoy there positions but they don't like politics.
Again, you're saying this about a family who's three people were a President, wannebe President and daughter considering politics. Whatever you're smoking I want some.
I said they might enjoy there positions, but they don't like politics. IE: Sure hillary would like be president, will she endure another pres bid? No.
words cannot describe how utterly annoying this is. Yes its a scandal, yes the state department dropped the ball, everyone knows it.
Now Lord Necromancer Whembly I beseach you, this rotting corpse is REALLY starting to stink
Didn't you read the title of the thread?
The right will never let this die until Obama and the Clinton's are completely out of politics and the Democrats have been swept from any position in the government.
This is just like how every once in a while the some idiot brings FDR's near deal programs to the supreme court as unconstitutional and "communist" despite the man hes trying to get in trouble has been dead for 60 years
words cannot describe how utterly annoying this is. Yes its a scandal, yes the state department dropped the ball, everyone knows it.
Now Lord Necromancer Whembly I beseach you, this rotting corpse is REALLY starting to stink
Didn't you read the title of the thread?
The right will never let this die until Obama and the Clinton's are completely out of politics and the Democrats have been swept from any position in the government.
Until then, never forget Benghazi!
*sigh*
Let’s remember a few points about Benghazi.
The “YouTube” spin included Hillary Clinton and Obama lying the next morning... taking great pains to emphasize that "We reject all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others." Which to me, contradicts everything about the 1st amendment. Which was immediately followed by a $100K ad campaign and denouncing this video in a UN speech. In short, this wasn’t spinning the truth... Obama and his administration was lying their asses off for weeks after. No way this is blamed on faulty intelligence.
The consulate was not secured for weeks. It was a journalist, two days after, who recovered Ambassador Stevens journal long before any investigative team was sent onsite.
Panetta and Gen. Ham knew immediately that this was a terror attack and informed the President & Staff.
Not that we didn’t know this already... but these recent declassified reports makes it pretty unequivocal that the administration knowingly and repeatedly lied to the American public while hitting the airwaves of the Sunday talk shows a few days later.
And for weeks afterwards.
The question is why?
We know the answer... it's because it was purely a POLITICAL response.
Look, we’re adults. We know that sometimes people feth up. We’d forgive these feth ups all the time. What we don’t forgive is the cover ups, manipulations and outright lying...
But Obama had an election to win, and Hillary had a reputation and an image to protect. So they pretended there was no terrorist attack, no help was sent, and they concocted a massive deception about a demonstration over that insulting youtube video... They then proceeded to lie repeatedly to the entire nation for weeks.
The media were complicit in this coverup.
It goes to show that a staffer loses her job for causing a traffic jam because her boss (loosely) belongs to a party with an ‘R’ in its name.
However, no one has lost their job when four Americans to die in an attack on what should be considered sovereign American soil because their boss belongs to a party with a ‘D’ in its name.
So, then the REAL question is, if they would lie so egregiously and continuously about a relatively small matter (from their political perspective), what else have they been willing to lie to us about?
I, for one, never believed them regarding the PPACA, Fast & Furious, the IRS scandals... this administration is tainted.
And when the inevitable happened and when it was not possible to blame George Bush or any other Republicans... this grossly incompetent Obama Administration did what they always do: THEY LIED.
You okay with that? Are you willing to accept it as some sort of "politics as usual" sense here?
Personally I am not surprised he lied, and neither should anybody else. All presidents lie, it's practically required. Some memorable ones include "I did not have sexual relations with this woman." "I am not a crook." and almost anything Bush said about WBDs. We as the American voters have created a system that not only allows important people in power to lie and get away with it, but also a system that is horribly divided along party lines. Obama lied to protect himself from republicans who would have attacked him of he admitted a mistake. This happens to all presidents, they have to lie and make half truths to protect themselves from a increasing partisan environment. They also limit what they try to do to simultaneously please their increasingly reactionary or radical parties and protect themselves from the other party.
Co'tor Shas wrote: Personally I am not surprised he lied, and neither should anybody else. All presidents lie, it's practically required. Some memorable ones include "I did not have sexual relations with this woman." "I am not a crook." and almost anything Bush said about WBDs. We as the American voters have created a system that not only allows important people in power to lie and get away with it, but also a system that is horribly divided along party lines. Obama lied to protect himself from republicans who would have attacked him of he admitted a mistake. This happens to all presidents, they have to lie and make half truths to protect themselves from a increasing partisan environment. They also limit what they try to do to simultaneously please their increasingly reactionary or radical parties and protect themselves from the other party.
If you want to accept that... that's your prerogative.
I don't. Not over something of this magnitude.
It's sorta a cop out to blame the American voters for "allowing" this.
whembly wrote: So, then the REAL question is, if they would lie so egregiously and continuously about a relatively small matter (from their political perspective), what else have they been willing to lie to us about?
But the Administration seemed so honest and sincere about the ACA.
(CNN) -- The September 2012 attack that killed four Americans at a diplomatic compound in Libya was "likely preventable" based on known security shortfalls there and prior warnings that the security situation in that country was deteriorating, the majority of the Senate Intelligence Committee concluded in a report released Wednesday.
The report on the attack in Benghazi puts some blame on the State Department, saying it should have "increased its security posture more significantly" in Libya's second-largest city because of general warnings that U.S. personnel were at risk there.
The intelligence community "provided ample strategic warning" that Americans and U.S. facilities were in danger, though it didn't offer a single warning that would have predicted the Benghazi attack that killed U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens and three others, the report said.
But the report didn't spare the intelligence community, saying it might have flagged potential threats to the compound had it done more analysis of "extremist-affiliated social media."
It also blasted the intelligence community for inaccurately reporting -- without "sufficient intelligence to corroborate it" -- that a protest might have led to the attack. The report said the community took too long to correct the erroneous reports, "which caused confusion and influenced the public statements of policymakers."
The report also noted what the FBI previously told the panel -- that 15 people who have been cooperating with the FBI investigation had been killed in Benghazi, severely hampering the investigation. The report says it is unclear whether the killings were related to the Benghazi investigation.
"The FBI's investigation into the individuals responsible for the Benghazi attacks has been hampered by inadequate cooperation and a lack of capacity by foreign governments to hold these perpetrators accountable, making the pursuit of justice for the attacks slow and insufficient," the report said. "As a result, key information gaps remain about the potential foreknowledge and complicity of Libyan militia groups and security forces, the level of pre-planning for the attacks, the perpetrators and their involvement in other terrorist activities and the motivation for the attacks."
The conclusion that State ignored security warnings is a direct slap at the Secretary of State at the time, Hillary Clinton.
Also, the coordination between State and the CIA is also... lacking.
So... add it all together everyone... the State Department, run by Hillary Clinton, and the CIA didn’t coordinate efforts to safeguard the consulate. The DoD, under Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, apparently didn’t provide readiness to respond.
I swear whembly you should devote you dedication to something more productive.
Nothing more will ever come of this, its old news only picked up by people using it to mud sling at once another.
Whos at fault? Hillary for not providing properly for the ambassador? The Department of Defense for not responding in time? The Republican Majority in the house which pushed through cutting more funding for the state department?
The correct answer is: They all are. The minute people learn accept that not everything that goes wrong is singularly the fault of the current party you oppose
I swear whembly you should devote you dedication to something more productive.
Nothing more will ever come of this, its old news only picked up by people using it to mud sling at once another.
Whos at fault? Hillary for not providing properly for the ambassador?
Yep.
The Department of Defense for not responding in time?
Yep.
The Republican Majority in the house which pushed through cutting more funding for the state department?
Yeah... that's been debunked.
The correct answer is: They all are. The minute people learn accept that not everything that goes wrong is singularly the fault of the current party you oppose
Typical Beltway mentality... if you blame everyone, then no one individual gets blamed.
Alexzandvar wrote: Source of debunking? State department DID receive cuts, and while there was money to improve security, it was tied up in committee.
Here's the actual freaking Budget for the 2013 Budget Justification Department of State Operations. (yeah... I booked marked it.... surprising eh? )
Funding for multple purposes has risen sharply over the past decade.
More importantly... which isn't really a surprised, the State Department has considerable latitude in allocating security funds based on current events and intelligence on possible threats.
Which is fine and proper in itself...
So... the State Dept has more than adequate fundings for security and this *claim* was nothing more to shift the blame to the Congressional staff.
And I'm not saying everyones to blame for everything, but in this case, those 3 parties ARE all at fault to varying extents.
Let's agree to disagree here. I'd posit that blame fall squarely within the Executive Branch.
Not holding enough people responsible is just as bad as to many.
Which is why there's interest in getting an accurate accounting from all parties involved.
(CNN) -- The deadly attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, was "likely preventable" based on known security shortfalls and prior warnings that the security situation there was deteriorating, the majority of the Senate Intelligence Committee concluded in a report released on Wednesday.
Separately, the findings also noted what the FBI had told the panel -- that 15 people cooperating with its investigation had been killed in Benghazi, undercutting the investigation. It was not clear if the killings were related to the probe.
Moreover, it said that people linked with various al Qaeda-related groups in North Africa and elsewhere participated in the September 11, 2012, attack, but investigators haven't been able to determine whether any one group was in command.
The report placed some blame for the outcome on the State Department, saying it should have "increased its security posture more significantly" in Libya's second-largest city because of general warnings that U.S. personnel were at risk.
Benghazi report sparks partisan outcry The intelligence community "provided ample strategic warning" that Americans and U.S. facilities were in danger, though it didn't offer a single warning that would have predicted the Benghazi attack that killed U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, the report said.
But the findings didn't spare the intelligence community, saying it might have flagged potential threats to the compound had it done more analysis of "extremist-affiliated social media."
It also blasted U.S. intelligence for inaccurately reporting -- without "sufficient intelligence to corroborate it" -- that a protest might have led to the attack.
The report said the intelligence community took too long to correct the erroneous reports, "which caused confusion and influenced the public statements of policymakers."
The Obama administration initially believed the armed assault was triggered by outrage over a U.S.-produced anti-Muslim film. It has since classified it as an organized terror attack.
Investigators haven't found evidence of pre-planning and suggest at least part of the attack was "opportunistic."
That suggests a vulnerability for diplomatic facilities, because attacks can happen with little warning, the report said.
Questions around security and intelligence as well as the slow-to-evolve and changing explanation fueled a ferocious response from Republicans in Congress, who have sharply criticized the administration and continue to investigate.
New York Times report casts doubt on al Qaeda involvement in Benghazi
A State Department spokeswoman, Marie Harf, said the report largely affirms the findings of an independent review of the Benghazi matter that recommended steps -- since undertaken by the agency -- to improve security at diplomatic facilities worldwide.
On the issue of whether the attacks were preventable, Harf noted that "we have repeatedly said there was no specific threat" pointing to an attack.
"Obviously, we've talked at length about the fact that we knew there were extremists and terrorists operating in Libya and in Benghazi. But, again, we had no specific information indicating a threat an attack was coming," she said.
The Intelligence Committee report follows the release on Monday of previously classified information by the House Armed Services Committee.
According to the documents, senior military officials told the panel there were no discussions related to any specific threat in Libya despite general warnings about the possibility of terror attacks around the anniversary of 9/11. As a result, additional military assets were not deployed to the area.
On the investigation, the FBI was quoted in the report as saying the 15 deaths have severely hampered its probe.
"The FBI's investigation into the individuals responsible for the Benghazi attacks has been hampered by inadequate cooperation and a lack of capacity by foreign governments to hold these perpetrators accountable, making the pursuit of justice for the attacks slow and insufficient," the report said.
"As a result, key information gaps remain about the potential foreknowledge and complicity of Libyan militia groups and security forces, the level of pre-planning for the attacks, the perpetrators and their involvement in other terrorist activities and the motivation for the attacks."
Several Intelligence Committee Republicans issued a separate set of conclusions.
Committee Vice Chairman Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, Richard Burr of North Carolina, Marco Rubio of Florida, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, and Dan Coats of Indiana said failures that led to the attack could be partly related to Obama's failure, in their words, to establish a clear detention policy for terror suspects that gets the most out of intelligence collection.
Instead of sending terror suspects directly to the military facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the administration has temporarily interrogated suspects on Navy ships, sometimes for weeks at a time, before sending them to the United States for trial.
"President Obama and his administration must end their efforts to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay and must develop a clear, cogent policy for the detention and interrogation of suspected terrorists," the Senators wrote.
Evidence Supports Inference that Hillary Clinton Was Directly Responsible for the Benghazi Security Failures
Evidence suggests that the security failures at Benghazi likely went straight to the top — meaning, very possibly, Hillary Clinton herself:
The decision to keep U.S. personnel in Benghazi with substandard security was made at the highest levels of the State Department by officials who have so far escaped blame over the Sept. 11 attack, according to a review of recent congressional testimony and internal State Department memos by Fox News.
Nine months before the assault that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others, State Department Under Secretary Patrick Kennedy signed off on an internal memo that green-lighted the Benghazi operation.
The December 2011 memo from Jeffrey Feltman — then-Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs (NEA) — pledged “to rapidly implement a series of corrective security measures.” However, no substantial improvements were made, according to congressional testimony to the House oversight committee from Regional Security Officer Eric Nordstrom.
The essence of the story is that Hillary had a goal of establishing a permanent presence in Benghazi — something completely unknown to Thomas Pickering of the inappropriately named “Accountability Review Board,” which held nobody accountable, conducted an insufficient review (not even interviewing Clinton), and which I suspect may not have even been a “board.” (What with the dishonesty of the first two words of this thing’s title, why would we believe the third is truthful?!)
You see, a permanent consulate is required by law to have certain security standards. Posterior-covering talking points in panicked emails after the slaughter warned not to refer to Benghazi as a “consultate,” presumably so that nobody would point out the inconvenient discrepancy between legal security requirements for consulates and the lack of security for this, er, “mission” or “diplomatic post.”
But the lack of security deeply troubled one State Department official:
Nordstrom repeatedly expressed his deep security concerns and noted Benghazi was still “undefined” in emails with his superiors seven months before the attacks.
In February 2012, he wrote that “while the status of Benghazi remains undefined, DS (Diplomatic Security) is hesitant to dev[ote] resources and as I indicated previously, this has severely hampered operations in Benghazi.”
He said that he “only had two DS agents on the ground. … and been advised that DS isn’t going to provide more than 3 DS agents over the long term.”
The connection to Hillary lies not merely in her ambitions to make Benghazi a Consulate that Shall Not Be Called a Consulate, but also in the level of approval that would have been needed to maintain the consulate without sufficient security. The Mustache himself says Hillary’s involvement was likely:
While other media reports have made passing references to the action memo signed by Kennedy and Feltman in the context of ongoing security issues, former State Department officials tell Fox News that the document is significant because Kennedy would not set policy on his own. Kennedy was ultimately responsible for overseas building operations deals with building leases and security, which should have followed strict OSPB standards.
“I find it very hard to believe that he (Kennedy) would sign this memo without having talked to Secretary Clinton or at least Deputy Secretary (William) Burns,” former ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton told Fox News after examining the December 2011 memo.
“Keeping this position open in Benghazi is a policy decision. It’s a policy decision that overrides normal security considerations. And I think that’s significant enough that a careerist like Undersecretary Kennedy would not do it on his own.”
Cue the Outrage Trump Card.
WHAT DIFFERENCE, AT THIS POINT, DOES IT MAKE?!?!?!
I liked the "Cue the Outrage Trump Card (TM)" bit.
Gregory Hicks: Benghazi and the Smearing of Chris Stevens
Shifting blame to our dead ambassador is wrong on the facts. I know—I was there.
Last week the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued its report on the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya. The report concluded that the attack, which resulted in the murder of four Americans, was "preventable." Some have been suggesting that the blame for this tragedy lies at least partly with Ambassador Chris Stevens, who was killed in the attack. This is untrue: The blame lies entirely with Washington.
The report states that retired Gen. Carter Ham, then-commander of the U.S. Africa Command (Africom) headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany, twice offered to "sustain" the special forces security team in Tripoli and that Chris twice "declined." Since Chris cannot speak, I want to explain the reasons and timing for his responses to Gen. Ham. As the deputy chief of mission, I was kept informed by Chris or was present throughout the process.
On Aug. 1, 2012, the day after I arrived in Tripoli, Chris invited me to a video conference with Africom to discuss changing the mission of the U.S. Special Forces from protecting the U.S. Embassy and its personnel to training Libyan forces. This change in mission would result in the transfer of authority over the unit in Tripoli from Chris to Gen. Ham. In other words, the special forces would report to the Defense Department, not State.
Chris wanted the decision postponed but could not say so directly. Chris had requested on July 9 by cable that Washington provide a minimum of 13 American security professionals for Libya over and above the diplomatic security complement of eight assigned to Tripoli and Benghazi. On July 11, the Defense Department, apparently in response to Chris's request, offered to extend the special forces mission to protect the U.S. Embassy.
However, on July 13, State Department Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy refused the Defense Department offer and thus Chris's July 9 request. His rationale was that Libyan guards would be hired to take over this responsibility. Because of Mr. Kennedy's refusal, Chris had to use diplomatic language at the video conference, such as expressing "reservations" about the transfer of authority.
Chris's concern was significant. Transferring authority would immediately strip the special forces team of its diplomatic immunity. Moreover, the U.S. had no status of forces agreement with Libya. He explained to Rear Adm. Charles J. Leidig that if a member of the special forces team used weapons to protect U.S. facilities, personnel or themselves, he would be subject to Libyan law. The law would be administered by judges appointed to the bench by Moammar Gadhafi or, worse, tribal judges.
Chris described an incident in Pakistan in 2011 when an American security contractor killed Pakistani citizens in self-defense, precipitating a crisis in U.S.-Pakistani relations. He also pointed out that four International Criminal Court staff, who had traveled to Libya in June 2012 to interview Gadhafi's oldest son, Saif al-Islam al-Qadhafi, were illegally detained by tribal authorities under suspicion of spying. This was another risk U.S. military personnel might face.
During that video conference, Chris stressed that the only way to mitigate the risk was to ensure that U.S. military personnel serving in Libya would have diplomatic immunity, which should be done prior to any change of authority.
Chris understood the importance of the special forces team to the security of our embassy personnel. He believed that by explaining his concerns, the Defense Department would postpone the decision so he could have time to work with the Libyan government and get diplomatic immunity for the special forces.
According to the National Defense Authorization Act, the Defense Department needed Chris's concurrence to change the special forces mission. But soon after the Aug. 1 meeting, and as a complete surprise to us at the embassy, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta signed the order without Chris's concurrence.
The SenateIntelligence Committee's report accurately notes that on Aug. 6, after the transfer of authority, two special forces team members in a diplomatic vehicle were forced off the road in Tripoli and attacked. Only because of their courage, skills and training did they escape unharmed. But the incident highlighted the risks associated with having military personnel in Libya unprotected by diplomatic immunity or a status of forces agreement. As a result of this incident, Chris was forced to agree with Gen. Ham's withdrawal of most of the special forces team from Tripoli until the Libyan government formally approved their new training mission and granted them diplomatic immunity.
Because Mr. Kennedy had refused to extend the special forces security mission, State Department protocol required Chris to decline Gen. Ham's two offers to do so, which were made after Aug. 6. I have found the reporting of these so-called offers strange, since my recollection of events is that after the Aug. 6 incident, Gen. Ham wanted to withdraw the entire special forces team from Tripoli until they had Libyan government approval of their new mission and the diplomatic immunity necessary to perform their mission safely. However, Chris convinced Gen. Ham to leave six members of the team in Tripoli.
When I arrived in Tripoli on July 31, we had over 30 security personnel, from the State Department and the U.S. military, assigned to protect the diplomatic mission to Libya. All were under the ambassador's authority. On Sept. 11, we had only nine diplomatic security agents under Chris's authority to protect our diplomatic personnel in Tripoli and Benghazi.
I was interviewed by the Select Committee and its staff, who were professional and thorough. I explained this sequence of events. For some reason, my explanation did not make it into the Senate report.
To sum up: Chris Stevens was not responsible for the reduction in security personnel. His requests for additional security were denied or ignored. Officials at the State and Defense Departments in Washington made the decisions that resulted in reduced security. Sen. Lindsey Graham stated on the Senate floor last week that Chris "was in Benghazi because that is where he was supposed to be doing what America wanted him to do: Try to hold Libya together." He added, "Quit blaming the dead guy."
Members of the House Intelligence Committee held a classified session Tuesday with the CIA’s former Libya station chief, whose assessment that there had been no protest leading before the Benghazi terrorist attacks was left out of the Obama administration’s talking points used on national television.
While the CIA would neither confirm nor deny the session on Capitol Hill, other sources familiar with the development told The Washington Times that committee members sought the station chief’s perspective on the talking points ahead of a long-anticipated public hearing Wednesday — during which former Deputy CIA Director Michael J. Morell is slated to testify.
Lawmakers say the hearing will delve into why Mr. Morell and other agency officials in Washington did not include the station chief’s assessments in claims by then-U.N. Ambassador Susan E. Rice to assert during several news talk shows that the Benghazi attacks grew out of a protest over an anti-islam video.
The discussion Wednesday will home in, lawmakers say, on a series of secure-video teleconferences held between senior officials in Washington and officials based in Libya during the days immediately following the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks.
Sources directly familiar with the CIA’s early gathering of the Benghazi intelligence told the Times on Tuesday that Mr. Morell attended a secure video conference call — known in intelligence circles as a deputies meeting — on the morning of Sept. 13, just two days after the Benghazi attacks.
During the call, Mr. Morell provided participants, including CIA officials in Libya, with the current thinking of intelligence analysts that the attacks had been carried out by extremists, but may have been an outgrowth of protests inspired by an anti-Islam video earlier that day.
At the time, the intelligence community’s assessment was that a possible protest outside the State Department’s Benghazi compound may have provided a convenient opportunity for the terrorists to carry out the attack.
But by Sept. 15, the CIA station chief in Tripoli had talked directly to his team in Benghazi, which had come to the defense of the compound during the attack, according to sources who spoke only on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the news media.
The sources said that the station chief relayed to his superiors in Washington in an email that the CIA personnel on the ground found no evidence that the attack had been an escalation of any protest.
However, the CIA officials at headquarters understood that the Benghazi CIA personnel had arrived at the State Department compound from a nearby CIA annex in the eastern Libyan city, roughly an hour into the attack — and had not been at compound when the violence initially began. As a result, CIA analysts were not yet prepared to change their initial assessments.
But Mr. Morell let officials know inside the Obama administration that the initial thinking about a videotaped-inspired protest leading to main attack was being challenged by some eyewitnesses and other information. Nonetheless, Mrs. Rice went on television the next day to blame the anti-Islam video.
Over the next four days, however, CIA officials gained access to the video security tapes and by Sept. 20 had definitively concluded that no protest had formed outside the compound before the attack, the sources said.
What is not clear is who specifically was on the Sept. 13 or other secure teleconferences around that time — specifically whether any senior officials from the White House were on the calls.
One source close to the situation said Mr. Morell and others in Washington were joined on at least one of the calls by the CIA station chief and by State Department’s then-Deputy Chief of Mission Gregory Hicks — both of whom were at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli.
What got said during the calls has emerged as one of the major bones of contention in the nearly two years of political fireworks and congressional investigations into the Benghazi attack.
Several Republican lawmakers argue the calls may finally help to explain why the talking points used by Mrs. Rice were crafted in the way that they were. The lawmakers have long argued that the Obama administration, with an eye on the November 2012 elections, intentionally pushed the false video narrative to downplay the role of terrorists in the attacks and to protect the president’s overall record on counterterrorism.
President Obama disputed the Republican claims during a February interview with Fox News, saying his administration did not try to “hide the ball” regarding the attacks, in which U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed.
Rep. Mike Rogers, Michigan Republican and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee declined to comment Tuesday. However, one of his aides told The Times that the question of how firmly Mr. Morell pushed the assessment of his station chief in Libya to senior officials at the White House and State Department is “clearly” what Mr. Rogers is “trying to get resolved.”
Frazzled wrote: Help me out.
We know it was terrorism
We know it was covered for the election.
Whats else is there to learn at this point?
My question is, why has justice not been done?
Because enough people don't care that 4 Americans died... don't care about being lied to during the elections, all in the name of protecting Obama's Foreign Policy credentials.
If you spend even 10% of the time bitching and moaning about all the people that died during embassy bombings when Bush was in office then somebody might actually care about this thread. But it is pretty transparent that you and the pundits care more about this hurting Obama than the actual dead people.
That's why this thread pisses me off everytime it rises, because it is the very definition of using dead people for politics while pretending that you are mad about using dead people for politics.
Frazzled wrote: Help me out.
We know it was terrorism
We know it was covered for the election.
Whats else is there to learn at this point?
My question is, why has justice not been done?
Because enough people don't care that 4 Americans died... don't care about being lied to during the elections, all in the name of protecting Obama's Foreign Policy credentials.
I'm just trying to understand the point of all the hearings now? Truth has been uncovered.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
That's why this thread pisses me off everytime it rises, because it is the very definition of using dead people for politics while pretending that you are mad about using dead people for politics.
On the flip side, no one has been caught, droned, or charged. There's not even a pretense about justice here. Why is that?
d-usa wrote: If you spend even 10% of the time bitching and moaning about all the people that died during embassy bombings when Bush was in office then somebody might actually care about this thread. But it is pretty transparent that you and the pundits care more about this hurting Obama than the actual dead people.
That's why this thread pisses me off everytime it rises, because it is the very definition of using dead people for politics while pretending that you are mad about using dead people for politics.
I already know you like to be lied to.
Besides... when those embassy bombing occurred during the Bush years... did something defend it by blaming it on a video? Did Bush send out his cronies on 5 different Sunday Show to mislead the public regarding those bombings?
d-usa wrote: If you spend even 10% of the time bitching and moaning about all the people that died during embassy bombings when Bush was in office then somebody might actually care about this thread. But it is pretty transparent that you and the pundits care more about this hurting Obama than the actual dead people.
That's why this thread pisses me off everytime it rises, because it is the very definition of using dead people for politics while pretending that you are mad about using dead people for politics.
I already know you like to be lied to.
Besides... when those embassy bombing occurred during the Bush years... did something defend it by blaming it on a video? Did Bush send out his cronies on 5 different Sunday Show to mislead the public regarding those bombings?
Nobody have a gak during those years, that's the fething point.
You still don't give a gak about all the people that died during those attacks, so it would be nice if you could have the common decency to stop pretending like you suddenly care about dead Americans. You guys are perfectly fine with people dying on a daily basis, but if a corpse is useful politically then you guys suddenly are bleeding hearts.
You can't hold the President to account unless you impeach him, which aint going to happen for murders he didn't do or authorize. It makes him look bad. What else?
Inversely to those poopooing the event, where are the drone strikes? When we didn't go eye for eye and retaliate the terrorists increased their attacks until we had to.
sebster wrote: I think we need a thread on Chappaquiddick. The mainstream media has been quiet on that for too long.
I was at Martha's Vineyard when that happened. A short bridge, but no railing, and you could see the skidmarks where somebody had tried to brake.
I was a very young Grump at the time, but the memory has stuck with me in all the decades since.
As for the OP - it is in the news because the Republicans hope that it can stir up votes - they are not looking for accountability, they are looking at the election.
An attack on the US Embassy occurred in a nation that was not friendly to the US. Backed by an organization that is not friendly to the US.
Raise your hands if you are surprised.
Anyone? Anyone? Beuller?
The government of that nation have not been entirely helpful in trying to track down the guilty parties.
Anyone surprised?
Yes - we can use drones to gather intelligence, or to attack possible suspects - but there is not enough intelligence to do so in a reasonable response. Outside of the US we are constrained - and we are not currently at war with Libya.
That takes HumInt - and the agencies friendly to the US in that area do not have the influence or manpower to do a credible job.
And, hey look, Fox News is making a big deal of it.
Anyone surprised? It is not like Fox News has a known political agenda or anything....
The surprises were the size of the attacks and the organization - but, given that over one hundred and fifty people took part in the attack, they were by no means an effective series of strikes - the attackers lost far more people than they injured or killed - and while they did manage to hit two high profile targets they did so at great cost, and helped sway opinion in the area in favor of the US.
If there is one thing that we do not want to do it is antagonize a nation that is only now beginning to view the US in a positive light - by going in mob handed we would do more damage to our standing in the area than one hundred and fifty armed personnel managed to inflict.
So, we are being cautious.
We are letting the sovereign government of Libya do the bulk of the investigation. And they have made inroads - limiting the scope and power of the militias, the beginnings of separation between secular forces and religion.
The overwhelming reaction of the civilian populace of Bennghazi was to condemn the attack.
And you are wondering why we aren't sending in more attack drones?
We do not need to make more enemies.
The Auld Grump, so blow the trumpets from Mount Zion....
If the individual was submitting his analyst version of the situation instead of the possible "correct" version to the WH. maybe the stand down orders would not have been issued or/and additional combat support can be pass over to control to the former Seals on ground. So right now this individual who influence the description of the situation is responsible for possibly costing four Americans their lives.
sebster wrote: I think we need a thread on Chappaquiddick. The mainstream media has been quiet on that for too long.
As someone who leans liberal, if I had my way Ted Kennedy would never have made another public appearance without the first question being about Mary Jo Kopechne.
Well... technically, if I had my way, he'd be in jail for at the minimum depraved indifference. But I don't always get what I want.
sebster wrote: I think we need a thread on Chappaquiddick. The mainstream media has been quiet on that for too long.
As someone who leans liberal, if I had my way Ted Kennedy would never have made another public appearance without the first question being about Mary Jo Kopechne.
Well... technically, if I had my way, he'd be in jail for at the minimum depraved indifference. But I don't always get what I want.
TheAuldGrump wrote: I was at Martha's Vineyard when that happened. A short bridge, but no railing, and you could see the skidmarks where somebody had tried to brake.
I was a very young Grump at the time, but the memory has stuck with me in all the decades since.
Well now I feel bad about using it to make a joke. Sorry.
We do not need to make more enemies.
The Auld Grump, so blow the trumpets from Mount Zion....
Everything you wrote there sums up the issue perfectly. Thankyou for posting it.
sebster wrote: I think we need a thread on Chappaquiddick. The mainstream media has been quiet on that for too long.
I was at Martha's Vineyard when that happened. A short bridge, but no railing, and you could see the skidmarks where somebody had tried to brake.
I was a very young Grump at the time, but the memory has stuck with me in all the decades since.
As for the OP - it is in the news because the Republicans hope that it can stir up votes - they are not looking for accountability, they are looking at the election.
An attack on the US Embassy occurred in a nation that was not friendly to the US. Backed by an organization that is not friendly to the US.
Raise your hands if you are surprised.
Anyone? Anyone? Beuller?
The government of that nation have not been entirely helpful in trying to track down the guilty parties.
Anyone surprised?
Yes - we can use drones to gather intelligence, or to attack possible suspects - but there is not enough intelligence to do so in a reasonable response. Outside of the US we are constrained - and we are not currently at war with Libya.
That takes HumInt - and the agencies friendly to the US in that area do not have the influence or manpower to do a credible job.
And, hey look, Fox News is making a big deal of it.
Anyone surprised? It is not like Fox News has a known political agenda or anything....
The surprises were the size of the attacks and the organization - but, given that over one hundred and fifty people took part in the attack, they were by no means an effective series of strikes - the attackers lost far more people than they injured or killed - and while they did manage to hit two high profile targets they did so at great cost, and helped sway opinion in the area in favor of the US.
If there is one thing that we do not want to do it is antagonize a nation that is only now beginning to view the US in a positive light - by going in mob handed we would do more damage to our standing in the area than one hundred and fifty armed personnel managed to inflict.
So, we are being cautious.
We are letting the sovereign government of Libya do the bulk of the investigation. And they have made inroads - limiting the scope and power of the militias, the beginnings of separation between secular forces and religion.
The overwhelming reaction of the civilian populace of Bennghazi was to condemn the attack.
And you are wondering why we aren't sending in more attack drones?
We do not need to make more enemies.
The Auld Grump, so blow the trumpets from Mount Zion....
I'm exalting you for this. I'm exalting you as hard as I can. A lot of the Arab Spring countries have fallen back into their old ways, or their 'revolutions' never got off the ground properly. Unlike the lost opportunity of Egypt, or the tragedy of Syria, Libya seems to be staggering drunkenly towards getting it right. We are helping them by staying at arm's length and moving slowly and cautiously. Everything you have said is correct, Auld Grump, and you are an awesome person for saying it.
This is interesting... I'll try to condense the twitter bomb she sent during this hearing:
Mike Morrel, Petraeus' former number two, admitted on Tuesday it had been the CIA, not the FBI, who deleted these references.
But today, Morell testified under oath that it was the CIA that removed “al Qaeda” and that he, personally, made other edits.
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Morell didn’t offer this info when asked by Congress in earlier private and public appearances.
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Then, later in Nov. 2012, Morell provided yet another account. In a meeting w/ Rep. Senators McCain (R-AZ), Graham (R-SC) and Ayotte (R-NH),
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Morell stated that he believed it was the FBI that removed the references "to prevent compromising an ongoing criminal investigation."
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Within hours of Morrel's statement, CIA officials "corrected" it, stating that it was their belief CIA officials had deleted the references, not the CIA.
Morrel claims this was some kind of error on his part.
But how could Morrel erroneously think the FBI was deleting references to "al Qaeda" and "terrorism" when he knew it was the CIA, and when he knew that he himself had deleted references to previous "warnings" of a coming terrorist attack?
Morell also acknowledged removing the talking points disclosure that CIA had provided “warnings” to the State Dept. prior to the attacks.
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Morell went against his own agency on this point in defense of Secy of State Hillary Clinton’s State Department.
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Morell said he felt the CIA was thumping its chest and unfairly heaping blame on the State Dept.
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
Here's the funny thing...if you think Morell is out of work due to all these "errors" he makes when preparing Talking Points for Susan Rice or in his Congressional testimony... he's doing aight.
Morell has now been hired by a PR firm operated primarily by former Hillary Clinton and Obama administration officials.
— Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) April 3, 2014
TheAuldGrump wrote: I was at Martha's Vineyard when that happened. A short bridge, but no railing, and you could see the skidmarks where somebody had tried to brake.
I was a very young Grump at the time, but the memory has stuck with me in all the decades since.
Well now I feel bad about using it to make a joke. Sorry.
No harm, no foul - just that I'd been there.
And that my parents had taken me out to see the scene of the accident.
A stupid, stupid thing - drinking and driving... just dumb. He claimed that he was not operating under the influence - but no test was ever administered. No one in my family believed his claim.
Having no railing... not exactly bright, either. And the bridge angled off of the line of the road, with no markers, lights, or reflectors.
Drunk, in the dark, and not knowing where the heck the danged bridge was, while driving backwards.
But after the accident he never tried to call the police, an ambulance, any form of help - he just called friends and family. And that is where he became culpable. Drunk, in shock, and stupid. Stupid, just stupid.
Then the fluffing around because it was Ted Kennedy that had the accident, with nowhere near enough investigatory oversight of the matter.
But it is worth mentioning that Kennedy pled guilty - and did not deny the charges. But further charges were never brought. In Massachusetts, in the 1960s... the DA did not want to dig deeply. Judge Boyle gave Kennedy a slap on the wrist, then patted his hand and told him that everything would be okay, suspending the sentence.
And Ouze - reporters asked Ted Kennedy about that accident before or after every debate that he had after that night. Even into the twenty-first century. He was never allowed to forget it, nor should he have been allowed to do so. He was hounded, and deserved it.
In 1979 Roger Mudd tore him to pieces in front of a camera - accusing him to his face of lying - and Kennedy lost any chance of winning the primary against Jimmy Carter.
He kept what remained of his political career, but he had destroyed any chance of the White House that he might have had.
The bridge now has a guard rail - and all concerned are come to dust.
The Auld Grump, this story it has no moral, this story it has no end.
This story only goes to show there ain't no good in men....
Republicans say e-mails released Tuesday on the attack in Benghazi, Libya, include "the smoking gun" that shows a White House official urged that the assault on the U.S. consulate be blamed on a protest that never happened.
.....
The e-mail, sent to various officials including White House spokesman Jay Carney, said one goal was "to underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy."
.....
Another goal was "to reinforce the president and administration's strength and steadiness in dealing with difficult challenges."
White House Directed Incorrect Benghazi Narrative
Newly-released emails: "Video" to blame, "not a broader failure or policy."
By Sharyl Attkisson April 29, 2014
Newly-released documents reveal direct White House involvement in steering the public narrative about the September 11, 2012 terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya, toward that of a spontaneous protest that never happened.
One of the operative documents, which the government had withheld from
Congress and reporters for a year and a half, is an internal September 14,
2012 email to White House press officials from Ben Rhodes, President Obama’s
Assistant and Deputy National Security Advisor. (Disclosure:Ben Rhodes
is the brother of David Rhodes, the President of CBS News, where I
was employed until March.)
In the email, Ben Rhodes lists as a “goal” the White House desire “To
underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a
broader failure or policy.”
The email is entitled, “RE: PREP CALL with Susan, Saturday at 4:00 pm ET”
and refers to White House involvement in preparing then-U.S.Ambassador
to the U.N. Susan Rice for her upcoming appearance on Sunday television
network political talk shows.
The Rhodes email states that another “goal” is “To reinforce the President and Administration’s strength and steadiness in dealing with difficult challenges.”
A court compelled the release of the documents, which were heavily-redacted, to the conservative watchdog group JudicialWatch, which has sued the government over its failed Freedom of Information responses. I have also requested Benghazi-related documents under Freedom of Information law, but the government has only produced a few pages to date.
Today, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) called the Rhodes email the “smoking gun” showing the “political manipulation by the White House” after the attacks.
“The political shop at the White House took over early on,” Graham told me. “They understood it was a terrorist attack, that they had a political problem, and were going to handle it politically. They weren’t going to entertain anything other than what they wanted the public to hear.”
USA Today quotes a spokesman for the White House National Security Council reacting to the Rhodes’ email by stating that it contains general talking points on unrest spreading throughout the region in response to an offensive video, and also made clear that "our primary goals" included the safety of U.S. personnel in the field and bringing those responsible for the attacks to justice.
Since the deadly attacks on the U.S. missions in Benghazi, there have been persistent allegations that the Obama administration developed a false political narrative to downplay or hide the fact that terrorists had struck. The President had campaigned by stating that al Qaeda was “on the run,” and Republicans have argued that news of a terrorist attack eight weeks before the election could have decimated his re-election campaign. Four Americans were killed in the assaults, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens.
White House officials copied on the Rhodes “goal” email include Press Secretary Jay Carney, then-Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer, then-White House Senior Advisor David Plouffe, then-White House Deputy Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri and Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest. Earnest has failed to respond to more than a year’s worth of my emails and phone calls in my effort to obtain official White House photographs taken the night of the Benghazi attacks. The White House photo office had told me that Earnest’s personal approval was needed for the photos to be released.
Rhodes has emerged as a key figure in the controversy but hasn’t yet been asked to provide testimony to Congress.
Changed classification?
Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) told me today that the government apparently tried to keep the Rhodes email out of Congress and the public’s hands by classifying it after-the-fact.
“They retroactively changed the classification,” Chaffetz says. “That was an unclassified document and they changed it to classified.”
In the past month, the government has supplied 3,200 new Benghazi-related documents under Congressional subpoena. In some instances, Congressional members and their staff are only permitted to see the documents during certain time periods in a review room, and cannot remove them or make copies.
Chaffetz says that the State Department redacted more material on the copies provided to Congress than on those that it was forced to provide to JudicialWatch.
One of the most heavily-redacted email exchanges is entitled, “FOX News: US officials knew Libya attack was terrorism within 24 hours, sources confirm.” The Fox News article was circulated among dozens of officials including Rhodes and then-Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough but the content of their email discussion is hidden.
“Topline Points”
An internal document provided by the State Department dated Sept. 14, 2012 is titled, “Topline Points” and poses answers to a series of questions apparently in preparation for the briefing to be provided to Ambassador Rice prior to her talk show appearances. The document fails to mention terrorism, although it had been repeated throughout the early versions of the talking points, and many government officials have said that they had already concluded by that time that terrorism was to blame.
“What’s your response to the Independent story that says we have intelligence 48 hours in advance of the Benghazi attack that was ignored?” is one question posed in the briefing memo. The suggested answer: “This story is absolutely wrong. We are not aware of any actionable intelligence indicating that an attack on the U.S. mission was planned or imminent. We also see indications that this action was related to the video that has sparked protests in other countries.”
But the final sentence to the answer is expanded and developed in the “PREP CALL with Susan” email from Rhodes at 8:09pm on Friday, September 14, 2012. It adds the phrase “spontaneously inspired” and also refers to the attack as “demonstrations” that “evolved.”
“The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the US Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the U.S. Consulate and subsequently its annex,” reads the Friday night email from Rhodes to White House press officials.
Obama administration officials have insisted they were acting on “the best intelligence available at the time” and that they clarified the story as they got more information.
But taken as a whole, the documents and testimony revealed since the attacks support the idea that the administration’s avoidance of the word “terrorism” was a strategy rather than an accident or mistake.
White House Involvement
Relatively few documents have been provided that shed light on White House involvement in the post-Benghazi narrative. Previously, emails showed that then-deputy national security adviser Denis McDonough, on Rhodes' behalf, assigned Hillary Clinton-aide Jake Sullivan to work with Deputy Director of the C.I.A. Mike Morell to edit the talking points on Benghazi.
As the various agencies worked to edit and approve the talking points on Sept. 14, Rhodes emailed that there would be a Deputies meeting the next morning to work out the issues. "That's polite code for let's not debate this on e-mail for 18 hours," one official involved told me last year.
Multiple government officials including those in the military, State Department and C.I.A. have stated in documents or under questioning that they immediately believed the attacks, using heavy weaponry and mortar shells, were the work of terrorists. Prior to the attacks, there had been multiple warnings of al Qaeda threats in Libya and, specifically, in Benghazi.
In fact, in an early version of the government’s “talking points,” the C.I.A. stated that it had “produced numerous pieces on the threat of extremists linked to al-Qa'ida in Benghazi and eastern Libya,” and that “These noted that, since April, there have been at least five other attacks against foreign interests in Benghazi by unidentified assailants, including the June attack against the British Ambassador's convoy. We cannot rule out the individuals has previously surveilled the U.S. facilities, also contributing to the efficacy of the attacks." The administration later removed these C.I.A. disclosures about the advance warning of a threat.
Morell testified to Congress earlier this month that he, and not the White House, was responsible for making some of the most controversial revisions to the talking points, including removing the language about the advance warnings. Morell has since gone to work as counsel for Beacon Global Strategies, a strategic relations PR firm dominated by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton officials and Obama administration officials. (Disclosure: In January, Morell was hired as an analyst for CBS News where I was previously employed.)
An administration official who asked not to be identified previously told me that “spontaneous” protests was probably not the right word to use in the talking points, but that there was no intent to deceive.
Sen. Graham has a different view.
“They understood it was a terrorist attack, that they had a political problem and they were going to handle it politically. They saw it as a chink in the President’s armor and they tried to repair it,” says Graham.
- Zero proof that they knew it was a terrorist attack.
- Obama calling it a terrorist attack the next day
- "Talking points" that we knew existed because that is what they said on TV and no proof that they knew that it was incorrect.
- Same old people saying "they knew!"
whembly wrote: Wow... never thought there would be a smoking gun here... o.O
How in hell is there a smoking gun there?
If this isn’t a smoking gun on Benghazi, at least on the controversy over the talking points that blamed a YouTube video rather than the terrorists who plotted and then conducted the attack, then I don't think we can ever claim anything as a smoking gun anymore.
It confirmed that this was a political response with the WH's direct involvement.
This thing shows the WH's staff sought to downplay evidence that the attack exposed fundamental errors in President Barack Obama’s foreign policy... particularly the administration's Mideast policies. Instead, the staff pushed the unverified (and eventually debunked) claim that the attack was an unpredictable riot precipitated by an anti-Islam YouTube video (Nakouli sp?).
Lemme re-emphasize:
The goal of the TV appearances, said Rhodes, is “to underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, not a broader failure of policy.”
- Zero proof that they knew it was a terrorist attack. - Obama calling it a terrorist attack the next day - "Talking points" that we knew existed because that is what they said on TV and no proof that they knew that it was incorrect. - Same old people saying "they knew!"
I've contradicted each and every one of those D...
Keep spinning away.
To be honest... nothing will come out of this though... so, I'm *meh* about it. Blame it on EasyE for resurrecting this.
Yeah, I'm not really seeing a smoking gun here either.
Now, if the Emails said that Obama ordered the attack on Ambassador Stevens over money owed to the Prez. That would be a smoking gun.
An email saying that the White House wants to emphasize that our policy is right and the President didn't do anything wrong.... well that's just Standard Operating Proceedure.
d-usa wrote: Every TV appearance has the goal of explaining how any president didn't feth up.
There is not a single bit of news here that we didn't already know.
Incorrect.
The administration and it's staff knew it had NOTHING to do with that video D... FROM. THE. GET. GO.
It was nothing more than an attempt to deflect a political problem during a heated election season.
It's every bit news worthy.
Furthermore...Why wasn’t Rhodes’s e-mail (the one pulled from JudicialWatch) released before yesterday? It seems perfectly germane to the House’s investigation of Benghazi.... huh?
Yeah. 4 brave souls murdered by terrorists in an attack on an embassy and whembly and co screaming for the President's head over it...
Meanwhile, 109,032 deaths including 66,081 civilian deaths and 4,486 U.S. soldiers in Iraq between 2003 and 2012. For... what was it again? Weapons of something or other, I forget.
And that was an intentional invasion, conducted whilst we were already at war in another part of the world.
But let's not grind our teeth about the four and a half thousand US service men and women in wooden boxes over a ficticious cause for a lying administration, who deliberately sent them out there to fething die when we can shout at the guy from the side we didn't vote for who was in the big chair when four people were killed by terrorists. Oh and we'll certainly not grind our teeth in the same fashion about the three thousand plus killed by a terrorist attack during the previous administration's time in office, against the twin towers.
Oh and then there's this:
January 22, 2002. Calcutta, India. Gunmen associated with Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami attack the U.S. Consulate. Five people are killed.
June 14, 2002. Karachi, Pakistan. Suicide bomber connected with al Qaeda attacks the U.S. Consulate, killing 12 and injuring 51.
October 12, 2002. Denpasar, Indonesia. U.S. diplomatic offices bombed as part of a string of "Bali Bombings." No fatalities.
February 28, 2003. Islamabad, Pakistan. Several gunmen fire upon the U.S. Embassy. Two people are killed.
May 12, 2003. Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Armed al Qaeda terrorists storm the diplomatic compound, killing 36 people including nine Americans. The assailants committed suicide by detonating a truck bomb.
July 30, 2004. Tashkent, Uzbekistan. A suicide bomber from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan attacks the U.S. Embassy, killing two people.
December 6, 2004. Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Al Qaeda terrorists storm the U.S. Consulate and occupy the perimeter wall. Nine people are killed.
March 2, 2006. Karachi, Pakistan again. Suicide bomber attacks the U.S. Consulate killing four people, including U.S. diplomat David Foy who was directly targeted by the attackers. (I wonder if Lindsey Graham or Fox News would even recognize the name "David Foy." This is the third Karachi terrorist attack in four years on what's considered American soil.)
September 12, 2006. Damascus, Syria. Four armed gunmen shouting "Allahu akbar" storm the U.S. Embassy using grenades, automatic weapons, a car bomb and a truck bomb. Four people are killed, 13 are wounded.
January 12, 2007. Athens, Greece. Members of a Greek terrorist group called the Revolutionary Struggle fire a rocket-propelled grenade at the U.S. Embassy. No fatalities.
March 18, 2008. Sana'a, Yemen. Members of the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Jihad of Yemen fire a mortar at the U.S. Embassy. The shot misses the embassy, but hits nearby school killing two.
July 9, 2008. Istanbul, Turkey. Four armed terrorists attack the U.S. Consulate. Six people are killed.
September 17, 2008. Sana'a, Yemen. Terrorists dressed as military officials attack the U.S. Embassy with an arsenal of weapons including RPGs and detonate two car bombs. Sixteen people are killed, including an American student and her husband (they had been married for three weeks when the attack occurred). This is the second attack on this embassy in seven months.
But sure, lets keep cranking the conspiracy engine about Obama, and whilst we're doing it, keep it stoked in case Hilary looks to run, cos feth knows we're scared of her chances... So, keep digging these four poor bastards back up and ride them around town on the back of a mule, to show the world what an evil conspiracy looks like...
FFS, You're like a dog with two dicks, constantly going over and over this whilst willfully ignoring the hundreds of thousands dead by the explicit instruction of the prior guy. Pack it in and knock it off.
d-usa wrote: Every TV appearance has the goal of explaining how any president didn't feth up.
There is not a single bit of news here that we didn't already know.
Incorrect.
The administration and it's staff knew it had NOTHING to do with that video D... FROM. THE. GET. GO.
NOTHING. IN. THOSE. EMAILS. BACKS. THAT. UP.
D... take a breath.
The CIA testifed that they went through proper channels to attest that it was an organized attacked, not because of a spontaneous protest.
This email PROVES that the WH staff was only interested in mitigating this event during the election season in order to maintain Obama's foreign policy strength against Romney.
d-usa wrote: Every TV appearance has the goal of explaining how any president didn't feth up.
There is not a single bit of news here that we didn't already know.
Incorrect.
The administration and it's staff knew it had NOTHING to do with that video D... FROM. THE. GET. GO.
NOTHING. IN. THOSE. EMAILS. BACKS. THAT. UP.
D... take a breath.
The CIA testifed that they went through proper channels to attest that it was an organized attacked, not because of a spontaneous protest.
This email PROVES that the WH staff was only interested in mitigating this even during the election season in order to maintain Obama's foreign policy strength against Romney.
It would prove that if there was any evidence that shows that they knew it was not because of the video, believed it was not because of the video, and then said it was because of the video anyway.
But it doesn't. It shows that they said what they believed to be true.
Yeah. 4 brave souls murdered by terrorists in an attack on an embassy and whembly and co screaming for the President's head over it...
Yep... or technically, it should rest on Hillary Clinton's feet. But, you go ahead and defend this administration's action on this.
Meanwhile, 109,032 deaths including 66,081 civilian deaths and 4,486 U.S. soldiers in Iraq between 2003 and 2012. For... what was it again? Weapons of something or other, I forget.
How is that germane to this discussion?
And that was an intentional invasion, conducted whilst we were already at war in another part of the world.
Relevance please?
But let's not grind our teeth about the four and a half thousand US service men and women in wooden boxes over a ficticious cause for a lying administration, who deliberately sent them out there to fething die when we can shout at the guy from the side we didn't vote for who was in the big chair when four people were killed by terrorists. Oh and we'll certainly not grind our teeth in the same fashion about the three thousand plus killed by a terrorist attack during the previous administration's time in office, against the twin towers.
So... it's Bush's fault.
Gotcha.
Oh and then there's this:
January 22, 2002. Calcutta, India. Gunmen associated with Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami attack the U.S. Consulate. Five people are killed.
June 14, 2002. Karachi, Pakistan. Suicide bomber connected with al Qaeda attacks the U.S. Consulate, killing 12 and injuring 51.
October 12, 2002. Denpasar, Indonesia. U.S. diplomatic offices bombed as part of a string of "Bali Bombings." No fatalities.
February 28, 2003. Islamabad, Pakistan. Several gunmen fire upon the U.S. Embassy. Two people are killed.
May 12, 2003. Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Armed al Qaeda terrorists storm the diplomatic compound, killing 36 people including nine Americans. The assailants committed suicide by detonating a truck bomb.
July 30, 2004. Tashkent, Uzbekistan. A suicide bomber from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan attacks the U.S. Embassy, killing two people.
December 6, 2004. Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Al Qaeda terrorists storm the U.S. Consulate and occupy the perimeter wall. Nine people are killed.
March 2, 2006. Karachi, Pakistan again. Suicide bomber attacks the U.S. Consulate killing four people, including U.S. diplomat David Foy who was directly targeted by the attackers. (I wonder if Lindsey Graham or Fox News would even recognize the name "David Foy." This is the third Karachi terrorist attack in four years on what's considered American soil.)
September 12, 2006. Damascus, Syria. Four armed gunmen shouting "Allahu akbar" storm the U.S. Embassy using grenades, automatic weapons, a car bomb and a truck bomb. Four people are killed, 13 are wounded.
January 12, 2007. Athens, Greece. Members of a Greek terrorist group called the Revolutionary Struggle fire a rocket-propelled grenade at the U.S. Embassy. No fatalities.
March 18, 2008. Sana'a, Yemen. Members of the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Jihad of Yemen fire a mortar at the U.S. Embassy. The shot misses the embassy, but hits nearby school killing two.
July 9, 2008. Istanbul, Turkey. Four armed terrorists attack the U.S. Consulate. Six people are killed.
September 17, 2008. Sana'a, Yemen. Terrorists dressed as military officials attack the U.S. Embassy with an arsenal of weapons including RPGs and detonate two car bombs. Sixteen people are killed, including an American student and her husband (they had been married for three weeks when the attack occurred). This is the second attack on this embassy in seven months.
Hey... I'm just as outrage that these happened.
Were they blamed on the video? Or Justin Beiber's music video?
But sure, lets keep cranking the conspiracy engine about Obama, and whilst we're doing it, keep it stoked in case Hilary looks to run, cos feth knows we're scared of her chances... So, keep digging these four poor bastards back up and ride them around town on the back of a mule, to show the world what an evil conspiracy looks like...
It’s been said before but it bears repeating…
No one died during Watergate.
FFS, You're like a dog with two dicks, constantly going over and over this whilst willfully ignoring the hundreds of thousands dead by the explicit instruction of the prior guy. Pack it in and knock it off.
It's.fething. Pathetic.
It's fething pathetic that some thinks it's okay to be lied to in such fashion.
It would prove that if there was any evidence that shows that they knew it was not because of the video, believed it was not because of the video, and then said it was because of the video anyway.
But it doesn't. It shows that they said what they believed to be true.
Yep... or technically, it should rest on Hillary Clinton's feet. But, you go ahead and defend this administration's action on this.
Meanwhile, 109,032 deaths including 66,081 civilian deaths and 4,486 U.S. soldiers in Iraq between 2003 and 2012. For... what was it again? Weapons of something or other, I forget.
How is that germane to this discussion?
And that was an intentional invasion, conducted whilst we were already at war in another part of the world.
Relevance please?
But let's not grind our teeth about the four and a half thousand US service men and women in wooden boxes over a ficticious cause for a lying administration, who deliberately sent them out there to fething die when we can shout at the guy from the side we didn't vote for who was in the big chair when four people were killed by terrorists. Oh and we'll certainly not grind our teeth in the same fashion about the three thousand plus killed by a terrorist attack during the previous administration's time in office, against the twin towers.
So... it's Bush's fault.
Gotcha.
It's fething pathetic that some thinks it's okay to be lied to in such fashion.
fine, then I'll be clear.
The administration prior to this launched a war, invaded a country, based on a lie, based on intentional fabrication, to settle a family grudge and score some sweet personal financial deals. At a cost in the blood of the men and women of the armed services and a huge civilian population, thousands dead, thousands more crippled and wounded, yet from you, not a whistle, not a peep, no anger, no continued 'Never Forget Iraq!' thread or constant reminder in any other thread relating to politics ever.
Thousands dead for lies and greed. Yet you and some others constantly come onto this forum ad nauseum (to the extent where others have made memes about it) to resurrect threads and start new ones about this one incident, because? Because it's partisan with you. Because you're using the death of these four men, in a surprise terrorist attack, to attack people who's politics you don't care for. If you were attacking the previous administration's hideous death toll and continued cover ups as well, then I'd have some time for it, but instead we get the oft touted 'oh it's all Bush's fault' sarcasm. Because all those thousands dead on a lie was fine, cos he was your guy...
I'm totally, sick of hearing you endlessly using these four dead men to push a political, partisan attack. It's not about some vaulted notion of justice, it's about using the memory of these people and their violent death to score points.
The administration prior to this launched a war, invaded a country, based on a lie, based on intentional fabrication, to settle a family grudge and score some sweet personal financial deals. At a cost in the blood of the men and women of the armed services and a huge civilian population, thousands dead, thousands more crippled and wounded, yet from you, not a whistle, not a peep, no anger, no continued 'Never Forget Iraq!' thread or constant reminder in any other thread relating to politics ever.
Wow...
And you think I'm nuts? Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS) is indeed alive.
Why is it that some of you still ignore the contents of the Iraq War Resolution?
But, then again, keep on blaming Bush because it's easier to hate someone.
Thousands dead for lies and greed. Yet you and some others constantly come onto this forum ad nauseum (to the extent where others have made memes about it) to resurrect threads and start new ones about this one incident, because?
*I* resurrected this thread? Might wanna back up from that accusation bucko.
Because it's partisan with you.
REALLY dude? Just look at what you just posted.
Because you're using the death of these four men, in a surprise terrorist attack, to attack people who's politics you don't care for.
So do you agree that this was a terrorist attack that had nothing to do with that anti-Muslin video? If so, there are PROOF that the administration KNEW that it was a terrorist attack. And yet, for political reasons, they blamed it on that video for weeks.
You okay with that?
If you were attacking the previous administration's hideous death toll and continued cover ups as well, then I'd have some time for it,
Sigh... first of all, I wasn't on Dakka during that time and second of all... Bush drove me fething nuts. For what it's worth...
Dude... Abu Gharib was one of the most embarrassing moment in US history. Bush should've accepted Donald Rumsfeld resignation.
but instead we get the oft touted 'oh it's all Bush's fault' sarcasm.
Hey... youstarted it boyo... just saying. If you start dishing... I'll throw it right back at ya. This is the OT Thunderdome™ after all.
Because all those thousands dead on a lie was fine, cos he was your guy...
Uh huh... might wanna look at the wiki I posted earlier. You'd learn something.
I'm totally, sick of hearing you endlessly using these four dead men to push a political, partisan attack. It's not about some vaulted notion of justice, it's about using the memory of these people and their violent death to score points.
I resent that MGS... I want policies in placed so that this doesn't happen again.
If you hold that opinion of me... fine... zero feths given. Likewise, I'll hold you accountable for defending this administration's actions regardless of why these men died.
One interesting thing from Attkisson is that recent tactic has been successfully used by Republican and Democrat administrations to release information slowly, sometimes over the course of several years, so people either become “numb” or disinterested in what would have been an enormous scandal.
She stated:
“If all that we know today had come out the week after Benghazi,” she said, “it would have really been disastrous.”
I agree and it's a shame that most of the media was only interested in protecting Obama, rather than maintain their journalistic integrity.
Or you release the news slowly because if you talk about what you know now, some random guy on the internet will keep a thread alive for years calling you a liar.
Pretty much the entire Congress voted to go to war there Stompa. They looked at the same intell Bush had and agreed. If he so straight up lied 110% to go to War you think we would have impeached his ass like we did Clinton, Bill (JFK nailed Marilyn Monroe and he nailed Pug Face)
Though I want to point out, not cutting hair here, you see where I am going with it.
January 22, 2002. Calcutta, India. Gunmen associated with Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami attack the U.S. Consulate. Five people are killed.
June 14, 2002. Karachi, Pakistan. Suicide bomber connected with al Qaeda attacks the U.S. Consulate, killing 12 and injuring 51.
October 12, 2002. Denpasar, Indonesia. U.S. diplomatic offices bombed as part of a string of "Bali Bombings." No fatalities.
February 28, 2003. Islamabad, Pakistan. Several gunmen fire upon the U.S. Embassy. Two people are killed.
May 12, 2003. Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Armed al Qaeda terrorists storm the diplomatic compound, killing 36 people including nine Americans. The assailants committed suicide by detonating a truck bomb.
July 30, 2004. Tashkent, Uzbekistan. A suicide bomber from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan attacks the U.S. Embassy, killing two people.
December 6, 2004. Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Al Qaeda terrorists storm the U.S. Consulate and occupy the perimeter wall. Nine people are killed.
March 2, 2006. Karachi, Pakistan again. Suicide bomber attacks the U.S. Consulate killing four people, including U.S. diplomat David Foy who was directly targeted by the attackers. (I wonder if Lindsey Graham or Fox News would even recognize the name "David Foy." This is the third Karachi terrorist attack in four years on what's considered American soil.)
September 12, 2006. Damascus, Syria. Four armed gunmen shouting "Allahu akbar" storm the U.S. Embassy using grenades, automatic weapons, a car bomb and a truck bomb. Four people are killed, 13 are wounded.
January 12, 2007. Athens, Greece. Members of a Greek terrorist group called the Revolutionary Struggle fire a rocket-propelled grenade at the U.S. Embassy. No fatalities.
March 18, 2008. Sana'a, Yemen. Members of the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Jihad of Yemen fire a mortar at the U.S. Embassy. The shot misses the embassy, but hits nearby school killing two.
July 9, 2008. Istanbul, Turkey. Four armed terrorists attack the U.S. Consulate. Six people are killed.
September 17, 2008. Sana'a, Yemen. Terrorists dressed as military officials attack the U.S. Embassy with an arsenal of weapons including RPGs and detonate two car bombs. Sixteen people are killed, including an American student and her husband (they had been married for three weeks when the attack occurred). This is the second attack on this embassy in seven months.
Now what your also missing is Kabul, Afghanistan and Green Zone, Iraq
Benghazi was a Diplomat Mission so just limited personnel. Yet with all these attacks on Consulate and Embassy you think we should have added in more Security for Stevens espacially in a "Hot Area". Before fingers are pointed at a funding cut for Security does not mean "cannot provide squat" it means "reallocate Security personnel in accordance with the environment"
to settle a family grudge and score some sweet personal financial deals.
Clinton authorized a missile attack on Iraq for the attempt at the time unknown assassination attempt on Bush Sr.
Contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder. Someone please make the connection here. I tried this once and no one got it.
Yet you and some others constantly come onto this forum ad nauseum (to the extent where others have made memes about it) to resurrect threads and start new ones about this one incident,
I look at this thread like I look at Bundy "Cause" to see how far Whembly can go. Also to gauge how much we forgot. Or not really knowing.
The administration prior to this launched a war, invaded a country, based on a lie, based on intentional fabrication, to settle a family grudge and score some sweet personal financial deals. At a cost in the blood of the men and women of the armed services and a huge civilian population, thousands dead, thousands more crippled and wounded, yet from you, not a whistle, not a peep, no anger, no continued 'Never Forget Iraq!' thread or constant reminder in any other thread relating to politics ever.
Wow...
And you think I'm nuts? Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS) is indeed alive.
Why is it that some of you still ignore the contents of the Iraq War Resolution?
But, then again, keep on blaming Bush because it's easier to hate someone.
It's remarkably easy to hate a man responsible for the deaths of thousands based on a lie and a personal agenda. I've read the War Resolution before, it's a mixture of horse gak and the things we knew he was doing along with every other despot on the earth who we don't invade, or indeed go ahead and quietly support...
Thousands dead for lies and greed. Yet you and some others constantly come onto this forum ad nauseum (to the extent where others have made memes about it) to resurrect threads and start new ones about this one incident, because?
*I* resurrected this thread? Might wanna back up from that accusation bucko.
Because it's partisan with you.
REALLY dude?
Just look at what you just posted.
You didn't post the initial, but here you are again, here we go again with the Whembly Benghazi-Bump Machine. And of course it's partisan, that's why there isn't an equal or heavier gnashing of teeth from you about Iraq or anything else. You take this one personally, not for the deaths, not for the people who fell, but because of who was in office, because of who was head of foreign affairs. Obama and Hilary. It's a political thing with you, it's ok, you can admit it, we all already know...
Because you're using the death of these four men, in a surprise terrorist attack, to attack people who's politics you don't care for.
So do you agree that this was a terrorist attack that had nothing to do with that anti-Muslin video? If so, there are PROOF that the administration KNEW that it was a terrorist attack. And yet, for political reasons, they blamed it on that video for weeks.
You okay with that?
Obama said it was a terrorist attack the next day.
It was, from where I'm sitting, a terrorist attack. There are mixed reports as to whether there was a protest, protests nearby or protests that day. This raises further questions about whether the attack used the protest as a front to get close enough to launch attack or whether there was other confusion during the attack.
I don't know, it does sound like confusion and conflicting information, it does not sound like I've heard from some, that this is some mandarin bs about Obama being sympathetic to the terrorists, or the four being offered up as sacrifice to the new regime in Libya. I'm totally ok with them presenting what they believe to be the case at the time and then, later, saying 'we were wrong, this is the actual case'.
If you were attacking the previous administration's hideous death toll and continued cover ups as well, then I'd have some time for it,
Sigh... first of all, I wasn't on Dakka during that time and second of all... Bush drove me fething nuts. For what it's worth...
Dude... Abu Gharib was one of the most embarrassing moment in US history. Bush should've accepted Donald Rumsfeld resignation.
The entire war was a shame. Bush and Blair should be on trial for the deaths of every serviceman or service woman and every Iraqi civilian. They flouted the international law they used to damn everyone else, ignored evidence that did not support their crusade and committed themselves to the deaths of thousands whilst they played golf together and 'prayed' from air conditioned offices.
Because all those thousands dead on a lie was fine, cos he was your guy...
Uh huh... might wanna look at the wiki I posted earlier. You'd learn something.
Read it, it's full of lies and the truths it contains are truths that the US doesn't usually use to invade another country, I might even wish they did, if it took out Mugabe or similar, but it was all about suiting Bush's needs, not about liberating people from a brutal oppressor... one the US and co had put there, armed and supported, till he didn't do as he was told...
I'm totally, sick of hearing you endlessly using these four dead men to push a political, partisan attack. It's not about some vaulted notion of justice, it's about using the memory of these people and their violent death to score points.
I resent that MGS... I want policies in placed so that this doesn't happen again.
No you don't, you and those you're listening to (or perhaps those you listen too and you haven't figured it out) want to damage this administration but more importantly use this to damage Clinton, because those on the other side are fairly terrified of her chances, should she run.
If you hold that opinion of me... fine... zero feths given. Likewise, I'll hold you accountable for defending this administration's actions regardless of why these men died.
Hey... it's thunderdome after all, right? Roll your sleeves up and get back in here!
One interesting thing from Attkisson is that recent tactic has been successfully used by Republican and Democrat administrations to release information slowly, sometimes over the course of several years, so people either become “numb” or disinterested in what would have been an enormous scandal.
I like how political tactics are new to you. Pssssst, they all do it... They've always done it...
“If all that we know today had come out the week after Benghazi,” she said, “it would have really been disastrous.”
I agree and it's a shame that most of the media was only interested in protecting Obama, rather than maintain their journalistic integrity.
Ahhhh, the media is sheltering Obama again, funny, I thought they were driven, both ego and finance-wise, to break new stories, be the first to release information and use the guise of 'reporting the truth' to reveal anything, no matter how damaging to a political side... This argument that the 'lamestream' is protecting the president is horse gak, if he slipped up, they'd report it in a heartbeat and knife each other in the rush to do it.
And then we have the largest 'news' channel in America being a direct and brazen partisan propaganda channel against Obama.
So, try again? Or perhaps just don't, because you've been flogging this horse for fething years now.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Jihadin wrote: Pretty much the entire Congress voted to go to war there Stompa. They looked at the same intell Bush had and agreed. If he so straight up lied 110% to go to War you think we would have impeached his ass like we did Clinton, Bill (JFK nailed Marilyn Monroe and he nailed Pug Face)
You seem to be forgetting the atmosphere here following 9/11. The public was up in arms, clamoring for blood and retribution. The Intel presented was a mixture of fabricated answers presented under torture, a lone CIA claim citing pipes being used for weapons, the harrowing and truthful presentation of Saddam's regime's terrible human rights record (but as I said, go to war with him over it, why didn't we have a problem with it when we were arming him? Why don't we have a problem with it when it's all the other monsters (lots of whom we also armed...)).
And above all, the times meant that going against the administration during that time of national emergency meant you were 'unAmerican', 'unpatriotic', it wasn't a nationally encouraged thing then to rebel against the tyrant in the White House, because he wasn't a black guy that we didn't vote for...
America had bloodlust and politicians voting against 'the evidence we need to go to war with someone threatening to commit further terrorist attacks against us' was endangering citizens' lives and a potentially unAmerican terrorist appeaser.
cincydooley wrote: Can we at least all agree that the whole feth up, coupled with age, should really disqualify Hilary from running in 2016?
No.
The terrorist attack on September 11, 2001 (the United States' single largest intelligence failure of her 200+ year history) or any time an embassy was attacked between 2002 and 2004 didn't disqualify George W. Bush from running for President in 2004, why should this incident disqualify Hilary?
the United States' single largest intelligence failure of her 200+ year history
I don't know man. Billy Mitchells was all like "yo I think the Japanese gonna bomb pearl harbor on a sunday morning and then they're totally gonna invade the Philippines" and everyone else was like "lolwut?"
the United States' single largest intelligence failure of her 200+ year history
I don't know man. Billy Mitchells was all like "yo I think the Japanese gonna bomb pearl harbor on a sunday morning and then they're totally gonna invade the Philippines" and everyone else was like "lolwut?"
He said it in 1921.
Billy Mitchell was a friggin stud of the first water.
In a fist fight between Billy Mitchell and Mikhail Tukhachevsky, neither of them win because they were both too awesome to live and died before the fight even started
You seem to be forgetting the atmosphere here following 9/11. The public was up in arms, clamoring for blood and retribution. The Intel presented was a mixture of fabricated answers presented under torture, a lone CIA claim citing pipes being used for weapons, the harrowing and truthful presentation of Saddam's regime's terrible human rights record (but as I said, go to war with him over it, why didn't we have a problem with it when we were arming him? Why don't we have a problem with it when it's all the other monsters (lots of whom we also armed...)).
I am not forgetting 9/11 Atmosphere I got out a three months before that and was hauled backed in and made a Movement Coordinator. So someone in CIA fabricated a answers yet Bush is at fault? Sounds like something similar in this thread eh
-Though I do know suicide bombers in Israel slacked way off since Saddam no longer able to donate 10K to the families for a bomber.
-Tough there were like 50+ circumstantial evidence of chemical weapons being found. 155mm double chamber artillery rounds I know of because the Insurgents thought they were HE. No explosion but "pops". That scared the Hell out of us.
-As for arming him I've no clue but I believe we had a thing against Iran for something about Embassy Hostage (guessing) but if you know the real reason why I like to read
-We armed Pol Pot?
-We armed Stalin.
-We armed the French in Indo-China.
-We armed the Hmong (they seriously hate the Vietnamese)
-We armed Thailand who seriously hate Cambodia and Vietnam
-We armed ANA (Afghanistan National Army)
-We armed Iraq Army
-We sell arms and combat vehicles to Israel
Just to mention a few. You have to remember. POTUS signs the Agreement/Treaty/Arms Deal but its the Dept of State that regulates the flow.
I'm going to take Bushnism for this. The Left hand (waves Right) at times does not know what the Left hand (waves Left) is doing.
And above all, the times meant that going against the administration during that time of national emergency meant you were 'unAmerican', 'unpatriotic', it wasn't a nationally encouraged thing then to rebel against the tyrant in the White House, because he wasn't a black guy that we didn't vote for...
Here I am thinking is not to disparage the Military people who keep rotating back and forth on deployments. Though a high portion of troops feel Bush had our back compare to Obama but Bush never ran against Obama because Bush had his eight years...
America had bloodlust and politicians voting against 'the evidence we need to go to war with someone threatening to commit further terrorist attacks against us' was endangering citizens' lives and a potentially unAmerican terrorist appeaser.
Breath..wwwooooooooosshhhhaaaaaaaaa....breath....wwoooooossshhhhaaaaaaa Let future generation decide if it was right or wrong.
Know this though. I would not trust a Middle Eastern country ever. They can nuke themselves for all I care. Israel can pretty much handle they're affair as they see fit and also their neighbor's if they get froggy.
The administration prior to this launched a war, invaded a country, based on a lie, based on intentional fabrication, to settle a family grudge and score some sweet personal financial deals. At a cost in the blood of the men and women of the armed services and a huge civilian population, thousands dead, thousands more crippled and wounded, yet from you, not a whistle, not a peep, no anger, no continued 'Never Forget Iraq!' thread or constant reminder in any other thread relating to politics ever.
Wow...
And you think I'm nuts? Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS) is indeed alive.
Why is it that some of you still ignore the contents of the Iraq War Resolution?
But, then again, keep on blaming Bush because it's easier to hate someone.
It's remarkably easy to hate a man responsible for the deaths of thousands based on a lie and a personal agenda. I've read the War Resolution before, it's a mixture of horse gak and the things we knew he was doing along with every other despot on the earth who we don't invade, or indeed go ahead and quietly support...
Thousands dead for lies and greed. Yet you and some others constantly come onto this forum ad nauseum (to the extent where others have made memes about it) to resurrect threads and start new ones about this one incident, because?
*I* resurrected this thread? Might wanna back up from that accusation bucko.
Because it's partisan with you.
REALLY dude?
Just look at what you just posted.
You didn't post the initial, but here you are again, here we go again with the Whembly Benghazi-Bump Machine. And of course it's partisan, that's why there isn't an equal or heavier gnashing of teeth from you about Iraq or anything else. You take this one personally, not for the deaths, not for the people who fell, but because of who was in office, because of who was head of foreign affairs. Obama and Hilary. It's a political thing with you, it's ok, you can admit it, we all already know...
No. It's because the four dead Americans deservesbetter.
That email that the WH desperately tried to classify shows how political this was.
Because you're using the death of these four men, in a surprise terrorist attack, to attack people who's politics you don't care for.
So do you agree that this was a terrorist attack that had nothing to do with that anti-Muslin video? If so, there are PROOF that the administration KNEW that it was a terrorist attack. And yet, for political reasons, they blamed it on that video for weeks.
You okay with that?
Obama said it was a terrorist attack the next day.
Act of terror in a "roundabout" manner.
It was, from where I'm sitting, a terrorist attack. There are mixed reports as to whether there was a protest, protests nearby or protests that day. This raises further questions about whether the attack used the protest as a front to get close enough to launch attack or whether there was other confusion during the attack.
I don't know, it does sound like confusion and conflicting information, it does not sound like I've heard from some, that this is some mandarin bs about Obama being sympathetic to the terrorists, or the four being offered up as sacrifice to the new regime in Libya. I'm totally ok with them presenting what they believe to be the case at the time and then, later, saying 'we were wrong, this is the actual case'.
The CIA testified (Morell) in Congress that they reported it was a sophisticated attack with no protest whatsoever.
You're getting the Cairo protest at this time mixed up with the Benghazi events.
If you were attacking the previous administration's hideous death toll and continued cover ups as well, then I'd have some time for it,
Sigh... first of all, I wasn't on Dakka during that time and second of all... Bush drove me fething nuts. For what it's worth...
Dude... Abu Gharib was one of the most embarrassing moment in US history. Bush should've accepted Donald Rumsfeld resignation.
The entire war was a shame. Bush and Blair should be on trial for the deaths of every serviceman or service woman and every Iraqi civilian. They flouted the international law they used to damn everyone else, ignored evidence that did not support their crusade and committed themselves to the deaths of thousands whilst they played golf together and 'prayed' from air conditioned offices.
Right... startup another thread on the Iraq War and I'd be happy to discuss this with you. I'd be you'll be surprised what my responses will be.
I'm totally, sick of hearing you endlessly using these four dead men to push a political, partisan attack. It's not about some vaulted notion of justice, it's about using the memory of these people and their violent death to score points.
I resent that MGS... I want policies in placed so that this doesn't happen again.
No you don't
YES. I. fething. DO! All you have to do is read my prior posts about this.
you and those you're listening to (or perhaps those you listen too and you haven't figured it out) want to damage this administration
Gee... trying to hold this administration accountable is the wrong thing to do... eh?
but more importantly use this to damage Clinton, because those on the other side are fairly terrified of her chances, should she run.
She should've resigned... much the same way that Rumsfeld tried to resign due to Abu Gharib. That's what should've happened.
What difference does it all makes?
It's all moot because if she runs, she'll win. I don't believe there's any viable Republican who can take on the Clinton Machine.
If you hold that opinion of me... fine... zero feths given. Likewise, I'll hold you accountable for defending this administration's actions regardless of why these men died.
Hey... it's thunderdome after all, right? Roll your sleeves up and get back in here!
“If all that we know today had come out the week after Benghazi,” she said, “it would have really been disastrous.”
I agree and it's a shame that most of the media was only interested in protecting Obama, rather than maintain their journalistic integrity.
Ahhhh, the media is sheltering Obama again, funny, I thought they were driven, both ego and finance-wise, to break new stories, be the first to release information and use the guise of 'reporting the truth' to reveal anything, no matter how damaging to a political side... This argument that the 'lamestream' is protecting the president is horse gak, if he slipped up, they'd report it in a heartbeat and knife each other in the rush to do it.
And then we have the largest 'news' channel in America being a direct and brazen partisan propaganda channel against Obama.
So, try again? Or perhaps just don't, because you've been flogging this horse for fething years now.
Answer me honestly... stick a Republican president in there instead of Obama, but the exact same things occured.
Think the media would be that forgiving?
Didn't think so.
When a Republican does something bad, the media is like THE REPUBLCIANS ARE DOING BAD THINGS. When a Democrat does something bad, the media is like THE REPUBLICAN ARE OVERLY CRITICIZING THE DEMOCRATS.
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Ouze wrote: I don't believe that an American corpse has ever been so thoroughly flogged in our history to such little effect for so transparent an agenda.
Do you really believe I'm doing that?
Am I explaining my positions good enough or do you think so little of me? o.O
sebster wrote: I have to think back to all those Republicans saying there shouldn't be an investigation in to Iraq because that'd be a witch hunt and just laugh.
sebster wrote: I have to think back to all those Republicans saying there shouldn't be an investigation in to Iraq because that'd be a witch hunt and just laugh.
O.o
Dude... there were investigations.
He's commenting on what many Republicans said about said investigations, not whether they happened.
sebster wrote: I have to think back to all those Republicans saying there shouldn't be an investigation in to Iraq because that'd be a witch hunt and just laugh.
O.o
Dude... there were investigations.
He's commenting on what many Republicans said about said investigations, not whether they happened.
Ah... my mistake seb.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Anyone else want to keep saying that the administration didn't know immediately that this was a terrorist attack?
This guy here... Brigadier General Robert Lovell, U.S. Air Force (Retired) told the House Oversight Committee yesterday, under oath, that the military knew immediately Benghazi was terrorist attack and not a “protest gone awry.”
“Nor did we completely understand what we had in front of us, be it kidnapping, rescue, recovery, protracted hostile engagement, or any or all the above. But, what we did know quite early on was that this was a hostile action.This was not demonstration gone terrible awry.To the point of what happened, the facts led to the conclusion of a terrorist attack. The Africom J2 was focused on attribution. The attacks became attributable very soon after the event.”
So... this was not an intelligence failure, but a leadership failure... brought on by the need to pretend that the Libya intervention/Foreign Policy was a smashing success during a hotly contest re-election campaign.
ugh
European leaders have been doing this for hundreds of years. Us Brits and old Frenchie are right at the top of the charts when it comes to shafting and back stabbing 
