Friday, March 29, AD 2024 3:21am

Libyan Revelations: Gross Incompetence or Worse

 

 

Each day we learn a bit more about what happened at Benghazi and each day it looks worse for the Obama administration.  Jennifer Griffin at Fox News has done yeoman work on this story:

Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin had breaking news tonight regarding the attack on the United States consulate in Libya. She reported that top administration officials decided on the night of September 11th, 2012 after the attack had already begun, not to call together the Counterterrorism Security Group (CSG).

CSG is an interagency group that specializes in both hostage situations and any terror attack on U.S. interests. That decision, according to senior military and intelligence officials, may have stymied some of the response to the attack.

According to senior military officials, the administration also did not deploy the interagency team made up of Department of Defense, FBI, CIA and State Department: the Foreign Emergency Support Team (FEST). It was decided that FEST was not to be sent to coordinate an on-the-ground response and help facilitate the FBI’s interests into Benghazi. It took 24 days for the FBI team in Libya to gain access to the compound.

The administration also received a direct report from the ambassador in Libya on August 15 which detailed his fears that the Benghazi consulate was vulnerable to attack:

The U.S. Mission in Benghazi convened an “emergency meeting” less than a  month before the assault that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other  Americans, because Al Qaeda had training camps in Benghazi and the consulate  could not defend against a “coordinated attack,” according to a classified cable  reviewed by Fox News.

Summarizing an Aug. 15 emergency meeting convened by the U.S. Mission in  Benghazi, the Aug. 16 cable marked “SECRET” said that the State Department’s  senior security officer, also known as the RSO, did not believe the consulate  could be protected.

“RSO (Regional Security Officer) expressed concerns with the ability to  defend Post in the event of a coordinated attack due to limited manpower,  security measures, weapons capabilities, host nation support, and the overall  size of the compound,” the cable said.

According to a review of the cable addressed to the Office of the Secretary  of State Hillary Clinton, the Emergency Action Committee was also briefed “on  the location of approximately ten Islamist militias and AQ training camps within  Benghazi … these groups ran the spectrum from Islamist militias, such as the QRF  Brigade and Ansar al-Sharia, to ‘Takfirist thugs.’” Each U.S. mission has a  so-called Emergency Action Committee that is responsible for security measures  and emergency planning.

What is emerging piece by piece is an administration that ignored the threat to the consulate in Benghazi prior to the attack, and, inexplicably and incredibly, refused to send military assistance on the evening of the attack, and left American heroes Tyrone Woods and Greg Doherty to fight on unaided and to die.  This is gross incompetence verging on the criminal.  We cannot allow them to get away with this.

 

 

Update:  Hattip to Allahpundit at Hot Air.  To their credit, CBS News has some damning new revelations:

“The [Counterterrorism Security Group] is the one group that’s supposed to know what resources every agency has. They know of multiple options and have the ability to coordinate counterterrorism assets across all the agencies,” a high-ranking government official told CBS News. “They were not allowed to do their job. They were not called upon.”…

Counterterrorism sources and internal emails reviewed by CBS News express frustration that key responders were ready to deploy, but were not called upon to help in the attack

Another senior counter terrorism official says a hostage rescue team was alternately asked to get ready and then stand down throughout the night, as officials seemed unable to make up their minds.

A third potential responder from a counter-terror force stationed in Europe says components of AFICOM — the military’s Africa Command based in Stuttgart, Germany — were working on course of action during the assault. But no plan was put to use…

“The response process was isolated at the most senior level,” says an official referring to top officials in the executive branch. “My fellow counterterrorism professionals and I (were) not consulted.”

 

 

 

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Paul W. Primavera
Friday, November 2, AD 2012 6:05am

Much of the country won’t ever get the truth about Benghazi because ABC, CBS, NBC, NPR and PBS won’t report it. Even though Fox News does report it, it has been so discredited (unfairly) that most people won’t believe what it does report. The only ones who will believe are those already convinced that Obama has got to go.

Paul W. Primavera
Friday, November 2, AD 2012 6:06am

Opps, forgot CNN in my litany. Doubt they’ll report it either. Hope I am wrong.

trackback
Friday, November 2, AD 2012 7:25am

[…] Libyan Revelations: Gross Incompetence or Worse – Donald McClarey, American Catholoc […]

philip
philip
Friday, November 2, AD 2012 9:32am

The media that refuses to air the emerging information is downright pitiful.
The advertisers should boycott the station.
Allow the giants to strangle themselves with the noose they are fashioning.
A pathetic lot.

Siobhan
Siobhan
Friday, November 2, AD 2012 11:32am

I recently got my power back on (I live on Long Island, New York) because of hurricane Sandy, and because I had no computer or TV for a couple of days, I was forced to listen to the “Palace Guard” media, in this case, CBS radio, to know what was happening in the region and the world. Well, all I heard was about the hurricane and how “Presidential” Obama was, and Governor Christie sucking up to him, and of course, Mayor Bloomberg endorsing the guy for re-election. Also, the “news” reported was about how great the economy was doing and how more jobs were being created. In other words, non-stop propaganda for Obama – not one word about Benghazi. It was so discouraging, and now today Rasmussen has the race tied. Are people really this shallow and frivolous? The momentum was clearly with Romney, and now they’re changing their minds because of a hurricane? If that’s the case, then these people have no business being inside a voting booth and deciding the fate of our country. Lord help us!

Paul W. Primavera
Friday, November 2, AD 2012 11:46am

@ Siobhan – I think Revelation 9:20-21 speaks about what you wrote:

20 And the rest of mankind, who were not killed with these plagues, repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and the idols of gold, and of silver, and of brass, and of stone, and of wood; which can neither see, nor hear, nor walk: 21 and they repented not of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.

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