Posts Tagged benghazi

Mark Geist On What Happened In Benghazi

From NRA:

Mark “Oz” Geist served 12 years in the United States Marine Corps and was a member of the Annex Security Team that fought the Battle of Benghazi. He answered freedom’s call when Washington wouldn’t even pick up the phone. Mark has the courage to tell the truth about Benghazi and how our politicians’ inexcusable inaction led to the deaths of four Americans, including Navy SEALs Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods.

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CIA Met With Benghazi Director

From The Daily Beast:

This is the first time the CIA has commented on the upcoming movie. Intelligence officials apparently had particular concerns that certain information in the Mitchell Zuckoff nonfiction book, on which Bay’s film is based, would end up in the final cut of the movie. This would allegedly jeopardize the security and safety of intelligence agency personnel serving in the field, in part because a major Hollywood production could widely disseminate protocol and procedures that the CIA uses to protect its staff in foreign locations, according to a source with knowledge of the matter.

The CIA wanted to make sure that details that are in a published book, are not in the movie? If the details would “jeopardize security and safety” how did they make it past the vetting process and into the book? This has the fingerprints of the White House all over it.

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Holding Our Leaders Accountable

From SOFREP:

Many are quick to light their torches and encircle presidential candidate Hillary Clinton without due process. It’s worth taking a step back to acknowledge that Clinton’s role as secretary of state was largely to serve as a public figurehead; the day-to-day, on-the-ground operations were run by Patrick Kennedy.

The big questions that should be asked by the House Select Committee on Benghazi are, “Why didn’t Mrs. Clinton hold Kennedy and Lamb accountable in the aftermath?” and “What do these two have on her that keeps Hillary blocking and tackling in the media for two diplomats whose decisions got good Americans killed that day?”

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Benghazi Select Committee Hearing

From The Post and Courier:

Rep. Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, the Republican chairman, vowed to pursue the facts wherever they lead him. Opening the panel’s first public hearing since its establishment four months ago, he said the U.S. must learn from past violence on U.S. facilities from Beirut to East Africa to Benghazi to prevent repeat attacks.

Watch the hearing via CSPAN:

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Why Benghazi Matters

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Panel Says White House’s Failure To Negotiate Gaddafi Surrender Resulted In Benghazi Attack

From The Daily Mail:

The Obama administration’s unwillingness to help broker a peaceful exit for the Libyan strongman, ‘led to extensive loss of life (including four Americans)’ when al-Qaeda-linked militants attacked U.S. diplomatic facilities in the city of Benghazi,’ the commission told reporters.

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Brandon Webb of SOFREP Talks to Sun News

From Sun News:

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Analyzing Breaking Events

By Scott Stewart

In last week’s Security Weekly, Tristan Reed and I provided a little bit of an “inside baseball” look at how we analyze the transnational criminal cartels in Mexico. We tried to explain some of the challenges that analysts face while analyzing a human network – Los Zetas in this instance — that is by its very nature a criminal and clandestine organization.

But cutting through the misinformation and disinformation surrounding murky human networks is not the only difficult task Stratfor analysts are faced with. Indeed, perhaps one of the most difficult things we are asked to do is untangle, decipher and contextualize breaking events for our readers and custom intelligence clients. Sometimes we are able to do so pretty well — a rapid reaction piece I wrote on Sept. 14, 2012, “Understanding What Went Wrong in Benghazi,” continues to be a highly read analysis. But on occasion, we’ve even fallen into the trap set by erroneous reporting. For example, our very first analysis on the attack in Benghazi incorrectly stated that the casualties were caused by rocket-propelled grenade attacks on the motorcade leaving the compound and that the incident was the result of violent protests over a derogatory movie about the Prophet Mohammed instead of a calculated assault by a well-trained and heavily armed militia. Read the rest of this entry »

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3 Reasons Benghazi Still Matters

From Reason.tv:

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Spec Ops Tracking Benghazi Suspects, Told To Leave Libya

From Fox News:

Special operators in the region tell Fox News that while Benghazi targets have been identified for months, officials in Washington could “never pull the trigger.” In fact, one source insists that much of the information on Benghazi suspects had been passed along to the White House after being vetted by the Department of Defense and the State Department — and at least one recommendation for direct action on a Benghazi suspect was given to President Obama as recently as Aug. 7.

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Keeping Embassies Safe

From CNN:

Before entering a high-threat area like Benghazi, or indeed any other unstable environment, it is essential to determine if the mission is worth the risk. In assessing Benghazi, the first question that comes to mind is:  What was so important about having a diplomatic presence in a city characterized as unstable; a city the British, French and United Nations had effectively abandoned because of warring militias and earlier bombings?  Why was the United States still there? All assessments about the viability of the mission and all plans to protect U.S. diplomatic compounds around the world have to begin with answers to this question.

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Burying Benghazi

From: Fred Thompson

So now, apparently, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is going to appear before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to testify about the terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya and the ensuing scandal.

Although, the murdered ambassador was working for her and she was in charge of the department responsible for the clearly inadequate protection of the diplomatic facility, she had essentially nothing to say about the matter even before her health difficulties. This follows the Obama Administration’s well-worn game plan and the failed practices of the past: the FBI cites “criminal investigations” to keep from having to discuss this terrorist attack … even with the CIA. Aided and abetted by the media, the White House ignores the matter, and even if it were forced to focus on it, would decline comment, citing the FBI’s criminal investigation. There have been no public hearings or testimony from Departments of Defense, State or the White House national security witnesses, even though it seems apparent that most of the information needed by Congress and the American people is not or should not be classified. Read the rest of this entry »

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The Benghazi Report and the Diplomatic Security Funding Cycle

The Benghazi Report and the Diplomatic Security Funding Cycle is republished with permission of Stratfor.”

By Scott Stewart
Vice President of Analysis

On Dec. 18, the U.S. State Department’s Accountability Review Board released an unclassified version of its investigation into the Sept. 12 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the attack, so the report was widely anticipated by the public and by government officials alike.

Four senior State Department officials have been reassigned to other duties since the report’s release. Among them were the assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security; two of his deputy assistant secretaries, including the director of the Diplomatic Security Service, the department’s most senior special agent; and the deputy assistant secretary responsible for Libya in the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs.

The highly critical report and the subsequent personnel reassignments are not simply a low watermark for the State Department; rather, the events following the attack signify another phase in the diplomatic security funding cycle. The new phase will bring about a financial windfall for the State Department security budgets, but increased funding alone will not prevent future attacks from occurring. After all, plenty of attacks have occurred following similar State Department budgetary allocations in the past. Other important factors therefore must be addressed.  Read the rest of this entry »

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CIA Operators Were Denied Help During Attack on Lybian Consulate

From: Fox News (Exclusive)

Watch “Special Report Investigates: Benghazi — New Revelations” on Fox News at 1 p.m. ET on Saturday, 3 p.m. on Sunday and 10 p.m. on Sunday.

Former Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods was part of a small team who was at the CIA annex about a mile from the U.S. consulate where Ambassador Chris Stevens and his team came under attack. When he and others heard the shots fired, they informed their higher-ups at the annex to tell them what they were hearing and requested permission to go to the consulate and help out. They were told to “stand down,” according to sources familiar with the exchange. Soon after, they were again told to “stand down.”

Woods and at least two others ignored those orders and made their way to the consulate which at that point was on fire. Shots were exchanged. The rescue team from the CIA annex evacuated those who remained at the consulate and Sean Smith, who had been killed in the initial attack. They could not find the ambassador and returned to the CIA annex at about midnight.

At that point, they called again for military support and help because they were taking fire at the CIA safe house, or annex. The request was denied. There were no communications problems at the annex, according those present at the compound. The team was in constant radio contact with their headquarters. In fact, at least one member of the team was on the roof of the annex manning a heavy machine gun when mortars were fired at the CIA compound. The security officer had a laser on the target that was firing and repeatedly requested back-up support from a Spectre gunship, which is commonly used by U.S. Special Operations forces to provide support to Special Operations teams on the ground involved in intense firefights. The fighting at the CIA annex went on for more than four hours — enough time for any planes based in Sigonella Air base, just 480 miles away, to arrive. Fox News has also learned that two separate Tier One Special operations forces were told to wait, among them Delta Force operators.

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A Warrior’s Farewell to Glen Doherty

Glen A. Doherty, a security contractor and former member of the Navy SEALs, was killed in Libya on Sept. 12, 2012, while defending the American Mission in Benghazi, Libya.

NY Times

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