It has already been well established that the US Ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, had repeatedly sought additional security for the Benghazi Consulate before the attack on September 11 that killed him and three others. The requests were never met, but they didn’t stop either.
New revelations today show two draft letters by Stevens’ staff dated September 11, the day of the attack, were addressed to the Libyan Foreign Minister and the Benghazi Chief of Police, expressing serious concerns about the security at the consulate, or lack thereof.
One of the letter detailed an incident that morning of a Benghazi police officer taking photographs of the inside of the consulate from a building across the street. Libyan officials denied receiving the letter, and one even insisted that they had no idea the ambassador was even in Benghazi.
Administration officials have defended the security plans for the consulate, noting that they seemed to work fine on days when the consulate didn’t get sacked and the ambassador wasn’t assassinated. The planning for security “just in case” appears to have been incomplete, at best.
With the military not defending the consulate and Benghazi having virtually no security forces of its own, the CIA was basically in charge of dealing with any attacks on the consulate with its agents on the ground. When they proved ill-equipped to deal with the massive attack, the fall-back plan was to ask some militias to help. That, needless to say, didn’t work either.
The Pentagon has released a timeline detailing their own response, saying that they were fully prepared for the possibility of deploying troops to Benghazi if the attack turned into a multi-day hostage situation or some sort of siege. Since the consulate was more or less immediately sacked and abandoned, they didn’t really have a chance to react until everything was over.
Why do we need a consulate in Benghazi when we already have an embassy in Tripoli? What possible justification (cough, cough, CIA) could there be to need any more than the embassy? Is there really THAT MUCH pressing business for Americans (cough, cough, CIA) in Benghazi?
There is no US consulate in Benghazi, which is why State didn't care about security and why State tried to avoid responsibility. It was a CIA operation with about two dozen agents. (Ineffective in intelligence, of course.) Why should State provide security for CIA? Besides, the Agency likes to keep a low profile.
The US does not have an embassy, a consulate or a diplomatic mission in Benghazi. There are none listed on this State Department list of all the US embassies and consulates in the world. http://www.usembassy.gov/
On September 12, 2012, SecState Clinton made two statements. She never used the word “consulate.”To describe the place that was attacked in Benghazi she used instead the words ‘U.S. diplomatic post, compound, our buildings and our office.’ http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/09/197654…. http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/09/197630….
There is (and was) no US consulate in Benghazi. No consul. No consular officials. No commercial officers. No diplomats of any kind. No consulate. It was a CIA operation with two dozen agents which the US has euphemistically called a "mission." Gives it a religious flavor. Chris Stevens was in this dangerous, volatile city in eastern Libya to coordinate CIA arms shipments to Turkey. His last official act in Benghazi was a dinner meeting with the Turkish ambassador.
Stevens was also probably using his past knowledge of Libyan militias — he managed them for the US from Benghazi in 2011 — to coordinate drone strikes in eastern Libya. There were several reported (by CNN) against an al Qaeda training camp in the Derna area in June.
The real story here is the Benghazi-Turkey arms & people connection and drone strikes that motivated Ambassador Stevens to be in Benghazi rather than in Tripoli where he was needed for necessary diplomatic functions.
Thanks … its nice to get good info. Rare among comments, but nice.
From your description, it also sounds as if the attack on the 'diplomatic post' was a pure military counter strike by people being bombed at the observation post that's directing the bombing.
Also interesting that from your description, there is very little distinction between "CIA" and "Ambassador" any more.
They wouldn't have gotten their fingers burned if they had stayed out of the kitchen a year and a half earlier.