Officials Provide More Details on CIA ‘Safe House’ in Benghazi

CIA Agents 'Clearly Outnumbered' Diplomats in Libyan City

When the US Consulate in Benghazi was attacked on September 11 of this year, a second compound, termed a “CIA safehouse” was hit at roughly the same time. Indeed, officials say they were attacked en route to the safehouse multiple times, despite its existence supposedly being a closely guarded secret.

Officials are adding to the details about it today, suggesting the safehouse was far bigger than previously acknowledged, and that the number of CIA agents in Benghazi “clear outnumbered” the US diplomats there.

It was also revealed that two of the slain Americans, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, who were reported slain at the consulate actually weren’t there, and instead died during the attack on the safehouse.

The safehouse was the CIA operating area for the State Department’s ongoing effort to track down shoulder-mounted surface-to-air missiles looted from Libya in the wake of last year’s NATO-backed regime change. Looted arms from Libya have showed up across northern Africa, as far south as Mali, and even in the Gaza Strip. There has been little indication that there has been much progress in located the looted weapons.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.