Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Officials: Terrorists Bragged About Attacks Prior to Murder of Ambassador Stevens

Still Claim "No Specific Threat," but pull out all officials from Benghazi


When Libyan Terrorists assaulted the virtually unguarded US Consulate in Benghazi, a terrorist attack on US Soil, on September 1l, the President and his administration were quick to blame "spontaneous protests" over a little known YouTube video.  Quickly facts came out refuting that narrative, but the Administration stuck by it for eight days before being forced to admit the attack was a terror attack.

Now we have learned, via Eli Lake at the Daily Beast, that Terrorists had bombed US personnel in Libya twice previously, and had bragged about the attacks.

Despite this, a "failure to connect the dots," and "no specific threat" are given as excuses for the miserable failure of security and the vulnerability of Ambassador Stevens.

No specific threat?  Well, I suppose if you define specific threat as knowing the exact force and tactics to be used, no, there was no specific threat.  But an undefended consulate which had already been the target of an IED attack, in a country where Al Qaida and their allies had already threatened US Personnel?  I don't think, in the real world, threats get any more specific than that.

Now, despite the fact that the FBI was denied access to the consulate for weeks, or perhaps because of it, the Washington Post reports that the Administration has withdrawn all official staff from the Benghazi consulate.  This seems like closing the barn door after the cows have left, if you ask me.  It seems like the kind of work people who know they've screwed up do to make it look like they didn't screw up.

The truth is that US Officials should have seen this attack coming.  Unreliable local security (really mercenaries) should not have been used to defend a US Consulate.  When terrorists bragged about previous attacks, that should have been taken seriously and reprisals made swiftly.  Instead, because of the miserable failures of this administration, a US Ambassador and three security staff are dead, and Terrorists can once again claim a successful attack on US Soil.

And it happened on Barack Obama's watch.

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