The REAL Benghazi Story: What the White House and Hillary Don't Want You to Know (20 page)

It has been confirmed, as I extensively documented in
chapter 3
, that Special Forces known as C-110, or the EUCOM CIF, were on a training mission in Croatia the night of the attacks. The distance between Croatia’s capital, Zagreb, and Benghazi is about 925 miles. The C-110 is a rapid-response team that exists for emergencies like terrorist attacks against U.S. embassies abroad.

Instead of being deployed to Libya, the C-110 was told the night of the attacks to return to its normal operating base in Germany.

Clinton defended the actions of then United Nations
ambassador Susan Rice, who on Sunday, September 16, 2012, infamously appeared on five morning television programs to offer the official Obama administration response to the Benghazi attack. In nearly identical statements, Rice asserted that the attack was a spontaneous protest in response to a “hateful video.”

Writes Clinton: “Susan stated what the intelligence community believed, rightly or wrongly, at the time. That was the best she or anyone could do. Every step of the way, whenever something new was learned, it was quickly shared with Congress and the American people. There is a difference between getting something wrong, and committing wrong. A big difference that some have blurred to the point of casting those who made a mistake as intentionally deceitful.”
⁸

Clinton’s claim that the intelligence community believed the attacks were a spontaneous protest in response to a “hateful video” is called into question by numerous revelations.

Stevens’ deputy Hicks testified he knew immediately it was a terrorist attack, not a protest turned violent. According to Hicks, “everybody in the mission” believed it was an act of terror “from the get-go.”
⁹

The CIA’s station chief in Libya reportedly e-mailed his superiors on the day of the attack that it was “not an escalation of anti-American protest.”
¹⁰

The claim of a popular protest also defies logic, as I noted repeatedly in this book. Spontaneous protesters do not show up with weapons, erect armed checkpoints surrounding a compound, and demonstrate insider knowledge
of a facility while deploying military-style tactics to storm a U.S. mission. Nor do spontaneous protesters know the exact location of a secretive CIA annex, including the specific coordinates of a building likely utilized to launch precision mortar strikes. Spontaneous protesters are not thought to be capable of mounting a fierce, hours-long gun battle with U.S. forces stationed inside the annex.

Interestingly, Clinton’s own description of the attacks does not contain any account of popular protests. She writes the attack began when, “without warning, dozens of armed men appeared at the gates of the compound, overwhelmed the local Libyan guards, and streamed inside. They set fires as they went.”
¹¹

Clinton does not mention any delay in the response by the CIA officers stationed about one mile from the Benghazi mission at a nearby secretive CIA annex.

She relates: “From the moment the CIA station learned their fellow Americans were under attack, a response team prepared to launch a rescue. They could hear explosions in the distance and quickly assembled their weapons and prepared to deploy. Two vehicles of armed officers left the CIA post for the diplomatic compound about twenty minutes after the attack had begun…. When the CIA team arrived, they split up to secure the compound and joined the DS agents in the search of the burning building.”
¹²

Clinton leaves out the fact that CIA agents who were on the ground in Benghazi testified to lawmakers they were loaded into vehicles and ready to aid the besieged U.S. special mission on September 11, 2012, but were told by superiors to “wait,” according to reports.

Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA), head of the House intelligence subcommittee that interviewed the CIA employees, explained that while there was no “stand-down order,” there was a disagreement at the nearby CIA annex about how quickly to respond. Westmoreland revealed that some CIA agents wanted to storm the Benghazi compound immediately, but they were told to wait while the agency collected intelligence on the ongoing attack.
¹³

In recounting the attacks, Clinton promotes the Obama administration narrative of a lull in the fighting.

She writes: “The drone was redirected to Benghazi and arrived on station roughly ninety minutes after the attack began, providing U.S. security and intelligence officials another way to monitor what was happening on the ground. Around that time the Operations Center reported that gunfire at the compound had subsided and our security forces were attempting to locate missing personnel. That was a chilling phrase. Much of the mob had withdrawn, but for how long?”
¹⁴

However, witnesses on the ground, including CIA contractors
who were inside the annex, said there was no lull in the fighting at all, as first reported by the
Daily Beast
.
¹⁵

The lull claim was central to the Obama administration’s explanation for why no air support or special forces were deployed to Benghazi, with the White House and State officials saying they believed the attack had finished and were taken by surprise when it continued.

Regarding security at the Benghazi mission, Clinton writes:

Though security upgrades had been made to the Benghazi compound – including extending the height of the outer wall with masonry concrete and barbed wire; installing external lighting, concrete vehicle barriers, guard booths, and sandbag emplacements; hardening wooden doors with steel and reinforced locks; and adding equipment to detect explosives – the review board determined that these precautions were simply inadequate in an increasingly dangerous city.
¹⁶

Clinton failed to mention her deputies were responsible for some of the most shocking security decisions made regarding the Benghazi compound.

As documented in
chapter 7
of this book, it was State Department undersecretary Patrick Kennedy who canceled the use in Tripoli of a DC-3 aircraft that could have aided in the evacuation of the Benghazi victims. Kennedy also nonsensically denied guard towers to the Benghazi mission and approved the withdrawal of Security Support Teams, or
SST, special U.S. forces specifically maintained for counterattacks on U.S. embassies or threats against diplomatic personnel. The Senate’s January 2014 Benghazi report found Kennedy’s withdrawal of the SST was made “despite compelling requests from personnel in Libya that the team be allowed to stay.”
¹⁷

Clinton placed the blame for the controversial talking points squarely with the CIA without mentioning the State Department contributed to the manufacturing of the points.

“The extensive public record now makes clear that Susan (Rice) was using information that originated with and was approved by the CIA,” she writes. “That assessment didn’t come from political operatives in the White House; it came from career professionals in the intelligence community.”
¹⁸

The Senate’s January 2014 report reveals that State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland played an active role in crafting the talking point,s as did Clinton’s deputy chief of staff, Jake Sullivan.
¹⁹

In her book, Clinton writes matter-of-factly: “The review board made twenty-nine specific recommendations (twenty-four unclassified) to address the deficiencies it found in areas such as training, fire safety, staffing, and threat analysis.”
²⁰

She relates: “I agreed with all twenty-nine and immediately
accepted them. I pledged that I would not leave office until every recommendation was on its way to implementation. By the time I left, we had met that goal.”
²¹

The ARB, known for minimizing Clinton’s complicity in the attacks, singled out four unnamed State officials guilty of “systemic failures and leadership and management deficiencies” that contributed to the “grossly inadequate” security situation in Benghazi.
²²

Unabashed House Republicans, writing in a House Majority report, had no problem naming the four officials, all of whom served directly under Clinton.

The four officials were revealed to be Assistant Secretary for Diplomatic Security Eric Boswell, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Diplomatic Security Scott Bultrowicz, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Diplomatic Security for International Programs Charlene Lamb and Deputy Assistant Secretary for Maghreb Affairs Raymond Maxwell.
²³

Despite State proclamations that those responsible would be disciplined or removed, three of the officials were reassigned to new posts. Maxwell voluntarily retired, which he had planned to do in 2012 before being delayed by the turmoil of the so-called Arab Spring. Maxwell was later found to not have contributed to security decisions in Benghazi, while the other three officials were reportedly involved in the ultimately disastrous decisions.

The House singled out Charlene Lamb, who worked closely with Clinton, for her “unwillingness to provide additional security personnel” to the Benghazi facility.

Clinton seeks to connect the Benghazi jihadist assaults to popular civilian protests that took place the same day outside the U.S. embassy in Cairo. She claimed the Cairo protests were about the anti-Islam film, which led to the belief the Benghazi assaults were also about the film.

“Half a world away in Cairo, young men began gathering in the street outside the U.S. Embassy as part of a protest organized by hard-line Islamist leaders against the insulting video,” she writes.
²⁴

However, as documented in several chapters in this book, the Cairo protests were announced days in advance as part of a movement to free the so-called blind sheikh, Omar Abdel-Rahman, who is serving a life sentence in the United States for conspiracy in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

Rahman’s son, Abdallah Abdel Rahman, even went so far as to threaten to storm the U.S. embassy in Cairo and detain the employees inside.

In fact, on the day of the September 11, 2012, protests in Cairo, CNN’s Nic Robertson interviewed Rahman’s son, who described the protest as being about freeing his father. No Muhammad film was mentioned. A big banner calling for Rahman’s release can be seen as Robertson walked to the embassy protests. No such banners were seen in protest of the Muhammad film.

Clinton writes that the
New York Times
later proved in an investigation that the Muhammad video was “indeed a factor” in what happened in Benghazi.

“There were scores of attackers that night, almost certainly with differing motives,” she writes. “It is inaccurate to state that every single one of them was influenced by this hateful video. It is equally inaccurate to state that none of them were. Both assertions defy not only the evidence but logic as well.”
²⁵

Clinton was referring to a December 28, 2013,
New York Times
piece by David D. Kirkpatrick titled “A Deadly Mix in Benghazi.”

See
chapter 9
of this book, where I extensively question the veracity of Kirkpatrick’s piece, showing that various details in his article were negated by the U.S. government, Benghazi victims, and numerous previous news reports. Kirkpatrick’s piece is even contradicted by his own previous reporting, as I found.

1
.   Amie Parnes, “Obama: Extremists used film ‘as an excuse’ to harm US interests,” The Hill, September 20, 2012,
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/250813-obama-extremists-used-film-as-an-excuse-to-harm-us-interests
.

2
.   “Transcript: Whistle-blower’s account of Sept. 11 Libya terror attack,” Fox News, May 8, 2013,
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/08/transcript-whistle-blower-account-sept-11-libya-terror-attack/
.

3
.   Catherine Herridge, “Report sheds light on ex-CIA deputy director’s role in Benghazi talking points,” Fox News, February 4, 2014,
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/02/04/report-sheds-light-on-ex-cia-director-role-in-benghazi-talking-points/
.

4
.   US Department of State, “Unclassified” ARB Report, 22–27, accessed February 26, 2014,
http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/202446.pdf
.

5
.   Eli Lake, “CIA Contractor Testimony Could Undermine Obama on Benghazi,” The Daily Beast November 6, 2013
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/11/06/cia-contractor-testimony-could-undermine-obama-on-benghazi.html
.

6
.   Aaron Klein, “Who’s lying? Benghazi witnesses vs. State Dept.” WND, November 28, 2013,
http://www.wnd.com/2013/11/whos-lying-benghazi-witnesses-vs-state-dept
.

1
.   “U.S. Embassy Officially Opens Consular Section in Tripoli,”
Tripoli Post
, August 28, 2012,
http://www.tripolipost.com/articledetail.asp?c=1&i=9095
.

2
.   U.S. Department of State, “Unclassified” ARB Report, accessed February 26, 2014,
http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/202446.pdf
, hereinafter “ARB report.”

3
.   U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence,
Review of the Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Facilities in Benghazi, Libya, with Additional Views
, September 11–12, 2012 (January 15, 2014),
http://www.intelligence.senate.gov/benghazi2014/benghazi.pdf
, 27–28.