2012-2013: I thought it might be interesting to interleave key points in these two story lines.
SYRIA July 23, 2012: Syria admits to possessing a stockpile of chemical weapons.
SYRIA July 23, 2012: Obama says that the Assad regime will be “held accountable” if it uses chemical weapons.
SYRIA Aug. 11, 2012: SecState Clinton says the use of chemical weapons is “a red line for the world.”
SYRIA Aug. 20, 2012: Obama says the use or movement of chemical weapons by the Assad regime would be “a red line.”
LIBYA Sept. 11, 2011: Obama refuses military rescue to Benghazi, Libya, embassy; 4 Americans among those murdered.
LIBYA Sept. 12 ff, 2011: Obama et al. insist Benghazi was not a “terrorist attack” but a “spontaneous demonstration” against an offensive-to-Muslims YouTube video that “got out of hand.”
LIBYA Sept. 20, 2012: Obama repeats video line on the same day his own PR guy says it was obviously a terrorist attack.
SYRIA Dec. 3, 2012: Obama says if Assad uses CWs, “There will be consequences, and you will be held accountable.” SecState Clinton says the U.S. is “planning to take action” if Assad’s regime uses CWs.
LIBYA Dec. 18, 2012: Benghazi report by independent panel blames “systemic” failures in leadership that led to “grossly” inadequate security at Benghazi.
LIBYA Dec. 20, 2012: The State Department “disciplines” four officials in the department by giving them all extended paid vacations.
LIBYA Jan. 23, 2013: Congress questions SecState Clinton about Benghazi. Clinton shrieks, “What difference does it make?”
SYRIA March 19, 2013: Reports out of Syria say CWs killed more than two dozen in a town near Aleppo. Assad says the rebels did it; the rebels say Assad did it.
SYRIA March 20, 2013: Obama says they’ll look into it, but he’s sure it was Assad’s fault.
SYRIA April 25, 2013: The White House says that the intelligence community assesses “with varying degrees of confidence” that Assad did it. Obama tells Congress he wants money to arm Syrian rebels.
LIBYA May 2013: Testimony and evidence emerge showing the Benghazi consulate reported at the beginning that they were under assault by terrorists and that they had repeatedly asked for and not only been denied extra security, but had security removed in the weeks prior to the attack. The memos were signed by SecState Clinton.
LIBYA July 31, 2013: The White House says the controversy over Benghazi is a “phony” scandal.
LIBYA Aug. 2013: Evidence emerges that the CIA had a facility in Benghazi from which it was illegally arming militants, that hundreds of SAMs were stolen by terrorists during the attack and that the CIA had been threatening its own people ever since to keep it all quiet.
LIBYA Aug. 20, 2013: SecState Kerry clears and reinstates four State Dept officials who had been on “administrative leave” (read: paid vacation) for nine months.
SYRIA Aug. 21, 2013: Reports come out of Syria that a chemical attack took place, killing as many 1,400 people. Assad says the rebels did it; the rebels say Assad did it.
SYRIA Aug. 31, 2013: Obama backs off from his announced intention to unilaterally order a military strike against Assad, says he’ll ask Congress for permission, even though he is really sure he doesn’t need it.
LIBYA Sept. 10, 2013: SecState Kerry tells Congress he will not make Benghazi survivors available for questioning.
LIBYA: Sept. 11, 2013: WH observes one minute of silence for 9/11/01 victims. WH does not mention previous 525,949 minutes of lies and evasion re 9/11/12 victims.
SYRIA Sept 12, 2013
Assad accepts a Russian proposal to give up all its chemical weapons.
Assad and Putin reiterate the CW attacks were done by rebels to give Obama an excuse to give them military support.
Obama asks Congress to delay votes on authorizing military strikes against Assad.
Syrian rebels claim Assad used CWs again. They post a video of three guys coughing as “proof.”
This video concisely summarizes the Benghazi scandal, then adds new and explosive information. I.e., that multiple Arab news sources have traced a direct connection between money that Obama sent to the Middle East and the group that killed four Americans during their assault on our embassy in Benghazi.
Obama Bankrolled Attack on the Benghazi Consulate [4:57]
This guy is reportedly this rag’s token non-liberal, which makes him about as right-wing as John McCain. This is what he said about why he heretofore ignored everything the right’s been screaming about Benghazi for ELEVEN MONTHS.
“Like many people, I figured anti-American radicals had launched the attack, guessed that Obama was as upset about it as anyone, and didn’t blame him or Hillary Clinton for failing to secure a diplomatic outpost in an unstable country. I opposed Team Obama’s reelection for totally unrelated reasons.”
The Twitchy team summed up his epiphany perfectly:
Welcome aboard, Captain Obvious.
My fave comments at Twitchy:
Holy crap. Two unconnected instances of real journalism escaping the plantation.
Is it possible that even the bootlickers have had enough?
Awwww….they’re so cute when they first wake up aren’t they?
ABC is reporting that they have obtained copies of twelve sequential White House emails that PROVE the White House edited out politically problematic information from the Benghazi talking points.
First is the original draft composed by the CIA.
Second is the draft after about ten revisions from within the Obama Administration.
Third is the last of at least TEN drafts coordinated by the Obama White House and the Clinton State Department that Obama’s Press Secretary Jay Carney falsely claimed was the ONLY change made by them.
The final, heavily edited version was distributed to Congress and Susan Rice before she appeared on five talk shows the Sunday after the attack.
ABC Report: CIA head Petraeus was disgusted by revised talking points
What we know for sure:
President Obama swore the attack was triggered by a YouTube video.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton swore the attack was triggered by a YouTube video.
UN Ambassador Susan Rice swore the attack was triggered by a YouTube video.
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney swore the attack was triggered by a YouTube video.
There was no YouTube video protest.
Benghazi was an extremist Muslim terrorist attack from the get go.
The Obama White House and the Clinton State Department knew it from the beginning.
President Obama and Hillary Clinton fabricated the video claim to cover their political backsides.
The Left-Stream Media may be waking up from their Obama Kool-aid stupor. This surprising report from The New Yorker:
“For a long time, it seemed like the idea of a coverup was just a Republican obsession. But now there is something to it.”
April 23, 2013: CBS reports that five House committees have released their interim report on Benghazi. The committees are Armed Services, Judiciary, Foreign Affairs, Intelligence and Oversight.
The report says Clinton lied during her testimony to Congress. Documents bearing her signature prove that she knew about the request for additional security and personally ordered that security to be reduced, thereby leaving the consulate wide open to the attack that killed Ambassador Stevens and 3 other Americans.
Democrats are whining that the report is just an evil Republican plot to make the Obama administration look bad.
The MSM will be all over this as soon as they get done reporting on the Kermit Gosnell abortion trial.
White House source says Benghazi attack was botched kidnapping [1:39]
White House Source states Benghazi Attack was attempted kidnapping of Ambassador Stevens.Arranged with Muslim Brotherhood as ‘October Surprise’ by Obama, who wanted to make release of Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman more palatable to American people and to boost sagging approval ratings.
Oct 27, 2012: Associated Press reporters filed a report from Libya that completely smashes the White House’s lame excuses about a protest gone bad.
The AP reporters say they interviewed five witnesses: one of the embassy guards, several people living next door to the consulate compound who were present when the militants first moved in and a lawyer who passed by the scene as he was headed to his nearby home.
According to these witnesses:
The attack on our Benghazi consulate began around nightfall with around 150 bearded gunmen sealing off the streets leading to the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi.
There was no sign of a spontaneous protest against an American-made movie denigrating Islam’s Prophet Muhammad, but the militants did gather around 20 youths in the area to chant against the film.
An hour or so later, the heavily armed militants blasted their way into the compound.
The trucks the attackers used to block off streets were marked with the logo of Ansar al-Shariah.
Ansar al-Sharia is one of the many powerful, heavily armed militias that operate freely in Libya. The group has an ideology similar to that of al-Qaeda, but it is not clear whether al-Qaeda’s branch in North Africa (AQIM) was involved in the assault.
Reporting international news is AP’s bailiwick.
On September 11, an American consulate in a red-hot Muslim region of the world is invaded by heavily armed men.
For the first time in 30 years, an American ambassador is murdered.
Our diplomatic compounds are U.S. soil, which makes this a direct, murderous assault on the United States of America.
The attack occurs on the anniversary of 9/11, the biggest attack on America by Muslim extremists.
AP filed this eyes-on-the-ground report October 27, forty-six days after the event. It says,
“The past week, the AP has gathered accounts from five witnesses.”
In other words, the Associated Press did NOT get around to interviewing eye witnesses of this world-class news event for SIX FULL WEEKS after it happened.
SIX weeks?
Six WEEKS!!
If you go and read the article itself (URL below), you’ll also see a lot of whining about how confusing it all was and where AP reports got some of it right and blahdiblah about those terrible Republicans who politicize stuff during an election year.
Whine. Whine. Cripes, they sound like Democrats. Oh wait. They are Democrats … Democrats who have seen not Chris Stevens’ blood on the wall, but their own.
Don’t expect to see me weeping big ol’ crocodile tears about these undeclared Obama PACs going DOWN. They so deserve it, the scumbags.
June 6, 2012: Terrorists blew a big hole in the gate of our consulate in Benghazi.
October 10, 2012: Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said,
“Under cover of darkness, assailants placed an IED on the north gate of Consulate Benghazi, blowing a hole in the security perimeter that was described by one individual as ‘big enough for forty men to go through.’”
“These pictures are of an attack that happened in Benghazi. The first was a so-called fish bomb. This is the compound in Benghazi before the attack. … The second bombing was an improvised explosive device [IED] that was placed on the north gate, breaching the wall [on June 6]. It was a test by terrorists and it was successful, and we didn’t respond fully and adequately.”
“We didn’t acknowledge it. We didn’t talk about it. We pretended it didn’t happen. It was a terrorist attack on a U.S. asset in Libya and it was never exposed. We pretended it didn’t happen.”
On Oct 19, 2012, Thomas Clough wrote about the September 11, 2012 attack:
“The attackers came equipped with assault rifles, automatic weapons and shoulder-launched rocket-propelled grenades. The attack began with rockets fire aimed at the mission gates. Within 15 minutes the attackers were inside the mission complex. Reports of well-targeted mortar fire was proof that this attack was the work of a trained and coordinated combat team.
[Once upon a time, I was a gunner in a heavy-weapons mortar platoon. We called our specialty “High-Angle Hell.” I speak from experience: precision artillery fire doesn’t “just happen.”]
In piecing together the details of the Benghazi attack up the U.S. consulate, it is becoming clear that there were U.S. Special Operations forces on the ground, at least two drones overhead and lasers being used to paint at least one target. The question then becomes, if these things were in place for a strike against attackers, who called it off? There can only be one answer, the commander-in-chief Barack Obama.
Fox News reports on the laser being used to paint the target:
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. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/10/26/cia-operators-were-denied-request-for-help-during-benghazi-attack-sources-say/
This went on for four hours and the White House was able to watch this all take place live. Two drones were above recording what was taking place and it seems one was called in to relieve the other, presumably because of fuel issues. A former Delta operator over at BlackFive writes:
Having spent a good bit of time nursing a GLD (ground Laser Designator) in several garden spots around the world, something from the report jumped out at me.
One of the former SEALs was actively painting the target. That means that Specter WAS ON STATION! Probably an AC130U. A ground laser designator is not a briefing pointer laser. You do not “paint” a target until the weapons system/designator is synched; which means that the AC130 was on station.
Only two places could have called off the attack at that point; the WH situation command (based on POTUS direction) or AFRICOM commander based on information directly from the target area.
If the AC130 never left Sigonella (as Panetta says) that means that the Predator that was filming the whole thing was armed.
If that SEAL was actively “painting” a target; something was on station to engage! And the decision to stand down goes directly to POTUS!
There is also the issue of the former Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods and a small team that ignored orders to stand down after they requested permission to go and help.
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.
CIA spokeswoman Jennifer Youngblood denied claims that requests for support were turned down.
“We can say with confidence that the Agency reacted quickly to aid our colleagues during that terrible evening in Benghazi,” she said. “Moreover, no one at any level in the CIA told anybody not to help those in need; claims to the contrary are simply inaccurate. In fact, it is important to remember how many lives were saved by courageous Americans who put their own safety at risk that night-and that some of those selfless Americans gave their lives in the effort to rescue their comrades. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/10/26/cia-operators-were-denied-request-for-help-during-benghazi-attack-sources-say/
I can’t help but think that this sounds, at least with the information that we are getting, like much of the response to the attacks of September 11, which was no response. Even more disturbing is what BlackFive writes,
“This is bigger than Watergate!… The worst has to be the team on the ground knowing that the President just left you to die.“
All of this was responded to by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta on Thursday. He said,
The U.S. military did not get involved during the attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, last month because officials did not have enough information about what was going on before the attack was over.
Just how much information did you need? The White House had emails. They had forces on the ground, drones overhead, a live feed, painted targets. For four hours nothing was done while the consulate was attacked. There was a Special Operations team operating in Central Europe that could have been called upon, but weren’t, and could have flown there in less than two hours. But none of this was done.
It is looking more and more as though this was not only a planned attack, but also that either the White House was either negligent and irresponsible in their “non-response” or complicit.
REMOVED U.S. Special Forces from a red-hot danger zone;
INSTALLED local militia with ties to Muslim extremists to “guard” the embassy;
IGNORED multiple signs that attack(s) were being planned for the anniversary of 9/11;
DENIED multiple requests for additional security;
LIED for weeks after the attack about what they knew and when they knew it.
SHORT STORY LONG – Here’s the timeline I’ve pieced together, with URLs at the end:
2011 March: Obama authorizes a military assault on Libya’s Gaddafi government, without obtaining the approval of Congress that is required by law. Only 47% of Americans approve of Obama’s action.
2011 October: The leader of Libya, Muammar Gaddafi, dies. While Gaddafi was admittedly a seriously major creep, he had at least been keeping Al-Qaeda out of Libya. Extremists move into the leadership vacuum left by his death.
2012 February: The U.S. embassy in Libya requests — and is granted — an extension on their Site Security Team (SST) composed of 16 Special Forces soldiers who provided security, medical and communications support to the embassy. The State Department says the SST can stay four more months. That sets them up to leave Libya in August, shortly before the anniversary of 9/11.
2012 March: Eric Nordstrom, the State Department’s Regional Security Officer, sends a cable to Washington asking for additional diplomatic security agents for Benghazi. He gets no response.
2012 April: Two men throw an IED over the consulate fence.
2012 May: Militant Muslims attack the Red Cross office in Benghazi, then post on Facebook that they’re planning something for the Americans.
2012 June: Unknown assailants blow a ginormous hole in the consulate gate. Four days later, the British ambassador’s car is ambushed by militants with a rocket-propelled grenade. Another threat appears on Facebook.
2012 July: Nordstrom again asks Washington for additional security for the diplomats in Libya. Again, he gets no response.
2012 August: Family members of the Libyan militia protecting the consulate receive warnings about an impending attack. Ambassador Stevens wants the 16-special forces SST to stay longer; Washington orders them to leave.
2012 September 8: Members of the Libyan militia protecting the consulate warn U.S. diplomats that the security situation is “frightening.”
2012 September 10: The day before the anniversary of 9/11, Ayman al Zawahiri, the man who took over as head of Al Qaeda after Osama bin Laden was killed, issues a public call for Libyans to avenge the death of his Libyan deputy, Abu Yahya al Libi, who was killed in June by a U.S. drone.
2012 September 11: American embassies are assaulted in 20 different countries. In Cairo, attackers scale the U.S. embassy walls and replace the U.S. flag with the Islamist banner. The consulate in Benghazi is attacked by about 20 heavily armed men. Our people in the White House, State Department, military, FBI and CIA watch the attack going down in real time.
Click on graphic to embiggen.
SBU means Sensitive but Unclassified. COM means Chief of Mission – i.e., the Ambassador.
February 17 Brigade is a militia with links to the Muslim Brotherhood, the largest and most influential Islamic movement in the world. It’s credo is, “Allah is our objective; the Quran is our law, the Prophet is our leader; Jihad is our way; and death for the sake of Allah is the highest of our aspirations.” Its most famous slogan, which is used worldwide, is “Islam is the solution.”
Click on graphic to embiggen.
Ansar al-Sharia: Translation “Partisans of Islamic Law” is an Islamist militia group in Libya that advocates for the implementation of strict Sharia law throughout Libya. Category Yellow: Homeland Security uses a five color-coded threat level scale to label the probability of a terrorist attack and its potential gravity. Red is severe risk; Orange is high risk; Yellow is significant risk; Blue is guarded, general risk; Green is low risk.
Late on the night of September 11 to 12: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issues a statement that “some have sought to justify this vicious behavior as a response to inflammatory material posted on the Internet.”
2012 September 12: Media outlets report that Ambassador Stevens and three other Americans were killed in an attack by well-armed militants. Reuters reports that some administration officials believe the assault “bears the hallmarks of an organized attack.” Reuters also reports there are indications that members of both al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Ansar al-Sharia may have been involved in organizing the attacks. President Obama says he does not believe the “outrageous and shocking attack” was simply due to a protest that turned violent, but he never mentions either the video or the word terrorism. He just says, “My suspicion is that there are folks involved in this who were looking to target Americans from the start.”
2012 September 13: White House spokesman Jay Carney says “the protests we’re seeing around the region are in reaction to this movie.”
2012 September 14: Carney says the administration had “no actionable intelligence” that a 9/11 attack was being planned.
2012 September 15: A CNN reporter walks through the unsecured crime scene at the Benghazi consulate and makes off with Ambassador Stevens’ personal journal. CNN reads and uses Stevens’ journal entries in news reports, citing it as an unidentified source “familiar with Stevens’ thinking” and saying the ambassador had been concerned about a “rise in Islamic extremism” that posed security threats to him and his staff.
2012 September 16: Susan Rice, Obama’s Ambassador to the United Nations, appears on multiple Sunday talk shows, saying again and again that a protest over the video was the “proximate cause” of the four American deaths. Libya’s interim president Mohamed Magarief says the assault in Benghazi was not a spontaneous protest, but “was planned, definitely.”
2012 September 19: National Counterterrorism Center Director Matthew Olsen testifies before the Senate Homeland Security Committee that the assault was an “opportunistic” attack in which armed terrorists took advantage of an on-going protest. (Olsen was appointed to the position in 2011 by President Obama.)
2012 September 20: President Obama says, “What we do know is that the natural protests that arose because of the outrage over the video were used as an excuse by extremists to see if they can also directly harm U.S. interests.” CBS reports that witnesses in Benghazi say there was no protest prior to the armed assault against the consulate. White House Press Secretary Carney declares it “self-evident that what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack.”
2012 September 21: Secretary of State Clinton says “what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack.”
2012 September 25: In his address to the U.N. General Assembly, Obama makes repeated references to the video, but never mentions terrorism. Then he goes on ABC’s The View and, when asked about Clinton’s statement that “what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack”, Obama blames “extremist militias” and says “we’re still doing an investigation.”
2012 September 26: Libyan president Magarief tells NBC there was no protest prior to the armed assault against the consulate.
2012 September 27: Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta says it’s “clear that there were terrorists who planned that attack.”
2012 September 28: The Director of National Intelligence (DNI), James Clapper, issues a statement kinda sorta taking the blame for maybe saying there had been a protest that got out of control. (Clapper was appointed by Obama in 2010 and is subject to his authority, direction, and control.)
2012 October 3: FBI investigators finally arrive at the crime scene in Benghazi, which has been unsecured since September 11. (One wonders what exactly constituted all the alleged “investigating” Obama et al. had been claiming they were doing. Isn’t securing the crime scene the FIRST thing you’re supposed to do?)
2012 October 6: U.N. Ambassador Rice says when she was yapping on all those t.v. shows about the video, she had “relied solely and squarely on the information the intelligence community provided to me and other senior U.S. officials.”
2012 October 7: The White House Disinformation Campaign on Libya Summarized [2:52]
2012 October 9: Senior State Department officials for the first time acknowledge that there was never any protest in Benghazi. Then they blame the whole “blame the video” thing on the intelligence community.
2012 October 10: Both Lt. Col. Andy Wood (head of the SST the State Department pulled out of Libya in August) and Eric Nordstrom (the State Department’s Regional Security Officer) testify at a House Oversight Committee hearing about how their repeated requests for more security in Libya were denied by Washington. Their testimony is confirmed by cables made public by Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Darrell Issa (R-Calif.).
2012 October 11: During the vice presidential debate, Biden says, “We weren’t told they wanted more security there.” He also blames the administration’s shifting explanations about the attack on the intelligence community.
2012 October 22: Members of the February 17 Brigade tasked with guarding the Benghazi consulate say that, on August 28, 2012, they received a tip about a possible attack on the diplomatic compound and that on the morning of 9/11, the consulate asked them to increase security, but later, for some unknown reason, said to never mind.
2012 October 23-24: ABC, CBS and Reuters all release the three emails reproduced above. Reuters notes, “The timing of the emails is consistent with what a senior State Department official told reporters at a briefing on Oct. 9.”
2012 October 24: When asked about the emails, White House spokesman Jay Carney said the White House knew about those emails as soon as they were received. The word he used was “instantaneously.”
2012 October 26: Fox reported that three urgent requests for military assistance for the Benghazi consulate were sent from the CIA annex. SOMEBODY told the CIA operators they were to stand down. Two former Navy SEALS, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, were at the CIA annex. They wanted to go help defend the consulate. They were ordered to stay put, but DISOBEYED that order. Both died heroically, trying to protect the ambassador and his staff.
I was talking about all this with Dearest and mentioned my blog of Oct 15, 2012 (see URL below) where I showed how President Carter’s approval ratings had gone above 50% for four months after our Tehran embassy personnel had been taken hostage. And I said, “I bet Obama was pissed they murdered Stevens instead of taking him hostage.”
Dearest said he would not be at all surprised if Obama had actually organized the whole thing. I was skeptical at first, but when he laid out his reasoning, I had to admit, disgusting as it is, it’s also plausible.
Suppose Obama made a deal with the Muslim Brotherhood, or somebody like them, to swoop into an unprotected compound on 9/11 and take Stevens hostage. And suppose that it was only because Doherty and Woods disobeyed orders to sit on their hands that said attackers found themselves getting shot at by two highly trained Navy SEALS.
Would not the likely outcome be that the attackers would assume they had been taken for suckers and take out their anger at Obama by publicly brutalizing and murdering the guy they were supposed to just kidnap?
Keep in mind, please, that we have NO EVIDENCE this is what happened. It just seems to make a lot of sense of all of the above, KWIM?
Consider if Stevens had been kidnapped and the American people had acted the way we usually do, rallying around in support of our leader during a time of national crisis. We could easily have been headed toward a sure Obama win on November 6th.
We may owe our national salvation to two heroic Navy SEALS. Had they survived, they would surely have been court-martialed. They knew that and ran into battle anyway, because it was the right thing to do.
It would be poetic to learn this is all true, seeing as it was Navy SEALS who risked their lives to get Osama bin Laden, only to have Obama claim all the credit then blab their identities and operational secrets to our enemies.
polination.blog 