According to testimony by five CIA personnel who testified before the House Intelligence Committee in a closed door testimony recently, they state the distress calls from the U.S. Consulate on the night of the attack on September 11, knew they were in a death trap. Making a series of radio distress calls to the CIA Annex during the assault last year. The testimonial characterized the calls as ‘almost frantic’, with State Department employees who knew they could not defend themselves, “pleading” for their lives. At least three of the five, who were all in Benghazi that night, responded to the scene at the consulate.
The CIA personnel stated they were ‘seething’ with anger because everything on the ground – from their perspective – showed it was a premeditated attack when asked their opinion on the claim that it was a result of an anti-Islam video. The witnesses testified that five mortars rained down on the annex in less than a minute which points to evidence of a professionally trained team, likening it to a professional hit on the compound. Congressional sources say this seems to undermine the briefing three days after the attack by then CIA Director David Petraeus who likened the attack to a ‘flash mob’. When Petraeus later appeared on the Hill in Novemeber following his resignation from the CIA, he tried to claim that he knew it was a terrorist attack all along and insisted that he did not put the emphasis on the anti-Islam video.
Late Florida Rep Bill Young spoke for 90 minutes with a diplomatic security agent, David Ubben, who was seriously injured in the assault, while they were both hospitalized together at Walter Reed Medical Center last summer. Ubben told Young, the terrorists who attacked the consulate knew the location of the safe room where Ambassador Chris Stevens and his security team sought shelter. After Young’s death in mid-October, his widow, Beverly Young, gave permission to use her husband’s comments about the September 11, 2012 attack ‘on the record’. The congressman had also spoken on this last summer. “He, (Ubben), emphasized the fact that it was a very, very military type of operation and that they had knowledge of almost everything in the compound,” Young said. “They knew where the gasoline was, they knew where the generators were, they knew where the safe room was, they knew more than they should have about that compound.” Ubben was severely injured defending the CIA Annex when mortar fire rained down on the rooftop killing former Navy Seals Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty and severely injured a third CIA contractor. While Young debated whether to discuss his conversation with Ubben, he felt that, on balance, the country should know that the diplomatic security agent, who recovered the body of foreign service officer Sean Smith from the burning consulate, was ‘heroic’.
An August 16 cable, reviewed and reported on last fall, showed there was an emergency meeting in Benghazi less than a month before the attack due to rapidly deteriorating security. The cable warned the office of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and other State Department leaders in Washington, that the consulate could not sustain a coordinated assault. It also reflected a ‘grave concern’ among officials on the ground that the Libyan militia charged with protecting the consulate had been compromised, perhaps even infiltrated by extremists. In summary, “certain sectors of the 17 February Brigade were very hesitant to share information with the Americans, but as the largest brigade, they acted as a buffer for the mission against some of the more anti-American Islamist militias in the town.” They were charged with protecting the consulate.
This brings a multitude of questions to mind, but for a ‘short list’ of mine:
– Why was the Ambassador even in Benghazi that night in the first place, especially on the anniversary of 9/11?;
– Where did the ‘video’ explanation come from and why was it used for over two weeks where the President of The United States used it in front of the United Nations?;
– Why was there NO rescue or reinforcement attempt made?;
– With all our capabilities to ‘spy’, even on our own citizens, how can we NOT KNOW anything about the attack well over a year after the attack?;
– The one I haven’t heard yet; How did the terrorists know the Ambassador was going to be there that particular time or night?, as this appears to be a well coordinated attack which would have to have been planned in advance?.
Some of these questions have been asked with NO honest answer provided after a full year. With all the ‘mis-information’ coming out of Washington these days, I have serious doubts and concerns!
Maybe it’s time for more Americans to take a little closer look!