Tag Archives: Central Intelligence Agency

I Hadn’t Really Considered This Angle

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PJ Media posted a story today that I think ads an interesting dimension to President Obama’s remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast. As you remember, the President reminded us that we should get up on our ‘high horse’ about what the Islamic terrorists are doing because some of the history of Christianity is not so pure–the Crusades, Spanish Inquisition, support of slavery, etc. First of all, the Crusades were a response to Muslim aggression, and the Christians were the ones who fought slavery.

As far as the Spanish Inquisition, PJ Media says it better than I can:

But perhaps it is Obama who should avoid getting on his high horse, since according to recently published statistics, Obama’s drone campaign has killed more people during the six years of his presidency than were killed the 350 years of the Spanish Inquisition.

…At least 2,464 people have now been killed by US drone strikes outside the country’s declared war zones since President Barack Obama’s inauguration six years ago, the Bureau’s latest monthly report reveals.

Of the total killed since Obama took his oath of office on January 20 2009, at least 314 have been civilians, while the number of confirmed strikes under his administration now stands at 456.

Research by the Bureau (Bureau of Investigative Journalism) also shows there have now been nearly nine times more strikes under Obama in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia than there were under his predecessor, George W Bush.

And the covert Obama strikes, the first of which hit Pakistan just three days after his inauguration, have killed almost six times more people and twice as many civilians than those ordered in the Bush years, the data shows.

The figures have been compiled as part of the Bureau’s monthly report into covert US drone attacks, which are run in two separate missions – one by the CIA and one for the Pentagon by its secretive special forces outfit, Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).

The research centers on countries outside the US’s declared war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan.

‘Nuff said.

I Have An Absolute Attitude Problem With This Story

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Yesterday Bloombergview posted a story about the fact that the Justice Department is threatening to bring charges against General Petreaus for classified information found on Paula Broadwell‘s computer. Paula Broadwell was writing a biography of the General, and he has been accused of giving her classified information. My first reaction to this is suspicion of the government. I posted a story in October (rightwinggranny) about Sharyl Attkisson, an investigative reporter who has done a tremendous amount of research on Fast and Furious and Benghazi.

The article at rightwinggranny stated:

Attkisson says the source, who’s “connected to government three-letter agencies,” told her the computer was hacked into by “a sophisticated entity that used commercial, nonattributable spyware that’s proprietary to a government agency: either the CIA, FBI, the Defense Intelligence Agency or the National Security Agency.”

…“The intruders discovered my Skype account handle, stole the password, activated the audio, and made heavy use of it, presumably as a listening tool,” she wrote in “Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama’s Washington.”

But the most shocking finding, she says, was the discovery of three classified documents that Number One told her were “buried deep in your operating system. In a place that, unless you’re a some kind of computer whiz specialist, you wouldn’t even know exists.”

“They probably planted them to be able to accuse you of having classified documents if they ever needed to do that at some point,” Number One added.

Considering the thuggish tactics often used by the Obama Administration, it is very possible that they did the same thing to Paul Broadwell’s computer.

So what is this really all about? Paul Mirengoff at Power Line posted a story that provides some interesting information.

The story at Power Line states:

Petraeus denies that he gave classified information to Broadwell. However, FBI officials reportedly found such documents on her computer after Petraeus resigned from the CIA when news of the affair became public. But it does not appear that the disclosure by Petraeus, if any, resulted in harm to the nation.

Indeed, President Obama has said that he knows of no evidence that Petraeus disclosed classified information “that in any way would have had a negative impact on our national security.” Obama has also said that “we are safer because of the work that Dave Petraeus has done.”

General Petraeus is going to be called to testify before the Congressional Committee investigating Benghazi. I am inclined to believe that this is a warning shot across the General’s bow designed to control his testimony. I hope the intimidation effort by the Obama Administration fails miserably.

Playing Politics With National Security

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Senator Diane Feinstein chose to release the Senate Intelligence Committee majority report of Central Intelligence Agency detention and interrogation after 9/11 yesterday. Today’s Wall Street Journal posted two editorials on the release of the report–one editorial entitled, “Spooks of the Senate,” and one opinion piece by former CIA Directors George J. Tenet, Porter J. Goss and Michael V. Hayden (a retired Air Force general) and former CIA Deputy Directors John E. McLaughlin, Albert M. Calland (a retired Navy vice admiral) and Stephen R. Kappes.

The Spooks of the Senate piece points out:

It (the report) devotes 6,000 pages to marshalling evidence to indict the CIA program, and nothing was going to interfere with its appointed verdict.

Not former CIA directors, who weren’t even interviewed (see the op-ed nearby). Not the virtues of bipartisanship, as the GOP minority staff were reduced to bystanders (see the minority report). And not the requirements of future security, which have been sacrificed to the immediate need to embarrass the agency to prove that Democrats were right.

The worst CIA failing in the report is poor management and a lack of adequate oversight. Junior officials were put in charge of detainees when wiser hands were needed, and in one case a detainee died from hypothermia. This may have resulted from the rapid CIA recruitment after 9/11, but it is a major failing, especially given the political backlash that CIA leaders knew was inevitable.

The opinion piece by the former Directors reminds us:

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on Central Intelligence Agency detention and interrogation of terrorists, prepared only by the Democratic majority staff, is a missed opportunity to deliver a serious and balanced study of an important public policy question. The committee has given us instead a one-sided study marred by errors of fact and interpretation—essentially a poorly done and partisan attack on the agency that has done the most to protect America after the 9/11 attacks.

Examining how the CIA handled these matters is an important subject of continuing relevance to a nation still at war. In no way would we claim that we did everything perfectly, especially in the emergency and often-chaotic circumstances we confronted in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. As in all wars, there were undoubtedly things in our program that should not have happened. When we learned of them, we reported such instances to the CIA inspector general or the Justice Department and sought to take corrective action.

The country and the CIA would have benefited from a more balanced study of these programs and a corresponding set of recommendations. The committee’s report is not that study. It offers not a single recommendation.

I have no idea what the motive for the undertaking and release of such a biased report was. However, it is time to put political bias aside and get down to the business of defending America. The current crop of Washington ‘leaders’ has run up an unreasonable deficit, cut our military back to a dangerous level, and padded their own nests constantly. There are a few exceptions, but the Democrats and establishment Republicans are working very hard to prevent them from doing anything constructive. It is truly time to clean house in Washington. Watch the voting in the House and the Senate in the next two years and cast your vote accordingly. We need to elect leaders who actually represent us–not their own political and private interests.

The Other Side Of The Story

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A website called CIAsavedlives has posted the following:

The recently released Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) Majority report on the CIA’s Rendition, Detention, and Interrogation Program is marred by errors of facts and interpretation and is completely at odds with the reality that the leaders and officers of the Central Intelligence Agency lived through. It represents the single worst example of Congressional oversight in our many years of government service.

Astonishingly, the SSCI Majority staff interviewed no CIA officers responsible for establishing, implementing, or evaluating the program’s effectiveness. Let us repeat, no one at the CIA was interviewed.

Worse, the Committee selectively used documents to try to substantiate a point of view where ample and contrary evidence existed. Over 5 years and at a cost of $40 million, the staff “cherry picked” through 6 million pages of documents to produce an answer they knew the Majority wanted. In the intelligence profession, that is called politicization.

The SSCI Majority would have the American people believe that the program was initiated by a rogue CIA that consistently lied to the President, the National Security Council, the Attorney General, and the Congress. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nothing.

We, as former senior officers of the Central Intelligence Agency, created this website to present documents that conclusively demonstrate that the program was: authorized by the President, overseen by the National Security Council, and deemed legal by the Attorney General of the United States on multiple occasions. None of those officials were interviewed either. None. CIA relied on their policy and legal judgments. We deceived no one. You will not find this truth in the Majority Report.

Absent from the report is any discussion of the context the United States faced after 9/11. This was a time we had solid evidence that al Qaida was planning a second wave of attacks against the U.S.; we had certain knowledge that bin Laden had met with Pakistani nuclear scientists and wanted nuclear weapons; we had reports that nuclear weapons were being smuggled into New York City; and we had hard evidence that al Qaida was trying to manufacture anthrax. It felt like a “ticking time bomb” every single day.

In this atmosphere, time was of the essence. We had a deep responsibility to do everything within the law to stop another attack. We clearly understood that, even with legal and policy approvals, our decisions would be questioned years later. But we also understood that we would be morally culpable for the deaths of fellow citizens if we failed to gain information that could stop the next attacks.

The report defies credulity by saying that the interrogation program did not produce any intelligence value. In fact, the program led to the capture of senior al Qaida leaders, including helping to find Usama bin Ladin, and resulted in operations that led to the disruption of terrorist plots that saved thousands of American and allied lives.

Finally, Congress was in the loop. The so-called “Gang of Eight” of top Congressional leaders were briefed in detail on the program. The briefings were detailed and drew reactions that ranged from approval to no objection to encouragement to be even more aggressive. Again, none of this context appears in the Majority’s report.

Our views are shared by the current CIA and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Republican Minority, both of which have released rebuttals to the Majority’s report. Both critiques are clear-eyed, fact-based assessments which challenge the Majority’s contention in a nonpartisan way. We urge all Americans to read them carefully before reaching any judgments.

Selective Comebacks

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One of the more amazing things to happen in recent years is the rehabilitation of the image of Bill Clinton. George H.W. Bush had a lot to do with bringing Bill Clinton back into the public spotlight in a positive way. It seems as if America has forgiven President Clinton for his antics in the White House and his general weaknesses regarding the opposite sex. Now we are about to face a similar situation with General David Petraeus (although General Petraeus was not the serial adulterer that President Clinton was).

Yesterday Bloomberg News posted an article entitled, “Why Is the FBI Still Targeting Petraeus?” It is becoming very obvious that justice and criminology under President Obama has become a totally political matter.

The article reports:

Most importantly: According to current and former U.S. intelligence officials who have spoken to us, the FBI still has an open investigation into whether Petraeus improperly provided highly classified documents to Paula Broadwell, his biographer and the woman with whom he had an affair.

A little history: In the spring of 2012, the Federal Bureau of Investigation stumbled upon the Petraeus-Broadwell relationship while investigating a separate cyber-stalking matter. While the FBI has cleared Broadwell of those charges, and Obama has said Petraeus never endangered national security, the FBI’s probe remains open.

Two U.S. officials familiar with the investigation say Broadwell was never authorized to receive material that was found on her personal computer. Because this included compartmentalized intelligence that only a handful of very senior officials were approved to view, the FBI considers the breach to be a serious matter. “It was inappropriately shared and it should never have been shared,” one former senior intelligence official said.

Before we decide if this is valid, there is another series of events we need to look at (as posted at rightwinggranny). The events listed below are reported by Sharyl Attkisson:

“The intruders discovered my Skype account handle, stole the password, activated the audio, and made heavy use of it, presumably as a listening tool,” she wrote in “Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama’s Washington.”

But the most shocking finding, she says, was the discovery of three classified documents that Number One told her were “buried deep in your operating system. In a place that, unless you’re a some kind of computer whiz specialist, you wouldn’t even know exists.”

“They probably planted them to be able to accuse you of having classified documents if they ever needed to do that at some point,” Number One added.

I wonder how the documents the FBI is searching for arrived in Paula Broadwell’s computer.

The article at Bloomberg further reports:

What stands out here is not just that Petraeus remains under investigation but that he remains under investigation while being reintegrated into the foreign policy establishment.

To wit: Petraeus is ostensibly being investigated for mishandling classified material and yet he retains his security clearance. What’s more, he has been casually advising the White House on Iraq, where he directed the effort to end a civil war in 2007 and 2008 and still maintains close relationships with many of its leaders.

“All of us who know him and are close to him are mystified by the fact there is still this investigation into him,” Jack Keane, a retired four-star U.S. Army General said in an interview.  Keane has been both an adviser to and mentor of Petraeus since he saved Petraeus’s life during a live-fire training exercise in 1991. 

Keane questions whether the Petraeus FBI probe lasting this long may be driven by something other than a desire to investigate a potential crime. “It makes you wonder if there is another motivation to drag an investigation out this long,” he said.

General Petraeus was an honorable man who made a mistake. I suspect that the people behind this continuing investigation are less honorable. It is time to return the White House to someone who will not abuse his power to eliminate people he considers political threats.

 

Reading Between The Lines On Benghazi

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On Friday, the official report on Benghazi was released by the House Intelligence Committee. On Saturday, Hot Air posted an article about the report. There is no obvious smoking gun in the report, but there are some interesting statements.

The article reports:

The media interpretation of the findings is also flatly contradictory in places. Take for example this declaration of a lack of any culpability. (Emphasis added.)

Debunking a series of persistent allegations hinting at dark conspiracies, the investigation of the politically charged incident determined that there was no intelligence failure, no delay in sending a CIA rescue team, no missed opportunity for a military rescue, and no evidence the CIA was covertly shipping arms from Libya to Syria.

The next paragraph in the report states:

So, nothing to see here. Move along. Except for one problem. The coverage also seeks to make it clear that Susan Rice couldn’t possibly be to blame for her blatantly false portrayals of the attack on the Sunday morning shows. Watch what happens to the analysis on this score.

In the immediate aftermath of the attack, intelligence about who carried it out and why was contradictory, the report found. That led Susan Rice, then U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, to inaccurately assert that the attack had evolved from a protest, when in fact there had been no protest. But it was intelligence analysts, not political appointees, who made the wrong call, the committee found. The report did not conclude that Rice or any other government official acted in bad faith or intentionally misled the American people.

The writer of the article asks the obvious question:

Keep in mind, these are not two paragraphs separated by miles of text. They’re back to back. And somehow, in the space of four sentences, we went from there was no intelligence failure to reading it was intelligence analysts… who made the wrong call. If you’re making the wrong call – particularly one which turned out to be so incredibly far off base – then that sounds like an intelligence failure to me.

Also rather stunning is the way that a complete vindication of the White House is somehow constructed out of these conclusions. Susan Rice was either lying or she was wrong. Neither possibility paints the administration in a very competent light. And if there was a failure of intelligence, how does that clear the White House? The last time I checked the CIA reports to the Director of Intelligence who, in turn, reports directly to the President… or has that changed? A better translation of this hopeful sounding article would be to say that the report cleared the political arm of Obama’s team of any wrongdoing, while allowing him to throw his intelligence team under the bus.

Unfortunately, we will probably never know who messed up in the Benghazi tragedy. So much for government transparency.

 

The Fight For Honest News Continues

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John Hinderaker at Power Line posted a story today about Sharyl Attkisson, the investigative reporter who resigned from CBS’s Washington Bureau in March of this year.

Ms. Attkisson tells her story in her book Stonewalled: My Fight For the Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation and Harassment in Obama’s Washington.

In the book, Ms. Attkisson describes the hacking of her computer while she was at CBS:

Attkisson says the source, who’s “connected to government three-letter agencies,” told her the computer was hacked into by “a sophisticated entity that used commercial, nonattributable spyware that’s proprietary to a government agency: either the CIA, FBI, the Defense Intelligence Agency or the National Security Agency.”

The breach was accomplished through an “otherwise innocuous e-mail” that Attkisson says she got in February 2012, then twice “redone” and “refreshed” through a satellite hookup and a Wi-Fi connection at a Ritz-Carlton hotel.

The spyware included programs that Attkisson says monitored her every keystroke and gave the snoops access to all her e-mails and the passwords to her financial accounts.

“The intruders discovered my Skype account handle, stole the password, activated the audio, and made heavy use of it, presumably as a listening tool,” she wrote in “Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama’s Washington.”

But the most shocking finding, she says, was the discovery of three classified documents that Number One told her were “buried deep in your operating system. In a place that, unless you’re a some kind of computer whiz specialist, you wouldn’t even know exists.”

“They probably planted them to be able to accuse you of having classified documents if they ever needed to do that at some point,” Number One added.

It is scary that our government is involved in this sort of thing.

John Hinderaker comments on Ms. Attkisson’s story:

If the Obama administration hacked into a reporter’s computers, used them to spy on her, and even prepared to frame her for a potential criminal prosecution by planting classified documents, aren’t we looking at the biggest scandal in American history? Perhaps I’m forgetting something, but I can’t come up with anything to equal the stunning lawlessness on display here–if what Attkisson says is true (which I don’t doubt), and if the administration is the guilty party.

John Hinderaker suggests that she file a lawsuit against the offending agency. Ms. Attkisson’s story is another example of a government that is out of control.

This Is Disturbing

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Below is the video posted at Fox News of a U.S. security team stationed in Benghazi in September 2012 telling their story of what happened the night of the attack on the CIA annex in Benghazi.

As you will see in the video, all three men claim that had they been allowed to go to the annex when the attack started, they believe the outcome of the battle would have been different. The men claim to have been told to ‘stand down’ by the top CIA officer in Benghazi. After waiting for thirty minutes, the men went to the annex without orders. They asked their CIA superiors to call for air support, but that support never came.

I have no idea why these men were delayed and not given the necessary support, but it seems to me that almost two years after the event, the American public should have those answers. I hope the Congressional Committee investigating this can provide those answers. I feel very strongly that the American public has been routinely lied to by the Obama Administration about Benghazi and that we are entitled to know the truth about what was going on in the annex and why the American military did not properly respond to the attack.

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Why There Is So Little Reporting On The Actions Of Hamas

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A website called Legal Insurrection posted an article yesterday about the lack of reporting in the mainstream media about the activities of Hamas.

You may recall a April 11, 2003, New York Times article by Easton Jordan entitled “The News We Kept To Ourselves.” The article states:

Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN’s Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard — awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff.

For example, in the mid-1990’s one of our Iraqi cameramen was abducted. For weeks he was beaten and subjected to electroshock torture in the basement of a secret police headquarters because he refused to confirm the government’s ludicrous suspicion that I was the Central Intelligence Agency’s Iraq station chief. CNN had been in Baghdad long enough to know that telling the world about the torture of one of its employees would almost certainly have gotten him killed and put his family and co-workers at grave risk.

That is the way thugs in the Middle East handle reporters. Things have not changed–that is the modus operandi used by Hamas.

The article at Legal Insurrection reports:

The Times of Israel confirmed several incidents in which journalists were questioned and threatened. These included cases involving photographers who had taken pictures of Hamas operatives in compromising circumstances — gunmen preparing to shoot rockets from within civilian structures, and/or fighting in civilian clothing — and who were then approached by Hamas men, bullied and had their equipment taken away.

The article at Legal Insurrection included tweets from reporters and stories of intimidation of reporters. The reason we are not hearing both sides of the story of the Gaza-Israeli war is that one side is a bunch of thugs who are endangering their own civilian population and doing everything they can to hide the truth.

There Will Be More

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As the select committee to investigate Benghazi gets organized, gets its security clearances in order, plans its witnesses, etc., there will be those who hope to obstruct its mission. There will also be those who are in search of the truth about what happened that night.

Allen West posted an article on his website today that illustrates why we need the select committee. I strongly suggest you follow the link and read the entire article.

Here are a few excerpts:

I was seated beside someone who personally knew one of the men who was there on the roof in Benghazi. This person was excited to share with me the “ground truth” of what happened September 11, 2012.

…I learned about the proximity of the staging area of the attack to the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, and the attackers were indeed Ansar al-Sharia, a group affiliated with al-Qaida. I came to understand why Ambassador Chris Stevens was there in the first place and that he had in fact requested better security but was denied – the question is, by whom? And I learned that the Martyrs of 17 February Brigade were in charge of security and were the ones who opened the gates, then fled.

I learned there are those who are being threatened with their pensions being cut off if they come forth to speak.

And I learned, as I presumed, that there was a covert weapons scheme going on in Libya, Benghazi. We had been supplying radical Islamists with weapons against Libyan President Moammar Gadhafi, effectively supplying the enemy and destabilizing that country. And it seems that there was a CIA weapons buy-back program, the aim of which was to ship the retrieved weapons out of Libya through Turkey, and to the Islamist forces in Syria.

I strongly suggest that you read the entire article. There are many things that the committee needs to investigate about what happened that night in Benghazi.

I was seated beside someone who personally knew one of the men who was there on the roof in Benghazi. This person was excited to share with me the “ground truth” of what happened September 11, 2012.
Read more at http://allenbwest.com/2014/05/exclusive-confidential-source-reveals-really-happened-benghazi/#fCXybhSrMwdlxbDk.99
I was seated beside someone who personally knew one of the men who was there on the roof in Benghazi. This person was excited to share with me the “ground truth” of what happened September 11, 2012.
Read more at http://allenbwest.com/2014/05/exclusive-confidential-source-reveals-really-happened-benghazi/#fCXybhSrMwdlxbDk.99
I was seated beside someone who personally knew one of the men who was there on the roof in Benghazi. This person was excited to share with me the “ground truth” of what happened September 11, 2012.
Read more at http://allenbwest.com/2014/05/exclusive-confidential-source-reveals-really-happened-benghazi/#fCXybhSrMwdlxbDk.99
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One Theory To Consider

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On May 16 The Asian Tribune posted an article about the September 11, 2012, terrorist attack on Benghazi. The basic theory of the article is that the outpost at Benghazi was a CIA operation running guns to the rebels in Syria.

The article reports:

It was on October 25 last year that FoxNews.com broke the story that a mysterious Libyan ship was reportedly carrying weapons and bound for Syrian rebels would have had some link to the September 11 terror attack on the U.S. ‘post’ in Benghazi.

Why do we use the term ‘post’ in this report? Because when changes were made to the Benghazi attack story by the Obama administration it changed from ‘American Consulate’ to ‘American Post’. The reason: Benghazi operation was entirely a CIA operation.

Through shipping records, Fox News has confirmed that the Libyan-flagged vessel Al Entisar, which means “The Victory,” was received in the Turkish port of Iskenderun — 35 miles from the Syrian border — on Sept. 6, just five days before Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other American officers were killed during an extended assault by more than 100 Islamist militants.

On the night of Sept. 11, in what would become his last known public meeting, Stevens met with the Turkish Consul General Ali Sait Akin, and escorted him out of the ‘posts’ front gate one hour before the assault began.

Although what was discussed at the meeting is not public, a source told Fox News that Stevens was in Benghazi to negotiate a weapons transfer, an effort to get SA-7 missiles out of the hands of Libya-based extremists. And although the negotiation said to have taken place may have had nothing to do with the attack on the consulate later that night or the Libyan mystery ship, it could explain why Stevens was travelling in such a volatile region on the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

When asked to comment, a State Department spokeswoman dismissed the idea,

Please follow the link above to read the details of this story. As I stated in the title, this is a theory. It may be a plausible theory, but it is a theory.

A Discussion On Benghazi From People With The Proper Experience

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On April 2, YouTube posted the following discussion on Benghazi featuring Clare Lopez and Fred Fleitz of the Center for Security Policy:

As you can see from the video, both of these people have the experience to comment on the events on the night of September 11, 2012, and the aftermath.

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Sometimes It Just Takes A While For The Truth To Come Out

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Fox News posted an article today about some of the testimony on the attack on Benghazi that simply does not add up. The testimony relates to whether or not the attack was a spontaneous event or the result of careful planning.

The article states:

In addition to Rogers’ (Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee) assessment, military experts say the mortar strike on the CIA base was evidence of a planned terror attack, and because it forced the evacuation of the annex, it must have been known immediately in Washington. But in a letter to the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee in January 2013, Morell said “the nature of the attacks suggested they did not involve significant pre-planning.”

Two of the witnesses that have previously testified before the committee are expected to be called back–former CIA Director David Petraeus and his ex-deputy Michael Morell.

The article reports:

In addition to Rogers’ assessment, military experts say the mortar strike on the CIA base was evidence of a planned terror attack, and because it forced the evacuation of the annex, it must have been known immediately in Washington. But in a letter to the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee in January 2013,Morell said “the nature of the attacks suggested they did not involve significant pre-planning.”

…Separately, Morell is accused by Republicans on the Senate Intelligence Committee of misleading lawmakers over the White House’s role in the so-called Benghazi talking points by stating the text was provided to the administration for their awareness, not for their input. Emails later released by the administration showed otherwise. Morell, who excised half of the talking points text, previously told Fox News that “neither the Agency, the analysts, nor I cooked the books in any way.”

When pressed on the sophistication of the mortar attack, two sources familiar with Petraeus’ statements to Congress said he also seemed to downplay the necessary planning and skill, stating the mortars could have been fired from the back of a truck with the same accuracy.

None of the five military officers contacted by Fox News said the truck explanation was plausible.

There has been so much misinformation put out by the Obama Administration about Benghazi that I really wonder what in the world is the truth and what is the reason for all the misdirection. It is amazing to me that the only person who has actually spent time in jail for the Benghazi attack is the filmmaker of the video that had nothing to do with the attack. The bad guys have been interviewed by CNN, but somehow out government can’t find them. It would be really nice if we found out what all the lying was about so that we could move on to other things.

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Cover-up? What Cover-up?

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Today’s Washington Free Beacon is reporting that a CIA employee has been suspended after refusing to sign a non-disclosure agreement barring him from discussing Benghazi.

The article reports:

Rep. Frank Wolf (R., Va.) revealed at an event on Monday that his office was anonymously informed about the CIA employee, who is purportedly facing an internal backlash after refusing to sign a legal document barring him from publicly or privately discussing events surrounding the Benghazi attack.

The revelation comes about a month after several media outlets reported that CIA employees with knowledge of the terror attack had been forced to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDA) and submit to regular polygraph tests.

…The newly formed Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi has similar goals as congressional investigators but is not confined by rules governing the legislative body, speakers at the event said.

Retired Air Force Col. Richard Brauer, cofounder of the group Special Operations Speaks, said the committee would aim to find out why U.S. military assets were ordered to “stand down” during the Benghazi attack.

“We’re tired of the lies and the cover-up that continues to this day,” Brauer said. “Who gave the order” to stand down, “to remain in place in Tripoli and the other locations and do nothing. When was this order given and why?”

“Forces were available on that very night, likely champing at the bit, but they were told to stand down,” he said. “These are words that will live in infamy.”

There were four Americans killed at Benghazi, one of whom was an American Ambassador. Under normal conditions, the attack on the annex at Benghazi and the killing of the Ambassador would be considered an act of war. There are many questions as to why no American forces were allowed to come to the rescue and as to why this attack was not considered an act of war. The only person to go to jail because of the Benghazi attack was the person who made the video that was not responsible for the attack. He has recently been let out of jail, but the fact remains that he is the only person who has gone to jail because of what happened at Benghazi. This whole scenario reads like something out of Through the Looking Glass.

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The Entire Picture In The Middle East

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Yesterday The Blaze posted an article looking at where American forces are deployed in the Middle East. Buck Sexton, who covers national security issues for The Blaze, explained what is actually going on. Buck Sexton is an ex-CIA Agent and NYPD Intelligence Division Specialist.

Below is the video from the article. It can also be found on YouTube:

I do not believe that President Obama’s foreign policy is feckless–I believe that he is intentionally downgrading America’s influence in world events. I don’t like thinking that, but I don’t see how, in view of recent events, that conclusion can be avoided.

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One Possible Explanation For Recent Foreign Policy Missteps

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President Obama’s foreign policy has been a disaster. President Bush’s foreign policy was slightly better, but was not successful in promoting democracy, freedom, and American interests around the world. President Bush attempted to promote democracy, but any gains were lost when President Obama pulled the troops out of Iraq. Generally speaking, in recent years, when given a choice, America has made the wrong decision.

On Monday, the Middle East Forum posted an article entitled, “Gulliver Tied Down by Lilliputians.” The article details some of the reasons for America’s recent lack of success in dealing with the Middle East.

The article reports:

One in five applicants for jobs at the Central Intelligence Agency have ties to Muslim terrorist organizations, according to the latest round of Snowden leaks. And Israel is a major target of American counterintelligence. Washington is insane.

Three years ago, the Washington Post sketched the elephantiasis in the U.S. intelligence establishment without, of course, access to the detailed numbers leaked by Edward Snowden last week. It doesn’t matter how much money you spend if you can’t hire people you can trust. If you spend $52 billion in the “black budget,” you create so many conflicting bureaucratic interest groups as to cancel out any possible signal with a wave of noise.

I have very mixed emotions about Edward Snowden and what he has done, but this is information that should be made public. Obviously common sense has departed from the CIA hiring process.

The article at Middle East Forum contrasts the fact that America intelligence services cannot find Arab translators and are forced to hire people whose backgrounds they cannot  verify with the fact that Israel routinely teaches Arab languages in high school and thus has more translators than they can use. Admittedly, Israel is in the midst of the danger, but we can still learn a lesson from them.

The article concludes:

The U.S. has relied extensively on friendly Arab intelligence services, above all the Egyptians, to fill the gap — except that the Obama administration did its best to bring down the Egyptian military in 2011 and install the Muslim Brotherhood. The Israelis have plenty to tell, but little that Washington wants to hear: Israel never fell victim to the mass delusion about the so-called Arab Spring, and has warned throughout (along with Saudi Arabia) that Iran’s nuclear ambitions must be crushed. Israel therefore is treated as an intelligence target rather than as a collaborator, while the Arab intelligence services who most might help us — Egyptian and Saudi — must regard us with skepticism in the best of cases and hostility in the worst.

America is flying blind into a hurricane. Americans who write about the Middle East now depend on what other countries choose to leak to us. Washington isn’t in the loop any longer.

Whether we are willing to admit it or not, America is involved in a war for her survival and for the survival of western civilization. Our enemies will fight this war whether we choose to fight it or not. It’s time to wake up and defend our freedom.

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More Questions Than Answers

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John Hinderaker posted an article at Power Line yesterday that asks a very interesting question about the Benghazi attack.

The article at Power Line links back to a Jake Tapper CNN article referenced on this site on August 2. The article confirmed a rumor that many CIA operatives were on the ground at Benghazi during the attack on September 11, 2012, and that those operatives were being muzzled by the government. The obvious question being asked is, “What is being covered up?”

The cover-up began instantly when a video with very few YouTube hits was blamed for the attack on Benghazi. Why was it instantly necessary to provide a cover story for this attack? Was this political–if it was terrorism, it might impact the election–or was this about something entirely different?

The article at Power Line points out some basic facts:

So, what do we make of all of this? Tapper’s reporting points toward the conclusion that the longstanding rumor to the effect that the terrorist attack occurred during a top-secret arms transfer mission is true. But how much does that really explain? It seems unlikely that the CIA mission prompted the attack: we now know that the Syrian rebels consist in substantial part of al Qaeda elements, and if arms were sent from Libya to Syria, al Qaeda probably wound up with some of them. So why would al Qaeda want to interrupt the CIA mission via an attack on the American compound in Benghazi?

…So I find it hard to understand how the current revelations fit with what we already know–or think we know–about Benghazi, or why the administration and the CIA are now so intent on covering up whatever the Agency was up to at the famous “annex.” My sense is that the current reporting leaves us a long way from understanding what really happened on September 11, 2012.

It will be interesting to see if we actually have the truth about Benghazi before President Obama is finished his second term.

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Incredible Coincidence Or Government Thuggery?

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The Benghazi attack is still surrounded by more questions than answers. Yesterday CNN posted an exclusive story about a number of CIA agents who were on the ground in the outpost at Benghazi during the attack. Since the attack, many of these agents have been recovering from the wounds, but all of the agents have remained out of sight. Why?

The article reports:

Since January, some CIA operatives involved in the agency’s missions in Libya, have been subjected to frequent, even monthly polygraph examinations, according to a source with deep inside knowledge of the agency’s workings.

The goal of the questioning, according to sources, is to find out if anyone is talking to the media or Congress.

It is being described as pure intimidation, with the threat that any unauthorized CIA employee who leaks information could face the end of his or her career.

In exclusive communications obtained by CNN, one insider writes, “You don’t jeopardize yourself, you jeopardize your family as well.”

Another says, “You have no idea the amount of pressure being brought to bear on anyone with knowledge of this operation.”

“Agency employees typically are polygraphed every three to four years. Never more than that,” said former CIA operative and CNN analyst Robert Baer.

In other words, the rate of the kind of polygraphs alleged by sources is rare.

“If somebody is being polygraphed every month, or every two months it’s called an issue polygraph, and that means that the polygraph division suspects something, or they’re looking for something, or they’re on a fishing expedition. But it’s absolutely not routine at all to be polygraphed monthly, or bi-monthly,” said Baer.

CIA spokesman Dean Boyd asserted in a statement that the agency has been open with Congress.

If the CIA has been all that open with Congress, why are agents being kept from the press and subjected to lie detector tests much more frequently than usual?

With this is mind, let’s take a look at the timeline regarding the resignation of General David Petraeus as the head of the CIA. Regardless of his affair, General Petraeus is known for being an honest man who loves his country and believes in America. There are a lot of stories about when General Petraeus began his affair with Paula Broadwell. The timeline on this is important–was the affair going on in early September 2011, when General Petraeus took over as the head of the CIA? If it was, how did the people who screened him for the job miss it? If the affair began later, was the Obama Administration aware of it? Why does this matter? The attack in Benghazi took place on September 11, 2012. General Petraeus resigned on November 9, 2012. The cover-up of Benghazi began immediately–keep in mind the only person in jail for the Benghazi attack is the filmmaker who made a film no one saw and had nothing to do with the attack. Is it possible that General Petraeus was told to go along with the cover-up or have his affair revealed?

Regardless of the scenario anyone chooses, it is obvious that there has been a cover-up of what happened in Benghazi. The thing to keep in mind is that cover-up, deny, and delay are all standard tactics of the Obama Administration. There are two main theories I have heard on what was going on in Benghazi — number one that it was a gun running operation supplying arms to the Syrian rebels, and number two that the attack was supposed to be a peaceful kidnapping of Ambassador Stevens so that he could later be swapped for the Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman (the Blind Sheik), currently serving a life sentence at Butner Federal Medical Center in North Carolina.

Neither scenario would be popular with the American public, but I suspect the spin artists in the media could dress up either one to make it work. With the recent reporting on Benghazi by CNN, it may actually be possible that Americans will eventually know the full story of what happened at Benghazi on September 11 of last year.

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I’d Love To See The Guest List

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Yesterday Breitbart.com reported that the White House announced that it would hold a meeting to brief reporters on Benghazi. The meeting was initially referred to by Politico as ‘off-the-record,’ but the White House changed that to ‘deep background.’ I agree that the word deep is probably a good description, but background is not the word I would place after it.

Fourteen news organizations were invited to the closed-door meeting.

Politico reported yesterday:

The meeting was conducted on “deep background,” according to White House spokesman Josh Earnest, but sources told POLITICO that the existence of the meeting was “off the record.” The meeting began around 12:45 p.m. and postponed the daily, on-the-record White House press briefing until mid-afternoon.

The session was announced to reporters in the wake of an ABC News report showing that White House and State Dept. officials were involved in revising the now-discredited CIA talking points about the attack on Benghazi.

I would love to see which fourteen news organizations were invited to the meeting! Can you imagine what would have happened if Nixon had tried this with Watergate?

Breitbart.com tells us what to look for as a result of this meeting:

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said, “Deep background means that the info presented by the briefers can be used in reporting but the briefers can’t be quoted.” So expect a fair number of “White House sources” to appear in reportage for the next few days.

Four people died at Benghazi because they did not have adequate security, and when they asked for help they did not get it. Later the Obama Administration lied about what happened. Also, remember that the man who made the video that was not responsible for the attack is the only person in jail as a result of the attack. He is still in jail. It’s time to stop playing games and explain what happened.

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Something Rotten In Denmark

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On Friday, Senator Graham told Fox News that Benghazi survivors were told by the Obama Administration to remain silent. On the same day, a website called Western Journalism posted a video stating that the Administration went as far as to change the name of one of the survivors of the attack so that the press would not be able to track him down. The statement comes about 5 1/2 minutes into the interview with Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah.

I have no idea what this is about. I can understand that if some of the survivors were CIA Agents, the government would want to keep their identities secret, but I also suspect that all of the survivors were not undercover, and there is no reason that they have been asked to remain silent and kept away from Congress and from the press. Where is the transparency?

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Mr. Paul Goes To Washington

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According to a Mediaite story posted this morning, Senator Rand Paul ended his filibuster in the Senate at 12:39 this morning.

YouTube posted the video of the Senator’s closing remarks:

The article reports:

During the half-day-long filibuster session, Paul was joined by fellow Republican Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Marco Rubio (R-FL), Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and Mike Lee (R-UT). Despite his support for Brennan’s CIA nomination, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) joined the effort, voicing his concerns about the Obama administration’s authority to assassinate American citizens without congressional oversight.

America needs to have this discussion. I don’t even like the idea of Americans being killed based on congressional oversight. In a country where the Biblical view on gay marriage may be considered hate speech and those in the the Catholic Church are not allow to practice their religious beliefs outside of their church, who determines who or what is dangerous? When we arrested the underwear bomber after an obvious attempt at terrorism, we read him his Miranda rights and allowed him to hire a lawyer. Now the President seems to think he has the right to kill American citizens on American soil without the benefit of either a lawyer or a trial. The problem here is very simple, “Who determines who is a danger to the country?” Depending on who holds the office of the presidency, we might see Bill Ayers being called a threat or we might see Glenn Beck declared a threat. Politics could easily influence these decisions. There is a reason we have a court system. It is not perfect, but it is better than the idea of the government being able to kill American citizens at will.

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It Was A Great Story Even If Some Of It Wasn’t True

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Argo was one of my favorite movies this year. I loved seeing the story of how a fake movie had such an impact on world events. However, evidently there was some serious poetic license taken with the story.

Saturday’s U. K. Mail told the story of the seizing of the American Embassy and the taking of hostages from another perspective. Martin Williams wrote the article. He was a  First Secretary at the British Embassy in Iran when militants invaded the US Embassy in November 1979. In the movie, the British were portrayed as refusing the help the Americans who had evaded capture during the storming of the embassy. Mr. Williams tells another story.

The article relates the role Mr. Williams played that day in 1979:

We continued to get regular anonymous threats, for while the Iranians considered America to be enemy No 1, or the Great Satan, Britain was the Little Satan.

So it was not entirely surprising when a mob stormed the American Embassy on November 4. We didn’t know then how long it would last.

But we had no hesitation in helping when, at about 5pm the following day, I was told that several people had evaded capture and I should go and find them. I set off in my dusty orange Austin Maxi, which Sue and I had driven all the way from England in late 1977. It was pretty distinct and the only one in Iran; it also had a prominent GB sticker on the back.

Please follow the link above to read the entire story in the U. K. Mail. It is an amazing story of people helping people in a very difficult time.

Mr. Williams concludes:

So what prompted Ben Affleck and his people, including producer George Clooney, to portray the Brits in such a derogatory way, I don’t know. If the film had portrayed what we did, it might have added even more dramatic tension.

Let me say that, although I was disappointed by the inaccuracies,  I thought Argo was a great piece of entertainment. I can see why it won the Oscar for Best Film, but it is a semi-fictional account only.

Not that I’m surprised by its narrow viewpoint, which was geared to show the CIA as the hero.

It is not the first time that Hollywood has chosen to depict a successful world event as entirely a result of their intervention.

As a boy I can remember one of my schoolmasters commenting on the fact that most war films  gave the impression that the Americans had won the Second World War single-handed.

But this time it’s personal. I was there and I took part, as did others.  So I am concerned that Argo could become accepted as the definitive historical account.

The truth is very different, and I think it only right to get the correct information out to the public.

Now we know the truth.

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Science Fiction Land

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I generally see about three movies a year. One of the movies I saw this year was ARGO. It was a fantastic movie. There was some poetic license in telling the story, but for the most part the story was as most Americans remember it. The idea of smuggling out the hostages as part of a movie crew was very creative, and it was wonderful to get them out of Iran alive and without having been tortured.

Yesterday the U.K. Mail posted a story about the drawings of the fake movie used to get the Americans out of Iran. The article posted a number of the drawings–they are fantastic.

The article reports:

The ‘Argo’ movie illustrations that the CIA used in 1980 to fool Iranian officials into freeing six American hostages have been made available for the first time in decades. 

The author of the concept illustrations, Jack Kirby, who co-created X-Men, died in 1994 but the man who hired him to draw them lives to tell the true story behind the original ‘Argo.’

Barry Ira Geller was an aspiring producer in 1978 when he purchased the production rights to the science fiction novel ‘Lord of Light‘ by Roger Zelazny, a story set on a faraway planet that was published in 1967.

…Chambers and Mendez changed the name of the production from ‘Lord of Light’ to ‘Argo’ and the rest of the story became history, as the plan was successful and all six Americans made it home safely.

Geller said he didn’t learn that his script had been used for the top secret mission until 2001. 

Asked how he feels now about the fact that his script played such an important role in history, Geller said, ‘I feel fantastic about it.’

‘It shows me that we all make a difference in the world,’ he added.

Kirby also would have been thrilled to know that his art had made such an impact, Geller said.. 

‘He would have loved it,’ he said.

Geller’s story, which was omitted from the blockbuster movie ‘Argo,’ is now being told in a upcoming documentary by director Judd Ehrlich called Science Fiction Land.

The documentary is being billed as the ‘true story behind “Argo.”‘

Please follow the link above to the U.K. Daily Mail to see the drawings. They are amazing.

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Ignoring The Statements Of Those Who Want To Harm Us

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Yesterday the Washington Times posted an article about a statement CIA Director nominee John Brennan. Mr. Brennen stated, “Jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one’s community, and there’s nothing holy, legitimate, or Islamic about murdering innocent men and women….Nor do we describe our enemy as jihadists or Islamists.”

The article points out that Mr. Brennan’s statement is at odds with the statements made by those who lead the jihadists.

The article reports:

Osama bin Laden described his war against the United States as a jihad as early as March 1997, when he told CNN that “we have declared jihad against the U.S., because in our religion it is our duty to make jihad so that God’s word is the one exalted to the heights.”

The founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al-Banna, wrote in a pamphlet titled “Jihad” that “Many Muslims today mistakenly believe that fighting the enemy is jihad asghar (a lesser jihad) and that fighting one’s ego is jihad akbar (a greater jihad).” The present spiritual adviser of the Muslim Brotherhood, Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, writes in his book, “Fiqh of Jihad,” that Muslims may engage in violent jihad against Israel.

If your next door neighbor continually threatens you, do you ignore the threats or do you pay attention and at least take defensive action? It seems that Mr. Brennan would choose to ignore the threats.

Sun Tzu is quoted as saying, “Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles without disaster.” That is one of the basic rules of war. Whether we like it or not, we are at war. The Islamists have made that clear. We can put someone in charge of the CIA who is in touch with  reality or we can put someone in charge who will ignore reality.

I believe that John Brennan’s statements, as well as some of his past military actions outside the chain of command (see rightwinggranny.com) should disqualify him for the position of Director of the CIA. Unfortunately I believe he will be confirmed and his appointment will put America at risk.

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Some Interesting Information About Benghazi

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The U. K. Daily Mail reported today:

‘Benghazi: The Definitive Report,’ published by William Morrow and Company, is due out in e-book on Tuesday. The authors, Webb and Murphy, are editors of SOFREP.com, a site devoted to news and stories written by current and former special operations commandos.

The book makes a lot of interesting charges about the fall from grace of General David Petraeus and exactly who orchestrated that fall, but it makes some even more interesting charges against CIA Director nominee John Brennan.

The article reports:

Murphy and co-author Brandon Webb also revealed that the September 11 Benghazi terrorist attack that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, was retaliation by Islamist militants who had been targeted by covert U.S. military operations.

The book claims that neither Stevens nor even Petraeus knew about the raids by American special operations troops, which had ‘kicked a hornet’s nest’ among the heavily-armed fighters after the overthrow of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi.

John Brennan, President Barack Obama’s Deputy National Security Adviser, had been authorizing ‘unilateral operations in North Africa outside of the traditional command structure,’ according to the e-book. Brennan is Obama’s pick to replace Petraeus as head of the CIA.

This is disturbing. The idea that there were ‘unilateral operations in North Africa outside of the traditional command structure’ is highly questionable. I don’t have a problem with the concept of secrecy, but the President is not entitled to run his own private army operations outside the structure of command. This is clearly unconstitutional. Not to inform the people who would be ultimately impacted by these operations is unthinkable.

The article further reports:

Webb and Murphy said they wrote the book to reveal ‘the truth’ behind the attack. They say news accounts of the incident have often been inaccurate because journalists have not had inside access to the people who were on the ground at the time.

The authors have been frustrated, they say, by politicians who have attempted to twist the facts of the case to suit their own ends. Conservatives sought to use the attack as an election issue and place the blame on Obama.

Democrats and the Obama administration have worked to deflect responsibility and downplay the warning signs that were present before the consulate was raided.

Webb and Murphy claim that the ‘inside’ story of the attack – as told by their connections in the CIA and special operations units of the military – show that Brennan never warned the CIA or Stevens about ongoing U.S. military operations in the country.

Had the State Department and the intelligence community known about what was happening, they would have stepped up security in Benghazi and could have prevented the tragedy.

The entire article makes me wonder about the fitness of John Brennan to be Secretary of Defense.

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