There were a number of new revelations on Benghazi this week, both the release of the Rhodes memo and testimony from the head of the African Command, as well as the announcement of a select committee. And in many ways many folks continue to miss the point.
There are a number of moving parts where Benghazi is involved, and I really do not want to get bogged down in details. So I will summarize briefly.
· We should have had better security. Widely acknowledged by everyone. It was Libya, it was 9/11, there were warnings and indications, and security was completely inadequate.
· There were other things going on there. There are a lot of theories but the biggest claim is that we were using Benghazi to supply arms through Turkey to Syrian rebels. I have no proof of that, but I do not doubt that.
· We should have sent help when we learned of the attack. We did not know how long the conflict would last, and we did not know the nature of the event, and we should have sent help right away. Hindsight is 20/20 but our people working in dangerous places need to know their country is sending help, even if there is not time.
· We still do not know where the President and Secretary of State were the evening of the attack. We do now know they were not in the Situation Room.
· The talking points were inaccurate and misleading. They were inaccurate, and therefore they mislead. Apparently a lot of time went into spinning these points for political reasons.
· The idea that the video and demonstrations evolved into an attack was not true. The question is, when did the people who continued that narrative know it was not the truth?
· The attack was, in fact, pre-planned and a coordinated attack by terrorists. This was known for a certainty the next day.
· When Susan Rice went on the Sunday shows days later, and when Obama and Clinton met the families of the 4 fallen heroes, they continued a false narrative about a video and demonstration. At that point the truth was available.
· None of the killers of the Ambassador and three others has been brought to justice. The President and Secretary of State both made clear that they would bring those responsible to justice but although The New York Times was able to interview the leaders our government is having difficulty keeping their promise.
· The administration has failed to cooperate with the investigation. It took a court to order the most recent memo released, and some of the redactions were clearly not necessary and meant to cover the truth.
All of the above are legitimate points for consideration. But IMHO there are some that are less significant and others that matter a great deal. For example, we clearly should have had better security, but nobody wanted our Ambassador killed and I blame the folks who attacked the compound and killed 4 Americans for what happened. There probably were other things going on there, and that would not surprise me.
I don’t think the whereabouts of the President or Secretary the night of the attack is terribly meaningful. I can even understand in the very early hours after the attack attributing the attacks on the video that had ignited demonstrations elsewhere. I also understand that in the midst of an election there will be spin of each and every issue. And so it is not surprising that teams at the White House would draft and rewrite talking points. Surely it happens in every administration, just as attacks occur in every administration.
But, from my point of view there are a couple of things in this list that are inexcusable. Some of these things stand out to me as being more than politics or incompetence.
1) We should have sent help. American citizens were in harm’s way. We were unsure about the nature of the attack. We did not know how long it would have lasted or if it was a hostage situation or how it would escalate. Those who use hindsight to say we could not have gotten there in time are missing the point.
The point is the horrible precedence it sets, and the message it sends. We are now telling our folks around the world that help may not be on the way, if we “don’t think” we can get there in time, or if it would not look good politically.
2) At some point, the spin became an outright lie. Susan Rice claimed there was no indication that this was a pre-planned attack by organized terrorists. The State Dept. (Mr. Hicks) reported the opposite. CIA reports from Libya were that is was pre-planned and organized. The General in charge of Africa reported it was pre-planned and organized. The real-time video was viewed by everyone including Diane Feinstein who said it was obvious to her it was a pre-planned terrorist attack. In an e-mail released this week the administration itself described it on 9/12 as a pre-planned organized attack by Ansar al-Sharia. And if nothing else, the Libyan President was on the same Sunday shows, stating categorically that it was a pre-planned and organized terrorist attack.
And yet, Susan Rice stated there was “no indication” it was pre-planned. She could have said “I don’t know”. Instead, her statement was not spin but a lie. And it was a lie continued by the administration in the days and weeks to come, including to the families of the fallen when they returned.
3) There has been no justice. Nobody has been brought to justice, despite promises that they would be. If they can be interviewed by the press we can bring them to justice. And I hear no updates on our progress. There has been no mention of an investigation by the President. The press does not seem concerned about bringing these killers to justice. Frankly, I just don’t understand. Is the NSA only effective inside America?
4) The administration is not cooperating. If there is nothing to hide, why does it take a lawsuit and an order from a court to have pertinent documents released? Why is this like pulling teeth? Why are documents needlessly redacted to the point they are unreadable? Clearly this is obstructionism, and political cover-up. It is not surprising but it is significant.
The reasons for continuing to push the Benghazi issue are actually pretty simple.
The first is justice. Those responsible for killing 4 Americans and those responsible for hiding the truth need to be held accountable for their actions.
The second is honesty. We can forgive a lack of understanding during the “fog of war”, and we understand politics, but if we allow the truth to be ignored in favor of an obvious falsehood we send the message that the truth is expendable. It is the precedence that matters here. I want future administrations to decide it is best to simply tell the truth to avoid “another Benghazi”.
And the last point is commitment. We must uphold our commitment to the security of the brave Americans who represent us around the world, and when there is trouble they must know that we “have their backs”. Sadly we let them down in Benghazi.
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