The depths of the scandalous Benghazi episode are becoming clear

The following timeline of events is what we know about the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya:

• April 5, 2011: Christopher Stevens arrives in the rebel stronghold of Benghazi to forge ties with the forces battling Moammar Gadhafi. President Obama appoints him as ambassador to Libya on May 22, 2012.

• February: The U.S. embassy requests and is granted a four-month extension, until August, of a Tripoli-based “site security team” composed of 16 special forces soldiers who provide security, medical and communications support to the embassy.

• March: State Department Regional Security Officer Eric Nordstrom sends a cable to Washington asking for additional diplomatic security agents for Benghazi, and later says he received no response. He repeats his request in July and again gets no response.

• April 6: Two fired Libyan security guards throw an IED over the consulate fence.

• May 22: An Islamist attack on the Red Cross office in Benghazi is followed by a Facebook post that warns “now we are preparing a message for the Americans,” and another a month later highlights Ambassador Stevens’ daily jogs in Tripoli in an apparent threat. The Red Cross closed the office.

• June 6: Unknown assailants blow a hole in the consulate’s north gate described by a witness as “big enough for 40 men to go through,” and four days later, the British ambassador’s car is ambushed by militants with a rocket-propelled grenade. The British close the consulate soon thereafter.

• July: The anti-Islam video “Innocence of Muslims” is posted on You Tube.

• Aug. 14: The US security team leaves Libya, despite Ambassador Steven’s desire that they remain, according to team leader Lt. Col. Andy Wood.

• In the weeks before Sept. 11, Libyan security guards are reportedly warned by family members of an impending attack. On Sept. 8, the Libyan militia tasked with protecting the consulate warns U.S. diplomats that the security situation is “frightening.”

•  Sept. 10: Al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri calls on Libyans to avenge the death of his Libyan deputy, Abu Yahya al Libi, killed in a June drone strike in Pakistan.

The next night, Ambassador Stevens and three other Americans, including two who disobeyed orders and came to help defend the consulate, are murdered in an attack that was unquestionably not the result of an obscure anti-Islam video.

Even dedicated Obama apologists cannot ignore the evident rising danger leading up to Sept. 11 that included violence serious enough to close the Red Cross office and the British consulate, and the direct violent attacks on the US consulate, and yet the needed and requested security enhancements were not provided.

It gets worse. From The Hill: "High-level staffers removed vital pieces of information tying terrorist organizations to attacks. They knew early on that radical Islamic terrorists participated in the attack. The former Deputy Chief of Mission to Libya, Gregory Hicks, said in the [Congressional] hearing, 'none of us should ever again experience what we went through in Tripoli and Benghazi on 9/11/2012.' He went on to say he had personally told former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton at 2 a.m. the night of the attack that it was a terrorist attack. Gregory Hicks also testified that Secretary Clinton's claiming the attack was incited by a YouTube video caused Libyan officials to hinder the FBI's arrival to the scene." For his forthrightness Mr. Hicks was demoted by the State Department.

Some question the veracity of the three witnesses who testified at the Oversight & Government Reform Committee. This is a predictable, if foolish, effort to discredit these witnesses. But these people are not bystanders; they are not people who are going to report on hearsay; they are not political operatives. In fact, Gregory Hicks is a registered Democrat who supported Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primary. These people were directly involved in different capacities before, during and after the attack. They are totally credible, and deserve not only our respect and appreciation, but our attention to their message.

So what went wrong? There are three possibilities: massive bureaucratic incompetence; the administration was asleep at the wheel; or the administration put political considerations ahead of doing the right thing. Negative repercussions of an Islamist terrorist attack on a US facility on the iconic date of Sept. 11, right before a presidential election, drove the administration to concoct an implausible scenario to try to deflect attention from the reality that al-Qaeda had indeed not been vanquished, contrary to Barack Obama's boasting to the contrary.

In answer to Hillary Clinton's asinine question: "What difference ... does it make?" It makes a huge difference. Four people died as a result of your and/or the administration's mishandling of this event, Ms. Clinton, and the people you worked for deserve to know who screwed up, and why.

We hired Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and every other public servant to act in the best interest of the American people and the nation, and expect them to put their personal political considerations aside. That clearly did not happen in Benghazi. There is no greater disservice.

Obama’s War in Libya Now A Quagmire

A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet

It was headed in that direction from day one.  The war in Libya, I mean.  Only a fool could have missed it.  All the markers were there.  But as the wise men of old told us:  “There are none so blind as those who will not see.”   I think what the ancient wisdom is saying is there are none so blind as those who are too arrogant to see.

The US had no business involved with the Libyan mess.  Well, how the heck did we get involved, anyway?  Glad you asked.

See, we Americans made a ghastly error in 2008 and we elected a man to the presidency who does not believe in American exceptionalism.  He felt and, apparently, still feels, that America ought not lead in world affairs and that we must bring America down to the level of other nations and instead of leading allow someone… anyone … else to lead. Well, we all see how great that worked out, now, don’t we?

Look.  There was a reason America was the world leader -- and must be again -- if there is to be any hope of anything remotely resembling peace on this globe.  We were, and (for now) remain the “biggest and the baddest” dude on the block.  No bragging here.  It is a fact.  America is the guy in your squad you want next to you in a firefight. (Combat veterans will know exactly what I am saying.)

Until 2008, America’s leadership had the skills to understand America’s power and how to apply that power to produce the results it wanted with the least amount of damage. Frankly, there is no leadership in Washington today.  All we have are followers.

Our fearless leader, Obama, in a state of “constant campaign”, has no time to actually study world affairs, and apply the wisdom of his predecessors, he handed the Libyan crisis off to our good friends the French (?) and the Mother Country, the UK, and eventually, an organization that has never been able to completely agree on anything, NATO.  By the way:  NATO stands for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.  Do you realize some of the countries in NATO today can’t find the North Atlantic without the aid of a map?

After America kicked Gaddafi’s door in for our friends to establish a “no-fly zone.”  America, unwilling to take the leadership, went home leaving the Libyan mess in the hands of, well, you know. It was at that moment that things fell apart. 

But our fearless leader cannot be bothered. Gambling on somebody, anybody (?), getting a bead on Gaddafi and taking him out and bringing the conflict to a speedy end, Obama hit the campaign money trail where he remains today.

And so, the Libyan campaign went into spiral mode, with the rebels circling the drain.

Gaddafi is embarrassing NATO, and Obama, by remaining alive and delivering withering attacks on the rebels and their strongholds… that just happen to be the cities where the women and children are located.  You know, the women and children this campaign was supposed to protect. 

That is extremely embarrassing for those in the Obama regime who are pushing the “obligation to protect” policy and philosophy of the United Nations.  Those naive idiots, educated, apparently, beyond their ability, are unable to discern the truth about their self-imposed guilt, actually believe the world has an obligation to protect those in danger around the globe with massive military intervention.  Back in the old days of reason we called that “Noblesse Oblige.”  Oh, and by the way, it didn’t work then, either.  However, what it WILL do is insure the US will remain at war somewhere on the globe -- perpetually.

Now we learn the US is giving US taxpayer money in the sum of 25 million dollars to the Libyan rebels in the form of “non lethal” support.  Sounds more and more like some sort of New Age war fighting, right? 

This is Obama’s way of fighting a war.  Give the rebels supplies such as medical supplies, uniforms, boots, tents, personal protective gear, radios, and Halal meals -- but nothing with which to actually fight Gaddafi. 

You can’t make this stuff up!  This is a bad joke. It only serves to make Obama look as limp-wristed and impotent as Jimmy Carter. 

Obama’s War in Libya is sucking the US in, little by little, like quicksand or a quagmire.  But you will not hear Obama condemned by the Obama propaganda machine we refer to often as the Mainstream Media.  As Obama’s lapdog, they dare not publish or broadcast the truth.  The dare not declare the obvious: The emperor has no clothes.

It now appears that only an act of God can deliver America from being sucked in deeper and deeper in a war in which we had no compelling reason, no nation interest, to commit America’s blood and treasure.

But here we are -- embroiled in Obama’s War -- a “splendid little war” that will go on and on and on.

J. D. Longstreet