New Disclosures on Benghazi

[elbe]

You should keep in mind that the reference to Ansar al Sharia was removed from he talking points memo after the CIA received objections from state department spokesperson Victora Nuland.

You mentioned that a couple times but I don't recall seeing a reference for that. Could you provide one or give me an idea where you previously did?

 

[The Big Dog]

For several not fanatic although conservative comments

But keep right on defending your hero & heroine. Nothing to see here; just move along.

Not sure who you are directing that to.

 

[triforcharity]

Local witnesses in Benghazi were very clear that the attackers specifically mentioned the video as the reasons for why they were attacking.

And yet, people on the ground say it wasn't even a talking point in the area. Interesting.

 

[elbe]

Right, if you want to believe that the government had it right, then switched to the wrong information based on the flimsiest excuse, that's certainly your prerogative. But I think that is just as baseless as automatically assuming that this is a lie ordered by Obama himself. We (or rather: Congress) need to actually look into this.

I believe that information evolves as new pieces come into the picture. Some pieces of evidence are pushed aside if there is reason to believe they aren't as pertinent as initially believed. Part of the CIAs job is to handle huge amounts of information, especially when investigating an incident, it is hardly outside the realm of belief that something they learned suggested, at the time, that ansar al sharia may not have been involved (or their involvement was not critical) or that the evidence supporting their involvement wasn't as firm as they wanted. It may, of course, be tricky to find out anything of substance from the CIA, because, well, they're the CIA.

If all your evidence is 'it said A and then it said B' and you can't ascribe motive for deliberately changing them I'm going to have to stick with 'they arrived at B from A naturally', even if it was in error.

 

[RandFan]

Unfortunately, AntPogo only exists to me in quoted form.

Doesn't matter. It was addressed.

 

[RandFan]

It just seems like all the evidence is circumstantial. Maybe it all adds up to something nefarious, or maybe people are just reading what they want into it. People are good at seeing patterns where there are none, especially if they've been primed by people with clear political biases.

I should also mention that I don't have any problem with hearings on the issue, but I honestly question the sincerity of the people calling for it. I don't see a whole lot of evidence that the congress-critters calling for the hearings actually care about the issue other than as a political target.

I couldn't have said it better. Agreed.

 

[The Big Dog]

You mentioned that a couple times but I don't recall seeing a reference for that. Could you provide one or give me an idea where you previously did?

Yes. It is in the weekly standard. I can't link because on phone. Google weekly standard. Nuland. Talking points.

Sorry

 

[The Big Dog]

I believe that information evolves as new pieces come into the picture. Some pieces of evidence are pushed aside if there is reason to believe they aren't as pertinent as initially believed. Part of the CIAs job is to handle huge amounts of information, especially when investigating an incident, it is hardly outside the realm of belief that something they learned suggested, at the time, that ansar al sharia may not have been involved (or their involvement was not critical) or that the evidence supporting their involvement wasn't as firm as they wanted. It may, of course, be tricky to find out anything of substance from the CIA, because, well, they're the CIA.

If all your evidence is 'it said A and then it said B' and you can't ascribe motive for deliberately changing them I'm going to have to stick with 'they arrived at B from A naturally', even if it was in error.

Well if CIA said A, and state department/white house said, make it B, you have a different situation. The weekly standard article shows just this.

 

[triforcharity]

Did Clinton lie? Yes or no? Look, if you don't think she lied then just say so. I'll stop addressing that to you. But I asked pointedly to other people who claimed that Clinton lied, to what end? That's when you responded to me, IIRC.

That was me. We're receiving very conflicting reports from first hand accounts that say the attack had nothing to do with any protest, but yet Clinton claims otherwise, even though the sources say they said nothing of the sort.

 

[RandFan]

That was me. We're receiving very conflicting reports from first hand accounts that say the attack had nothing to do with any protest, but yet Clinton claims otherwise, even though the sources say they said nothing of the sort.

Thanks. As you know I respect your opinion.

ANTPogo has addressed this. I've posted the original draft above. It is not at all clear that anger from the video did not contribute to the attack.

I don't know what Clinton knew for a fact. I don't what the state department knew for a fact. I do know that there was contradiction in the CIA draft and subsequent memos but I don't know why.

Having spent pages of reading claims and links I can honestly say that I don't know exactly what precipitated the attack. I will concede that it was a coordinated terrorist attack and not a spontaneous uprising of locals. When that was a known fact to Clinton I do not know. Is it possible she had conflicting information? That seems likely. Is it possible Clinton made a mistake? That seems likely. Was it gross negligence? I haven't seen a case for that.

 

[The Big Dog]

Never mind, I jumped on th lap top.

Here is the article, the various versions of the talking points memo are on page two:

http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/benghazi-talking-points_720543.html?page=1

It is helpful to remember that Hillary Clinton was Nuland's boss.

 

[elbe]

Yes. It is in the weekly standard. I can't link because on phone. Google weekly standard. Nuland. Talking points.

Sorry

I'm having a hard time finding the specific weekly standard article (the search results find seemingly unrelated articles), but I found a WaPo article that talks about it. Is this information accurate to the one from the standard?

But a senior State Department official — identified by the Weekly Standard as State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland — objected to this draft after being asked to clear the talking points for release. The CIA made some changes, but apparently that was not enough. Nuland said in an e-mail disclosed by the House report that the edits did not “resolve all my issues or those of my building leadership” and that the State Department’s leadership “was consulting with [National Security Staff.]”

(Update: Reading between the lines, part of State’s concern appears to be inconsistency in messaging. Nuland, as State Department spokesman, had been constrained from saying much about the attack at the podium, and now the CIA was proposing to give lawmakers much more information than the administration had released. Moreover, from State’s perspective, the original draft contained references to CIA’s warnings about the security environment, which appeared designed to deflect attention from the agency’s substantial role in Benghazi.)

Minutes later, a White House official (said to be Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser for strategic communications), who was part of the email group receiving Nuland’s message, e-mailed to say that the State Department’s concerns would need to be addressed and the issue would be resolved at a meeting the next day at the White House.

The result, after the meeting, was a wholesale rewriting of the talking points. The House report says “the actual edits, including deleting all references to al-Qaeda, were made by a current high-ranking CIA official,” which the Weekly Standard identifies as Deputy Director Mike Morell.

Oddly, in November, three GOP senators released a statement saying that Morell had told them that the references to al-Qaeda had been removed by the FBI — but then six hours later the CIA contacted them to say Morell “misspoke” and instead the CIA had actually made those deletions. His own apparent role appears not to have been mentioned.

Morell may have had his hand on the pen, but the available evidence suggests that White House and State Department had much more involvement than the “single adjustment” of changing the word “consulate” to “diplomatic facility,” as Carney asserted.

The biggest unknown is whether the “building leadership” in the State Department that objected to the initial talking points included anyone on Clinton’s immediate staff. (One presumes that nit-picking over wording would not have risen to Clinton’s level.) There is no indication that Nuland had any role in crafting or even discussing the talking points after her email on Friday evening, nor is it clear from the email portions that have been released whether she had actually consulted with other officials before objecting to the draft.

I'm honestly not sure what conclusions we can draw from that. It doesn't sound very clear about the objections State may have had about the talking points as presented.

 

[elbe]

Never mind, I jumped on th lap top.

Here is the article, the various versions of the talking points memo are on page two:

http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/benghazi-talking-points_720543.html?page=1

It is helpful to remember that Hillary Clinton was Nuland's boss.

Ah, thanks. I did stumble on that page but since "Nuland" doesn't appear on page 1 (and I didn't notice it was more than 1 page) I didn't think it was the article in question.

What I have noticed, after a quick read through of the talking points, is that the revised versions don't actually appear to be wrong, just unspecific. I was under the impression that they contained mistakes.
I'll have to give the article a more thorough reading in the morning.

 

[Sam.I.Am]

This is just asserted. Notwithstanding the ARB report you don't know how the cuts in spending didn't affect the security overhaul. You are just speculating about what the cuts affected.

The Benghazi site was on a list of 14 sites that had top priority for security upgrades according to the State Department themselves.The ARB report specifies what was done at Benghazi. My assertion is that the people who run the State Departments physical security programs are competent enough to allocate resources to the places that need it the most first and put off upgrades where the risk is low for later on.

What is speculation is to suggest that the cuts were applied evenly and that all of the sites had a 10% cut in budgeting across the board which is what your comment implies. A budget encompasses all locations, not just one. You ask for what you want and get what is available. The normal progression from there is to apply the funds in the places that you have identified as needing it the most first and where you fall short in funding you defer it until later for the places last on your list.

Benghazi was one of 14 locations that were listed as high or critical in their security needs out of 264 locations. These locations were a top priority in upgrading their physical security conditions. Benghazi had just underwent a substantial increase of physical security measures as pointed out in the ARB report. That those increases couldn't withstand a mortar and RGB attack is not a failure of those defenses. Not very many places can undergo those types of situations and come out of it intact.

You can of course continue this line of thought and say that the State Department was evil or dumb or whatever and applied the cuts to what they asked for evenly while ignoring who needed it first or that they decided to go with applying the lesser funding to the places that needed it least first. But you will come out of it looking like someone with no understanding of how budgeting works.

 

[RandFan]

The Benghazi site was on a list of 14 sites that had top priority for security upgrades according to the State Department themselves.The ARB report specifies what was done at Benghazi. My assertion is that the people who run the State Departments physical security programs are competent enough to allocate resources to the places that need it the most first and put off upgrades where the risk is low for later on.

What is speculation is to suggest that the cuts were applied evenly and that all of the sites had a 10% cut in budgeting across the board which is what your comment implies. A budget encompasses all locations, not just one. You ask for what you want and get what is available. The normal progression from there is to apply the funds in the places that you have identified as needing it the most first and where you fall short in funding you defer it until later for the places last on your list.

Benghazi was one of 14 locations that were listed as high or critical in their security needs out of 264 locations. These locations were a top priority in upgrading their physical security conditions. Benghazi had just underwent a substantial increase of physical security measures as pointed out in the ARB report. That those increases couldn't withstand a mortar and RGB attack is not a failure of those defenses. Not very many places can undergo those types of situations and come out of it intact.

You can of course continue this line of thought and say that the State Department was evil or dumb or whatever and applied the cuts to what they asked for evenly while ignoring who needed it first or that they decided to go with applying the lesser funding to the places that needed it least first. But you will come out of it looking like someone with no understanding of how budgeting works.

At the end of the day it's up to you to demonstrate your claims. You've not done that. I don't need to "say" anything. You can either demonstrate your claim or you can speculate. I'm guessing there will be no further evidence to justify the speculation, am I right?

Do you know how the funds were allocated or are you guessing? Seriously, what evidence do you have as to how the funds were spent? I'm guessing all you have is guess work.

If you have the evidence for how the funds were allocated that's something that could be interesting. Absent that I don't think there are any skeptics that would buy into your speculation based on such thin data.

 

[Sam.I.Am]

At the end of the day it's up to you to demonstrate your claims. You've not done that. I don't need to "say" anything. You can either demonstrate your claim or you can speculate. I'm guessing there will be no further evidence to justify the speculation, am I right?

Do you know how the funds were allocated or are you guessing? Seriously, what evidence do you have as to how the funds were spent? I'm guessing all you have is guess work.

If you have the evidence for how the funds were allocated that's something that could be interesting. Absent that I don't think there are any skeptics that would buy into your speculation based on such thin data.

Do you really think that I would point out specific numbers without some sort of point of reference?

According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), six threat categories inform the SETL: international terrorism, indigenous terrorism, political violence, crime, human intelligence, and technical threat. A rating is then assigned for each category, on a four-level scale.

•Critical: grave impact on American diplomats

•High: serious impact on American diplomats

•Medium: moderate impact on American diplomats

•Low: minor impact on American diplomats

The protective measures for each post are dictated by the post’s overall threat level. At the time of the Benghazi attack, only a small number of the 264 overseas diplomatic posts were rated either HIGH or CRITICAL in all of the threat categories. Our posts in Benghazi and Tripoli were 2 of the 14 posts rated either HIGH or CRITICAL in all of the threat categories on SETL and the only two facilities that met no OSPB or SECCA standards.

Link

This link talks about Sec Clintons offices decision to override security concerns and open the consulate anyway. Which is not exactly flattering to the narrative.

 

[RandFan]

Do you really think that I would point out specific numbers without some sort of point of reference?

Link

This link talks about Sec Clintons offices decision to override security concerns and open the consulate anyway. Which is not exactly flattering to the narrative.

In my time at JREF I don't think I've ever seen the goal posts moved as much and as much contradiction between those who are opponents of the administration. Well, I've seen it from 9/11 truth but this is the first time since then. If you and the rest of those who critisize could decide on a single narative then we might have something. As it is there are many theories and many fingers point in many directions. Newton's bit makes it clear he does not blame Clinton for responsibility but is leaning to fault the CIA, AIU. Others fault Obama. Others the state department. Etc., etc.. If I relied on critics alone I could not come up with a coherent narrative.

 

[DavidJames]

In my time at JREF I don't think I've ever seen the goal posts moved as much and as much contradiction between those who are opponents of the administration. Well, I've seen it from 9/11 truth...

Can you imagine if the original 9/11 had occurred on Obama's watch? I have no doubts one of the larger organizations involved in that 9/11 truth movement would be the Republican Party.

 

[Sam.I.Am]

In my time at JREF I don't think I've ever seen the goal posts moved as much and as much contradiction between those who are opponents of the administration. Well, I've seen it from 9/11 truth but this is the first time since then. If you and the rest of those who critisize could decide on a single narative then we might have something. As it is there are many theories and many fingers point in many directions. Newton's bit makes it clear he does not blame Clinton for responsibility but is leaning to fault the CIA, AIU. Others fault Obama. Others the state department. Etc., etc.. If I relied on critics alone I could not come up with a coherent narrative.

Really. You ignore the meat of what I said and focused on what others said? Please point out where I moved the goalposts.

 

[Puppycow]

Interesting bit of trivia in the Wiki article on Nuland.

Nuland is married to historian Robert Kagan, with whom she has two children.

It's a small world in Washington.

Kagan in turn was a co-founder with William Kristol (of The Weekly Standard) of the Project for the New American Century.

Kind of shows the continuity of the bipartisan foreign policy establishment.