Wednesday, October 10, 2012

May 3, 2012 Libya email terminated use of US airplane enabling US personnel to travel safely within Libya, US staff told they must fly Libya commercial air which precluded them from arming and securing themselves against constant violence in the country

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10/5/12, "Email Shows State Department Rejecting Request of Security Team at US Embassy in Libya," ABC News, Jake Tapper

"ABC News has obtained an internal State Department email from May 3, 2012, indicating that the State Department denied a request from the security team at the Embassy of Libya to retain a DC-3 airplane in the country to better conduct their duties.

Copied on the email was U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens, who was killed in a terrorist attack on the diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya,  Sept. 11, 2012, along with three other Americans. That attack has prompted questions about whether the diplomatic personnel in that country were provided with adequate security support.

No one has yet to argue that the DC-3 would have  definitively  made a difference for the four Americans killed that night. The security team in question, after all, left Libya in August.

But the question – both for the State Department, which is conducting an internal investigation, and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which is holding hearings next week – is whether officials in Washington, D.C., specifically at the State Department, were as aware as they should have been about the deteriorating security situation in Libya, and whether officials were doing everything they could to protect Americans in that country.

Earlier this week, the chair of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and another member of the committee wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton listing 13 incidents leading up to the attack, ranging from IED and RPG attacks to a “posting on a pro-Gaddafi Facebook page” publicizing early morning runs taken by the late Ambassador Stevens and his security detail around Tripoli....

The subject line of the email, from Miki Rankin, the post management officer for Libya and Saudi Arabia, reads Termination of Tripoli DC-3 Support.”

Rankin informs Stevens and the others on the (May 3) email, whose names have been redacted, that Undersecretary of State for Management Patrick Kennedy “has determined that support for Embassy Tripoli using the DC-3 will be terminated immediately. Post’s request to continue use of the plane in support of the SST was considered. However, it was decided that, if needed, NEA will charter a special flight for their departure.” You can read the email HERE.

An “SST” is a Security Support Team, about 16 Special Forces troops assigned to protect officials from the U.S. State Department. This particular SST was assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli.

Shown the email uncovered by ABC News, a spokesman for the committee said the “document is consistent with what the Oversight Committee has been told by individuals who worked in Libya. Ambassador Stevens and the diplomatic mission in Libya made multiple security related requests that were turned down by Washington based officials. Security related transportation has been identified as one of the particular items where embassy personnel did not receive the support they sought.”

Provided with a copy of the e-mail, a senior State Department official downplayed the importance of the denied request. The official told ABC News that “the DC-3 was pulled from Iraq and moved to support Libya early on when there was no commercial airline service into Libya. When commercial service was re-established in Libya, the aircraft was reassigned to other State Department business. We use our aircraft when no commercial flights exist.”

The U.S. government official who provided the email to ABC News – and wanted to remain anonymous because of  the sensitivity of the matter – described the small DC-3 plane as an asset for a security team to more freely and safely move throughout the country, and to more easily transport arms and other security equipment. In short, having the plane allowed the security team to better perform its duties, the official said.

The State Department official acknowledged that the plane was used to get around Libya, not just to get in and out of the country. But once commercial air service was re-established, the State Department decided that the SST didn’t need the plane anymore. The security team, it would seem, disagreed....

On Wednesday, Oct. 10, the committee will hold a hearing featuring the testimony of Regional Security Officer Eric Nordstrom, who was stationed in Libya from September 2011 through June 2012; and Deputy Assistant Secretary of International Programs Charlene Lamb."

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10/7/12, "Obama Names Fox to Guard Libyan Henhouse," noquarterusa.net, Larry Johnson

"The lies and deceit of the Obama Administration are Nixonesque. And the facts are trickling out to expose how President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton are trying to cover up the debacle in Libya that left the U.S. consulate sacked, the CIA base detstroyed and our Ambassador and three CIA employees dead.

Thank to ABC we have an email that documents the decision by the Under Secretary of Management, Patrick Kennedy, to withdraw key military support to the Embassy.

So, in the months immediately prior to the attack the ability of the SST to move quickly around the country is ended and the Mobile Security Deployment Team, which should have been protecting the Ambassador in Benghazi, was withdrawn from the country. So you need to ask, “who was in charge of Diplomatic Security?”

Let’s return for a moment to the memo leaked to ABC. Note who made the decision to pull the plug on the SST plane? The Under Secretary for Management, Patrick Kennedy. Guess who was in charge of Diplomatic Security? Patrick Kennedy.

But now there is an Accountability Review Board (aka ARB) named to investigate the attack and murdes in Libya. First the good news–the head of this ARB is retired Ambassador Thomas Pickering. A man of great character and experience.

Now for the bad news–who appointed the ARB and who does the ARB report thru? PATRICK KENNEDY. While Secretary of State Clinton is listed as naming the team and as the final person to receive the report, Patrick Kennedy actually is the intermediary in this process. Here is the announcement and please examine who signed the announcement:...[Patrick Kennedy]

Patrick Kennedy should be a target of this investigation. He must recuse himself. We already have evidence that Kennedy’s decisions stripped the Embassy of critical security assets. This is a cover up in the making. What is quite clear even without an investigation is that Obama and his team out of the blocks lied about the attack and its causes in Libya."


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