JMS's Chronology of the Bengazi Raid and "cover-up"

[twa]

we could always change any advantage in weapons ,and attacking a consulate isn't exactly choosing your ground....unless you know it is next to defenseless.

The level of security sucked...period

The response doesn't look too good either(though brave men went above and beyond)

[visionary]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...8A626Q20121107

Americans tour base to recruit for Libya army

U.S. officials in Libya have begun to look for recruits whom they plan to train to form Libya's new army, a former commander of Libyan rebels who toppled Muammar Gaddafi said on Tuesday.

After a wave of anti-American violence in the Arab world in September during which the U.S. ambassador to Libya died in a militant attack, President Barack Obama took measures to improve the security of U.S. diplomatic installations in the region.

A team of about 10 Americans from the embassy in Tripoli visited a paramilitary base in the eastern city of Benghazi 10 days ago to interview and get to know potential recruits, according to militia commander Fathi al-Obeidi.

"The American team asked us for a tour of our base and we granted them permission to walk around freely," he told Reuters.

[Thiebear]

Way to not address any of the issues I brought up.

I have a great immagination? You are the one who said I got to have 150 of myself. Now that was imaginative. You did that because you wanted to make this kind of an ego thing.. But it's not an ego thing. 150 terrorists with a clear advantage in weapons, rules of engageemnt, timing, choosing the ground and intelligence would slaughter 16 guys. The 16 wouldn't even know what hit them. Which is probable why the 16 guys typically aren't used as guards but extraction teams where they don't give up so many advantages.

Mine has been proven all over the world with spectacular results, yours only works when you play online.
continue with your imaginary timeline with imaginary actions and incorrect findings... as stated on page one.

[JMS]

Mine has been proven all over the world with spectacular results, yours only works when you play online.

And yet you can't name a single historical or empiracle precident to support your premise that 16 guys could stand up against 150 man comparable armed team attacking an embassy. And I can and have named a half dozen historical examples where many more than 16 guards were unsucessful in defending against many fewer than 150 where the attackers had the same advantages enjoyed by the attackers in Benghazi.

continue with your imaginary timeline with imaginary actions and incorrect findings... as stated on page one.

Curious you haven't given one addition to the timeline which I haven't made (1) or requested any new omissions. Nor have you restated any general objection twice when asked to support it...

You are just a mess in this thread...

[DaGoonie55]

I see both sides of the arguement JMS. I understand they were grossly overwhelmed. I also know what a team of 6 pissed off Seals can do under duress. (I was not one, but was privelidged to see them in action a couple of times). The are truly gifted in the art of closing with and destroying the enemy.

To answer you JMS - I don't think if a team of 16 SF warriors held off a massive offensive it would be public knowledge. This Seal team 6 raid on Osama is the exception. They operate with absolute secrecy and noone may ever find out what they did for their country. I'm not saying it didn't happen in history - just saying we probably will never know if it occurred.

To answer Thiebear - I have the utmost respect for our men in uniform, especially our SF teams who operate in conditions and endure hardships that video games can't begin to mimic. However, I do not believe that the consulate could have been defended. Given the size and layout of the grounds (from my minimal research) it just isn't a place you can harden to withstand an attack. A Hilton hotel would have been better to defend. Their best hope was exactly what happened. Although I believe the Ambassador lives to scream at whoever was at fault if our boys were there. RIP

Granted - none of this jabbering changes anything that happened - I think this is a great discussion and I look forward to it's continued fervor.

Hail

[JMS]

Hail

Hail.

[AsburySkinsFan]

I quoted the full article jut in case there are some who are too lazy to click the link and find out what the Pentagon says happened. If a mod deems that I should shorten it then I will certainly comply.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...8A903U20121110

Pentagon releases Benghazi timeline, defends response

Pentagon leaders knew of the September 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi an hour after it began, but were unable to mobilize reinforcements based in Europe in time to prevent the death of the U.S. ambassador, according to a timeline released on Friday.

Senior defense officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, rejected criticism accusing the Pentagon of failing to move quickly to send reinforcements to relieve the consulate or using armed aerial drones to fire on the attackers.

"Unfortunately, no alternative or additional aircraft options were available within a timeline to be effective," the official added.

The Obama administration's response to the attack became a highly charged political issue in the last weeks of the presidential campaign. The CIA, which had a base near the consulate, and the State Department have released timelines on the incident.

According to the Pentagon's timeline, the military's Africa Command, based in Europe, ordered an unmanned, unarmed surveillance drone diverted to the city in eastern Libya just 17 minutes after the attack on the consulate began about 9:42 p.m. local time (3:42 p.m. EDT), the first military action in response to the incident. It took the drone more than an hour to arrive at the scene.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's office was notified of the attack 50 minutes after it began, and Panetta learned of it shortly thereafter as he and the military's top general headed to a previously scheduled meeting with President Barack Obama at the White House.

Obama, Panetta and Army General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, discussed potential responses to the unfolding events in Benghazi during their meeting, which began 78 minutes after the start of the Libya attack, according to the timeline.

PENTAGON MEETINGS

Panetta and Dempsey then returned to the Pentagon and began a two-hour series of meetings with General Carter Ham, head of Africa Command, and other senior military leaders from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. EDT (12 a.m. to 2 a.m. Libya time) to organize responses to the attack.

But as they arrived at the Pentagon, the surviving personnel from the consulate in Benghazi were being evacuated by a CIA team that arrived from a nearby base, about two hours after the start of the attack. Ambassador Christopher Stevens was missing.

Stevens' body was found at a local hospital. He apparently died of asphyxiation in the smoke-filled diplomatic compound after it was set ablaze by the attackers. Stevens and three other U.S. personnel died in the attack on the consulate and a nearby CIA annex.

"When initial reports came in, we knew the ambassador could not be reached," a senior defense official told reporters. "We were looking at the possibility of a potential hostage-rescue scenario, for instance. So we didn't know if this was going to be an hours-long event or a days-long even or longer."

During the meetings, the group formulated a response to the attack and gave verbal orders to prepare to deploy two teams of Marine anti-terrorism troops, used for providing security, and two special forces units, one based in Europe and the other in the United States.

One Marine Corps Fleet Antiterrorism Security Team, or FAST team, was designated for the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli and the other for the consulate in Benghazi. The special forces units were ordered to prepare to go to a staging base in Europe.

As the Pentagon meetings got under way, a six-man security team from the embassy in Tripoli, which included two Defense Department personnel, left for Benghazi, landing at the airport at 1:30 a.m Libya time (7:30 p.m. EDT).

A CIA timeline released last week said that team was held up at the airport trying to organize transportation and locate the missing U.S. ambassador.

The team from Tripoli got to the CIA base in Benghazi, at about 5:15 a.m. Libya time (11:15 p.m. EDT), arriving at the start of a mortar attack by militants that killed two U.S. security officers.

An hour after that, a Libyan military unit arrived at the CIA base and helped evacuate all U.S. personnel and the bodies of Stevens and the other slain Americans.

[Thiebear]

And yet you can't name a single historical or empiracle precident to support your premise that 16 guys could stand up against 150 man comparable armed team attacking an embassy. And I can and have named a half dozen historical examples where many more than 16 guards were unsucessful in defending against many fewer than 150 where the attackers had the same advantages enjoyed by the attackers in Benghazi.

Guards? These aren't Walmart greeters or bags of meat with a gun.
75% of the our already deadly trained fighters go through special forces and fail.
Those that succeed continue their training and if you remember earlier in the year an elite group was also sent home (6)? (so its really 22, and from what i read up to 34 in January 2012).

Note: in previous Wars with entire countries: We drop 6-12 into different parts of enemy country by themselves with no backup and ask them to identify targets and "loosen the lid" so its a bit easier for us to shock the world "again" with how fast we move.

So lets go back and watch that video: 1/2 the people walking through the gate were wearing jeans an a tshirt with no weapon?
You believe in your predetermined brain of yours that the 6 elite and embassy 'guard', and 16 special forces not only wouldn't have prevented this from happening with their "Intel"
but that there is no way they could succeed.

Fios has 5 military channels and i'm sure you could read up on what "Special" forces go through and survive. (spend 1/2 the time you've spent disproving and read up.
Then watch the vidoes that have been released to date of people just wandering around through the front gate and the light might turn on.

and yet I'm the mess... and your calling our special forces "guards"

Show me any evidence of "Comparible" armed or trained? based of the photos of that night. As I've stated and the stats on the training prove 75% of the US Military are not comparible to the 'initial' Special Forces Training.
These 150 you keep referring to did their training where?

Noticed you haven't updated the timeline since the day after you posted it: Good job on getting it so accurate it needs no update.

[AsburySkinsFan]

So that video absolutely tells the whole story, seriously, you're speculating and then demanding that someone else's speculation beats yours. This is like the games we used to play as kids, "My gun is bigger than yours!" "No, it's not!" "Yes it is!"

And then the neighbor has the audacity to point out that both guns are imaginary.

[Thiebear]

So that video absolutely tells the whole story, seriously, you're speculating and then demanding that someone else's speculation beats yours. This is like the games we used to play as kids, "My gun is bigger than yours!" "No, it's not!" "Yes it is!"

And then the neighbor has the audacity to point out that both guns are imaginary.

What? the video / photos shows many different unarmed people walking through the front gate: Yes/No
Special Forces are better than Alqaeda volunteers: yes/no
A group of 2 cia agents (ex Speical Forces (Seal) made it to the consulate during the firefight, got in, saved the staff still there and 1 body, got out, and took them to the annex Yes/No


answer those three questions ASF

[AsburySkinsFan]

What? the video shows unarmed people walking through the frong gate: Yes/No
Special Forces are better than Alqaeda volunteers: yes/no

answer those two questions ASF

Does the video show what happened before? No
Again, you are drawing conclusions based on what you don't know.
Yes, special forces are better, but why stop there? Why not demand to know why there wasn't an entire infantry regiment based in the compound. The reality is that whatever happened on the ground, the security wasn't sufficient.
The conspiracy theorists then have to conclude that the US State Department intentionally pulled security from the compound in full knowledge that attacks were eminent. Which is when the tinfoil hats come out.

[Thiebear]

Does the video show what happened before? No
Again, you are drawing conclusions based on what you don't know.
Yes, special forces are better, but why stop there? Why not demand to know why there wasn't an entire infantry regiment based in the compound. The reality is that whatever happened on the ground, the security wasn't sufficient.
The conspiracy theorists then have to conclude that the US State Department intentionally pulled security from the compound in full knowledge that attacks were eminent. Which is when the tinfoil hats come out.

I wouldn't demand to know who wasn't there.. I do demand to know who were there and then removed against the wishes of the people they were protecting.
Per the Ambassador and Col Wood? the leader of the special ops team.

edit:
You forgot to answer i believe: Did a couple of cia agents make it into the consulate, extract the people and get back out again? (thats some serious training them alqaeda got there).
Would you believe if 150 Special forces unit took that consulate that people could just come and go as they please through the front gate 1/4 of the way through the fighting?
Heck would you believe if 2 speical forces personnel took that consulate that people could just come and go through the front gate?
which again leads to "assumption" on my part yes.

(I know i catch hell for climate change and since i'm not a scientist i can't comment)
THIS: I know, I put them through school, I lived with them, dealt with them in the Pentagon.
Edit: in 1988 i was going to become one, but went to Turkey and played on a volcano out in the black sea instead.
I even coach a girls softball team with one.

[visionary]

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/petra...zi-questioning

Petraeus believed terrorists behind Libya attack

A congressman says David Petraeus (peh-TRAY'-uhs) is telling lawmakers he believed all along that the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Libya was a terrorist attack.

The former CIA chief is testifying behind closed-doors before the congressional intelligence committees. It's his first Capitol Hill appearance since resigning last Friday over an extramarital affair.

Republican Rep. Peter King tells reporters after the House hearing that Petraeus focused his remarks on Libya.

Lawmakers say Petraeus told them that CIA talking points written after the attack in Benghazi that killed four Americans referred to it as a terrorist attack. But Petraeus says that reference was removed by other federal agencies that made changes to the CIA's draft.

I'm starting to think we need to look at the intelligence chief more.

[JimboDaMan]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com...cnn/?hpt=hp_t2

McCain skips Benghazi briefing, gets testy when questioned by CNN.

(CNN) - Most of the Republican members of a Senate committee investigating the terrorist attack at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, skipped a classified briefing by administration officials on the incident Wednesday, CNN has learned.
...
When CNN noted that McCain had missed a key meeting on a subject the senator has been intensely upset about, McCain said, "I'm upset that you keep badgering me."

While McCain refused to shed light on why he didn't show, his spokesman Brian Rogers emailed CNN a short time later with an explanation. He blamed it on a "scheduling error" but wouldn't provide any more detail.

.
McCain is either playing games or is unable to adequately manage his own schedule. To use the same logic the Senator used regarding Susan Rice, either way he is incompetent and needs to resign.

Note: I do NOT think this proves McCain should resign, just noting that following his own logic would make him unfit

[Jumbo]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com...cnn/?hpt=hp_t2



McCain is either playing games or is unable to adequately manage his own schedule. To use the same logic the Senator used regarding Susan Rice, either way he is incompetent and needs to resign.

That's just crazy--those guys missing that meeting after all their phony ass political posturing in matter than involves our people being killed. ****ing vermin. I tell you what...my dark side ("the other guy" as Banner would say) has rarely been more activated more strongly than by the frequent "conservative" (hate to soil a fine term) originating political bull**** of the last couple years. I think I have some latent Stalin tendencies.