Not that we are surprised here, but it appears that intelligence sources on the ground in Libya are challenging the Obama administration’s account the the attack was “spontaneous” which took place in Benghazi.
According to Fox News,
“There was no protest and the attacks were not spontaneous,” the source said, adding the attack “was planned and had nothing to do with the movie.”
The source said the assault came with no warning at about 9:35 p.m. local time, and included fire from more than two locations. The assault included RPG’s and mortar fire, the source said, and consisted of two waves.
The account that the attack started suddenly backs up claims by a purported Libyan security guard who told McClatchy Newspapers late last week that the area was quiet before the attack.
“There wasn’t a single ant outside,” the unnamed guard, who was being treated in a hospital, said in the interview.
U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice maintains that the Benghazi incident “was a spontaneous reaction to what had just transpired in Cairo, as a consequence of the video,” and that after the protest outside the U.S. consulate gathered steam, “those with extremist ties joined the fray and came with heavy weapons.”
Libyan President Mohammed el-Megarif told CBS News’ “Face the Nation” on Sunday that the government in Tripoli, where the U.S. embassy is located, believes the attacks were “preplanned” and “predetermined.”
Though the attacks coincided on the eleventh anniversary of the attacks that took place in America, Rice maintains that it was a coincidence. “It is coincidental. All evidence we have points to this video being the spark of these events. In all of the intel and traffic, there was no one out there saying, ‘Oh, it’s September 11th, we must avenge…'”
She claims it is a “consensus view of the U.S. intelligence community at this point” and that she “was not out there volunteering her own opinions.”
“There was cable traffic, involving discussion of the video and the potential for protests, the Embassy was aware,” Rice said. “There were discussions about protests between the relevant agencies — intel and State — but the idea that there was no response from State is false.”
The problem is that the Obama administration has difficulty in being forthcoming and being truthful and they have demonstrated that. When someone on the ground there conflicts with their story, they claim “consensus of the intelligence community” agrees with them. Seeing that the State Department didn’t even have adequate protection for the ambassador there, I’d lend more weight to the unnamed source than I would Barack Obama, Susan Rice or Hillary Clinton in this matter.
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