Five weeks later - we still don't know who is responsible fro the security failures which resulted in the Benghazi death of Ambassador Stevens as well as three additional Americans

http://original.antiwar.com/andrew-p-napolitano/2012/10/17/who-is-responsible-for-the-mess-in-libya/

Who Is Responsible for the Mess in Libya?

by Andrew P. Napolitano, October 18, 2012

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How many times have you heard the truism that in modern-day America the cover-up is often as troubling as the crime? That is becoming quite apparent in the case of the death of Chris Stevens, the former U.S. ambassador to Libya.

Stevens and three State Department employees were murdered in the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, last month, on Sept. 11. About an hour before the murders, the ambassador, who usually resides in the U.S. embassy in Tripoli but was visiting local officials and staying at the consulate in Benghazi, had just completed dinner there with a colleague, whom he personally walked to the front gate of the compound. In the next three hours, hundreds of persons assaulted the virtually defenseless compound and set it afire.

Around the same time that these crimes took place in Benghazi, a poorly produced, low-grade 15-minute YouTube clip was going viral on the Internet. The clip shows actors in dubbed voices portraying the prophet Mohammed and others in an unflattering light. The Obama administration seized upon the temporary prevalence of this clip to explain the assault on the consulate. Indeed, the administration sent U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice to represent it on five Sunday morning TV talk shows on Sept. 16, to make the claim that the attack on the consulate was a spontaneous reaction to the YouTube clip, that it could not have been anticipated, and that the perpetrators were ordinary Libyans angry at the freedom moviemakers in America enjoy.

Soon, U.S. intelligence reports were leaked that revealed that the intelligence community knew the attack was not as described by Rice. The intelligence folks on the ground in Libya reported before Sept. 16 that the attack was well organized, utilized military equipment and tactics, and was carried out by local militias with ties to al-Qaeda. In response to these leaks, the State Department, for which Rice works, acknowledged that the assault was an organized terrorist attack.

The Obama administration has publicly rejected the intelligence leaks and insisted as recently as last week during the vice presidential debate that “we” did not know the assault was an act of terrorism against American personnel and property. The word “we” was uttered by Vice President Biden, whose credibility hit a new low when he insisted that the government did not know what we now know it knew. A day after the debate, the White House claimed that the “we” uttered by Biden referred to the president and the vice president, and not to the federal government or the State Department. This is semantics akin to Bill Clinton’s “it depends what the meaning of ‘is’ is.”

Earlier this week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in one of her rare forays into domestic politics, backed up the White House. She actually claimed that the White House was kept in the dark by the State Department.

What’s going on here?

What’s going on here is the unraveling of a value-free foreign policy and its unintended consequences. The whole reason that the streets in Libya are not safe and the country is ruled by roving gangs of militias is because the U.S. bombed the country last year. In an unconstitutional act of war, the president alone ordered the bombing. It destroyed the Libyan military, national and local police, roads, bridges, and private homes. It facilitated the murder of our former ally Col. Gadhafi and ensured the replacement of him by a government that cannot govern.

The consulate attack defies the claims of the president, articulated loud and long during this presidential campaign, that because he killed Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda is dead or dying, and the terrorists are at bay. Thus, in order to be faithful to his campaign rhetoric, the president has been unfaithful to the truth. I personally have seen excerpts from intelligence cables sent by American agents in Libya to Washington on Sept. 12, the day after the attack and four days before Rice’s TV appearances, acknowledging the dominant role played by al-Qaeda in the attack.

So who is to blame here? The president. He is responsible for destroying the government in Libya, and he is responsible for the security of U.S. personnel and property there. He is accountable to the American people, and he is expected to tell the truth. Instead, he has leaked the possibility of more bombings in Libya. These bombings would be more than a month after the Benghazi consulate attack and would attack the very government that Obama’s 2011 bombs helped to install.

Is it any wonder that Bill Clinton, in an unguarded private moment, referred to Obama as “the amateur”?

and.....







http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/17/us-libya-usa-bluemountain-idUSBRE89G1TI20121017

(Who thought hiring Blue Mountain made sense - and why ? )

(Reuters) - The State Department's decision to hire Blue Mountain Group to guard the ill-fated U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, entrusted security tasks to a little-known British company instead of the large firms it usually uses in overseas danger zones.

The contract was largely based on expediency, U.S. officials have said, since no one knew how long the temporary mission would remain in the Libyan city. The cradle of last year's uprising that ended Muammar Gaddafi's 42-year rule, Benghazi has been plagued by rising violence in recent months.

Security practices at the diplomatic compound, where Blue Mountain guards patrolled with flashlights and batons instead of guns, have come under U.S. government scrutiny in the wake of the September 11 attack in Benghazi that killed U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

Federal contract data shows that the Benghazi security contract, worth up to $783,284, was listed as a "miscellaneous" award, not as part of the large master State Department contract that covers protection for overseas embassies.

"Blue Mountain was virtually unknown to the circles that studied private security contractors working for the United States, before the events in Benghazi," said Charles Tiefer, a commissioner at the Commission on Wartime Contracting, which studied U.S. contracting in the Iraq andAfghanistan wars.

Several British government sources said that they were unfamiliar with Blue Mountain, which is based in Wales. They said British authorities used a different contractor for security protection in Libya.

Fred Burton, vice president of intelligence at the Stratfor consulting firm and a former U.S. diplomatic security agent, said he did not know Blue Mountain, but it likely got State Department work because it was already working in Libya.

"They may have been the path of least resistance," he said.

Blue Mountain was able to work in Libya because it forged a business alliance with a local security firm, as required by Libyan regulations.

Eric Nordstrom, former regional security officer for the U.S. Embassy in Libya, testified at a congressional hearing last week that contracting out for security in the eastern Libyan city "was largely based on our concern of how long we would be in Benghazi. We were concerned that if we retained or brought on board full-time employees we would have to then find a position for them if that post ever went away."

In describing the challenges of hiring private security at Benghazi, he added: "It's my understanding that there was a very high turnover with those people."

GUARDS OF BENGHAZI

Blue Mountain hired about 20 Libyan men - including some who say they had minimal training - to screen visitors and help patrol the mission at Benghazi, according to Reuters interviews.

Some of the guards sustained injuries and said they were ill-prepared to protect themselves or others when heavily armed militants last month stormed the rented villa that was serving as the mission.

They also described being hired by Blue Mountain after a casual recruiting and screening process.

State Department security officials had their own concerns about some of the guards at the mission months before the recent attack, according to emails obtained by Reuters this week. One guard who had been recently fired and another on the company's payroll were suspected of throwing a homemade bomb into the U.S. compound in April. They were questioned but not charged.

The State Department has declined to comment on the company other than confirming it was the contractor in Benghazi. Blue Mountain did not respond to numerous emails and phone calls, and a person answering the phone at its office in Carmarthen, Wales, said the company would not discuss the issue.

Previously known as Pilgrim Elite, Blue Mountain says on its website that it offers security services and professional training and has operated in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan.

The website once listed General Motors as a client, and a GM spokeswoman in Detroit told Reuters that Blue Mountain's work for the company was "on a very limited basis and mostly in the UK."

A Blue Mountain recruiter posted a notice on a security website in 2011 seeking employees with visas to work in Libya.

The State Department contract for "local guard" services in Benghazi took effect in March 2012. Several of Blue Mountain's Libyan employees told Reuters that they had no prior security training or experience.

"I was never a revolutionary or a fighter, I have never picked up a weapon during the war or after it," said Abdelaziz al-Majbiri, 28, who was shot in the legs during the September 11 assault.

The Libyan commander in charge of the local guards at the mission was a former English teacher who said he heard about Blue Mountain from a neighbor. "I don't have a background in security, I've never held a gun in my life," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety.

When hired, the commander said he was told "you have great English and get along with everyone and are punctual; we want you to be a guard commander."

The unarmed guards were told to sound the alarm over the radio and then run for cover if there was an attack, a Libyan who acted as a supervisor for the Blue Mountain local guard team at the mission said during an interview with Reuters.

He also displayed a medal embossed with "Department of State" and a horseman carrying Libyan and U.S. flags. "They thanked us for our help and also gave us this medal as an appreciation," he said.

Despite their inexperience, the Blue Mountain guards said they feared the Americans were not concerned enough about security.

"We used to tell the Americans who spoke to us on many occasions that we needed more support in security, because it felt thin on the ground. But they didn't seem to be so worried, and (were) confident that no one will dare to come close to the consulate," one guard said.

'DOWN IN THE WEEDS'

Tiefer, who is also a government contracting law professor at the University of Baltimore, said the Benghazi contract paled in comparison to other State Department security awards.

"This is down in the weeds," he said in a telephone interview.

Most State Department work goes to eight large private security firms with vast experience.

In the late summer of 2011, after Libyan rebels took control of Tripoli, Blue Mountain guards were seen working security at the Corinthia Hotel and its sister Palm City residential compound in the Libyan capital.

A United Press International report indicated that Blue Mountain and its local partner, Eclipse, also were competing for contracts guarding oil fields.

Blue Mountain and Eclipse parted ways in the spring over problems with Tripoli contracts, several sources familiar with the matter said.

The severed relationship may have prevented Blue Mountain from getting additional work in Libya, which required the local affiliation.

On a social network website earlier this year, a Blue Mountain official described the firm as "one of the few companies certified and legally allowed to work in Libya."

Blue Mountain Chief Executive Officer Nigel Thomas, a former British special forces member, did not respond to emails or phone calls.

NO EASY TASK

Setting up security in Libya after the anti-Gaddafi revolution was not easy, documents show.

In a July 9 memo approved by the late ambassador Stevens, regional security officer Nordstrom said his office hoped to shore up defenses at U.S. compounds in Libya and would consider partial arming of some local guard supervisors, without being more specific.

But Nordstrom described difficulties getting local gun permits, noting it could take up to 60 days for "selection, training, equipping, policy approvals and deployment" of armed guards.

and can you say " Send in the drones ! "




http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/18/world/africa/libya-singles-out-islamist-as-a-commander-in-benghazi-consulate-attack.html?_r=0

CAIRO — Libyan authorities have singled out Ahmed Abu Khattala, a leader of the Benghazi-based Islamist group Ansar al-Shariah, as a commander in the attack that killed the American ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, last month, Libyans involved in the investigation said Wednesday.

Witnesses at the scene of the attack on the American Mission in Benghazi have said they saw Mr. Abu Khattala leading the assault, and his personal involvement is the latest link between the attack and his brigade, Ansar al-Shariah, a puritanical militant group that wants to advance Islamic law in Libya.

The identity and motivation of the assailants have become an intense point of contention in the American presidential campaign. Republicans have sought to tie the attack to Al Qaeda to counter President Obama’s assertion that by killing Osama bin Laden and other leaders his administration had crippled the group; Mr. Abu Khattala and Ansar al-Shariah share Al Qaeda’s puritanism and militancy, but operate independently and focus only on Libya rather than on a global jihad against the West.

But Mr. Abu Khattala’s exact role, or how much of the leadership he shared with others, is not yet clear. His leadership would not rule out participation or encouragement by militants connected to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, an Algerian Islamic insurgency that adopted the name of Bin Laden’s group a few years ago to bolster its image, but has so far avoided attacks on Western interests.

Like the other leaders of the brigade or fighters seen in the attack, Mr. Abu Khattala remains at large and has not yet been questioned.

The authorities in Tripoli do not yet command an effective army or police force, and members of the recently elected Parliament have acknowledged with frustration that their government’s limited power has shackled their ability to pursue the attackers.

The government typically relies on self-formed local militias to act as law enforcement, and the Benghazi-area militias appear reluctant to enter a potentially bloody fight against another local group, like Ansar al-Shariah, to track down Mr. Abu Khattala.

Asked last week about Mr. Abu Khattala’s role, an American official involved in a separate United States investigation declined to comment on any particular suspects, but he indicated that the United States was tracking Mr. Abu Khattala and cautioned that the leadership of the attack might have been broader than a single man.

“Ansar al-Shariah is not only a shadowy group, it’s also quite factionalized,” the official said. “There isn’t necessarily one overall military commander of the group.”

It was not immediately clear if that assessment might have changed with new information from Libyan witnesses. The New York Times reported Tuesday that Mr. Abu Khattala was a leader of the brigade, but withheld accounts of his specific role in the attack to protect witnesses. On Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reported that three witnesses had seen him during the Sept. 11 attack on the mission and that the Libyan authorities were focused on his role.

The Journal reported that Mr. Abu Khattala had been seen at large in the Leithi neighborhood of Benghazi, known for a high concentration of Islamists. But his exact whereabouts is unclear. Libyan border security is loose, so it is possible that he will flee or has already left the country.

Mr. Abu Khattala was a member of the Islamist opposition under Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi and was imprisoned in his notorious Abu Salim prison. Unlike most of the other Islamist prisoners, however, Mr. Abu Khattala never renounced violence as a means for seeking political change. He was let out of prison only last year, along with a batch of other political prisoners released in a futile bid by the government to appease the nascent uprising.

Mr. Abu Khattala fought Colonel Qaddafi along with the rest of the Libyan opposition and the current leaders of the big militias in eastern Libya. But as those groups lined up behind the transitional government and the democratic process, Mr. Abu Khattala and a small core of like-minded Islamists formed Ansar al-Shariah, which now includes 100 to 200 fighters. Its name means “supporters of Islamic law,” and it opposes electoral democracy as a substitute.

It has staged displays of armed might intended to deter Western-style secular liberals whom it suspects of moving to liberalize Libya, where alcohol is currently banned,polygamy is legal and a vast majority of women wear an Islamic head covering.

But Ansar al-Shariah also guarded a local hospital and engaged in preaching and charitable work, before popular anger at the group for its role in the mission attack forced it to scatter and hide out of sight.

Suliman Ali Zway contributed reporting from Tripoli, Libya, and Eric Schmitt from Washington.