Posted on 10/10/2012 9:56:15 PM PDT by Hunton Peck
In an often heated congressional hearing Wednesday, lawmakers and witnesses alike pointed to State Department official Charlene Lamb as the person most directly responsible for rejecting multiple requests for increased security at the U.S. diplomatic missions in Libya prior to the Sept. 11 attack.
House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) excoriated the State Department for rejecting requests from the U.S. Embassy in Libya for an extension of temporary security forces that were withdrawn in the months prior to the attack that killed Amb. Chris Stevens and three other Americans.
In a dramatic moment at the hearing, Issa released unclassified cables from March and July that the State Department had refused to release, detailing those requests.
One cable, written by then Amb. Gene Cretz, noted that three Mobile Security Detachments [MSD], consisting of 18 personnel, and the Site Security Team [SST], consisting of 16 personnel, were about to leave their temporary assignments. He said that the Libya mission needed both an extension of those forces and an increase in the number of permanent security officials in Libya.
The SST is a team of U.S. military personnel that was deployed to assist the embassy staff on a temporary basis for 60 days and then extended for another 60 days, but not extended for a third 60-day tour.
During the hearing, the top regional security officer in Libya over the summer, Eric Nordstrom, and Lt. Col. Andrew Wood, a Utah National Guardsman who was leading a security team in Libya until August, placed the blame squarely on Lamb, the deputy assistant secretary of state for international programs, whom they said was the official who denied those requests.
"All of us at post were in sync that we wanted these resources," Nordstrom testified, adding that Lamb had directly told him over the phone...
(Excerpt) Read more at thecable.foreignpolicy.com ...
Wow. Looks like twin brothers separated by birth.
ping to article -— it found a thread ;-)
I don’t even want to think about what that makes the guy behind Kennedy’s left shoulder...
Pretty much like thinking that a high school football team could perform as well as the Green Bay Packers.
Diaper change?
Ms Lamb stated : “ “We had the correct number of assets in Benghazi on the night of 9/11,”
Obviously , Ms Lamb isnt aware that Muslims remember anniversaries ( 9/11/01 )
The fact is that there was one security officer.
If she was concerned with political cost , she might even have armed the officer with real ammo, or as directed by Secty. of State Clinton , only a weapon with no ammo (just for show ).
She released the 16 member security crew prior to the attack , and released the DC-6 which could have been used for emergency evacuation .
It seems that there were four sacrificial lambs ( the victims) , and another lamb thrown under the bus ( Ms. Lamb, herself )
And , the Commander-in-Chief slept
After all , we have priorities , and the priorities are funding in Los Vegas , and a re-coronation .
.
I listened to C-Span while driving yesterday. These two sounded merely mouthed. This is the first image I have seen of them. It’s nice to know that my imagination is still pretty sharp...although she looks more useless than she sounded.
I loved the part when one of the Reps asked these two if they had ever been on the ground in North Africa—and they hadn’t. Typical bureaucrats. They could be from any colonial foreign office throughout the ages.
Horse turds like the Lamb will be making your healthcare decisions.
The State Dept position was that they needed to transition away from military security assets to State Dept assets—and by that they meant poorly trained, unreliable local contract personnel who ended up abandoning the consulate. Lamb said they were using a “model” for the security arrangements that had worked elsewhere. LTC Wood subsequently said he felt as though a “cookie cutter” security plan was being foisted upon them, and that the realities on the ground were being disregarded. Lamb and Kennedy obviously had no clue, the whole hearing, that they had done anything wrong. They had followed the model. They adhered to protocol. In their words, “nothing” could have prevented that attack. They totally discounted the deterrence effect a well-armed, well-manned security detail can provide. To them it was just a matter of numbers, even if that meant replacing highly trained, highly skilled military personnel with marginally trained and unreliable local contract employees. By the way, the Yemeni in charge of US embassy security in Yemen was killed today.
These murders were PLANNED by Obama and the State Dept.
Planned.
Before the Fact.
Treason.
I would add to this:
"Obama informed of attack, went to bed, was well rested for campaign appearance the next day"
Newman!
Interestingly, the question of politics was asked and the answer given....... I swear on a stack of Bibles that there was no political influence to the decision. It was made on the basis of State Dept rules and formulas. (my words but close to the testimony from Kennedy I believe)
What came out loud and clear was that REMF’s overruled the people in the field based on calculations lacking reality as a variable.
My guess is that in the end it was Hillary who was responsible for the lack of security and probably not because of any sinister conspiracy but simple incompetence.
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