Posted on 11/02/2012 5:45:37 AM PDT by Travis McGee
The Benghazi debacle boils down to a single key factor — the granting or withholding of “cross-border authority.” This opinion is informed by my experience as a Navy SEAL officer who took a NavSpecWar Detachment to Beirut.
Once the alarm is sent – in this case, from the consulate in Benghazi — dozens of HQs are notified and are in the planning loop in real time, including AFRICOM and EURCOM, both located in Germany. Without waiting for specific orders from Washington, they begin planning and executing rescue operations, including moving personnel, ships, and aircraft forward toward the location of the crisis. However, there is one thing they can’t do without explicit orders from the president: cross an international border on a hostile mission.
That is the clear “red line” in this type of a crisis situation.
No administration wants to stumble into a war because a jet jockey in hot pursuit (or a mixed-up SEAL squad in a rubber boat) strays into hostile territory. Because of this, only the president can give the order for our military to cross a nation’s border without that nation’s permission. For the Osama bin Laden mission, President Obama granted CBA for our forces to enter Pakistani airspace.
On the other side of the CBA coin: in order to prevent a military rescue in Benghazi, all the POTUS has to do is not grant cross-border authority. If he does not, the entire rescue mission (already in progress) must stop in its tracks.
Ships can loiter on station, but airplanes fall out of the sky, so they must be redirected to an air base (Sigonella, in Sicily) to await the POTUS decision on granting CBA. If the decision to grant CBA never comes, the besieged diplomatic outpost in Benghazi can rely only on assets already “in country” in Libya — such as the Tripoli quick reaction force and the Predator drones. These assets can be put into action on the independent authority of the acting ambassador or CIA station chief in Tripoli. They are already “in country,” so CBA rules do not apply to them.
How might this process have played out in the White House?
If, at the 5:00 p.m. Oval Office meeting with Defense Secretary Panetta and Vice President Biden, President Obama said about Benghazi: “I think we should not go the military action route,” meaning that no CBA will be granted, then that is it. Case closed. Another possibility is that the president might have said: “We should do what we can to help them … but no military intervention from outside of Libya.” Those words then constitute “standing orders” all the way down the chain of command, via Panetta and General Dempsey to General Ham and the subordinate commanders who are already gearing up to rescue the besieged outpost.
When that meeting took place, it may have seemed as if the consulate attack was over, so President Obama might have thought the situation would stabilize on its own from that point forward. If he then goes upstairs to the family quarters, or otherwise makes himself “unavailable,” then his last standing orders will continue to stand until he changes them, even if he goes to sleep until the morning of September 12.
Nobody in the chain of command below President Obama can countermand his “standing orders” not to send outside military forces into Libyan air space. Nobody. Not Leon Panetta, not Hillary Clinton, not General Dempsey, and not General Ham in Stuttgart, Germany, who is in charge of the forces staging in Sigonella.
Perhaps the president left “no outside military intervention, no cross-border authority” standing orders, and then made himself scarce to those below him seeking further guidance, clarification, or modified orders. Or perhaps he was in the Situation Room watching the Predator videos in live time for all seven hours. We don’t yet know where the president was hour by hour.
But this is 100 percent sure: Panetta and Dempsey would have executed a rescue mission order if the president had given those orders.
And like the former SEALs in Benghazi, General Ham and all of the troops under him would have been straining forward in their harnesses, ready to go into battle to save American lives.
The execute orders would be given verbally to General Ham at AFRICOM in Stuttgart, but they would immediately be backed up in official message traffic for the official record. That is why cross-border authority is the King Arthur’s Sword for understanding Benghazi. The POTUS and only the POTUS can pull out that sword.
We can be 100% certain that cross-border authority was never given. How do I know this? Because if CBA was granted and the rescue mission execute orders were handed down, irrefutable records exist today in at least a dozen involved component commands, and probably many more. No general or admiral will risk being hung out to dry for undertaking a mission-gone-wrong that the POTUS later disavows ordering, and instead blames on “loose cannons” or “rogue officers” exceeding their authority. No general or admiral will order U.S. armed forces to cross an international border on a hostile mission unless and until he is certain that the National Command Authority, in the person of the POTUS and his chain of command, has clearly and explicitly given that order: verbally at the outset, but thereafter in written orders and official messages. If they exist, they could be produced today.
When it comes to granting cross-border authority, there are no presidential mumblings or musings to paraphrase or decipher. If you hear confusion over parsed statements given as an excuse for Benghazi, then you are hearing lies. I am sure that hundreds of active-duty military officers know all about the Benghazi execute orders (or the lack thereof), and I am impatiently waiting for one of them to come forward to risk his career and pension as a whistleblower.
Leon Panetta is falling on his sword for President Obama with his absurd-on-its-face, “the U.S. military doesn’t do risky things”-defense of his shameful no-rescue policy. Panetta is utterly destroying his reputation. General Dempsey joins Panetta on the same sword with his tacit agreement by silence. But why? How far does loyalty extend when it comes to covering up gross dereliction of duty by the president?
General Petraeus, however, has indirectly blown the whistle. He was probably “used” in some way early in the cover-up with the purported CIA intel link to the Mohammed video, and now he feels burned. So he conclusively said via his public affairs officer that the stand-down order did not come from the CIA. Well — what outranks the CIA? Only the national security team at the White House. That means President Obama, and nobody else. Petraeus is naming Obama without naming him. If that is not quite as courageous as blowing a whistle, it is far better than the disgraceful behavior of Panetta and Dempsey.
We do not know the facts for certain, but we do know that the rescue mission stand-down issue revolves around the granting or withholding of cross-border authority, which belongs only to President Obama. More than one hundred gung-ho Force Recon Marines were waiting on the tarmac in Sigonella, just two hours away for the launch order that never came.
Thank you Sir for the black and white image you’ve painted.
There are no more shades of gray.
I heard about that not long after it happened. Didn’t Jerry Rivers give out some info that could have jeopardized the troops? Seems I had heard that too- something about him being embedded and giving out his location?
Remember him breathlessly reporting in a war zone and then running to grab a gurney for a few steps and then come back to the camera?
Moron.
Not necessarily. The CIA assets already in-country might have been put into action soley on the authority of the acting ambassador or CIA station chief in Tripoli.
They were the only forces under the control of Americans already in Libya.
Sending assets such as a full military rescue requires CBA, so all the White House needed to do was passively NOT grant CBA.
This would still leave the acting ambassador or CIA honcho in Tripoli free to use the local in-country assets. If anybody from Washington had tried to tell that brave guy not to assist the Benghazi mission, he would have told them to F themselves. He had "the chop" on the assets in Libya, the authority, and he would have moved them no matter what Washington said.
But he couldn't do jack-squat to get those 100 Force Recon Marines from Italian territory into Benghazi except to beg and plead for help, and he probably did.
I'll say it again: the six CIA "shooters" from Tripoli, by the time they arrived in Benghazi, they should have been met by 100+ Force Recon Marines who had already secured the perimeter, while USN and USAF jets circled high above, ready to spit doom at anybody lifting a finger against an American in Benghazi.
And the single reason why they were not there, is because Obama refused to grant CBA for the rescue mission that was already staged at Sigonella.
I remember Geraldo drawing in the sand, but I hadn’t heard of the $#!++y hand prank. That’s awesome!
I really enjoyed your article, and the parts that were edited out, too. Thanks and congrats!
Thank you for your service to our nation and for standing for the truth about what happened in Benghazi.
HOORAY PJ Media! HOORAY Travis McGee! Educational. Opens up a whole new line of questions in addition to those prior to the attack and our responses post event. The microscope on the timeline during the attack will be very telling. Thank you, sir.
The former SEALs defied orders to stand down after such orders were issued three times. The CBA did not apply here. They were already there. So all we can do is surmise that they fully intended to let ALL the personel at the ‘consulate’...(which was not REALLY a consulate,) die rather than intervene.
I had originally heard that the attempted rescue was executed despite a specific order to stand down.
BUMP!
One of the reports stated that the military outside Libya was told to stand down, it is not a terrorist attack.
Also read that Washington seemed to keep changing their mind on whether to send in military or not.
Geraldo got knocked on his behind at Ft. Knox in the 80s.
Interesting twist, but no matter where he is, he is AFRICOM with full authority. Even in the air in transit I assume he has a full and secure commo package.
That’s what is so great about CBA.
It’s crystal clear, and easily provable either way.
If only a reporter would ask the right question.
While I'm on the subject, that so-called "parsing" might as well be called what it is: dissimulation. There's a good case to call it dissembling.
One night, there was a security alert issued because there was a shadowy figure seen moving about inside the wrecked building, with the obvious intent of being there unseen.
"The authorities" went in with flashlights and (probably) shotguns to see what the deal was...
Some "reporter" had acquired some Army duds, complete with Thunderbird shoulder patch, and had stealthily, so he thought, slipped into the building to "get the big story"...
I'm not gonna mention any names 'cause I wasn't there... but guess which name I heard mentioned...
I sincerely appreciate your efforts.
I'll say it again: the six CIA "shooters" from Tripoli, by the time they arrived in Benghazi, they should have been met by 100+ Force Recon Marines who had already secured the perimeter, while USN and USAF jets circled high above, ready to spit doom at anybody lifting a finger against an American in Benghazi.
And the single reason why they were not there, is because 0bama refused to grant CBA for the rescue mission that was already staged at Sigonella.
Compare this to the hideous, vile and repulsive lie that he told to the nation during the debate, saying ...
“The minute I found out what was happening . . . I gave the directive,” he said, “to make sure we are securing our personnel and doing whatever we need to do. I guarantee you everybody in the CIA and military knew the number-one priority was making sure our people are safe.”
He just caused it, by not executing orders with CBA.
A damned liar with a complicit Quisling media is a powerful combination.
Petraeus blew whatever credibility he had when he threw in with this filthy soetoro crowd of islamists and communists.
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