Posted on 10/25/2012 6:47:10 AM PDT by shortstop
American life must be cheap.
At least in the valuation of the White House and the other big buildings around Washington.
Must be the men and women sent overseas mean nothing. We’ll meet your coffin at Andrews, if there are TV cameras, but damned if we’ll come to your rescue.
That’s what we learned at Benghazi.
As details have come out in dribs and drabs, each new revelation has illustrated the uncomfortable fact that we left those men to fight and die alone.
We did not defend them, we did not relieve them, we just watched them. Our drone circled overhead, providing a real-time video feed, but it did not fire its missiles, it was not used to guide in a relief force, it just took pictures.
Grisly souvenirs of a gutless administration.
For most of a year, our Libyan ambassador and various members of his security detachment warned of danger and pleaded for assistance. Time and time again the people on the ground said it wasn’t safe and they needed protection. Time and time again people in Washington declined the requests. Instead of increasing our security forces there, the administration cut them.
And then the attack came.
On September 11, in a concerted and effective three-pronged attack, well-rehearsed terrorist soldiers moved against our consulate.
It was like shooting fish in a barrel.
We were outgunned and defenseless. Our “safe room” became a death trap and our “safe house” was a point of ambush.
Almost immediately, the consulate contacted Washington and passed steady information about the attack. Maybe Washington didn’t need to be told. At some point before or during the attack, a Predator drone began circling the fight, sending video back to Washington.
The State Department quickly and repeatedly sent secure e-mail updates to senior officials and organizations across the government – to include the White House situation room. Two hours into an eight-hour attack, the State Department reported that an al Qaeda-linked local militia had taken credit for the action.
Much attention has been paid to what the White House and senior officials did, not to what they didn’t do.
What they did do is swear for almost two weeks that the attack was a passionate outgrowth of protests over a YouTube video. Over and over, including on a taxpayer-funded ad in Pakistan, the president and secretary of State apologized for the video and condemned it as disrespectful to Islam.
That’s what they did.
And it’s worthy of attention.
But even more worthy is what they didn’t do.
And what they didn’t do is help the besieged Americans in Benghazi.
They let them die, live on surveillance TV.
The fight, we have learned in the last two days, lasted not two or six hours, but eight. For eight hours our men and women were under fire. At the end of those eight hours, apparently from some sort of explosive, the last two Americans – former Navy SEALs – lost their lives.
While we did nothing.
Yes, the government had endangered the Libyan mission by gutting its security and denying its requests for more.
But, yes, when the attack began, and for a couple of hours after, American forces seem to have been well within quick-response distance.
Though our Sixth Fleet supposedly asserts American power in the Mediterranean and northern Africa, it has been gutted to such an extent that it is almost meaningless. President Obama says this has something to do with horses and bayonets.
Almost any naval vessel, however, could send missiles to Benghazi. Further, U.S. Navy aircraft in Spain and Crete seem to be within easy range of Libya.
Not a one of them was sent to relieve the besieged Americans.
But that’s not the worst part. In a situation like this, the Navy was the junior varsity. Sitting an hour’s flying time north of Benghazi is an entire U.S. Air Force base in Italy.
It is incomprehensible that over the course of an eight-hour battle in which Americans were fighting and dying that not a single one of those aircraft was scrambled. We had attack aircraft, fighters and gunships a plenty, parked on the pavement in Italy, and none of them were brought to bear.
Further, we have an airborne Brigade Combat Team in Italy. Not a one of those soldiers was moved. The only report of military response to the Benghazi attack was the activation of a quick-response force in Stuttgart, Germany.
But it wasn’t that quick and it wasn’t that close. And by the time it got to Sicily the fight had been over for several hours.
The bottom line: We didn’t do anything.
Which means we are either impotent posers, incapable of actually pulling our sword from its sheath, or we decided to let them die.
Either our head was so far up our backside that through several hours of fighting nobody had the brains or the balls to order a sortie, or we just decided to let them die.
Neither explanation is very comforting.
Neither explanation is consistent with American values.
Our ethic is to leave no man behind.
In this situation, we left a lot of men behind, and we took pictures.
And then we blamed it all on a movie.
When we knew that it was a terrorist attack that had nothing to do with a movie.
That’s not the American way. It’s the way things are done in Washington under the current regime, it’s not the American way.
American life must be cheap.
At least in the eyes of the people in charge.
WE had nothing to do with it - what an ignorant headline.
When, oh when, will Congress act?
Obama let them die! Someone gave the order to stand down. I suggest we all call our congress critters today and demand answers and impeachment proceedings should Obama win or steal this election.
Moreover, there needs to be some heads rolling over this debacle to include that clueless beatch (Lamb) who whether acting on orders or her own misguided and delusional PC assessment, REFUSED repeated request(s) to augment or even retain what security there was in Libya, as well as the Sec Def and the bottom-feeding, scumbag, Chairman of the JCS, Dempsey who has become an Obama sycophant and a political animal, while sacrificing the lives of our Military Warriors in AfGan with the ROE's he has accepted as well as refusing to order Military response to the attack in Bengazi.
SHAMEFUL!
There were options, many options and time to execute them.
We're going to hear stories from the military in a few months that Obama refused to help. He refused to authorize the attack on Bin Laden 2, 3 or 4 times, some claim he did not authorize it at all! Did Pinetta do it on his own making Obama free from a failed mission but ready to take credit for a successful one?
This guy took an oath and has thumbed his nose at it dozens of times. Dereliction of duty! Treason!!!
I listened to one lady on one of the Fox shows yesterday who had worked in the past for Nixon, Ford, and Bush. I forget her name, but her words were chilling.
She pointed out that the 2 seals fought to the death on the rooftop with only a machine gun. She says they fought for hours, that the machine gun was covered in their blood, indicating they continued to fight even while wounded.
What kept them fighting? She said it was because they KNEW that reports had been sent, that there were cameras, eyes in the sky, real time understanding of their plight.
Why did they keep fighting? She said it was because they just KNEW that help was coming. They just KNEW that they wouldn't be abandoned, left behind. That was not the US way. We don't desert our guys in the field.
What they didn't count on was the cowardice and/or complicity of our president and his team.
Some General or Field grade officers some place should be ashamed of themselves for not risking those stars/birds to save those men. At a time like that to hell with it. Chuck it all, because those Seals were right: we do NOT abandon our people. We just don't.
This is far more sinister, far dirtier than Blackhawk Down. This is a national disgrace...no, it's a national betrayal.
As a retiree with 24+ years, this is why I can no longer tolerate the thought of Obama bin Laden, to quote Bob Shieffer, remaining as my president.
Ping to #27
you are absolutely correct...
Romney, if you or your staff are monitoring this site, here is what you can do on day 1..
Fire every single flag rank officer that could have but did not...
We have left Americans behind b4....comes to mind, Wake Island, the Phillipines, China, the Alamo, etc.. but—to my knowledge—never like this!!!!!
Semper Bob Lonsberry!
(See Lonsberry/Fubo...)
*****
Thanks for the info.
i’m not the one who let them die
You know, as I’ve gotten older and (I hope) wiser, I’ve come to despise a lot of what Teddy Roosevelt did - he was the first progressive President, and started us on the path that led to Wilson, FDR, LBJ, Clinton and this schmuck.
However, TR DID have a strong dislike of foreigners victimizing Americans. PERDICARIS ALIVE, OR RAISULI DEAD! He sent a squadron of warships to Morocco to ensure that Perdicaris and his step-son were released. Bathhouse Barry wouldn’t even consider doing such a thing, much less have the cajones to actually do it.
Unfortunately, with *this* Pres__ent, we do.
Which is why it's so important to get it together and rally around Romney, as much as we may not like him.
As someone I respect once said- the way to end these attacks is to kill the perps, then their wives, offspring, inlaws, siblings and salt the earth where they live.
Until Western/Christian nations take this war seriously (ie where everyone has skin in the game) we will continue to experience these attacks.
If we are not willing to carry the battle to our opponents we surely will perish.
In nutshell you are either part of the problem or part of the solution.
Last night on FOX KT McFarland added a detail I hadn’t heard
The bodies of the 2 former SEALS were found on the roof of the safe house a mile from the consulate, with one bloody machine gun
They died fighting, hard, with a single weapon, against hundreds of jihadists, thinking help was on the way, up until some last unimagineable realization the drone and recce aircraft overhead was simply recording their deaths
It absolutely pains me to write that we abandoned those who believed in us, believed they would not be deserted.
There is no excuse for allowing that to continue. It, too, is an issue of life, in the same way as “keeping and bear arms” is an issue of life.
We don’t betray our people in the field. We just don’t.
I prayed with, and led in Easter services with, some of our Seals on the deck of the Hercules and the Winbrown(sp) many years ago in what we called “Denver”. (Those who know know.) I led them in worship on a tarmac on Christmas eve.
None of those special operators, Army/Navy/AF/Marines, would have dreamed of leaving anyone behind. NOR would their eagles and stars.
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