Replies

FACE THE NATION (CBS): Leon Panetta, former defense secretary and CIA director

Good, they can ask if he got the order at 5pm or “immediately” when the phone call came in at 3:42pm?

The TOC agent called Washington at the 'top of the incident', 342pm. At 5pm the President is already aware of the attack from 'when we received that phone call', just updated on the fire. Panetta's 'Soon after the initial reports' is 1 hour 20 minutes later, which doesn't jive with "when we received that phone call, I immediately made sure"...Will FACE THE NATION (CBS) fail on clarifying this?

Background;

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57544719/timeline-how-benghazi-attack-probe-unfolded/

9:40 p.m. (3:40 p.m. ET): Gunfire and an explosion are heard. A TOC agent sees dozens of armed people over security camera flowing through a pedestrian gate at the compound’s main entrance. It is not clear how the gate was opened.

The agent hits the alarm and alerts the CIA security team in the nearby annex and the Libyan 17th of February Brigade, one of several powerful militias serving as a de facto security presence in Benghazi. The embassy in Tripoli and the State Dept. command center were also alerted.

11 p.m. (5 p.m. ET): Just ahead of the weekly meeting with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Chairman of Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey, White House National Security Advisor Tom Donilon tells President Obama of the attack and the fire at the main villa. The president and those officials discuss possible responses to the situation.

http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/Panetta-Benghazi-Testimony20130207.pdf

Soon after the initial reports about the attack on Benghazi, General Dempsey and I met with President Obama and he ordered all available DoD assets to respond to the attack in Libya and to protect U.S. personnel and interests in the region.

TRANSCRIPT: Presidential debate on foreign policy at Lynn University
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/10/22/transcript-presidential-debate-on-foreign-policy-at-lynn-university/

“Now with respect to Libya, as I indicated in the last debate, when we received that phone call, I immediately made sure that, number one, that we did everything we could to secure those Americans who were still in harm’s way;”