November 02, 2012 03:10 PM CDT
Fox News Finds Benghazi Smoking Gun, Raises Serious Questions →
James Carafano builds off of Fox New's recent report and asks five good questions.
The cable concluded that the consulate could not withstand a “coordinated attack.” Further, the cable identified terrorist groups that were operating in the area. The existence of this document raises some serious questions.
Why was the cable kept secret for so long?
How could anyone rule out a terrorist attack? In the days following the attack, some senior Administration officials insisted the assault on the embassy was a spontaneous act. This assessment, they claim, was based on the view of the intelligence community. How could intelligence agencies not have access to this cable? If they did, how could they rule out the possibility of a terrorist attack? It just doesn’t add up.
Why didn’t the Administration provide any interim findings of their investigation into the Benghazi attack?
Why wasn’t a coordinated rapid response force ready to go? Given this assessment, it is difficult to understand why an appropriate response force for exactly the kind of attack that happened wasn’t ready to launch at a moment’s notice—and if there was such a capability, why it wasn’t used.
How long do we have to wait to get answers to obvious questions? Nothing the Administration has said to date adequately addresses the issues raised by this cable. The Administration has had more than a month to reflect on this evidence. They ought to be able to comment on it and explain how it squares with what Administration officials have said in the last weeks—and they ought to be able to do it right now.
This entry was tagged. Foreign Policy Libya Terrorism