More junk from Judicial watch. I would never trust anything from them without a thorough check of the sources and context. They love to take a single quote and blow it out of context. That is what is happening here. Notice there is no document anywhere that says the force was told to stand down. In fact, the team was based in Germany, but was on a training mission in Croatia. It, along with a team from the US, was indeed dispatched to a staging base in Southern Italy.
Judicial Watch just wants to show that because there is an emailing saying: "we have identified the forces that could move Benghazi. They are spooling up as we speak", it means that the force was ready to move to Benghazi, and because it did not arrive, it was told to stand down. That is simply not in evidence. The team based in Germany was on a training mission in Croatia when the attack happened. This team is know as CIF(Commander’s in-Extremis Force)-110, and is based in Stuttgart. Note the attack on the consulate started at 9:40pm and on the annex between 4-5am. Forces from Tripoli arrived on scene at 5am and evacuated at 6:30am.
Note, the attack started at 9:40pm. Realize that the team from Tripoli didn't arrive at the annex until 5am. Note that even based on the email, if the forces were "spinning up" at 1:19am, they'd need to be at the annex in 3:41 in order to help with the annex attack. Based on all the additional evidence, it appears the force was sent to Southern Italy along with air assets and a team from the US. It appears they had dispatched the forces to Italy in order to deal with a hostage situation or the possibility of an additional attack on another embassy/facility. They appeared to have wanted to assemble a sizeable team. By 2:30am, Libyan security forces had taken control of the situation at the consulate and Ambassador's Steven's body had been taken to the hospital.
U.S. efforts to determine Ambassador Stevens’ whereabouts were unsuccessful for several hours. At approximately 0200 local, Embassy Tripoli received a phone call from ARSO 1’s cell phone, which he had given to the Ambassador while they were sheltered in the safe area. A male, Arabic-speaking caller said an unresponsive male who matched the physical description of the Ambassador was at a hospital
At approximately 0630 local, all U.S. government personnel evacuated with support from a quasi-governmental Libyan militia. They arrived at the airport without incident. The DoD unarmed surveillance aircraft provided visual oversight during the evacuation. Embassy Tripoli lost communication with the convoy at one point during transit, but quickly regained it. Evacuees, including all wounded personnel, departed Benghazi on the chartered jet at approximately 0730 local. Embassy Tripoli staff, including the Embassy nurse, met the first evacuation flight at Tripoli International Airport. Wounded personnel were transferred to a local hospital, in exemplary coordination that helped save the lives of two severely injured Americans.
Total time-frame is 9:40 - 6:30 That is 9 hours. How long do you think it would take to end a training mission, arrange transport back to base, re-equip and depart for a hostile location? In the middle of everything, a call is received at it appears order has been restored. Another team from the embassy is already en-route. It would make sense to send the force to a staging area to await further developments. Remember, the several embassies had been attacked that day and the Cairo embassy had been overrun. Imagine if all forces had been deployed to Benghazi and another attack occur ed somewhere else in the middle east?
Again, from the Accountability Review Board, comprised of Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering as Chairman and Admiral Michael Mullen as Vice Chairman. Additional members were Catherine Bertini, Richard Shinnick, and Hugh Turner. Do you impugn their integrity?
The interagency response was timely and appropriate, but there simply was not enough time for armed U.S. military assets to have made a difference.
The report is available here
This entire thing is based on bunch of unfounded implications and leaps in logic. 1. Just because a team is "spinning up" doesn't mean it can be at the Benghazi annex in 3:41. 2. The team was not told to stand down, it was indeed dispatched, but to Southern Italy instead of directly into a potentially hostile city. Remember, they had drones over the site and over a hundred attackers hit the consulate. The city was extremely unstable, with large formerly rebel militias vying for control. 3. There is no stand down order anywhere in this article. The force mentioned has been referenced numerous times.
The only people lying here is Town Hall and JW.
