BENGHAZI THREAD

Great article! Tanto needs to be running this country. What a Patriot...

http://townhall.com/columnists/lawre...ghazi-n1897853

Source: Clinton Directly Involved In Terrorist Group “Security Force” At Benghazi
Lawrence Meyers | Sep 29, 2014


Gross incompetence at the State Department, likely stemming from decisions by Hillary Clinton, is a primary reason why Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the Benghazi terrorist attack.

A source who has asked to remain anonymous due to their proximity to the investigation, said that much of the blame for the murders rests squarely within the State Department, then under the command of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The State Department had final decision-making authority over all of the following:

· The selection of the 17 February Martyrs Brigade, affiliates of terrorist organization Ansar al-Sharia, as security for the U.S. Special Mission Compound, which housed the Ambassador;

· The refusal to provide U.S. Special Forces as security for the Ambassador;

· The location of the compound, which was located next door to an outpost of terrorist organization Ansar Al-Sharia; The “stand down” order that delayed military contractors at a nearby CIA Annex from aiding the compound.

Terrorists as Security Guards

The 17 February Martyr’s Brigade, or 17 Feb, was the largest and most well-known militia group in Libya at the time of the attack. Its moniker refers to an incident on that date in 2006, when Libyan security forces killed a group of people outside the Italian consulate in Benghazi.

The militia was born during the war against Qaddafi, taking advantage of the security vacuum to collect weapons and recruit personnel. After the September 11 attack on the compound, members merged into Ansar al-Sharia, a coalition terror organization whose name means “Partisans of Sharia Law.”

However, there appears to be no explanation for why the State Department chose a known Jihadist group to protect Americans in a war-torn Islamic nation.

At a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in May of 2013, Rep. Blake Farenthold (R – TX) told Eric Nordstrom, the State Dept.’s Regional Security Officer in Tripoli at the time, “I’m stunned that the State Department was relying on a militia with extremist ties to protect American diplomats. That doesn’t make any sense. How does that happen?”

Nordstrom went on to list a host of cases in which local militias, in Islamic countries, had betrayed and murdered their American employers, implying that such poor tactical decision-making was not an unusual occurrence at State.

Despite all this, 17 Feb was chosen to handle security for the Ambassador. Who made the ultimate determination? A source close to the investigation says Hillary Clinton made that decision.

“She could have outsourced that work to anyone,” the source says. “17 Feb was never properly vetted. Even a casual look at Middle East newspapers would have revealed them to be Ansar al-Sharia affiliates. As early as that summer, the Libyan government was conducting air strikes on 17 Feb. Obviously, nobody at State read these reports.”

The source went on to say, “The 17 Feb guys that resided on the compound were paid by us, were fed by us, we gave them cars, they swam in our pool, and they repaid us by participating in the attack.”

“We did not trust 17 Feb”

Kris “Tanto” Paronto, one of several military contractors housed in a nearby CIA Annex who attempted to rescue Ambassador Stevens, says “We did not trust 17 Feb. They were a former terrorist organization and we believed the group had been infiltrated by Islamic Radicals. Even beyond this, though, there is a bigger issue.”

“We normally train directly with local militias in other countries, which is a tactically sound decision. It is critical that a rapport be established with 17 Feb for them to be used as a Quick Reaction Force. While our Chief of Base had spoken to them numerous times, the GRS staff itself – the people supporting the agency at the Annex -- never spoke to, worked with, or trained with any 17 Feb commanders or members.”

Tanto reports that the Blue Mountain Group, a group of unarmed Libyan security guards outside the compound gate, either abandoned their posts as the attack began, and may have even opened the gates for the terrorists to enter. There was no “break-in” as has been falsely reported.

Indefensible Compound

Tanto further says thathe had been in charge of high-level ambassador protection in Iraq on previous occasions. Thus, when he saw the compound, he knew something was “extremely abnormal.” The eight-acre compound was too vast to be effectively fortified and defended.

“I chalked it up to the State Department being idiots, because they never did anything that made sense security-wise,” he said, reiterating his statements from the recently released best-seller, “13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi.”

The sheer indefensible size of the compound was but one mistake. A second fatal error was committed by State Department Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy, who refused to provide U.S. Special Forces security, according to a Wall Street Journal editorial by Gregory Hicks, the former Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Tripoli.

A third fatal mistake was the selection of compound’s location. Three weeks after the compound was rented, an outpost of the terrorist organization Ansar al-Sharia moved in next door. The compound’s location was not changed, nor was additional security or rooftop firepower provided, despite requests. It seems unfathomable that the compound was not relocated with terrorists living right next door.

Who Gave Bob the “Stand-Down” Order?

There is no question that a “stand down” order was delivered to Tanto and the operators directly, by their Chief of Base, the CIA official known only as “Bob.” The operators have corroborated that the order was given to them while Bob was on the phone.

Until now, however, exactly to whom Bob was speaking to has been a mystery.

Our source reports that Bob was seeking assistance from none other than the 17 February Martyr’s Brigade – the very group participating in the attack.

“Bob was literally on the phone, calling for help from the guys who were in the midst of attacking our people,” our source says. “Interdepartmental communication was so poor that he didn’t know that he was essentially calling al-Qaeda to save our people from al-Qaeda.”

Additionally unreported until now, was that Bob made a second call while Tanto and his team were in their SUVs, ready to roll to the Ambassador’s rescue.

According to the source close to the investigation, “If the chain of command was followed, and there is no reason to believe it wasn’t, Bob was on the phone with the Chief of Station in Tripoli, who in turn would have been in direct contact with the Seventh Floor at State.”

The “Seventh Floor” is where the highest-ranking State Department officials, including Hillary Clinton, are located.

Why?

Additional military support wasn’t just lacking during the battle, but well after it ended. After evacuating everyone from the compound and CIA Annex to the Benghazi airport, hours after repeated calls for help had been made, no U.S. plane ever came for them.

All that time passed, four men were dead in a terrorist attack, yet not a single US asset showed up.

It was if everyone involved literally did not exist.

I offered the only two logical explanations for this lack of support, both of which Tanto agreed with. Either there was gross incompetence at multiple levels, across multiple assets in multiple regions, including Washington, all occurring at that exact time when help was needed most…

…or that calls for assistance were received, but deliberately ignored.

The former theory is implausible, but not impossible. The latter theory is both plausible and likely.

More than one report suggests that Stevens was in Libya to buy back surface-to-air missiles sold to al-Qaeda groups in Libya, to fight against Qaddafi, and/or Syria to fight against Assad. If so, it raises the question of whether military support could be sent for a mission that Administration or Congressional officials would prefer to deny the existence of.

After all, who wants to tell the American people about missiles being sold to any Islamic terrorists, regardless of who they are allegedly fighting against?

Cover-Up

This theory would explain the cover-up emanating from Washington.

It, along with the pre-election embarrassment of a terror attack, would explain the Administration’s adherence to the ludicrous “offensive video” explanation for days after the attack.

It would explain why the operators have not been interviewed or invited to testify before the Accountability Review Board. The ARB report is Washington politics at its worst – a document filled with bureaucratic nonsense about “recommendations” and references to the operators only facing “a few skirmishes” when returning from the compound to the Annex when, according to our source, “more than eighty terrorists were killed in lengthy firefights.”

It should come as no surprise that Hillary Clinton appointed four of the five people to the ARB.

It would also explain why Hillary Clinton thinks there is no difference between a terrorist attack and a spontaneous demonstration.

The Heroism

Amidst all these new revelations, it is easy to forget the distinction between the Ambassador’s compound and the nearby CIA Annex. This is critical, as it highlights the heroism of Tanto and his comrades.

These brave individuals were hired strictly as security for the case officers at the CIA Annex, not for the Ambassador’s compound. It was only during a routine meeting that Tanto told the compound’s occupants, “if you are in trouble, give us a call and we’ll come get you.”

Civilians intellectually understand that military service is about sacrifice, dedication, honor, and bravery. To men like Tanto, however, those words have a primal, visceral meaning. There was no legal or operational requirement for the operators to risk their lives.

Each man did so for one reason: they gave their word.

That was one reason the delay was so agonizing. The other reason was that nobody else was coming to help the Ambassador and his group, and the operators knew it. They were completely alone. The compound’s house had been set on fire. There was no air support. There was no cavalry.

Coming Forward

Despite the heroic acts of Tanto and his comrades, the U.S. Government and the mainstream media have tried to bury everything having to do with their story. The disrespect shown to them by their former employer, and suppression of the truth, is what motivated the men to come forward.

Tanto said, “We watched on TV, as the news media distorted the facts. The story was being politicized, instead of it being about what was important: the sacrifices of Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty. At one point, I heard on NPR how we were figments of the right wing’s imagination!”

Besides never being asked to testify at any hearings, the men were also denied reimbursement for their losses in Libya…right down to their socks, undershirts, and underwear.

The last straw came when, immediately following the memorial service for their fallen comrades, they were asked to sign non-disclosure agreements.

“We couldn’t stay silent after that. We resigned immediately,” Tanto said. “This has never been about politics. It’s about people hearing the truth, wherever it leads.”

Haunted

As for whether a flood of emotion hit Tanto after the incident, he says it still hasn’t come out. “I’m holding on to it. It’s all still there. I need it to strengthen my resolve for all the naysayers who claim this didn’t happen.”

That’s why the support the team has received on social media means more to them than words can express.

“Please tell everyone how much it means to us to know when Americans have our back, so we don’t have to fight anymore. Any veteran just wants respect for what he did. It is so powerful to see some naysayer on Twitter say something and have a hundred replies bury him. “

“It helps keep the demons at bay.”

Kris “Tanto” Paranto tweets @KrisParanto. His colleagues tweet @MarkGeistSWP and @JohnTiegen

Great article! Tanto needs to be running this country. What a Patriot...
Originally Posted by IIFFOFRDB

Have you ever mentioned Pat Tillman death and the cover-up surrounding it?

Wasn't Tillman killed in a friendly fire situation?

Have you ever mentioned Pat Tillman death and the cover-up surrounding it?



Originally Posted by WTF

I am not sure at what you are driving at regarding Pat Tillman ?
(I mention here honorably)
His loss was a terrible tradgedy to see on the news to me.
I would like to know more about that. Are you implying a cover up?
Can you further eleborate ?

There was some cover up regarding how Tillman died. Poor judgement on the part of some of the survivors and a willingness of the commander to "go along with the story" most likely to protect the image of Tillman and the Army itself. I don't think anyone in the executive offices were involved and they certainly didn't impede the investigation.
Fortunately The Pentagon and Congress finally got to the bottom of it. Unlike Benghazi...

http://www.theamericanconservative.c...whistleblower/

The Conscience of a Benghazi Whistleblower


Raymond Maxwell claims he witnessed top Hillary Clinton aides purge State Department files. Here's why you should believe him.
By PETER VAN BUREN • September 19, 2014


Ray Maxwell has a helluva story: Hillary Clinton’s most senior aides participated in a Benghazi cover-up. Maxwell says he knows because he was there. Proving or disproving his allegations will be an uncertain task. People will claim he is nothing more than a disgruntled employee with an agenda. I don’t think that’s true. Because I was once in his place.

Raymond Maxwell was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, covering Libya. Soon after Ambassador Chris Stevens and others were killed in Benghazi, Maxwell participated in a secret Sunday session, he says, where Clinton aides Cheryl Mills and Jake Sullivan oversaw a document review with the aim to “pull out anything that might put anybody in the front office or the seventh floor in a bad light.” (“Seventh floor” is slang for the Secretary of State.)

As the House Select Committee on Benghazi held its first hearing Wednesday, the focus was on the Secretary of State’s role in securing American embassies and consulates abroad. Maxwell did not testify, and may or may not be eventually called to speak publicly to the Committee, but his allegations loom in the background.

I’ve met Maxwell and talked with him, though he did not confide in me. When you join State, you serve whomever is in the White House, and like myself Maxwell worked from Reagan through Obama. “For any Foreign Service Officer, being at work is the essence of everything,” Maxwell told a reporter after he was ultimately pushed into an early retirement following State’s internal review of the Benghazi debacle. In 2013, Maxwell spoke to the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the House Oversight Committee yet kept quiet about the bombshell information. Maxwell impresses as a State Department archetype, dedicated to the insular institution, apolitical to the point of frustration to an outsider, but shocked when he found his loyalty was not returned.

He has revealed what he knows only two years after the fact. People will say he is out for revenge. But I don’t think that’s the case. As a State Department whistleblower who experienced how the Department treats such people, I know it’s not a position anyone wants to be in.

My own whistleblowing seems minor compared to something that might alter the race for the presidency. With 22 years at State, I spent 12 months leading two Provincial Reconstruction Teams in Iraq. The staggering incompetence and waste of taxpayer money I saw, coupled with the near-complete lack of interest I found at the Department while trying to “go through channels,” led me to write a book exposing it all. The response was devastating: my security clearance was pulled; my case was sent to the Department of Justice for prosecution; I was frog-marched out of my office and forbidden to enter any State Department facility; I was placed on a Secret Service watch list as a potential threat to Mrs. Clinton; the pension I earned over a long career was threatened; and only after the intercession of some of the lawyers now representing Edward Snowden was I “allowed” to retire. My case appeared in Glenn Greenwald’s column. All over a book that discussed history and named no names.

For whistleblowers to go public, there is a calculus of pain and gain, and working it out takes time. You try to go through channels: Congressman Jason Chaffetz says Maxwell first told lawmakers his full story privately some time ago. Then you wait in hopes that the information will come out without you, that someone else might speak up first; you hint at the truth, hoping someone will take the bait, but instead see faux investigations and bleats about “it’s just politics” further bury it.

There was a two-year gap between much of what I saw in Iraq and my public coming out. The same was true for Snowden and other whistleblowers. You don’t just wake up one morning and decide to turn your own life, and that of your family, upside down, risking financial ruin, public shaming, and possibly jail time. It is a process, not an event. You have to wonder what your fate will be once the media grows bored with your story, how far your actions will follow you. Fear travels with you on your journey of conscience. In my case, I was ignorant of what would happen once I blew the whistle. Ray Maxwell had examples to learn from. He likely calculated he needed to retire securely from State before taking Team Clinton head-on.

Now of course much of this is politics, in all its forms, though non-political questions about Benghazi still exist, especially as America resumes war in Iraq with its largest embassy vulnerable. Politics still does matter and is indeed inevitable, as the measure of candidates needs to be taken. Among other things, their view of whistleblowers is important.

Document reviews at State following a significant event are not unheard of; an affected office needs to recap how it got to where it is. Conducting such a review in secret, on a Sunday, with some of the Secretary’s most senior advisors personally overseeing things, is in fact unheard of. The details of Maxwell’s story ring true, the place, the procedures. Checks of State Department entry and exit records and room use requests should establish the basic facts. Proving what happened at that document review will be much, much harder and will focus in large part on Maxwell’s own credibility.

Is Maxwell a disgruntled employee with an agenda? Possibly, but whistleblowers act on conscience, not revenge; the cost is too high for that, and in this day revenge is available much cheaper via a leak or as an unnamed source. Going public and disgruntlement often coincide but are not necessarily causally connected. Knowing the right thing to do is easier than summoning the courage and aligning one’s life to step up and do it.

I think Ray Maxwell is credible. I don’t think his timing suggests he is not. We’ll see, paraphrasing Clinton’s own words on Benghazi, if it really matters anymore, and what difference it does make.

Peter Van Buren blew the whistle on State Department waste and mismanagement during the Iraqi reconstruction in his first book, We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People. His new book, Ghosts of Tom Joad: A Story of the #99Percent, is available now.

Who Gave Bob the “Stand-Down” Order?

There is no question that a “stand down” order was delivered to Tanto and the operators directly, by their Chief of Base, the CIA official known only as “Bob.” The operators have corroborated that the order was given to them while Bob was on the phone.

Until now, however, exactly to whom Bob was speaking to has been a mystery.

Our source reports that Bob was seeking assistance from none other than the 17 February Martyr’s Brigade – the very group participating in the attack.

“Bob was literally on the phone, calling for help from the guys who were in the midst of attacking our people,” our source says. “Interdepartmental communication was so poor that he didn’t know that he was essentially calling al-Qaeda to save our people from al-Qaeda.”

Additionally unreported until now, was that Bob made a second call while Tanto and his team were in their SUVs, ready to roll to the Ambassador’s rescue.

According to the source close to the investigation, “If the chain of command was followed, and there is no reason to believe it wasn’t, Bob was on the phone with the Chief of Station in Tripoli, who in turn would have been in direct contact with the Seventh Floor at State.”

The “Seventh Floor” is where the highest-ranking State Department officials, including Hillary Clinton, are located.
Originally Posted by IIFFOFRDB

"Plans were still forming and changing, with input and decisions flying between Benghazi, Tripoli and Washington ... they hoped the wait orders would be reversed" (p. 99, Mitchell Zuckoff with the Annex Security Team, 13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi).

"Seventh Floor at State"=

Is this ANOTHER inane thread from Slobbrin?

I am not sure at what you are driving at regarding Pat Tillman ?
(I mention here honorably)
His loss was a terrible tradgedy to see on the news to me.
I would like to know more about that. Are you implying a cover up?
Can you further eleborate ? Originally Posted by rioseco

Krakauer demonstrates that the willful deception went all the way up to the White House, when an email from an army official exhorted President Bush not to mention the manner of Tillman's death, lest it prove "embarassing" should the incident prove to be friendly fire (something the official already knew). This deceit, Krakauer notes, led one Tillman friend to leave the army and another to go AWOL, losing their faith in the institution they'd signed up for.

http://www.alternet.org/story/142692...ath?page=0%2C1

Originally posted by IIFFOFRDB........

Who Gave Bob the “Stand-Down” Order?

There is no question that a “stand down” order was delivered to Tanto and the operators directly, by their Chief of Base, the CIA official known only as “Bob.” The operators have corroborated that the order was given to them while Bob was on the phone.

Until now, however, exactly to whom Bob was speaking to has been a mystery.

Our source reports that Bob was seeking assistance from none other than the 17 February Martyr’s Brigade – the very group participating in the attack.

“Bob was literally on the phone, calling for help from the guys who were in the midst of attacking our people,” our source says. “Interdepartmental communication was so poor that he didn’t know that he was essentially calling al-Qaeda to save our people from al-Qaeda.”

Additionally unreported until now, was that Bob made a second call while Tanto and his team were in their SUVs, ready to roll to the Ambassador’s rescue.

According to the source close to the investigation, “If the chain of command was followed, and there is no reason to believe it wasn’t, Bob was on the phone with the Chief of Station in Tripoli, who in turn would have been in direct contact with the Seventh Floor at State.”

The “Seventh Floor” is where the highest-ranking State Department officials, including Hillary Clinton, are located....
Originally Posted by IIFFOFRDB

All good questions and you can bet Gowdy's investigators are pursuing the answers....................If/when the GOP regains control of the Senate, the full truth and the Obama Benghazi lies will be exposed.

What are you saying whirlaturd none of the countless investigations have stumbled on anything?

Krakauer demonstrates that the willful deception went all the way up to the White House, when an email from an army official exhorted President Bush not to mention the manner of Tillman's death, lest it prove "embarassing" should the incident prove to be friendly fire (something the official already knew). This deceit, Krakauer notes, led one Tillman friend to leave the army and another to go AWOL, losing their faith in the institution they'd signed up for.

http://www.alternet.org/story/142692...ath?page=0%2C1 Originally Posted by WTF

Again, right prevailed...The White House and the Pentagon got to the bottom of the tragedy and let the truth be told...Again, Unlike Benghazi, the IRS, the NSA, etc. Investigators have been stonewalled, lied to and people in the know keep saying "there's nothing to see" long enough for it to become old news.
This shit will eventually see the light of day. It may be after the next Presidential election and that's fine. That's when a president's legacy is set anyway. There are too many smoking guns.

Krakauer demonstrates that the willful deception went all the way up to the White House, when an email from an army official exhorted President Bush not to mention the manner of Tillman's death, lest it prove "embarassing" should the incident prove to be friendly fire (something the official already knew). This deceit, Krakauer notes, led one Tillman friend to leave the army and another to go AWOL, losing their faith in the institution they'd signed up for.

http://www.alternet.org/story/142692...ath?page=0%2C1 Originally Posted by WTF

Fucking mutineer!!! I thought that people couldn't leave the army without being party to insurrection, at least according to some comments on another thread about a Republican congressman and his suggestions some Generals might resign rather than continue on a course set by Lord Obama.........

"Seventh Floor at State"= Originally Posted by IIFFOFRDB

Does anyone really like her?