Robert Gates Defends Obama Military Response To Benghazi

[_Kevin Graham]

WASHINGTON -- Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates defended the Obama administration's response to the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attack in Benghazi on Sunday, saying he would not have done anything different militarily if he had still been at the Pentagon.

"Frankly had I been in the job at the time, I think my decisions would have been just as theirs were," said Gates on CBS's "Face the Nation," referring to the role of then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey.

"We don't have a ready force standing by in the Middle East -- despite all the turmoil that's going on, with planes on strip alert, troops ready to deploy at a moment's notice. And so getting somebody there in a timely way -- would have been very difficult, if not impossible."

Republicans have harshly criticized the Obama administration's military response to the Benghazi attack. In recent days, they have been championing the suggestions of Gregory Hicks, the former deputy chief of mission for the U.S. in Libya, who testified before a House committee last week.

Hicks said he was furious that the administration did not send in a team of Special Forces or fly a fighter jet over Benghazi to intimidate the attackers.

Gates did not single out Hicks by name on Sunday, but he mocked those sorts of suggestions, saying they painted "a cartoonish impression of military capabilities and military forces."

"And frankly, I've heard, 'Well, why didn't you just fly a fighter jet over and try and scare 'em with the noise or something?' Well, given the number of surface to air missiles that have disappeared from Qaddafi's arsenals, I would not have approved sending an aircraft, a single aircraft -- over Benghazi under those circumstances," he said.

"And with respect to -- sending in special forces or a small group of people to try and provide help, based on everything I have read, people really didn't know what was going on in Benghazi contemporaneously," Gates added. "And to send some small number of special forces or other troops in without knowing what the environment is, without knowing what the threat is, without having any intelligence in terms of what is actually going on on the ground, I think, would have been very dangerous."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/1 ... 62532.html

[_mledbetter]

WASHINGTON -- Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates defended the Obama administration's response to the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attack in Benghazi on Sunday, saying he would not have done anything different militarily if he had still been at the Pentagon.

"Frankly had I been in the job at the time, I think my decisions would have been just as theirs were," said Gates on CBS's "Face the Nation," referring to the role of then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey.

"We don't have a ready force standing by in the Middle East -- despite all the turmoil that's going on, with planes on strip alert, troops ready to deploy at a moment's notice. And so getting somebody there in a timely way -- would have been very difficult, if not impossible."

Republicans have harshly criticized the Obama administration's military response to the Benghazi attack. In recent days, they have been championing the suggestions of Gregory Hicks, the former deputy chief of mission for the U.S. in Libya, who testified before a House committee last week.

Hicks said he was furious that the administration did not send in a team of Special Forces or fly a fighter jet over Benghazi to intimidate the attackers.

Gates did not single out Hicks by name on Sunday, but he mocked those sorts of suggestions, saying they painted "a cartoonish impression of military capabilities and military forces."

"And frankly, I've heard, 'Well, why didn't you just fly a fighter jet over and try and scare 'em with the noise or something?' Well, given the number of surface to air missiles that have disappeared from Qaddafi's arsenals, I would not have approved sending an aircraft, a single aircraft -- over Benghazi under those circumstances," he said.

"And with respect to -- sending in special forces or a small group of people to try and provide help, based on everything I have read, people really didn't know what was going on in Benghazi contemporaneously," Gates added. "And to send some small number of special forces or other troops in without knowing what the environment is, without knowing what the threat is, without having any intelligence in terms of what is actually going on on the ground, I think, would have been very dangerous."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/1 ... 62532.html

Even Dowd disagrees with that while she tepidly tries to defend the democrats with a "both sides are guilty" argument.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/12/opini ... .html?_r=0

[_Analytics]

The following things are extraordinarily clear:

1. Attacks like this happen.
2. Our defenses are never perfect.
3. When they happen, they happen extraordinarily fast and the government responds according to standard protocol.
4. Communication that comes out of the White House is never perfectly clear, complete, and free of spin.
5. The government's handling of Benghazi could have been better, but it was still par for the course.

Swing voters understand these things. The more Republicans try to manufacture a scandal out of Benghazi, the more they appear desperate and unwilling to address real issues. Romney figured out he couldn't win on this issue. When will the rest of the party figure that out?

[_subgenius]

The following things are extraordinarily clear:

1. Attacks like this happen.

for example? i mean what other embassy attacks in hostile regions have occurred while the staff of said embassy issues notices of increasing danger?

Our defenses are never perfect.

especially when they are not in place...which is the issue.

When they happen, they happen extraordinarily fast and the government responds according to standard protocol.

extraordinarily fast?...see countless memos mentioned above...the only thing that happened fast was Obama's sidestep....and Hillary's exit stage left.

Communication that comes out of the White House is never perfectly clear, complete, and free of spin.

so that it makes it acceptable?...got it!

The government's handling of Benghazi could have been better, but it was still par for the course.

again, provide this "course".

Swing voters understand these things. The more Republicans try to manufacture a scandal out of Benghazi, the more they appear desperate and unwilling to address real issues. Romney figured out he couldn't win on this issue. When will the rest of the party figure that out?

actually the "swing" voters for Obama just don't care about these things...they care about entitlements and having other people work while they do not. Foreign affairs and other people's lives are of no interest to them, they care about their immediate self, that is all...and that is what is "extraordinarily clear".

[_mledbetter]

The following things are extraordinarily clear:

1. Attacks like this happen.
2. Our defenses are never perfect.
3. When they happen, they happen extraordinarily fast and the government responds according to standard protocol.
4. Communication that comes out of the White House is never perfectly clear, complete, and free of spin.
5. The government's handling of Benghazi could have been better, but it was still par for the course.

Swing voters understand these things. The more Republicans try to manufacture a scandal out of Benghazi, the more they appear desperate and unwilling to address real issues. Romney figured out he couldn't win on this issue. When will the rest of the party figure that out?

Hey Analytics. Long time no speak. Hope you are doing well, sir. :-)

Please allow me to respectfully disagree with you on this...

Romney didn't have time on his side, so all of these facts haven't come out yet, because of the cover-up that was taking place.
Swing voters typically--i say typically, dammit!-- aren't that smart, which is why they are so easily swayed by polls and political scandal and advertisements.

1. "Attacks like this happen": a good reason why we should have given our people the security they were requesting.
2. "Our defenses are never perfect": especially when our defenses are made up of the enemy.
3. It's not the response that's so much the issue, as it is the mistakes leading up the attack.
4. Communication coming out of the White House that this was just a spontaneous attack brought about by an internet video was crystal clear.
5. So it's okay to keep being an apologist for Obama/Hillary/whoever because, hey, he's still not quite as corrupt and stupid as the last guy.

Add this to the growing scandal involving the IRS--which to conservatives is nothing new, btw--you have a Democratic party and an administration that is hell bent on doing whatever is necessary to retain power. Yes, just like those asses, the Republicans, I agree!

-Matt

[_Analytics]

Romney didn't have time on his side, so all of these facts haven't come out yet, because of the cover-up that was taking place.
Swing voters typically--i say typically, dammit!-- aren't that smart, which is why they are so easily swayed by polls and political scandal and advertisements.

Most voters in general aren’t that smart, lol.

1. "Attacks like this happen": a good reason why we should have given our people the security they were requesting.

Keep it in context, though. The reality of the U.S. government is that just about everybody throughout the defense department and state department are constantly requesting more assets for security. Such requests are routinely denied because instantaneously giving everybody everything they want isn’t logistically possible.

3. It's not the response that's so much the issue, as it is the mistakes leading up the attack.

Your side needs to get clear on what you think the scandal is. Are you claiming that George W. Bush administration left the government with an invincible State Department, and that the Obama administration came in and made radical changes that all of the sudden put the embassy at risk? Or are you claiming that with one phone call, Obama could have had Special Forces there on the ground that would have saved the four Americans? Or are you claiming that in real time as the events unfolded he knew everything that was going on (including the thoughts and motivations of the attackers), and had the presidential responsibility to instantaneously provide the American public with a detailed, flawless account?

Sure, things could have been handled much better. But this was the government’s business-as-usual level of incompetence—not a scandal.

[_ajax18]

It looks pretty clear at this point that Hillary Clinton knew this was a terrorist attack when she said to the families of the victims, "We're going to find whoever made this video and bring them to justice."

[_Res Ipsa]

It looks pretty clear at this point that Hillary Clinton knew this was a terrorist attack when she said to the families of the victims, "We're going to find whoever made this video and bring them to justice."

You want to provide a cite for that quote? The closest I can find is:

"I take this very personally," Clinton said. "So we're going to get to the bottom of it, and then we're going to do everything we can to work to prevent it from happening again, and then we're going to work to bring whoever did this to us to justice."

[_ajax18]

The interview with the victims families was on Fox News back when Benghazi happened. At that point, Hillary promised the victims families to bring the producer of the video to justice. Unfortunately I can't find a transcription of the victims families interviews but this record of her blaming the video at the remains ceremony seems to be on message with the youtube video blame theory that the White House cooked up shortly after the terrorist attacks.

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2012/10/24/Florida ... ehind-her/

On Sept. 14, 2012, three days after the assault at Benghazi, President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke at the transfer of remains ceremony to honor the four Americans killed. The White House published video of their remarks.

After lauding the four slain Americans, Clinton said “This has been a difficult week for the State Department and for our country. We’ve seen the heavy assault on our post in Benghazi that took the lives of those brave men. We’ve seen rage and violence directed at American embassies over an awful internet video that we had nothing to do with. It is hard for the American people to make sense of that because it is senseless, and it is totally unacceptable

.”

Emails released late Tuesday provide evidence that, contrary to Clinton’s remarks on 9-14, on the evening of 9-11 and just two hours into the attack, Clinton had been made aware that terrorist group Ansar al-Sharia was claiming responsibility for the attack. The United States had a drone or maybe multiple drones overhead, feeding video of the battle back to the State Department and the White House Situation Room. That video allowed members of the administration to monitor the battle in real time.

While President Obama did not blame the YouTube video during his remarks at the transfer of remains ceremony, he stood behind Clinton during her remarks, which he surely read and approved beforehand. He did not describe the assault as a terrorist attack. He did turn some of his remarks toward the families of the fallen: “To you — their families and colleagues — to all Americans, know this: Their sacrifice will never be forgotten. We will bring to justice those who took them from us. We will stand fast against the violence on our diplomatic missions. We will continue to do everything in our power to protect Americans serving overseas, whether that means increasing security at our diplomatic posts, working with host countries, which have an obligation to provide security, and making it clear that justice will come to those who harm Americans.”

Weeks later Americans learned that Ambassador Stevens and security officers in Libya had repeatedly asked for increased security, and had been repeatedly turned down by the State Department in Washington. The prime suspect remains at large, and feels free enough to grant an interview with the New York Times.

[_cinepro]

Hopefully the IRS Scandal will give conservatives the mallet they need and allow us to move on from this focus on Benghazi once and for all.

I think lots of mistakes were made by the State Department following the attack, but as Analytics points out, if we account for the expected amount of confusion and human error in such situations, the whole thing has been played out.