Why I haven't forgotten Benghazi

By FRANK MIELE I haven’t forgotten Benghazi. Have you?

Yeah, I know there is lots of pressure on you to just pretend it never happened, or that it was an unfortunate but unavoidable incident that just so happened to result in the death of four Americans, including the ambassador to Libya.I also know that the House Intelligence Committee put out a unanimous report in November that “found no evidence” of an intelligence failure, nor of any failure to mount a rescue effort, nor of any coverup of said illusory failures. I know that the House Select Committee on Benghazi was established in May 2014, and has done virtually nothing in the subsequent nine months other than holding a hearing on how security has been improved at embassies worldwide. And, yep, I know that’s putting the cart before the horse, and that it is increasingly unlikely that the committee will ever actually investigate the aromatic but illusory dead horse being dragged behind.But I also know that the massacre at Benghazi is not going away. I know that no matter how inconvenient, unpleasant or downright threatening the truth is, it will eventually come out, thanks to patriotic Americans who are willing to dodge unfriendly fire from the U.S. media and political hacks in order to honor the principle that you never leave a fellow soldier behind. The mutilated, tortured body of Ambassador Chris Stevens came home from Benghazi, but until his story is told, the ghosts of Stevens and the three other Americans killed that night of Sept. 11, 2012, should haunt you.They do haunt retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely and his fellow members of the independent Citizens Commission on Benghazi, which has been working for more than a year and a half to find out just what happened  before, during and after the assault on the U.S. compound in Benghazi.Vallely, who has been a resident of Bigfork, Montana, for many years, founded the commission, along with Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney and four-star Adm. James Lyons. The 17-member panel includes three former CIA officers, a Navy SEAL, a former member of U.S. Army special forces, a former deputy undersecretary of defense, two representatives of the media, two former congressmen and other high-ranking military figures.In the past week, their work has been highlighted by Jerome Corsi, senior reporter at World Net Daily, in a series of stories that describe a disturbing pattern of deceit, abuse and morally obtuse behavior by American policy makers.

Story No. 1: “Admirals, Generals, Intel: Benghazi Inquest Compromised.” Starting with the mystery of the emasculation of the House Select Committee, Corsi asks members of the Citizens Commission on Benghazi whether they believe the investigation led by Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., has been compromised.

“Vallely told WND (World Net Daily) that he believes Gowdy ‘has received much pressure not to get to the truth, and we are now coming to the conclusion that there is no longer any intention in Washington, by the leadership of both the Democratic and Republican Parties, to get to the truth.”Vallely went on to say that “an honest investigation into Benghazi would prove treasonous acts at the very top of the White House and the State Department, and a continuing cover-up in Congress that now involves the Republican leadership and especially House Speaker John Boehner.”Why exactly such a cover-up would take place is the underlying theme of the three articles by Corsi. In the Citizens Commission’s interim report issued last April, it was alleged that the United States in 2011 had been supplying weapons and military support to al-Qaida-linked rebels in Libya. Those allegations have been circulated in conservative circles for months, but because of the lack of interest by the mainstream media in this explosive story, most Americans are blissfully unaware of it.For those of you who are new to the premise, Corsi spells it out this way:“The purpose of the mission in Benghazi appears to have involved a scheme managed by Stevens, first to supply weapons to al-Qaida-related groups and others who sought to overthrow Moammar Gadhafi and later to Syrian rebels. Republican leaders are covering up the White House’s offenses, some commission members believe, because the White House made them aware of the gun-running and they gave assent to it.”Wow, that’s big news, right? Worthy of a full-scale congressional investigation, right? Deserving of front-page coverage in the New York Times, right?Nah! “What difference does it make?” as Hillary Clinton said about finding out who really killed Ambassador Stevens, and why.

Story No. 2: “Generals Conclude Obama Backed Al-Qaida.” Further details about the alleged gun-running scheme are provided by former CIA officer Clare Lopez.“In early 2011, before Gadhafi was deposed, Christopher Stevens came to Benghazi in a cargo ship, and his title at the time was envoy to the Libyan rebels, which basically means Christopher Stevens was America’s first envoy to al-Qaida,” she told Corsi. “At that time, Stevens was facilitating the delivery of weapons to the al-Qaida-related militia in Libya.”That’s because, as part of President Obama’s strategy of “leading from behind,” the United States was working with extremist Islamic rebels to overthrow the Gadhafi regime in Libya. Another way to think of “leading from behind” is “keeping your hands clean” because obviously the United States didn’t want to take the lead in overthrowing an Arab government at that time. The United States, remember, was positioning itself as a friend of the Arab Spring rebellions, up to and including supporting the rise to power in Egypt of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is the Islamic equivalent of the worldwide communist party. So Stevens was the point man for these back-door operations, which even to this day have not been addressed by any official public investigation, whether in Congress or elsewhere. Corsi also spoke to Kevin Shipp, a former CIA counterintelligence expert in the Reagan era, who agreed with Lopez that both the Obama White House and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are desperate to classify the Benghazi attack as an act of random violence in order to “suppress from the public” the true story.“The shocking part, maybe even a violation of international law that the Obama administration has been terrified to have fully revealed, is that Stevens as part of his duties as a State Department employee was assisting in the shipment of arms first into Libya for the al-Qaida-affiliated militia, with the weapons shipped subsequently out of Libya into Syria for use by the al-Qaida-affiliated rebels fighting Assad,” Shipp said.“Very possibly, these gun-running activities could be looked at even as treasonable offenses,” he concluded.

Story No. 3: “Admiral: U.S. Could Have Ousted Gadhafi Peacefully.” This article gets to the very heart of the foreign-policy bungling by the Obama administration that eventually led to the death of Ambassador Stevens.Remember, back in 2011, the United States was trying to curry favor with Islamic extremists who were toppling regime after regime in the Middle East, and thus with the support of not just president Obama but also senior Republican Sen. John McCain and many others in D.C., the United States was providing weapons and logistical support to the Libyan rebels, who were a thinly disguised variation of al-Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood. Gadhafi, of course, was the former bad boy of the Middle East, who had funded terrorism and sought nuclear weapons up until the time his palace was bombed by the U.S. Air Force under the orders of President Reagan. That had kept him quiet for many years, and the invasion of Iraq in 2003, had turned him into an ally of the United States who was set only on maintaining his own power base. By that time, he had destroyed his own weapons of mass destruction and was providing covert assistance to the U.S. in tracking al-Qaida.In other words, it would have made sense from a policy point of view to keep Gadhafi in power if at all possible, and if not, to at least give him and his family safe passage out of the country. That’s what you do for allies, even dirty ones.And that’s what Gadhafi thought we were going to do for him.According to the Citizens Commission’s interim report, Gadhafi had “expressed his willingness to abdicate shortly after the beginning of the 2011 Libyan revolt, but the U.S. ignored his calls for a truce, which led to extensive loss of life..., chaos, and detrimental outcomes for U.S. national security objectives across the region.”Retired Rear Adm. Chuck Kubic told reporter Corsi that he was trying to arrange a 72-hour truce that would allow Gadhafi and allied forces to “negotiate a cease-fire” in order to “get Gadhafi’s abdication and his subsequent either internal or external exile.” Although Gadhafi was ready to step down, the Obama administration showed no interest in accepting the offer.“I found it hard to understand that we have a Nobel Peace Prize winner in the White House and President Obama was not willing to give peace a chance in Libya for 72 hours,” Kubic told Corsi.“I don’t know if the decision came from the White House or from Hillary Clinton at the State Department,” he said, “but the advice for me from AFRICOM (U.S. military headquarters for African operations) was basically just leave everything alone, to simply stand down.”A week later, on March 29, 2011, “President Obama signed the finding authorizing the United States to arm the rebels,” Kubic said, leading the way to the arms-running operation headed by Chris Stevens, which resulted ultimately in the brutal assassinations of both Gadhafi and StevensThese are the facts, as they have been rooted out by private citizens — working in opposition to a government-led cover-up that has received de facto support from the media and both major political parties. I encourage you to read the full stories by Jerome Corsi at World Net Daily, and judge them based not on your own political leanings but on your honor as an American citizen.Then call or write to your representatives in Congress and demand answers, demand accountability, demand public hearings.I have not forgotten Benghazi. How could you?

Frank Miele is the managing editor of the Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell, Montana.