ABC News is now ginning up an allegation that the State Department denied a request for additional Security by the Libyan embassy - and suggesting that in some way the Obama Administration bears some responsibilty for the death of Ambassdor Stevens and 3 others as a result of the Beghazi attack last month.
http://abcnews.go.com/...
ABC News has obtained an internal State Department email from May 3, 2012, indicating that the State Department denied a request from the security team at the Embassy of Libya to retain a DC-3 airplane in the country to better conduct their duties.
Let's read that again carefully....
...denied a request from the security team at the Embassy of Libya to retain a DC-3 airplane
So really this wasn't a denial of
Security, it was a denial of a request
to keep a Plane they had been using 6 months previously when there was NO AIR TRAFFIC in Libya.
So exactly how does the lack of this plane mean that the Obama Administration was lackadaisacal about Security?
This is one of the reasons I don't watch ABC News. The wingnut influence (of their ownership company Disney, who tried to block the release of Farenheit 9/11 and then their "Investigative Unit" who cut and spliced together the original "Reverend Wright Tapes" and ginned up the "God Damn America" debacle, not to mention their in-kind contribution the Bush Campaign - "Path to 9/11") is undeniable.
Their on air reporter breathlessly claims that (You should listen to the audio, it's amazingly inflammatory):
An explosive email from the State Dept. that reveals the extra security requested by American diplomats before last month's deadly attack were denied.
Oh, so this email is "Explosive?" It is a Unabomber Email Now?
The fact is extra Security (as in personnel) isn't what they asked for, they simply asked to be able to keep using the plane. Would having their own private plane be more "secure"? Well, yeah, but they weren't attacked on a plane now were they? They were on the ground in a completely different city.
The Email actually says this:
Undersecretary for Management has determined that support for Embassy Tripoli using the DC-3 will be terminated immediately.
Post's request to continue use of the plane in support of SST (Security Support Team of 16 Special Forces Troops) was considered. However, it was decided, NEA will charter a special flight for their departure if needed
This is what the State Dept said to ABC:
the DC-3 was pulled from Iraq and moved to support Libya early on when there was no commercial airline service into Libya. When commercial service was re-established in Libya, the aircraft was reassigned to other State Department business. We use our aircraft when no commercial flights exist.
Which frankly makes perfect sense, but this isn't mentioned until 3/4th of the way down in the article.
This took place six months before the attack and the only thing it means is they didn't have their own plane, if they needed one - they would charter one.
What's the diff? Well apparently this is.
The U.S. government official who provided the email to ABC News – and wanted to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the matter – described the small DC-3 plane as an asset for a security team to more freely and safely move throughout the country, and to more easily transport arms and other security equipment. In short, having the plane allowed the security team to better perform its duties, the official said.
The State Department official acknowledged that the plane was used to get around Libya, not just to get in and out of the country. But once commercial air service was re-established, the State Department decided that the SST didn’t need the plane anymore. The security team, it would seem, disagreed.
Ok, there was a disagrement. And someone with hurt fee fees, trying to settle a score released the email.
The point that really set me off is this, from the 3rd Paragraph of the report.
No one has yet to argue that the DC-3 would have definitively made a difference for the four Americans killed that night. The security team in question, after all, left Libya in August.
If no one has made that argument why is ABC reporting this "explosive email" about something that didn't make a difference? And if you read further as I note above, it appears that it wasn't the 16 member SST that left in May (the team stayed until August), it was
just the plane. that they didn't need anymore.
So is ABC trying to make someone suggest they would have survived if the SST back in Tripoli still had their own DC-3?
Seriously, what's this email have to do with an attack that didn't take place in Tripoli, and didn't involve use of a plane of any kind? What exactly is ABC trying to pull by making an issue out of something that one way or another "no one argues" would have prevented the attack?
Vyan