# Benghazi Attack for Dummies. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 8, 2013, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466 "2013-11-08T23:46:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 40
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/781 "2014-01-30T03:55:15Z")
I bet that you don’t commit assets until you fully understand the tactical situation has a really abbreviated signature. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/782 "2014-01-30T04:04:48Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Hand waving noted. > [@Acewiza](#): > > Consider the following scenario (all times Benghazi local): When Hicks in Tripoli receives a call at 9:40 PM from Ambassador Stevens informing him “Greg, we are under attack!” (his last words), Hicks immediately notifies all agencies and prepares for the immediate initiation of an exisjting “Emergency Response Plan.” > > At AFRICON, General Carter Ham attempts to mount a rescue effort, but is told to “stand down”. By 10:30 PM an unarmed drone is overhead the compound and streaming live feed to various “Command and Control Agencies” so everyone watching that feed knew damn well what was going on. > > At 11:30 PM Woods, Doherty and five others leave Tripoli, arriving in Benghazi at 1:30 AM on Wednesday morning, where they hold off the attacking mob from the roof of the compound until they are killed by a mortar direct hit at 4:00 AM. > > So nothing could have been done, eh? Nonsense. If one assumes that tanker support really “was not available” what about this: It’s amazing to see a timeline presented that deletes the entire quick CIA’s response to Amb Stevens’ call that rescued a dozen or so Americans from the US Consolate and delivered them to the CIA Annex where there was no long drawn out holding off the mob prior to Woods and Dougherty being hit by a random outburst of a few mortar rounds. Can you back up your erroneous and deficient timeline by identifying it as the work of any credible source? That would be appreciated. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/783 "2014-01-30T04:12:43Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > I bet that you don’t commit assets until you fully understand the tactical situation has a really abbreviated signature. They did see a real need to commit assets because Steven’s whereabouts and condition was not known for some time and when word came that he had died at a hospital there was a lull in the fighting that lasted during the interim period until the mortar attack that killed Woods and Dougherty, ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/784 "2014-01-30T04:19:00Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Reading for context is “hand waving” now? > > Good to know. How dare you dismiss him like that! Have you any idea how many times he’s watched The Dirty Dozen!? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/785 "2014-01-30T06:45:50Z")
Twelve? ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/786 "2014-01-30T07:11:53Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Consider the following scenario (all times Benghazi local): For your post to have any value, we need to accept your version of the timeline, and and to believe that everyone else involved knew the whole timeline _in advance_. I don’t know if they could have gotten F-16s into position to suppress the mortar attack. But keep in mind that you’re asking them to commit those planes before anyone even knew that a mortar attack was coming, or from where. How the situation would play out was not known at the time. Many, many things could have happened; to say that they should have had the one piece of equipment in the one place it could help to prevent the one thing that did happen requires the use of tactical magic. > [@](#): > > As for those hand-wringing naysayers who would worry about IFR clearances, border crossing authority, collateral damage, landing rights, political correctness and dozens of other reasons not to act – screw them. Does the phrase “act of war” mean anything to you? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/787 "2014-01-30T07:36:13Z")
One thing still bugging me: what was Stevens even doing there in Benghazi? The proper place for the ambassador is the Embassy, in Tripoli. From accounts I’ve read, Benghazi was known to be located in unsettled territory, riskier than an embassy. Got two bits says whoever killed him screwed up their plan to take him hostage. (Unless, of course, they didn’t know he was there.) But why _was_ he there? Nothing dishonorable about an ambassador being in a consulate rather than the embassy, but, on the other hand, neither does Obama take a break from the White House to go sweep out the Lincoln Memorial. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 10:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/788 "2014-01-30T10:24:23Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Twelve? Now, I must go write the screenplay for _The Dirty Gross_ ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/789 "2014-01-30T12:59:20Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Consider the following scenario… Ad hoc hypothesis. Fifteen. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/790 "2014-01-30T14:32:51Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > One thing still bugging me: what was Stevens even doing there in Benghazi? The proper place for the ambassador is the Embassy, in Tripoli. In general, ambassadors travel within a country all the time. It would be extraordinary for an ambassador to feel as though they are confined to taking meetings at an embassy (or even the capital), as though all the important officials and dignitaries within that country are expected to come to the US Ambassador’s principal office in the embassy in order to have a meeting. Now, Libya is different than most countries in that a large part of it is like the Wild Wild West, but your assumption that being an ambassador is a desk job in the capital of a country is simply incorrect. > [@](#): > > Got two bits says whoever killed him screwed up their plan to take him hostage. (Unless, of course, they didn’t know he was there.) All of the reviews that have been made public have no evidence at all to suggest that there was an effort to kidnap him. > [@](#): > > But why _was_ he there? This has been extensively covered in the various reports – [like this one.](http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/202446.pdf) There’s no one paragraph I could point out that gives a concise answer, but I would summarize it by saying that Stevens was a guy who consistently wanted to be out and about meeting with people, not working the phones or letting people come to His Excellency. He had substantial connection to Benghazi because he arrived there as the President’s special envoy while the war was still ongoing, and lived and worked there for months before Tripoli fell and a US Embassy was established. Part of his schedule for that day included a lunch with local officials and later a meeting with a Turkish diplomat. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/791 "2014-01-30T15:45:59Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Hand waving noted. I’m glad you recognize what you’re doing. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/792 "2014-01-30T16:08:37Z")
**Ravingman:** Not implausible. Clearly, the Ambassador was a man of courage and commitment, we will never have too many like him. Nonetheless, I have a few quibbles, minor points, perhaps, but that’s the trouble with quibbles. We have no evidence that the attackers hoped to take him hostage? What solid evidence do we have \*at all \*regarding their motives? Why _wouldn’t_ they want such a high value hostage? Its not as though they spurn such tactics as beneath them. And it also leaves the question as to whether they even knew he was there. Given his high public profile in Libya, I’m going to have to think that pretty likely but sure, I don’t have any evidence that such was their plan. As to your offering of some extra credit homework, I’m not real crazy about that approach, summarizing a 39 page document as not explicitly supporting your case, but hey, close enough. All I gotta do is read it all if I want to directly challenge one **Ravenman** post. Lucky me! Gonna pass on that one, thanks, but I have wildflowers to press. Seems to me, however, that your interpretation offers more problems than it solves for Benghazi hysterics. Whatever risks there were, the Ambassador was likely well aware, and took them anyway, the courage of a soldier for peace who doesn’t get to shoot back. We could hardly have assigned him a squadron of Marines as his entourage, that wouldn’t so much undercut his message as nullify it. Just as I said, plausible, even if I am not entirely convinced. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/793 "2014-01-30T17:12:13Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > We have no evidence that the attackers hoped to take him hostage? What solid evidence do we have \*at all \*regarding their motives? Why _wouldn’t_ they want such a high value hostage? Its not as though they spurn such tactics as beneath them. And it also leaves the question as to whether they even knew he was there. Given his high public profile in Libya, I’m going to have to think that pretty likely but sure, I don’t have any evidence that such was their plan. The reason Stevens was killed is that some of the attackers poured fuel around one of the buildings and set it on fire. There didn’t seem to be any effort by the attackers to go through each room of the building as though they were searching for someone. From all accounts I’m familiar with, the attackers were behaving like they just wanted to ransack the whole place. > [@](#): > > Sometime between 2145 and 2200 local, armed intruders appear to have used filled fuel cans that were stored next to new, uninstalled generators at the February 17 living quarters near the C1 entrance to burn that building. The crowd also lit on fire vehicles that were parked nearby. Members of the crowd then moved to Villa C. > > In Villa C, ARSO 1, who was protecting Ambassador Stevens and IMO Smith in the safe area, heard intruders breaking through the Villa C front door. Men armed with AK rifles started to destroy the living room contents and then approached the safe area gate and started banging on it. ARSO 1 did not want to compromise their location in the safe area by engaging the intruders, and he warned the Ambassador and IMO Smith to prepare for the intruders to try to blast the safe area gate locks open. Instead the intruders departed, and the lights in Villa C appeared to dim. ARSO 1 realized that smoke from fires set inside the villa, away from his vantage point, was reducing the light and visibility. I’m sorry you don’t want to read evidence about what happened. Go ahead and continue posting your conjectures that aren’t backed up by evidence of what happened. It’s also not my job to work to provide specific, detailed, evidence based refutations of your wild-ass guesses. Maybe someone will come along and suggest that moon men were responsible for the attacks, and I guess I’d be in error to point them to a document that shows there’s no reason to suggest that the attacks belong in the X Files, huh? I guess we’re in Touchy-Feely GD, where everyone’s opinion is equally valid, no matter how little they can support it. ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/794 "2014-01-30T17:35:26Z")
The abject stupidity of this scenario continues to amaze me. Aside from all the other issues, the idea of F-16s flying over a city full of civilians at 550 knots and making strafing runs on “targets of opportunity” boggles the mind. Are the bad guys going to crowd up on some street corner where they are identifiable and separate from all the other residents? Are they not going to occupy actual, like, buildings and such? And are F16s equipped with optical gear and gunsights that will accurately target miscreants while flying by at something in excess of 900 feet per second? Or are we just going to kill a lot of people, most of whom have no involvement with the attacks? ---
**Author:** ![RadioWave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/91b2a8/32.png) [@RadioWave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RadioWave)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/795 "2014-01-30T17:43:42Z")
It’s not fair to say they had no involvement in the attacks… By the time the F-16’s arrived, the crowd would have consisted of the people who helped the CIA chase away the killers and then drove Ambassador Stevens to the hospital. Acewiza just strafed the good guys. ---
**Author:** ![Acewiza](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f475e1/32.png) [@Acewiza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acewiza)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/796 "2014-01-30T18:35:18Z")
> [@CannyDan](#): > > The abject stupidity of this scenario continues to amaze me. Why am I not surprised you clearly have no F-16 combat flight ops experience in the close air support role? ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/797 "2014-01-30T18:49:55Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Why am I not surprised you clearly have no F-16 combat flight ops experience in the close air support role? Oh, _do_ tell. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/798 "2014-01-30T18:54:09Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Why am I not surprised you clearly have no F-16 combat flight ops experience in the close air support role? I directed a similar question at another poster several times, but since you apparently think your scenario was something that could have been done if we didn’t have a Democrat President (or whatever): Why do you assume your scenario is at all realistic when the following people have concluded that the Department of Defense did not neglect to do anything that it could have done? The people are: the then-Secretary of Defense, a former Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, two four-star combatant commanders, the commander of the four-person Special Forces team based in Tripoli, an independent review board that included the services of a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, and the report of the Senate Intelligence Committee. So how is it that you are better informed on what the military could have done than all of those experts? ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/799 "2014-01-30T18:57:39Z")
Because he flies F-16’s in _Battle Field 2_ all the time. It can be done! ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/800 "2014-01-30T18:58:48Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > …I’m sorry you don’t want to read evidence about what happened. Go ahead and continue posting your conjectures that aren’t backed up by evidence of what happened. It’s also not my job to work to provide specific, detailed, evidence based refutations of your wild-ass guesses. Maybe someone will come along and suggest that moon men were responsible for the attacks, and I guess I’d be in error to point them to a document that shows there’s no reason to suggest that the attacks belong in the X Files, huh? I guess we’re in Touchy-Feely GD, where everyone’s opinion is equally valid, no matter how little they can support it. Did you say this? I believe you did… > [@](#): > > …There’s no one paragraph I could point out that gives a concise answer, but I would summarize it… So, I can either read the whole thing, or I can accept your summarization as solid fact? Is there a third option anywhere? Wouldn’t I be “summarizing” as well, to spin things closer to my preferred stance? Since, as you say, there is nothing definitive to “hang your hat upon”? With all due awe, yours is no better than mine, save that it is yours. > [@](#): > > …It’s also not my job to work to provide specific, detailed, evidence based refutations of your wild-ass guesses… Only if you \*intend \*to refute them. My guesses are no more “wild ass” than your own, I daresay. If you only intend to offer another plausible set of conjectures, that is entirely reasonable, given the murky circumstances. But your posture as the guy who knows the facts that I don’t is insupportable. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466.md?page=39) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466.md?page=41)