# 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:** 49
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2014, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/961 "2014-02-05T20:55:22Z")
Is there any point to this latest round of posts? Get back on debate or let it go. ---
**Author:** ![Oliveritaly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oliveritaly/32/15233_2.png) [@Oliveritaly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oliveritaly)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2014, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/962 "2014-02-05T21:15:30Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Is there any point to this latest round of posts? Get back on debate or let it go. It’s fun to read. ---
**Author:** ![Oliveritaly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oliveritaly/32/15233_2.png) [@Oliveritaly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oliveritaly)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2014, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/963 "2014-02-05T21:17:14Z")
Magiver, acewiza you both should really stop posting. Anyone with a shred of knowledge re: operations is just poking at you now. Give it up. ---
**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:** [February 5, 2014, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/964 "2014-02-05T21:31:09Z")
> [@Acewiza](#): > > Declining to divulge information is what I did. I can neither confirm nor deny what it is you think I might know. Your every post in this thread confirms what you don’t know. ---
**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:** [February 5, 2014, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/965 "2014-02-05T21:56:16Z")
So, the scenario posted by **Acewiza** was written by a Air Force pilot who retired in 1984. He appears to be a very accomplished pilot, but one can’t help but wonder why the only expert he will listen to is a airman who has been out of uniform for thirty years and whose writing suffers from serious factual errors. (Like the CG of “AFRICON” being told to “stand down,” an order that literally never occurred.) ---
**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:** [February 5, 2014, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/966 "2014-02-05T22:37:03Z")
Link? ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2014, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/967 "2014-02-05T23:02:52Z")
[http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/colonel-phil-handley/betrayal-in-benghazi/](http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/colonel-phil-handley/betrayal-in-benghazi/) Just an angry old man, really. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/968 "2014-02-06T00:31:10Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Is there any point to this latest round of posts? As the OP’er, I feel obliged to read all posts to this thread. So, for my sake, can it be euthanized? Please. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/969 "2014-02-06T00:33:21Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Further, if those four Green Berets had flown in with the six-man team, leaving the embassy defenseless, … > [@](#): > > … About 12:30 at the same time that we see the Twitter feeds that are asserting that Ansar Sharia is responsible for the attack, we also see a call for an attack on the embassy in Tripoli. And so we begin to - we – we had always thought that we were in – under threat, that we now have to take care of ourselves and we began planning to evacuate our facility. When I say our facility, I mean the State Department residential compound in Tripoli, and to consolidate all of our personnel in – at the annex in Tripoli. > > We have about 55 diplomatic personnel in the two annexes. … > > … Lieutenant Colonel Phillips and Lieutenant Colonel Arnt and Lieutenant Colonel Gibson mountains of strength. I’m still in awe of them. They asked me, in one of the phone calls, when were you going to move to the annex, and I said, ''We’ll move at dawn,`` because none of our people had great experience driving the armored suburbans that we were going to have to use. > > Our local staff drove for us as part of our security procedures. They of course were not there that night, and we would have to go through check points, militia check points on the way to the annex to get there, and I didn’t want our people to be going through those check points, because I didn’t know what to expect from the militias. …[RIGHT][CITE](http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/08/transcript-whistle-blower-account-sept-11-libya-terror-attack/)[/RIGHT] Of course, if those four Green Berets had been allowed to [del]abandon their posts[/del] go on the rescue mission and things in Tripoli went bad (read: up to 55 dead diplomatic personnel, ya know the folks we send abroad without guns to fend off the bad guys), we can be certain that we wouldn’t hearing demands to know who didn’t, and why they didn’t, order those four Green Berets to stand down. CMC ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/970 "2014-02-06T00:54:17Z")
> [@KarlGauss](#): > > As the OP’er, I feel obliged to read all posts to this thread. Well there’s yer problem right there… ---
**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:** [February 6, 2014, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/971 "2014-02-06T01:31:04Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > [http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/colonel-phil-handley/betrayal-in-benghazi/](http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/colonel-phil-handley/betrayal-in-benghazi/) > > Just an angry old man, really. Thank you. Nice spot of plagiarism there, **Acewiza**. At least that explains your problems with follow-up questions and citing your sources. Next time, maybe copy something less error-riddled, though. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/972 "2014-02-06T05:39:41Z")
In all the years I’ve been reading the Straight Dope I don’t think I’ve ever seen two people so thoroughly humiliated and destroyed in a debate as I’ve seen in this thread. The discovery that one of the posters was plaguizing the drunken ramblings of some internet hero was the icing on this incredible cake. I suspect this thread will be closed soon, so I just wanted to congratulate the posters while I still could. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/973 "2014-02-06T06:34:20Z")
> [@CannyDan](#): > > So, to sum it up, **Magiver** is still hung up on the rapid deployment of a cargo plane filled with buckets of old drill bits like the one he once commissioned, in peacetime, with no lives at stake, from a commercial airport. And a 4 man team assigned to receive the evacuees from the Benghazi attack rather than tardily, futilely – and foolishly – following along behind them. As long as we can blame Hilary. I didn’t specify anything. I pointed out the how easy it is to launch an airplane in contrast to the posters who thought it was some kind of miracle. It’s odd that you think trained military personnel can’t do it when it’s routine stuff for civilian companies. I then got a rash of crap about how impossible it was to drop equipment on location and I cited the GPS chute system used for precisely that function. Nothing particularly high tech or cutting edge. That was followed by not being able to quickly deploy in a covert manner. Again, I posted the type of equipment in their inventory. Go figure someone who plans fast covert operations decided small fast commercial vehicles are useful for moving from point to point quickly. So to sum it up, I posted the time delays on deployment which were unnecessary in the first place. We had a huge advantage in this situation with drones. [Current technology](http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/new-surveillance-technology-can-track-everyone-in-an-area-for-several-hours-at-a-time/2014/02/05/82f1556e-876f-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_print.html) allows us to track everything viewed by a drone continuously. The software will literally follow every car and person moving in a small city. This is more area than what was required in this situation. The people making the decisions waited too long. They didn’t know how the situation was going to unfold so the logical decision was to immediately move assets toward the area to provide options. Any military plane capable of hanging a weapon would have been useful in the area. Any covert group in the area would have been useful. Once on-site it gives planners options to work with. This is what should have been done. So I’ll ask the question again, why did Hillary say it was her biggest regret when asked if she could have any “do-overs”. Quote: “I mean, you know, you make these choices based on imperfect information. And you make them to, as we say, the best of your ability. But that doesn’t mean that there’s not going to be unforeseen consequences, unpredictable twists and turns.” Why the regret if the right decisions were made? ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/974 "2014-02-06T06:39:16Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Of course, if those four Green Berets had been allowed to [del]abandon their posts[/del] go on the rescue mission and things in Tripoli went bad (read: up to 55 dead diplomatic personnel, ya know the folks we send abroad without guns to fend off the bad guys), we can be certain that we wouldn’t hearing demands to know who didn’t, and why they didn’t, order those four Green Berets to stand down. > > CMC Tripoli wasn’t under attack. Benghazi was. Using your logic we should never respond to emergencies because someone might die. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/975 "2014-02-06T07:00:11Z")
> [@KarlGauss](#): > > As the OP’er, I feel obliged to read all posts to this thread. So, for my sake, can it be euthanized? Please. If you love something, let it go. If it doesn’t come back, it probably died. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 10:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/976 "2014-02-06T10:02:13Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > Why the regret if the right decisions were made? Because people died. If she could go back in time to several days before the attack and order them to leave Libya, than I’m sure she would. That would have saved their lives, but there’s no possible way she could have known at the time to get them out before the attack. ---
**Author:** ![Oliveritaly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oliveritaly/32/15233_2.png) [@Oliveritaly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oliveritaly)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/977 "2014-02-06T10:31:52Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Thank you. > > Nice spot of plagiarism there, **Acewiza**. At least that explains your problems with follow-up questions and citing your sources. > > Next time, maybe copy something less error-riddled, though. Wow, just wow. Good job Acewiza! ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2014, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/978 "2014-02-06T11:32:54Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > Tripoli wasn’t under attack. Benghazi was. And we all know that there was absolutely no chance of anyone attacking the Embassy in Tripoli that day at all because…? ---
**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:** [February 6, 2014, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/979 "2014-02-06T14:13:25Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > We had a huge advantage in this situation with drones. [Current technology](http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/new-surveillance-technology-can-track-everyone-in-an-area-for-several-hours-at-a-time/2014/02/05/82f1556e-876f-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_print.html) allows us to track everything viewed by a drone continuously. The software will literally follow every car and person moving in a small city. This is more area than what was required in this situation. Those systems are not equipped on Predators, so it couldn’t have been available. In fact, several of those sorts of systems are mounted on aerostats. Do you know how long it would take an aerostat to get to Benghazi? I assure you it isn’t a couple hours, because aerostats if left to their own devices move very, very, very, VERY slowly indeed. ---
**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:** [February 6, 2014, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466/980 "2014-02-06T14:21:02Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > So to sum it up, I posted the time delays on deployment which were unnecessary in the first place. We had a huge advantage in this situation with drones. [Current technology](http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/new-surveillance-technology-can-track-everyone-in-an-area-for-several-hours-at-a-time/2014/02/05/82f1556e-876f-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_print.html) allows us to track everything viewed by a drone continuously. The software will literally follow every car and person moving in a small city. This is more area than what was required in this situation. The people making the decisions waited too long. What delays? The 20-25 minutes to get militia support and armored vehicles before the team from the CIA annex relieved the consulate? The 17 minutes before a drone was redirected toward Benghazi? The two hours and fifteen minutes before the Secretary of Defense ordered **three** teams to make ready to depart for Libya? The two hours and thirty minutes before the team in Tripoli was able to charter a private plane, because there were no U.S. government planes there? Where [in the timeline](http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/05/08/us/benghazi-pentagon-timeline.html?ref=politics&_r=1&) are these unreasonable delays? Please, for once, be specific. > [@Magiver](#): > > They didn’t know how the situation was going to unfold so the logical decision was to immediately move assets toward the area to provide options. > [@Magiver](#): > > Did you miss the part where they couldn’t have known the timeline of what was to come when deciding to act? > [@Magiver](#): > > Tripoli wasn’t under attack. Benghazi was. Using your logic we should never respond to emergencies because someone might die. So, they didn’t know what was going to happen next, so they should have left an embassy in Libya undefended right after a consulate in Libya was attacked? For the sake of sending 10 men instead of 6, who still needed a Libyan armored column to effect the rescue of the people at the annex? Horrible idea. > [@Magiver](#): > > Any military plane capable of hanging a weapon would have been useful in the area. The nearest ones were in Aviano. > [@Magiver](#): > > Any covert group in the area would have been useful. Once on-site it gives planners options to work with. The groups in the area _were sent_: one from the CIA annex, and another from Tripoli, made it and effected the evacuation. Three other teams were readied, one was sent to Tripoli because the attack was over, the other two to Italy because the attack was over. > [@Magiver](#): > > This is what should have been done. It _is_ what was done. The available air (the drone) and ground (the two teams) assets were sent, along with Libyan support. Can you articulate what should have been done, using the assets available? The only specific thing you’ve advocated was senting the four Special Forces men at Tripoli, which a) wouldn’t have made a difference in Benghazi and b) would have left the Tripoli embassy unguarded. > [@Magiver](#): > > So I’ll ask the question again, why did Hillary say it was her biggest regret when asked if she could have any “do-overs”. Quote: “I mean, you know, you make these choices based on imperfect information. And you make them to, as we say, the best of your ability. But that doesn’t mean that there’s not going to be unforeseen consequences, unpredictable twists and turns.” > > Why the regret if the right decisions were made? Because Americans died, and it could have been prevented. Not by somehow teleporting in motorcycle Special Forces, but by heeding the warnings of a crumbling security situation, or by ensuring there were military assets close by. _That’s_ the legitimate criticism here, not that any rescue attempt was held back or anyone was told to stand down. It’s all in the Senate Intelligence Committee report. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466.md?page=48) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/benghazi-attack-for-dummies/673466.md?page=50)