Posted: 6:52 pm EDT
[twitter-follow screen_name=’Diplopundit’ ]

Flare-Up on Benghazi Committee as Hillary Clinton Testimony Nears http://t.co/yFJMNYIvvQ

— The New York Times (@nytimes) October 18, 2015

.

On October 7, Chairman Gowdy wrote a 13-page letter to Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Benghazi Committee (see pdf).  On October 18, Rep. Cummings responded with a 2-page letter stating that the alleged classified information in a Blumenthal email dated March 18, 2011, was not in fact classified, and was redacted by Gowdy himself.  That email is available to read here (pdf); note the absence of redaction codes.  On October 18, @TGowdySC responded to @RepCummings’ letter on whether that Libya source was classified info in his letter here (pdf).

The Democrats charged that the Select Committee “has never held a single hearing with anyone from the Department of Defense in 17 months, and the Select Committee has conducted nearly ten times as many interviews of State Department employees than Defense Department employees (39 compared to 4).” 

The report says that the Committee has conducted a total of 54 transcribed interviews and depositions to date. Previous congressional committees and the independent Accountability Review Board (ARB) had already spoken to 23 of these individuals. The actual number of “new” interviews is 31 according to the Democrats contradicting the “50 interviews” apparently cited by Mr. Gowdy.

Going by the report, below is a list of 31 people interviewed by the Committee. We note that that are no DOD or CIA folks included here, only State Department people:

• 1: State Department Chief of Staff State Department Chief of Staff from 2009 until February 1, 2013
• 2: Senior Watch Officer in the Diplomatic Security Command Center from 2011 to 2013
• 3: Principal Officer who served in Benghazi in the fall of 2012
• 4: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the summer and fall of 2012
• 5: Principal Officer who served in Benghazi in the summer and fall of 2012
• 6: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the summer of 2012
• 7: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the spring and summer of 2012
• 8: Principal Officer who served in Benghazi in the spring and summer of 2012
• 9:  diplomatic security agent who served in Benghazi in the spring of 2012
• 10: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the spring of 2012
• 11: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the winter and spring of 2012
• 12: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the winter of 2012
• 13: Principal Officer who served in Benghazi in the fall and winter of 2011-2012
• 14: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the fall and winter of 2011
• 15: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the fall of 2011
• 16: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the spring of 2011
• 17: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the spring of 2011
• 18: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the spring of 2011
• 19: Diplomatic Security Agent who served in Benghazi in the spring of 2011
• 20: Post Management Officer for Libya from 2011 through June 2012
• 21: Communications Officer for the State Department Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs from the fall of 2008 to the present
• 22: U.S. Ambassador to Libya from December 2008 until May 2012
• 23: U.S. Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations from July 2010 until July 2013
• 24: U.S. Deputy Chief of Mission in Libya from 2009 until June 15, 2012
• 25: Deputy to the U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations from July 2011 until September 2014
• 26: Contracting Officer in the State Department Office of Acquisitions starting in May of 2012
• 27: Executive Secretariat Director of Information Resources Management who served from spring of 2008 until November of 2012
• 28: Chief of the Records and Archives Management Division from fall of 2014 to the present
• 29: Spokesperson in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs from 2011 through 2013
• 30: A speechwriter for Secretary Clinton
• 31: A speechwriter for Secretary Clinton

Here’s one thrown over by WaPo’s Pinocchios:

Here’s one who was a student in Cairo in 2011:

Here’s one who wasn’t at the State Department anymore at the time of the incident:

Here’s one who says “I don’t know of anything.”

Boy! Who wrote these questions? A secretary of state “ordering” a secretary of defense?  What universe is that?

Who signed off on the April 2012 cable “denying security resources to Libya?” Can these congressional folks really be this ignorant? Every cable that goes out must have clearance. They all include the name or names of draftee/s and the names of the clearing and approving officials. How could a DS agent in Benghazi know if the secretary of state in WashDC “personally” signed off on any cable? And are these folks really ignorant of the hierarchical structure of the State Department? Or are they purposely ignorant because reality is not sexy enough to blow up?

New hearings, please, on the topic of what can be done so politicians grow a conscience instead of playing offense/defense when they search for the “truth” — the kind where we don’t have to wrap the word “truth” in air quotes.

The former deputy director of the CIA writes that “The State Department facility in Benghazi has been widely mischaracterized as a US consulate. In fact it was a Temporary Mission Facility (TMF), a presence that was not continuously staffed by senior personnel and that was never given formal diplomatic status by the Libyan government. The CIA base—because it was physically separate from the TMF—was simply called “the Annex.” [….] CIA does not provide physical security for State Department operations. Why so few improvements were made at the TMF, why so few State Department security officers were protecting the US ambassador, Chris Stevens, why they allowed him to travel there on the anniversary of 9/11, and why they allowed him to spend the night in Benghazi are unclear. I would like to know the conversations that took place between Stevens and his security team when the ambassador decided to go visit Benghazi on 9/11/12. These were all critical errors.

Well, the temporary mission did not issue visas, nor had a consular officer tasked with providing citizen services. The State Department must have had another mission, what was it?  To lend cover to the “Annex”? If there was no State Department temporary mission in Benghazi, would the CIA have had an outpost there? How many people from the CIA did this Committee talked to? What the frack were they thinking when they interviewed UN personnel and speechwriters but not interview the spooks?

Or could it be that State was there for a very simple reason — the need for a reporting outpost? Click here (pdf) for the Action Memo from the Near Eastern Affairs Bureau (NEA) to the Under Secretary for Management (M) requesting approval for the continued operation of the U.S. presence in Benghazi through the end of calendar year 2012. That’s why there was a “tent” and not a fortress.  The memo was approved in December 2011.

Also see the email chain in this document collection (pdf) on Diplomatic Security coverage and the “Banghazi Plan;” RSO Eric Nordstrom’s emails are clear enough, the status of Benghazi post was undefined and Diplomatic Security did not want to devout resources to it.  NEA wanted to be there, why?  DS did not want to put resources there, why? The email from Shawn P. Crowley, the Principal Officer in Benghazi from January-March 2012 is also instructive.  Plenty of lessons there, but folks are not seriously looking, why?

#