Good post.
The Ambassador’s loss was collateral.
The goals of the hostiles were to:
1. Exploit document and computer file intel regarding oil contracts and weapons movements.
2. Acquire the weapons that the Brits stored at our Mission after they shut down their Mission.
3. Revenge the death of Yahya al-Libi the AQ 2nd in command.
4. Take our Ambassador hostage to pressure the release of the “Blind Sheik”. The hostiles tried very hard to find Stevens but could not. He would have been far more valuable alive to the hostiles.
I have no clue about revenge or anything. Lets not forget these people are semi autonomous in the field. Any group can be working with anyone at any point in time. Motive is way beyond me. Maybe they were paid by Syria since Stevens was likely involved in getting weapons to the rebels there. Maybe a publicity stunt since there were apparently a bunch of attackers and very few deaths considering only 2 people fired back and one seemingly by accident. How could they fail to kil or capture more people?