I tend to agree with you. It may well be the response was purely about the election and their naïveté (the view Rush is touting as I type), but I’m not convinced. I suspect there was/is something far more devastating they want to keep hidden. They knew when they refused aid that 30-40 Americans might die. That seems a much bigger risk politically. So I have to believe 30-40 deaths was preferable to the truth.
And if the goal was to not have an example of terrorism in front of everybody’s eyes - to keep the “the war on terror is over” meme going - they would not have denied security like that or prepared the video to be used as an excuse but would have instead tried to prevent the attack from happening in the first place. It seems like there was advance planning for this. Whether it was over the blind sheik, weapons running, or something else I don’t know. But it seems like they were compelled by something they considered bigger than the lives at stake.
The war on terror being over was already going to be botched by Zawahiri’s call for revenge attacks on the terrorist from Libya who had been killed, and the turmoil going on in Cairo at the same time.
No, I think somebody had them over a barrel and they couldn’t just do what should be SOP: prevent terrorist attacks.