Posted on 10/20/2017 9:47:36 AM PDT by drewh
As President Donald Trump and his administration face mounting questions about the incident, the FBI is working with authorities in Niger to investigate an ambush that left four U.S. soldiers dead in the country earlier this month, a law enforcement official told CNN.
Investigators are providing technical assistance, helping to collect and analyze evidence related to the surprise attack, that killed Special Forces soldiers Bryan Black, Jeremiah Johnson, Dustin Wright and La David Johnson.
Officials say the investigation is routine: The FBI usually looks into the killing of American citizens overseas, it often gives assistance investigating international terror investigations, and the agents on the ground in Niger are based out of U.S. embassies in nearby African countries.
But news of the probe is likely to put more pressure on the White House to tell what it knows about the deadly operation. Trump has been criticized for staying quiet about the incident for nearly two weeks, and he has come under fire for reportedly mishandling a condolence call to Myesha Johnson, La David Johnson's widow
On Oct. 4 a routine patrol of about 40 soldiers came under heavy fire from militants whom the Pentagon believes were a branch of the Islamic State group. In addition to the four deaths, two soldiers were wounded.
Black, Wright and Johnson died on the ground before being evacuated by helicopter. However, Johnson's body was not recovered until two days later.
Earlier this week, Sen. John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, accused the White House of withholding information and demanded it release the information it has regarding the events.
"We've been waiting for weeks and weeks," McCain told reporters Wednesday. "We will not sit by without having a complete understanding of what's going on."
Pentagon officials said they will be more forthcoming with information going forward and Defense Secretary James Mattis told reporters this week "the loss of our troops is under investigation."
All Trump has to do is blame the Niger shootings on a video and he will be home free.
Comey is unemployed now and will be a consultant in uncovering truth, as he has done in the past....
So they won’t investigate Hillary and her crime business, won’t allow the witness to testify about Clinton and the Russia deal.
Sessions needs to go, Trump needs to fire all Obama appointees, NOW
Forgive me for not being up on military movements but WTH are we doing in Niger?
My effort to find any FBI reporting on Benghazi has come up with zilch. They arrived late and left quickly. It seems they were simply a part of the cover-up.
It was because of her in the first place that the Benghazi guys died.
And, correct me if I am wrong, but I understand the the guys were in Niger as leftover policy made by Obama.
So, sure, the FBI needs to look into it to cover up Obama's @$$.
This Niger investigation is so obviously the media’s prelude to painting Niger as Trump’s Benghazi. They will keep inventing scandals to keep Clintons and Uranium One off headlines.
Of course, Sessions also seems determined to bury any Clinton scandal so whatever.
It's bothering me that our brave field commanders might become loathe to make hazardous, risky, daring decisions involving their troops for fear that bad outcomes would invite leftist politicians, the enemedia, even our questionable FBI to descend on them en masse to investigate them, even get them drummed out of the service or court-martialed.
We know the Left is attempting this at the moment in the Niger ambush event.
This is scary stuff.
We've been so happy that the "rules of engagement" have been changed from Obama's do-nothing mandates to more aggressive rules for confronting the enemy.
However, this savage politicization whirling around the Niger ambush will, I fear, result in a setback for aggressive US troop action in combat and a return to the Obama ways.
Did every action or skirmish performed by US troops in WW2 that turned out badly result in President Roosevelt, the DC houses of congress and J. Edgar Hoover conducting witch-hunts and second-guessing investigations of who specifically was to blame for battlefield loss here, or a raid or foray there?
Keep the politicians and the slavering media out of this...and let the Army conduct its investigation without the leftists pressuring them in their work.
We here at FR know who they're really after, anyway.
Leni
Someone like say their boss Elmer Fidd Sessions should tell the FBI to imvestigate Hillary instead.
Well, anyone can say anything to justify whatever they want to do but it doesn't make it legit. What, if any, constraints are there with respect to their legal jurisdiction? Its seem that the FBI is accountable to no one but itself.
The FBI has offices in 80 countries.
CIA spies domestically and FBI conducts foreign investigations. That’s about right in Bizarro world. But we can all sleep better tonight knowing that the FBI (the guys who can’t find their a$$ with both hands) is on the case. Expect arrests any day now./s
If anything, these guys were probably sold out so the left could pull this stunt.
I totally agree with you. McCain IS that hateful.
Sessions is no help at all.
Says McCain two weeks after the attack occurred and likely a few days after info request was sent to DoD. McCain is a lying scum bag.
We have SF A-Teams all over the world. When I was a federal agent fighting the drug war in Bolivia during the 90s there was an FS team stationed there. We took their medic with us on operations.
Most people think of SF like its Seal Team. Their job is completely different. There mission is to assist local forces in training, logistics, everything from building runways to operating local medical clinics.
The idea to to prepare any potential battlefield in advance and to build support the the US. I am sure they do a bunch of other cool stuff as well.
My limited experience with them was always positive. To a man they are top shelf operators.
Probably something special, since we’ve already heard from commanders on the ground that it’s just the opposite: Trump is giving the commanders full reign.
Thomas Wictor, on Twitter, has excellent insights on this engagement. These guys were special forces, likely a 12-man team. The fought approximately 40 enemy.
Did the FBI investigate all of the casualties of war, like in Afghanistan, under 0blama??
well said, Ken. the MSM needs this Niger investigation to keep Uranium One off the front pages...
Local ISIS affiliate. However, villagers who recovered Sgt Johnson’s body told US troops that “light skinned” insurgents had recently arrived in the area, and may have led the ambush that killed the four Green Berets.
In recent days, senior intel officials have talked about the “scattering” of ISIS remnants with the fall of Mosul and Raqqa. One potential sanctuary is the border region between Niger and Mali and much of the countryside in Mali. Based on the villagers’ report, it sounds like ISIS fighters from other areas are moving in. Of course, any claim of that sort should be taken with a huge grain of salt.
This much we know: the “patrol” was more of a training mission than a hunt for bad guys. The area was considered secure, enough that an American UAV was not assigned to provide overwatch for the mission, despite the fact we have a drone base in Mali. CAS and medevac support were entrusted to the French, who have fought a long insurgency in Mali, one of their former colonies. Took aobut 30 minutes for Mirages to arrive overhead for CAS, a little longer for medevac.
Very clear that ISIS did their homework on our training patterns in the area, and we had grown a bit complacent. Additionally, don’t discount the possibility of ISIS informants in the ranks of local security forces—in that kind of environment, it’s almost a given.
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