Petraeus Throws Obama Under the Bus

Weekly Standard ^ | 6:05 PM, OCT 26, 2012 | WILLIAM KRISTOL

[Snuph]

Breaking news on Benghazi: the CIA spokesman, presumably at the direction of CIA director David Petraeus, has put out this statement: "No one at any level in the CIA told anybody not to help those in need; claims to the contrary are simply inaccurate. ”

So who in the government did tell “anybody” not to help those in need? Someone decided not to send in military assets to help those Agency operators. Would the secretary of defense make such a decision on his own? No.

It would have been a presidential decision. There was presumably a rationale for such a decision. What was it? When and why—and based on whose counsel obtained in what meetings or conversations—did President Obama decide against sending in military assets to help the Americans in need?

[cynwoody]

Patraeus is as GUILTY as OBAMA

It was Obama's call. What would you have Petraeus do? Mount a coup?

Blaming Petraeus, et al, is exactly how the Regime hopes to skate past this.

[PieterCasparzen]

Those guys did it —they thought they were risking a Blackhawk Down incident b4 a Presidential election, and so they forbade anyone to help.

That makes more sense than some of the other conspiracy theories

Even Panneta admitted it saying they couldn't risk resources

They already had an Ambassador missing - they did not know until about dawn what had become of the Ambassador. They already had the "pre-election bad incident". The Ambassador is actually the President's personal representative, and his murder is actually an act of war. It's far worse than a Blackhawk Down situation.

The retired Lt. Col. who called in to Rush today summed up how things actually work in these situations.

As long as a President assents to proceeding, every effort is made to get everybody back home safe and sound, and any and all assets can be used. There are forces on standby in every theater for precisely these types of situations.

In order for no help to come, the President would have to have refused to give the order to proceed, in effect, ordering the theater 4-star to not proceed.

[AFPhys]

Absolutely stunning. I am very happy to see this coming from Petreaus. I hope he gets together with Congress immediately if not sooner to discuss with them everything he knows about this horrendous attack and the way it was handled by the executive branch.

[lwoodham]

Which may be why Romney stayed away from talking about it in the last debate -- he can't bring up classified data.

Wow! That never crossed my mind. I would not be surprised if Romney was intentionally briefed on choice bits of information that was probably made up for cover about what happened in Benghazi, and then instructed that it was classified and that he couldn't discuss it. I know that the left is that devious.

[Paul R.]

Thanks for the link. It reads as if most likely several thousand are still floating about. Not good.

Looking about a little on the Web, this evening, there is some suggestion that AC-130’s have at least some defense capability against MANPAD’s. Can anyone comment further?

[AFPhys]

“...I really don’t get why you seem to be furious with Patreaus. I wouldn’t waste my breath on that guy.

We’ve got a president that needs to be impeached. Why divert attention.”

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Hear Hear. Well said. Focus is needed here, and the group to be focused on is State&Defense headed by the CinC.

Frankly, I am as certain as can be without being in the room that CinC made this call after Jarrett advised.

[berdie]

Panetta’s statement made no sense.

Supposedly the attack was being watched in real time. So they knew what was going on.

In any event, since when has the military failed to act because they didn’t know all of the details? There was an attack on an ambassador. There were calls for help. What more information was needed?

[AFPhys]

DO:

It seems to me that you are the solid voice of reason on this thread. There may have been others (I’m not going to look again at it all) but you have been tremendous.

I agree that it is very important to keep Director/CIA as much above the fray as possible in a situation like this. I do not understand his failure to smash the “video narrative”, but he definitely should not be doing something like say, “The President is lying.” to the world, via a spokesman. I am glad that he has come around for whatever reason to know that his remaining silent is a wrong course of action now. I also believe he should not be resigning, for reasons you delineate quite well in this thread. Congress ought to subpoena him, and the strongest action I believe he ought to take is to defy an order by the President to say nothing to Congress. I believe that with this statement, he is telling Issa that he will cooperate, and immediately, with such a subpoena. I suspect a large part of that testimony would have to be in closed session. After that, Congress can decide the best course of action, releasing as much info to the voters as possible, immediately.

CIA is too important to squander. This whole situation is fraught with danger in many ways, not the least of which is the position of these executive agencies and departments.

In addition, I strongly object to people who are calling the administration out for “treason”, and calling for impeachment based on the CinC failing to order a “rescue mission”. That is properly HIS CALL, despite my strong disagreement with the call he made. If you want to call for impeachment, call for it on the basis of failure to enforce laws like DOMA or instituting new law such as DREAM act without Congressional approval. Call for it based on the kangaroo court arrest of the video maker. Call for it based on lying to American and the world about the motivation for this attack. All these things are clearly unConstitutional, just as it is clearly Constitutional that CinC makes the call for use of the military in this type of case.

That said, CinC DEFINITELY SHOULD relate FULLY to America, before the election, WHY he made the call he did, and who he consulted, and the assets that were immediately available. That ought to be related at least several days before the election so military members and diplomatic corps can give rebuttal or supporting opinion. Then, let America’s voters decide whether they agree with him: do we give support to Americans in need without counting the cost, or do we evaluate whether “rescue” is worth it. I can imagine many would disagree with my belief that we give support first and evaluate later. This is something that American voters should decide together.

Time has run short to do that, but it is still not impossible. Without such a course by CinC, it is my opinion that everyone ought to simply say, “I can not trust this guy to be CinC since I don’t know how he will treat our people going forward” and vote against him with prejudice.

[AFPhys]

If I were in the field and saw a drone or two circling overhead, I would hope and pray it had a bomb or two on it and illuminate a target. They may not have known one way or the other, but simply held out hope.

[PieterCasparzen]

Man-portable air-defense systems have been around for a long time and are plentiful all over the world already.

This link, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-portable_air-defense_systems, lists a number of attacks that have happened over the years.

Dealing with hostile fire is a core part of military actions and the U.S. military is the best there is.

I think the last decade provides ample evidence that, given the order to do so, the U.S. military would have gotten the job done if it was possible.

What stopped them was the the President refusing to give the order.

The retired Lt. Col. caller to Rush today clarified the chain of command for civilians like me who would not be aware of the details. According to that interview, within minutes of the alarm sounding that an Ambassador was in peril, the President would be asked to approve rescue operations.

[PieterCasparzen]

A little more far out speculation: As the attack unfolded, the CIA or other intelligence discovered or reasoned that the attack was in fact bait, designed to bring in U.S. support aircraft. An AC-130 shot down in Libya would sure blow Obama’s foreign policy narrative!!!

That's been floated around. But once again, the dead or kidnapped Ambassador trumps that. To lose military forces in battle is tragic but part of military operations (think about it, we've lost thousands over the past decade). To have an Ambassador murdered, or taken hostage, that is the real embarassment politically. The Ambassador is the President's personal representative.

There simply is no logical answer as to why a sitting President or Cabinet official would not give the order to attempt a rescue of a consulate under attack.

The idea of risk outwaying reward for a rescue is not a factor with diplomatic rescues, for the most part, because they are not very large battles that endanger thousands of lives. The risk is born by members of the military - but that is their mission.

The risk/reward idea comes into play in military rescues of other members of the military during wartime, such as the rescue of downed pilots. The military channel had one such situation during the Viet Nam War where men were being lost to save a downed pilot.

This is an entirely different situation with a civilian diplomat being rescued - or not, in this case.

The question is did the President order rescue operations or did he order the military to stand down.

[AFPhys]

It is EXTREMELY important strategically that Romney STAY OUT of the whole Libya mess now. If he says anything about it, there will be no end to increasing polarization. Any sound byte would be about Romney vs Obama, instead of Obama vs America’s military/diplomatic corps. The best way for him to gain relative stature, and for America to hear the truth about Libya, is for the process that is underway to proceed without Obama and the Dems being able to claim that he “is politicizing Benghazi”.

As hard as it is, Romney must say NOTHING about it as much as humanly possible, for him to get maximum traction from it.

[xzins]

David Petraeus threw in with the wrong crowd. Too bad he wasn’t a student of the Bible, “Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.” 1 Co 15:33

[itssme]

Yes, I believe you've summed it up...now the pos in the White House has to be tried and hung for treason...or some other appropriate punishment. NOW, HOW DO WE GET THIS OUT TO THE PUBLIC..DEMAND THAT BOEHNER CALL A PRESS CONFERENCE? WHO ELSE COULD/SHOULD CALL A PRESS CONFERENCE AND LAY IT OUT TO THE PUBLIC? WHO ELSE...ANYONE HAVE ANY SUGGESTIONS THAT COULD INVOLVE WE THE PEOPLE WHO ARE WILLING TO HELP GET THIS INFO TO THE PUBLIC?

[Ann Archy]

AMEN!!!!!! He MIGHT have been good guy, but not anymore.....he’s turned into a COWARD!

[SueRae]

I believe Petraeus.

[clearcarbon]

Has President George W Bush been blamed yet? If not, what’s taking so long?

[huldah1776]

Exactly. I never heard or said one byte about him not saying anything. In fact his not saying anything reveals that he will NOT LEAK info or use our military as political pawns. I simply acknowledged that he had intel. Period.

[uncbob]

All that is true

I am repeating what Panetta said

They didn’t want to risk losing the rescue teams etc to the missiles on top of losing the ambassador which means he has admitted they weren’t going to send a rescue mission

That is a direct contradiction to what Obama is saying and Panetta is on record

FOX should be all over this contradiction

[MayflowerMadam]

“The last time I saw anything like this it was the Watergate Scandal.”

PLEASE... don’t buy into the comparison-to-Watergate mantra. We are SICK of it! This is nothing like Watergate. Watergate was a few bumbling clowns, doing a B&E (badly), to get a few files from an office. The cover-up was bad, but not critical. Since then, there have been 100 situations much worse, all perpetrated by democrats. Watergate continues to be the standard libs use because Nixon was President at the time.

The crime in Watergate: Trying to steal FILES.

The crime in Benghazi: Purposely sacrificing four American LIVES in an attempt to manipultate the outcome of an election.

Everyone spews: “It’s not the crime; it’s the cover-up.” NO! It’s the crime.