Panetta Says Risk Impeded Deployment to Benghazi (Lies)

Mr. Panetta was at the White House for a regular meeting on the afternoon of Sept. 11 as the first reports of the attack unfolded, an American official said. By that evening Mr. Panetta had consulted with General Dempsey and General Ham and had ordered a number of American military forces in the region to move closer to Libya.

Defense officials say they did not receive a request for military support from the State Department as the attack unfolded.

In response to Mr. Panetta’s decision, a small Special Operations “strike force” team moved from Central Europe to the Sigonella Air Base in Sicily while two Navy destroyers already in the Mediterranean were moved off the Libyan coast. A rapid-reaction team of elite Marines left Rota, Spain, and arrived to protect the American Embassy in Tripoli, the Libyan capital, the next day.

But a senior military official said that uncertainty about what was happening on the ground in Libya delayed the decision about where to send the Special Operations forces until about 9 p.m. in Washington, or 3 a.m. on Sept. 12, in Libya.

Ultimately, the decision relayed from the military’s Joint Staff in Washington was “to get close but not into Libya,” the official said. The task force then deployed over the next 24 hours to Sigonella, which is about an hour by plane from Benghazi. But by that time the shooting was over and the Americans were eventually evacuated.

One early article about the survivors...

Libya rescue squad ran into fierce, accurate ambush Sept. 12, 2012
Miscommunication which understated the number of American survivors awaiting rescue - there were 37, nearly four times as many as the Libyan commander expected - also meant survivors and rescuers found themselves short of transport to escape this second battle, delaying an eventual dawn break for the airport.
(snip)
Having been told to expect 10 Americans and having found 37, Obeidi did not have enough vehicles to break out, despite having one heavy anti-aircraft gun mounted on a pickup truck.
(snip)
"(The ambassador) died as a result of suffocation by the fumes of the fire inside the embassy and one was also killed by gunfire before around 37 people were moved to a place we thought was safe," Sharif told Reuters in Benghazi.
(snip)
He estimated that a dozen or more Americans were hurt.

Here is another...

Al Qaeda offshoot a prime suspect in Libya attack Sept. 13, 2012
The 30 Americans at the consulate who survived the attack did so by taking shelter in an annex of the consulate. They were hunkered down there for about four and a half hours until Libyan forces finally got control of the situation.
Then the Americans were taken to the Benghazi airport, flown to Tripoli, and from there to Germany.

There were other early reports, that I can't find now, that said there were 37 people evacuated to Tripoli and then flown to a hospital in Germany. I have read nothing further on them since then.

If it was too risky, then why was our ambassador there? Why were 30 other Americans there? They were obviously working for the US government, but it is unclear who was signing the paychecks of the contractors. Who was the boss? Then follow the chain up from there.

It is risky for our troops in Afghanistan to go out on patrol. But they are sent out to do it every day. It is risky for our troops to talk to members of the Afghan police and/or military. You just never know when one will randomly blow up or shoot you in the back.

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