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What was Ambassador Steven's role in the Gun Running?
In-Extremis | Katechon

Posted on 11/01/2012 8:00:54 PM PDT by Katechon

It is becoming increasingly clear that the Obama régime has been running guns and armaments and munitions to the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliate jihadist groups, including heat-seeking shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles designed to shoot down jetliners. The American Mission in Libya was apparently trying to buy back man-portable anti-aircraft missiles that the Obama Régime sold or gave to the Muslim Brotherhood and then went "missing." The Administration was also trying to buy back weapons previously owned by the Gaddafi Régime that spread everywhere after the "revolution."

Peter Bouckaert, Human Rights Watch emergencies director, told CNN he has seen the same pattern in armories looted elsewhere in Libya, noting that "in every city we arrive, the first thing to disappear are the surface-to-air missiles." He said such missiles can fetch many thousands of dollars on the black market. "We are talking about some 20,000 surface-to-air missiles in all of Libya, and I've seen cars packed with them." he said. [...] The United States has spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to buy them back [...]
“The rebels came from all over the western mountains, and they just took what they wanted,” said Riyad, a supervisor of the ruined arsenal’s small contingent of rebel guards.
A report by the UN Support Mission in Libya (PDF) said that Gaddafi had accumulated a large stockpile of MANPADs, and that although thousands were "destroyed" during the 2011 military intervention in Libya, there were "increasing concerns over the looting and likely proliferation of these portable defence systems, as well as munitions and mines, highlighting the potential risk to local and regional stability."

As soon as islamic organizations outside Libya realized that there were Manpads available, they tried to get them.

When the Obama Régime discovered that thousands of MANPADs had "disappeared" and were "on the loose in Libya" it turned around and stuck a LOT of cash in the CIA "annex", or "safehouse" in order to BUY those weapons back. (I wrote about the CIA annex here.)

Fox News Bureau Chief of Intelligence Catherine Herridge said that the role being played by the U.S. Mission in Libya is to control the movement of weapons out of Libya to Syrian rebels fighting to bring down the Bashar Al-Assad régime. The Benghazi mission played a key role in “engaging, legitimating, enriching and emboldening Islamists who have taken over or are ascendant in much of the Middle East,” said the president of the Center for Security Policy. From there, we can infer that Ghadaffi was overthrown in order to use Libya as the doorway to get the arms in for distribution to Syria, Yemen, Jordan, Egypt and eventually Saudi Arabia. Especially Syria, for now.

That's the big picture.

The State Department and the CIA were somehow, some way running or heavily involved in this armament pipeline. But what was Stevens' function inside this apparatus? What do we know about it? I suggest that we use this thread to aggregate facts, data and sources in order to help answering that question.

Only when we will get to see more clearly what role Stevens played in the running of this armament pipeline (to the incipient Caliphate) will we begin to learn "Why the Obama régime wanted him dead?," or at least:

a) Why was the security protection for the Benghazi Mission prior to the 9/11 anniversary attack stripped?, and

b) Why did the Obama régime refuse to send (or even permit) local help on the night of the attack.

How did Ambassador Stevens help in the gun and armament running?

We know that Benghazi was staffed by CIA operatives, working for the State Department, whose job was a) to secure and destroy dangerous weapons (like RPGs and SAMs) looted from Gaddafi’s stockpiles during and after the 2011 revolution, and b) to facilitate the onward shipment of those weapons to Syria.

Was Ambassador Stevens' job to cover for all of this?

We know that Obama signed an intelligence finding in early 2012 authorizing U.S. support for the Syrian rebels, and that this summer CIA operatives were on the Turkish-Syrian border helping to steer weapons deliveries to selected Syrian rebel groups, most of them “hard-line Islamic jihadists.”

One of those jihadis was Abdelhakim Belhadj.

Abdulhakim Belhadj, head of the Tripoli Military Council and the former leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, "met with Free Syrian Army leaders in Istanbul and on the border with Turkey," said a military official working with Mr Belhadj. "Mustafa Abdul Jalil (the interim Libyan president) sent him there. -- Ruth Sherlock in Tripoli, 27 Nov 2011, for the Telegraph

Belhadj’s contact with the Syrian Free Army was part of a Lybian delegation to Turkey offering arms and fighters to the Turkish-backed Syrian jihadis.

The Daily Telegraph on Saturday [November 26 2011] revealed that the new Libyan authorities had offered money and weapons to the growing insurgency against Bashar al-Assad.

Mr Belhaj also discussed sending Libyan fighters to train troops, the source said. Having ousted one dictator, triumphant young men, still filled with revolutionary fervour, are keen to topple the next. The commanders of armed gangs still roaming Tripoli's streets said yesterday that "hundreds" of fighters wanted to wage war against the Assad regime.

So we have the United-States, Libya and Turkey working together with and through Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists like Belhadj to get weapons into the hands of Syrian rebels, known to be dominated by Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.

We know also that a Libyan-flagged vessel, Al-Entisar, docked at the Turkish port of Iskanderun on September 6, 2012.

A mysterious Libyan ship [the Libyan-flagged vessel Al Entisar, which means "The Victory,"] -- reportedly carrying weapons and bound for Syrian rebels -- [...] was received in the Turkish port of Iskenderun -- 35 miles from the Syrian border -- on Sept. 6 [...]

On the night of Sept. 11, [Ambassador] Stevens met with the Turkish Consul General Ali Sait Akin, and escorted him out of the consulate front gate one hour before the assault began at approximately 9:35 p.m. local time.

[A] source told Fox News that Stevens was in Benghazi to negotiate a weapons transfer, an effort to get SA-7 missiles out of the hands of Libya-based extremists.

[...] According to an initial Sept. 14 report by the Times of London, Al Entisar was carrying 400 tons of cargo. Some of it was humanitarian, but also reportedly weapons, described by the report as the largest consignment of weapons headed for Syria's rebels on the frontlines.

"This is the Libyan ship ... which is basically carrying weapons that are found in Libya," said Walid Phares, a Fox News Middle East and terrorism analyst. [...]

The cargo reportedly included surface-to-air anti-aircraft missiles, RPG's and Russian-designed shoulder-launched missiles known as MANPADS.

The ship's Libyan captain told the Times of London that "I can only talk about the medicine and humanitarian aid" for the Syrian rebels. It was reported there was a fight about the weapons and who got what "between the free Syrian Army and the Muslim Brotherhood."

"The point is that both of these weapons systems are extremely accurate and very simple to use," Fox News military analyst Col. David Hunt explained. He said the passage of weapons from Libya to Syria would escalate the conflict. "With a short amount of instruction, you've got somebody capable of taking down any, any aircraft. Anywhere in the world."

[...] In March 2011, the Reuters news service first reported that President Obama had authorized a "secret order ... (allowing) covert U.S. government support for rebel forces" to push the Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi from office.

At a hearing on March 31, before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, several lawmakers raised concerns about the finding reported by the Reuters news service and whether the Obama administration knew who constituted the rebel forces and whether Islamists were among their ranks.

"What assurances do we have that they will not pose a threat to the United States if they succeed in toppling Qaddafi?" Republican Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., asked. "There are reports that some opposition figures have links to Al Qaeda and extremist groups that have fought against our forces in Iraq."

[...] A month after the October 2011 death of Qaddafi, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced in Tripoli that the U.S. was committing $40 million to help Libya "secure and recover its weapons stockpiles." [...]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/10/25/was-syrian-weapons-shipment-factor-in-ambassadors-benghazi-visit/

The group accused of moving the weapons is the Foundation for Human Rights, and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (IHH).

U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens’ last meeting in Benghazi the night he was killed was with the Turkish Consul General Ali Sait Akin, who is reported to have been there to discuss a weapons transfer or a warning about the possible compromise of the Libyan weapons pipeline to Syria. Whatever the topic of Ambassador Stevens’ discussion with Akin, he clearly and knowingly put himself in harm’s way to be there, in Benghazi, on the night of September 11.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: belhadj; benghazi; gunrunning; libya; shadowwars; syria; threatmatrix; vanity

1 posted on 11/01/2012 8:01:02 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: Katechon

Good compilation.


2 posted on 11/01/2012 8:03:18 PM PDT by KC Burke (Plain Conservative opinions and common sense correction for thirteen years.)
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To: Katechon

Shhh....don’t tell the Obamedia. Their heads will explode.


3 posted on 11/01/2012 8:07:09 PM PDT by txrefugee
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To: txrefugee
I heard Obama was scared that the guns would have his fingerprints all over them and traced right back to him.

Steven was lured back to make a buy on the weapons and ex-seals were hired to recover them and NOT his security

4 posted on 11/01/2012 8:10:51 PM PDT by scooby321 (AMS)
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To: Katechon

I don’t see any way even this bunch of traitors/clowns would send 20,000 missiles to the rebels. That is way too many for any use against the Colonel.

I do agree Stevens was a marked man.


5 posted on 11/01/2012 8:16:33 PM PDT by arrogantsob (The Disaster MUST Go. Sarah herself supports Romney.)
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To: txrefugee

Agreed, but nothing surprising about the Ambassador tied to a CIA gun running operations. Think about this operation, nothing about it should have upset the Muslim Brotherhood/Libya Gov’t.

There was another reason the Arab mob was organized that night and it had nothing to do with gun running. The lack of security, the lack of action on the US part (except for the heroic seals), the casing of the consulate before hand leads to other reasons namely the kidnaping of the Ambassador. Keep the focus on why the mob assembled in the first place and the US reaction was complicit during the attack. All hell has broken loose since the seals made it go FUBAR. The US will have to have steely resolve to address this mess.


6 posted on 11/01/2012 8:16:48 PM PDT by affan76
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To: Katechon

Who is the Muslim gal that works very closely with Hillary? Was she the go between the White House and the Muslim Brotherhood in gun running? Knew the right connections.Her whole family from Mother to Brothers to Sisters are all in the Muslim Brotherhood


7 posted on 11/01/2012 8:37:32 PM PDT by YukonGreen
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To: arrogantsob

The Obama régime did not sell 20,000 MANPADs to the “rebels”. Those weapons were Gaddafi’s, and they went “missing” after he was overthrown. The diplomatic mission of State and its CIA operatives wanted to buy ‘em back. That’s why the CIA annexe has so much money in it, and so many weapons. That’s why it was such a high-value target.

On the other hand, the Obama régime is apparently selling or giving weapons to hard-line jihadists.


8 posted on 11/01/2012 8:39:02 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: affan76
Stevens was meeting with the Turks in Benghazi an hour before the attack. The Turks went free. Why did Stevens meet with the Turks in Benghazi and not Tripoli? Which is safer? Which is more comfortable? Which is easier to get to? Why would Stevens travel with little protection from Tripoli to Benghazi to meet with the Turks when he personally knew there was a risk to his personal safety? Was he ordered to go? Was Stevens working for the CIA and his ambassadorship just a cover?

Who gave the orders?

Sorry. I have read too many Tom Clancy novels.

9 posted on 11/01/2012 8:40:58 PM PDT by ConservativeInPA (I advocate indentured servitude for the 47% until the national debt is eliminated.)
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To: Katechon

Stevens got Ron Browned.


10 posted on 11/01/2012 9:27:44 PM PDT by glock rocks (14 million US deer tags this fall... the world's largest standing army of scoped-rifle marksmen. Hmm)
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To: ConservativeInPA

Panetta might know. The gunrunning may have started during his
previous job. Petraeus may have been brought in to provide
unimpeachable war-hero credentials, and hence political cover, to the whole fustercluck. PS - this scandal is great material for Clancy’s future novels, I’m sure he’s taking lots of notes.


11 posted on 11/01/2012 9:30:47 PM PDT by rfp1234
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To: Katechon

Who’s ‘Ambassador Steven’?


12 posted on 11/01/2012 9:32:36 PM PDT by Revolting cat! (Bad things are wrong! Ice cream is delicious!)
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To: YukonGreen

“Knew the right connections.Her whole family from Mother to Brothers to Sisters “

Huma is Hillary’s aid and is rumored to be an MB spy. I wonder if MB connections have made some large “donations” to the Clinton Library recently?


13 posted on 11/01/2012 9:33:01 PM PDT by garjog (We do not want another four more years of the last four years.)
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To: Katechon
More info about the IHH, the group accused of moving the weapons from Libya to Turkey. The (IHH) is "an islamic Turkish NGO founded in 1992, and now active in more than 100 countries.
It was behind the "Free Gaza Movement," behind the Gaza "aid" flotilla, trying to break Israel's blockade of Gaza since 2008, which is "a registered charity based in Cyprus," and banned by Israel in 2008.
This Turkish islamic organization was the one operating the Mavi Marmara, the lead ship of a the six-ship the Gaza "aid" flotilla "carrying 10,000 tonnes of medicine, construction materials and education supplies" that was stormed by Israeli troops in May 2010.
"IHH," wrote the BBC, "raises some of its money from Islamic religious groups and has strong sympathy among Turkey's Islamist-rooted ruling party."
The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC) says the islamic Turkish organization is an overt supporter of Hamas, which an Islamic militant group (founded by the Muslim Brotherhood) that seized power in Gaza in 2007.
According to the BBC, "The ITIC says it also has evidence the IHH has helped provide weapons and funds for 'Islamic terrorist elements in the Middle East'."
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon said, "The organisers are well-known for their ties with global Jihad, al-Qaeda and Hamas. They have a history of arms smuggling and deadly terror."

14 posted on 11/01/2012 9:35:40 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: Katechon
This is Turkish Consul General Ali Sait Akin:

This is the Turkish man U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens met the night he was killed.
Do we know of any tie between Ali Sait Akin and the IHH ??
15 posted on 11/01/2012 9:49:42 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: Revolting cat!

lol, I made a typo. Steven’s, rather than Stevens’. Sorry !!


16 posted on 11/01/2012 9:49:57 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: YukonGreen
That gal?

17 posted on 11/01/2012 9:54:34 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: scooby321

“Steven was lured back to make a buy on the weapons and ex-seals were hired to recover them and NOT his security.”

Interesting indeed. But where and how can we learn more about Stevens’ role in this?


18 posted on 11/01/2012 10:03:21 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: Katechon

interesting report by Fox on the ship and its cargo:

http://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20121019_220000_Special_Report_With_Bret_Baier#start/272/end/302


19 posted on 11/01/2012 10:03:54 PM PDT by Katechon
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To: Katechon

Nice article. Just curious if you got any info from former CIA pilot Robert “Tosh” Plumlee cause I read some of this on one of his Facebook posts? He also stated that Stephens was allowed to be iced to cover up the gun buy-back scheme that was going on.


20 posted on 01/06/2020 12:46:59 PM PST by clemente
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