In the midst of all the fresh #Benghazi kerfuffle in response to the new Ben Rhodes Email - which in point of fact, largely quoted the CIA vetted talking points word for word - it might be nice to go back and actually review the original source of this Nontroversy, which would be the appearance by then-U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice on the various Sunday Talk shows.
And what's interesting, beside the fact that her comments also match the CIA vetted Talking Points, is the fact that she doesn't say what it is the GOP has been claiming she said for the last two years. Here's the original video from Meet the Press, I'll go over the transcript segments over the flip.
The first point is that yes, Rice did mention the video - but that like the Ben Rhodes email - she did it in context of the broader set of demonstrations, not just the attack in Benghazi.
Gregory: the images, as you well know is jarring to americans watching this play out this week, and we'll share the map of this turmoil with our viewers to show the scale of it across not just the arab world but the entire islamic world and flashpoints as well. in egypt, of course, the protests outside the u.s. embassy there that egyptian officials were slow to put down. this weekend in pakistan, protests as well there. more anti-american rage. also protests against the drone strike. in yemen, you had arrests and some deaths outside of our u.s. embassy there. how much longer can americans expect to see these troubling images and these protests go forward?
So, just to re-iterate, the question being asked by David Gregory is about "These Protests" - he doesn't even
Mention Benghazi. Not yet.
Before I get to Rice's answer here is the section for the Rhodes email that has gotten the Right-Wing so up in arms.
To underscore that these protests are rooted in an internet video and not a broader failure of policy
So the CIA and White House anticipated - correctly - that Rice would be asked about "These Protests" and it was in response to
that that Rice brought up the video thusly... but it wasn't like she made the argument that it was
Only the video.
Rice: well, david, we can't predict with any certainty. but let's remember what has transpired over the last several days. this is a response to a hateful and offensive video that was widely disseminated throughout the arab and muslim world. obviously, our view is that there is absolutely no excuse for violence, and that what has happened is condemnable. but this is a spontaneous reaction to a video, and it's not dissimilar but perhaps on a slightly larger scale than what we have seen in the past with "the satanic verses" and cartoons of the prophet muhammad. the president has been clear that our top priority is protection of american personnel in our facilities and bringing to justice those who attacked our facilities.
Rice did emphasize the video, but only in reference to a question about
the protests, not the attack in Benghazi.
So what then, did she say about the actual attack?
Gregory: you talked about this as spontaneous. can you say definitively that the attacks on our consulate in Libya that killed ambassador stevens and others there was spontaneous? was it a planned attack? was there a terrorist element to it?
Rice: let me tell you the best information we have at present. first of all, there's an fbi investigation that's ongoing and we look to that investigation to give us the definitive word as to what transpired. but putting together the best information that we have available to us today, our current assessment is that what happened in benghazi was, in fact, initially a spontaneous reaction to what had just transpired hours before in Cairo, almost a copycat of the demonstrations against our facility in Cairo, which were prompted, of course, by the video.
Again, let me re-emphasize - because it seems to need repeating, she said CAIRO [and the other protests] were inspired by the video - but she also said that in turn
the Libya attack was inspired by the Cairo attack, which breached the walls of the embassy -
not that Benghazi was inspired by the video. Benghazi took place many hours after the Cairo Embassy - as well as others - had been breached.
So the next question is did she deny, for political reasons, that it was a "Terrorist Attack"?
Rice: what we think then transpired in benghazi is that opportunistic extremist elements came to the consulate as this was unfolding. they came with heavy weapons, which unfortunately, and it escalated into a much more violent episode. obviously, that's our best judgment now. we'll await the results of the investigation, and the president has been very clear we'll work with the libyan authorities to bring those responsible to justice.
Gregory: was there a failure here that this administration is responsible for, whether it's an intelligence failure, a failure to see this coming, or a failure adequately protect u.s. embassies and installations from a spontaneous reaction like this?
Rice : david, i don't think so. first of all, we had no actionable intelligence to suggest that any attack on our facility in benghazi was imminent. in cairo, we did have indications that there was the risk that the video might spark some protests, and our embassy, in fact, acted accordingly, and had called upon the egyptian authorities to reinforce our facility. what we have seen with respect to the security response, obviously, we had security personnel in benghazi, a significant number, and tragically, among those four that were killed were two of our security personnel. but what happened, obviously, overwhelmed the security we had in place, which is why the president ordered additional reinforcements to tripoli and why elsewhere in the world we have been working with governments to ensure they take up their obligations to protect us and we reinforce where necessary.
On this point, Ansar Al-Sharia had called for an attack in response to the video and in general opposition to the U.S. - but they called for an attack
at the Embassy in Tripoli, not several hundred miles away in the consulate annex in Benghazi. It's like getting El Paso confused with Corpus Christi, which are on opposite sides of Texas. We now know that some members of Ansar Al-Sharia may be been involved in the attack, as well as possible supporters of Al Qaeda and possibly the late former Libyan leader Quaddafi. There had been
other attacks in Benghazi against the British for example, but we still to this day do not have any
actionable intelligence that our Consulate in Benghazi was likely to be attacked
on that day.
Al Qeada has never taken credit for the attack. In fact, Al Qaeda said it was a Spontaneous Uprising in retaliation for the killing of one of their leaders.
“The killing of Sheikh Abu Yahya only increased the enthusiasm and determination of the sons of (Libyan independence hero) Omar al-Mokhtar to take revenge upon those who attack our Prophet,” Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula said in a statement, quoted by the US-based monitoring group.
Al-Qaeda’s Yemen-based offshoot did not claim direct responsibility for Tuesday’s attack on the US consulate in Benghazi that killed the US ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, and three other Americans.
But it stressed that “the uprising of our people in Libya, Egypt and Yemen against America and its embassies is a sign to notify the United States that its war is not directed against groups and organizations … but against the Islamic nation that has rebelled against injustice.”
Also Ansar Al-Sharia, who are supporters of Al Qaeda but operate seperately in Libya, admitted that some of the members may have been involved, but denied that it was an attack they had planned. Actually, they say
it was spontaneous too.
Ansar al-Shariah Brigade didn't participate in this popular uprising as a separate entity, but it was carrying out its duties in al-Jala'a hospital and other places where it was entrusted with some duties. The Brigade didn't participate as a sole entity; rather, it was a spontaneous popular uprising in response to what happened by the West.
Not that we should take their word for it entirely, but then again since they love to take credit for successful attacks to increase their cachet, the fact that both Al Qeada and Ansar Al-Sharia say that the Benghazi attack
wasn't planned isn't insignificant. This also shows why it's been so difficult to specifically identify the perpetrators - they weren't all
affiliated to each other. This event was less organized than a twitter Jihadi Flash Mob with high-end weaponry.
Some of this information had been included in the initial draft of the CIA vetted talking points for Rice, but changes were made by CIA and State to remove references to specific groups in order to avoid damaging and prejudicing any future prosecutions. It wasn't a decision made by anyone at the White House.
In his email to Rice, Ben Rhodes addressed this situation thusly - Email timeline.
Indeed, the only substantive information specifically about Benghazi in the Rhodes email was the response to the question about actionable intelligence, which stated that "the currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the US Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the US Consulate and subsequently its annex."
"The demonstration evolved into an attack inspired by the Cairo protest" - which is exactly what Rice said. What we now know is different is that there wasn't a demonstration in Benghazi, it was
just an attack.
So did Ben Rhodes add this "demonstration evolving" part? Well, No. Because that sentence is exactly word-for-word what CIA Director Petreaus had already approved except for one edit - made by Rhodes, and concurred with separately by State - to replace the word "Consulate" with "Diplomatic Post".
That's it, that's all that Rhodes "changed". He removed "Consulate", but there's something else interesting about all this, when this final approved version was sent to Rice - it was also sent to
Capital Hill.
From the first moment of this, exactly when Susan Rice received her copy of the talking points - so did Congress. They knew what Susan Rice knew as soon as she knew it, but two years later their still "Surprised" as they try and figure out what she knew, and when? The only real thing that's changed in our understanding is that unlike other 7-8 protests and demonstration going on at our embassies on the exact same day, Benghazi was never a "protest", it was only an attack. A spontaneous attack.
Vyan
1:36 PM PT: Transcript from Face the Nation - Same day. Via Comments.
MS. RICE: So we’ll want to see the results of that [FBI] investigation to draw any definitive conclusions. But based on the best information we have to date, what our assessment is as of the present is in fact what began spontaneously in Benghazi as a reaction to what had transpired some hours earlier in Cairo where, of course, as you know, there was a violent protest outside of our embassy– –sparked by this hateful video. But soon after that spontaneous protest began outside of our consulate in Benghazi, we believe that it looks like extremist elements, individuals, joined in that– in that effort with heavy weapons of the sort that are, unfortunately, readily now available in Libya post-revolution. And that it spun from there into something much, much more violent.
BOB SCHIEFFER: But you do not agree with him that this was something that had been plotted out several months ago?
MS. RICE: We do not– we do not have information at present that leads us to conclude that this was premeditated or preplanned.
MR. SCHIEFFER: Do you agree or disagree with [the previous guest, the president of Libya’s general national congress] that al Qaeda had some part in this?
MS. RICE: Well, we’ll have to find out that out. I mean I think it’s clear that there were extremist elements that joined in and escalated the violence. Whether they were al Qaeda affiliates, whether they were Libyan-based extremists or al Qaeda itself I think is one of the things we’ll have to determine.
Again she sticks to the Cairo inspired Benghazi point, but did not deny the possibility that Al Qeada-ish person could have been involved, we just didn't have confirmation of that. We still don't.
3:08 PM PT: Today's Diary by Houndog brings up a crucial point.
The CIA based their initial assessment on media reports of the situation. The didn't have access to video from the Libyan's which proved there was no "protest or demonstration" at Benghazi until the 18th, two days after Susan Rice's appearance on the Sunday Talk Shows. This video evidence change the assessment from the "demonstration escalated into an attack" to realizing that there wasn't any real demonstration, there was simply an attack which began several hours after the breaching of the Cairo embassy. Still there is no evidence the attack was pre-planned or "coordinated" in an organized way.