Bumps in the Road

When 9/11 rolls around next year, it will not only be the 12^th anniversary of the cowardly attacks by Islamic radicals on the sovereign soil of the US, but it will also be the first anniversary of an equally cowardly attack by Islamic radicals on the US embassy in Libya, which, like every other embassy in the world, rests on soil sovereign to the country it represents. The attack cost the lives of our ambassador, Christopher Stevens, Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith, and two ex-SEALs, Glen Doherty and Tyrone S. Woods, who were there to provide security.

Stevens was an improbable ambassador even in a country as unsettled as Libya. He hitched a ride to get there aboard a Greek freighter, arriving in country as the regime of Moammar Gadhafi was collapsing but before the dictator had been executed. Once in country, he directed the landing of supplies and vehicles needed to establish a diplomatic American presence representing the US to the rebels fighting Gadhafi forces.

Stevens, who was 52 years old, had served in Morocco as a Peace Corps volunteer teaching English.  He was fluent in Arabic and well-traveled throughout the Middle East, which he made the focus of his 20-year State Department career after receiving his law degree. Stevens had served two other assignments in Libya prior to his final one and had diplomatic postings in Israel, Egypt, Syria, and Saudi Arabia. Yet he seemed particularly devoted to the Libyan people, among whom he had many personal friends and with whom he often socialized.

This past June while in Washington, he spoke with a reporter about the rising violence in Libya among Islamists – which included the June bombing of our consulate in Benghazi. Now that Gadhafi was gone, he said, people felt freer to express their opinions about the future of the country. Unfortunately the lack of a strong government to fill the vacuum left by the previous regime and a weak-willed police force were incapable of dealing with trouble-makers whose rhetoric was over the line and designed to incite violence, particularly against Americans.

It should trouble ordinary Americans who care for their country to know that their State Department – and therefore the Obama administration – had 48 hours’ notice that the Benghazi consulate and the Cairo embassy were targets for attacks by Islamic radicals. Nertheless, diplomats there were not warned. A local Libyan militia commander said, after the Benghazi attacks, that he had warned Stevens the security situation was deteriorating and that he was concerned for the 30 or so Americans and embassy staff. There was a nearby “safe house” but Stevens and some others, including the other three killed, stayed in the consulate. Although Stevens was “guarded” by his security detail consisting of two ex-SEALs and friendly local militia, none were armed and the local “security” left the scene when the fighting started. Most importantly: there was no US Marine detachment there – standard operating procedure for consular protection, especially in a country with roaming bands of well-armed militia and unknown agendas.

This tragedy was an intelligence breakdown that would have been excoriated in the press if a Republican administration were in power. Think the 9/11 Commission, Jamie Gorelick, and “connecting the dots” all in the same sentence.

Within 24 hours of the attack, which was known in Washington almost as it was launched, our intelligence experts knew that this was terrorist-motivated. Yet, after the attack – which was launched around 9:30 p.m. from three sides by well-armed militia replete with rocket-propelled grenades – Obama and Hillary Clinton cooked up a story that the attacks were a response to a 15-minute YouTube video that slurred the Prophet Mohammed. The “incendiary” video had been on the web for months with less than a dozen “hits” so anyone who believed what the White House was peddling must also believe that the moon is made of cheese. As Senator John McCain later said, “most people don’t bring rocket-propelled grenades and heavy weapons to a demonstration.”

The White House also tried to deflect criticism that these were hostile, well-planned and coordinated embassy attacks by saying that photos released by Libyans show that they were trying to take Ambassador Stevens to the hospital and that he was alive when they found him. The Libyans, however, had a funny way of transporting our diplomat because anyone can Google “Stevens dragged” and see his dead body being dragged through the streets partially clothed with onlookers taking cell phone photos of him before being dumped. The Obama administration has clamped shut any post-mortem findings, but rumors from the scene suggest that Stevens had been brutalized, including raped, when the attackers set upon him.

With an election six weeks away, there is little wonder why Obama and his handlers would lie to the American people about the treatment of our country’s diplomatic representative on the 11^th anniversary of a horrific attack by Islamic radicals of the same ilk. The last thing a politician up for reelection needs is any evidence that he can’t keep Americans safe from terrorists – both here and abroad. We will likely not learn the truth of what happened in the final days and hours to our embassy in Libya until this mendacious administration is out of office.

It also should trouble ordinary Americans that our sovereign, burned out consulate was left unsecured by the provisional Libyan government which America helped put into power. A strong American president, less concerned that the world like us, would have demanded that our consulate be secured, and if in doubt that his demand would be carried out immediately, would have put an armed force on the ground with air cover and FBI agents sufficient to protect the crime scene. Since that didn’t happen, curious onlookers were able to take what they wanted from the scene, including secrets that every embassy wants kept secret – like the names of locals who help feed intelligence to the ambassador.

The charred remains of Ambassador Stevens’ diary were found among the ruins by a CNN reporter who, in the absence of any CIA agents sent immediately upon news of the attack to prevent it, passed the diary on to CNN headquarters in Atlanta. Despite CNN’s agreement with Stevens’ family to return it to them unread, CNN superstar Anderson Cooper revealed some of its details on his TV program, which masquerades as news. Mr. Cooper’s “diary scoop” caused an eruption at the State Department. Little wonder. It revealed a government totally bumfuzzled with how it should respond to the situation in Libya. More damning, the seven remaining diary pages, written in Stevens’ handwriting, said that he was concerned about the relentless security threats associated with the rise of Islamic extremism in the area, specifically in Benghazi, the growing presence of al-Qaeda in Libya, and knowledge that he was on al-Qaeda’s hit list. As good a diplomat as he was, Stevens would have passed those concerns on to the State Department, whose incompetent Secretary Hillary might have had interest in it, except that she was too busy inviting the anti-American new President of Egypt, a card-carrying member of the Muslim Brotherhood, to come visit the White House and have a spot of tea with Obama – when he wasn’t on the golf course … of course.

Libya lost a friend with the death of Christopher Stevens.  He was the “Lawrence of Arabia” for Libyans, traveling among their ordinary people with minimal presence of personal security with him – and those guards who accompanied him were often out of sight. Stevens wanted to be viewed as if he were Libyan. He would be seen in local shops and coffee cafes where Libyans would come up to him to have their picture taken. On Wednesday, the Libyan president told NBC that the anti-Islam film had “nothing to do with” the attack on the US consulate that killed this popular diplomat.

Sean Smith, also killed in the attack, was an employee of the State Department who managed the IT functions for embassies and consulates. He was an avid online gamer who played under the online pseudonym “Vile Rat.” Many of the people who knew him had never met him except online. But those who knew him offline described him as a “first class nice guy.”

One of the online players who knew Smith personally had gamed with him as he moved from one diplomatic assignment to another. In Baghdad, he recalled, Smith would key stroke that the “incoming” sirens were going off, signaling a strike, and he would disappear for a long while. This would cause the other players to “freak out.” But then Smith would always return after a bit.

On the night before the attack, he messaged:

(12:54:09 PM) vile_rat: assuming we don’t die tonight. We saw one of our “police” that guard the compound taking pictures.

Then later, according to his friend, “this time he said ‘F - - K’ and ‘GUNFIRE’ and then disconnected and never returned.” Only later did the online community learn that he had been killed. Smith, Stevens, and a security guard had retreated to a safe room in the consulate. The attackers broke into the compound, poured diesel fuel around the building, and ignited it. It’s unknown if they were aware that anyone was inside. The security guard made his way out of the burning consulate. Smith and Stevens didn’t.

Sean Smith was married. His wife, Heather, was born and grew up in Roswell, GA before moving to Dulles VA where the two met. They have two small children, Samantha and Nathan, who will grow up without their dad, Vile Rat.

Also killed in the attack was ex-SEAL, Glen Doherty, who worked for a private security firm on contract with the State Department to protect the ambassador. Doherty was an adrenaline junkie who was fearless and, according to his sister, loved two things: being outdoors and being with friends. His closest friends were a group of misfits with whom he’d attended elementary school and he was the glue that kept them all together. He learned to fly after graduating from high school, rode fast motorcycles, guided white water rafting down the Colorado River, and was a Utah ski bum during the winters.

At age 25 he enlisted in SEAL training, and after graduating, became a registered nurse and paramedic as well as a trained sniper, writing a book, The 21st Century Sniper: A Complete Practical Guide. His nursing skills helped him attend to the wounded when his unit was sent to the scene of the suicide bombing of the USS Cole, which killed 17 and wounded 39 sailors. His sniper skills helped his Special Ops unit to find and rescue Pvt. Jessica Lynch, the wounded Quartermaster Corps trooper who was captured during the attack on Baghdad. Doherty did two tours in Iraq during the 2003 “Iraqi Freedom” Gulf War.

His marriage to his high school sweetheart couldn’t stand the strain of his risky assignments which took him to the corners of the world. His work with the private security firm would keep him on three-month projects after which he would return for one or two months to the states. He bored easily. One friend described him as a person who thought the only thing cooler than doing what he was doing was to leave it in order to do something else.

After the first attack on the consulate, Doherty shepherded 30 embassy staff to a second building and notified the State Department’s operations center in Tripoli to evacuate them.  Apparently some friendly militia arrived to protect the embassy compound. Around 2 a.m. a five minute attack on the second building was launched. First-hand accounts about the evacuation of the embassy staff to the Benghazi airport conflict at this point. More needs to be factually known. But the second attack included mortars launched into the compound. Doherty was killed just outside the compound gate by a mortar blast. He was 41 years old.

Tyrone Woods, known as Rone to friends, was the other ex-SEAL killed in the Benghazi attacks. He had enlisted in the Navy after graduating from high school and volunteered for SEAL training. His career with the SEALs spanned two decades, including tours in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Like Doherty, he was a registered nurse and paramedic.

Previously married, his former brother in law said Woods was the sort of person who was not able to adjust to civilian life. “He was always waiting for that phone to ring” before another high-stakes mission. During the SEAL infamous “Hell Week” – a grueling five and a half days of almost unending training during which a total of three or four hours of sleep is allowed, Woods was injured. His choice after recovery was drop out or repeat Hell Week. He went through it a second time, telling his mother, “I don't want to be just another barnacle scrapping Sailor".

In 2010 he retired from the SEALs and joined a firm providing consulate security services in Central America and the Middle East. He remarried, moved to Henderson NV, and bought a house. His wife gave birth to a son earlier this year, whom he was able to see before leaving for Libya. He and Doherty were probably killed in the same mortar blast.

In this past Sunday’s 60 Minutes interview of the 2012 presidential candidates, Steve Kroft asked Obama if recent events had given him any pause about his support for the “Arab Spring” uprisings. Obama’s response:

I think it was absolutely the right thing for us to do to align ourselves with democracy, universal rights a notion that people have to be able to participate in their own governance, but I was pretty certain and continue to be pretty certain that there are going to be bumps in the road because, you know, in a lot of these places, the one organizing principle has been Islam …

I guess that’s what the unpardonable attacks on our embassies in Libya and Cairo were … and the deaths of four Americans … Stevens, Smith, Doherty, and Woods … bumps in the road.