The White House Version of the Benghazi Attack is Fiction

The attacks on the US consular compound in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012, killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, including two former Navy SEALS. Five days later, Susan Rice, then the US Ambassador to the United Nations, appeared on five Sunday morning talk shows and said that the incident began as a "peaceful protest" against an anti-Moslem film and was later “hijacked” by militants. Rice, who now is Obama's national security adviser, has since called Benghazi "a false controversy." The Obama administration has always insisted that the Benghazi attacks that killed the four Americans erupted from a protest over an anti-Moslem video. But many Republicans, as well as intelligence and political analysts, have staked out the position that there was no "peaceful protest" in Benghazi, and that the attack was a well-planned terrorist operation carried out by al-Qaida groups. The Republicans, intelligence professionals and analysts have insisted the "hijacked peaceful protest" story was created by the White House to help insure President Obama's re-election because any hint of organized terrorism would have revealed that Obama's assertions that his Mideast policy was working were false. The White House, the President, the Attorney General and the Democrat Party leadership have all accused the GOP of "playing partisan politics," exaggerating the White House role in the Benghazi affair and demanding that the GOP "witchhunt" should end because there is no evidence to support their position. ~~~~~ But now, an email, dated September 14, 2012, has been found among documents released by Judicial Watch on Tuesday. Judicial Watch obtained the documents on April 18 under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit it filed against the State Department last June, said President Tom Fitton. The group obtained 41 emails, many of which had portions blacked out. The September 14, 2012, email is being called "the smoking gun" that the congressional investigators have been looking for. It shows White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes advising Susan Rice to focus on the YouTube video as the cause of a spontaneous protest that led to the attack. But, this White House fabrication of the Benghazi facts is contradicted by previously released emails showing that senior defense officials told the administration on the night of the attack that it was a terrorist action linked to al-Qaida and that no protest had occurred. Rather than follow the defense department's and the CIA Libya station chief's facts, Rhodes outlined talking points for Rice that were invented to help the President be re-elected. Rhodes gave Rice the advice "to underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy" and to "reinforce the President and Administration's strength." The email also contained a note for Rice to make sure to mention that al-Qaida had been destroyed. The email was prepared for a September 15 "prep call" with Rice that was to occur at 4 p.m., according to the email. The day after the prep call - five days after the attack - Rice appeared on five Sunday talk shows, each time linking the Libyan attacks to the anti-Moslem video. Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton cited the same reason for the attacks, while Obama would not say whether it was terrorism until several days afterward. Former CIA deputy director Mike Morell testified several weeks ago that he had no idea where the story about a video protest came from when he saw Rice make the claim on television. Judicial Watch's Fitton says : "Now we know where the video protest story came from. The Obama White House's chief concern about the Benghazi attack was making sure that President Obama looked good...These documents undermine the Obama administration's narrative that it thought the Benghazi attack had something to do with protests or an Internet video." Fitton added : "Given the explosive material in these documents, it is no surprise that we had to go to federal court to pry them loose from the Obama State Department." Many top White House officials received the Rhodes memo -- White House Press Secretary Jay Carney; Deputy Press Secretary Joshua Earnest; then-White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer; then-White House Deputy Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri; then-National Security Council Director of Communications Erin Pelton; Special Assistant to the Press Secretary Howli Ledbetter; and then-White House Senior Adviser and political strategist David Plouffe. ~~~~~ The political response to the White House email has been swift. Senator Lindsay Graham told Newsmax : "It shows political operatives in the White House working to create a political narrative at odds with the facts. Their goal was not to tell the truth about what actually happened. They did not want to provide the best information available. Instead, we were provided the most beneficial political story for President Obama." New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte told Fox News Channel : "We always said, 'Where did the video reference come from?' Now we know it came from the White House" and not the intelligence community. Both Graham and Ayotte are members of the Senate Armed Services Committee. They have been among the many Republicans who have called for an independent investigation of the Benghazi attacks. Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe, the committee's ranking GOP member, told Newsmax : "This was a cover-up, and these emails only continue to confirm my belief. The emails show that in the days after the attack in Benghazi, the White House was more focused on protecting President Obama than informing Americans about the terrorist attack that left Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans dead. They were pushing the video thing because it was just a matter of days before that he had made the American people think that his Middle East policy had stopped all terrorist activity. This was a couple of months before the election. Obviously, with an organized terrorist attack, it just defused the message that he was trying to send. That was their motivation. It couldn't be anything else. I don't think anyone now doubts that they knew it was an organized terrorist attack. It's the motive. The motive was fairly political." Referring to such famous political scandals as Watergate, Iran-contra and the Pentagon Papers, Inhofe added : "We all know that it's not the act, it's the cover-up that people find so offensive. This is far worse, because there's absolutely no doubt in anyone's mind that they were lying, they were not telling the truth to the American people. This happens to be the worst of all the cover-ups." ~~~~~ Dear readers, it is now clear that it was the White House communications group - those in highly political positions - which fabricated and disseminated a fictional story intended to lie to the American public and Congress about what really happened in Benghazi. The lies were intended to save President Obama's faltering election campaign against Mitt Romney by creating the illusion that Obama had defeated al-Qaida -- the truth is that al-Qaida had just come through a rebuilding process and was preparing to strike in a wider area than before, partly from new bases in Africa involved in the Benghazi attack. We can now also conclude that the Benghazi lies and cover-up were one part of a plan to hold onto the White House despite Obama's poor first-term performance. The other part had started in 2010 when the IRS began illegally harassing conservative tea party political groups. It is very difficult to believe that the Obama White House that lied about Benghazi is not also lying about its role in the IRS scandal. It is time for Congress to act.