US government failed to ‘react and respond’ to Benghazi attack, 4 whistleblowers from CIA and State get lawyers
The U.S. government had the ability to “react and respond” to the Benghazi terrorist attack and could have had forces on the ground before the second wave of the assault began, a special operator with knowledge of the response told Fox News in an exclusive interview.
Benghazi safehouse on fire following the September 11 attack photo supplied by State Dept
At least four career officials at the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency have retained lawyers or are in the process of doing so, as they prepare to provide sensitive information about the Benghazi attacks to Congress, Fox News has learned.
“I know for a fact that C 110 the UComm CIF was doing a training exercise, not in the region of northern Africa, but in Europe. And they had the ability to react and respond,” the anonymous Special Ops member told Fox.
The C 110 is a 40-man Special Ops force capable of rapid response and deployment, a group trained specifically for an event like the Benghazi attack, Fox News reports. The unit was training in Croatia on Sept. 11, 2012, just 3.5 hours away from Benghazi.
“They would have been there before the second attack,” the anonymous special operator said. “They would have been there at a minimum to provide a quick reaction force that could facilitate their exfil out of the problem situation.”
“Nobody knew how it was going to develop, and you hear a whole bunch of people and a whole bunch of advisors say, ‘Hey, we wouldn’t have sent them there because the security was unknown situation.’ If it’s an unknown situation, at a minimum you send forces there to facilitate the exfil or medical injuries. We could have sent a C 130 to Benghazi to provide medical evacuation for the injured.”
Victoria Toensing, a former Justice Department official and Republican counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, is now representing one of the State Department employees. She told Fox News her client and some of the others, who consider themselves whistle-blowers, have been threatened by unnamed Obama administration officials.
“I’m not talking generally, I’m talking specifically about Benghazi – that people have been threatened,” Toensing said in an interview Monday. “And not just the State Department. People have been threatened at the CIA.”
Toensing declined to name her client.
Federal law provides explicit protections for federal government employees who are identified as “whistle-blowers.” The laws aim to ensure these individuals will not face repercussions from their superiors, or from other quarters, in retaliation for their provision of information about corruption or other forms of wrongdoing to Congress, or to an agency’s inspector-general.
