Yes, note the phrase "may have". What also "may have" happened is that all of them were killed and, lacking sufficient fighters, the CIA annex was overrun and everyone there was also killed.Fog of war. I think it was a good call, albeit controversial and a major point the RWs made attacking the Left. You might try reading Sun Tzu's "Art of War" for some enlightenment on the subject of military strategy and tactics. As callous as it may seem, it's better to lose four people than eight or twenty. How many people were in the CIA complex and might have been lost if the station chief had sent his best defenders over to the consulate then found himself under attack, as happened. Let's not forget that only two deaths were at the consulate. The other two were at the CIA annex when it came under attack a few hours later.Not sure what you are responding to. I didn't say a thing about collecting weapons and giving them to someone. When the shit went down at the consulate, there was a secret CIA house just a few blocks away with able bodied, well-trained armed Americans that could have been sent to help, and they were told to stand down and not help. Why? Why because the U.S. government didn't want to give away the position of their "secret" CIA base of operations... and what was the price? Possibly 4 American lives. I have a problem with that.
Monday-morning quarterbacking is fun and 20/20 Hindsight is always perfect, but it's a lot different in the field under fire. IMHO, the station chief made the correct call.
http://www.puppetpress.com/classics/ArtofWarbySunTzu.pdf
The Art of War by Sun Tzu - Download
Yeah but if they would have sent them before the shit really hit the fan and the bystanders would have seen there was backup, they may have dispersed and things may have never gotten to the level it got to. You can quote what you want, and I'll quote you back, "You NEVER leave a man behind."
You don't know. As for "never leave a man behind", agreed, but this is the middle of a fire fight and maximizing defenses against an enemy of unknown force takes some time to assess. Let's not forget this happened over a few hours, from about 9PM to 4AM. Not a lot of time to make plans.
The main problem with Benghazi, IMHO, is a lack of foresight by the WH. They ordered an operation then supported it on a shoe-string budget. The Bush WH made the same mistake when invading Iraq in 2003. People needlessly lost lives in both cases because 1) they didn't have sufficient people in place and 2) there wasn't proper contingency plan in place. It was a failure of leadership by the WH. The Republicans fucked up by attacking Hillary instead of Obama. My guess is that, by that time, Obama had already won the 2012 election and they were looking at 2016. It was pure Washingtonian bullshit at work, not the best interests of the nation.