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The U.S. mission in Libya recorded 230 "security incidents" over a one-year period between 2011 and 2012, according to a State Department document that provides the most expansive view yet of the concerns on the ground in the run-up to the deadly Sept. 11 consulate attack.
The document was obtained by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which is preparing to hold a high-profile hearing on Wednesday featuring security officers who served in Libya.
One of them, Eric Nordstrom, claimed in an Oct. 1 email -- obtained by Fox News -- that he had argued for additional security, citing the "number of incidents that targeted diplomatic missions."
However, Nordstrom suggested the U.S. government was eager to give the impression that Libya was safer than it was and declined.
"These incidents paint a clear picture that the environment in Libya was fragile at best and could degrade quickly," he wrote. "Certainly, not an environment where post should be directed to 'normalize' operations and reduce security resources in accordance with an artificial time table."
The account is similar to that of Lt. Col. Andy Wood, the former head of a Special Forces security team who has also agreed to testify. He has given similar accounts in the media of being rebuffed in calling for more security.
The testimony is sure to fuel the firestorm on Capitol Hill over the administration's handling of the attack -- both in terms of security before the attack and the public explanation afterward of what happened.
Pushed on whether security was pulled back before the Sept. 11 strike, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland declined to get into specifics.
"I'm not going to go into all of these kinds of timeline details as to what we had when and where," she said.
Nuland said that in advance...
