Back in 2011, amid the discussions of withdrawal from Iraq, and the debate over how many troops would be needed to maintain a stable environment, two influential names rose to the surface, Tom Donilon and Denis McDonough. Both Donilon and McDonough overrode the Pentagon advice, and advised President Obama to dismiss the military and heed their counsel instead.
In August [2011], after debates between the Pentagon, the State Department and the White House, the Americans settled on the 3,000 to 5,000 number, which was reported in August. According to two people briefed on the matter, one inside the administration and one outside, the arguments of two White House officials, Thomas E. Donilon, the national security adviser, and his deputy, Denis McDonough, prevailed over those of the military.
Intelligence assessments that Iraq was not at great risk of slipping into chaos in the absence of American forces were a factor in the decision, an American official said. (link)
Will the Main Stream Media pick up on this? The painful reality of truth is that it exists regardless of anyone’s opinion of it. Nor does the truth care about the discomfort from its appearance.
(Via NRO) Did the Department of Defense just reveal that former President Clinton lied to America in 1993?
Could be.
At the Bergdahl/Hagel hearing going on in the House today, Democrat Rep. Adam Smith asked DoD General Counsel Stephen Preston for a specific example from the past where the United States “dealt with non-state actors who are holding a service member in order to achieve their recovery.” (more…)
WASHINGTON DC – The White House plans no discipline in connection with the accidental release to the press last month of the identity of the CIA’s station chief in Afghanistan, but is planning more safeguards to prevent such a mistake in the future, a White House spokesman said Wednesday.
“In all of these circumstances we are balancing our commitment to transparency with the need to protect some information for national security reasons,” spokesman Josh Earnest said, briefing reporters on a review conducted by White House Counsel Neil Eggleston. (more…)
(Via FOX News) The terrorists who attacked the U.S. consulate and CIA annex in Benghazi on September 11, 2012 used cell phones, seized from State Department personnel during the attacks, and U.S. spy agencies overheard them contacting more senior terrorist leaders to report on the success of the operation, multiple sources confirmed to Fox News.
The disclosure is important because it adds to the body of evidence establishing that senior U.S. officials in the Obama administration knew early on that Benghazi was a terrorist attack, and not a spontaneous protest over an anti-Islam video that had gone awry, as the administration claimed for several weeks after the attacks.
Eric Stahl, who recently retired as a major in the U.S. Air Force, served as commander and pilot of the C-17 aircraft that was used to transport the corpses of the four casualties from the Benghazi attacks – then-U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, information officer Sean Smith, and former Navy SEALs Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods – as well as the assault’s survivors from Tripoli to the safety of an American military base in Ramstein, Germany.
In an exclusive interview on Fox News’ “Special Report,” Stahl said members of a CIA-trained Global Response Staff who raced to the scene of the attacks were “confused” by the administration’s repeated implication of the video as a trigger for the attacks, because “they knew during the attack…who was doing the attacking.” Asked how, Stahl told anchor Bret Baier:
“Right after they left the consulate in Benghazi and went to the [CIA] safehouse, they were getting reports that cell phones, consulate cell phones, were being used to make calls to the attackers’ higher ups.”
A separate U.S. official, one with intimate details of the bloody events of that night, confirmed the major’s assertion. (more…)
Beep Beep * Beep Beep * Beep Beep * {{backing up}}Chuck Hagel testifying on the distinct premise “It’s easier to ask for forgiveness than permission“…..
Against the backdrop of current events this little snippet will not reach the attention of too many people. However, it’s lack of visibility in the news is not to say the inherent message is not resoundingly indicative of something newsworthy.
When Egypt held their 2011 “election” after the fall of Hosni Mubarak, the Muslim brotherhood worked diligently to elect their President, Mohammed Morsi.
Actually, he interrupted a vacation specifically to call Morsi on the day of his victory, offering congratulations and an immediate invitation to the White House.
But for Mohammed Morsi the actual trip to the White House would have to wait. There was another world leader he needed to meet first.
Indeed Morsi’s first official State Delegation, August 20th 2012, as the newly elected President of Egypt was to see an old friend: (more…)
President Barack Obama has actually done what President Richard Nixon only wished he could have !
The key part of this report is that when Darryl Issa found out about the data transmission, the DOJ immediately stated they were informed by the IRS the data-file contained legally protected taxpayer information and should not have been sent to them. Funny how the DOJ defend themselves ONLY AFTER congress finds out about the issue.
WASHINGTON DC – Internal Revenue Service officials sent the Federal Bureau of Investigation a “massive” database listing of tax exempt organizations just a few weeks before the November 2012 elections, House investigators announced Monday.
Oversight and Government Reform chairmen Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, say they recently obtained an email from Lois G. Lerner, the former head of the IRS tax exempt division, to a Justice Department official asking how to format the list of tax exempt groups for delivery to the FBI.
Issa, who heads the oversight committee and Jordan, who chairs a subcommittee, said in a statement on Monday sent a new letter to the IRS, demanding more information about the data sent to the FBI. (more…)
Back in 2011, amid the discussions of withdrawal from Iraq, and the debate over how many troops would be needed to maintain a stable environment, two influential names rose to the surface, Tom Donilon and Denis McDonough. Both Donilon and McDonough overrode the Pentagon advice, and advised President Obama to dismiss the military and heed their counsel instead.
