13 Hours: Bret Bair interview leaves us still questioning what really happened at Benghazi

This week, in a one hour interview with Bret Baier on Fox News titled “13 Hours” we heard first person accounts from the brave men who fought there of what actually happened during those hours of the attack on the U. S. Consulate and CIA annex in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012. The three men were CIA contractors whose job as part of the annex security team was to protect CIA case officers and personnel at the annex.

Around 9:30 pm that evening they got a call from their team leader that the consulate was under attack. The three were ready to go within five minutes of that first call, but were told to stand down or wait three separate times. After repeated calls from within the compound for help, and almost half an hour later, they disobeyed the stand down orders. Kris “Tanto” Paronto requested the support of a drone to provide eyes above and an AC-130 for protection and fire power, and he, along with Mark “Oz” Geist and John “Tig” Tiegen, headed towards the compound.

Their harrowing account of the events of that evening and early into the next day remove all doubt the stand down or wait orders resulted in the deaths of U. S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and U. S. Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith, along with CIA contractors Tyrone S. Woods and Glen Doherty. To watch the full interview, click here.

In addition, we also recently found out about a failed Special Operations mission to rescue journalists James Foley and Steve Sotloff from their ISIS captors on July 4^th, 2014. Against an enemy known to be constantly on the move to avoid their whereabouts being discovered and raided, we now know President Obama dithered and waited for over a month before authorizing the rescue operation that would have saved these Americans from their very savage and very public beheadings.  When he did finally authorize the mission it was to take place on July 4^th, 2014, with the president obviously hoping to reap the political fanfare and publicity of a successful mission occurring on America’s Independence Day. Sadly, when the extraction team arrived they found the place empty. The hostages and their captors had moved…evidently quite recently.

America has the best military in the world. Our Special Forces operators are the most highly specialized and trained warriors on the planet. Time and again their missions have been heralded during this administration, going back to Vice President Joe Biden lauding Seal Team Six for the successful raid and killing of Osama bin Laden. I don’t recall any other time in our history when their actions have been made so public, while understanding all too well that secrecy is integral to successful Special Forces operations.

Speaking with a retired Special Forces officer after watching 13 Hours he agreed with the CIA contractors that the stand down order and the thirty minute delay cost the lives of U. S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, Sean Smith, Tyrone S. Woods, and Glen Doherty. Which leaves one to wonder, after hearing the account of what happened on the night of September 11, 2012, why weren’t our Special Forces teams sent in to rescue the ambassador and the others? By all accounts this would have been a successful mission, and one the president could have capitalized on days before his reelection. If he really is all about the “optics” this should have been an easy decision for him. Instead he watched in real time as our people were murdered, knowing all he had to do was give the order to go in and our teams would have taken it from there.

No, there is more we need to know about Benghazi. After repeatedly requesting more protection from the State Department; after a failed assassination attempt on the British ambassador and the Tunisian consulate being stormed in June; after Sean Smith and Ambassador Stevens both recording events and their concerns about the growing presence of al-Qaeda in the area; why were these requests denied? There is a reason our people were held back from rescuing Ambassador Stevens and the others on September 11, 2012. What was going on that was so scandalous that the decision was made to permit Americans to be murdered rather than have the world discover the truth of the activities that were taking place in Benghazi? Who directed “Bob” at the CIA to issue the wait and stand down orders? We must demand answers from President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. It really does make a difference.

Below is another great commentary from Bill Whittle of Afterburner: President Coward. While I agree the actions of our president are the actions of a coward, I believe the actions of the president surrounding the events of Benghazi go beyond cowardice to the cover up of something else that was going on at the consulate. We must push our legislators to pursue this until we get the truth.