CIA Station Chief Told Washington That There Were No Demonstrations On The Night That The U.S. Consulate Was Attacked

A protester reacts as the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi is seen in flames during a protest by an armed group said to have been protesting a film being produced in the United States September 11, 2012. Credit: Reuters/Esam Al-Fetori

CIA Officer Confirmed No Protests Before Misleading Benghazi Account Given -- Washington Times

Information on ground rejects protest account

Before the Obama administration gave an inaccurate narrative on national television that the Benghazi attacks grew from an anti-American protest, the CIA’s station chief in Libya pointedly told his superiors in Washington that no such demonstration occurred, documents and interviews with current and former intelligence officials show.

The attack was “not an escalation of protests,” the station chief wrote to then-Deputy CIA Director Michael J. Morell in an email dated Sept. 15, 2012 — a full day before the White House sent Susan E. Rice to several Sunday talk shows to disseminate talking points claiming that the Benghazi attack began as a protest over an anti-Islam video.

That the talking points used by Mrs. Rice, who was then U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, were written by a CIA that ignored the assessment by its own station chief inside Libya, has emerged as one of the major bones of contention in the more than two years of political fireworks and congressional investigations into the Benghazi attack.

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My Comment: As far as the administration is concerned .... there is nothing new to report on Benghazi. But the steady drip - drip of leaks and contradictory information .... coupled with those who were on the ground and who are now publicly contradicting the administration's narrative on Benghazi .... makes one realize that a special prosecutor will need to be appointed to get to the bottom of this case .... the families who lost their loved ones clearly need closure.