The intelligence officials are anonymous as of now:
‘Within 24 hours of the 9-11 anniversary attack on the United States consulate in Benghazi, U.S. intelligence agencies had strong indications al Qaeda–affiliated operatives were behind the attack, and had even pinpointed the location of one of those attackers. Three separate U.S. intelligence officials who spoke to The Daily Beast said the early information was enough to show that the attack was planned and the work of al Qaeda affiliates operating in Eastern Libya.’
If this is true, I suspect it is because the current administration knows how much of a powder keg the Middle East is at the moment, and a direct military response, even if highly targeted, would have threatened Obama’s foreign policy further as well as any fruit the Arab Spring will have produced.
This could explain Secretary Of State Hilary Clinton’s PR tour across the region, the insistence on the video as the source of the attack (Susan Rice as well), and the lengthy, slow and visible, investigation. A plurality, if not a majority of Americans, and a vast majority Muslims it seems, are not where Obama wants them to be: woven together under a banner of liberal internationalist doctrine, with him bridging the divide.
Don’t get in the way: He’s threading the needle.
Addition: Yes, there is a certain amount of facetiousness in this post. Libyan president in a television interview says it was a planned, coordinated attack. Is it incompetence, a lack of communication, an inability to manage so many disparate interests and lack of leadership? Is it a failure or success of the liberal internationalist doctrine?
Related On This Site: From The BBC Via Michael Totten: ‘Libya: Islamist Militia Bases Stormed In Benghazi’
Via Reuters: ‘U.S. Ambassador To Libya Killed In Benghazi Attack’
Walter Russell Mead At The American Interest Online: ‘Obama’s War’…From The WSJ: “Allies Rally To Stop Gadhafi”…From March 27th, 2009 At WhiteHouse.Gov: Remarks By The President On A New Strategy For Afghanistan And Pakistan…From The New Yorker: ‘How Qaddafi Lost Libya’…
Adam Garfinkle At The American Interest: ‘Remember Libya?’…A Few Thoughts On Watching Operations In Libya
Is Bernhard Henri-Levy actually influencing U.S. policy decisions..? From New York Magazine: ‘European Superhero Quashes Libyan Dictator’…Bernhard Henri-Levy At The Daily Beast: ‘A Moral Tipping Point’…Charlie Rose Episode On Libya Featuring Bernhard Henri-Levy, Les Gelb And Others…
