Dark Forces: The Truth About What Happened in Benghazi (31 page)

The second unexplained meeting that has drawn significant attention was with Turkish Consul General Ali Seit Akin. His role remains more murky. In a message of condolence he posted to the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli’s Facebook page, he said that he and Stevens “knew each other well and were good friends already” because they had both been posted to Benghazi during the uprising.
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In his diary entry previewing the day, Stevens mentioned the upcoming meeting with Akin, “who had helped me land in Benghazi last year.”

Turkey was a major player in Libya. Initially, the Turkish government of Islamist premier Tayyip Recep Erdog˘an opposed the NATO bombing attacks and, despite prodding by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and other top NATO officials, refused to take part in it. Turkish businesses had invested heavily in Qaddafi’s Libya and opposed the bombing, knowing that their assets would be among the targets. Tens of thousands of Turkish construction workers lived in Benghazi and in other major cities, and had to be evacuated at the beginning of the conflict. Later, Erdog˘an’s government sent humanitarian aid and assistance to the rebels in Benghazi, and held extensive political consultations with them in Ankara, Doha, and elsewhere. Ultimately, Turkey supported the new government.

Although Akin posted a CV to the consul general’s website, it suggested that he was an intelligence officer under diplomatic cover, or just a very mediocre diplomat. After a twenty-year career that began at the Department of Defense (where many officers in Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization, MIT, start their careers) and took him to Tehran, Frankfurt, New York, and Riyadh with the Foreign Ministry, he ended up as the deputy Turkish representative to the World Trade Organization, and then as a deputy consul in Benghazi.
*
Really? Although I contacted Akin when writing this book, he refused to answer questions by email or telephone.

Given the mess created by the
Al Entisar
shipment, it’s hard to believe the two diplomats didn’t discuss it. Erdog˘an’s government made clear their displeasure with the publicity the shipment had received and the lack of discretion of the Syrian rebels and their Libyan supporters. They were also unhappy with the way in which the weapons were distributed and felt they should have been in control, given the involvement of Erdog˘an’s favorite “NGO,” the IHH Humanitarian Relief Foundation, a group brazenly used as a cutout by the Turkish government.
*

Many have speculated that Chris Stevens went to Benghazi to oversee a secret weapons pipeline to the Syrian rebels. That speculation was fueled by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in her only public testimony before Congress on the Benghazi attacks. Her exchange with Senator Rand Paul is worth quoting in its entirety:

SEN. PAUL:
Now, my question is, is the U.S. involved with any procuring of weapons, transfer of weapons, buying, selling, anyhow transferring weapons to Turkey out of Libya?

SEC. CLINTON:
To Turkey? I will have to take that question for the record. That’s—I—nobody’s ever raised that with me. I—

SEN. PAUL:
It’s been in—it’s been in news reports that ships have been leaving from Libya and that they may have weapons. And what I’d like to know is, the annex that was close by, were they involved with procuring, buying, selling, obtaining weapons, and were any of these weapons being transferred to other countries, any countries, Turkey included?

SEC. CLINTON:
Well, Senator, you’ll have to direct that question to the agency that ran the annex. And I will—I will see what information is available and—

SEN. PAUL:
You’re saying you don’t know.

SEC. CLINTON:
I do not know. I don’t have any information on that.
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Secretary Clinton of course knew exactly why she had sent Chris Stevens to Benghazi, and it was not to facilitate freelance gunrunning to the Syrian rebels, but just the opposite. My investigation has found that Stevens was sent to ferret out unsolicited weapons transfers by overzealous jihadis and do what he could to shut those down, so that professionals—most likely under John Brennan’s control—could do the job. “The Turks were squawking about what a shitty job we did at controlling weapons distribution,” a senior U.S. Special Operations officer told me. “Stevens’ job was to get the MANPADS back, or at least out of the hands of al Qaeda–affiliated groups.”

Larry Johnson, a former CIA officer who supported Hillary Clinton in her 2008 presidential bid, told me his sources believed Stevens was sent to Benghazi “to support the White House arms smuggling operation, run by John Brennan. Brennan was responding to Saudi and Turkish pressure to do something to halt the spread of Iranian influence, and was assisting them in acquiring weapons that could be used by the rebels.”
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Both of these sources agreed that the CIA was not running guns out of Benghazi, but was working with others to do so. “That way, they didn’t have to report the activity to Congress,” Johnson said.

But they were also trying to buy back the four hundred or so Stingers that had gone loose. “The MANPADS buyback was key to why Stevens was in Benghazi,” a third intelligence source who was directly engaged in the MANPADS buyback operations told me. “There was a meeting planned that night on the buyback.”

If Stevens didn’t raise the subject of the
Al Entisar
shipment with Akin, the Turkish official probably did. Akin’s role in the Benghazi attacks is considered so sensitive that, until now, the State Department and the CIA have denied Freedom of Information Act requests relating to his meeting with Stevens.
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Their meeting was critical to this story for another reason as well, which I will reveal in the next chapter.

CAT AND MOUSE

After his briefing at the CIA Annex, Stevens went for a scheduled meeting at the Fadeel Hotel downtown to confer with members of the Benghazi Local Council. Although touted as a four-star hotel, the Fadeel was long in the tooth, left dusty and a bit beaten up by the revolution. Twenty of the council’s forty-one members showed up for the closed-door meeting, including President Jumaa al-Sahli. This was Stevens’ opportunity for more ground truth.

The council members were “frustrated at the slow pace of reforms instituted by the Transitional National Council and its successor, the General National Congress,” Stevens reported. They feared that the U.S. candidate for prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, would focus national resources to develop Tripoli and the western half of the country, leaving Benghazi and the east to its own devices. They urged Stevens to get the U.S. government “to ‘pressure’ American companies to invest in Benghazi,” not a good sign. It is quite likely that Stevens laid out his concerns about loose weapons and the need to collect them in a responsible manner, as they reorganized and integrated the many militias vying for control of the city and the surrounding region.
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Stevens had real anxiety about the security situation in Benghazi, especially as multiple militias, some of them commanded by known al Qaeda operatives, were claiming to be in charge of the city’s security—and even his own. David McFarland had briefed him on a disturbing meeting just the day before with Wisam bin Hamed and Muhammad al-Gharabi, commanders of rival Libya Shield brigades. Just as the council members would the next evening, they pledged “they would not continue to guarantee security in Benghazi” if the United States continued to back Jibril for prime minister over the Muslim Brotherhood candidate, Awad al-Barasi.

Making the threat even more alarming was the fact that Wisam bin Hamed reportedly fought against U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan before returning to Libya in 2011 to fight Qaddafi. His Libya Shield brigade regularly flew the black flag of al Qaeda at rallies and in battle. According to the Library of Congress report, he worked hand-in-glove with Ansar al-Sharia. As McFarland had reported, “blurry lines defined membership in Benghazi-based brigades,” so it was often difficult to know who was who.
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One of Stevens’ jobs during his stay in Benghazi was to smooth over relations with the 17th February Martyrs Brigade, which had supposedly quit as the mission’s quick reaction force a few days earlier. Alec Henderson had been working day and night to hammer out a new agreement with them. But who were they really? Were they making a pact with jihadis? Or even al Qaeda?

The meeting at the Fadeel Hotel was the first avowed security breach of Stevens’ trip. Someone on the local council had invited the press, who “showed up unexpectedly, despite U.S. efforts to keep the Ambassador’s program and movements from being publicized,” the State Department review board found.

It worried Alec Henderson, the RSO. And it worried Stevens.

The cat was out of the bag.

But Khalil Harb and his Quds Force team didn’t learn that Stevens was in town from journalists who attended that dinner. Rather, they sent journalists to the dinner as a subtle warning to the Americans: We’re watching you. We know where you are.

That was how the Iranians worked, like a cat playing with a mouse. They were toying with the American ambassador before they killed him.

The ARB report, which acknowledged the security breach, also propagated the lie that Stevens “met with the City Council at a local hotel
for dinner
” (italics added). According to Stevens’ schedule and my sources, the City Council meeting at the Fadeel hotel took place in late afternoon. Stevens had other plans for dinner that the State Department was intent on keeping from the public eye.

In his diary, Stevens noted that he dined that evening after the Local Council meeting with a Libyan friend and the friend’s partner. He described his friend, whose name I have voluntarily withheld, as a “hotelier and caterer extraordinaire” who came from Jalu, an oasis town in the desert south of Benghazi. Although this was clearly a private dinner, Stevens noted that the couple gave him “intelligent comments on the history of the revolution and the [Muslim Brotherhood’s] influential role in supporting it from the beginning.” Nevertheless, when Stevens showed his sympathy for the Muslim Brotherhood, they offered “heated words” that were “very anti-MB.”

In a comment to himself, Stevens noted that Habib Bubaker, a local translator he had used for official meetings since first arriving in Benghazi during the revolution, also blamed TNC chairman Abdul Jalil “for handing the revolution over to the MB.”

Clearly, Chris Stevens was struggling with his own pro–Muslim Brotherhood leanings, which he shared with the State Department hierarchy. However, unlike his bosses, he was inquisitive and challenged his prejudices.

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THE ATTACKS

The next day was the eleventh anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terror attacks on America, and the Obama White House wanted everyone to know they were on top of it. They announced that White House counterterrorism advisor John Brennan was the man in charge. For more than a month, Brennan had been convening meetings and reviewing security measures to make sure this most auspicious of anniversaries came and went peacefully.

During the briefing today, the President and the Principals discussed specific measures we are taking in the Homeland to prevent 9/11 related attacks as well as the steps taken to protect U.S. persons and facilities abroad, as well as force protection. The President reiterated that Departments and agencies must do everything possible to protect the American people, both at home and abroad.
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Chris Stevens, Greg Hicks, and Lieutenant Colonel George Bristol—Andy Wood’s successor in command of the scaled-down Special Forces team that remained in Tripoli—must have been pleased to know that John Brennan was taking charge of their security, since no one else was.

Apparently, Brennan’s idea of security preparations was to lie low, hunker down, and hope for the best. Astonishingly, given the number of vulnerable U.S. diplomatic and military facilities in hot areas of the Middle East, not a single military asset was put on readiness alert for that day anywhere within an eight-hour flight of Libya. No one thought to contact AFRICOM commander General Carter Ham with orders to beef up security for U.S. facilities in the fifty-four countries in his area of responsibility; no one called Admiral James G. Stavrides, the Supreme Allied Commander–Europe (SACEUR), to put his Commander’s In-Extremis Force (CIF)—then in Croatia—on standby, or to make sure that U.S. fighter jets and refueling aircraft were placed on strip alert. They didn’t even give a heads-up to the interagency Foreign Emergency Support Team (FEST), a special unit created to respond to terrorist incidents at U.S. embassies worldwide, to be prepared in case they were needed.

In fact, as General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, subsequently told the Senate Armed Services Committee, the September 10, 2012, meeting referred to in the White House press release was a “routine monthly review of counterterrorism operations, worldwide,” not specifically devoted to the September 11 anniversary.
2

It was another seemingly petty lie from the Obama White House, but one that carried deadly consequences.

THE CIA WARNING

And yet, the CIA had actionable intelligence identifying credible threats to U.S. diplomatic facilities in the region.

In Egypt, prominent jihadis had issued a call for supporters to burn down the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and kill everyone inside, to pressure the U.S. government to release the Blind Sheikh and Muslim detainees in Guantánamo Bay.
3
Supporters of the Blind Sheikh had been camped out in front of the embassy in Cairo for days before the 9/11 anniversary, claiming to be conducting a peaceful protest. They were led by Mohammad al-Zawahri, the brother of al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri. Mohammad had been in an Egyptian jail on terrorism-related charges until just a few weeks earlier, when he was pardoned by President Mohamed Morsi.
4

You would think that the presence of the brother of the Supreme Leader of al Qaeda outside the U.S. Embassy would set off alarm bells back in Washington and perhaps prompt someone to ask CENTCOM commander General James Matthis, who had direct responsibility for Egypt, to put his CIF on alert. Didn’t happen.

CNN reporter Nic Robertson took notice. He interviewed Zawahri in front of the U.S. Embassy on September 10 about his demand. “And when you call for the release of prisoners, you’re talking about Sheikh Abdul-Rahman,” he said.

“Of course” al-Zawahri replied, “he is the first one we ask about.” The Blind Sheikh’s son was standing next to him and nodded his head. CNN reportedly caved in to Obama administration pressure and stopped referring to Robertson’s astonishing report later on, since it contradicted the official line that the attacks came in response to an Internet video.
5

Egypt specialist Raymond Ibrahim, who scours the Arabic-language press and social media to reveal information that often gets shunted aside by the national media as politically incorrect, reported on September 10 that two prominent jihadi groups tied to al Qaeda were also calling on their supporters to storm the U.S. Embassy. They went a step further, threatening not just to burn down the embassy but to take hostage anyone left alive “unless the Blind Sheikh is immediately released.”
6

The CIA took these threats seriously and, on September 10, “notified Embassy Cairo of social media reports calling for a demonstration and encouraging jihadists to break into the Embassy,” a draft of the post-Benghazi administration talking points reveals. That sentence was subsequently deleted, apparently by Hillary Clinton’s deputy chief of staff, Jake Sullivan.
7

In response to these direct threats and to the explicit CIA warning, U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson, who boasted of her close ties to Morsi and her sympathy for the Muslim Brotherhood, ordered the evacuation of all U.S. Embassy personnel by noon on September 11 and issued a warning to Americans living in Egypt not to visit the embassy that day. She also ordered the U.S. Marine guards to remove the magazines from their duty rifles, so as not to appear too aggressive. That order would have near-fatal results.
8

But even those dramatic actions did not prompt U.S. military leaders or their civilian bosses to put U.S. military forces in the region on alert, as Admiral Mullen, General Dempsey, and AFRICOM commander General Carter Ham have all testified.

According to the official version, there were no “indicators and warnings” of a specific attack. “We were blindsided,” the former director of operations (J3) for AFRICOM, Rear Admiral Richard Landolt, told me.
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RECON

In Benghazi, the day began with a bad omen.

At 6:43 AM, not long after sunup, one of the unarmed Blue Mountain security guards at the Special Mission Compound noticed that a Libyan policeman had parked his car by the front gate and climbed to the roof of a building under construction just across the street, where he was taking photographs inside the mission’s thirteen-acre walled compound. At the same time, he was talking to someone on a cell phone, apparently getting instructions. As he was getting back into his car, where two other individuals were waiting for him, the guard went over and asked what he had been doing. The policeman angrily told the guard to get lost and sped off.

When the guard told David Ubben and Scott Wickland, the two assistant regional security officers (ARSOs), they went nuts. According to the State Department review board, they asked the guard to take them across the street and show them exactly where the man had been standing. To both of them, it smacked of a recon mission. The policeman clearly had been in a position to take pictures of all four of the villas inside the compound, which otherwise were hidden from view by the perimeter wall.

That was the second warning from the Quds Force team. They already had all the pictures they needed of the Special Mission Compound and of the Annex. Indeed, they had even taken measurements with a laser rangefinder, as became apparent later.

The incident so disturbed Ubben and Wickland that the mission drafted a complaint to Mohammad Obeidi, the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs office in Benghazi, and to the local police chief. The complaint noted that the person photographing the compound “was part of the police unit sent to protect the mission,” and had arrived in official police vehicle number 322. It also reminded Obeidi of the ongoing security concerns at the mission, and the failure of the Libyan authorities to provide the normal assistance accorded by host countries to accredited diplomats:

On Sunday, September 9, the U.S. mission requested additional police support at our compound for the duration of U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens’ visit. We requested daily, twenty-four hour police protection at the front and rear of the U.S. mission as well as a roving patrol. In addition, we requested the services of a police explosives detection dog.

We were given assurances from the highest authorities in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that all due support would be provided for Ambassador Stevens’ visit to Benghazi. However, we are saddened to report that we have only received an occasional police presence at our main gate. Many hours pass when we have no police support at all.
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The State Department review board commented laconically that the complaint was never actually submitted to the Libyan authorities “due to the typically early closure of Libyan government offices.” Nor was it provided to Congress despite repeated requests that the State Department provide all relevant documents relating to the Benghazi attacks. Congress only saw it after a reporter stumbled upon copies of both letters in the ruined compound six weeks after the attacks. “Given the location where they were found, these documents appear to be genuine and support a growing body of evidence indicating that the Obama administration has tried to withhold pertinent facts about the 9/11 anniversary attack from Congress and the American people,” Representative Issa wrote Secretary Clinton.
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EYES ON

With the continued uncertainty about their agreement with the 17th February Martyrs Brigade, RSO Alec Henderson asked Stevens to restrict all of his meetings to the compound that day. He didn’t want to risk moving around town, especially without a gun truck escort from the 17th February Martyrs Brigade.

Stevens’ draft schedule, found by reporters in the wreckage of the compound, had him visiting the offices of the Arabian Gulf Oil Company (AGOCO) that morning. AGOCO was a Benghazi-based oil producer and exporter that controlled roughly one-quarter of Libya’s oil. They had played a critical role in the rebellion by pledging to repay the government of Qatar and the private oil trading giant, Vitol, for fuel they provided to the rebels. AGOCO operated the largest oil export terminal in the country, in Tobruk, which could easily be shut down in the event of political protests. AGOCO undoubtedly wanted Stevens’ assistance in taming the rivalries among warring militias, so that they could continue to export oil. That meeting got shifted to the following day.

David McFarland, the TDY political officer, returned to Tripoli on the early morning commercial flight. That left Stevens, Sean Smith, and the five DS agents as the only Americans at the compound. Because it was the September 11 anniversary, flags at the compound were flown at half-mast.

From Stevens’ diary, we know that he was happy to be back in Benghazi, but also apprehensive. “It’s so nice to be back in Benghazi. Much stronger emotional connection to this place—the people but also the smaller-town feel and the moist air & green & spacious compound,” he wrote that morning.

He had breakfast with Habib Bubaker, his fixer, translator, and friend. Bubaker ran an English school in town, and first met Stevens during the heady days of the insurrection the year before. While Stevens spoke fluent Arabic, “he preferred English in his official meetings.” Bubaker made introductions and became a confidant. Bubaker accompanied Stevens throughout most of that fateful day.
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He had set up meetings with appellate court judge Naeem Jibril, and with the TNC’s local representative, Dr. Fatih Baja. Both were trusted personal sources he had cultivated during his earlier stay in Benghazi. He felt he could rely on them to give him ground truth on the political lay of the land, without the posturing and breast-beating he’d endured with the local council the night before. He also met as scheduled with Mahmoud El-Mufti of the Al Marfa Shipping and Maritime Services Company. These meetings were devoted to the intense jockeying for the prime minister’s position, where different militias, clans, and corporate interests were all vying for power, influence, protection, and jobs. “[Mahmoud] Jibril reportedly fared well. Possibly also Mufti,” Stevens wrote in his diary that morning. “Baja says Jibril should win. But they’re worried about the MB [Muslim Brotherhood] and extremists denying him his rightful place or making life difficult if he wins.”

Stevens also met at least briefly with some of the local security guards, including those from the 17th February Martyrs Brigade he had known from the old days, but didn’t yet have the down-and-dirty negotiating session with brigade commanders Fawzi Bukatif and Fathi Obeidi. He was also planning to meet with the Egyptian, Swedish, and Italian consuls, whose contact information was conveniently included at the end of his five-page schedule.

His last meeting of the day was with the Turkish consul general.

He had every reason to be meeting with the Akin. Turkey played a major role in Libya both politically and economically. Plus, there was Turkey’s direct involvement in the Syrian civil war. Turkey was both the staging area for the Syrian rebels, providing them safe haven and protection, and an active participant in the weapons pipeline. Akin would be a tremendous source of information for who was doing what for the Syrian rebels in Benghazi. If he didn’t know the players, nobody did.

It should come as no surprise that the ambassador was collecting intelligence. After all, it was his job. But, unlike the CIA, he gathered information openly, like a reporter, then used it to form the political judgments that he sent back in official cables to his superiors in Washington.

An initial State Department “tick-tock” of events that night wasn’t released until October 9. The briefer warned reporters he was giving them “as much granularity as I possibly can. This is still, however, under investigation. There are other facts to be known, but I think I’m going to be able to give you quite a lot, as far as I know it. I have talked to the—to almost all the agents that were involved, as well as other people.”
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