> (in article

> <97261360-7991-48cf-823c-c7274a1d6...@b6g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>):

> > Is an American General losing his job for trying to save the Americans

> > besieged in Benghazi? This is the latest potential wrinkle in the

> > growing scandal surrounding the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack

> > that left four men dead and President Obama scrambling for a coherent

> > explanation.

> > On October 18, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta appeared unexpectedly

> > at an otherwise unrelated briefing on “Efforts to Enhance the

> > Financial Health of the Force." News organizations and CSPAN were told

> > beforehand there was no news value to the event and gave it scant

> > coverage. In his brief remarks Mr. Panetta said, "Today I am very

> > pleased to announce that President Obama will nominate General David

> > Rodriguez to succeed General Carter Ham as commander of U.S. Africa

> > Command.” This came as a surprise to many, since General Ham had only

> > been in the position for a year and a half. The General is a very well

> > regarded officer who made AFRICOM into a true Combatant Command after

> > the ineffective leadership of his predecessor, General William E.

> > "Kip" Ward. Later, word circulated informally that General Ham was

> > scheduled to rotate out in March 2013 anyway, but according to Joint

> > doctrine, "the tour length for combatant commanders and Defense agency

> > directors is three years." Some assumed that he was leaving for

> > unspecified personal reasons.

> > However on October 26, "Ambassador" posted the following RUMINT on

> > TigerDroppings (h/t Jim Hoft):

> > I heard a story today from someone inside the military that I trust

> > entirely. The story was in reference to General Ham that Panetta

> > referenced in the quote below.

> > quote:

> > "(The) basic principle is that you don't deploy forces into harm's way

> > without knowing what's going on; without having some real-time

> > information about what's taking place," Panetta told Pentagon

> > reporters. "And as a result of not having that kind of information,

> > the commander who was on the ground in that area, Gen. Ham, Gen.

> > Dempsey and I felt very strongly that we could not put forces at risk

> > in that situation."

> > The information I heard today was that General Ham as head of Africom

> > received the same e-mails the White House received requesting help/

> > support as the attack was taking place. General Ham immediately had a

> > rapid response unit ready and communicated to the Pentagon that he had

> > a unit ready.

> > General Ham then received the order to stand down. His response was to

> > screw it, he was going to help anyhow. Within 30 seconds to a minute

> > after making the move to respond, his second in command apprehended

> > General Ham and told him that he was now relieved of his command.

> > The story continues that now General Rodiguez would take General Ham's

> > place as the head of Africom.

> > This version of events contradicts Mr. Panetta’s October 25 statement

> > that General Ham advised against intervention. But so far there is

> > nothing solid to back it up. Maybe Ham attempted to send a reaction

> > force against orders, or maybe he simply said the wrong thing to the

> > wrong people. Perhaps he gave whomever he was talking to up the chain

> > a piece of his mind about leaving Americans to die when there was a

> > chance of saving them. At the very least U.S. forces might have made

> > those who killed our people pay while they were still on the scene.

> > The Obama White House is famously vindictive against perceived

> > disloyalty – the administration would not let Ham get away with

> > scolding them for failing to show the leadership necessary to save

> > American lives. The Army's ethos is to leave no man behind, but that

> > is not shared by a president accustomed to leading from that location.

> > The question remains why the repeated requests – which is to say

> > desperate pleas – to send a relief force were refused. Perhaps Mr.

> > Obama and his national security brain trust thought the terrorist

> > assault would be a minor skirmish and quickly blow over. When it

> > became clear that the attack was something more serious, they may have

> > had visions of the rescue team getting involved in a Mogadishu-like

> > firefight, a “Blackhawk Down 2.” This would have been too much for the

> > risk-averse Mr. Obama, particularly in a Muslim country, and less than

> > two months before the election. Instead they simply watched the live

> > video hoped for the best. If there were American fatalities, they felt

> > they could shift blame for the circumstance to the supposed Youtube

> > video which they had already blamed for the riot at the U.S. Embassy

> > in Cairo hours earlier. In fact the Embassy had sent out its “apology”

> > tweets even before the Cairo riot commenced.

> > Hillary Clinton’s freakishly bizarre statement on September 14 is also

> > worth noting. At a memorial service to the fallen she told Charles

> > Woods, father of slain former Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods, that “we will

> > make sure that the person who made that film is arrested and

> > prosecuted." In that situation one would expect her to vow to take

> > down the terrorists who killed Tyrone, not the supposed instigator of

> > the spontaneous mob action that never happened.

> > But since when does the Secretary of State feel it is her duty to

> > promise to have an American filmmaker who has committed no crime

> > arrested? For all the bowing and scraping to Islam that has gone on in

> > the last four years, blasphemy against that or any other faith is

> > still not illegal in this country. The First Amendment still exists.

> > It is strange that Mrs. Clinton believed that the parents of the slain

> > Americans would empathize with her outrage at the filmmaker, rather

> > than reserve their anger for the extremists who actually did the

> > killing. But as Mr. Woods said, he "could tell that she was not

> > telling me the truth." Indeed the truth has been the fifth casualty in

> > this entire tragic affair.

> This administration isn't slow to abandon people to save it's own skin.

> What's really frightening is their tendency to think that the public is this

> stupid. Not surprising, but frightening. Along with all of the above and

> getting close to an election, there wasn't any leadership with the balls to

> do the right thing. General Ham apparently made the right choice and is now

> suffering for it. I expect after a few years we'll know the full extent of

> the cowardice and failure that is the current Obama-Democrat administration.