Tag Archive for: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi

Benghazi: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it

Excerpts from the forward to Mitchell Zuckoff’s book “13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi”:

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Dean Rusk,Lyndon B. Johnson and Robert McNamara in Cabinet Room meeting February 1968.

“A BLOODTHIRSTY MOB BORE DOWN ON THE UNITED States’ poorly defended diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya. Besieged American envoys and staffers withdrew to a locked room as fires set by the attackers drew closer. The Americans prayed and appealed for rescue, calling home to Washington and to nearby allies. If no help came, they feared one of three fates: They’d be killed by the invaders, suffocate from smoke, or be roasted alive. In the meantime, they’d fight.

The date was June 5, 1967.

War had just begun between Israel and Egypt, and morning radio reports in Benghazi were filled with false claims that US military planes had provided air cover for Israeli attacks or had bombed Cairo, less than seven hundred miles away. Hundreds”

[ … ]

“With no rescue in sight, Kormann took down from the wall a photo of President Lyndon Johnson and his wife, Lady Bird Johnson. He broke it from its frame, flipped it over, and wrote on the back that, whatever happened, they had done their duty. Everyone in the smoky vault signed the farewell note.”

[ … ]

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Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Robert Gates in cabinet meeting , November 2009.

“Forty-five years later, on September 11, 2012, the American diplomatic outpost in Benghazi again came under sudden siege by a murderous mob. Again the attackers couldn’t reach their prey, so they plundered buildings and set fires with deadly intent. But this time, no British or other friendly troops were close enough to attempt a rescue.

With fires raging, gunmen swarming, State Department security officers taking cover, and the US ambassador missing, a call went out from one of the overwhelmed Americans: “If you don’t get here soon, we’re all going to die!”

George Santayana wrote, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

It is prophetic that the two attacks on American embassy personnel in Benghazi happened under the leadership of Democratic President Johnson and his Secretary of State Dean Rusk; and forty-five years later under Democratic President Obama and his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

It this a harbinger of things to come?

Please watch 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi Official Trailer: