The report from a State Department-ordered investigation into the Sept. 11 attack on a U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya said that systemic failures led to the compound having little or no meaningful defense against attack.
The Accountability Review Board’s report identified 29 areas to improve, blaming the security failure on the day of the attack on "leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels within two bureaus,”
reported Fox News.
The report said that members of Libyan militias who were hired to provide security were found to have provided little in terms of “meaningful defense.”
There were "some troubling indicators of its reliability in the months and weeks preceding the September attacks" that should have raised red flags but did not in Benghazi or in Washington. The feeling at the consulate was that it was not a high priority.
"We did conclude that certain State Department bureau level senior officials in critical levels of authority and responsibility in Washington demonstrated a lack of leadership and management ability appropriate for senior ranks in their responses to security concerns posed by the special mission," said retired Admiral Mike Mullen, the co-chair of the board and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
He added that they did not find any specific missteps among officials, but rather that negligence may have been the main cause — as the report showed.
As a result of the report, Eric Boswell, assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security, Charlene Lamb, deputy assistant secretary for embassy security, and a third unnamed official from the Bureau of Near East Affairs resigned Wednesday based on the specific failures found by investigators.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in letters to both Congressional panels that looked into the attack she accepted “every one of” the recommendations in the report, with some already underway.
"The Accountability Review Board report provides a clear-eyed look at serious, systemic challenges that we have already begun to fix,” she wrote. “I am grateful for its recommendations for how we can reduce the chances of this kind of tragedy happening again. I accept every one of them."
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