by Madeleine Morgenstern via TheBlaze.com
A House committee formally concluded for the first time that there was no military “stand down” order given on the night of the deadly terror attacks in Benghazi, Libya.
It’s a finding that one committee aide acknowledged to TheBlaze, “some people are going to be upset about.” The allegation that the military was told to stand down on aiding the Americans in Benghazi has long been used to accuse the Obama administration of not doing enough to save the lives of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and others during the Sept. 11, 2012 attacks.
The Republican-led House Armed Services Committee, however, concluded in its new report that no such order was given; rather, Army Lt. Col. S.E. Gibson, then-head of the site security team at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, was ordered by higher commanders to remain in Tripoli, lest another attack take place there as part of a larger coordinated assault.
“The term ‘stand down’ means different things to different people. To someone in uniform, it means you are to do nothing … that is not the direction that Lt. Col. Gibson was given,” the committee aide told TheBlaze.
The finding is part of the committee’s Benghazi report set to be released Tuesday. Stevens, information technology specialist Sean Smith, and CIA security contractors and former Navy SEALs Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods were killed.
“They didn’t know where the next attack was coming from,” the aide said. “They were given alternate orders to stay in Tripoli.”
Read the full story at: The Blaze