The increasingly angry, embittered John McCain
In the video below, Sen. John McCain demonstrates his version of respect for the uniform as he responds to testimony by Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, regarding the inability of the U.S. military to respond in time to the Benghazi attacks. As McCain sees, Dempsey’s testimony was “one of the more bizarre statements I have ever seen” and “simply false”. In other words, the general was lying under oath to a congressional committee:
“I stand by my testimony, your dispute of it notwithstanding,” Dempsey responded afterward.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta backed up Dempsey’s statement before the Senate Armed Services Committee. As Tom Curry of NBC News reports:
“In his testimony, Panetta said the Department of Defense and U.S. armed forces “did all that we could do in response to the attacks in Benghazi.” He explained that “armed UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones), AC-130 gunships, or fixed-wing fighters with the associated tanking – you’ve got to provide air re-fueling– armaments – you’ve got to arm all the weapons before you put them on the planes” — were not in the vicinity of Libya.
He said that even if he’d been able to deploy F-16 fighters or AC-130 gunships over Benghazi in time, “the mission still depends on accurate information about what targets they’re supposed to hit. And we had no forward air controllers there” and no communications with U.S. personnel on the ground.
He said, “because of the distance, it would have taken at least 9 to 12 hours, if not more, to deploy these forces to Benghazi. This was, pure and simple, — in the absence as I said of any kind of advance warning — a problem of distance and time.”
Panetta also pointed out that the two attacks in Benghazi were relatively brief, and occurred six hours apart. “We were not dealing with a prolonged or continuous assault which could have been brought to an end by a U.S. military response,” Panetta said.
According to Richard Sisk of military.com, McCain wasn’t alone in pressing the case:
“Other Republicans on the committee joined McCain in questioning why the military didn’t send F16s or AC-130 gunships to drive off the terrorists attacking Benghazi, but Dempsey and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, who also testified, said there simply wasn’t time and they lacked the intelligence to mount an effective response.
Dempsey said there wasn’t an AC-130 gunship within 1,000 miles of Benghazi and the nearest F16s at a base in Aviano, Italy, were not on standby alert and would not have reached Benghzi in time.
Panetta added that “you can’t just willy-nilly send F16s there and blow the hell out of a place without knowing what’s taking place.”
It would be nice if the world were as simple and uncomplicated as McCain prefers to it be, if intervention were possible merely because he wants it to be possible, if technicalities such as time and space could be waved away merely by his own insistence that they are unimportant.
We do not live in such a world, although McCain increasingly appears to believe that he does.
– Jay Bookman
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519 comments Add your comment
appleseed
February 8th, 2013
9:19 am
Makes you wonder how old TD,CC et al be?
Granny Godzilla
February 8th, 2013
9:19 am
Oh and Markoo
I believe your wording was “stood up to”….rather different than “disagree”
on the strength of chacter scale
DownInAlbany
February 8th, 2013
9:19 am
SEN. GRAHAM: Your testimony, as I understand it, Secretary Panetta, that you talked to the president of the United States one time.
SEC. PANETTA: I talked to him on Sept. 11 with regards to the fact that we were aware this attack was taking place.
SEN. GRAHAM: One time.
SEC. PANETTA: Right.
SEN. GRAHAM: What time did you tell him that?
SEC. PANETTA: I think that was approximately about 5 o’clock?
GEN. DEMPSEY: Yeah, about 5 o’clock.
SEC. PANETTA: About 5 o’clock.
SEN. GRAHAM: General Dempsey, did you ever talk to the president of the United States at all?
GEN. DEMPSEY: I was with the secretary when — at that same time.
SEN. GRAHAM: Did you talk to the president?
GEN. DEMPSEY: Yes.
SEN. GRAHAM: You talked to him how many times.
GEN. DEMPSEY: The same — one time.
SEN. GRAHAM: How long did the conversation last?
GEN. DEMPSEY: We were there in the office for probably 30 minutes.
SEN. GRAHAM: So you talked to him for 30 minutes, one time, and you never talked to him again, either one of you.
GEN. DEMPSEY: Until afterwards.
SEN. GRAHAM: Until after the attack was over.
GEN. DEMPSEY: That’s right.
SEN. GRAHAM: Thank you.
Were there any AC-130 gunships within a thousand miles of Benghazi, Libya?
GEN. DEMPSEY: No, sir.
SEN. GRAHAM: Were there any AC-130 gunships within 2,000 miles of Benghazi, Libya?
GEN. DEMPSEY: I have to go back and look at a map and figure out the distance.
Later in the hearing, Graham asked Panetta if he thought it was “typical” for a commander in chief to make no follow-up phone calls.
SEN. GRAHAM: Are you surprised that the president of the United States never called you, Secretary Panetta, and say, ‘how’s it going?’
SEC. PANETTA: I — you know, normally in these situations –
SEN. GRAHAM: Did he know the level of threat that –
SEC. PANETTA: Let — well, let me finish the answer. We were deploying the forces. He knew we were deploying the forces. He was being kept updated –
SEN. GRAHAM: Well, I hate to interrupt you, but I got limited time. We didn’t deploy any forces. Did you call him back — wait a minute –
SEC. PANETTA: No, but the event — the event was over by the time we got –
SEN. GRAHAM: Mr. Secretary, you didn’t know how long the attack would last. Did you ever call him and say, Mr. President, it looks like we don’t have anything to get there anytime soon?
SEC. PANETTA: The event was over before we could move any assets.
SEN. GRAHAM: It lasted almost eight hours. And my question to you is during that eight-hour period, did the president show any curiosity about how’s this going, what kind of assets do you have helping these people? Did he ever make that phone call?
SEC. PANETTA: Look, there is no question in my mind that the president of the United States was concerned about American lives and, frankly, all of us were concerned about American lives.
SEN. GRAHAM: With all due respect, I don’t believe that’s a credible statement if he never called and asked you, are we helping these people; what’s happening to them? We have a second round, and we’ll take it up then.
SEC. PANETTA: As a former chief of staff to the president of the United States, the purpose of staff is to be able to get that kind of information, and those staff were working with us.
SEN. GRAHAM: So you think it’s a typical response of the president of the United States to make one phone call, do what you can and never call you back again and ask you, how’s it going, by the way, showing your frustration we don’t have any assets in there to help these people for over seven hours?
SEC. PANETTA: The president is well-informed about what is going on. Make no mistake about it.
Can you say, AWOL? Naw, didn’t think so.
Gotta go pick up biscuits for my crew…enjoy!
RB from Gwinnett
February 8th, 2013
9:20 am
Keep, “Personally, I don’t know if the President went to bed and what was already set.”
If you don’t know that yet it’s only because you don’t WANT to know that. It’s been in the news enough that anybody who’s paying any attention at all knows.
Granny Godzilla
February 8th, 2013
9:28 am
So the President went to bed and was updated by his staff?
Got melodrama?
Was McCain up all night? Graham?
Puh-lease.
GT
February 8th, 2013
9:46 am
What burns me is they have time to run all this garbage up a flag pole and salute it but they can’t get any meaningful legislation out of Congress as this country spins in stagnation.
You want a war go after the fat cats that caused this recession. Put the cameras on their little games of systemic blood sucking the economy. Get tough with someone who is not in a food chain that can’t bite back, who in reality is your boss. You want to impress the country with how brave, how shock and aw you can be, blow some of your bad breath on Wall Street. Ten minutes with that would be 10 hours of this Republican grandstanding. The war is here mister and if you aren’t with us you are with them, which may explain why they ain’t in jail, and you are running a distraction to give them some cover.
Escaped from Email Purgatory
February 8th, 2013
9:54 am
Note to commenters: RINO is a derisive acronym used by hard core conservatives to describe republicans who are too liberal – please take the label “liberal” in the proper context. We’re talking about conservative republicans here.
Amazing how many commenters to Bookman’s blogs consider being white a cruel trick of Nature or a character flaw. That reminds me. It’s Black History Month so the Reverend Farrakhan will be making his annual appearances on BET, One and Bounce.
The Charmer believes white folks were invented by an evil scientist.
I’d wager that most who comment negatively about Fox News have rarely if ever watched it or visited the website.
The low information voter. The colony is growing. Heck, it’s thriving.
GT
February 8th, 2013
10:06 am
Farrakhan is as much a representative of black positions as is the white iconic David Duke. In fact I could indulge you in many a non representative of the white race such as the assassins of little children and every mass school yard shooting I can remember. But I am white and I am not represented by these people, as I am Georgian but consider Newt an immoral fool living off a following of immoral fools who contribute mightily to FOX’s success.
Now for FOX. Watch it all the time since I am getting too old for Saturday Night Live, pass my bedtime. What is more enjoyable than to watch Rove melt down into burning embers on election night or watch Morris get his matching papers last week. No station can hire blond bimbos like FOX, must have been where they got the name.
DownInAlbany
February 8th, 2013
10:10 am
Was McCain up all night? Graham?
Last time I checked, they neither was Commander-in-Chief!
Escaped from Email Purgatory
February 8th, 2013
10:17 am
@GT
Not the point. Check the images that roll passed when black-oriented networks recognize the exemplary during Black History Month.
If Farrakhan ain’t among the images presented, then this year will be the first time. Perhaps his inclusion is within a cautionary context – “Don’t be this guy!” Do you believe that?
Farrakhan is a sharp stick that gets poked in the eye of white folks dumb enough to care what he thinks. That’s his virtue. A guilty pleasure for some, you might say.
Relative to your comments about FOX, I’d argue if I could, but I think you’re correct.
But say whatever else you want about FOX News. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them celebrating David Duke
GT
February 8th, 2013
10:26 am
Got it and agree. I so use to people teeing off on ghost they imagine I have reflex response, sorry. In fact what you say Escape is dead on. Fear of the dark is what I call it; let the imagination run wild with fear and then parade around in the daylight like you are bad. Same people want to shock and aw us. I love that phase, shock and aw, sound more like what I see in Georgia than any enemy we have in the Middle East.
Donovan
February 8th, 2013
10:40 am
We have been over this ground before. We have our view of things and you close-minded Obama loyalists have your view of things. Since we have no faith in the views of your political spectrum, we have the luxury of looking at this Benghazi coverup and calamity with a jaundice eye and a more circumspect viewpoint.
The American consulate in Benghazi was probed and attacked in more than a half dozen incidents prior to the lethal attack. The British presence in Benghazi ended their diplomatic duties prior to the lethal attack, based on their violent encounters with Islamic radicals. The American consulate begged for more security numerous times before the lethal attack, but was denied for fear of looking weak against al Qaeda that was supposed to be on the run.
We now have statements from the Sec. of Defense and the Joint Chief that nothing could have been done and that they had no credible intel to warrant force protection. That is as much a pile of BS as ex-liar Sec. of State saying, “what’s the difference”. What we have here is plain and simple. We have a career Democrat politician heading up the Defense Derpartment, a career Army general covering his appointed rear end, and a career liar finding cover for her legacy. In civilian life, all these people involved would have been put in jail.
Any serious commander or serious politician would have taken the fore warnings about Benghazi and placed assets to deal with the probable threats and concerns. We have the luxury of placing an aircraft carrier on station for such reasons, but those reasons were not considered important by this regime. Help could have been in place, but was not. Dire results happened due to ineptness, irresponsibility, and bad management.
The mismanagement was handled with fabricated stories of a video, suppression of the story by the MSM, and the political correctness during an election campaign. You liberals know it and we know it.
It is crime that this happened and it is a crime that you liberals support. When I read that your reaction to this indictment boils down to chastising John McCain as just an angry old white man it flies in my face that you prefer to lend blind support for an injustice that happened to our very own foreign diplomats. Shame on you.
When you support the obvious bad decisions of your political party simply because you are Democrat voters, you are no better than the enemies that wish us harm. Your party leaders made bad decisions that got innocent people killed and you stand behind them shamefully in collusion. Your excuses and explanations are shameful. This is why we have problems with your ideas and agendas.
Finn McCool (The System isn't Broken; It's Fixed)
February 8th, 2013
11:18 am
Like when Bush was in office we liberals looked under every rock trying to find a way to get him impeached. This is the Cons doing it to Obama.
I don’t think the answer is under this particular rock so you Cons might want to move on to the next rock.
Jon Soltz: Neocon Tantrums | Elm River Free Press
February 8th, 2013
2:32 pm
[...] Senator John McCain uses his time in a hearing with General Martin Dempsey to berate him for not indiscriminately bombing Libya in the hours after the attacks in Beghazi. This is the same [...]
Jon Soltz: Neocon Tantrums | Irascible Musings
February 8th, 2013
4:39 pm
[...] Senator John McCain uses his time in a hearing with General Martin Dempsey to berate him for not indiscriminately bombing Libya in the hours after the attacks in Beghazi. This is the same [...]
tomj
February 8th, 2013
5:04 pm
John McCain can not get over the fact that the American people soundly rejected him as president. Thinking that he was unqualified, lacking the judgement, character, credibility and integrity to be president. McCain is a hatemonger and no warmonger but he’s certainly is not a military or foreign affairs expert. The real experts even the republican experts like Gen, Colin Powell and Sen. Chuck Nagel refused to endorse McCain. Whick made McCain into a bitter jealous, revengeful vindictive old man. At McCain’s advance age he lacks the basic skills, knowledge, proficiency and temperament to understand today’s modern world. As long as the Republican party condones politicians likes John McCain, they will never win again. The leadership of the GOP should demand McCain’s
resignation /
http://pol.moveon.org/mccain10/thanks.html?id=-17340335-0gXtorx
http://rt.com/news/prime-time/vietnamese-dispute-mccain-torture-claim/
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/opinions/benson/
Jon Soltz: Neocon Tantrums | Political Ration
February 8th, 2013
6:09 pm
[...] Senator John McCain uses his time in a hearing with General Martin Dempsey to berate him for not indiscriminately bombing Libya in the hours after the attacks in Beghazi. This is the same [...]
tomj
February 8th, 2013
10:06 pm
John McCain is just a bitter, jealous, hateful, revengeful, warmonger. Retire McCain let the “REAL” military and foreign affairs experts take over.
G. Washington
February 11th, 2013
3:33 pm
John McCain is no longer fit to serve this country in any capacity. A bitter, partisan hack who continually puts party above nation in pursuit of some sort of retribution for his failed political career. McCain lays in a bed of disgrace because those are the fleas he surrounds himself with.