Ambassador Thomas Pickering: No Benghazi Cover-Up
Ambassador Thomas Pickering, who headed the Accountability Review Board looking into the Benghazi affair with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Michael Mullen, told me on radio Monday night that there is no cover-up. The board found that four persons failed in their performance regarding security, and it was recommended that two leave their jobs, and all four have.
In congressional hearings scheduled for Wednesday, Gregory N. Hicks, the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of the Benghazi terrorist attacks, is expected to say that he tried in vein to get the Pentagon to scramble jets over Benghazi that he believes would have averted a second attack and saved American lives. Pickering says Hicks never said that to his board and he and Mullen looked extensively into that and “there were not assets in place able to reach Benghazi in time to have made any significant difference…” There was also an issue of clearance from the Libyan government to use its airspace, and Pickering says Libyans were slow to respond that night.
When asked his response to charges of a cover-up, the ambassador said, “I have a rude phrase that’s not repeatable on your program.” Pickering says is personal view is that allegations of a cover up were initiated “to try to swing the election one way or another.” He added, “The nasty grip of partisan politics still hangs on here.”
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