TEARLINE
FEINSTEIN SPEAKS: U.S officials argued for more than a week after the embassy assault that it stemmed from a protest against an American-made film ridiculing Islam. Feinstein’s comments Wednesday made it clear that there was no doubt in her mind that evidence pointed to a planned act of terrorism. When asked by CBS 5 if there was an intelligence flaw, the senior California senator who hails from San Francisco replied: “I think what happened was the director of intelligence, who is a very good individual, put out some speaking points on the initial intelligence assessment. I think that was possibly a mistake.” Feinstein continued, “I think we have to take a good look as to whether our intelligence – particularly in these nine middle eastern countries, very troubled from within – is what it should be.”
Feinstein goes on to say that the results of the State Department’s Accountability Review Board are expected in mid-November, at which point she will hold a hearing probing the intelligence, not security failures, leading up to and during the assault on Benghazi. >Video of Senator Feinstein comments here. Video of Peter King buttressing these statements is here.
Meanwhile — commentator Max Boot asks, "does the press have better intelligence than the intelligence community?" and a contributor to Foreign Policy magazine questions whether select members of the media have been complicit in covering for that same intelligence community.
AROUND THE WORLD
Dana Priest on the despicable murder of a Pakistani teenager.
Governor Romney has proposed entirely privatizing foreign aid.
Combined Task Force 68 and Naval Mobile Construction Battalion, as well as 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery of the Kentucky National Guard have all arrived in Africa, to prosecute Operation Enduring Freedom – Trans-Sahara and – Horn of Africa, respectively.
For the first time in a decade, rebels and the government of Colombia came together for formal peace talks on Wednesday, with the goal of ending the longest-running war in the Western Hemisphere — nearly 50 years old and counting.
ON THE FIGHT
The lowly IED, cobbled together explosives ignited by cobbled together detonators, has now replaced artillery as the greatest killer on the modern battlefield, according to Michael Barbero, head of the Joint IED Defeat Organization.
The militia commander who led the deadly raid on the U.S. mission in Benghazi is an Islamist and former political prisoner whose fighters were also blamed for assassinating a senior military officer after he defected to the opposition during last year’s revolution. Government-allied militias say they have not been told to arrest the man, identified as Ahmed Abu Khattala, in the Benghazi attack. FBI agents have been shown a cellphone picture of the commander at the scene of the attack, according to Libyans familiar with the investigation. But it is unclear where the man, identified as Ahmed Abu Khattala, is now.
Any attempts to build a direct-action capability within the nascent Libyan government would almost certainly rely on the Global Security Contingency Fund, or GSCF, jointly administered by the Departments of State and Defense.
TRAVELS AND EVENTS
Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Andrew J. Shapiro completed a series of consultations with senior civilian and military officials in the United Kingdom, Iraq, and Jordan this week.
CONTRACT WATCH
The panthers of the cyberspace warfare operations underworld have a much-needed infusion of cash to facilitate the acquisition of the intellectual capital and innovative solutions that come with them to address this nations pressing challenges in cyberspace. Abacus, SpectrumS4, Odyssey Systems Consulting Group, P3I and EIS are being awarded a $800M contract to provide "a variety of engineering and technical advisory and assistance services". The location of the performance is Hanscom Air Force Base, Massachusetts.
The Naval Special Warfare Command (NSWC) is seeking responsible business concerns that can provide Courses of Instruction for the Scan Eagle Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in accordance with the below description. Performance is to be accomplished at the Contractor locations and Government sites.
USSOCOM needs translators and linguists, yesterday. For what, and where, they won’t say — as it should be.
Robert Caruso is a veteran of the United States Navy, and has worked for the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, Business Transformation Agency and the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
