Covert N. African war widens
Region had been identified as threat well before Benghazi strike
WASHINGTON — Small teams of special operations forces arrived at American embassies throughout North Africa in the months before militants launched the fiery attack that killed the U.S. ambassador in Libya. The soldiers’ mission: Set up a network that could quickly strike a terrorist target or rescue a hostage.
But the teams had yet to do much counterterrorism work in Libya, though the White House signed off a year ago on the plan to build the new military task force in the region, and the advance teams had been there for six months, said three U.S. counterterror officials and a former intelligence official. All spoke only on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the strategy publicly.
The counterterror effort indicates that the administration has been worried for some time about a growing threat posed by al-Qaida and its North Africa offshoots. But officials say the military organization was too new to respond to the attack in Benghazi, where the administration now believes armed al-Qaida-linked militants surrounded the lightly guarded U.S. compound, set it afire and killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.
Republicans have questioned whether the Obama administration has been hiding key information or hasn’t known what happened in the attack’s immediate aftermath. They are using those questions in the final weeks before the U.S. elections as an opportunity to assail President Barack Obama on foreign policy, an area in which he has held clear opinion-poll leads since Osama bin Laden’s killing in 2011.
On Tuesday, leaders of a congressional committee said requests for added security at the Benghazi consulate were repeatedly denied, despite a string of less-deadly terror attacks on the consulate in recent months. Those included an explosion that blew a hole in the security perimeter and another incident in which an explosive device was tossed over the consulate fence.
In a letter responding to the accusations, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told Congress she has set up a group to investigate the Benghazi attack, and it is to begin work this week.
As of early September, the special operations teams consisted only of liaison officers assigned to establish relationships with local governments and U.S. officials in the region. Only limited counterterror operations have been conducted in Africa so far.
The White House, the CIA and the Defense Department’s U.S. Africa Command all declined to comment.
The go-slow approach being taken by the Army’s top clandestine counter terrorist unit — known as Delta Force — is a White House effort to counter criticism from some U.S. lawmakers, human rights activists and others that the anti-terror fight is shifting largely to a secret war, using special operations raids and drone strikes with little public accountability. The administration has been taking its time in setting up the new unit to get buy-in from all players who might be affected, such as the U.S. ambassadors, CIA station chiefs, regional U.S. military commanders and local leaders.
Eventually, the Delta Force group will form the backbone of a military task force responsible for combating al-Qaida and other terror groups across the region, with an arsenal that includes drones. But first, it will work to win acceptance by helping North African nations build their own special operations and counterterror units. And nothing precludes the administration from using other military or intelligence units to retaliate against the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 consulate attack in Benghazi.
But some congressional leaders say the administration is not reacting quickly enough. “Clearly, they haven’t moved fast enough to battle the threat,” said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich.
Mr. Rogers would not comment on the special operations counterterrorism network, but said: “You actually have to hunt them [terrorists] down. No swift action, and we will be the recipient of something equally bad happening to another diplomat.”