When first I read the news that Muslim fundamentalists in Egypt were attacking the U.S. embassy in protest to a movie about Mohammad, my immediate reaction was that they were idiots. Someone, somewhere in the United States made a movie insulting their religion and they’re getting violently pissed off at the embassy? What a bunch of morons.
Then yesterday I read that similar attacks in Libya resulted in the death of Ambassador Stevens and several others.
Again, I was astounded by the dangerous insanity on display. Put simply, if you think your religion demands that you kill people who disrespect it, then your religion is stupid, and you are stupid for following it.
[Update: This first detail section appears to be a false report. It’s now being reported that Ambassador Stevens was killed in the embassy.]
Then I read the details of the attack:
The U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other embassy staff were killed in a rocket attack on their car, a Libyan official said, as they were rushed from a consular building stormed by militants denouncing a U.S.-made film insulting the Prophet Mohammad.
Gunmen had attacked and burned the U.S. consulate in the eastern city of Benghazi, a center of last year’s uprising against Muammar Gaddafi, late on Tuesday evening, killing one U.S. consular official. The building was evacuated.
The Libyan official said the ambassador, Christopher Stevens, was being driven from the consulate building to a safer location when gunmen opened fire.
“The American ambassador and three staff members were killed when gunmen fired rockets at them,” the official in Benghazi told Reuters.
Oh.
That doesn’t sound so stupid. In fact, it sounds less like mob action and more like special ops. The crowds gathering outside the embassy may have been the usual ignorant fools, but somebody with tactical smarts was hiding amoung them. Whoever it was, they knew enough to hold off the rocket attack until they had a high-value target out in the open. They may or may not have whipped the mob into a frenzy, but they sure used the mob to suit their purposes.
I’m just guessing from reports, but it looks like our ambassador wasn’t killed by the mob. He was killed by somebody’s soldiers.
Update: And then the story changes again. It now appears the the ambassador died in the fire at the embassy, but the remaining Americans were followed to their safe house, which came under siege:
Here, two more things went wrong. First, Obeidi found four times as many Americans at the single-storey, fortified house as he had been told expect – 37, not just 10. So he did not have enough transport. Then, the villa came under massive attack.
This time, there was little doubt in the minds of Libyans who experienced it that this was a well-organized assault by men who had mastered the complexities of military mortar fire.
“This attack was planned,” Obeid said. “The accuracy with which the mortars hit us was too good for any ordinary revolutionaries.”
While some Libyan officials suggested that former soldiers from Gaddafi’s army may have been involved in Benghazi, some of the Islamist fighters also have substantial military experience from years spent fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
So, yeah, it was a military operation against U.S. personnel. A small act of war.
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