WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Security at the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya was grossly inadequate to deal with a September 11 attack that killed a U.S. ambassador and three others because of systemic failures within the State Department, an official inquiry found on Tuesday.

In a scathing assessment, the review cited “leadership and management” deficiencies at two bureaus of the department, poor coordination among officials in Washington and “real confusion” on the ground over who had the responsibility, and the power, to make decisions that involved policy and security concerns.

WASHINGTON, Dec 18 (Reuters) – Security at the U.S. mission
in Benghazi, Libya was grossly inadequate to deal with a Sept.
11 attack that killed a U.S. ambassador and three others because
of systemic failures within the State Department, an official
inquiry found on Tuesday.

In a scathing assessment, the review cited “leadership and
management” deficiencies at two bureaus of the department, poor
coordination among officials in Washington and “real confusion”
on the ground over who had the responsibility, and the power, to
make decisions that involved policy and security concerns.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Syria’s chemical weapons could be used at “a moment’s notice” and the international community should not accept any assurances from Syrian officials that they will not be used, U.S. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers said on Wednesday.

U.S. and other Western officials recently issued sharp warnings to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad not to deploy chemical weapons. Syria called those warnings a “pretext for intervention” in the civil war.

WASHINGTON, Dec 10 (Reuters) – China’s economy is likely to
surpass the United States in less than two decades while Asia
will overtake North America and Europe combined in global power
by 2030, a U.S. intelligence report said on Monday.

“Meanwhile, the economies of Europe, Japan, and Russia are
likely to continue their slow relative declines,” it said.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – After a car bomb struck the U.S. ambassador’s residence in Lima in 1992, the State Department convened a special panel to answer the same questions now hovering over a review of the September attacks in Benghazi, Libya: How much security is enough? What is the right role for U.S. diplomats?

The Lima panel, known as an Accountability Review Board, issued a final report “that didn’t find anybody had been delinquent,” former U.S. Ambassador to Peru Anthony Quainton said. That report was never made public.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – After a car bomb struck the U.S. ambassador’s residence in Lima in 1992, the State Department convened a special panel to answer the same questions now hovering over a review of the September attacks in Benghazi, Libya: How much security is enough? What is the right role for U.S. diplomats?

The Lima panel, known as an Accountability Review Board, issued a final report “that didn’t find anybody had been delinquent,” former U.S. Ambassador to Peru Anthony Quainton said. That report was never made public.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – When U.S. intelligence officials testified behind closed doors two weeks ago, they were asked point blank whether they had altered the talking points on which U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice based her comments about the Benghazi attacks that have turned into a political firestorm.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, acting CIA Director Michael Morell and National Counterterrorism Center Director Matthew Olsen each said no, according to two congressional sources who spoke on condition of anonymity.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice on Tuesday failed to win over her harshest Republican critics in the U.S. Senate who are threatening to block her nomination if President Barack Obama chooses her for Secretary of State or another top post in his second-term Cabinet.

Rice met for about an hour behind closed doors at the U.S. Capitol with Senators John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte. They have openly criticized her for initial comments after the September 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi that suggested it was a spontaneous event arising from protests of an anti-Islam film rather than a preplanned terrorist strike.

WASHINGTON, Nov 16 (Reuters) – Former CIA Director David
Petraeus told Congress on Friday that he and the spy agency had
sought to make clear from the outset that September’s deadly
attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya,
involved an al Qaeda affiliate, lawmakers said.

Petraeus told the House of Representatives intelligence
committee that “there were extremists in the group” that
launched the initial attack on the diplomatic mission,
describing them as affiliates of al Qaeda and other extremist
groups, said Representative C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger, the
committee’s top Democrat. “The fact is that he clarified it.”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Intelligence officials on Thursday showed lawmakers a real-time film of the deadly attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, and discussed a timeline of events in sometimes heated exchanges at a closed-door hearing, lawmakers said.

The House and Senate intelligence committees heard from intelligence, FBI and State Department officials on the events surrounding the September 11 attack that killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans.