printLes Aspin. President Clinton. Mogadishu, Somalia, October 1993.
Rand Paul takes us back to “Black Hawk Down,” in drawing parallels between the way Hillary Clinton has escaped responsibility for refusing security to her underlings in Benghazi, and the fate of Bill Clinton’s Secretary of Defense Les Aspin, who too refused “tanks and armor-plated vehicles to reinforce the mission in Somalia,” a month prior to the deaths there of 18 American soldiers, the wounding of 80, and the loss of two American helicopters.
Via The Washington Times:
Two months later, after less than a year of service, Aspin resigned as secretary of defense.
Though Mr. Clinton cited personal reasons for Aspin’s resignation, it was reported widely that he had asked him to step down. Aspin did ultimately accept responsibility for his decisions, saying, “The ultimate responsibility for the safety of our troops is mine. I was aware of the request and could have directed that a deployment order be drawn up. I did not, and I accept responsibility for the consequences.”
By refusing to grant requests for weapons and reinforcement in Somalia in 1993, Aspin made a bad decision, admitted his bad decision, accepted responsibility and eventually left his position as a result of it.
When Ambassador Stevens, Libya’s site-security team commander Lt. Col. Andrew Wood and others made repeated requests for increased security and resources in Benghazi, those requests were ignored. No one denies that these requests crossed Mrs. Clinton’s desk. But virtually everyone involved has denied that they should accept responsibility for the tragedy in Benghazi.
Has Sen. R. Paul forgotten that Hillary is a girl, and thus would get preferential treatment, especially in the Obama administration?
Hillary had no time for the Benghazi embassy, whose defense she entrusted to a local militia called the “February 17th Martyrs Brigade,” Paul told Mike Huckabee. On the other hand, she threw money around on frivolities. For example: $100K on sending an American-Indian comedian to India on a “Make Chai Not War” tour.
Hillary also spent $80 million on a consulate in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, which was designed in such a way as to rule out its effective defense.
On and on.
UPDATED (5/20): In reply to Myron Pauli on the post’s Facebook thread:
“The problem is foreign policy, as this writer has repeated in numerous articles and blog posts (and an RT TV appearance). However, from the fact that foreign policy is the crux of the matter here—it doesn’t follow that derelictions such as Hillary’s should be ignored by those libertarians who claim to be in the business of thinking and writing about these matters. As I keep telling you, this either/or thinking in our circles amounts to plain laziness. The reason Rand is resonating so well is that he is in there, addressing each matter with sophisticated arguments and pointed references to history.”