DIA Released Information on Benghazi Because It Chose To Do So

A closer review of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) FOIA release to Judicial Watch of information concerning the September 2012 Benghazi attacks, which we reported several days ago, compels the conclusion that the great body of the information released by DIA was disclosed, solely because DIA chose to do so, consistent with a pattern by responsible parts of the U.S. government to curb the Obama Administration’s overwhelming prideful incompetence.

While much of the text of the documents, written in 2012, remains withheld under FOIA exemptions, key passages in them have been released by the DIA, as we reported, showing Obama Administration misfeasance in the matter of its reports on the Benghazi incident, confirming the long-rumored transfer under U.S. oversight of Qaddafi-regime weapons from jihadists in Libya to jihadists in Syria, and forecasting the emergence of a jihadist political entity in eastern Syria and western Iraq (an entity which in fact emerged calling itself the Islamic State). The wholesale release by U.S. intelligence agencies of any intelligence information which is less than several decades old, is unusual to say the least, for such information is said to contain the “holy of holies” of such agencies: facts or hints about the agencies’ intelligence “activities, sources, and methods.” Much of the material still withheld from Judicial Watch is indeed classified as concerning activities, sources, and methods. Much of the released material was originally classified, probably for that reason.

But more important to consider, is that by law, the DIA is practically immune from being forced to disclose anything to the public, under FOIA or otherwise. Indeed, much of the still-withheld information — classified or not — is withheld under the Federal statute 10 U.S.C. section 424. Section 424 says that except “as required by the President” or providing information to Congress, “no provision of law [notably, the FOIA—ed.] shall be construed to require the disclosure of (1) the organization or any function of” a Department of Defense organization named in the law; or “(2) the number of persons employed by or assigned or detailed to any such organization or the name, official title, occupational series, grade, or salary of any such person.” The DOD organizations named which are thus the subjects of this law, are the DIA, the National Reconnaissance Office, and the National Geo-Spatial Agency.

What this means, is that the DIA, which “owns” the documents which were released to Judicial Watch, could probably have withheld most or all of the text which it did release, if it had chosen to do so. This law and similar laws about NSA-activities or CIA-operations information, are considered a lock for the government, in FOIA litigation. Note, for example, Seymour Hersh’s report about the bin Laden killing, that information about the raid was conveyed and stored in such a way that it cannot be accessed by FOIA, because of the CIA-operations law.

But the DIA chose to release information that it did not have to release to the public. The DIA’s entirely discretionary release of this information is a new instance in a pattern over the past several weeks, of assaults on the Obama Administration’s credibility and its crimes, by forces which Lyndon LaRouche has characterized as in aggregate “the institution of the Presidency.” A previous part of this pattern can be seen in Hersh’s article on the killing of bin Laden, the main U.S. source of which Hersh described as “a retired senior intelligence official who was knowledgeable about the intelligence about bin Laden’s presence in Abbottabad,” the SEALs’ training for the raid, and the after-action reports. Less exotic, but nevertheless extremely important, were the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruling that the FBI/NSA bulk-collection program regarding Americans’ phone calls was illegal, and passage by the House of Representatives of the USA FREEDOM Act severely limiting that program. The unexpected resistance in the Senate to the Administration’s demand for fast-track authority to negotiate the TPP and other foreign-trade pacts in secret and without involvement of Congress in consequently changing U.S. laws, is likely part of this pattern as well. At the very least, a whole lot of the people who participate at a high level in governing the U.S., have gotten drastically fed up with the Obama Administration.

A similar moment occurred during the Nixon Administration in the early 1970s, when such institutions decided enough was enough, with emergence of the “Watergate” scandal. As a Senate committee investigated Nixon and Company’s corruption and undermining of Americans’ constitutional rights, and moved toward impeachment of Nixon, and a Federal grand jury appeared to be moving toward indictments of Administration officials, Congressional leaders told Nixon it was time for his resignation. Improbably, that man holding the most powerful office in the world complied, and announced his resignation. How soon the present institutions will so act regarding the Obama Administration remains to be seen. It simply cannot be soon enough.