The emerging consensus about the embassy attack in Libya that killed an
American ambassador and several other Americans is that it was a "well-planned commando style attack."
According to a government and journalist source we have spoken to, this actually does not appear to be the case. Rather, the attack appears to have been a spontaneous decision by an extremist group to capitalize on otherwise non-violent protests about an anti-Muslim film trailer.
First of all: "This was not a commando style raid, that's ridiculous, this type of thing can be put together in a matter of minutes with a few cell-phone calls," said Matthew VanDyke, a journalist (with his own web page here) and analyst on Libya and the Middle East. VanDyke is an American who actually fought on the side of the Libyan rebels during the Libyan revolution and was taken as a prisoner by Qaddafi for five and half months.
VanDyke has had close friends in Libya for years, from his days of motorcycle travel. Many of them lost family members in the initial fighting, and were still losing family members when they contacted him in the states.
According to a government and journalist source we have spoken to, this actually does not appear to be the case. Rather, the attack appears to have been a spontaneous decision by an extremist group to capitalize on otherwise non-violent protests about an anti-Muslim film trailer.
First of all: "This was not a commando style raid, that's ridiculous, this type of thing can be put together in a matter of minutes with a few cell-phone calls," said Matthew VanDyke, a journalist (with his own web page here) and analyst on Libya and the Middle East. VanDyke is an American who actually fought on the side of the Libyan rebels during the Libyan revolution and was taken as a prisoner by Qaddafi for five and half months.
VanDyke has had close friends in Libya for years, from his days of motorcycle travel. Many of them lost family members in the initial fighting, and were still losing family members when they contacted him in the states.
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