WASHINGTON — Ex-CIA Director David Petraeus told lawmakers during private hearings Friday that he believed all along that the Sept. 11 attack on the US consulate in Libya was a terrorist strike, even though that wasn’t how the Obama administration initially described it publicly.
The retired general addressed the House Intelligence Committee in his first Capitol Hill testimony since resigning last week over an extramarital affair with his biographer Paula Broadwell, but he did not discuss that scandal except to express regret about the circumstances of his departure.
SHIRTLESS PHOTO OF FBI AGENT WHO HELPED BRING DOWN PETRAEUS
PAULA BROADWELL AND PETRAEUS ATTENDED GALA TOGETHER
Petraeus said that his agency determined immediately after the Sept. 11 Libya attack that “Al Qaeda involvement” was suspected — but the line was taken out in the final version of the CIA’s talking points circulated to administration officials, according to a top lawmaker who was briefed.
Rep. Peter King, R-NY, said Petraeus said he did not know who removed the reference to terrorism. King said to this day it’s still not clear how the final talking points emerged that were used by UN Ambassador Susan Rice five days after the attack when the White House sent her to appear in a series of television interviews. Rice said it appeared the attack was sparked by a spontaneous protest over an anti-Muslim video.
King, who spoke to reporters after Petraeus testified before the House Intelligence Committee, indicated he and other lawmakers still have plenty of questions about the aftermath of the attack.
“No one knows yet exactly who came up with the final version of the talking points,” he said.
Petraeus was heading next to the Senate Intelligence Committee to testify. At the same time, lawmakers unexpectedly convened a briefing with top members of various committees to examine a Sept. 25 letter to President Obama that asked a series of classified questions on Benghazi.
Petraeus’ testimony both challenges the Obama administration’s repeated claims that the attack was a “spontaneous” protest over an anti-Islam video, and according to King conflicts with his own briefing to lawmakers on Sept. 14. Sources have said Petraeus, in that briefing, also described the attack as a protest that spun out of control.
“His testimony today was that from the start, he had told us that this was a terrorist attack,” King said, adding that he told Petraeus he had a “different recollection.”
“The original talking points were much more specific about Al Qaeda involvement. And yet the final ones just said indications of extremists,” King said, adding that the final version was the product of a vague “inter-agency process.”
Further, King said a CIA analyst specifically told lawmakers that the Al Qaeda affiliates line “was taken out.”
The suggestion that the intelligence was altered raised questions about who altered it, with King asking if “the White House changed the talking points.”
One source told Fox News that Petraeus “has no idea what was provided” to Rice or who was the author of the talking points she used.
“He had no idea she was going on talk shows” until the White House announced it one or two days before, the source said.
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said Petraeus disputed Republican suggestions that the White House misled the public on what led to the violence in the midst of President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.
“There was an interagency process to draft it, not a political process,” Schiff said after the hearing. “They came up with the best assessment without compromising classified information or source or methods. So changes were made to protect classified information.
“The general was adamant there was no politicization of the process, no White House interference or political agenda,” Schiff said. “He completely debunked that idea.”
Schiff said Petraeus said Rice’s comments in the television interviews “reflected the best intelligence at the time that could be released publicly.”
Lawmakers said the affair with Broadwell that ended Petraeus’ widely respected career came up only briefly at the top of Petraeus’ 90-minute appearance before the House committee.
“The only thing he did in the beginning of his testimony is he did express deep regret to the committee for the circumstances for his depature” and reassure the committee that the Libya attacks had nothing to do with his resignation, said Rep. Jim Langevin, R-R.I.
Earlier, Petraeus, the retired four-star Army general and formerly one of the most respected US military leaders, was whisked into a House Intelligence Committee hearing in a manner more suited to covert operative — through a network of underground hallways leading to a secure room.
His entrance was hidden from the dozens of cameras by Capitol Hill police barring doorways and back staircases. During previous appearances before Congress, CIA directors typically have walked through the building’s front door.
The secretive arrival attested to the circus-like atmosphere of the scandal that has preoccupied Washington, even as the possibility of war looms in Israel and the US government faces a market-rattling “fiscal cliff” that could imperil a still-fragile economy.
Congressional Republicans blasted the Obama administration’s handling of the Benghazi terror attack after grilling State Department, CIA and FBI officials for hours yesterday — and today, they’re putting the disgraced ex-CIA Director on the hot seat.
Top diplomats, spies and lawmen gave closed-door briefings to the House and Senate intelligence committees, which are probing the administration’s response to the Sept. 11 attack on the US consulate in Benghazi.
US Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the assault.
“Disgraceful is the sad parade of conflicting accounts” from the administration, said House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), as she opened her own public hearing on the attack.
She said reports have indicated the administration “failed to adequately protect the American consulate — and denied consulate requests for additional security.”
At yesterday’s briefings, officials labored to explain how the administration took more than a week to call the incident a terrorist attack, after insisting it was a spontaneous demonstration against a US-made anti-Muslim film.
“There are still a lot of questions,” Rep. King said yesterday, wondering “why the [administration’s] talking points didn’t say more about al Qaeda and al Qaeda affiliates.”
Meanwhile, Attorney General Eric Holder denied that his decision to keep the Petraeus scandal from President Obama until after the election was politically motivated.
Holder said his office quickly found that there were no security threats posed by the affair, and that it was unnecessary to alert Obama until the investigation was completed.
With AP and Fox News
Additional reporting by S.A. Miller and Gerry Shields