Hillary Clinton faced questions about her support of military involvement in the Libyan civil war in 2011 during his congressional testimony Thursday.
Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., pressed Clinton on an Aug. 21, 2011, email from Jake Sullivan, her former director of policy planning, in which Sullivan outlined a list of reasons why and how Clinton could take credit for what was then considered a successful intervention in Libya to depose Muammar Gadhafi.
Clinton is widely seen to have driven the administration’s participation in the NATO coalition that peppered Libya with airstrikes in 2011.
“You had another big obstacle, didn’t you? And that was the White House itself,” Roskam said of the U.S. intervention in Libya, for which Clinton advocated. “They were opposed to military action.”
Clinton emphasized the collaborative nature of the coalition intervention that bombed Libya.
“There were many in the State Department who believed it was very much in America’s interest and in furtherance of our values” to get involved in Libya, Clinton said.
She noted “the first planes that flew were French planes.”
“The bulk of the work militarily was done by the Europeans and the Arabs,” she said.
Libya is presently an Islamic State stronghold and has become an unstable state in an already volatile region. Clinton, who also voted in favor of the widely unpopular Iraq intervention, sought to distance herself from what was once enthusiastic support of U.S. military involvement in Libya during the hearing Thursday.
The Sullivan email in question described Clinton’s “leadership/ownership/
Pressed from the left by progressives, Clinton has tried to soften her hawkish edges as she vies for the Democratic nomination for president.
Rep. Martha Roby, R-Ala., said records indicate there was “confusion” in Clinton’s office about Libya policy.
“It appears that you were a large cause of that uncertainty,” Roby said.
She told Clinton the Libya intervention was “yours, so to speak.”
Roby read from a 2012 email that indicated “the secretary asked last week whether we still have a presence in Benghazi.”
“I think she would be upset to know yes,” the email said, according to Roby.
The Alabama Republican pressed Clinton on how she could not know about the State Department’s presence in Benghazi given her public advocacy for Libya-focused policy the previous year.
Clinton denied being unaware of the Benghazi presence, touting her agency’s accomplishments in securing a Libyan election and stripping the former Gadhafi regime of chemical weapons.
“I can’t speak to that,” Clinton said of the email Roby had cited. “I have no recollection” of the conversation described in the email, Clinton said.
After Roby read the names of the two aides on the email, Clinton denied they were ever on her staff.
“The facility in Benghazi was a temporary facility,” Clinton said, noting the State Department was still deciding whether it would be made into a formal consulate when it was attacked.
Roby noted Ambassador Chris Stevens, then an envoy, had 10 agents with him in 2011 but only three in Benghazi. Stevens had brought two additional personal security officers with him to Benghazi.
Roby asked Clinton why the security level had changed when Clinton’s attention level to Libya had also seemingly diminished.
