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Holy hell I can’t believe I’m back in the business of writing about CIA reports on trips to Africa again, but here I am.
In this post, I noted that David Petraeus made a two-day trip to Cairo on October 31, just as the CIA launched its pushback campaign against Fox reporting, and just before Scott Shane wrote a maudlin story about Petraeus’ image.
October 25 [earliest reported date] – week of October 28: Petraeus interviewed by FBI.
October 26: Fox reports that CIA security in annex were twice told to stand down by “CIA chain of command.”
October 31: Acting after speaking to FBI “whistleblower,” Eric Cantor’s Chief of Staff calls Robert Mueller about investigation.
October 31- November 1: Petraeus in Cairo for security discussions.
November 2 [based on a briefing held November 1 while Petraeus was still in Cairo]: CIA releases timeline rebutting Fox report–mentioned by Broadwell–that CIA chain of command told security to stand down.
November 2: FBI interviews Broadwell a second time.
November 2: Scott Shane writes odd article on demise of Petraeus’ image, blaming his absence from media for Benghazi blowback, in part repeating a point made by Broadwell on October 26.
That appears to be the trip–and the report currently being withheld from the Intelligence Committees on the grounds it is not yet complete–referred to by Dianne Feinstein in this interview with Andrea Mitchell. (Daily Caller reported on this first.)
DiFi: I believe that Director Petraeus made a trip to the region shortly before this became public.
Mitchell: To Libya?
DiFi: Yes. I believe that there is a trip report. We have asked to see the trip report. One person tells me he has read it, and then we try to get it and they tell me it hasn’t been done. That’s unacceptable. We are entitled to this trip report and if we have to go to the floor of the Senate on a subpoena, we will do just that.
Mitchell: You’re suggesting that you might have to subpoena from the intelligence community a trip report that David Petraeus made after going to Libya within the last two weeks.
DiFi: Yes, for the very reason that it may have some very relevant information to what happened in Benghazi.
So right between the time the FBI interviewed Petraeus and the time Scott Shane was writing a valediction to Petraeus’ career, Petraeus went “to the region”–possibly to Libya itself. And CIA doesn’t want to tell Dianne Feinstein what Petraeus learned or did there.