One of the four surviving warriors who defended more than 30 American personnel at two U.S. facilities in Benghazi tells Breitbart News he supports Donald J. Trump for president because: “He gets it.”
“You got a businessman, who knows how to run things, knows how to get things done–he’s going to have the aggressiveness America needs to have,” said John “Tig” Tiegen, a Marine veteran. Along with Mark “Oz” Geist, a Marine veteran; Kris “Tanto” Paronto, an Army Ranger veteran and Dave “Boon” Benton, a Marine veteran and trained sniper, Tiegen contributed to the book 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi.
The book chronicles their fight to beat back repeated attacks along with former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty, who were killed along with Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and State Department IT specialist Sean Smith on Sept. 11, 2012. Another former Navy SEAL fighting with them is given the cover name of Jack DaSilva.
Tiegen said he endorsed Trump for president and was thrilled to have a Monday night slot addressing the Republican National Convention.
The Marine said he and his comrades have met Trump and came away impressed by his sincere interest in their story and its lessons for American leaders.
“We got to ask him questions and to see if he would give us the political answer or the straight up answer,” he said. “You know? He gave us the straight up answer. Didn’t try to sweet-talk anything or answer our question with a question.”
Although he and Geist are stepping up to help Trump win the White House, he said the book and their story was not meant to be political, it was meant to be a testimony to the bravery of the four men killed that night.
“We just wanted to make sure the four guys were being honored correctly,” he said. “To bring politics into the story of that night would be a dishonor to them. We weren’t fighting for our political parties, you know? We were fighting for each other–to get out of there alive.”
The Marine said there is still a question about why the Pentagon did not send help that night.
It could be something about former President Bill Clinton and his wife, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Tiegen said.
As president, Clinton abandoned the Army Rangers fighting in Mogadishu and the secretary of state abandoned the 30 personnel in Benghazi, he said. “You don’t have to be in uniform, to me, the average American always thinks: ‘Hey, if Americans are in trouble, the troops are going to come for you.’ It seems like under the Clintons, they don’t do that.”
When the House Select Committee on Benghazi came out with its final report, Tiegen said he stopped reading it when he got to the part about how the Air Force was unable to send fighter jets because their planes were all broken down for a parts inventory.
“Every one in the military knows they are lying when they say a whole entire Air Force base overseas was shut down all the planes were down for maintenance or for training,” he said. “For me that was the red flag, I knew I didn’t have to read their report no more, because I knew they were lying–that never happens. It doesn’t happen in the U.S., so you know it doesn’t happen overseas on 9-11–they’re covering somebody’s behind–maybe they were offered a job with the Clinton Foundation? I don’t know.”
There were military units and assets available to help, such as the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, he said. “The 24th MEU, they were about four hours away from Benghazi. An MEU is a battalion of Marines. They have aircraft that could get there. They have jets that can get there.”
USS Jason Dunham, an Aegis-class destroyer, was six miles off the coast, he said. “If that ship is there, then there have to be other ships close by, too.”
Privately, people have reached out to Tiegen and his comrades from the Benghazi raid with stories from the inside, such as inside U.S. Africa Command, about what really happened, he said. “We had guys contact us, who were in AfriCom, and they said: ‘Yes, the State Department told us to stand down.'”
Tiegen said, “If I was getting ready to join the military right now, I wouldn’t do it. I’d wait to see who is getting elected–if it is another Clinton, you don’t know if they have your back if something happens. They will just leave you to hang out to dry.”
With a Clinton in charge, it is hard to make military decisions, he said.
“Either a bunch of your guys get blown up or shoot a guy on a motorcycle–it’s happening all the time over there –they don’t know who they can shoot, so that everybody comes home–because if they shoot the wrong guy, they go to prison.”
Similarly, President Barack Obama has stymied military decision-making and execution because of his emphasis on political loyalty, he said.
Generals and admirals who spoke up against the president were fired and relieved, creating a collection of flag officers who place career advancement before duty, he said.
“It is really disheartening to know that the generals care more about the politics than what is actually is going on,” he said.
“Now, you got all these pansies up in the Joint Chiefs of Staff,” he said. “They have no cojones. They’re going to leave 30 Americans out to die because they have a brunch they have to go to–like I keep saying: ‘If Pearl Harbor’ was held today, we’d be screwed. We’d all be speaking Japanese.'”
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