GOP rep: Bad call on Benghazi slowed hunt for culprits

• E-mails show that the Obama administration was alerted to the attack two hours after it began
• For several days, officials said the attack was tied to anti-Islam video
• The consulate also had been targeted in April and June

WASHINGTON -- The efforts to target the terrorists of the deadly attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi was hampered initially because the Obama administration cast it wrongly as a spontaneous riot, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee charged.

"It did slow down some efforts to actually start targeting the people that we thought did it," said Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., on Wednesday. "If you aren't willing to say it was an al-Qaeda affiliated group attacking the embassy you're not likely to be looking for the perpetrators."

Rogers said there was an overwhelming amount of information clearly pointing to a planned attack. Intelligence before the attack suggested al-Qaeda affiliates in the area were looking for Western targets.

E-mails surfaced Wednesday showing that the consulate alerted the Obama administration to the attack two hours after it began and possibly before U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens had been killed. The e-mails stated that the diplomatic mission was under attack and that Stevens and four staff members were in a safe house in the compound in Benghazi.

Those e-mails were sent to the State Department Operations Center, and were routed to the White House Situation Room among others. The e-mails stated that an al-Qaeda terror group was taking responsibility for the attack on Internet messaging services, a common method of communication for al-Qaeda-linked terror groups.

For several days after the attack, President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice referred to the attack as prompted by protesters outside the consulate who were angry over an anti-Islam video produced by an American. The White House eventually backed off that claim, saying that the attack was a pre-planned assault by a terror group.

The Benghazi consulate was also targeted in April and June, in possible "probing" attacks designed to test the facility's defenses. The attack that killed the Americans was a military style assault using mortars and small arms fire in a coordinated fashion.

"It's a mountain of information that is hard to dispute at this point," Rogers said of the evidence pointing to a terror attack timed for the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks in Washington and New York. "What is hard to do is come to that conclusion it was about a video."

Clinton said Wednesday that the administration was acting on the best information it had at the time. Referring to the e-mails that surfaced Wednesday, she said: "You know, posting something on Facebook is not in and of itself evidence and I think it just underscores how fluid the reporting was at the time and continued some time to be."

Yet the White House has produced no intelligence or evidence on why spokesman Jay Carney and others, including the president, insisted for days that the attack was the result of the video. The White House on Wednesday refused to say when Obama first received intelligence reports indicating that the attack was not related to the anti-Islam video. When asked the question, White House national security adviser Tommy Vietor said, "I'm declining to comment."

Rogers said the administration has since focused its efforts on identifying those responsible for the attack and bringing them to justice.

"Given the right focus and the right time I think we will find those responsible," he said.