Republicans screeched about the tragic Benghazi attack but moot about Russian bounty?

Senate Democrats demand to see copies of Trump's intelligence briefings about Russian bounties for killing American military.

 
Sgt. Benjamin Hines, Staff Sgt. Chritopher Slutman and Cpl. Robert Hendriks

When Ambassador Christopher Stevens was killed in Benghazi,  Libya, the Republicans went on a hysterical rant against Hillary Clinton who had nothing to do with the attack. But, Republican hypocrites are expressing little outrage about the deaths of three American military who were killed in a roadside bomb attack in Afghanastan and may have been victims of Russian paid bounty to the Taliban.

Echo opinion by the editorial board of USA Today:

Russian bounty to the Taliban (Sunni Islamic fundamentalists)

Commander in chief has been briefed that Vladimir Putin might have paid for dead U.S. troops, and he owes the American people answers: USA Today editorial echo: Our view

When three U.S. Marine reservists were killed in a roadside bomb attack last year in Afghanistan, they seemed like more tragic casualties of America's two-decade war against Islamic fundamentalists there. Now, however, the case has taken on an even more sinister twist: U.S. intelligence officials suspect that the attackers might have been motivated by Russian bounties on American troops.

Congress must demand any evidence that President Vladimir Putin has the blood of the three Americans, or other U.S. service members, on his hands — and whether President Donald Trump was told about the Russian payments and did nothing about them.

As the nation heads into the Independence Day weekend, it's worth remembering the names of those who lost their lives on April 8, 2019, in Afghanistan:

►Staff Sgt. Christopher Slutman, 43, of Newark, Delaware, was a firefighter for Ladder Company 27 in the Bronx, where he was decorated for valor after rescuing an unconscious woman from a burning building in 2014. He was the married father of three daughters.

►Sgt. Benjamin Hines, 31, of York, Pennsylvania, was engaged to be married. His obituary said he "laid down his life for God, family and country." His mother, Wendy, reflected at the time on her son's infectious smile and his desire from age 2 to be a Marine.

►After Cpl. Robert Hendriks, 25, was killed, his younger brother, Joseph, also a Marine serving in Afghanistan, accompanied the coffin home to Long Island. "We are inconsolable," Felicia Arculeo said of her son's death, "and broken into a million pieces."

'President has been briefed'

Since news broke Friday that a Russian military intelligence unit offered Afghan insurgents money for dead U.S. troops, the White House has issued a flurry of denials about what the president knew and when he knew it. The evidence of bounties was not strong enough and, as a consequence, Trump was not briefed on it, according to the president and his staff.

Until Tuesday. “The president has been briefed on what is unfortunately in the public domain because of The New York Times,” White House (Blondex3!) press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters. “But that does not change the fact that there is no consensus on this intelligence that still has yet to be verified.”

Russia and the Taliban have denied the intelligence findings.

But the evidence keeps mounting: News organizations have reported that the allegations were first included in a written daily intelligence briefing for the president last year, that then-national security adviser John Bolton told Trump about it in March 2019, that the intelligence was again included in the President's Daily Brief this February after U.S. troops discovered $500,000 in cash in a Taliban raid, that the information was credible enough for British allies to be informed, and that American intelligence agencies uncovered" on it is branded 'Another phony ... Russia Hoax'?

Even if the president was in the dark until The Times broke the story, he isn't any more. Has the commander in chief expressed even an ounce of concern that a foreign leader (?) ~ treason...! — with a known record of seeking to inflict pain on the United States since the Soviet Union got bogged down in Afghanistan and lost the Cold War — might have bought and paid for dead American troops?

No. Instead, Trump's first instinct was to tweet that the initial report about bounties was "another phony ... Russia Hoax."

Isn't it, in fact, more plausible that while Trump has been busy praising his relationship with Putin and urging that Russia be allowed back into the Group of Seven leading industrial nations (from which it was banished after seizing and annexing Crimea in 2014), it would be politically damning to admit during a presidential election year that he was aware of Russian perfidy and did nothing?

Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., is asking the right questions about Russia and bounties: Was the intelligence told to Trump? Was it in his daily briefing book? What's being done to safeguard U.S. troops and hold Putin accountable?

Answers to these and other questions are owed to Congress and the American people, especially to the families of the fallen U.S. service members.