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.

Donald Trump is an irresponsible Putin surrogate: #RussianBounty

Echo opinion column published in the Austin American Statesmann newspaper, in Texas by columnist and political analyst Mona Charen.

Christopher Slutman, 43, had always wanted to be a firefighter. He was that kind of kid, the kind who wants to save people. He was also a Marine Reserves staff sergeant who had served in Iraq. 

Last year, he was assigned to duty in Afghanistan.

On April 8, 2019, just two weeks before he was scheduled to return home, he and two other Marines were killed when a roadside bomb exploded near Bagram Air Base. This may be one of the attacks Russia was sponsoring.

Also murdered that day were Cpl. Robert A. Hendriks, 25, of Locust Valley, New York, and Sgt. Benjamin Hines, 31, of York, Pennsylvania.

The question that cannot be avoided is this: Did Donald Trump — through laziness, dereliction or some still-inexplicable prostration to Vladimir Putin — make these Marines’ deaths, or those of other Americans, more likely?

The New York Times, Associated Press, The Washington Post, Fox News and The Wall Street Journal are all reporting that U.S. intelligence agencies had become aware that Russia was offering cash bounties to the Taliban to kill Americans and other coalition forces as early as March 2019. The intelligence was included in the president’s daily brief in the spring of this year. It was also the subject of a National Security Council meeting. “Given that there was an NSC meeting, I suspect that (Trump) did know” about the intelligence, former CIA and NSA director Michael Hayden told The Washington Post.

The president’s spokespeople are playing the word games. Pressed on whether the information was included in the PDB, press secretary Kayleigh McEnany sidestepped. The president “has not personally been briefed on the matter.” Well, that could mean merely that the information was not spoon-fed verbally. Besides, she added, the reports of Russian cash for American corpses were “unconfirmed” and there was “no consensus” in the intel community. But that is always the case with intelligence.

CIA Director Gina Haspel, by contrast, did not deny the intelligence. She acknowledged that when information is obtained that may affect the welfare of U.S. combat forces, it is “shared throughout the national security community — and with U.S. allies.”

So others knew, but the president was kept in the dark? And if he was kept in the dark, what does that say about his leadership?

Trump, who maintains the highest vigilance about any harsh word from Joe Scarborough or Don Lemon, says he was unaware. “Nobody briefed or told me, @VP Pence, or Chief of Staff @MarkMeadows about the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians, as reported through an ‘anonymous source’ by the Fake News @nytimes,” he tweeted. He wasn’t finished. “Everybody is denying it & there have not been many attacks on us.”

Pause on that for a moment. “There have not been many attacks on us.” That must be a great comfort to the Hendriks, Hines and Slutman families.

Trump is not slow to anger. Yet when it comes to Vladimir Putin putting bounties on the heads of America’s warriors, he is strangely unperturbed. Knowing that Putin was reveling in American deaths, Trump invited him to attend the G-7 meeting in September.

It is hardly news that Trump lacks empathy, but he has made concern for “our great military” one of his calling cards. Where is even a hint of rage at Putin for putting targets on their backs? All of his ire is directed at The New York Times, with none to spare for the Kremlin ghoul. Far from imposing a price, Trump rewarded him.

Trump’s vaunted “love” of the military is not for the real military, the one represented by Hendricks, Hines and Slutman. 

Instead, his passion is a twisted, gangster image of militarism. He ran for office promising that as commander in chief he would order the U.S. military to commit war crimes. While president, he pardoned war criminals. His “love” of the military is worse than phony. He has no appreciation of what sacrifice means. He has no understanding that serving means putting someone else’s welfare before your own. He thinks the military are a bunch of thugs. The thing that drew him to General Jim Mattis was the nickname “mad dog” — which Trump falsely later claimed to have bestowed on Mattis.

Robert Hendriks, Benjamin Hines and Christopher Slutman were patriots. Slutman, an Eagle Scout, was always contributing to his community. Robby Hendriks’s mother always knew he would serve his country. Ben Hines had a gift for lifting morale in his unit.

It is not credible to imagine that Trump was ignorant of Russia’s role in this. But in any case, it is now known to the world. Where, oh where, is Trump’s concern for them?

Charen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.