Although Hillary Clinton would probably repeat her infamous comment during her Benghazi testimony, “At this point, what difference does it make?,” the truth always matters, and the truth is, as an Air Force source has just confirmed,  that there was in fact a Benghazi rescue mission literally ready to take off, and the Obama-Clinton administration said no.  As The Blaze reported on May 11, a new witness has come forward to expose that Benghazi lie:

A member of the U.S. Air Force, who was stationed in Italy during the 2012 Benghazi attacks, insisted Wednesday that the U.S. could have done more to help the four Americans who died that night.

“I definitely believe that our aircraft could have taken off and got there in a timely manner, maybe three hours at the most, in order to…at least stop that second mortar attack and have those guys running for the hills, and basically save lives that day,” the man, who chose not to reveal his identity, said on Fox News’ “Special Report.”

The man also shot down the military’s claim that a refueling tanker was not available at the time, claiming the excuse was invalid because U.S. jets frequently refuel using a “hot pit maneuver,” allowing jets to touch down to get fuel without turning their engines off.

This contradicts the preposterous from the get-go Obama-Clinton administration position that no rescue mission was attempted because it would not have arrived in time.  No one had any idea how long the first attack would take or if there would be a second attack.  When the Iranians took our hostages in 1979, at least Jimmy Carter, as Investor’s Business Daily points out, attempted a rescue mission:

It is said that Carter’s presidency literally crashed and burned in the Iranian desert with the failed Desert One Delta Force mission that was sent to rescue our embassy hostages from the clutches of the mullahs he had naively helped to power. But as we have noted, at least Carter tried a rescue, as President Obama failed to do at Benghazi as he rested up for a Las Vegas fundraiser.

Instead of resting for that fundraiser, President Obama could have given the order that would have let the planes at Aviano Air Force base in Italy and at other locations take off.  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who told her own daughter in an email that Benghazi was a terrorist attack, could have tried to save the first U.S. ambassador in three decades to be killed while serving, Christopher Stevens.  Also denied rescue were Ty Woods, Sean Smith, and Glenn Dougherty.  Benghazi security officer Kris Paronto, who, along with colleagues John Tiegen and Mark Geist survived the attack, said others could have been saved.  As Front Page Magazine reported:

A preview by Benghazi security officer Kris “Tanto” Paronto of 13 Hours, the block-buster Michael Bay film that premieres on Thursday, raises dramatic new questions about the refusal by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to authorize a military rescue of the besieged U.S. diplomatic facility and the nearby CIA Annex on Sept 11-12, 2012.

In a presentation at a conference organized by the Maryland Citizen Action Network last weekend, Paronto revealed that two AC-130H “Spectre” gunships were “on call” that night, both within range of Benghazi.

One of them was a six-hour flight away, co-located with a U.S. special operations team in Djibouti.

The other was at Naval Air Station Sigonella, in Sicily. “That’s a 45-minute flight,” Paronto said.

The Spectre gunship with its 25mm rapid-fire gatling guns, its 40 mm precision Bofors gun, and its 105mm canon is “good in urban warfare because you have little collateral damage,” Paronto explained.

An email unearthed by the relentless watchdog group Judicial Watch and detailed in a December 8 press release confirms that yes, a Benghazi rescue not only could have been attempted, but in fact was ready to go, and that Hillary Clinton should have been aware of it and given the go-ahead:

Judicial Watch today released a new Benghazi email from then-Department of Defense Chief of Staff Jeremy Bash to State Department leadership immediately offering “forces that could move to Benghazi” during the terrorist attack on the U.S. Special Mission Compound in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012. In an email sent to top Department of State officials, at 7:19 p.m. ET, only hours after the attack had begun, Bash says, “we have identified the forces that could move to Benghazi. They are spinning up as we speak.” The Obama administration redacted the details of the military forces available, oddly citing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) exemption that allows the withholding of “deliberative process” information.

Bash’s email seems to directly contradict testimony given by then-Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta before the Senate Armed Services Committee in February 2013. Defending the Obama administration’s lack of military response to the nearly six-hour-long attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Panetta claimed that “time, distance, the lack of an adequate warning, events that moved very quickly on the ground prevented a more immediate response.”

Among the recipients of this urgent communication were Jacob Sullivan, who was deputy chief of staff to Secretary Clinton at the time of the terrorist attack; Wendy Sherman, who was Mrs. Clinton’s undersecretary of state for political affairs, the fourth ranking official in the State Department; and Thomas Nides, who was deputy secretary of state for management and resources.

Yes, a rescue could have been mounted and in fact was being readied as the attack was underway.  Hillary Rodham Clinton is unworthy of the presidency and was up to her eyeballs in the Benghazi disaster, the failure to mount a rescue, and the cover-up of the incompetence that resulted in the deaths of four Americans: Ambassador Chris Stevens, Ty Woods, Glenn Doherty, and Sean Smith.  Criminal negligence is not a qualification for higher office.

Daniel John Sobieski is a freelance writer whose pieces have appeared in Investor’s Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine, and the Chicago Sun-Times among other publications.