BREAKING: US Special Forces were STOPPED from going to Benghazi to aid men on the ground

CBS reporter Sharyl Atkinson is all over this.

This is old ground to those of you whom read this site regularly, but it's nice to have it confirmed by someone whom was there on the ground.

According to diplomat Gregory Hicks, murdered Ambassador Chris Stevens deputy who was one of the Benghazi survivors now giving testimony to congress, a team of Special Forces prepared to fly from Tripoli to Benghazi during the Sept. 11, 2012 attacks and save the Americans under attack was ordered not to do so.

Needless to say, this directly contradicts what we were told by President Obama, Secretary Clinton and other administration officials, that nobody was ever told to stand down and that that there were no resources available:

Hicks gave private testimony to congressional investigators last month in advance of his upcoming appearance at a congressional hearing Wednesday.

According to excerpts released Monday, Hicks told investigators that SOCAFRICA commander Lt. Col. Gibson and his team were on their way to board a C-130 from Tripoli for Benghazi prior to an attack on a second U.S. compound "when [Col. Gibson] got a phone call from SOCAFRICA which said, 'you can't go now, you don't have the authority to go now.' And so they missed the flight ... They were told not to board the flight, so they missed it."

No assistance arrived from the U.S. military outside of Libya during the hours that Americans were under attack or trapped inside compounds by hostile forces armed with rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and AK-47 rifles.

Hicks told congressional investigators that if the U.S. had quickly sent a military aircraft over Benghazi, it might have saved American lives. The U.S. Souda Bay Naval Base is an hour's flight from Libya.

Hicks recounts how we had F-15's in easy reach of Benghazi, and says point blank that had we sent a couple of fighter aircraft over the attack area, the Libyan attackewrs would likey have left and the mortar attack that killed two Americans the next morning would not have occurred.

Read more excerpts from his testimony here.

We knew before that the Americans whom died in Benghazi could have saved. We knew that before, but having it confirmed by someone who was on the ground here makes it a lot stronger.

So that leads to the heart of the matter, the real unanswered questions:

Why did this happen, and why did this president and his administration go to such lengths to lie and cover it up? Was it really because it could have proven embarrassing in the middle of the president's re-election campaign?

What was Ambassador Stevens doing in a dangerous unsecured location like Benghazi? And why was he meeting with the Turks just before the attack?

Why exactly was it in American interests not to rescue him and his associates when they came under attack?

Why were both of the two buildings being used by the Americans in Benghazi delibeately left unsecured, and why were Ambassador Stevens' repeated requests for more security repeatedly ignored?

Was the US, perhaps represented by the Ambassador Stevens himself involved in negotiating for weapons caches in Libya? If so, why?

Answer those questions and we'll find out what really happened that night - in Benghazi, and in Washington DC.

The ghosts of some brave men and the living whom remain, like Charles Woods deserve some answers.