(CNSNews.com) – The White House is declining to say when President Barack Obama first  learned of three e-mails that the State Department sent to the White  House on Sept. 11, 2012, directly notifying the Executive Office of the  President that the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi was under attack, that  U.S. Amb. Chris Stevens was at the Benghazi mission at the time of the  attack, and that the group Ansar al-Sharia had taken credit for the  attack.

The White House also declined to say when the president first met with the National Security Council after the Benghazi attack.

“I have been asked by one of our spokespeople to relay ‘that we  decline to comment,’” said White House National Security Staff aide  Debbie Bird in a written response to CNSNews.com.

CNSNews.com had asked Bird: 1) “When did the President  first meet with the National Security Council after the Benghazi attack  on 9/11/12?” 2) “When did White House staff first discuss the substance  of the e-mails that went to the White House with the President or with  the National Security Advisor?”

Carney also took a question about the e-mails today during a press  gaggle held aboard Air Force One at 9:34 a.m. A reporter asked: “Jay,  there are some emails that have emerged, which suggest that the White  House and other areas of the government were told within hours of the  Benghazi attack that an extremist group had claimed responsibility. How  is that compatible with the idea that it was a spontaneous attack?”

Carney downplayed the significance of the State Department emails.

“There were emails about all sorts of information that was becoming  available in the aftermath of the attack,” Carney said. “The email  you’re referring to was an open-source, unclassified email referring to  an assertion made on a social media site that everyone in this room had  access to and knew about instantaneously. There was a variety of  information coming in.

“The whole point of an intelligence community and what they do is to  assess strands of information and make judgments about what happened and  who was responsible,” said Carney, “and I would refer you to what we’ve  already said about, and what the DNI [Director of National  Intelligence] has already said about, the initial assessments of the  intelligence community, and the fact that throughout this process, I and  others made very clear that our preliminary assessments were  preliminary, that an investigation was underway, and that as more facts  became available, we would make the American people aware of them.

“Again,” said Carney, “this was an open-source, unclassified email  about a posting on a Facebook site. I would also note I think that  within a few hours, that organization itself claimed that it had not  been responsible. Neither should be taken as fact. That’s why there’s an  investigation underway.”

The NSC is chaired by the president, and includes Secretary of State  Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, National Security  Advisor Tom Donilon, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey,  Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and U.S. Attorney General Eric  Holder. A NSC meeting would allow the leader of the intelligence  community to communicate directly with the leader of the State  Department in the presence of the president and for all of them to weigh  any conflicting information.

The three emails in question, which were obtained by CBS News, were  sent by the State Department to various government officials, including  two officials in the Executive Office of the President, on Sept. 11,  2012, while the attack on the Benghazi was taking place and immediately  after it had taken place.

Each of the emails has been redacted so that the suffixes of most of  the email addresses are intact—showing where the people who sent them  and received them work—but the prefixes are blacked out, so the personal  identities of the senders and receivers is obscured.

The first email was sent by a State Department officials at 4:05 PM  on Sept. 11, 2012. It carries the subject line: “U.S. Diplomatic Mission  in Benghazi Under Attack.” The text of the email says: “The Regional  Security Officer reports the diplomatic mission is under attack. Embassy  Tripoli reports approximately 20 armed people fired shots, explosions  have been heard as well. Ambassador Stevens, who is currently in  Benghazi, and four COM [Chief of Mission] personnel are in the compound  safe haven. The 17th of February militia is providing security support.”

This email went to at least 32 other officials in the State  Deparment. It also went to an official at the office of the Director of  National Intelligence, to someone at the FBI, and to someone at the  Defense Department. It also went to two officials at the White House.

A State Department official sent out a second email to the same list  of recipients 49 minutes later at 4:54 PM. The subject line on this  email said: U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi.” The subject line said:  “Embassy Tripoli reports the firing at the U.S. Diplomatic Mission in  Benghazi has stopped and the compound has been cleared. A response is on  the site attempting to locate COM personnel.

A State Department official sent out a third email at 6:07 PM on  Sept. 11, 2012—a little over two hours after the first email went out.  This email went to a different set of recipients, but still included two  officials at the White House. The subject line on this email was:  “Ansal al-Sharia Claims Responsibility for Benghazi Attack.” The text  said: “Embassy Tripoli reports the group claimed responsibility on  Facebook and Twitter and has called for an attack on Embassy Tripoli.”

None of the emails said anything about a YouTube video or a spontaneous demonstrations at the U.S. mission in Benghazi.

Five days after the State Department sent these emails to the White  House, U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice went on national television programs  and told the nation that the administration believed that what had  happened in Benghazi had started as a spontaneous protest against a  video that had been posted on YouTube.

“But based on the best information we have to date,” Rice said on  CBS’s “Face the Nation,” “what our assessment is as of the present is in  fact what, it began spontaneously in Benghazi as a reaction to what had  transpired some hours earlier in Cairo, where, of course, as you know,  there was a violent protest outside of our embassy sparked by this  hateful video.”

“We do not have information at present that leads us to conclude that this was premeditated or preplanned,” said Rice.

The day after the Sept. 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, the president traveled to Las Vegas for a fundraiser.  (article)