The United States believes the attack on its Consulate in Libya that killed four Americans including the ambassador to the country was an act of terrorism, the White House has said, terming it "inexcusable."
"It was a terrorist attack and it was an inexcusable attack," the White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters abroad Air Force One, when asked about Republican criticism that the US President Barack Obama so far has not termed it as a terrorism attack.
"It is certainly the case that it is our view as an administration, the President's view, that it was a terrorist attack," Carney said.
"Our position is that it was a terrorist attack. It is, I think by definition, a terrorist attack when there is a prolonged assault on an embassy with weapons," he said.
"The broader questions here about who participated, what led to the attack on the facility in Benghazi -- all those questions are under investigation at two levels, by the FBI and by the Accountability Review Board established by (the) Secretary (of State, Hillary) Clinton to look at issues of security in Benghazi and security at other diplomatic facilities," he noted.
Top Republican Senators welcomed such a statement coming from the White House but said that such a thing coming two weeks after the attack is reflective of the failed policies of the US President towards the Middle East.
"We recognize that Al-Qaeda involvement in a terrorist attack that killed four Americans in Libya is an inconvenient truth for a President who claims to be destroying Al-Qaeda," said Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham.
"But it is not too much to ask why the President and his Administration have taken so long to state what has appeared obvious for a long time about what really happened in Benghazi on September 11, 2012.
This is just one more example of this President's failure to lead in the Middle East and how that failure has threatened America's national security interests. Now is not the time to lead from behind," they alleged.
Addressing an election rally, Congressman Paul Ryan, the Republican vice presidential candidate, alleged that Obama's foreign policy is blowing up in American faces.
"Look around the world. It looks like Tehran in 1979 but in about a dozen capitals around the world. They're burning our flags at our embassies. They're climbing our walls at our embassies. They're taking down our flags and putting up the flags of the Muslim Brotherhood. They just killed four of our diplomats in Benghazi. And Iran is that much closer toward a nuclear weapon," he said.
"What happens when your government is not clear and forceful and resolved on speaking out for our values and our issues, when we propose to gut our military, as this administration does, it sends one message and one message alone: weakness," Ryan alleged.