Chris Stevens's Benghazi diary reveals final days

Stevens was clear-eyed about the dangers that awaited him. “Security vacuum. Militias are power on the ground,” he wrote on Sept. 6. “Dicey conditions, including car bombs, attacks on consulate, British embassy, and our own people. Islamist ‘hit list’ in Benghazi. Me targeted on a prominent [al Qaeda] website (no more off-compound jogging).”

Yet Stevens was hopeful. A month earlier, Libya’s transitional government had handed power to an elected national congress. Democracy was sprouting. “People want it. Leadership is largely honest and intelligent, if lacking in experience.”