Full Version: Preventing 9/11
Ex-Adviser Says Bush Ignored Terror Threats
The 9/11 Commission is currently trying to sort out whether and how 9/11 could have been prevented.
Richard Clarke seems to indicate that the Bush administration could have done more:
On Larry King, he said:
Again, Clarke says that we didn't do everything we should have, but no direct "we knew, it could have been prevented" type statement.
Time magazine did an article on this in 2002:
Could 9/11 Have Been Prevented?
Question for debate:
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11? Did it see 9/11 coming? Should it have seen 9/11 coming? Was 9/11 preventable?
The 9/11 Commission is currently trying to sort out whether and how 9/11 could have been prevented.
Richard Clarke seems to indicate that the Bush administration could have done more:
QUOTE
"I find it outrageous that the president is running for re-election on the grounds that he's done such great things about terrorism. He ignored it. He ignored terrorism for months, when maybe we could have done something to stop 9/11," Clarke told CBS.
On Larry King, he said:
QUOTE
KING: Was 9/11 preventable?
CLARKE: Well, we'll never know. But let me compare 9/11 and the period immediately before it to the millennium rollover and the period immediately before that. In December, 1999, we received intelligence reports that there were going to be major al Qaeda attacks. President Clinton asked his national security adviser Sandy Berger to hold daily meetings with the attorney general, the FBI director, the CIA director and stop the attacks. And every day they went back from the White House to the FBI, to the Justice Department, to the CIA and they shook the trees to find out if there was any information. You know, when you know the United States is going to be attacked, the top people in the United States government ought to be working hands-on to prevent it and working together.
Now, contrast that with what happened in the summer of 2001, when we even had more clear indications that there was going to be an attack. Did the president ask for daily meetings of his team to try to stop the attack? Did Condi Rice hold meetings of her counterparts to try to stop the attack? No.
And if she had, if the FBI director and the attorney general had gone back day after day to their department to the White House, what would they have shaken loose? We now know from testimony before the Commission that buried in the FBI was the fact that two of the hijackers had entered the United States. Now, if that information had been able to be shaken loose by the FBI director and the attorney general in response to daily meetings with the White House, if we had known that those two -- if the attorney general had known, if the FBI director had known, that those two were in the United States, Larry, I believe we could have caught those two. Would that have stopped...
KING: But who knew -- you knew they were in the United States, who else knew?
CLARKE: No, I didn't. I didn't know.
KING: We should have known is what you're saying.
CLARKE: The people in the FBI knew. Not the director.
KING: They did know.
CLARKE: Some people in the FBI knew. And if Condi Rice had been doing her job and holding those daily meetings, the way Sandy Berger did, if she had a hands-on attitude to being national security adviser, when she had information that there was a threat against the United States, that kind of information was shaken out in December 1999, it would have been shaken out in the summer of 2001, if she had been doing her job.
CLARKE: Well, we'll never know. But let me compare 9/11 and the period immediately before it to the millennium rollover and the period immediately before that. In December, 1999, we received intelligence reports that there were going to be major al Qaeda attacks. President Clinton asked his national security adviser Sandy Berger to hold daily meetings with the attorney general, the FBI director, the CIA director and stop the attacks. And every day they went back from the White House to the FBI, to the Justice Department, to the CIA and they shook the trees to find out if there was any information. You know, when you know the United States is going to be attacked, the top people in the United States government ought to be working hands-on to prevent it and working together.
Now, contrast that with what happened in the summer of 2001, when we even had more clear indications that there was going to be an attack. Did the president ask for daily meetings of his team to try to stop the attack? Did Condi Rice hold meetings of her counterparts to try to stop the attack? No.
And if she had, if the FBI director and the attorney general had gone back day after day to their department to the White House, what would they have shaken loose? We now know from testimony before the Commission that buried in the FBI was the fact that two of the hijackers had entered the United States. Now, if that information had been able to be shaken loose by the FBI director and the attorney general in response to daily meetings with the White House, if we had known that those two -- if the attorney general had known, if the FBI director had known, that those two were in the United States, Larry, I believe we could have caught those two. Would that have stopped...
KING: But who knew -- you knew they were in the United States, who else knew?
CLARKE: No, I didn't. I didn't know.
KING: We should have known is what you're saying.
CLARKE: The people in the FBI knew. Not the director.
KING: They did know.
CLARKE: Some people in the FBI knew. And if Condi Rice had been doing her job and holding those daily meetings, the way Sandy Berger did, if she had a hands-on attitude to being national security adviser, when she had information that there was a threat against the United States, that kind of information was shaken out in December 1999, it would have been shaken out in the summer of 2001, if she had been doing her job.
Again, Clarke says that we didn't do everything we should have, but no direct "we knew, it could have been prevented" type statement.
Time magazine did an article on this in 2002:
Could 9/11 Have Been Prevented?
Question for debate:
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11? Did it see 9/11 coming? Should it have seen 9/11 coming? Was 9/11 preventable?
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11? Did it see 9/11 coming? Should it have seen 9/11 coming? Was 9/11 preventable?
Clarke has been careful to say, in every interview I've seen with him, that there is no way to know whether more action would have stopped the plot. But there was a chance.
President Bush or Condoleeza Rice could have, based on the extremely high threat levels, demanded that the FBI etc. go back and shake the trees every night. Putting the -head- of the FBI on the hotseat daily for what he, personally, was doing to foil the attack could have drawn up the names of the two members of Al'Qaeda that were known to be in the country. If people at the highest levels of the administration had those names, they could have spread them all across the country (as Clarke says in his 9/11 commission testimony, he likes to think he would have done something drastic like put them on America's Most Wanted). With that level of attention, those two men could have been apprehended. That would have stopped at least part of the plot and could have unravelled the entire thing.
Now, I count 6 different "could have" points in that entire scenario, where things might have broken down. But I think Bush and/or Rice should admit that they didn't take that first, top step. I know, I know, I'm talking about using law enforcement to go after terrorism. Only a crazy person would think that could work.
You can also absolutely paint a different scenario for what President Clinton could have done years earlier. To me it is obvious that you can't rely on foiling plot after plot, that eventually one is going to get through. So Clinton could have done things that Clarke suggested, like bombing terrorist training camps repeatedly even in the absence of a specific terrorist incident that we were responding to. This might have diminished Al Qaeda to the point where they were no longer a threat to us.
Clarke has been careful to say, in every interview I've seen with him, that there is no way to know whether more action would have stopped the plot. But there was a chance.
President Bush or Condoleeza Rice could have, based on the extremely high threat levels, demanded that the FBI etc. go back and shake the trees every night. Putting the -head- of the FBI on the hotseat daily for what he, personally, was doing to foil the attack could have drawn up the names of the two members of Al'Qaeda that were known to be in the country. If people at the highest levels of the administration had those names, they could have spread them all across the country (as Clarke says in his 9/11 commission testimony, he likes to think he would have done something drastic like put them on America's Most Wanted). With that level of attention, those two men could have been apprehended. That would have stopped at least part of the plot and could have unravelled the entire thing.
Now, I count 6 different "could have" points in that entire scenario, where things might have broken down. But I think Bush and/or Rice should admit that they didn't take that first, top step. I know, I know, I'm talking about using law enforcement to go after terrorism. Only a crazy person would think that could work.
You can also absolutely paint a different scenario for what President Clinton could have done years earlier. To me it is obvious that you can't rely on foiling plot after plot, that eventually one is going to get through. So Clinton could have done things that Clarke suggested, like bombing terrorist training camps repeatedly even in the absence of a specific terrorist incident that we were responding to. This might have diminished Al Qaeda to the point where they were no longer a threat to us.
Did the Bush team take reasonable precautions?? No, but neither did Clinton. I think America was for legit reasons unworried about a strike on 9/11. Such an event is unpredictable even given the border crossing in 99 in Washington. We are unprepared now. Not trying to sound scary or anything but we are still vulnerable. The US is to large and the cost is to much to absolutely prevent terrorism. Our airlines are back to pre 9/11 security for the most part even.
I mean look at Israel or look at N. Ireland or Spain. Regions of continual terrorist attacks. Nothing can stop terrorism. No one on earth especially a nation the size of the US can stop terrorism. If they want to strike us they will strike us. It is really that simple. These nations who have people more adept at handling terroism cannot stop it.
So my conclusion. No one saw 9/11 coming. The US recieves threats daily none of which bear any fruit. Its like thousands of creis for wolf and someone is supposed to decipher the one real call?? Absurd. 9/11 was not preventable and neither is a future strike. We can thwart one or two here and there but if they want to hit us they will and we cannot do anything about that. Of course we try our hardest to prevent it but logic and reason tells me in its entirety terrorism is unstoppable.
I mean look at Israel or look at N. Ireland or Spain. Regions of continual terrorist attacks. Nothing can stop terrorism. No one on earth especially a nation the size of the US can stop terrorism. If they want to strike us they will strike us. It is really that simple. These nations who have people more adept at handling terroism cannot stop it.
So my conclusion. No one saw 9/11 coming. The US recieves threats daily none of which bear any fruit. Its like thousands of creis for wolf and someone is supposed to decipher the one real call?? Absurd. 9/11 was not preventable and neither is a future strike. We can thwart one or two here and there but if they want to hit us they will and we cannot do anything about that. Of course we try our hardest to prevent it but logic and reason tells me in its entirety terrorism is unstoppable.
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11?
I don't think they did, every account I have read of the actions by the Bush administration points to the fact that not only were they unprepared, but they weren't even paying attention to the issue. The administration itself has stated that in so many words saying that "they caught us with our pants down". Of course if someone has evidence to the contrary then I'd be more than happy to read it, because to me this is not a partisan issue. If Clinton or any other democrat were in office I'd be asking the exact same questions.
Another factor I believe played into this is the fact that President Bush basically took the longest vacation of any president in our history during that time. If the president had spent a little more time in Washington doing his job instead of in Crawford, TX and Kennebunkport (sp?) relaxing with family and friends then things could have possibly been different.
Did it see 9/11 coming?
Individual intelligence agents might have had pieces of the puzzle, but obviously no one connected the dots.
Should it have seen 9/11 coming?
Absolutely they should have seen it coming. Lets just take the example of those people in the FBI that knew two of the hijackers were in the US. Obviously they didn't know they were hijackers at the time, but if the government was aware of a general threat level as Clarke suggests then something could have been done. If Rice had been holding meetings daily with her team then this information might have surfaced and it could have been investigated further.
Was 9/11 preventable?
Maybe not completely but at the very least in part. Continuing my point from above, lets suppose those lower level FBI agents raised a flag on those two illegals they knew about (who eventually turned out to be hijackers). They could have started investigating them.
Best case scenario: They might have gotten a general idea of the plan (i.e. crash airplanes into public buildings) by interrogating them. They might have even gotten a general timeframe (i'm sure specifics were not communicated until the last minute). Also, provided they cracked they could have mapped out their movements and MO and possibly been lead to other cells.
Worst case scenario: the presence of surveillance would have either deterred these two from carrying out their mission entirely or at the very least they might have been apprehended at the airport. That would have meant 1 less plane hitting a building and a few 100 additional lives saved.
I don't think they did, every account I have read of the actions by the Bush administration points to the fact that not only were they unprepared, but they weren't even paying attention to the issue. The administration itself has stated that in so many words saying that "they caught us with our pants down". Of course if someone has evidence to the contrary then I'd be more than happy to read it, because to me this is not a partisan issue. If Clinton or any other democrat were in office I'd be asking the exact same questions.
Another factor I believe played into this is the fact that President Bush basically took the longest vacation of any president in our history during that time. If the president had spent a little more time in Washington doing his job instead of in Crawford, TX and Kennebunkport (sp?) relaxing with family and friends then things could have possibly been different.
Did it see 9/11 coming?
Individual intelligence agents might have had pieces of the puzzle, but obviously no one connected the dots.
Should it have seen 9/11 coming?
Absolutely they should have seen it coming. Lets just take the example of those people in the FBI that knew two of the hijackers were in the US. Obviously they didn't know they were hijackers at the time, but if the government was aware of a general threat level as Clarke suggests then something could have been done. If Rice had been holding meetings daily with her team then this information might have surfaced and it could have been investigated further.
Was 9/11 preventable?
Maybe not completely but at the very least in part. Continuing my point from above, lets suppose those lower level FBI agents raised a flag on those two illegals they knew about (who eventually turned out to be hijackers). They could have started investigating them.
Best case scenario: They might have gotten a general idea of the plan (i.e. crash airplanes into public buildings) by interrogating them. They might have even gotten a general timeframe (i'm sure specifics were not communicated until the last minute). Also, provided they cracked they could have mapped out their movements and MO and possibly been lead to other cells.
Worst case scenario: the presence of surveillance would have either deterred these two from carrying out their mission entirely or at the very least they might have been apprehended at the airport. That would have meant 1 less plane hitting a building and a few 100 additional lives saved.
QUOTE
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11? Did it see 9/11 coming? Should it have seen 9/11 coming? Was 9/11 preventable?
Did anyone see a couple of 747's heading toward the twin towers? Yep, seconds before it happened. Anyone that says that it was preventable is a mind reader.
Sure the twin towers were a target, but so was the Mall of America, the Red Line in Boston and just about every other building and/or gathering place in the Vast Country.
It is simply too easy to "Monday morning quarterback" this, and almost every other tragidy that ever happens.
Was Pearl Harbor preventable?, was the Murder of JFK preventable?, was the Family of six killed on the Freeway on any given day preventable?
What I am saying is, for the days, weeks, months and years preceeding 9/11 I did not see a single outraged American speaking out about why nothing was being done to stop the upcomming terrorist attack on the Twin Towers. Did anyone?
We are all brilliant after the fact.
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11? Did it see 9/11 coming? Should it have seen 9/11 coming? Was 9/11 preventable?
Taking it one question at a time.
Did it see 9/11 coming?
No, how could anyone? Although there had been lots of discussion about a terrorist attacks against the United States proper, I do not believe any American could have foreseen the 9/11 massacres because such an act was completely incomprehensible to any American before 9/11.
Should it have seen 9/11 coming?
The administration should have and did see that we were vulnerable. But it was something that might happen some time in the future. Plans were being made to take out the al-Qaeda leadership, which many probably thought would take care of the problem.
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11?
What does that mean?? What were reasonable precautions pre-9/11 are considered laughable now.
Was 9/11 preventable
Sadly, but emphatically, no! We know now that terrorists could be planning an attack on us right now. Their operatives could be in-country and we have no way of knowing. Without something to give them away we will be in the dark until the attack occures. That is how terrorism functions.
I don't know if this should go here or not, but I watched Warren Rudman and Gary hart testify before the Senate in Jan 2001 on the results of a commission they co-headed. This is just a piece of their report, but I think it highlights how involved taking action against the threat of terrorism and any other threat we face in this coming century is.
Too many of the American people are looking for easy explainations and scapegoats. What we should be looking for is what was the intelligence failure and how can we insure it does not happen again. I think great progress has already been made in that diection.
http://www.fas.org/irp/threat/nssg.pdf
The United Stated Commission On National Security 21st Century
Co-Chaired by Former Senators Gary hart and Warren Rudman
Jan 31, 2001
Opening Statement:
Securing the national Homeland
"The combination of unconventional weapons proliferation with the persistance of international terrorism will end the relative invulnerability of the U.S. homeland to catastophic attack. A direct attack against American citizens on American soil is likely over the next quarter century. The risk of not only death and destruction but also a demoralization that could undermone U.S. global leadership. In the face of this threat, our nation has no coherent or integrated governmental structures."
There are 117 pages in this report which finishes with these recommendations:
1. The president should develope a comprehensive strategy to heigthen America's ability to prevent and proect against all forms of attack on the homeland and to respond to such attacks if prevention and protection fail.
Completed.
2 - The President and Congree should agree to create a national Homeland Security Agency with responsibility for planning, coordinating, and integrating various U.S. government activities involved in homeland security. They should use FEMA as akey building block in this effort.
Completed
3 - The President should propose to congress the transfer of the Customs Service, the Boarder patrol, and Coast guard to the national Homeland Security Agrency, while preserving them as distinct entities.
Completed
4 - Completed
5 - Not acted upon
6 - Not acted upon.
7 through 15 have not to my knowledge been acted upon
Taking it one question at a time.
Did it see 9/11 coming?
No, how could anyone? Although there had been lots of discussion about a terrorist attacks against the United States proper, I do not believe any American could have foreseen the 9/11 massacres because such an act was completely incomprehensible to any American before 9/11.
Should it have seen 9/11 coming?
The administration should have and did see that we were vulnerable. But it was something that might happen some time in the future. Plans were being made to take out the al-Qaeda leadership, which many probably thought would take care of the problem.
Did the Bush administration take reasonable precautions to prevent 9/11?
What does that mean?? What were reasonable precautions pre-9/11 are considered laughable now.
Was 9/11 preventable
Sadly, but emphatically, no! We know now that terrorists could be planning an attack on us right now. Their operatives could be in-country and we have no way of knowing. Without something to give them away we will be in the dark until the attack occures. That is how terrorism functions.
I don't know if this should go here or not, but I watched Warren Rudman and Gary hart testify before the Senate in Jan 2001 on the results of a commission they co-headed. This is just a piece of their report, but I think it highlights how involved taking action against the threat of terrorism and any other threat we face in this coming century is.
Too many of the American people are looking for easy explainations and scapegoats. What we should be looking for is what was the intelligence failure and how can we insure it does not happen again. I think great progress has already been made in that diection.
http://www.fas.org/irp/threat/nssg.pdf
The United Stated Commission On National Security 21st Century
Co-Chaired by Former Senators Gary hart and Warren Rudman
Jan 31, 2001
Opening Statement:
Securing the national Homeland
"The combination of unconventional weapons proliferation with the persistance of international terrorism will end the relative invulnerability of the U.S. homeland to catastophic attack. A direct attack against American citizens on American soil is likely over the next quarter century. The risk of not only death and destruction but also a demoralization that could undermone U.S. global leadership. In the face of this threat, our nation has no coherent or integrated governmental structures."
There are 117 pages in this report which finishes with these recommendations:
1. The president should develope a comprehensive strategy to heigthen America's ability to prevent and proect against all forms of attack on the homeland and to respond to such attacks if prevention and protection fail.
Completed.
2 - The President and Congree should agree to create a national Homeland Security Agency with responsibility for planning, coordinating, and integrating various U.S. government activities involved in homeland security. They should use FEMA as akey building block in this effort.
Completed
3 - The President should propose to congress the transfer of the Customs Service, the Boarder patrol, and Coast guard to the national Homeland Security Agrency, while preserving them as distinct entities.
Completed
4 - Completed
5 - Not acted upon
6 - Not acted upon.
7 through 15 have not to my knowledge been acted upon
Of course 9/11 was preventable. If we had solved coordination problems between FBI and CIA years ago there was an excellent chance we could have caught several of the terrorists beforehand and possibly unraveled the plot.
Its the fault of every president from Reagan onward. They all dealt with terrorism in a half-hearted, piece-meal way and never spent the resources to fix our intelligence holes.
Its the fault of every president from Reagan onward. They all dealt with terrorism in a half-hearted, piece-meal way and never spent the resources to fix our intelligence holes.
QUOTE(santasdad @ Mar 27 2004, 08:04 AM)
Its the fault of every president from Reagan onward. They all dealt with terrorism in a half-hearted, piece-meal way and never spent the resources to fix our intelligence holes.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. However, although international terrorism has been with us for decades it was not until the 1990s that it became a recognizable possible threat to America. Even then, as the report I cited shows, terrorism against America proper was thought to be something that "would probably" happen, "sometime" in the next 25 years.
We as Americans have got to stop this witch hunt for gujilty parties that do not exist. We have got to concentrate in the real intelligence probablems of that time, see where we have progressed since then, and make the right decisions on how to make our intelligence operation better in the future.
All the rest is election year political posturing that does nothing to serve the nation.
1SG
redliner,
Just how is a govenment with an extremely narrow mandate going to be able to justify shooting down 4 airliners over a crowded city in peacetime? I think we have seen the answer: feign ignorance and naivety, without explicity stating so.
If you bother a rabid rottweiler through a fence, and then the beast gets free and attacks you, who do you blame? Is this to say that human beings are like rabid dogs? Yes, in certain circumstances. Some of these people know nothing else but killing and terror (translated 'freedom' in Arabic - BTW, this is not a justification) to achieve their goals. A product of their environment if you like. Did we cause their environment to be as it is? We certainly haven't done anything to prevent it.
QUOTE
Did anyone see a couple of 747's heading toward the twin towers? Yep, seconds before it happened. Anyone that says that it was preventable is a mind reader.
Just how is a govenment with an extremely narrow mandate going to be able to justify shooting down 4 airliners over a crowded city in peacetime? I think we have seen the answer: feign ignorance and naivety, without explicity stating so.
If you bother a rabid rottweiler through a fence, and then the beast gets free and attacks you, who do you blame? Is this to say that human beings are like rabid dogs? Yes, in certain circumstances. Some of these people know nothing else but killing and terror (translated 'freedom' in Arabic - BTW, this is not a justification) to achieve their goals. A product of their environment if you like. Did we cause their environment to be as it is? We certainly haven't done anything to prevent it.
QUOTE
Of course 9/11 was preventable. If we had solved coordination problems between FBI and CIA years ago there was an excellent chance we could have caught several of the terrorists beforehand and possibly unraveled the plot.
According to Osama, 13 of the 19 hijackers didn't even know what was going to happen!
Tracking down 6 individuals in a Country of over 250 million would be a daunting task if you put the entire GDP into the effort.
That IS the nature of terrorism.
Israel, with probably the best anti terrorism abilities still gets hit often.
QUOTE(QuantumMekanic @ Mar 27 2004, 03:52 PM)
If you bother a rabid rottweiler through a fence, and then the beast gets free and attacks you, who do you blame? Is this to say that human beings are like rabid dogs? Yes, in certain circumstances. Some of these people know nothing else but killing and terror (translated 'freedom' in Arabic - BTW, this is not a justification) to achieve their goals. A product of their environment if you like. Did we cause their environment to be as it is? We certainly haven't done anything to prevent it.
It is a good thing to remember that the leaders of the al-Qaeda Network do not come from empoverished backgrounds. They do not have the excuse that the United States is somehow oppressing them. So, what has the west, especially America done to incite such hatred from people like this?
We entered their sacred soil? We were asked to do so by the government of Saudi Arabia in hopes of preventing his neighbor Saddam from taking those sacred lands for himself. It is America's fault that ben Laden's offer of troops to fight the Iraqis was turned down in favor of American military might? Or do you think that after the stellar performance of al-Qaeda fighter in the latest war in Iraq they ever had a chance of fighting off Saddam should he have decided to take that country and all of it oil reserves. The Saudi Government never thought so.
Too many Americans and other westerners seem to want to blame American policies for the 9/11 massacres. The blame should be placed squarely where it belongs. On the heads of the al-Qaeda leadership.
If I walk by a rottweiler and he breaks out of his yard and attacks my children, no one should complain if I kill him. Those that say it is my fault because the week before I walked by the same fence, could not be more wrong. Not only wrong but they are guilty of perpetrating an injustice against me, that may injure my standing in my community, doing me grievious harm well into the future.
The question is, WHY?
1SG
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