In an article published on September 11, 2007, titled 'Are We Safer Today?,' 9/11 Commission leaders Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton wrote: "Beyond all our problems in the Muslim world, we must not neglect the most dangerous threat of all. The 9/11 Commission urged a 'maximum effort' to prevent the nightmare scenario: a nuclear weapon in the hands of terrorists. The recent [July 2007] National Intelligence Estimate says that al-Qaeda will continue to try to acquire weapons of mass destruction and that it would not hesitate to use them. But our response to the threat of nuclear terrorism had been lip service and little action. The fiscal 2008 budget request for programs to control nuclear warheads, materials and expertise is a 15 percent real cut from the levels two years ago. We are in dire need of leadership, resources and sustained diplomacy to secure the world's loose nuclear materials. President Bush needs to knock heads and force action. 'Military power is essential to our security, but if the only tool is a hammer, pretty soon every problem looks like a nail. We must use all the tools of U.S. power–including foreign aid, educational assistance and vigorous public diplomacy that emphasizes scholarship, libraries and exchange programs–to shape a Middle East and a Muslim world that are less hostile to our interests and values. America's long-term security relies on being viewed not as a threat but as a source of opportunity and hope.' "
– Ron Suskind, The Way of the World, 246