The 9/11 Commission report of July 22, 2004, said, regarding the potential to prevent the attacks of September 11, 2001: “We identified ten ‘operational opportunities’ when we missed a chance to disrupt the 9/11 plot. Among those opportunities were: the failure to share information about the two hijackers [Nawaf al-] Hazmi and [Khalid al-] Midhar, […]
Category: quotes
7/22/2004
In their July 22, 2004, report, the 9/11 Commission agreed upon four overarching failures regarding the prevention of 9/11: “A ‘failure of imagination’ characterized our inability, at all levels of government and society, to appreciate the magnitude of the threat from al Qaeda and Islamist terrorism. A ‘failure of capabilities’ was a failure that limited […]
7/22/2004
Lee Hamilton, Co-chair of the 9/11 Commission, said on July 22, 2004: ” ‘There is no silver bullet or decisive blow that can defeat Islamist terrorism.’ Instead, it would take every tool of counterterrorism that the government possessed.” These included the ability to “prevent terrorist sanctuaries; work with Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia; sustain a […]
7/22/2004
Regarding the 9/11 Commission’s final report on July 22, 2004, Commission co-chairs Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton wrote: “We discovered real defects within the United States government. Our recommendations arose out of serious concern. We found national security institutions built to fight and win the cold war, yet poorly designed to combat the stateless and […]
7/22/2004
According to information in the 9/11 Commission’s final report, which was issued on July 22, 2004: “The commissioners went on to report that in spite of all the [terrorism] warnings to different parts of the [Bush] administration, the nation’s ‘domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have direction and did […]
7/22/2004
On July 22, 2004, “The 9/11 Commission let loose with a…sweeping indictment of a breakdown in the federal government–the CIA, the FBI, the Pentagon, the National Security Council, the Federal Aviation Administration, Congress–that left the nation vulnerable to attacks that were a shock but ‘should not have come as a surprise.’ The executive summary of […]
7/22/2004
At a press conference for the release of the 9/11 Commission report on July 22, 2004, “Commission co-chairman Thomas Kean confirmed the existence of Iraq-al Qaeda ties. ‘There was no question in our minds that there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda,’ he declared.” – Stephen F. Hayes, Cheney, Page 440 […]
7/20/2004
National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice “testified to the Sept. 11 panel [9/11 Commission] that she did not recall being briefed on the [15 page intelligence] report [written by the Clinton Administration] during the transition period to the Bush administration, and she said she did not read it until after the Sept. 11 attacks, when Vice […]
7/18/2004
According to a deposition on July 18, 2004, when Brigadier General Janis Karpinski mentioned that there were innocent people being held at a detention center in Iraq, “Maj. Gen. [Walter] Wojdakowski, the second most senior general in Iraq at the time [replied]: ‘I don’t care if we have 15,000 innocent civilians, we are winning the […]
7/15/2004
“Newer revelations about interrogation tactics at Guantanamo were revealed in an ICRC [International Committee of the Red Cross] report to the Bush administration in July 2004. The ICRC labeled the Guantanamo interrogation process as ‘an intentional system of cruel, unusual and degrading treatment and a form of torture.’ “ [The 15th of the month used […]