President Bush’s war cabinet met at Camp David on September 17, 2001. After al-Qaeda was identified for the attacks on 9/11, “The cabinet then voted to go to war against al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan, although [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld abstained. At the end of the meeting Bush said, ‘I believe Iraq was […]
Category: quotes
9/17/2001
Vice President Dick “Cheney said there was no indication that Iraq was linked to last week’s [9/11] terrorist attacks in New York and Washington. ‘Saddam Hussein’s bottled up at this point,’ he said.” – Michael R. Gordon, “A New War And Its Scale,” The New York Times, Sep. 17, 2001 […]
9/17/2001
“…it was reported that President Bush authorized the CIA to secretly detain and interrogate persons in a September 17, 2001, directive known as a memorandum of notification and that harsh tactics were devised in late 2001 and early 2002.” – Jordan J. Paust, Beyond the Law, Page 28 […]
9/17/2001
“The officials said that at the meeting in Kandahar [Afghanistan], where the delegation arrived this morning [September 17, 2001], the Taliban leaders would be told that they had ‘only a few days’ to hand over Mr. bin Laden or face an eventual American military attack that would almost certainly target the Taliban as well as […]
9/17/2001
“On September 17 [2001], [President] Bush signed an order giving enormous powers to the CIA, allowing it to conduct the war in Afghanistan and make foreign policy decisions using the help of foreign intelligence agencies, in order to capture or kill members of al Qaeda. Up to $900 million and perhaps more than $1 billion […]
9/17/2001
“The September 17 [2001] Memorandum of Notification [allowing the CIA to assassinate terrorists] had moved much faster than usual. …in this critical instance, the CIA would be gaining fearsome new powers with very little debate–none of it public. The Agency was taking on new responsibilities in areas where it had no expertise, such as interrogation […]
9/17/2001
” ‘Do you want Bin Laden dead?” a reporter asked President George W. Bush six days after the Sept. 11 attacks [September 17, 2001]. ‘I want him–I want justice,’ the president answered. ‘And there’s an old poster out West, as I recall, that said, *Wanted: Dead or Alive.* ‘ ” – Kate Zernike and Michael […]
9/17/2001
National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice presented a paper to President Bush dealing with directives for setting the retaliation for the 9/11 attacks in motion. “President Bush then considered [this paper] with principals on Monday morning, September 17 [2001]. ‘The purpose of this meeting,’ he recalled saying, ‘is to assign tasks for the first wave of […]
9/17/2001
While discussing the 9/11 attacks, “on September 17 [2001], President Bush had told his advisers, ‘I believe Iraq was involved.’ ” – Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Next Attack, Page 147 […]
9/17/2001
Then-CIA Director George Tenet wrote, after the 9/11 attacks, the CIA wanted to use their tribal sources in Afghanistan to track down those responsible. “The president [Bush] approved our recommendations on Monday, September 17 [2001], and provided us broad authorities to engage al-Qa’ida. As [Chief of CIA’s Counterterrorist Center] Cofer Black later told Congress, ‘the […]