Kean Commission Finds 9/11 Should Have Been
Prevented
There's a storm building
over Washington, as the commission investigating the attacks on New
York and Washington finds evidence that the Bush administration
could have -- should have -- prevented the aerial assaults.
CBS Evening News Wednesday quoted former New Jersey Gov. Tom
Kean, a Republican who was appointed by President Bush, as saying,
"This was not something that had to happen" and he "is now pointing
fingers inside the administration and laying blame." Kean said,
"There are people that, if I was doing the job, would certainly not
be in the position they were in at that time because they failed.
They simply failed."
CBS reports Kean's final analysis could "shed light on one of
the most controversial assertions of the Bush
administration—that there was never any thought given to the
idea that terrorists might fly an airplane into a building." As
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said on May 16, 2002, "I
don't think anybody could have predicted that they would try to use
an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile."
Similarly, President Bush denied having any idea about the threat,
saying on May 17, 2002 "Had I know that the enemy was going to use
airplanes to kill on that fateful morning, I would have done
everything in my power to protect the American people."
The story began to
spread. Soon after the White House statements, ABC News reported,
"White House officials acknowledged that US intelligence officials
informed President Bush weeks before the Sept. 11 attacks that bin
Laden's terrorist network might try to hijack American planes." The
president received that briefing around the same time the FBI was
receiving information that a large number of Arabs were training at
US flight schools.
When CBS asked other Administration officials about Rice and
Bush's denials, they got nothing: "The usually talkative Attorney
General John Ashcroft just stared when reporters asked him about
the terror warnings. FBI Chief Robert Mueller also refused to
comment."
The warnings picked up by intelligence officers before 9/11 were
so specific that the White House acknowledges at least one
prominent member of the administration was already taking
precautions. Attorney General John Ashcroft (right) was "traveling
exclusively by leased jet aircraft instead of commercial airlines"
because of "what the Justice Department called a 'threat
assessment.'"
Since the attacks, the White House has tried to prevent an
independent investigation into the governments inability to stop
the attacks. TomPain.com reports, "first, the administration
opposed the creation of the commission. Then, when public outcry
forced Congress to create the commission, the White House tried to
choke off its funding. The administration then classified key
portions of a bipartisan 9/11 congressional inquiry. Then the White
House dragged its feet in providing documents to the commission.
And now it continues to refuse to hand over key documents, forcing
the commission to threaten court subpoenas. But it seems like the
White House should have learned by now that that kind of
obfuscation and denial is only going to backfire."
It always does.