Abstract

The 9/11 Report

This article discusses the implications of the 9/11 commission report on the presidency of U.S. President George W. Bush. While George W. Bush has been President, we've had two of the biggest intelligence screw-ups in US history. The intelligence community overstated the weapons of mass destruction threat posed by Iraq (and Bush overstated the exaggerations), and the national security and law enforcement systems failed to detect and thwart the horrific attacks of September 11, 2001. Bush has shown a profound lack of curiosity about these intelligence failures. And the final report of the 9/11 commission illustrates why he was uninterested--or escapist. The report shows that the Al Qaeda threat was not on the White House A-list. No Principals Committee meeting on al Qaeda was held until September 4, 2001 (although the Principals Committee met frequently on other subjects, such as the Middle East peace process, Russia and the Persian Gulf). The report details the many steps the Bush Administration took in its first eight months to establish an Al Qaeda counterterrorism policy. But counterterrorism was not on the fast track. Is it fair to blame the Bush crowd for not having done more before 9/11? In a way, yes. The Administration can be faulted for setting the wrong priorities.