Against the Tide, by Lincoln Chafee: on Homeland Security

Bill Clinton: 1990s terrorism commission concluded US would get hit big

[Condi Rice said about the Commission report], "That commission said we are going to get hit in the US and we are going to get hit big. That's number 1. And number 2, we have big systemic problems. The FBI doesn't work the way it should and it doesn't communicate with the intelligence." The thrust of Rice's answer was that the president had been in office only 233 days. It was another way of saying Bush's watch had not really started.

In her answers to the commission, Rice kept steering the testimony back to the previous administration. "I think the question, is why over all of these years did we not address the structural problems that were there, with the FBI, with the CIA."

Condoleezza Rice: Post-9-11: Blamed structural reforms needed in FBI & CIA

Rice's answer was another way of saying [Bush's] watch had not really started. Rice kept steering the testimony back to the previous administration. "I think the question, is why over all of these years did we not address the structural problems that were there, with the FBI, with the CIA." By definition, then, no one in the administration made a mistake on domestic security in the 9 months leading up to Sep. 11. The structure was wrong, not the people in charge of it. Her subtext was: "if only a previous administration had put the right structural reforms in place."

George W. Bush: OpEd: Failed to know Al Qaeda enemy, like UK did with Hitler

At this writing, President Bush often points to the words of Osama bin Laden as proof that we need to wage endless war in Iraq, but in September 2001 those of us who wanted to know what drove bin Laden's rage against us were looked upon with suspicion.

Bin Laden had talked extensively about 3 grievances: American military bases the holy sites of Mecca and Medina, in his native Saudi Arabia; the plight of the Palestinians under Israeli occupation in Gaza and the West Bank; and the misery of the Iraqi people living under UN sanctions.

George W. Bush: OpEd: Resisted 9-11 investigation exposing administration

People forget that the only reason we had an investigation into September 11, as flawed and incomplete as it was, is that the families of the victims demanded it. They demanded it for more than a year before they managed to overcome the president's resistance to opening u his government to scrutiny.

The September 11 families wanted an official account of what happened, how it happened and why. Most Americans did.

Congress mandated an investigation. In a July 2003 interim report the commission complained that President Bush was resisting its investigation while publicly pledging good faith and cooperation. By October of that year, the commission resorted to issuing subpoenas for documents.

Lincoln Chafee: Know your enemy: Al Qaeda wants US troops away from Mecca

I felt differently. We needed to find and destroy this small band of international criminals, disarm their propaganda machine, and use hard-nosed police work to prevent future attacks.

He said, "Americans are asking why do they hate us? They hate our freedoms. Our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote." He had not invested 10 seconds in the central admonition of Sun-tzu: Know your enemy. He said not a word to address the presence of American troops near Mecca and Medina, or the Palestinian question, or sanctions against Iraq,

Lincoln Chafee: False WMD fear hurt efforts at nuclear nonproliferation

As early as 1998, the New American Century was using the catchphrase "weapons of mass destruction" to take us down a very hazardous path. Of course, the real weapon of mass destruction is nuclear; but by whipping up fear over nonexistent chemical and biological weapons the Bush administration has actually harmed international efforts at nuclear nonproliferation. With an extremist White House in power today, we have many unstable, hostile regimes springing to acquire nuclear weapons.