News Intelligence Analysis
Sept. 11 panel chairman tries
to smooth over critical remarks
By Ken Fireman, Tribune
Newspapers. Newsday; Tribune news services contributed
December 19, 2003
WASHINGTON -- The head of the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on Thursday stood by his comments that the attacks were preventable but said he was not pointing fingers at anyone in either the Bush or Clinton administration.
In an interview on ABC's "Nightline," former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean sought to clarify what he said on CBS a day earlier. He had suggested that some government officials were culpable and had not yet been held accountable.
"I do not believe it had to happen," Kean said in the CBS interview, speaking of the hijacking attacks. "There were people certainly--if I were doing the job--who would certainly not be in the position that they were in at that time, because they failed. They simply failed."
Kean's initial comments sparked intense curiosity among relatives of Sept. 11 victims who wondered whether they were based on new information discovered by the commission as it sifted through a large amount of classified government documents to which it has recently gained access.
"That is what is different since the last time he [Kean] made any statements to the press," said Lorie Van Auken of East Brunswick, N.J.
Her husband, Kenneth, died at the World Trade Center.
The comments also triggered a political controversy, as retired Gen. Wesley Clark, a Democratic presidential candidate, and Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) said Kean's words indicated that the Bush administration might have done more to prevent the terrorists from hijacking four commercial airliners in September 2001.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan countered, saying the administration knew of nothing "that leads us to believe that Sept. 11 could have been prevented."
But Kean, in an advance transcript of his "Nightline" interview, sought to tamp the controversy. He said he had been referring in the CBS interview to mistakes made by various agencies, such as allowing known terrorists to enter the country and dangerous items to be taken aboard planes.
Al Felzenberg, spokesman for the commission, noted, as others have, that some terrorists had expired visas, that all eluded aviation security, and that miscommunication between intelligence agencies may have kept authorities from following clues to the attacks.
"If any of these things hadn't happened, it might have been a different story," said Felzenberg, who added that Kean "did not intend to make news."
Kean said he was not blaming any specific officials.
"We have no evidence that anybody high in the Clinton administration or the Bush administration did anything wrong," he said.
He added that any conclusions about the performance of government officials "will be reached when we are finished with our job, not now."
Kean is not the first public official to suggest that the attacks might have been prevented.
After a lengthy investigation by a joint panel of the House and Senate intelligence committees concluded last summer, Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.), co-chairman of the panel, said that "the attacks of Sept. 11 could have been prevented if the right combination of skill, cooperation, creativity and some good luck had been brought to task."
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) has criticized the FBI and CIA several times for failing to follow up on other clues.
Kean said the 10-member commission, which is charged with determining whether anything could have been done to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks and what lessons can be learned to forestall future assaults, has not decided whether to ask President Bush or former President Bill Clinton to testify.
The commission plans to hold public hearings in late January and issue its report by May.
It recently worked out agreements giving it some access to documents from the Federal Aviation Administration and NORAD, the Pentagon's flight monitoring system, on defensive measures taken on the day of the attacks, classified briefings given to Bush beforehand about the threat of such attacks, and how New York City responded to the assaults.
Copyright © 2003, Chicago Tribune
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