In My Time - Dick Cheney [174]
We needed a new way forward, one based on the recognition that we were at war. We needed to go after the terrorists where they lived, rooting them out before they could attack. And we needed to hold those who gave them sanctuary and support responsible. As the president had said in his address to the nation on the night of September 11, “We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them.”
In the PEOC on 9/11 with Josh Bolten, Tucker Eskew, Karen Hughes, Nick Calio, Mary Matalin, Eric Edelman, Scooter Libby, Condoleezza Rice, and Larry Lindsay. (Official White House Photo/David Bohrer)
In this new kind of war, intelligence would be crucial. We had to find the terrorists so we could take down their networks. We had to stop others from supporting them. And we needed to place high priority on identifying networks and states that were trafficking in weapons of mass destruction so that we could shut down their efforts and prevent terrorists from acquiring those weapons. Terrible as 9/11 had been, the next attack, if it involved nuclear or biological weapons, would be exponentially worse.
In the morning meeting of the National Security Council, we discussed crisis management tasks, figuring out when commercial airline operations should begin again, when the military alert status would return to DefCon 4 from its current elevated level of DefCon 3. We agreed that combat air patrol flights would continue to fly over Washington and New York, and we discussed briefing Congress on the continuing threat.
The NSC meeting that afternoon concentrated more on our military response. The president was determined to use every tool of our national power to defeat the new kind of enemy we faced and to hold those who supported them responsible. I stressed the importance of going after state sponsors of terrorism. By holding them accountable for the acts of the terrorists, we would begin to deny terrorists safe haven and bases from which to operate—two elements they needed to plot, plan, and execute attacks.
We were confident that we would have help in the effort ahead. NATO announced that for the first time in its history, it was prepared to invoke Article V of the NATO Charter, which declares that an attack against one is an attack against all. Other nations would be with us as we responded to 9/11, but it was important, I said, that we not allow our mission to be determined by others. We had an obligation to do whatever it took to defend America, and we needed coalition partners who would sign on for that. The mission should define the coalition, not the other way around. The president made clear that he’d prefer to have allies with us, but we were at war, and if America had to stand alone, she would.
The next day, September 13, we were told that another attack on Washington, D.C., appeared imminent, and the Secret Service recommended that I go to Camp David. Thus Lynne and I missed the prayer service the next day at Washington National Cathedral and the president’s eloquent words about grief and justice. Instead on Friday, September 14, we attended a small memorial service at Camp David’s Evergreen Chapel. As light from an overcast sky came through the windows, we joined members of the military serving at Camp David in prayers for the lost and those who were suffering and for guidance in the way ahead.
Later that afternoon, members of the National Security Council began arriving at the camp for a series of meetings that the president had