Replying to 9/11 Probe

Suddlenly much doubt is croping up around National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice's assertions about 9/11. Many of her statements have recently been contradicted by other key officials and by news reports.

We have a right to know the truth about what the White House did to prevent 9/11. Yet Rice is refusing to testify in public before the bipartisan commission investigating the attacks.

Here are but a few of Rices' contradicting claims:

* RICE CLAIM: '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.' National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 5/16/02
* FACT: On August 6, 2001, the President personally 'received a one-and-a-half page briefing advising him that Osama bin Laden was capable of a major strike against the US, and that the plot could include the hijacking of an American airplane.' In July 2001, the Administration was also told that terrorists had explored using airplanes as missiles. [Source: NBC, 9/10/02; LA Times, 9/27/01]

* RICE CLAIM: In May 2002, Rice held a press conference to defend the Administration from new revelations that the President had been explicitly warned about an al Qaeda threat to airlines in August 2001. She 'suggested that Bush had requested the briefing because of his keen concern about elevated terrorist threat levels that summer.' [Source: Washington Post, 3/25/04]
* FACT: According to the CIA, the briefing 'was not requested by President Bush.' As commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste disclosed, 'the CIA informed the panel that the author of the briefing does not recall such a request from Bush and that the idea to compile the briefing came from within the CIA.' [Source: Washington Post, 3/25/04]

* RICE CLAIM: 'In June and July when the threat spikes were so high
we were at battle stations.' National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04
* FACT: 'Documents indicate that before Sept. 11, Ashcroft did not give terrorism top billing in his strategic plans for the Justice Department, which includes the FBI. A draft of Ashcroft's 'Strategic Plan' from Aug. 9, 2001, does not put fighting terrorism as one of the department's seven goals, ranking it as a sub-goal beneath gun violence and drugs. By contrast, in April 2000, Ashcroft's predecessor, Janet Reno, called terrorism 'the most challenging threat in the criminal justice area.'' Meanwhile, the Bush Administration decided to terminate 'a highly classified program to monitor Al Qaeda suspects in the United States.' [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04; Newsweek, 3/21/04]

* RICE CLAIM: 'The fact of the matter is [that] the administration focused on this before 9/11.' National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04
* FACT: President Bush and Vice President Cheney's counterterrorism task force, which was created in May, never convened one single meeting. The President himself admitted that 'I didn't feel the sense of urgency' about terrorism before 9/11. [Source: Washington Post, 1/20/02; Bob Woodward's 'Bush at War']

* RICE CLAIM: 'Our [pre-9/11 NSPD] plan called for military options to attack al Qaeda and Taliban leadership, ground forces and other targets -- taking the fight to the enemy where he lived.' National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04
* FACT: 9/11 Commissioner Gorelick: 'There is nothing in the NSPD that came out that we could find that had an invasion plan, a military plan.' Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage: 'Right.' Gorelick: 'Is it true, as Dr. Rice said, 'Our plan called for military options to attack Al Qaida and Taliban leadership'?' Armitage: 'No, I think that was amended after the horror of 9/11.' [Source: 9/11 Commission testimony, 3/24/04]

Could these blatant contradictions be why Rice is refusing to testify? America has the right to know, call the White House and Demand Rice testify.

(202) 456-1112












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