Bush asks Daschle to limit Sept. 11 probes
January 29, 2002 Posted: 9:26 PM EST (0226 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush personally asked Senate Majority
Leader Tom Daschle Tuesday to limit the congressional investigation into
the events of September 11, congressional and White House sources told
CNN.
The request was made at a private meeting with congressional leaders
Tuesday morning. Sources said Bush initiated the conversation.
He asked that only the House and Senate intelligence committees look
into the potential breakdowns among federal agencies that could have
allowed the terrorist attacks to occur, rather than a broader inquiry
that some lawmakers have proposed, the sources said Tuesday's discussion
followed a rare call to Daschle from Vice President Dick Cheney last
Friday to make the same request.
"The vice president expressed the concern that a review of what happened
on September 11 would take resources and personnel away from the effort
in the war on terrorism," Daschle told reporters.
But, Daschle said, he has not agreed to limit the investigation.
"I acknowledged that concern, and it is for that reason that the
Intelligence Committee is going to begin this effort, trying to limit
the scope and the overall review of what happened," said Daschle,
D-South Dakota.
"But clearly, I think the American people are entitled to know what
happened and why," he said.
Cheney met last week in the Capitol with the chairmen of the House and
Senate intelligence committees and, according to a spokesman for Senate
Intelligence Chairman Bob Graham, D-Florida, "agreed to cooperate with
their effort."
The heads of both intelligence committees have been meeting to map out a
way to hold a bipartisan House-Senate investigation and hearings.
They were discussing how the inquiry would proceed, including what would
be made public, what would remain classified, and how broad the probe
would be.
Graham's spokesman said the committees will review intelligence matters
only.
"How ill prepared were we and why? We are looking towards the
possibility of addressing systemic problems through legislation," said
spokesman Paul Anderson.
Some Democrats, such as Sens. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and Robert
Torricelli of New Jersey, have been calling for a broad inquiry looking
at various federal government agencies beyond the intelligence
community.
"We do not meet our responsibilities to the American people if we do not
take an honest look at the federal government and all of its agencies
and let the country know what went wrong," Torricelli said.
"The best assurance that there's not another terrorist attack on the
United States is not simply to hire more federal agents or spend more
money. It's to take an honest look at what went wrong. Who or what
failed? There's an explanation owed to the American people," he said.
Although the president and vice president told Daschle they were worried
a wide-reaching inquiry could distract from the government's war on
terrorism, privately Democrats questioned why the White House feared a
broader investigation to determine possible culpability.
"We will take a look at the allocation of resources. Ten thousand
federal agents-where were they? How many assets were used, and what
signals were missed?" a Democratic senator told CNN.
· CNN Capitol Hill Producer Dana Bash and CNN Correspondents Jon Karl
and John King contributed to this report.
--
Regards
Karl Carlile (Communist Global Group)
Be free to join our communism mailing list
at http://homepage.eircom.net/~kampf/
|