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CNN Live Today
Congress Returns to 9/11 Investigation
Aired September 19, 2002 - 11:07 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Lawmakers are holding a second day of hearings on intelligence failures prior to the September 11 attacks. A summary of the investigation finds no smoking gun, but plenty of missed signals by U.S. intelligence agencies.
CNN Congressional Correspondent, Kate Snow, is live on Capitol Hill with the very latest -- Hi there, Kate.
KATE SNOW, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Fredricka. Being questioned right now the deputy secretary of defense, Paul Wolfowitz, along with the deputy secretary of the state department, Richard Armitage. Both of them presenting opening statements. You see there Senator Rockefeller who has been questioning Wolfowitz just a few moments ago about the fact that George Tenet, the CIA director, early on had indicated in a memo internally, that we were at war, that the U.S. was at war with al Qaeda, and ought to consider this a war, and a war-like footing.
Senator Rockefeller asking just a few moments ago of Mr. Wolfowitz, what does that mean, if you were told you were at war by George Tenet, shouldn't you have been taking action.
The response from Mr. Wolfowitz said, it means you plan for war and he -- even then, Fredricka, got into a little bit of what seemed to be an indication about the plans currently that the administration has against Iraq.
Mr. Wolfowitz talking about planning for war, and saying you can't get serious about this war on terrorism, without thinking about military action.
Mr. Wolfowitz in his opening statement also talked about -- he said that no matter how good intelligence gets to be, we will not win this war simply by going after individual terrorists. He said we must not only capture and kill terrorists, but we must drain the swamp in which those terrorists breed.
Also speaking just before him was Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. He talked about the challenges, looking backwards at missed intelligence. He said it is very difficult, though, to look back in hindsight, because in hindsight, it is hard to tell what you may have missed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD ARMITAGE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE: For the Department of State, the metric to define success in many aspects of this war, is in things that didn't happen, things that were avoided.
So I guess another way of saying that is that your administration and successive of administrations have to be right every time, every single time. The terrorists only have to be right once.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SNOW: As we continue this afternoon, Fredricka, expect more questions from the senators about missed clues. They consider these two gentlemen to be consumers, if you will, of intelligence. These are two of the highest ranking officials from the Department of State and the Department of Defense who are supposed to be given intelligence information, there is going to be a lot of talk about information sharing and whether it is better now than it was prior to September 11 -- Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: All right. Kate Snow from Capitol Hill. Thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired September 19, 2002 - 11:07 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Lawmakers are holding a second day of hearings on intelligence failures prior to the September 11 attacks. A summary of the investigation finds no smoking gun, but plenty of missed signals by U.S. intelligence agencies.
CNN Congressional Correspondent, Kate Snow, is live on Capitol Hill with the very latest -- Hi there, Kate.
KATE SNOW, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Fredricka. Being questioned right now the deputy secretary of defense, Paul Wolfowitz, along with the deputy secretary of the state department, Richard Armitage. Both of them presenting opening statements. You see there Senator Rockefeller who has been questioning Wolfowitz just a few moments ago about the fact that George Tenet, the CIA director, early on had indicated in a memo internally, that we were at war, that the U.S. was at war with al Qaeda, and ought to consider this a war, and a war-like footing.
Senator Rockefeller asking just a few moments ago of Mr. Wolfowitz, what does that mean, if you were told you were at war by George Tenet, shouldn't you have been taking action.
The response from Mr. Wolfowitz said, it means you plan for war and he -- even then, Fredricka, got into a little bit of what seemed to be an indication about the plans currently that the administration has against Iraq.
Mr. Wolfowitz talking about planning for war, and saying you can't get serious about this war on terrorism, without thinking about military action.
Mr. Wolfowitz in his opening statement also talked about -- he said that no matter how good intelligence gets to be, we will not win this war simply by going after individual terrorists. He said we must not only capture and kill terrorists, but we must drain the swamp in which those terrorists breed.
Also speaking just before him was Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. He talked about the challenges, looking backwards at missed intelligence. He said it is very difficult, though, to look back in hindsight, because in hindsight, it is hard to tell what you may have missed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD ARMITAGE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE: For the Department of State, the metric to define success in many aspects of this war, is in things that didn't happen, things that were avoided.
So I guess another way of saying that is that your administration and successive of administrations have to be right every time, every single time. The terrorists only have to be right once.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SNOW: As we continue this afternoon, Fredricka, expect more questions from the senators about missed clues. They consider these two gentlemen to be consumers, if you will, of intelligence. These are two of the highest ranking officials from the Department of State and the Department of Defense who are supposed to be given intelligence information, there is going to be a lot of talk about information sharing and whether it is better now than it was prior to September 11 -- Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: All right. Kate Snow from Capitol Hill. Thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
