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95–505 PDF 2005

S. Hrg. 108–741

MAKING AMERICA SAFER: EXAMINING THE

RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE 9/11 COMMISSION

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JULY 30, 2004

Printed for the use of the Committee on Governmental Affairs

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman 

TED STEVENS, Alaska 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

PETER G. FITZGERALD, Illinois 

JOHN E. SUNUNU, New Hampshire 

RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

MARK PRYOR, Arkansas

MICHAEL D. BOPP, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

DAVID A. KASS, Chief Investigative Counsel 

MICHAEL L. STERN, Deputy Staff Director for Investigations 

JOYCE A. RECHTSCHAFFEN, Minority Staff Director and Counsel 

KEVIN J. LANDY, Minority Counsel 

AMY B. NEWHOUSE, Chief Clerk 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Opening statements: Page 

Senator Collins ................................................................................................. 1

Senator Lieberman ........................................................................................... 3

Senator Voinovich ............................................................................................. 18

Senator Levin .................................................................................................... 21

Senator Coleman .............................................................................................. 24

Senator Durbin ................................................................................................. 29

Senator Specter ................................................................................................. 36

Senator Dayton ................................................................................................. 39

Senator Fitzgerald ............................................................................................ 42

Senator Carper ................................................................................................. 45

Senator Lautenberg .......................................................................................... 49

Senator Pryor .................................................................................................... 53

Senator Akaka .................................................................................................. 56

Prepared statement: 

Senator Shelby .................................................................................................. 61

WITNESSES 

FRIDAY, JULY 30, 2004

Hon. Thomas H. Kean, Chairman, National Commission on Terrorist Attacks 

Upon the United States ....................................................................................... 5

Hon. Lee H. Hamilton, Vice Chairman, National Commission on Terrorist 

Attacks Upon the United States ......................................................................... 8

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Hamilton, Hon. Lee H.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 8

Joint prepared statement with attachments .................................................. 63

Kean, Hon. Thomas H.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 5

Joint prepared statement with attachments .................................................. 63

APPENDIX 

Memorandum submitted by Senator Specter ........................................................ 71

Democratic National Campaign Matter submitted by Senator Specter .............. 72

Questions and Responses for Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton from: 

Senator Collins ................................................................................................. 73

Senator Akaka .................................................................................................. 74

Senator Durbin ................................................................................................. 76

Senator Lautenberg .......................................................................................... 79

Senator Bennett ................................................................................................ 84

Senator Shelby .................................................................................................. 86

(1)

MAKING AMERICA SAFER: EXAMINING THE 

RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE 9/11 COMMISSION 

FRIDAY, JULY 30, 2004

U.S. SENATE, 

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS, 

Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 11:04 a.m., in room 

SH–216, Hart Senate Office Building, Hon. Susan M. Collins, 

Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Collins, Voinovich, Coleman, Specter, Fitzgerald, Lieberman, Levin, Akaka, Durbin, Carper, Dayton, Lautenberg, and Pryor. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN COLLINS 

Chairman COLLINS. The Committee will come to order. 

Let me begin by thanking our Committee Members for rearranging their schedules on very short notice to be here today. I particularly want to acknowledge our Democratic members, all of 

whom raced down from Boston this morning and have accused me 

of depriving them of a good night’s sleep. This is not a Republican 

plot. We are very happy to have you here. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Madam Chairman, if I may say so, in a 

phrase that may have become familiar, on behalf of this side we 

are reporting for duty. [Laughter.] 

Chairman COLLINS. I also want to welcome our two distinguished 

witnesses who join us today. I am very grateful for their work and 

for their presence as well. 

Today, the Governmental Affairs Committee begins a series of 

hearings on the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission calling 

for a restructuring of our intelligence organizations. The task that 

we have been assigned by the Senate leaders is to examine in 

depth the recommendations for reorganizing the Executive Branch 

and to report legislation by October 1. 

We must act with speed, but not in haste. We must be bold, but 

we cannot be reckless. We must protect not just the lives of our 

citizens, but also those values that make life worth living. All terrorism involves death and destruction, but the ultimate goal of terrorists is to destroy everything that we treasure and that defines 

us as Americans—our democracy, protection of the rights of all, adherence to the rule of law, economic opportunity, and religious and 

political freedom. 

2

Those who despise our way of life will stop at nothing to achieve 

this goal. Osama bin Laden has repeatedly said that al Qaeda 

makes no distinction between military and civilian targets. He has 

called the murder of any American anywhere on Earth ‘‘the duty 

of every Muslim.’’

The 9/11 Commission makes numerous findings as to how we can 

better protect ourselves and our liberty. These recommendations, 

ranging from improving educational and economic opportunities in 

Muslim states to implementing a biometric screening system to improve border security, will be considered by congressional committees in the weeks ahead. 

Today, however, our focus is on a key Commission finding: That 

we must reform the structure of our intelligence community. 

The Commission makes two major recommendations to accomplish this end: The establishment of a National Counterterrorism 

Center to unify intelligence analysis and operational planning, and 

the creation of a new National Intelligence Director to lead our entire intelligence effort, which now involves 15 agencies scattered 

across the Federal Government. 

The center, as envisioned by the Commission, would not be another layer of bureaucracy but, rather, a means by which our intelligence agencies can share and integrate their expertise, their information, and their institutional memories. 

The proposed Intelligence Director would have the authority to 

allocate resources and control budgets to ensure that the most important priorities are funded in keeping with the policies established by the President and the National Security Council. This reorganization would represent a fundamental overhaul of our intelligence structure and a sea change in our thinking. 

The precise form and extent of reorganization remain to be determined, and we need to make clear, just as the 9/11 Commission report does, that the intelligence failures were not the result of individual negligence but of institutional rigidity. Massive reorganizations of government are always controversial. They are often met 

with great resistance from those being reorganized. While turf battles abound in Washington, for the American people it is results 

that count. 

Power struggles for authority and responsibility, however well 

motivated, cannot be allowed to doom needed reforms. Our theme 

should be, as the Commission quotes one CIA official, ‘‘One fight, 

one team.’’ It can be done. 

Consider, for example, the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986. It centralized operational authority in the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Initially, this restructuring was vigorously opposed by those who clung to the independence of the service branches. The performance of our military 

since then, in the Gulf War, in Bosnia, and in Afghanistan and 

Iraq, is testament to the wisdom of that unifying reform. 

The threat we face today requires the same willingness to innovate, to coordinate information, to share skills and talent, and to 

pursue the overriding mission that helped America meet the challenges of the 20th Century. This Committee must do everything in 

its power to see that America’s intelligence structures are rebuilt 

to meet the challenges of the 21st Century. 

3

Today, we are honored to hear from the two leaders of the 9/11 

Commission: Chairman Thomas Kean and Vice Chairman Lee 

Hamilton. I thank them for their extraordinary service and welcome them here today. 

Before calling on the Commissioners, I would like to recognize 

my friend, Senator Lieberman, for any opening comments that he 

might have. In addition to possessing tremendous experience and 

insight, Senator Lieberman brings a decidedly nonpartisan approach to this urgent task. I very much appreciate his assistance 

in putting these hearings together so quickly, and I look forward 

to working with him and the other Members of our Committee as 

we strive to meet our October 1 goal. 

Senator Lieberman. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LIEBERMAN 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I 

know that you and I agree—and I would guess that every other 

Member of the Committee does—that the report of the Kean-Hamilton 9/11 Commission presents us, this Committee, and the Congress with one of the most important opportunities any of us will 

have to be of service to our country. And I take encouragement 

from your leadership of this Committee as we begin the process of 

responding to the Commission’s report because I know it will be 

nonpartisan; I know that you will, as you always do, put the national interest ahead of partisan interest. And I think together we 

are going to get this job done and get it done with unprecedented 

thoughtfulness and speed. 

Our leadership, Senators Frist and Daschle, late on the day that 

the 9/11 Commission report was issued, charged this Committee 

with the responsibility of examining the reorganization recommendations from the Commission. We accept this responsibility 

with a sense of urgency the Commission recommends and the 

American people rightfully expect. 

Vice Chairman Hamilton, reflecting on all the witness interviews 

that led the Commission to conclude that changes were necessary 

in a way the American intelligence community was organized, has 

said, ‘‘A critical theme that emerged throughout our inquiry was 

the difficulty of answering the question: Who is in charge? Who ensures that agencies pool resources, avoid duplication, and plan 

jointly? Who oversees the massive integration and unity of effort to 

keep America safe?’’

‘‘Too often,’’ Lee Hamilton concluded, ‘‘the answer is no one.’’ 

That is unacceptable. That status quo failed us on September 11, 

2001, and it will fail us again, unless we begin to work now to institute the reforms the 9/11 Commission has recommended. 

I want to thank both Chairman Kean and Vice Chairman Hamilton for their remarkable leadership. The Commission has far exceeded the hope Senator McCain and I had for it when we pushed 

for its creation in the months after September 11. If you will allow 

me, your service, gentlemen, reminds me of a favorite quote from 

Thomas Jefferson: ‘‘Citizens who love their country on its own account, and not merely for its trappings of interest or power, can 

never refuse to come forward when they find that the Nation is engaged in dangers which they have the means of warding off.’’

4

That is what you have done. Your Nation, our Nation, was and 

is in danger. And while we are safer than we were on September 

11, we are still not safe, as your report concludes. You and your 

fellow Commissioners put your private lives aside and stepped forward to document for the Nation the story of September 11 and the 

bold actions that are needed now to confront and defeat the continuing danger of terrorism. 

I know it was nearly 2 years of difficult, painstaking work for all 

the Commission members and staff, and we are grateful and proud 

that in these fractious times, your Commission was able to carry 

out its work in a thoroughly nonpartisan fashion and produce a 

unanimous report. You have created the model Congress must follow as we respond to your recommendations. 

Our thanks also go to the families of the victims of September 

11 who have played such a steadfast role in demanding answers to 

the difficult questions surrounding the attack so lives could be 

saved in the future. The only answer those family members would 

not accept was ‘‘No,’’ as in there will be no Commission. They insisted that there be a Commission. 

So I conclude, if I might, that Jefferson would be proud that our 

Nation still produces citizens like Tom Kean, Lee Hamilton, the 

other members of the Commission, and the families of the victims 

of September 11. 

I have long believed that if we, as a Nation, are ever going to 

make sense of what happened on September 11, we need to look 

back honestly—not with rancor, not with rumor, not with fear, but 

with clear eyes and honest hearts. Your extraordinary work enables us now to do just that. 

You answer better than anyone has the two questions that we all 

want answered: How could the September 11 attacks have happened? And how can we prevent, to the best of our ability, anything 

like September 11 from ever happening again? 

This 587-page report does not close the book on September 11; 

rather, it now opens a new chapter for Congress and the White 

House to write, as we fulfill our responsibilities to create the 21st 

Century intelligence and homeland defense systems your report 

calls for. In this mission, we should all feel the same sense of urgency the Commissioners have expressed. 

Chairman Kean, you said, ‘‘This system is not fixed. Our biggest 

weapon of defense is our intelligence system. If that doesn’t work, 

our chances of being attacked are so much greater. So our major 

recommendation is to fix that intelligence system and to do it as 

fast as possible.’’

That is why we are holding these hearings today, unprecedented 

for the speed and the time at which they have been called. Our 

staffs will be working this summer to have legislation ready for the 

Senate’s consideration by the end of September. When the Senate 

returns on September 7, just days before the third anniversary of 

September 11, we are going to be well on our way. And many other 

congressional hearings will follow. 

Today, this Committee I hope will focus mostly on the Commission’s recommendations for the creation of a National Counterterrorism Center, a National Intelligence Director, and some related issues like information sharing. 

5

1The joint prepared statement of Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton appears on page 63. 

As always, as we begin our work, history can inform our judgments. I go back to 1924 when General Billy Mitchell predicted 

that a war with Japan was coming and that it would begin with 

an attack on Pearl Harbor. He even predicted the time of day the 

attack would occur. Then came December 7, 1941. Sadly, we also 

had warnings years before, as you document, before September 11, 

of the mounting terrorist threat and gaps in our government’s intelligence preparedness. Then came September 11, 2001, and again 

we showed we were unprepared. 

We cannot let another attack succeed because of our own inaction, and we meet to begin these deliberations at a time when our 

Nation has been given fair and factual warning that our terrorist 

enemies intend to attack again. 

Your Commission’s recommendations offer us a chance to seize 

control of our future and defend America. We must act now and not 

put this over to the next Congress. 

Jefferson, again, once warned that, ‘‘Lethargy is the forerunner 

of death to public liberty.’’ In the case of terrorism, lethargy can 

also be the forerunner to the death of thousands of innocent Americans. That is why we must not go slow or protect the status quo. 

It is time to act to fulfill our congressional responsibilities in an 

age of terrorism to provide for the common defense and ensure domestic tranquility, and I am confident that this Committee, working across party lines in the national interest, can lead the way. 

Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you, Senator. We will start with Governor Kean. 

TESTIMONY OF HON. THOMAS H. KEAN,1 CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE 

UNITED STATES 

Mr. KEAN. Madam Chairman Collins, Senator Lieberman, Members of the Committee, it is a great honor to appear before you 

today, to open our public testimony on behalf of the recommendations in the final report of our 9/11 Commission. 

We also want to thank the leadership of the U.S. Senate. Both 

the Majority Leader and the Democratic Leader have shown your 

strong support for our work. We commend them, and we commend 

you for your leadership. And I might just say a word on that. We 

did not envision—we hoped for speed because we have this strong 

sense of urgency. But you have even exceeded our expectations. 

This is remarkable. I would like to thank this Committee very 

much, as well as the U.S. Senate. This is in the interests of our 

country. Thank you for your service. 

The U.S. Government must take all the steps it can to disrupt 

and defeat the terrorists and protect against and prepare for terrorist attacks. 

Our recommendations to address the transnational danger of 

Islamist terrorism rest on three policies: To attack terrorists and 

their organizations; prevent the continued growth of Islamic terrorism; and protect and prepare for terrorist attacks. 

6

The long-term success of our efforts depend on the use of all elements of national power. We must use diplomacy, intelligence, covert action, law enforcement, economic policy, foreign aid, public diplomacy, and, of course, homeland defense. If we favor one tool 

while neglecting others, we are still going to leave ourselves vulnerable and we will weaken our overall national effort. 

Our recommendations about what to do encompass many themes: 

Foreign policy, public diplomacy, border security, transportation 

security, the protection of civil liberties, and setting priorities for 

national preparedness. We also make, of course, several recommendations on how to do it—how to organize the U.S. Government to address the new national security threat of transnational 

terrorism. 

We understand and appreciate that the topic of today’s hearing 

is governmental organization. We will address in detail some of our 

key recommendations in this area. However, it would be wrong if 

I did not pause for just a moment to make clear that changes in 

government organization are vastly important, but are still only a 

part of what we need to do. If we do not carry out all important 

recommendations we have outlined in foreign policy, in border security, in transportation security, and in other areas, reorganizing 

the government alone is not enough to make us safer and more secure. 

I know there is a fascination in Washington sometimes, I guess, 

with bureaucratic solutions—rearranging the wiring diagrams, creating new organizations. And we do recommend some important institutional changes. We will articulate and defense those proposals. 

But, of course, reorganizing government institutions is only part of 

the agenda that is before us all. 

Some of the saddest aspects of the 9/11 story are the outstanding 

efforts of so many individual officials straining, often without success, against the boundaries of the possible. Good people can overcome bad structures. They should not have to. 

We have the resources and we have the people. We need to combine them more effectively to achieve that unity of effort that we 

are all seeking. This morning, we will address several major recommendations on how the Executive Branch, we believe, can simply work better. They have to unify strategic intelligence and operational planning against Islamic terrorists across the foreign-domestic divide with a National Counterterrorism Center; they must 

unify the intelligence community with a new National Intelligence 

Director; they must unify the many participants in the counterterrorism effort and their knowledge in a network-based information-sharing system that transcends traditional national boundaries; and we must unify our national effort by strengthening the 

ability of the FBI and homeland defenders to carry out the 

counterterrorism mission. 

We will address each of these in turn. 

The National Counterterrorism Center. Our report details many 

unexploited opportunities that we could have used, really, to disrupt that September 11 plot: The failures to watchlist, the failures 

to share information, the failures, as so many have put it, to connect the dots. The story of Hazmi and Mihdhar in Kuala Lumpur 

in January 2000 is a telling example. See, there we caught a 

7

glimpse of the future hijackers, but we lost their trail in Bangkok. 

Domestic officials were not informed until August 2001 that Hazmi 

and Mihdhar had entered the United States and were living very 

openly here. They started then to pursue some late leads, but on 

September 11, time simply ran out. 

We could give you any number of other examples, and will, if you 

would like, where we find no one was firmly in charge of managing 

the case. No one was able to draw relevant intelligence from anywhere within the government, assign responsibilities across the 

agencies—and that is foreign or domestic—track progress, and 

quickly bring these things forward so they could be resolved. In 

other words, as we have said, no one was the quarterback. No one 

was calling the play. No one was assigning roles so that government agencies could execute as a team and not as individuals. 

We believe the solution to this problem rests with the creation 

of a new institution, the National Counterterrorism Center. We believe, as Secretary Rumsfeld told us, that each of the agencies 

needs to ‘‘give up some of their existing turf and authority in exchange for a stronger, faster, more efficient government-wide joint 

effort.’’ We, therefore, propose a civilian-led unified joint command 

for counterterrorism. It would combine intelligence—what the military, I gather, calls the J–2 function—with operational planning—

which the military calls the J–3 function. We would put them together in one agency, keeping overall policy direction where it belongs, in the hands of the President and in the hands of the National Security Council. 

We consciously and deliberately draw on the military model, the 

Goldwater-Nichols model. We can and should learn from the successful reforms in the military that were done two decades ago. We 

want all the government agencies that play a role in counterterrorism to work together, to have one unified command. We want 

them to work together as one team in one fight against 

transnational terrorism. 

The National Counterterrorism Center would build on the existing Terrorist Threat Integration Center and replace it and other 

terrorism ‘‘fusion centers’’ within the government with one, unified 

center. 

The NCTC would have tasking authority on counterterrorism for 

all collection and analysis across the government, across the foreign-domestic divide. It would be in charge of warning. 

The NCTC would coordinate anti-terrorist operations across the 

government, but individual agencies would continue to execute operations within their competencies. 

The NCTC would be in the Executive Office of the President. Its 

chief would have control over the personnel assigned to the center 

and must have the right to concur in the choices of personnel to 

lead the operating entities of the departments and agencies focused 

on counterterrorism, specifically the top counterterrorism officials 

at the CIA, FBI, Defense and State Departments. The NCTC chief 

would report to the National Intelligence Director. 

Now, we appreciate, as we talked about this on the Commission, 

that this is a new and difficult idea for those of us schooled in the 

government that we knew in the 20th Century. We won the Second 

World War and we won the Cold War because the great departVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
8

1The joint prepared statement of Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton appears on page 63. 

ments of government—the State Department, the Defense Department, the CIA, and the FBI—were organized against clear nationstate adversaries. Today, we face a transnational threat. That 

threat respects no boundaries and makes no distinction between 

foreign and domestic. The enemy is resourceful, it is flexible, and 

it is disciplined. We need a system of management that is as flexible and resourceful as the enemy we face. We need a system that 

can bring all the resources of government to bear on the problem 

and that can change and respond as the threat changes. We need 

a model of government that meets the needs of the 21st Century. 

And we believe that the National Counterterrorist Center will meet 

that test. 

I will now introduce my Vice Chairman, really my Co-Chairman, 

Lee Hamilton, who has not only been a wonderful colleague, but 

has taught this country boy from New Jersey a tremendous amount 

about that whole subject. 

TESTIMONY OF HON. LEE H. HAMILTON,1 VICE CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE 

UNITED STATES 

Mr. HAMILTON. Thank you very much, Chairman Kean. I want 

to say that the success, whatever it may be, of the Commission is 

very largely attributable to the remarkable leadership of Tom 

Kean, and it has been a high privilege for me to have the opportunity to serve with him. 

Madam Chairman, Senator Lieberman, the distinguished Members of the Committee, let me also join the Chairman in expressing 

my appreciation to the Senate leadership, to you, Madam Chairman, to Senator Lieberman, for your initiative in starting these 

hearings so quickly and responding to our recommendations. We 

are deeply grateful to you for your leadership. It has been quite remarkable. 

As part of the 9/11 story, we spent a lot of time looking at the 

performance of the intelligence community. We identified at least 

six major problems confronting that community. 

First, there are major structural barriers to the performance of 

joint intelligence work. National intelligence is still organized 

around the collection disciplines of—humint, signals, and all the 

rest of it—of the home agencies. It is not organized around the 

joint mission. The importance of integrated, all-source analysis cannot be overstated. It is not possible to connect the dots without it. 

Second, there is a lack of common standards and practices across 

the foreign-domestic divide for the collection, processing, reporting, 

analyzing, and sharing of intelligence. 

Third, there is a divided management of national intelligence capabilities between the Director of the CIA and the Defense Department. 

Fourth, the Director of Central Intelligence has a very weak capacity to set priorities and move resources. 

Fifth, the Director of Central Intelligence now has three jobs: 

Running the CIA, running the intelligence community, and serving 

9

1The chart referred to appears in the Appendix on page 70. 

as the President’s Chief Intelligence Adviser. No person can perform all three responsibilities. 

And, finally, the intelligence community is too complex and too 

secret. Its 15 agencies are governed by arcane rules, and all of its 

money and nearly all of its work is shielded from public scrutiny. 

That makes sharing intelligence exceedingly difficult. 

We come to the recommendation of a National Intelligence Director not because we want to create some new czar or a new layer 

of bureaucracy to sit atop the existing bureaucracy. 

We come to this recommendation because we see it as the only 

way to effect what we believe is necessary: A complete transformation of the way the intelligence community works. 

You have a chart before you of our proposed organization. It is 

on page 413 of the book, the report. It is on the poster board. Unlike most charts, what is most important on this chart is not the 

top of the chart; it is the bottom.1

We believe that the intelligence community needs a wholesale 

Goldwater-Nichols reform of the way it does business, as the Chairman indicated. The collection agencies should have the same mission as the Armed Services do: They should organize, train, and 

equip their personnel. These intelligence professionals, in turn, 

should be assigned to unified joint commands, or in the language 

of the intelligence community, ‘‘Joint Mission Centers.’’ We have already talked about a National Counterterrorism Center. A joint 

mission center of WMD and proliferation, for example, would bring 

together the imagery, signals and humint specialists, both collectors and analysts, who would work together jointly on behalf of the 

mission. All the resources of the community would be brought to 

bear on the key intelligence issues as defined by the National Intelligence Director. 

So when we look at the chart from the bottom up, we conclude 

you cannot get the necessary transformation of the intelligence 

community—that is, smashing the stovepipes and creating joint 

mission centers—unless you have a National Intelligence Director. 

He needs authority over the intelligence community; he needs 

authority over personnel, information technology, and security. Appropriations for intelligence should come to him, and he should 

have the authority to reprogram the funds within and between intelligence agencies. 

The National Intelligence Director would create and then oversee 

the joint work done by the intelligence centers. 

He would be in the Executive Office of the President. He would 

have a small staff, a staff that is really an augmented staff of the 

present Community Management staff of the CIA. 

He would not be like other czars that we have created in this 

town over a period of years who really have not had meaningful authority. The National Intelligence Director would have real authority. He will control National Intelligence Program purse strings. He 

will have hire-and-fire authority over agency heads in the intelligence community. He will control the IT. He will have real troops, 

as the National Counterterrorism Center and all of the joint mission centers would report to him. 

10

We have concluded that the intelligence community is not going 

to get its job done unless somebody is really in charge. That is just 

not the case now, and we paid the price: Information was not 

shared, agencies did not work together. We have to—and can—do 

better as a government. 

To underscore again, we support a National Intelligence Director 

not for the purpose of naming another chief to sit on top of the 

other chiefs. We support the creation of this position because it is 

the only way to catalyze transformation in the intelligence community and to manage a transformed community afterward. 

What we learned in the 9/11 story is that the U.S. Government 

has access to a vast amount of information. But the government 

has weak systems for processing and using the information it possesses, especially across agency lines. Agencies live by the ‘‘need to 

know’’ rule and refuse to share. Each agency has its own computer 

system and its own security practices, outgrowths of the Cold War. 

In the 9/11 story, we came to understand the huge costs of failing 

to share information across agency boundaries. Yet in the current 

practices of government, security practices encourage overclassification. Risk is minimized by slapping on classification labels. There 

are no punishments for not sharing information. 

We believe that information procedures across the government 

need to be changed to provide incentives for sharing. 

We believe the President needs to lead a government-wide effort 

to bring the major national security institutions into the information revolution. The President needs to lead the way and coordinate 

the resolution of the legal, policy, and technical issues across agency lines so that information can be shared. 

The model is a decentralized network. Agencies would still have 

their own databases, but those databases would be searchable 

across agency lines. In this system, secrets are protected through 

the design of the network that controls access to the data, not access to the network. 

The point here is that no single agency can do this alone. One 

agency can modernize its stovepipe, but cannot design a system to 

replace it. Only Presidential leadership can develop the necessary 

government-wide concepts and standards. 

The other major reform we want to recommend to you this morning concerns the FBI. 

We do not support the creation of a new domestic intelligence collection agency, the so-called MI5. We believe creating such an 

agency is too risky to civil liberties, would take too long, cost too 

much money, and sever the important link between the criminal 

and counterterrorism investigative work of the FBI. 

We believe Director Mueller is undertaking important reforms. 

We think he is moving in the right direction. 

What is important at this time is strengthening and institutionalizing the FBI reforms, and that is what we are recommending. 

What the FBI needs is a specialized and integrated national security workforce, consisting of agents, analysts, linguists, and surveillance specialists. 

11

These specialists need to be recruited, trained, rewarded, and retained to ensure the development of an institutional culture with 

deep expertise in intelligence and national security. 

We believe our other proposed reforms—the creation of a National Counterterrorist Center and the creation of a National Intelligence Director—will strengthen and institutionalized the FBI’s 

commitment to counterterrorism and intelligence efforts. The 

NCTC and the NID would have powerful control over the leadership and the budgets of the Counterterrorism Division and the Office of Intelligence respectively. They would be powerful forces 

pressing the FBI to continue with the reforms that Director 

Mueller has instituted. 

Taken together, then, we believe these reforms within the structure of the Executive Branch, together with reforms in Congress, 

and the other recommendations referred to by the Chairman, can 

make a significant difference in making America safer and more secure. 

We believe that reforms of the Executive Branch structures are 

vitally important, and we are immensely pleased that this Committee is focusing on those reforms today as a way of making 

America safer. We are especially pleased that your Committee is 

taking the lead with regard to this, and with these words, we close 

our testimony and we would be pleased to respond to questions. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you both for excellent statements. We 

are now going to begin 10-minute rounds of questions for each 

member. I would note that the only lights are right here and they 

are a little bit hard to see, but we will try to help make sure that 

everybody gets the full 10 minutes. 

Congressman Hamilton, I would like to start my questioning 

with you because of the role that you played as Chairman of the 

House Select Committee on Intelligence as well as the many other 

hats that you have worn. Some observers suggest that the overall 

effect of the intelligence reorganization that the 9/11 Commission 

has recommended would be to diminish the influence of the CIA, 

to considerably increase the importance of the Pentagon, and to 

give the White House more direct control over covert operations. 

Former CIA Director Robert Gates, for example, has said that 

the recommendation to place the new National Intelligence Director within the Executive Office of the President troubles him because that official would oversee intelligence operations both inside 

the United States and abroad. He cites the problems that have 

been caused when the White House has directly ordered covert activities, noting Oliver North’s role in the Iran-Contra scandal, as 

well as the Watergate scandal where the CIA helped those who 

broke into Daniel Ellsberg’s office. He has gone even further than 

that and said that the Commission’s recommendation in this regard reflects a lack of historic perspective. 

I would like to give you the opportunity to respond to those specific comments, which, as you know, are shared by some others 

within the intelligence community. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Madam Chairman, we think that counterterrorism is the paramount national security concern of this Nation 

today. And we think it will be that for as long as any of us are active, for a long time. And we think it really is a unique kind of 

12

challenge because it cuts across so many areas of our government 

and our Nation’s life. 

We found that the principal problem leading to September 11 

was that the agency simply did not share information, and so we 

have set up this structure to encourage that sharing. 

Now, why do we put the National Counterterrorism Center in 

the Executive Office of the President? That is one of the questions 

you raised. You raised a lot of difficult questions. We do it for two 

principal reasons. One is that terrorism, as I have indicated, is our 

most important national security priority, for this President or any 

President. And to be very candid about it, it is inconceivable to me 

that a President of the United States would want his highest national security priority handled somewhere else in the government 

that is not under his direct control. 

Now, keep in mind that counterterrorism policy involves so many 

different things. I mean, it is diplomacy, it is military action, it is 

covert action, it is law enforcement, it is public diplomacy, it is 

tracing money flows in the Treasury Department. And we have to 

organize ourselves in such a way that we can integrate and balance 

all of these tools of American foreign policy to deal with the threat 

of counterterrorism. That kind of thing can only be coordinated and 

done in the White House under the President’s direct control. 

Where else would you put it? You want to put all of this authority 

in the CIA? Do you want to put it all in the Defense Department 

when you are dealing with all of these other aspects of 

counterterrorism policy? I don’t think so. 

Now, the second reason we put it in the Executive Office building 

is that the National Counterterrorism Center—it is not just an intelligence center, but it is a center for operations, and it is going 

to be directing agencies, many agencies of the government working 

together on counterterrorism. And those activities are going to involve the CIA, they are going to involve the FBI, they are going to 

involve the Defense Department, they are going to involve the Department of State, and other areas of the government as well. You 

cannot coordinate those activities from a single department. You 

have to do it in the White House, I believe. 

Now, all of us have a different idea of how this government 

works best, but we concluded that we had to put this authority in 

the White House just because it is such a cross-cutting kind of 

issue. 

Is there a danger to that? Oh, sure. That is the Iran-Contra problem. I had a little experience with the Iran-Contra problem. 

Chairman COLLINS. I recall that. 

Mr. HAMILTON. So I am alert to anything where you concentrate 

power. We do have to be careful about that. 

Now, one answer is that another part of our recommendations is 

congressional oversight. It has to be robust. And so everything kind 

of fits together here. And, incidentally, among other things, I think 

it is a small thing, perhaps, that hasn’t been too much noted in our 

report, we do recommend the establishment of a board in the Executive Branch to keep an eye on government intrusion, if you would. 

But there is no magic solution here with regard to the concentration of power, but I think we do have some real checks and balances in it. 

13

And, incidentally, Mr. Gates was an outstanding CIA Director. 

Anything he has to say, even if he is critical of us, deserves a lot 

of attention because he is a very knowledgeable person. 

Chairman COLLINS. He is indeed, which is why I wanted to give 

you an opportunity to respond to his concern. 

Governor, should the National Intelligence Director have a fixed 

term as the FBI Director does to help insulate that individual from 

political pressure? Or should the Director serve at the pleasure of 

the President because, after all, that individual would serve as the 

President’s principal adviser on intelligence matters? What are 

your thoughts on that? 

Mr. KEAN. Well, we talked about this some on the Commission. 

We had left it really to serve at the pleasure of the President, and 

I think for a number of reasons. 

First of all, if he served a term, you would, as you have just said, 

perhaps having somebody who is the President’s chief adviser on 

intelligence, somebody that the last President who may not agree 

with that President picked. And that did not make a lot of sense 

to us. 

It seemed to us that as long as you had the lever of confirmation 

by the Senate and the fact that this individual would report to the 

Congress and testify before the Congress, that it was probably better to let him serve at the pleasure of the President. 

Chairman COLLINS. I support the concept of the National Intelligence Director, and I agree with the Commission’s recommendation that would be a much needed improvement over the current 

system. I was surprised, however, that the Commission did not recommend that the Director be a member of the Cabinet or at least 

Cabinet level. 

This individual is going to have to deal with the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of Homeland Security. Wouldn’t it be helpful in dealing with Cabinet members for 

that individual to have the stature of a Cabinet member? Governor 

Kean. 

Mr. KEAN. We basically decided, again, after a lot of discussion, 

that it should not be Cabinet level, and the reason was that this 

is an operational position. It is not a policy position. This individual would be carrying out policy and carrying out directions and 

coordinating intelligence and moving policy. We believe that as you 

move through the various government agencies, that if this is the 

President’s adviser in this area of counterterrorism, which is probably the most important priority that the next President or Presidents will have for some time, then his authority as he moves 

among various government departments will be pretty clear because it will come directly from the President of the United States. 

But because it was not policy, it was operational, we did not make 

him a member of the Cabinet. 

Mr. HAMILTON. If I may add to that? 

Chairman COLLINS. Please do. 

Mr. HAMILTON. The Governor is absolutely right, of course. One 

feature in our thinking here is it just takes a long time to set up 

a department. If you look at the Department of Energy, some of us 

were around when that was set up a long time ago, 20 or 25 years 

14

ago. It is still having problems in organizing and functioning as a 

department. 

The Department of Homeland Security is a major reorganization 

of government, just getting underway, and it has excellent leadership, but it has growing pains. 

So we were reluctant to say, OK, let’s come along and set up another whole department of government. 

Intelligence is a support function, and it is a support function for 

the President, it is a support function for each of the key departments of government, all of them, and we did not think you should 

have a department of government performing a support function. 

And they are, as Tom has indicated, the principal reasons. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Senator Lieberman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Madam Chairman. Let me join you 

in thanking the Members of the Committee first for changing their 

schedules and coming back so quickly. A measure of the sense of 

urgency in the Congress is that we also have a non-member of the 

Committee, Senator Bill Nelson of Florida, who cares enough about 

this to be here with us today, and I thank him for attending the 

hearing. 

Gentlemen, in your report you document more completely, and I 

would say more unnervingly than I have seen anywhere before, the 

lost opportunities to have done something that might well have 

prevented September 11 from occurring: The failure of the agency 

to share information, the failure to connect the dots, etc. 

We are coming up to the third anniversary of September 11. A 

lot has been done by Congress, by the Executive Branch, to try to 

fix some of that, but clearly, in making the recommendations you 

have, you believe much more substantive reform is necessary. 

To document the urgency of your recommendations, I wonder if 

you could answer a few questions that go to the status quo today, 

post-September 11. 

For instance, maybe you have anecdotes or examples you could 

cite of continuing failure to share information or continuing inability, without a quarterback, as you say, to coordinate the resources 

of the Federal Government in the battle against terrorism. 

Mr. KEAN. I can say that as we proceeded with our work, we ran 

into numerous occasions where we found out information that one 

agency had, and sometimes highly classified information but, nevertheless, something that should have been shared with other 

agencies in this fight against Islamic terrorism. And it wasn’t. It 

still wasn’t. The last example of that I think was perhaps some 3 

weeks or a month ago that we were all amazed to find something 

that, again, was boxed into one silo and was not being shared 

across the larger community. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Congressman Hamilton, do you have any 

examples of the continuing problems today that should propel us 

to respond to your recommendations? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, Senator, that is a very hard thing to tie 

down. I think you are absolutely right when you say that a lot has 

been done. I don’t have any doubt about the sincerity of the officials, their willingness, their desire to make substantial improvements. And if you talk to any of these officials, they will give you 

a list of 10 or 15 points that they have done. 

15

Now, have they actually been implemented all the way? That is 

where it gets tough to check. But we all pick up the paper, we read 

about the Governor of Kentucky flying in here. That was a problem. I saw a report the other day—I am sure it is available to 

you—about the mistakes we continue to make in screening airplane passengers. We all know about the cargo problem coming in. 

So we find a desire to move ahead, but the whole government 

just is not acting with the urgency we think is required across the 

board, whether it is screening for cargo or checking airplane passengers or checking the airspace or whatever. Lots of good things 

have been done, but much more needs to be done. And what seems 

to us to be lacking is that real sense of urgency. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Congressman Hamilton, let me go back and 

quote in part from you what I quoted earlier in my opening statement: ‘‘A critical theme that emerged throughout our inquiry was 

the difficulty of answering the question: Who is in charge? Too 

often, the answer is no one.’’

Who is in charge today? 

Mr. HAMILTON. The answer you get—and we asked that question 

in multiple forms—is always the President. But, of course, the 

President has enormous responsibilities, and it is not a very satisfactory answer. 

So I think you then get—the second answer is, well, the top officials, the FBI Director, the Director of CIA, the Secretary of Defense and others have good working relationships and they meet together frequently. And I think they do, and I think there is some 

genuine sharing back and forth that is an improvement over the 

pre-September 11 period. But I think you have to institutionalize 

that. And I do not find today anyone really in charge—you can’t 

possibly argue today that the CIA Director is in charge of the intelligence community. That just does not stand up. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Let me ask a more targeted question, and 

also thank you for that—the answer both of you have given argues 

for the urgency with which we should approach our response to 

your recommendations. 

Clearly, one of the main goals of our current counterterrorism 

policy is to find and capture or kill Osama bin Laden. Is it clear 

to you that anyone is in charge of that search in our government 

today? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, my impression is that the military is in 

charge, the Defense Department. We have, I think it is somewhere 

between 10,000 or 15,000—I am not sure of the exact number—

military forces in Afghanistan. They are not engaged in securing 

the country. That is a NATO responsibility, which I have some 

problems with it. But our troops there are in the southern part of 

the country on the border now, and I believe the search, my impression is, is really very much under control of the military. Now, 

a lot of intelligence assets are in place to try to locate Osama bin 

Laden and his team. 

I do not have a feeling that—well, we are not critical of this at 

all. We did not get into that in great detail. But that is my sense 

of it. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Governor, do you want to add anything to 

that? 

16

Mr. KEAN. In a sense, what is going on now with Osama bin 

Laden went beyond our mandate. We had to set some limit to the 

time of our research and our work. And I have the same information, really, that Lee Hamilton just gave you. But I do not have 

anything further. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I do not want to continue too much on this 

point, but the military, to the best of your knowledge, is in charge 

of the search for bin Laden. Hopefully, presumably, they are cooperating with the intelligence agencies and others. But in the reform that you recommend, it would be clear who was in charge. 

The National Intelligence Director would be in charge in marshalling all the resources of the various agencies to pursue and capture 

or kill bin Laden. 

Let me ask a very different kind of question about our mission 

on this Committee. I take it to be the charge from Senator Frist 

and Senator Daschle that we are to consider and act legislatively 

on any of your recommendations that deal with the Executive 

Branch of government and would be benefited by legislation. In listening to your statements when the report was issued, I concluded 

that you felt that the two top priorities were the creation of a National Intelligence Director and a National Counterterrorism Center. 

I think our goal here is to prioritize and just go through as many 

of these recommendations as possible and adopt them as quickly as 

we can. What would you two list as the other urgent recommendations that should be priorities of ours after the National Intelligence Director and the National Counterterrorism Center? 

Mr. KEAN. Well, one that may not be and the very difficult ones 

that are not in the purview possibly of your Committee involve the 

Congress and ways to improve oversight. They are very important. 

Most of our recommendations do not require a lot of money, frankly, to implement. One that does is border screening, to move ahead 

a little faster with biometric identification, ways in which we can 

secure our borders, national standards for driver’s licenses and 

means of identification, things that would make us safer in terms 

of people who are moving around this country without clear forms 

of identification or who get into this country without proper means 

of doing so. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Is that something, Governor, that we are 

talking about in legislative appropriations? Or would we be considering that a priority to authorize by statute, to give the Executive 

Branch more authority than they have now to set up the kind of 

screening system that the Commission has proposed? 

Mr. KEAN. I am not sure what it would take. I am not an expert 

in how much of this is authorization, and how much of it you can 

empower the President to do. But I think it would certainly take 

appropriations, because that is the one—as I remember, it is the 

one part of our report that really is going to take some money. 

Mr. HAMILTON. It is not an easy question to answer how you implement these recommendations. I am very pleased that you have 

focused on the two big ones. They clearly are the two big ones. The 

third one, the reform of the Congress on oversight, we think is 

right up there very close to those two. 

17

From that point on, I think many recommendations kind of 

merge in my mind. Some of them could be handled, like the border 

security problems, largely with an infusion of money. The big cost 

in our recommendations is really border security and not the organizational change that we have been talking about thus far. 

I think a lot of things can be done by Executive order. Now, there 

is always the question whether it is better to do it by statute. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. HAMILTON. And usually, given my background, you would expect me to say that it is better to have a statute in back of it. But 

I read in the paper that the President is thinking about some actions, and I am quite sure he will move in some areas by Executive 

order. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. My time is up, but just very briefly, I believe I also heard you mention the FBI changes as a priority. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We did. The information sharing across agencies—very important—really has to be done by the President. I do 

not think that can be done by the Congress. It is setting common 

standards across the Executive Branch, and the FBI, I do not think 

requires legislative action. I think it can continue to be done by the 

Director. The President may want to weigh in there with an Executive order. I do not know. But I think that could be done by the 

Executive Branch. 

Mr. KEAN. But the FBI recommendations do, at least in our 

minds, really call for very strong congressional oversight. We applaud what the Director is doing, Director Mueller. He is moving 

in exactly the right direction. But we have a tremendous fear, after 

looking very hard at the FBI, that when he and his top two or 

three people may move on, that a lot of the FBI would like to move 

back to just the way they were, like to go back, if you like, to 

breaking down doors again. And they did that very well over a 

number of years and brought a lot of people to justice. But we are 

asking them to have this other function now of finding and disrupting plots against the United States of America. And we want 

to make sure that the people who are in that line of work have the 

same recognition within the FBI, have the same chances for advancement, have the same chance to assume eventual leadership in 

the organization and are not downgraded. And we worry that if 

there is not Executive action and strong congressional oversight 

that the FBI, after this leadership departs, could start moving back 

in the other direction again. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We do not have strong views about how you implement. I really think that is your job more than ours, and the Executive Branch. We would defer to you as to the best way to implement these, and we did not try to spell out the implementation. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. That is very helpful. Thank you very much. 

I think I can speak for the Chairman and say that we are very 

honored that the Senate leadership has given us responsibility for 

the Executive Branch changes you recommend, and we are very 

grateful that the Senate leadership has not given us responsibility 

for the Legislative Branch changes that you recommend. [Laughter.] 

Chairman COLLINS. I concur. Senator Voinovich. 

18

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR VOINOVICH 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you, Madam Chairman, for holding 

this hearing. 

Chairman Kean and Vice Chairman Hamilton, thank you for 

your extraordinary service to our Nation during these difficult 

times. Your work has been invaluable in providing discerning insight into the pre- and post-September 11, 2001, world, and I commend you for your exemplary bipartisan cooperation. 

What we do with your recommendations will have a major impact on our national security and ability to respond to Osama bin 

Laden’s 1998 declaration of war against the United States of America and our response to Islamic extremism, which threatens world 

order and the well-being of the United States of America. 

Madam Chairman, the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations to 

establish a National Intelligence Director and a National Counterterrorism Center would constitute, as we all know, an unprecedented restructuring of the U.S. intelligence community. However, 

we must not only focus on the organization and structure of the intelligence community, but also address the capacity of its component agencies to execute their missions in terms of their human 

capital management and information technology. 

Governor Kean, you said good people can overcome bad structures, but they should not have to. I would like to say that good 

structures without good people with good interpersonal skills cannot be successful. 

We had a coach at Ohio State named Woody Hayes who used to 

say, ‘‘You win with people.’’

In March 2001, former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger, a 

member of the U.S. Commission on National Security in the 21st 

Century, the Hart-Rudman Commission, testified before this Committee and said that, ‘‘It is the Commission’s view that fixing the 

personnel problem in the national security establishment is a precondition for fixing virtually everything else that needs repair in 

the institutional edifice of the U.S. national security policy.’’

As the Members of this Committee know, I have been focused on 

addressing the Federal Government’s human capital challenges. 

The Office of Personnel Management just released a report pursuant to legislation I introduced to review the personnel system for 

Federal law enforcement agents who are critical to keeping us secure at home. The 9/11 Commission, your Commission, made several recommendations in the area of human capital, and it is critical that they are not overlooked as we proceed with legislation to 

create new leadership and operational structures in the community. 

Now, we have been just talking about the FBI, and the Commission did not recommend a dedicated domestic surveillance agency; 

instead, it recommends strengthening the FBI’s existing capabilities. Others have suggested creating an agency within the FBI that 

would only focus on terrorism. 

My concern is this: Shouldn’t there be a Federal agency which 

focuses solely on catching the terrorists who have infiltrated the 

United States and are plotting the next terrorist attack? The question is: Will the FBI, which will still be investigating organized 

crime and civil rights issues, be able to do the mission? 

19

We had a hearing in another committee that I belong to, the Foreign Relations Committee, on organized crime and corruption. And 

at that hearing we heard about the Russian mafia’s operation in 

the United States. I asked the question: With your new counterterrorism responsibilities, do you have the human resources to deal 

with that problem? And the answer came back: No. 

It seems to me that if we are talking about concentrating on terrorism that we should be very careful in terms of tasking agencies 

and making sure that if we have tasked them with more than what 

they have traditionally done, that they have the added resources to 

get the job done. 

I would like your response to that. 

Mr. KEAN. I think there is no question about that. You cannot 

task an agency without giving them the resources. We believe that 

the FBI under the present Director’s reforms, if they are carried 

out fully—and they still have some ways to go—can perform both 

functions as long as it is understood that both functions are a high 

priority of the agency. But you are absolutely right, you have got 

to give them the resources. There has been an appalling lack of 

language skills in the FBI, an appalling lack of a number of other 

skills that we need in the agency if it is going to perform the kind 

of functions you just elaborated. So I would answer yes, I guess. 

Senator VOINOVICH. The other thing that bothers me is that 

George Tenet said before your Commission that it would take at 

least 5 years to rebuild the CIA Directorate of Operations, and an 

important part of that process would be bringing in new people 

with the right skills and background. 

In your examination of the intelligence community, how would 

you assess its workforce? You have heard from many of these people. Did you get into the quality and the numbers of their workforce? 

Mr. KEAN. Yes, and I found Director Tenet’s answer just unacceptable because we have not got 5 years. We simply have not got 

5 years. 

Now, I know and we all know that there has been a lack over 

the years in what we call human intelligence. We spent a tremendous amount of the budget on mechanical—not mechanical devices, 

but new high-tech devices, from satellites to the Predator, which 

are all useful but do not take the place of human intelligence on 

the ground, and we did not, in my opinion—and I think the Commission’s opinion—put enough resources into some of those, and 

those are the areas in which we have got to rebuild. 

I think we have got to look at our recruiting techniques, whether 

or not they are too limited in a sense, whether we are overlooking 

some people in this country who already have those language skills 

and could be helpful in this operation. 

Now, we were not sanguine about the CIA’s present capability 

based on a human capability to do its job. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Senator, I really appreciate your emphasis on the 

human capital and the training of our people because I think you 

recognize—and I hope we recognize—how critically important it is 

to have well-trained people. 

I want to say that the National Intelligence Director, as we perceive that responsibility, would have very large personnel responVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
20

sibilities. He or she is going to establish standards for education 

and training and make assignments across these national intelligence agencies. And you would put in that one person major responsibility for improvement of your personnel. 

The second point I would make with regard to the FBI is that 

while we think they are moving in the right direction, they have 

got a long way to go in terms of having a specialized, integrated 

national security workforce. We all know the culture and the shape 

of the FBI over a period of years has been law enforcement. If you 

want to get ahead in the FBI, you do it on the law enforcement 

side. That is where the FBI has made its name. And the intelligence side, which is important, has not had the same kind of emphasis. And what we want to see in the FBI is a national security 

workforce or intelligence workforce that is highly trained, highly 

specialized, and has all of the skills that are necessary. 

Senator VOINOVICH. What you need to do, though, is to have a 

personnel system that is flexible, that is competitive, that can attract the best and brightest people into those agencies, and also 

certainly the people that are getting the job done. 

We have a budget problem. We have a growing deficit here. And 

you say that what you are suggesting here is not going to cost a 

lot of money. I think that it will cost a lot of money if we are going 

to staff those agencies with the right people with the right skills 

and knowledge. One of the things that this Congress is going to 

have to consider is where are we allocating resources. 

We spend a whole bunch of money on armament around here. 

We spend all kinds of money on all the new gadgets, as you have 

said, and everything else. And I think we ought to start looking at 

taking some of that money and putting it into intelligence and diplomacy and some of the other things that you talked about, because this war against terrorism is not going to be won necessarily 

with more bombers and missiles. 

Mr. HAMILTON. One of the very important things here is diversity. To be very blunt about it, the kind of people you need in many 

aspects of the CIA today are not people like me who come out of 

the Midwest, who are white, who do not speak languages, and 

graduated from Indiana University. Maybe they come from Ohio 

State University, Senator. I do not know. [Laughter.] 

But you have really got to have diversity. You have got to have 

people that speak these languages, and most of these language we 

cannot pronounce let alone speak the language. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Congressman, after September 11, I thought 

the most incredible thing that happened is that the State Department, the CIA, and the FBI said, ‘‘Is there anybody out there that 

can speak Arabic and Farsi?’’ And I thought to myself, as a former 

Governor and the commander-in-chief of the Ohio National 

Guard—and we fought in the Persian Gulf War—that 10 years 

later the light bulb would have gone on in somebody’s head and 

said, ‘‘We need to go out and attract people that can speak Arabic 

and Farsi so that we can deal with this new challenge that we 

have.’’

Mr. KEAN. Senator, the two things we need, the two biggest 

needs, are analysts and linguists. Those are the two things we do 

not have. You are absolutely correct, but part of this concern is 

21

what underlay our recommendation that counterterrorism forces be 

combined and not duplicated across the government, fewer fusion 

centers across the government, to pool expertise in the National 

Counterterrorism Center. We think that would go some way to 

meeting the kind of problems which you have rightly outlined. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Senator Levin. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LEVIN 

Senator LEVIN. Thank you, Madam Chairman, and thank you 

both for your great service to this Nation before, during, and after 

your service on this Commission. You are going to continue to fight 

for the reforms that you have proposed, and I think that is further 

testament to your dedication to this land, and we are all appreciative of it. 

I believe a top priority of reform must be greater independence 

and objectivity of intelligence analysis which is provided to our policymakers—intelligence, analysis, and threat assessments which 

are not influenced and not tainted by the policies of whatever administration is in power. This has been a problem throughout the 

course of recent decades, right up to current time. 

When you propose, as you do, to—well, first of all, do you agree 

that a high priority should be the objectivity and the independence 

of the analysis, both threat analysis and intelligence analysis? Governor Kean. 

Mr. KEAN. Yes, absolutely. And we believe that has to be and 

continues to be a high priority no matter which agency that information is coming from. 

Senator LEVIN. And how does placing your Director, your proposed Director, in the White House, even closer than the current 

CIA Director—and there were plenty of issues about just how independent that threat analysis and intelligence analysis was. But 

putting aside that question for the moment, how does putting the 

Director even closer to the policymaker do anything other than to 

make this problem even more difficult? 

Mr. KEAN. I think it is a tremendous problem. I think all of us 

recognize that the separation of intelligence and policy is very important. Those of us who have dealt with it know that it is also impossible to achieve completely. You are always going to have interaction here, and you want to build, I guess, some barriers or some 

walls so you do not have excessive politicization. 

But I think it is unrealistic to think that you can build any kind 

of a structure where you have none at all. 

Senator LEVIN. Well, but that is not the issue, is it? You are tearing down a wall. You are not building a wall. Aren’t you putting 

that person closer to the policymakers? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Let me respond in this way. First of all, under 

the present structure, you cannot say you get good competitive 

analysis. That is what you just issued your report on, group think. 

And that means you do not get competitive analysis. So the way 

we are doing it now is not working if you want competitive analysis. 

Second, the same kind of arguments were made when the competitive analysis—they sound an awful lot like the arguments 

22

1The chart referred to appears in the Appendix on page 70. 

against organizing the Joint Chiefs of Staff when Goldwater-Nichols came into play. 

We, today, have the best military in the world, and it performs 

far better today because of joint commands than it did when you 

had separate commands. Now, we want to do the same thing in the 

intelligence area. 

The third point would be that not all of the analysis is going to 

fall under the Director. If you look back over recent experience, 

where did you get the most independent analysis? You got it from 

INR. We do not change that at all. State, Treasury, Energy, Army, 

Navy, Air Force, and Marines would all still function like they do 

today. You have exactly the same situation. In other words, they 

would be independent, and there is one other thing we add that 

will increase your competitive analysis, and that is a little, tiny 

word in this chart over here that says ‘‘open’’ sources.1

If you look back over the experience of September 11, we have 

said that the American people, not just the leaders, did not get it, 

did not have the imagination. The reason our criticism is so broad 

is because almost all of the information was available in open 

sources. And so we want to elevate open sources in this process of 

intelligence because we think it is critically important to have 

these people expert in the cultures, and the languages that we 

have already talked about. 

Senator LEVIN. In addition to the——

Mr. HAMILTON. So, Senator, I don’t see any reduction of competitive analysis in what we have said. I think it is a problem today, 

and I think what we have suggested will increase the prospect for 

competitive analysis, which is what you want. 

Senator LEVIN. I think that is a major question for anybody who 

is restructuring to consider. 

Mr. HAMILTON. It is. 

Senator LEVIN. As to whether or not you are going to increase 

or decrease further the independence of those analyses and those 

assessments. 

There is another issue here too which is created when you move 

the head of intelligence into the Executive Office of the President, 

and that is that you point to congressional oversight as being the 

antidote or the check-and-balance on that, in part, but the closer 

you move decisionmaking and conversations to the White House, 

the more privilege the White House always claims to those conversations and those decisions. 

And you put great emphasis on oversight, and by the way, I 

could not agree with you more on the failures of oversight, the need 

for additional oversight, but by moving it into the Executive Office 

of the President, moving that Intelligence Director, because that is 

closer to the President and the privileges which Presidents, particularly this President, have claimed, are you not making congressional oversight more difficult? 

Mr. KEAN. When we were meeting with people from the Executive Branch and briefing them on these recommendations, one of 

the President’s staff said to me, ‘‘You recognize that any conversation this person has will be subject to congressional hearing.’’

23

And I said, ‘‘Yes.’’

And that person said, ‘‘Well, you know, that means they might 

not be included in every conversation.’’

And I said, ‘‘So be it,’’ but the understanding of the Commission, 

and I think the understanding of the Executive Branch, when we 

briefed them on this, that there would be no executive privilege involving this individual because they would be subject to Senate 

confirmation, and Senate hearings, and they would not be one of 

those officials that the President appoints directly without Senate 

confirmation, and that is the area, I gather, where executive privilege is always invoked. 

Mr. HAMILTON. The point I want to make is that the agencies 

remain as they have been, under our proposal. They have their investigative powers, they have their legal responsibilities, their constitutional limitations. Their authorities really do not change. What 

changes is that the National Intelligence Director has enough authority to ensure that you share information back and forth. 

I think, Senator, the concentration of authority is always worrisome, and you have really got to look at it very carefully, and that 

is why we try to build in, as much as we can, checks and balances. 

But I do not think our recommendations fundamentally change the 

balance of power, if you would, with respect to the executive. 

Senator LEVIN. One of the things that you do hear for the first 

time is that you would give the National Counterterrorism Center 

head the authority to assign operational tasks to other agencies so 

that you could have this second person in command, below the National Intelligence Director, actually tasking, for instance, Defense 

Department personnel. 

Would you agree with that? 

Mr. KEAN. Yes. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Yes. 

Senator LEVIN. Now, that, does it not, creates a problem of disunity of command, for instance, inside the Defense Department. 

You will be getting someone inside the Defense Department, getting a tasking requirement from presumably inside his own department, inside his own commander or her own commander at the 

same time someone from outside that department can task that 

person in the Defense Department to carry out a certain task. 

Mr. HAMILTON. One of the National Intelligence Directors, he has 

three deputies, and one of them is the Deputy for Military Intelligence, and his job is exactly the question of serving the military 

requirements and balancing the needs of the military and the national policymakers. The Army, the Navy, the Air Force, and the 

Marine Corps intelligence elements are going to remain exactly as 

they are today under the Secretary of Defense, just like the elements remain for the State Department, and the Treasury and the 

others. 

Look, there is no magic solution here, and every move you make 

has some advantages and has some disadvantages. We think the 

advantage is, first, of sharing information, and second, of having 

someone in charge of managing the situation is critical, and you 

don’t have that today, Senator. 

If you go back to the example I think the Chairman used in the 

opening statement of these two fellows running around in BangVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00027 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
24

kok, and then later on the West Coast, we had all kinds of information about those people over here, over there, over yonder within 

the Federal Government. What didn’t happen was we didn’t put it 

all together, and nobody took responsibility for managing the case. 

Intelligence doesn’t usually come to you and say, ‘‘OK. The World 

Trade Center is going to be hit at 9 o’clock in the morning.’’ That 

is not the kind of intelligence or you might get that if you are 

lucky. Ordinarily, you get 20 or 30 pieces of information, and somebody has to put it together, and somebody has to manage it. 

Senator LEVIN. And one other thing, if I can just conclude with 

this. And we went into that case in great detail at the Joint Committee on Intelligence between the House and the Senate. There 

were people that had responsibility to report the presence in the 

United States of those two men. They knew they came here from 

Bangkok. The CIA knew it. There were people in the CIA who were 

responsible for reporting this to the INS and to the FBI. They 

failed in their jobs. 

And then we had people here, in the FBI, at the bin Laden desk, 

who received information from local FBI offices who did nothing 

with that information, who failed to do their job, and nobody was 

held accountable for failing to do their jobs. And that is something, 

it seems to me, that is critically important, and I don’t see a lot 

in your report on holding people accountable because there we had 

people who had jobs to notify the INS, notify FBI, that those two 

guys had entered the United States. They knew it, and they failed 

to do it. 

And when I asked that question of the CIA Director, and I asked 

the same question of Mr. Mueller about the FBI reports just falling 

through the cracks inside the United States, the answer was they 

will let us know what action will be taken, in terms of holding individuals accountable for those failures. 

So, yes, we have got to address that issue. The accountability 

issue is an important one. Thank you. 

Mr. KEAN. Absolutely, Senator. And you know one of things we 

found, and you probably did in your inquiry, also, is it was not just 

problems of sharing from agency to agency, it was problems sharing within the agencies——

Senator LEVIN. Absolutely. 

Mr. KEAN [continuing]. That was such a problem. We hope this 

structure will force that sharing of information and also put somebody in charge. 

Senator LEVIN. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Senator Coleman. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR COLEMAN 

Senator COLEMAN. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

I would like to focus a little bit on where we were, where we are 

at today, and then, most importantly, where we have to go tomorrow. 

As I read this—and it makes, by the way, very compelling reading. It could almost be fiction, but it is not. It is nonfiction—but, 

in part, and what struck me reading about the day, September 11, 

the absolute inability to grasp, as it was happening, what was happening, the inability to grasp, even as planes hit the tower; you 

25

know, folks, the lack of understanding that we have got a problem 

with planes being missiles. So we are still getting ID and tag by 

folks in the air, when others think there has been a command to 

intercept because we can’t imagine the unimaginable. 

I would sense, and it goes back to Senator Voinovich’s concern, 

after the 1991 Gulf War, we never thought about getting human 

capacity on the ground to increase intelligence capability to perhaps help us understand that. 

So we came from a place where we cut back on intelligence. We 

did not develop the human capacity to allow us then to think the 

unthinkable. 

[The prepared opening statement of Senator Coleman follows:]

PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR COLEMAN 

I am delighted to be here today to discuss the recommendations of the National 

Commission on the Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States. I have already read 

much of the Commission’s report and am extremely impressed with both its thoroughness and the unanimity behind the Commission’s recommendations. America 

owes both the Commission members and their staff a debt of gratitude. 

I am gratified that our leaders are acting quickly upon the recommendations. 

President Bush has already announced his intention to sign a set of executive orders 

implementing many of the Commission’s suggestions. Soon after the report was released Majority Leader Frist and Minority Leader Dashle jointly charged this Committee and others with holding hearings and reporting legislation to the full Senate 

by October 1. I have already conveyed to Chairman Collins my desire to be actively 

involved in helping her meet this deadline. The Senate leadership is also forming 

a task force to study the Commission’s recommendations concerning Congressional 

oversight of intelligence and homeland security. 

Over the next few months we will have an opportunity to reform this nation’s approach to gathering, analyzing, and using intelligence. We will examine further improvements in how our nation guards against terrorism. There is no doubt that the 

issues are complicated and that a range of legitimate views exists. But with the 

Commission’s report supporting us, we should be able to cut through many of the 

jurisdictional and bureaucratic obstructions that so often delay and warp real reform and concentrate instead on the underlying merits of various proposals. 

But the task before us should not detract from the enormous accomplishments we 

have already made. As the Commission notes, we are safer today. In large part that 

is thanks to the efforts of first responders and other Federal, State, and local officials across the nation. But our progress also reflects the strong leadership of both 

President Bush and Congress. We do not take the safety of Americans lightly and 

we have already acted. 

In the last 3 years we have implemented several accomplishments: 

• We have inflicted a crushing military defeat on al Qaeda and its state sponsor 

in Afghanistan. Although some of their leaders, including bin Ladin, remain 

at large, there is no doubt that their capacity to train, fund, and organize terrorist strikes on America is substantially diminished.

• We have dethroned one of the world’s most heinous dictators in Iraq. The 

leader of a regime that brutalized its own people, threatened our allies in the 

Middle East, and did everything it could to acquire weapons of mass destruction.

• We have worked with Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to change their attitudes 

regarding terrorism and the ideologies that feed it. Saudi Arabia is beginning 

to deny terrorists any safe haven within its borders. Working with Pakistan, 

we have uncovered a global network for disseminating nuclear technology and 

equipment led by one of Pakistan’s top scientists.

• Strong U.S. leadership has led to dramatic reversals in the policies of Libya 

and even Iran regarding their willingness to admit and disclose past efforts 

to acquire nuclear technology.

• Early last year Congress completed the most sweeping reorganization of the 

Federal Government since WWII when it created the Department of Homeland Security. For the first time a major department exists with the primary 

task of protecting America’s heartland and borders from terrorist attacks.

26

• The Patriot Act has allowed all levels of law enforcement to gather and use 

information on terrorist activity in more coordinated ways. Key improvements 

include eliminating the wall between domestic and foreign intelligence and 

enhanced powers to track financial transactions. The fact that some provisions of the Act have generated controversy should not blind us to the broad 

consensus that lies behind most of it.

• The United States is actively trying to spread the benefits of political freedom 

and economic prosperity to the Middle East. The President has stressed the 

need for internal reform in his discussions with Arab governments. We are 

actively working to get our message out to Arab audiences through stations 

such as Radio Farda and Al Hurra TV.

• President Bush’s Proliferation Security Initiative enlists cooperating nations 

in a stronger effort to control the spread of the technology behind weapons 

of mass destruction.

• The Administration has created the Terrorist Threat Integration Center to coordinate governmental efforts against terrorism. As the Commission noted, it 

has also initiated important reforms in both the FBI and the CIA. Secretary 

Powell and Secretary Rumsfeld have significantly increased the intelligence 

capabilities of the Departments of State and Defense, respectively.

• Spending on intelligence, technology, and equipment has increased dramatically. Congress has generously funded the Office of Domestic Preparedness so 

that State and local governments can increase their readiness for both natural and man-made disasters.

This effort has been ably led by President Bush. But it has been assisted by leaders from both parties. Under the leadership of both Chairman Collins and Ranking 

Member Lieberman this Committee has reported out a number of key bills making 

our nation safer. These include the legislation creating the Department of Homeland 

Security and action earlier this year to increase the efficiency of the Department’s 

State and local grant programs. 

But I know we can do much more:

• We can work to implement improved technologies and procedures to increase 

our ability to track and stop terrorists and weapons at our borders while 

speeding the travel of the large majority of visitors and cargo.

• We can improve our processes for admitting and keeping track of foreign students. This nation’s leadership in higher education is both critical to our future competitiveness and an important avenue of cultural exchange with the 

future leaders of other countries. The vast majority of foreign students return 

home with a better appreciation of and respect for American culture and society.

• We can help foster peace in the Middle East by renewing our commitment 

to Israel’s national security and making sure that Palestinians understand 

that internal reforms and a cessation of violence will lead to their own homeland.

• Finally, we can overcome bureaucratic inertia and turf battles to create a better institutional structure for collecting and analyzing intelligence. The new 

structure should coordinate intelligence activity to ensure that it reflects national priorities but allow enough freedom, especially in the analysis of data, 

to ensure that senior policy officials receive a variety of viewpoints.

I look forward to the challenge before us.

Senator COLEMAN. Where we are at, and I want to press this, 

and I don’t want to leave this hanging because the comment was 

made about not operating with a sense of urgency, and I am going 

to be very blunt, is the comment about Director Tenet and the time 

that it would take to develop the capacity that we didn’t develop 

over the 1990’s, and in fact we cut back with over the 1990’s, the 

human capacity, the ability for folks to understand the Islamic 

frame of mind, who could speak Farsi and speak Arabic, is his estimate of 5 to 7 years, are you saying that reflects a lack of urgency 

on his part? 

27

Mr. HAMILTON. I think it reflects the difficulty of the job. I think 

if there is one thing we all agree on, it is we need more human 

intelligence. And I was on the Intelligence Committees when we 

got quite fascinated with the fancy technology, and we put a lot of 

money into it. I don’t think that was a mistake, but on the other 

hand, looking back on it, you can say we didn’t put enough emphasis on human intelligence, so far as the congressional oversight was 

concerned. 

But, Senator, one of the things that really impresses me on 

human intelligence is I think our expectations often get too far in 

front of us. It is very difficult work. If you are thinking about 

human intelligence, and you mean you are going to put a fellow in 

the cell of Osama bin Laden, which is very few people, it is just 

exceedingly difficult to do because of the suspicious nature of that 

cell. 

Don’t misunderstand me—I am all for human intelligence, and I 

am disappointed like the Governor is, when I heard the 5-year estimation by George Tenet, but I’m not too surprised by it, and no one 

should expect that this is a silver bullet. Human intelligence is 

very tough to do. 

Senator COLEMAN. I think it is fair to say that there are no silver 

bullets here. There are, as the report lays out, ‘‘We do not believe 

it possible to defeat all terrorist attacks against Americans. Every 

time and everywhere a President should tell the people we can’t 

promise that a catastrophic attack like 9/11 won’t happen again no 

matter what we do.’’

I used to be a prosecutor. We used to say in law enforcement we 

try to cut the odds. We put bad people away to cut the odds, but 

we never guarantee the safety of every citizen. You cannot do that. 

I just want to, again, this lack of urgency, is there any sense that 

Tom Ridge has a lack of urgency as he approaches his job of Homeland Security or of Director Mueller? Is there any sense that he has 

a lack of urgency in approaching his job? 

Mr. KEAN. No. I would say they have no lack of urgency. But 

what I think we have to do though is instill that same urgency in 

the American people, the understanding that this is something, 

these people are planning to attack us again and trying to attack 

us sooner, rather than later, that every delay we have in changing 

structures or changing people or whatever it is, to make that less 

likely is a delay the American people can’t tolerate. 

We, as former members of the Commission, now as private citizens, and you obviously as the leaders of our country, have got to 

get that across to people. There are a lot of priorities out there, but 

this one cannot again submerge the way it did some years ago. 

Senator COLEMAN. I asked this question because this is a political season, and this should not be a political football, and I could 

just see a headline, ‘‘Chairman Says Lack of Urgency.’’ So it is not 

Mueller, and it is not Tenet, and it is not Ridge, and I presume it 

is not Condi Rice and not——

Mr. KEAN. No, and we didn’t say that in our report about any 

of those people, and wouldn’t. The sense of urgency is there, but 

a sense of urgency must be extended, magnified, made an important part. 

28

One of the things we note in our report, in the last presidential 

campaign, we had all these warnings, all the way from World 

Trade Center One through Black Hawk Down, which bin Laden 

was part of, to all the attacks abroad and at home, the ones that 

were stopped and the ones that succeeded, all that laid out, we 

went through all the rhetoric of the last presidential campaign, terrorism was mentioned only once——

Senator COLEMAN. Let me talk about where we——

Mr. KEAN [continuing]. And al Qaeda. So, anyway, the only point 

I’m making is the more sense of urgency we can get and establish——

Senator COLEMAN. Including for the American public to understand that the world has changed. We live in a post-September 11 

world, and our reality has changed. We are never going to get back 

on that track. 

Just a practical reflection on the recommendation for a National 

Intelligence Director and the creation of a National 

Counterterrorism Center, which I support in concept, but the practical piece I am looking at is this, Chairman Hamilton talked about 

Homeland Security takes a long time to set up. We are still in the 

process of setting that up. How do we deal with the risk—I am 

worried about, as we move forward with other structural change, 

do you fear us creating any gaps? Are there some things that we 

should be looking at in the interim? 

And I will raise the question about Homeland Security. I would 

actually think most Americans would think that the Director of 

Homeland Security is the person now today responsible because we 

know that the threat of terrorism is no longer just an international 

issue; it is also a domestic issue. And so we would think, I think 

the average American would think Tom Ridge has that responsibility, but clearly, structurally, it is not there. 

Help me understand how we, in moving forward, if we were to 

move forward with a National Intelligence Director, a new 

Counterterrorism Center, what do we do to make sure that we do 

not have any interim gaps, that we do not actually weaken our capacity during that period of time? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Any time you make a transition or a change, a 

major change like we are suggesting, there are some risks involved. 

You have to weigh it, however, against the risk of doing nothing, 

and we believe that the risk of not moving is much greater than 

the risk of moving, even though there are some risks of moving. 

And so I guess that is the way I would approach your question. 

We are recommending major structural change, and as you go 

through that, we all know there is a real difficult period, and there 

are some risks. You cannot deny it——

Senator COLEMAN. One of the things——

Mr. HAMILTON [continuing]. Until you get it working like you 

ought to get it. 

Senator COLEMAN. Governor Kean, did you want to respond to 

that? 

Mr. KEAN. Just, Senator, that you are right, obviously right 

about the risk. But we came to a conclusion, all 10 of us from what 

we studied in this, that the present system is unacceptable and 

doesn’t work. It is just that simple. It does not work, and the AmerVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00032 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
29

ican people will be less safe if we continue in the present structure 

than if we start to move to the kind of structure we’ve suggested. 

Senator COLEMAN. The one thing that you are not recommending 

is a new Domestic Intelligence Agency. You are still willing to say 

we will leave that with the FBI, but really I saw two caveats there: 

One, only if the National Counterterrorism Center is created. 

Mr. KEAN. That’s correct. 

Senator COLEMAN. So would it be a judgment if, for whatever 

reason, that the sense was that we do not go in that direction, 

would you then be recommending a new Domestic Intelligence 

Agency or some shift away from the FBI, in the absence of that 

structural change? 

Mr. KEAN. If we don’t make this structural change, my hope is 

the Congress and the people who decide not to do it, will make a 

whole series of recommendations to replace what we have recommended. 

What we are basically saying is we have done the best we could. 

We had debates that went on for a year on the Commission. We 

brought in every member of government. We talked to a number 

of so called ‘‘wise men’’ around this town who had served in positions of government. This is the best we can come up with. We’re 

not saying it is the best anybody can come up with. If people can 

come up with something better, God bless them, but what we’re 

saying is basically it is the best we can do, and if people don’t like 

it, please come up with something new. Do not leave what’s there 

now. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I have real doubts about an MI5, period, whether 

or not you do what we recommend. I don’t think it fits in this country. And interestingly enough, the MI5 people who we talked with 

don’t think it will fit here either because the two countries are so 

very different. 

You’ve got an FBI today that is accustomed to carrying out very 

sensitive intelligence collection with respect to the rule of law, in 

compliance with the law. That is a very valuable asset, and you 

don’t want to lose it. So put me down on the side of being opposed 

to the MI5, period. 

Senator COLEMAN. Very brief, one other area—actually, my time 

has concluded, and with that I will thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Senator Durbin. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DURBIN 

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. 

I have been in Boston, and I have lost my voice. I do not know 

why. [Laughter.] 

But thank you for this hearing, and I am glad that you did it in 

a timely fashion. I want to salute the Chairman for bringing us together. 

Let me also salute both of you publicly, which I have done by 

press release, but I wanted to do it in person for your contribution 

to our country. You have done an excellent job, and it is painful 

to concede, but I must concede, I think you did a better job than 

a congressional committee could have done. Yours was truly a bipartisan effort. In a political season, you were as apolitical as you 

30

could be and still be honest about your conclusions, and I thank 

you for that. 

I am one of the few in this, maybe the only Member of this Committee, who happens to be on this Committee, the Intelligence 

Committee, and the Appropriations Committee. So I have sort of 

seen all of this coming together in a variety of different ways. And 

I would have to say to you that I think you were sparing in your 

criticism of Congress, when it comes to our oversight role. I think 

you could have come down a lot harder. 

You said that it was the single most important and most difficult 

thing that needs to be done—to reform congressional oversight, but 

I can tell you candidly that the Senate Intelligence Committee, 

with 30 or so staffers who work extremely hard and do a fine job, 

are not sufficient to the task. With all of the intelligence agencies, 

with all of the responsibilities we have, we cannot give adequate 

oversight with that limited number of staff people. 

I do not know if a Joint Committee is the best approach. It is 

an old concept, as Congressman Hamilton said at one of our briefings, that goes back 40 or 50 years, but we need to find a way to 

create, as you suggest, a nonpartisan staff up to the task, and a 

Committee that understands its responsibility, and we should not 

overlook it. As we start pontificating about the Executive Branch, 

we ought to be introspective as well, and thank you for challenging 

us. 

I also think that you were somewhat sparing in your criticism of 

our technological capacity. You have conceded that we need to 

move into new technology, imaginative, creative technology, biometric screening and things of that nature, and I think you are exactly on point when you suggest that. 

But I have to say that it has been my experience, having focused 

on one small aspect of this war on terror, that we are woefully behind, and that is the development of technology in our government. 

It is incredible to me how far behind we were on September 11, 

and you must have seen this as you looked at the antiquated computer system at the FBI, for example, incapable of word search, incapable of E-mail, incapable of access to the Internet, incapable of 

sending photographs over their computer system. The photographs 

of the hijackers were sent by overnight express to the regional office of the FBI. Computers could not send them. 

Well, Bob Mueller is a fine selection by the President and a good 

man as the head of the FBI in my estimation, and he is trying, 

through trial and error, to improve this system, but the system, to 

give you a notion, is so woefully behind that a year ago the Inspector General gave us an update on our effort to integrate the collection and sharing of fingerprints between the FBI and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, now part of the Department of 

Homeland Security. 

We wanted them to be able to share fingerprints of suspicious 

people, so we suggested in 1999 that is what they should do, and 

the Inspector General told us last year he thought that by the year 

2008 they would be capable of doing that, a mere 9 years after 

identifying this as a priority. 

So understand my skepticism, when you start talking about biometric screening. Existing fingerprints at two Federal agencies canVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00034 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
31

not be shared today for the safety and security of America, leading 

me to my point and one of yours as well. 

I think that we have to look on this, as Franklin Roosevelt 

viewed Pearl Harbor, World War II, and the need for an atomic 

bomb. He said, ‘‘We have got to break through all of the bureaucracy then in Washington, bring together the private sector, academia, and the public sector and create a Manhattan project and 

build some atomic bombs.’’ General Groves did it in a thousand 

days, had the bombs that ended the war through the Manhattan 

Project. 

We are now 1,053 days after September 11, and we have to ask 

ourselves where is the Manhattan Project in technology for our 

government? It is something I have been preaching on here in this 

Committee with little or no success. There is bureaucracy fighting 

me off. ‘‘Please stay out of this. We do this ourselves,’’ and yet the 

reality of sharing fingerprints and even envisioning biometric 

screening says to me that we need to be as bold in our thinking 

as Franklin Roosevelt was about the atomic bombs when it comes 

to the technology to fight this war on terrorism.

PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DURBIN 

Madam Chairman and Senator Lieberman, I want to thank you both for holding 

this important hearing. As you recognized, national security is not something that 

could wait until September. 

I want to salute the families of those lost on that terrible day in 2001 for demanding the creation of an independent commission and insisting on answers to their 

questions about how 19 angry men armed with the simplest of weapons could strike 

such a blow against the most powerful nation in the world and about how we could 

make sure that this country will never again be so unprepared. By refusing to be 

silenced, you have done a great service to this nation. And, I want to recognize the 

bipartisan partnership that characterized this commission and its work. I hope we 

can build on that spirit as we seek to turn recommendations into law.

First Line of Defense 

The 9/11 Commission has produced an extremely valuable report, not least because it has compelled us to meet to try to adapt and implement its recommendations before we lose any more time. Intelligence is our first line of defense, and it 

is essential that it be a flexible, creative force, not some modern Maginot Line, vulnerable to circumvention by our enemies.

Failures 

Our intelligence failed us on September 11 and it failed us in Iraq. In Iraq, information was misinterpreted or misused, and the American people were misled, and 

the consequences have been enormous. 

The 9/11 Commission Report reads: ‘‘We believe the 9/11 attacks revealed four 

kinds of failures: In imagination, policy, capabilities, and management,’’ and of 

these they conclude that the most important failure was one of imagination. That 

is a shortcoming we cannot afford to repeat.

Slow to Enact Change 

It is a failure, though, that I fear could be repeated. We see numerous warning 

signs already. The first ominous sign is the length of time it has taken to spur action on the urgent questions of information sharing and organizational reform in the 

wake of September 11. Some of the suggestions contained within the 9/11 Commission Report were voiced in the joint intelligence committees’ report in December 

2002. President Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, chaired by former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft, reportedly called for a director of national 

intelligence over two years ago. We clearly could have already implemented a number of badly needed changes, and today we could be reviewing the progress of our 

reforms rather than hurriedly trying to design them. 

I understand that the President is planning to issue a series of executive orders 

addressing some of these concerns; I wish he would have done so earlier. Over a 

year and a half has gone by since the joint committees issued our call for reform 

of the intelligence systems with a series of concrete recommendations.

32

Gravity of the Threat 

The central failure of imagination that the 9/11 Commission pinpoints was the inability of leadership (in both Administrations and in both Houses of Congress) to 

recognize the gravity of the threat we faced. Handicapped by a Cold War structure 

and perhaps a Cold War mindset, our intelligence system had not changed with the 

times, while the rest of the world had. The end of the Cold War had unleashed new 

nationalisms and ideologies and created a new international dynamic. With the Soviets out of Afghanistan and now completely out of the picture, veterans of that conflict including Osama Bin Laden set their sights on a new enemy—us. 

Our intelligence analysts and policy makers recognized this fact but not the magnitude of the threat it presented. The paradigm had changed but we had not sufficiently adapted. 

Now the Commission points out that about 90 percent of the country’s $5 billion 

annual investment in transportation security has gone to aviation, to fight the last 

war. While aviation security is crucial, we have other vulnerabilities, and we must 

be as creative as our enemies. 

The Commission concludes that ‘‘The current efforts [in transportation safety] do 

not yet reflect a forward-looking strategic plan systematically analyzing assets, 

risks, costs, and benefits.’’

That same assessment could be applied to our entire approach to intelligence: We 

do not yet have the forward looking strategy that we so badly need.

Summer 2004: Blinking Red Again 

As Members of the Governmental Affairs Committee, our job has to be to help 

create the architecture to promote that strategic vision. In the summer of 2001 

there were many fragmentary but important warning signs: In the words of CIA Director George Tenet, ‘‘the system was blinking red.’’ 

There have been a number of public reports that the warning lights are again 

blinking furiously this summer. I’m not convinced we are significantly better 

equipped to confront these security challenges, and I am convinced that Administration foreign policies have made the international environment an even more dangerous place, with the war in Iraq, with the resulting loss of momentum in the fight 

against al Qaeda, without progress toward Middle East peace, and with the alienation of allies and the weakening of international institutions. 

Iraq 

The Commission report identifies Islamic jihadists as the enemy, but chose not 

to address how the war in Iraq has added to their ranks. One commissioner called 

Iraq ‘‘a third rail’’ whose touch would have proved deadly to the commission’s desired consensus. That metaphor is worth thinking about, though, since it is the electrified rail that provides power to the system, and the war in Iraq has both diverted 

energy away from the global war on terrorism while at the same time inflaming new 

enemies. 

When we went to war with Iraq, without either a coalition or an imminent threat, 

we lost ground in the battle of ideas, in the struggle to convince the Islamic world 

that we are not their sworn enemy. But that die has been cast. We must now look 

forward to how we can forge policies to help us re-take the high ground through 

diplomacy, economic development, and multilateral engagement.

Intelligence Reform 

In addition to rethinking our diplomatic approach, in the face of rising threats, 

we must implement and expand on the commission’s domestic recommendations. We 

must better coordinate and integrate the flow of information. We must address the 

perils of ‘‘groupthink.’’ We should encourage creativity rather than rely on seniority; 

current institutional barriers that hamper mid-career hiring within the intelligence 

community may shut new thinkers with fresh perspectives. We need to promote real 

reform and communication rather than merely rearrange the organizational flow 

chart of the intelligence community. In seeking to create a single intelligence tsar, 

we must insulate that position from the political pressures of the White House—

under any Administration. And, finally, we must maintain our oversight capabilities 

and fulfill our oversight responsibilities.

Information Access Failures 

As the pivotal questions of ‘‘what went wrong, why, and what must we do about 

it’’ continue to be dissected and debated, we have learned much about communication breakdowns and information exchange failures that preceded September 11, 

2001. 

We have heard about decisions to insulate and not share crucial information. We 

have identified systems deficiencies. We have encountered stovepiped, turf-conscious 

agencies. We have acknowledged some of the culprits that contributed to making 

33

our U.S. homeland vulnerable, unprotected, and unwittingly caught off-guard. And 

we’re still asking the question: Are we really any more secure today? 

What action are we taking as a result of these lessons and revelations? We’ve undertaken a massive and unprecedented restructuring of a huge portion of our government framework in the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security. 

Of all the essential elements we are evaluating, none can possibly be more vital 

than the mission of ensuring interoperability of information systems for agencies responsible for homeland security and intelligence. 

If you look at an on-line slide show called ‘‘Who We Are’’ accessible on the Intelligence Community’s website (www.intelligence.gov), it briefly describes each of 

the various component agencies and their respective areas of responsibility. It is 

noteworthy that many are characterized by the type of information and intelligence 

they collect and analyze. For instance, it indicates that the Army, Navy, Air Force, 

and Marine Corps Intelligence Organizations ‘‘each collect and process intelligence 

relevant to their particular Service needs,’’ the Department of State ‘‘deals with information affecting US foreign policy,’’ the Department of Treasury ‘‘collects and 

processes information that may affect US fiscal and monetary policy,’’ the FBI deals 

with ‘‘counterespionage and data bout international criminal cases,’’ the National 

Reconnaissance Office ‘‘coordinates collection and analysis of information from airplane and satellite reconnaissance by the military service and the CIA.’’

These intelligence collectors and analysts perform critical missions. When it comes 

to facilitating interaction of all this intelligence information, we must stop thinking 

inside the boxes, and not be stifled by lines on organizational charts. We must not 

be locked in by ‘‘who is supposed to do what’’ under current mandates. We must 

adjust our response to the very different world in which we now live.

Leadership Needed 

I believe we need to give a key official the primary job of overseeing a network 

of networks for facilitating intelligence information access and exchange. I have 

used the analogy of President Roosevelt’s decision to put General Leslie Groves in 

charge of the ‘‘Manhattan Project.’’ We need an information systems management 

genius with all the power, clout, vision, drive, and administrative freedom to manage this specific task and responsibility. 

If General Groves was able to build the atomic bomb in 1,000 days, shouldn’t we 

be able to tackle the challenge of Federal systems interoperability and meet with 

equal fervor the urgent homeland security and intelligence missions? Today marks 

the 1,053rd day since September 11, 2001. 

One of the elements included in the Homeland Security bill reported by this Committee in July 2002 was a proposal I offered relating to the whole question of interoperable information systems. It seemed to be a logical component of the comprehensive proposal to restructure 28 agencies into a new, unified Homeland Security Department. 

I first broached this idea at a hearing this Committee conducted under Senator 

Lieberman’s leadership on June 26, 2002. That hearing focused on the relationship 

between a Department of Homeland Security and the intelligence community. In response to my question about the need for a Manhattan Project, one of our witnesses, 

Lt. General Patrick Hughes, the former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, 

suggested that while ‘‘(t)he technology to do the things that you are talking about 

wanting to do is present and available’’ the problem is ‘‘parochial interests’’ which 

get in the way of the ‘‘synergistic larger effect of mission support across the government.’’ (S. Hrg. 107–562, p. 43, June 26, 2002) 

Each of the agencies consolidated in DHS brought along its own separate information technology budget, strategic plan, and program—the Coast Guard, Customs, 

FEMA, INS, Secret Service, Transportation Security Administration, and others. 

Each one has a unique system that does not necessarily have the capacity to communicate or coordinate their respective activities. 

And the problem is not limited to forging links and establishing a functional network for data access within the Department itself. It is equally important to establish appropriate links between the Homeland Security Department and other agencies, such as the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Department of Defense, the 

FBI, the State Department, and State and local officials, which are not embraced 

under the Homeland Security Department’s organizational umbrella. What kind of 

network is needed to enable the robust information sharing your findings and recommendations demand? 

The amendment which my fellow Governmental Affairs Committee Members 

unanimously accepted when we marked up legislation to create the Department two 

years ago was considered by Tom Ridge as a ‘‘force multiplier.’’ It would have 

required designating a key official whose primary responsibility is to design and deploy an enterprise architecture to achieve information systems interoperability beVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00037 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
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tween and among Federal agencies responsible for homeland defense whether inside, or adjunct to, the new Department. 

The language we agreed to in Committee never made it into the final product creating the Department of Homeland Security in November 2002. We faced a takeit-or-leave-it floor vote on a fast-track proposal put forward by the President after 

he spent months contending that a new Department was entirely unnecessary. 

That setback does not mean that this issue has disappeared. The proposal was 

introduced at the beginning of this Congress as part of a comprehensive homeland 

security bill, S. 6, on January 7, 2003. 

If DHS is making progress on integration and interoperability of information systems, I’ll be the first in line to praise it. Department officials should be anxious and 

proud to share what’s been accomplished to date. But we really do not know. In the 

FY 2004 Homeland Security Appropriations bill enacted last October 1, language 

was added at my request requiring the Department to submit a report to Congress 

about their progress. 

The report language mandates a report on the status of the Department’s efforts 

to complete an inventory of the Department’s entire information technology structure; devise and deploy a comprehensive enterprise architecture that promotes 

interoperability of homeland security information systems, including communications systems, for agencies within and outside the Department; consolidate multiple 

overlapping and inconsistent terrorist watch lists; and align common information 

technology investments within the Department and between the Department and 

other federal, state, and local agencies responsible for homeland security to minimize inconsistent and duplicative acquisitions and expenditures. 

That report was due on December 15, 2003. I regret to say, we are still waiting 

for it. 

Federal agencies have deployed information systems in stovepipes, with little 

thought given to interoperability with the systems of other agencies. Interoperable 

information systems would allow for efficient sharing of data and better communications between agencies responsible for intelligence gathering, border security, crisis 

response, and other homeland security missions. The need for more effective cooperation between agencies such as the FBI, CIA, Department of State, and INS has 

become obvious, yet poorly developed information systems are getting in the way 

when technology should be enhancing agencies’ effectiveness. 

When it comes to information sharing, we must not delude ourselves into thinking 

we are where we ought to be. We are not. 

It’s high time we focus more on the need to share, rather than on the need to 

know. Knowing what we know about gaps in information access and dissemination, 

it would be unconscionable—as this Committee takes on the responsibility to evaluate the intelligence community structure—for us to exclude this element. 

We need to designate a high level intelligence information sharing czar with the 

power to harness and procure the best in technology and grant that leader all the 

authority and resources needed to establish, implement, and manage what the Commission Report calls a ‘‘trusted information network.’’ 

I look forward to hearing from our distinguished panel, two exemplary public 

servants, whose leadership I commend. I thank them for their service and for arranging to be here today. Thank you, Madam Chairman.

Senator DURBIN. I would appreciate your thoughts on that. 

Mr. KEAN. Thank you, Senator. I like the way you talk, from my 

point of view. 

We are fighting people now who are different than anybody we 

have ever fought before in our long history. They are, if you like 

the expression, entrepreneurial. They are coming at us in ways 

that we would never have envisioned before. When we examined 

the hijackers who succeeded, 19 out of 19, they tested our defenses, 

and they overcame every one of them, one by one. 

Now, when we met privately with President Clinton, one of the 

things that he said to us was, ‘‘You know, it takes defense always 

a couple of years to catch up with offense.’’ Well, we are into a couple of years now, and we can’t really afford it any longer. 

And I think it is a combination. It certainly is the kind of technology you talk about, government can’t be behind in that. It certainly is the human intelligence that we were talking about before. 

35

We cannot any more afford not to have that. It is the language 

skills and so many things. 

And the trouble is, because it is a new war, and a new enemy, 

and a new way of thinking, we have got to think anew, and act 

anew in ways that we have never conceived before. And if we don’t 

do that, that is what we talked about a little bit in our report about 

imagination, about the fact that somebody maybe should be sitting 

there reading Tom Clancy, in some ways, to envision the enemy, 

and understand them and come at them. But you are absolutely 

right, Senator——

Senator DURBIN. Yes, zero in—and perhaps Congressman Hamilton could help and respond to this—zero in on technology for a 

moment and acknowledge the obvious. And that is that even if we 

have a President with the will to change, even if we decide that 

the person in charge is Cabinet level, not Cabinet level, but coordinating the agencies, there seems to be, at the lower levels, bureaucratic resistance, turf protection, the cliche ‘‘the old stovepipes,’’ 

and also the inability for us to think in fresh and modern terms 

about the potential of technology. 

Every agency is inventing its own form of database and technology. The idea of merging and marrying information is critical to 

our national defense. There is political resistance to it. There is 

technological resistance to it. I think we need something like a 

Manhattan Project that says, ‘‘Step aside. We do not have time for 

this battle. We have to be prepared. We need intelligence as our 

first line of defense in terrorism, and the strongest weapons in 

those arsenals for the intelligence agencies will be information 

technology. Now, let us build, let us have our new Manhattan 

Project and build these arsenals in intelligence.’’

Congressman Hamilton. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, I think you would have been a very good 

member of the Commission, Senator——

Senator DURBIN. I had something else going on. [Laughter.] 

Mr. HAMILTON. If we’d have had that kind of advocacy at the 

time. 

Look, in the National Intelligence Director, we give him a lot of 

authority, and one of the authorities we give him is to set information and information technology policies across the board. That is 

what you don’t have today. Your illustration of the fingerprinting 

is a classic illustration of stovepipe, absolutely classic illustration 

of it. We should have featured it in the report, and we didn’t. 

How do you deal with that? Well, you have to make these agencies share their information across agency lines, and you can only 

do that if you get an integrated technology system. And you have 

to have someone in the government, other than the President—everybody says it is the President’s responsibility, but Presidents 

can’t do everything. 

You have to have somebody in the government who has the authority to set your information technology policy and speaks with 

the authority of the President, and that’s why you have a National 

Intelligence Director in our recommendation and that’s why you 

put him in the Office of the President. If you’ve got him stuck out 

here somewhere in center field, he’s not going to have the authorVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00039 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
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1The memorandum referred to submitted by Senator Specter appears in the Appendix on page 

72. 

ity. He has to have the authority that comes with the presidency 

of the United States. 

And I just think you have made, more eloquently than we have 

been able to make, the case for the National Intelligence Director 

to have the authority. 

Senator DURBIN. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Senator Specter. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR SPECTER 

Senator SPECTER. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. 

I am glad to see these hearings proceeding today. And in the face 

of the 9/11 Commission report and the Senate Intelligence Committee report a few weeks ago, documenting the failures of intelligence on Iraq, that we are finally appearing to move to place 

under one unified commander something which I think has been 

evident for a long time. 

I believe that we can move ahead with legislation knowing what 

we are doing without a long period of time because there is a lot 

of experience in the Congress as to what the problems are. I think 

there is no doubt that had all of the information been in one central pool, that September 11 could have been prevented. 

The Phoenix FBI report did not reach the proper source. The two 

terrorists who came in, known to the CIA, from Kuala Lumpur 

passed by Immigration. The Zacarias Moussaoui matter, in and of 

itself, would have provided a total unraveling. And it was in this 

room, in early June 2002, that FBI Director Mueller finally faced 

up to some very basics when Special Agent Colleen Rowley had 

written that 13-page, single-spaced report. So that finally we are 

coming to a point where we are talking about a single commander. 

We face an incredible culture of concealment in the intelligence 

agencies. And I would like to put in the record just two memoranda, one when I chaired the Intelligence Committee, took the testimony of a longstanding CIA agent who had been there for 40 

years who passed on to both the President and President elect, in 

January 1993, information which came from the Soviet Union 

which was tainted, that it had been controlled by the Soviet Union. 

And this CIA operative did not tell the President or President 

elect that it was tainted because he said, if he had, they would not 

have used it. And he said, in his own extraordinarily arrogant 

way—arrogance is a quality around here in superabundance. It 

might even be on this Committee, even closer to home—and this 

CIA operative did not tell anybody in the Agency. 

And, Madam Chairman, I would like this made a part of the 

record.1

Chairman COLLINS. Without objection. 

Senator SPECTER. And one other memorandum which has been 

made part of the public record on the concealment in the FBI, a 

memorandum from Director Freeh which recites a situation where 

a member of Attorney General Reno’s staff had commented to the 

FBI that, with respect to the investigation of campaign finance reform, there was a lot of ‘‘pressure’’ on him and the Public Integrity 

37

1The information referred to above appears in the Appendix on page 73. 

Section regarding the case because ‘‘the Attorney General’s job 

might hang in the balance.’’ And this should have been disclosed 

to the Oversight Committee of Judiciary and finally was when we 

issued a subpoena in the spring of 2000. So that we are dealing 

with an extraordinarily difficult matter.1

I think that Congressman Hamilton is exactly right on the separation of policy from intelligence. And I wonder if any consideration 

had been given by the Commission, Congressman Hamilton, to the 

creation of a 10-year term so that the Director would overlap Presidents and would have that insulation on the analogy of the Director of the FBI, removable for cause, but otherwise secure notwithstanding executive pressure or executive influence? 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think we gave very little consideration to it. I 

recall one discussion where it came up. It was not pursued. It was 

not rejected, but we did not make it part of the recommendation. 

I often think that the analogies of the kind of—to the position we 

are creating here would be the U.S. Trade Representative, the 

OMB Director. And if you are thinking about independence, this is 

not in the Commission’s report, but one of the remarkable positions 

in the Federal Government is the Chairman of the FBI, who has 

an unusual independence there, how that was created, he has a 

term that is not coterminous with the President. But we did not 

get into that in the Commission. 

Senator SPECTER. Well, I think that is something this Committee 

will take up and certainly something that is very much on my 

mind. 

With respect to the structure on what might be called ‘‘dualhatting,’’ as I examine the Table of Organization, you have the deputy is in the FBI, the deputy is in the Department of Defense, and 

it seems to me very difficult to have the Director of National Intelligence in charge. And you say in your joint statement that he will 

control the national purse strings, he will have hire and fire authority over agency heads in the intelligence community. 

My own preference, and I am not in concrete on it, would be to 

take the bull by the horns and take the Counterintelligence Unit 

out of the FBI and put the Counterintelligence Unit under the National Director. You do not have the same consideration with the 

CIA because the CIA is not under anybody else, but have the National Director in charge of the CIA. On the Defense Intelligence 

Agency it is a little tougher because Defense has a role which goes 

beyond counterintelligence, and you have to have tactical control. 

And, Congressman Hamilton, you said that when you deal with 

the Department of Defense that it would be the same as today, but 

I do not think that is really true if the new National Director has 

budget authority and has the authority to hire and fire. 

Let me ask you, Governor Kean, why not take the bull by the 

horns? You might encounter some additional resistance on the turf 

struggles, and I expect that to be fierce not only from the CIA, the 

acting Director has already fired a salvo right midship on you, and 

the FBI Director, in a very anticipatory defense, has come out 

agreeing with your recommendations. So nothing more needs to be 

done to the FBI. And wait until you get involved with the DepartVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00041 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
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ment of Defense. And then you have the committees. And the 

Armed Services Committee has a vested interest in the authority 

of the Department of Defense, and the Intelligence Committee, etc. 

But why not go to the core, right to the roots and take these 

agencies and really put them under this new National Director so 

they serve one master and one person in control? 

Mr. KEAN. I believe we didn’t want to—we were very careful to 

recognize that we were in the midst of a war, and we recognized 

that change had to occur in order to pursue that war correctly for 

the century. But I believe we were not, the kind of change you suggested we just didn’t discuss really. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, he’s recommending a much more radical 

approach——

Mr. KEAN. Yes, we didn’t go that far. 

Mr. HAMILTON [continuing]. Than we tackled. 

Senator SPECTER. Powerful, not radical. [Laughter.] 

Mr. HAMILTON. We think the National Intelligence Director oversees three principal areas—one is defense, one is homeland security 

and one is foreign intelligence—and we do think it is necessary to 

get coordination among those three under one head, the National 

Intelligence Director. And that is the way we set it up as we did. 

We understand that there is going to be some opposition to this 

proposal. My sense, in listening to you, if I understand it properly—and I may not—that the opposition would be far greater. 

Senator SPECTER. Oh, I think the opposition is going to be far 

greater. When Senator Lieberman and I put in the bill for Homeland Security 30 days after September 11, there was enormous resistance. It was only when FBI Agent Colleen Rowley blew the lid 

off of the FBI that we made progress. And then we fought very 

hard to have the Secretary of Homeland Defense, in creating a new 

agency, this was a perfect time to give him the authority to direct. 

And it is all over the congressional record. We argued this vociferously in the fall of 2002. But I think the pressure is going to be 

tremendous. 

My time is up. A concluding comment. I think now, with the 

threat, we have been told by the Director of the FBI and the Secretary of Homeland Security that we are going to be attacked 

sometime between now and November 2, that is a pretty awesome 

matter. I think we do not focus on it enough. We sort of block it, 

put it aside. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We draw a sharp distinction between tactical and 

strategic intelligence, and we understand that tactical intelligence 

must stay with the military, and that is why we don’t make any 

changes really with regard to the service intelligence. 

We do put the DIA in this organizational chart, but the distinction we draw is between strategic and tactical. 

Senator SPECTER. I think tactical is right. I will conclude here, 

Madam Chairman. I think tactical is right, and the other could go 

under the new National Director. But to conclude the thought that 

I was on, I believe there is going to be a lot of pressure, and it is 

really the existence of this threat that we are going to be attacked 

which makes it imperative building up public pressure. 

39

And I commend you gentlemen and the Commission for this report which is focusing a lot of attention, and those of us who have 

been pushing it may have the assistance now to get it done. 

Thank you. 

Mr. KEAN. Thank you, Senator. 

Chairman COLLINS. Before calling on Senator Dayton, I want to 

note that the distinguished Chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Warner, has joined us, in addition to Senator Bill 

Nelson, and we thank them both for their interest in these proceedings today. 

Senator Dayton. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DAYTON 

Senator DAYTON. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I also want to 

commend you for holding this hearing in swift response to the 9/

11 Commission’s report. 

Mr. Chairman and Mr. Co-Chairman, I want to say again to you 

that we are all indebted to you and to the other members of your 

Commission and your staff for this critically important work that 

you have provided the Nation. 

It is a profoundly disturbing report because it chronicles, in 

excruciating detail, the terrible attack against our homeland, the 

despicable murder of so many American citizens, and the horrible 

destruction to countless other lives and liberties throughout this 

Nation and because of the utter failure to defend them by their 

Federal Government, by their leaders and the institutions that 

were entrusted to do so, and because of serious discrepancies between the facts that you have set forth and what was told to the 

American people, the Members of Congress and to your own Commission by some of those authorities. 

There is way too much to cover here, but I will begin. According 

to your report, the first of the four airliner hijackings occurred on 

September 11 at 8:14 a.m, Eastern time. At 10:03 a.m., almost 2 

hours later—an hour and 49 minutes, to exact—the fourth and last 

plane crashed before reaching its intended target, the U.S. Capitol, 

because of the incredible heroism of its passengers, including Minnesota native, Thomas Burnett, Jr. 

During those entire 109 minutes, to my reading of your report, 

this country and its citizens were completely undefended. Yes, it 

was a surprise attack. It was unprecedented. Yes, it exposed serious flaws in, as you have noted, our imaginations, our policies, capabilities, and management designs. 

But what I find much more shocking and alarming were the repeated and catastrophic failures of the leaders in charge and the 

other people responsible to do their jobs, to follow established procedures, to follow direct orders from civilian and military commanders, and then they failed to tell us the truth later. It does not 

matter whether they were Republicans, Democrats or neither. It 

matters what they did or did not do. 

According to your findings, FAA authorities failed to inform the 

military command, NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, about three of the four hijackings until after the 

planes had crashed into their targets at the second World Trade 

40

Center, the Pentagon and the ground in Pennsylvania, which was 

not their target. 

The direct FAA notification of the military occurred regarding 

the first plane 23 minutes after it was hijacked and only 9 minutes 

before it struck the first World Trade Tower. NORAD then scrambled one of only two sets of fighter planes on alert in the entire 

Eastern third of the country—one in Massachusetts, one in Virginia—but it didn’t know where to send them because the hijackers 

had turned off the plane’s transponder so NORAD could not locate 

it on their radar. And they were still looking for it when it exploded into its target at 8:46 a.m. 

The second hijacking began, according to your report, one minute 

later. NORAD was not notified until the same minute that the 

plane struck the second World Trade Tower. It was 5 more minutes 

before NORAD’s mission commander learned about that explosion, 

which was 5 minutes after thousands of Americans saw it on live 

television. 

By this time, the third plane’s transponder was off. Communication had been severed. Yet it was 15 minutes before the flight controller decided to notify the regional FAA center, which in turn did 

not inform FAA Headquarters for another 15 minutes. So, at that 

point, 9:25 a.m., FAA’s National Command Center knew that there 

were two hijacked planes that had crashed into the two World 

Trade Centers and a third plane had stopped communicating and 

disappeared from its primary radar. Yet no one at the FAA Headquarters asked for military assistance with that plane either. 

NORAD was unaware the plane had even been hijacked until 

after it crashed into the Pentagon at 9:34. This is just unbelievable 

negligence. It does not matter if we spend $550 billion annually on 

our national defense, if we reorganize our intelligence or if we restructure congressional oversight if people do not pick up a phone 

to call one another, if we are not told that somebody needs a new 

radar system or does not install it when it is provided. 

And this was not an occasional human error failure. This was 

nothing but human error and failure to follow establishd procedures and to use common sense. And, unfortunately, the chronicle 

is not over. NORAD mission commander ordered his only three 

other planes on alert in Virginia to scramble and fly north to Baltimore. Minutes later, when he was told that a plane was approaching Washington, he learned that the planes were flying east over 

the Atlantic Ocean, away from Baltimore and Boston, so that when 

the third plane struck the Pentagon, NORAD’s fighters were 150 

miles away, farther than they were before they took off. 

By then, FAA’s Command Center had learned of the fourth hijacking and called FAA Headquarters, specifically asking that they 

contact the military at 9:36 a.m. And at 9:46 a.m., the FAA Command Center updated FAA Headquarters that United Flight 93 

was ‘‘twenty-nine minutes out of Washington, D.C.’’

Three minutes later, your document records this following conversation of the FAA Command Center to the Headquarters:

Command Center: ‘‘Uh, do we want to, uh, think about 

scrambling aircraft?’’

FAA Headquarters: ‘‘Oh, God, I don’t know.’’

41

Command Center: ‘‘That’s a decision somebody’s going to 

have to make probably in the next 10 

minutes.’’

FAA Headquarters: ‘‘Uh, yeah, you know, everybody just 

left the room.’’

At 10:03, United Flight 93 crashed into Pennsylvania farm soil, 

and nobody from the FAA Headquarters had contacted the military. NORAD did not know that this fourth plane was hijacked 

until after it crashed 35 minutes later. The fighter planes had 

reached Washington 7 minutes after that crashed, and they were 

told by the mission commander, ‘‘Negative clearance to shoot the 

aircraft over the Nation’s capital.’’

Yet 1 week after September 11, in response to initial reports that 

the military failed to defend our domestic airspace during the hijacks, NORAD issued an official chronology which stated that the 

FAA notified NORAD of the second hijacking at 8:43—wrong. FAA 

notified NORAD of the third hijacking at 9:24—according to your 

report— wrong. FAA notified NORAD of the fourth hijacking at an 

unspecified time and that prior to the crash in Pennsylvania Langley F–16 combat air control planes were in place, remaining in 

place to protect Washington, DC. All untrue. 

In public testimony before your 9/11 Commission, in May 2003, 

NORAD officials stated, I assume under oath, that at 9:16, they 

had received the hijack notification of United Flight 93 from the 

FAA. That hijacking did not occur until 9:28. There was a routine 

cockpit transmission recovered at 9:27. 

And in that testimony before you, NORAD officials stated also 

that at 9:24 they received notice of the hijacking of the third plane, 

American Flight 77. Also, untrue, according to your report, which 

states that NORAD was never notified that flight was hijacked. 

NORAD officials testified that they scrambled the Langley, Virginia, fighters to respond to those two hijackings. Yet tape recordings of both NORAD and FAA both reportedly documented that the 

order to scramble was in response to an inaccurate FAA report that 

American Flight 11 had not hit the first World Trade Tower and 

was headed to Washington. That erroneous alert was transmitted 

by the FAA at 9:24 a.m., 38 minutes after that airplane had exploded into the World Trade Tower. 

Yet NORAD’s public chronology on 9/18/01, and their Commission testimony 20 minutes later, covered up those truths. They lied 

to the American people. They lied to Congress, and they lied to 

your 9/11 Commission to create a false impression of competence, 

communication, coordination, and protection of the American people. 

And we can set up all of the oversight possible, at great additional cost to the American taxpayers, and it will not be worth an 

Enron pension if the people responsible lie to us, if they take their 

records and doctor them into falsehoods and if they get away with 

it. Because for almost 3 years now NORAD officials and FAA officials have been able to hide their critical failures that left this 

country defenseless during two of the worst hours in our history, 

and I believe that President Bush must call those responsible for 

those representations to account. If the Commission’s accounts are 

correct, he should fire whoever at FAA, at NORAD or anywhere 

42

else betrayed their public trust by not telling us the truth. And 

then he should clear up a few discrepancies of his own. 

Four months after September 11, on January 27, 2002, the 

Washington Post’s Dan Balz and Bob Woodward authored an, ‘‘Insider’s Retrospective on Top Administration Officials’ Actions on 9/

11 and Thereafter.’’

They reported that very shortly after the Pentagon was struck at 

9:34, ‘‘Pentagon officials ordered up the Airborne Command Post 

used only in national emergencies. They sent up Combat Air Patrol 

in the Washington area and a fighter escort for Air Force One.’’ 

Secretary Rumsfeld was portrayed as, ‘‘taking up his post in the 

National Military Command Center,’’ and all of that reportedly occurred before 9:55 a.m. Right thereafter, ‘‘Bush then talked to 

Rumsfeld to clarify the procedures military pilots should follow before firing on attack planes. With Bush’s approval, Rumsfeld 

passed the order down the chain of command.’’

This was supposedly taking place, according to that article, before the fourth plane crashed in Pennsylvania at 10:03. It looks 

very impressive. The President is acting swiftly and decisively, giving orders to the Secretary of Defense and on down the chain of 

command, Combat Air Patrol planes are patrolling Washington directed by an Airborne Command Post all before 10:03 a.m. 

However, according to your Commission, President Bush spoke to 

Secretary Rumsfeld for the first time that morning shortly after 10 

a.m. Based on White House notes and Ari Fleischer notes of the 

conversation, the Commission’s report states that it was a brief 

call, in which the subject of shoot-down authority was not discussed. 

The Commission then states that the Secretary of Defense did 

not join the National Military Command Center’s conference call 

until just before 10:30 a.m. The Secretary himself told the Commission he was just gaining situational awareness when he spoke with 

the Vice President at 10:39 a.m. That transcript is on page 23—

on page 43. My time is out, but it reflects the Vice President’s honest mistaken belief that he had given an order, after talking with 

the President, to shoot down any plane that would not divert. Yet, 

incredibly, the NORAD commander——

Chairman COLLINS. The Senator’s time has expired. 

Senator DAYTON. I am just going to finish this, if I may. Yet, incredibly, the NORAD commander did not pass that order on to the 

fighter planes because he was ‘‘unsure how the pilots would or 

should proceed with this guidance.’’

As you say, Mr. Co-Chairman, the situation is urgent when we 

do not get protected in those circumstances, and it is even worse 

when it is covered up. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Senator Fitzgerald. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR FITZGERALD 

Senator FITZGERALD. Thank you, Madam Chairman. And, 

Madam Chairman and Senator Lieberman, thank you both for 

holding this hearing so promptly. Governor Kean, Congressman 

Hamilton, thank you for your service to our country. I am very 

much aware of how much time, effort, and wisdom you have 

43

brought to bear, and all members of the Commission have brought 

to bear. 

I talk with Governor Thompson from time to time, and I am well 

aware that you were doing this without compensation. And for 

somebody like Governor Thompson, who has a very high billable 

hour rate, it can be a big sacrifice. So I want to thank all the members of the Commission. I think your recommendations are very 

good. I think one of my recollections immediately after September 

11 is some fingerpointing going on between the CIA and the FBI; 

the CIA pointing out that they did not have responsibility for domestic counterterrorism intelligence operations, and then the FBI 

pointing out that they did not have responsibility for the terrorists 

abroad. 

We long ago gave the FBI the responsibility for domestic counterterrorism intelligence efforts because, when our intelligence officers 

are operating domestically within the United States, dealing with 

U.S. persons and U.S. property, the Constitution applies, and we 

have an entirely different set of guidelines that come into play, 

guidelines that the CIA does not necessarily abide by when they 

are operating abroad. But this separation between domestic intelligence and foreign intelligence has created these ‘‘stovepipes’’ and 

this lack of sharing. 

And I guess, back in the 1970’s, many have pointed to the 

Church Commission, which came down hard on apparent abuses of 

domestic intelligence operatives back in the 1970’s, and the 1960’s 

and beforehand, and they really made sure that the CIA had nothing to do with spying on citizens or persons within our borders. 

But in attempting to funnel these two separate stovepipes—domestic intelligence and foreign intelligence—into one overall head, 

I am wondering if we have hit upon, with your Commission recommendations, the optimal recommendation. In effect, would not 

our National Intelligence Director, who would have responsibility 

for counterterrorism operations, have the same powers of a CIA Director if the CIA had responsibilities for counterterrorism intelligence within the United States? 

Governor Kean, if you would like to address that. 

Mr. KEAN. Well, right now the, at least as Chairman Hamilton 

has said, that the CIA Director has basically an impossible job. He 

has three different things, and in our experience, no CIA Director 

that we have looked at has been able to do all three well, though 

they have tried. 

We believe that it’s the combination of the Center and the National Intelligence Director, together, that make the sense. What 

we’re trying to do is force the sharing of information, then make 

one person responsible. That is somebody who is responsible to not 

only the President, but to the Congress and to the American people. 

He would not have—the agencies would do the same thing they 

do now. I mean, nobody would—the CIA would not be dealing with 

domestic intelligence; the FBI would not be dealing with foreign intelligence. They would simply be sharing information. 

As I understand it, what we have proposed is the overall Director 

would be able to task, and once this information was shared, would 

be able to direct what more information was needed. But the two, 

44

the agencies would not be mixed, if I understand your question, in 

their responsibility. He could not task the FBI to go do something 

abroad or the CIA to do something in this country. 

It would be the sharing of information and then the direction of 

how that sharing ought to be used to get future information or to 

take that information to the President or wherever else it needed 

to go for action. 

Senator FITZGERALD. Are the Commission members convinced, 

though, that domestic intelligence must be separated and must be 

in a different agency than the foreign intelligence gathering in the 

counterterrorism area? 

Why could we not have that in one agency? Would that not solve 

the stovepipe problem and the lack of sharing of information? 

Mr. KEAN. I don’t think we would have—the sharing of—we understand the sharing of domestic and foreign intelligence. We think 

if you combine the two, given the methods that we use abroad, 

ungoverned often by the laws of the United States because they are 

operating in other places, the way the FBI operates because they 

are dealing with current intelligence, dealing with American citizens very often, is fundamentally different. 

Senator FITZGERALD. And do you see Justice Department supervision of domestic intelligence as a necessity because of the different guidelines with the U.S. Constitution coming into play? 

Mr. HAMILTON. I would say, yes, but I want to be clear that what 

we recommend, I think, is close to what you’re driving at because 

we have in place the National Intelligence Director, and he oversees three areas: Homeland intelligence, foreign intelligence, and 

defense intelligence. So there is one person in charge of domestic 

defense, foreign intelligence. Now, he has three deputies to head up 

each of those areas, but there is one person in charge, and there 

is, to that extent, a pooling of intelligence information, a sharing 

of it. 

And I think it meets what your concern is because one of our 

principal feelings is that, in dealing with counterterrorism, you 

must get away from this division of foreign intelligence is over 

here, and domestic intelligence is over here and never the twain 

shall meet. That’s a prescription for disaster, we think. 

Now, we also are concerned, of course, with the civil liberties 

question very much here. And the authorities of the Justice Department and the FBI remain exactly the same. They have the 

same limits and protections on civil liberties that you have today. 

The difference is that you have the communication, the coordination and the planning that would be better, we believe, under this 

proposal. 

I just want to commend the interest that I think you expressed 

with regard to civil liberties. It is an enormously important aspect 

of all of this, and while we don’t have specific recommendations 

with regard to civil liberties, except one, and I will mention that, 

civil liberties was a major fact throughout in our considerations. 

We believe that the civil liberties, you need an oversight board 

in the Executive Branch as kind of an added check on Executive 

authority, and that’s a very important board. 

45

Now, the other thing of course would be congressional oversight, 

but we want to try to create, within the Executive Branch itself, 

a concern about civil liberties and privacy. 

Senator FITZGERALD. Now, I noted with interest in your report 

that you talked about the lack of information sharing prior to September 11, but contrasted that with the period in the weeks leading up to the Millennium, when information somehow was flowing 

fairly freely between agencies with responsibility. And it seems 

that, for some reason, there was this sense of urgency that Congressman Hamilton said initially is so important. There was that 

sense of urgency under our existing structure around the time of 

the Millennium and information was shared. But then we had no 

sense of urgency in the summer of 2001, and information wasn’t 

flowing freely between the agencies. 

In attempting to make one person accountable for intelligence 

here, are you trying to create a permanent sense of urgency in that 

there would be one person who was responsible, and that person 

is always going to be on alert; is that what the effort here is, to 

create a permanent sense of urgency? 

Mr. KEAN. We would hope that would be one of the results is 

that this would be somebody in charge at the President’s side, testifying before the Senate and the Congress, communicating the 

problems and the sense of urgency on a continual basis. You mentioned the Millennium alert. It is instructive because senior officials, because of the tremendous information we had at that point 

of things that might happen, were engaged on a nearly daily basis. 

The FBI at that point shared information, no question about it. The 

public was alert. There was a lot of—remember all the stuff in the 

newspapers about what might happen? 

We think that kind of sharing and that kind of alert probably 

helped us get through this Millennium period without incident. The 

NCTC would ensure, we believe, a high level of intention of terrorist information across all agencies and ensure information sharing, at this point, by the FBI and, as needed, we could then engage 

also the attention of the public. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I’m glad you mentioned that, Senator. 

That is a success story, the Millennium incident, and it I think 

reinforces the case we try to make. It worked in that case because 

there was sharing of information. There was a real focus at that 

moment. We were really concerned about terrorism hitting the 

country at the Millennium, at the change, and it worked. It didn’t 

work on September 11, and it didn’t work in most other cases, but 

it worked there. 

Chairman COLLINS. The Senator’s time has expired. 

Senator FITZGERALD. Well, thank you very much. Thank you, 

Madam Chairman. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Senator Carper. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR CARPER 

Senator CARPER. Thank you, Chairman Collins. 

To our witnesses today, to our co-chairs, thank you very much for 

being here. I said to Senator Lieberman earlier that during the 

time, the 10 years I served in the House, Congressman Hamilton 

was one of my mentors, and he provided just wonderful leadership 

46

by example. And I am not surprised at the kind of job that he has 

done in this capacity as well. 

Governor Kean, who preceded me as Governor of Delaware, our 

terms did not overlap as governors, but each of the new governors 

who are elected are assigned a mentor to serve them and to help 

show them the ropes, and he was a mentor to many of the governors who preceded me, and I just want to thank you both for the 

terrific previous service that you have provided in how you have reaffirmed again your abilities and the qualities that you hold. 

Congressman Hamilton, you mentioned earlier that the kind of 

people that ought to be in charge of following up, and making these 

decisions, and running the show in our intelligence operations are 

not necessarily white males from Indiana who speak only English. 

And I just want to say, for this Senator from Delaware, I just want 

to thank you for writing a report in English that even I could understand. [Laughter.] 

And to read the Executive Summary, I was just, frankly, amazed 

and so gratified that it was as approachable and digestible as it 

was. And I commend you and your team for that. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I’m not sure Tom and I can take credit for that. 

I think our staff deserves the credit. 

Senator CARPER. Well, pass it along, please. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. As you know, we work in a difficult environment around here, a highly contentious, politically charged environment. We deal with difficult issues every week, and sometimes 

we do not make much progress on them. Yet you have been asked 

to take on as difficult and complex an issue as one could approach. 

You have done it in a highly charged, politically charged, environment. Yet you have been able to deliver to us, and to the President, 

and the American people, a comprehensive report that is understandable, that is clear and which enjoys unanimous support of all 

of the folks who served with you on the Commission. 

And I would just ask, just honestly, bluntly, directly, how did you 

do it? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, the chief credit for that should go to Tom 

Kean because of his remarkable leadership qualities. He is a very 

wise man, but he is also a very patient man. But to be more specific, Senator, the focus, first, was on agreeing to the facts, and we 

continually asked ourselves do we have the facts straight, do we all 

have agreement on the facts? If you don’t have agreement on the 

facts, you can’t get very far, and that was the very strong emphasis 

throughout the early part. 

Then, with regard to trying to build a consensus, it took a lot of 

patience by the Chairman, but I don’t know you build consensus 

except talking it out, and it takes—it’s a very tedious process. It 

just takes time. You have to deliberate. 

Tom, you may have some thoughts about this, but I think what 

Tom did as Chairman was to give all Commissioners a chance to 

express themselves in great detail. 

We went over the language—you complimented us on the language—we went over the language of this report three, four, five, 

six times to try to get it right, all of it, all 13 chapters, and that 

47

takes an enormous amount of time. But, Tom, you may want to add 

to that. 

Mr. KEAN. I would certainly give credit. You know Lee Hamilton. 

You know what he’s like. You know his reputation. When you have 

somebody like that to work with, consensus becomes much more 

easy because, when Lee spoke, everybody obviously listened, and 

he was always a maker of consensus. 

I think one of the things that helped an awful lot is that we got 

to know each other very well. And as we got to know each other, 

those ‘‘Rs’’ and ‘‘Ds’’ we see on each other started to get dimmer, 

and we started talking much more about issues and much more 

about the report, and our recommendations, and debating the facts. 

It was tremendously helpful I think that some of the Commissioners held informal parties at their homes, where the Commissioners attended, to get to know each other even better. We got to 

know each other’s families. 

And as you work together like that, I’d say the last 2 months, 

they were seminars. And I don’t think people even remembered 

what party people belonged to. They were so passionate on the 

issues and the recommendations and that we get it right. And it 

does, it’s a question of time, it’s a question of dialogue, it’s a question of getting to know each other, and it’s a question of trust. We 

trusted each other in the end and were able to come together. 

Senator CARPER. Madam Chairman, my colleagues, I would just 

say that we just heard a little tutorial, and not a bad one, for how 

to run this place a lot more effectively going forward. And you provided great leadership and examples in the past, and you have certainly done that again in this instance. 

I might be wrong, but my recollection is that when the idea of 

a 9/11 Commission was first floated, our President was not embracing of the idea, at least initially. I have even heard that there are 

times when there were questions about whether or not the Commission was getting the information that you had requested. 

Now, we have a situation where, as our party’s convention has 

just concluded in Boston, where our nominee, Senator Kerry, has 

pretty much endorsed your Commission’s report in its entirety and 

has called for its adoption, its enactment, pretty much in its entirety. 

We see and hear President Bush, not only having embraced the 

idea of the Commission, but now rushing to maybe implement as 

many aspects of it as he can through Executive Order. And I am 

wondering, as the elections in November approach, what is going 

on here? And maybe more important than that, and the question 

I would have of you, is we had a way of saying in Delaware during 

my administration, ‘‘carpe diem.’’ It is the only Latin I know, ‘‘Seize 

the day.’’

And there is something to be said for seizing the day, particularly when it is so hard to get anything done around here. And we 

have the momentum, we have unanimity from your Commission, 

we have a Democrat presidential candidate and a Republican incumbent President who are saying this is what we ought to do and 

want to do. And so there is part of me that says, well, let us seize 

the day. 

Is there any danger from rushing to judgment? 

48

Mr. KEAN. I think there is always a danger of not doing things 

with due deliberation and thought. We believe very strongly in our 

recommendations because we worked on them very hard, and we 

had a lot of debate, and a lot of give-and-take, and we came up 

with what we thought was the best. It may not be the best. Maybe 

you all can do better, but there is a moment here, it is a moment 

when hopefully people can come together because we haven’t got a 

lot of time. 

We made hard recommendations. I mean, these recommendations, we didn’t go the easy route. We tried to reorganize government, to talk about doing some things in the legislative body. 

These are very hard things to do, and we recognized that they were 

hard things to do, and yet it is an emergency. There’s an enemy 

out there who is planning, as we meet here, to attack us, and so 

I hope ‘‘carpe diem’’ is the right way to go—seize the day—but seize 

the day, as this body always does, with deliberate speed and with 

due deliberation. That would be my recommendation. 

Senator CARPER. When governors succeed governors, there is a 

transition period and hopefully a time of interchange when the new 

governor is briefed by the person who succeeded him or her. And 

I understand a similar kind of thing happens when Presidents succeed one another. And I have heard that former President Clinton 

shared with President Bush his own concerns about the rising importance and urgency of addressing the issue of terrorism. 

In the conversations that you had, the testimony that you had 

with President Bush or President Clinton, was that ever approached? 

Mr. KEAN. Yes, there was a conversation. There was a little bit 

different recollection of the Presidents of what occurred. It was a 

long time ago. But there definitely was such a conversation. 

One of the things, by the way, you bring up the transition, that 

hasn’t gotten much attention in our recommendations and should. 

We think one of the times the United States is most vulnerable is 

during that transition between Presidents because one set of very 

important people who have responsibilities in this area are leaving 

and another set are coming in. Sometimes nominations take a long 

time, it takes a long time to find the right individual, and it takes 

a long time to get that individual cleared, and then confirmed and 

all of that. During that time, these agencies are vulnerable and 

without leadership in many cases. 

And we have a very strong recommendation here that Presidents 

have a certain day—probably before their inauguration—when they 

come up with these most important positions involving the defense 

of this country and that they give those, expeditiously give those 

names to the U.S. Senate, and the U.S. Senate treat these nominations unlike other nominations, in that they recognize the speed 

which we need those people in place. 

And that’s an important recommendation that I bring up because 

you mentioned transition because I don’t think it’s gotten really 

any attention at all, but we do think it’s important. 

Senator CARPER. Last quick one, if I could. 

Chairman COLLINS. The Senator’s time has expired, and our witnesses are on a really tight time frame. 

49

Senator CARPER. Madam Chairman, could I just ask just a word 

on rail security? We have all this emphasis on air security, and I 

know your report touches on it, just if I could, just one quick word 

on rail security, if you would please. 

Chairman COLLINS. Certainly. 

Mr. KEAN. Well, since I’ve been living on Amtrak this last 2 

years between New Jersey and Washington, I have great concern 

over it. [Laughter.] 

No, I think we have a lot further to go on rail security, on cargo 

security. There are a number of other areas that we have to move 

on. We don’t believe—we didn’t get into it except to recommend further measures be taken, but we are not where we should be on rail 

security. There is no question about it. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We note that about I think 90 percent of the 

funding or something has gone to aviation, very little to rail. 

Senator CARPER. And I would add that of the amount which has 

been appropriated, very little has actually trickled down to do the 

work for which it was intended. Thank you both very much. 

Chairman COLLINS. Senator Lautenberg. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LAUTENBERG 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thanks, Madam Chairman, and my 

thanks to you and to Senator Lieberman, getting this burning issue 

into the starting gate. When you are this low in seniority, your intelligent comrades have already asked many of the questions that 

you have been saving up for several hours to ask. 

Madam Chairman, I want to say that when I see Governor Tom 

Kean, who will continue earning the respect of the people in New 

Jersey, as he has in the past, for his balanced hand and for even 

defending me once in an election campaign when it was asserted 

that I was going to come to Washington and make some money on 

the side, Governor Kean sprang up, and he said, ‘‘I disagree with 

Frank on lots of things, but I know he is not coming to Washington 

to make some money on the side. He would have been better off 

if he had stayed up front and made it up there.’’ [Laughter.] 

But we thank you, Tom Kean, and you, Lee Hamilton. The two 

of you I think present a kind of model that perhaps we can learn 

from in terms of our negotiations here. 

But one thing that you said in response to Senator Carper’s question, and that is getting to know one another and the time to discuss things, there is a tendency here, as you know from your legislative experience, Lee, that the issues that get very hot jump out 

in front, and the next thing you know, if the cameras start, the actions follow and not always very thoughtfully enough. 

So, while we have a good start here, I think we have to allow 

sufficient time to do it thoroughly, and you have not recommended 

how the structure develops so much as the direction that it ought 

to go in. 

And I think it was Senator Specter who talked about something 

before that also was part of my concerns, and that is should this 

individual who is responsible be term identified so that we remove, 

as much as possible, the fact that that person is going to be influenced by presidential contact in a way that elongates their service. 

50

I have been through the same thing with the FAA, as an example. I think the FAA should not be a political—the administrator 

should not be a political appointment. Whenever you get anything 

that takes as long as it does to solve those complicated problems 

with technology, and personnel and training, I think that someone 

ought to know that they have got an assignment, be it 6 years, 8 

years, I do not know what the term ought to be, and the Federal 

Reserve, Congressman Hamilton, you noted has that condition. So 

I would hope that would be part of an examination.

PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LAUTENBERG 

Madam Chairman: I want to add my voice to the chorus of Americans thanking 

Governor Kean and Congressman Hamilton and their fellow commissioners and 

staff. They have done an outstanding job under difficult circumstances in getting to 

the bottom of what went wrong before and during the savage terrorist attacks on 

September 11, 2001. And they have recommended steps that we can take to avoid 

another September 11. 

The Commission’s report has given us much to consider. The challenge Congress 

faces is to consider the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations swiftly, but also thoroughly. Some of the recommendations, if implemented, would lead to sweeping 

changes in U.S. law and policy, which currently limit the role intelligence agencies 

and the military play in domestic security. We need to think these changes through 

because they have implications not only for national security, but also for the civil 

liberties that are the hallmark of our Nation. 

The Commission has rightly recognized that our various national security, foreign 

intelligence, and counterintelligence agencies were created during the Cold War to 

fight the Cold War. 

We face a new enemy: Transnational Islamic jihadists. They want to make our 

home front the front lines. They are determined to acquire and use weapons of mass 

destruction. They make no distinction between soldiers and civilians. They know no 

restraint. 

Consequently, we need to reorganize parts of the government to fight this new 

enemy and win this new war. 

The Commission’s recommendation to create a National Director of Intelligence is 

appealing for many reasons, especially on the accountability front. But I’m concerned that putting an intelligence ‘‘czar’’ in the White House may subject that person to undue political pressure. We have already seen how intelligence can be manipulated to justify something as precipitous as going to war. 

Also, while it’s obviously imperative that we streamline operations and get agencies to share information on a ‘‘real-time’’ basis, too much consolidation may promote a counter-productive ‘‘groupthink’’ mentality. 

I was struck by a July 19th article in the New York Times about the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research. As Times reporter Douglas Jehl pointed 

out, the Bureau has ‘‘no spies, no satellites and a reputation for contrariness.’’ This 

little agency, which is just one-tenth the size of the Central Intelligence Agency, had 

the best, most accurate pre-war intelligence about Iraq and whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. 

Figuring out how to duplicate the success of an agency like the Bureau of Intelligence and Research across the government, and then getting better coordination 

from such agencies, may be preferable to consolidation. 

While today’s hearing is ostensibly about two specific recommendations—creating 

a National Intelligence Director (NID) and a National Counterterrorism Center 

(NCTC)—I do intend to discuss some of the Commission’s other findings, particularly with regard to the flights that took Saudi nationals, including 13 members of 

Osama Bin Laden’s family, out of the United States shortly after September 11. 

That continues to trouble me a great deal. 

This is the first of many important hearings. Thank you for getting today’s hearing organized on such short notice, Madam Chairman. When it comes to making 

America safer, there’s much we need to do, and we don’t have a moment to waste.

Senator LAUTENBERG. I spoke to Governor Kean one time—and 

I do not know whether you remember—I called to ask whether or 

not you were getting the data that you wanted because there was 

some talk about subpoenaing records, and that kind of disappeared. 

51

And just to get things in perspective, the original date for your delivery of this report was in early May, was that it? 

Mr. KEAN. Yes, May 28. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. And there was a lot of pressure on you to 

complete your work and—let me put it in my terms—just get it 

done with, but you persisted in wanting to have enough time to 

complete the job. And when was it finally agreed that you would 

have more time to do this? It was due May 28, did you say? 

Mr. KEAN. The Congress passed that bill—I think it was your 

bill, wasn’t it, Senator Lieberman? I don’t remember the date you 

passed it, but it was March, very early March we were given the 

understanding. We were, by the way, a month late getting started 

because of the appointments of Mr. Kissinger and Mr. Mitchell, 

and then their withdrawal. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Yes, and I had the feeling that this thing 

was still being sort of rushed through. 

And one of the other things that was discussed, and that is we 

do not know what the final role of technology is going to be in intelligence gathering. You know that at Fort Monmouth in New Jersey 

there is so much wonderful work being done on information gathering, on access to data, and we have to permit these things to be 

included in any of the equation that we finally develop. 

June 16, the 9/11 Commission reported in its findings that there 

was ‘‘no collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein and al 

Qaeda.’’

Yet the next day, on June 17, the President said, ‘‘The reason I 

keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda is because there was a relationship between 

Iraq and al Qaeda.’’

In the same week, Vice President Cheney said that Saddam had 

long-established ties with al Qaeda. 

Given your findings, do you believe that these statements by the 

President and the Vice President at that time added to a clarification about Iraq and al Qaeda or was it a further misinterpretation? 

Mr. KEAN. Well, first, let me clarify one thing. There was some 

thought at one point that maybe the White House or the Vice 

President had information that we didn’t have. We have clarified 

that. We believe that there is no information that we don’t have, 

that we are all sharing the same information base. 

And, second, there was a relationship between al Qaeda and Iraq 

not as far as September 11 goes. There was no collaborative relationship there at all, but we have documented in the report a number of contexts spanning several years evidence that the two sides 

discussed some possible cooperation, including a report of Iraq may 

be offering a safe haven to bin Laden when there was some question of whether he could stay with the Taliban, but nothing concrete seemed to emerge from those contexts. 

We found, the word we use in the report is we have found no evidence of a collaborative operational relationship, and we certainly 

see no evidence at all that Iraq cooperated in any way with al 

Qaeda in developing and carrying out the attack on the United 

States. 

52

Senator LAUTENBERG. Then, the statement ‘‘long-established ties 

with al Qaeda’’ doesn’t exactly square with your interpretation of 

things. 

Mr. KEAN. There was a relationship, but it wasn’t, as we say, we 

use the word ‘‘collaborative operational relationship’’ very carefully 

because that’s what we don’t find. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Yes. I think that what was intended was 

something different. 

And I would ask another question, and that is your report that 

we must openly confront the problems in the U.S.-Saudi relationship, and you cite our failure to clamp down on Saudi-financed organizations and those institutions that promote jihad against 

Americans. Do you think that the administration is doing enough 

to confront Saudi Arabia about their activities, and have they kind 

of let Saudi Arabia off fairly easily, would you think? 

Mr. KEAN. We have a section in the report on Saudi Arabia and 

some of our recommendations in that regard. There has been certainly a change in the Saudi Arabian attitude toward terrorism, 

and particularly al Qaeda. 

We believe right now, in every evidence we have from the Commission, is that right now the Saudi Government is doing everything it can to work with the U.S. Government to find and destroy 

al Qaeda because they have recognized that al Qaeda is, if anything, just as much, if not even more, anxious to wipe out the royal 

family and their governance of Saudi Arabia than they are to attack us. Its the same—so, by necessity, we have become great allies. 

The problem we had before September 11 was not that the Saudi 

Government was involved, but that there were obviously Saudi financing and Saudi help from wealthy individuals that was getting 

in through, sometimes through charities from Saudi Arabia that 

were getting into al Qaeda and helping bin Laden do whatever he 

was doing. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Fair to say, however, that was induced by 

the increasing awareness of their own domestic problems. But 

when it came to American problems, there certainly was no forthrightness between the Saudi Arabian Government and our needs to 

find information; is that fair to say? 

Mr. KEAN. Yes. What we even suggest very strongly in the report 

is this relationship forever has been about oil; we got the oil and 

anything else was probably all right. We ignored some other things 

on our side. It can’t be that way any more. We’ve got to have a 

much more intelligent, collaborative relationship with Saudi Arabia. We’ve got to encourage them toward the reforms which I think 

both of us probably now realize are necessary in that country. 

We’ve got to have a whole different policy and a different face, 

and it can’t be just about oil any more. It’s got to be a different 

relationship. 

If the Saudi—there are three countries we go into: Saudi Arabia, 

Afghanistan, and Pakistan. They are three of our most important 

relationships at this point. If any of those were to change drastically in the wrong direction, this country would have very serious 

problems in the region, and so we do recommend very special work 

in the area of diplomacy, not just military, area of diplomacy, culVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00056 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
53

tural exchanges, educational help in particularly those three countries. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. That ought to be the condition for all of 

our relationships, I think. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. 

Chairman COLLINS. Senator Pryor. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR PRYOR 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Before I get started, earlier did you announce that Senators 

could put their opening statements in the record? 

Chairman COLLINS. Without objection, any statements may be 

submitted. 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I want to thank 

you and Senator Lieberman for your leadership on this issue, and 

certainly you two who led this Commission, and the Commissioners 

and their staff. We all know that the staff is absolutely critical in 

getting this done, but I really want to thank you all, everybody involved in this process, for what you have done. This is an excellent 

report in every way, and it is very helpful for us in the Senate, and 

the Congress and in government generally. 

I want to touch on something, a recommendation you make—it 

is on page 396—where you talk about threat-based assessments domestically. And I am not going to get into chapter and verse on it, 

but that is where the reference is. And I want to be clear on this 

because this is something that in this Committee we have spent 

some time talking about in the last year and a half. 

There is a natural balance that you have to strike, and I think 

there are some who would argue that, basically, we need to look 

at population as the predominant criteria in keeping Americans 

safe. And then folks from rural States say, ‘‘Wait a minute. We 

have needs too. We have infrastructure. We have targets. We are 

part of the system, and terrorists could enter the system through 

our States.’’

And I would like both of you to share your sense of that balance 

and how the Congress should strike that balance. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, we come out pretty decisively I guess on 

one side of that question, and we think that the assistance that 

would be made available to improve protection in a given community and to improve response should be distributed largely on the 

basis of the assessment of the threat. 

Now, that is not a precise science, but it is, I think, reasonably 

clear that most of the threats that we are familiar with are aimed 

at high-visibility targets in the United States, and we do know, I 

think, that they want to do as much damage as they possibly can 

with each strike, and they want to strike at the symbols of America. 

So we think that the largest threats are in New York and in 

Washington. That doesn’t mean there are no threats elsewhere, but 

that’s where most of the threats are. And therefore money that is 

distributed to deal with the aftermath of those threats or protecting against those threats should be based largely on that assessment of risk. 

54

And we specifically say, as you have noted, that this is not a general revenue-sharing program. This is a program that has a very 

specific purpose to it, and so that is where we came down on that 

issue. 

Now, you’re from Arkansas, and I’m from Indiana, and I know 

some of the pressures that operate here on American politicians. So 

that advice may not always go down well, but we are not suggesting that the other communities have no interest in this or have 

no claim to it. We just think the major focus of the resources 

should go to the high-risk areas. 

Mr. KEAN. Yes, and how you do that would be up to the Congress, obviously. Because, I mean, we recognize you can have a 

rural area, and you can have a nuclear plant or you can have a 

rural area and in that State is a container port. I mean, there are 

a number of facilities, it isn’t just in population, but what we suggest is where we know, from the charter, and the results, and the 

evidence, that the terrorists are the greatest risk, what the greatest risk of attack is, probably that’s where the majority of the funds 

ought to be targeted. 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you. 

Mr. Hamilton, earlier, you said—and I cannot exactly quote it—

but basically you said that the principal problem with September 

11 was that the agencies did not share information, and the Commission report makes the recommendation of restructuring certain 

agencies and responsibilities within the government. 

Are you two convinced that we need to have a major reorganization and that we cannot achieve the same thing by just forcing the 

existing apparatus, if we could call it that, to share information 

across agencies and have one person designated by the President 

and/or Congress to have some directional and budget authority 

type of oversight over these various agencies? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, the latter is what we are really talking 

about with the National Intelligence Director. You have got to 

smash the stovepipes, and you’ve got to force it, and we don’t know 

any way to do that except to put someone over it who will not only 

put out an order, but follow it on a day-to-day basis and make sure 

that it’s done and whose responsibility it is to get it done. 

We think institutional change is essential to bring about the kind 

of transformation you need in the intelligence community. And if 

you don’t have the institutional change, we don’t think it’s going 

to happen or if it’ll happen, it’ll happen for a year or two and then 

people will forget about it. 

Mr. KEAN. What you suggest is happening right now, I think, in 

the sense that I think people are aware of the problem, aware, and 

I think from the top there’s a lot of effort from the top for these 

agencies to try and get sharing of information. It’s still not occurring, and the reason it’s not occurring is the culture of these places 

is old and it’s deep, and people aren’t used to it, and they don’t like 

it, and they still treasure these nuggets that they have, and they 

want to use it for their own cases and their own possibilities, and 

it’s not getting shared right now. It really isn’t. 

Senator PRYOR. And I agree with that. I guess one concern I have 

is that the last thing I want to do is just create another bureaucracy. And I think that Homeland Security has done a lot of great 

55

things. I think they are getting a lot of things right, but I also 

think that there exists within this brand-new Federal agency different cultures, turf battles, and other similar problems. And so I 

guess if I’m looking at Homeland Security as a model, even though 

it’s a good model in many respects, I am not sure it is the model 

I would want to follow in moving our intelligence this direction. 

Do you all have any comments on that? 

Mr. HAMILTON. We do not want to create new bureaucracy here 

any more than I think anyone else does. We do not think we are 

recommending a significant net increase in personnel, for example. 

The current Community Management staff in the CIA would become the core staff of this National Intelligence Director. And what 

we are really doing here is breaking down the bureaucracy with 

this proposal. We are not adding to it. Now, if we were just adding 

to the bureaucracy, we ought not to do it. Nobody wants to do that. 

This National Counterterrorism Center replaces a number of fusion centers across the government. It’s going to become the center 

point. We’re going to knock out a lot of fusion centers, and it will 

become this fusion center, as your Chairman said the other day in 

conversation, a ‘‘super TTIC,’’ I think you called it. That’s a good 

description. I think TTIC is a good concept, but it needs to be very 

much strengthened from what it is. So I don’t think we’re creating 

new bureaucracy here. 

The model that we’re actually following is a private-sector model. 

One of the models we looked at very hard is GE, and much of what 

we’ve done is patterned after that 

Senator PRYOR. Good. Well, let me ask specifically how some of 

this works because, as I look at your flow chart and read some of 

your findings and conclusions in the report, I guess I still have 

some questions about whether some of these intelligence agencies 

stay within the agency they are in right now? For example, in the 

Department of Defense, there are a number of intelligence agencies. Do they stay there, but then at some point or in some way 

report to the NID, the National Intelligence Director, or are they 

actually working for the NID? How does this work? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, the FBI would report to the Deputy NID, 

National Intelligence Director, on homeland intelligence. 

Senator PRYOR. Right. 

Mr. HAMILTON. The DIA, the NSA, the imagery places, the 

satellite images, they would report through the Deputy NID for domestic intelligence, and the deputies, of course, report to the National Intelligence Director. That is the flow of information. 

Senator PRYOR. But does that not put some of these folks or 

maybe all of them in a position of having two bosses? For example, 

they would have the Secretary of Defense or they would have some 

other boss and the NID? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Yes, there is some of that. I think that is correct. 

You cannot avoid that, I don’t believe. You have it today. But the 

chain of command here, with regard to counterterrorism, is very 

clear, I believe. 

Senator PRYOR. Well, again, thank you all for your work on this. 

You have just done a great service to this country. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. And last, but certainly not least, 

the Senator from Hawaii, Senator Akaka. 

56

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AKAKA 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I 

would like to take the time to commend our Chairman and Ranking Member, for acting so swiftly in calling hearings on the 9/11 

Commission report. You did it so swiftly. It took me this long to 

get here. [Laughter.] 

I would ask permission, Madam Chairman, that my statement be 

placed in the record. 

Chairman COLLINS. Without objection. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Akaka follows:]

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AKAKA 

Thank you Madam Chairman. I would like to commend our Chairman and Ranking Member for acting swiftly in calling hearings on the 9/11 Commission Report 

so soon after its release. I cannot think of a more pressing issue before this Committee. I extend my welcome and gratitude to Governor Kean and my good friend 

Lee Hamilton, with whom I served in the House of Representatives, for your hard 

work and commitment to this cause. I know our Committee will use the next few 

months to examine your recommendations thoroughly. 

Just as the terrible tragedy of September 11, 2001, brought all Americans together in mourning for our lost compatriots and in a common resolve to defeat our 

faceless foes, your Commission’s report provides us with another opportunity to 

work together in a nonpartisan manner to fashion an effective response to those enemies. 

I want to thank you, your colleagues, and your staff for your great dedication and 

contribution, especially for your unbiased approach to improving our nation’s defenses. 

So many comments in your report struck me for their insight and throughout our 

hearings, I hope to discuss many of them. Let me start by emphasizing a comment 

on page 340 of your report: 

‘‘America stood out as an object for admiration, envy, and blame. This created a 

kind of cultural asymmetry. To us, Afghanistan seemed very far away. To members 

of al Qaeda, America seemed very close. In a sense, they were more globalized than 

we were.’’

I think you have identified both the problem and its solution. 

As you know, we are proud in Hawaii of our multi-cultural society, our acceptance 

of one another, our location as a gateway to Asia. 

As your report observes, Americans need to think ‘‘globally.’’ But in order to do 

that we need to begin not only with improving the work force we have but the work 

force we will need in the future. 

In many areas of your report, you point out the gaps in our human capital resources to provide both analysts and field agents in this global war on terrorism. 

As you mention, it takes up to seven years to bring an operations recruit of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to full performance. You point out that the total number of undergraduate degrees granted in Arabic in 2002 was six. You mention that 

the CIA’s Counterterrorist Center (CTC) ‘‘established a new strategic assessments 

branch during July 2001. The decision to add about ten analysts to this effort was 

seen as a major bureaucratic victory, but the CTC labored to find them.’’

The counterterrorism institutions we have now, as your report notes, are seriously 

understaffed. The Terrorism Threat Integration Center (TTIC), which has the primary responsibility for terrorism analysis and for day-to-day terrorism analysis provided to the President, according to the Administration, is seriously understaffed 

and is having trouble getting qualified people detailed to serve in it. 

As we review the Commission’s recommendations for institutional and operational 

reorganization, I believe we also need to consider programs that ensure that we can 

attract and retain the professional workforce that is necessary. Moreover, we must 

guarantee that institutions created to address the current threat of terrorism are 

also capable of adjusting to new threats. 

We should ensure that we are training the right people in the right way to combat 

future threats. Right now we are taking analysts from several agencies to serve in 

TTIC, and robbing Peter to pay Paul is not the best solution. We need to plan for 

where the intelligence analysts of tomorrow will come from if it is true that today’s 

war on terrorism will take generations to fight. 

57

After September 11, Robert Mueller, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), made a plea on national television for speakers of Arabic and Farsi to 

help the FBI and national security agencies translate documents critical to 

counterterrorist efforts. 

Recognizing this problem, the Commission’s report properly notes that ‘‘the FBI 

should fully implement a recruiting, hiring, and selection process for agents and analysts that enhances its ability to target and attract individuals with educational 

and professional backgrounds in intelligence, international relations, technology, 

and other relevant skills.’’ 

I agree completely and I would extend this recommendation to additional agencies. 

I introduced with my colleagues, Senators Voinovich, Durbin, Allen, Warner, 

Brownback, Chambliss, Rockefeller, and Collins, S. 589, the Homeland Security Federal Workforce Act, a bill to provide enhanced student loan repayment authority and 

scholarships for individuals skilled in language and science who perform government service. Our bill also provides for a rotational program to provide critical 

cross-training for the national security community. In addition, Senator Durbin and 

I introduced S. 2299, the Homeland Security Education Act, which would encourage 

the expansion and improvement of science, math, and foreign language programs at 

the elementary, secondary, and higher education levels. 

The predecessor of S. 589, S. 1800, was first introduced in December 2001 and 

the current bill passed the Senate in November 2003. It has not yet been acted upon 

by the House. 

Both bills address the immediate and long-term human capital problem facing our 

intelligence and national security communities. According to the Commission’s report, it takes five to seven years of training, language study, and experience to bring 

a CIA recruit up to full performance. Much more could be accomplished if the training began in our elementary schools and continued throughout high school and college. 

Many foreign language programs at the elementary school level have suffered 

deep cuts, forcing schools to reduce or eliminate their foreign language programs. 

This is crucial as foreign language study at the elementary and secondary levels 

offer the best chance for students to develop the strongest language proficiencies. 

Moreover, while these schools may not be teaching Arabic, it is easier to learn additional languages after learning one foreign language. 

In addition to early and sustained education, we need to develop long-term relationships with people from every walk of life all across the world, whether or not 

the languages they speak are considered critical at the time. An ongoing commitment to maintaining these relationships and language expertise helps prevent crises 

from occurring and provides diplomatic and language resources when needed. We 

cannot afford to seek out those with foreign language skills after a terrorist attack 

occurs. We must provide an ongoing commitment to language education and encourage knowledge of foreign languages and cultures. 

The report notes that ‘‘security concerns also increased the difficulty of recruiting 

officers qualified for counterterrorism [. . .] Many who had traveled much outside 

the United States could expect a very long wait for initial clearance. Anyone who 

was foreign-born or had numerous relatives abroad was well-advised not even to 

apply. With budgets for the CIA shrinking after the end of the Cold War, it was 

not surprising that, with some notable exceptions, new hires in the Clandestine 

Service tended to have qualifications similar to those of serving officers: That is, 

they were suited for traditional agent recruitment or for exploiting liaison relationships with foreign services but were not equipped to seek or use assets inside the 

terrorist network.’’ 

The Commission recommends that the CIA Director develop ‘‘a stronger language 

program, with high standards and sufficient financial incentives.’’ But as the Commission observes, ‘‘the limited pool of critical experts—for example, skilled 

counterterrorism analysts and linguists—is being depleted. Expanding these capabilities will require not just money, but time.’’

This is a reflection of a current and future human capital problem that will require a substantial and long-term investment in our intelligence agencies and our 

entire educational system if the United States is to meet the challenges of protecting its people and our borders. 

Having the right people in the right places is the only way to combat future 

threats. We must ensure that any institutions created as a result of this Commission’s recommendations are not just framed in terms of their capability of addressing the current threat of global terrorism but are capable of educating the public 

about future threats so that Americans can be prepared to fight them. We need to 

avoid the trap of designing systems to fight the last war.

58

Senator AKAKA. I also want to express my welcome, and gratitude, and my deep appreciation to Governor Kean and my good 

friend Lee Hamilton—I wish we had the time to talk about our 

years there in the House—also, your fellow commissioners and of 

course your staff for your honest, nonpartisan approach. 

Let me start by emphasizing an observation made on page 340 

of your report, where you observe, ‘‘America stood out as an object 

for admiration, envy and blame. This created a kind of cultural 

asymmetry. To us, Afghanistan seemed very far away. To members 

of al Qaeda, America seemed very close. In a sense, they were more 

globalized than we were.’’

I think you have identified both the problem and its solution. 

We, in Hawaii, are proud of our multicultural society, our acceptance of one another and our position as a gateway to Asia. 

Throughout your report, you point out the gaps in our human capital resources to provide both analysts and field agents for this 

global war on terrorism. 

As you mentioned, it takes up to 7 years to bring a CIA operations recruit to full performance. The total number of undergraduate degrees granted in Arabic in 2002 was six. And when the 

CIA created a Strategic Assessments Branch in 2001, at its 

Counterterrorism Center, the CIA had trouble finding 10 analysts 

to serve it. 

As your report observes, Americans need to think globally, but 

in order to do that, we need to improve the workforce we have 

today and recruit the workforce we will need in the future. 

Our current counterterrorism institutions, as you note, are seriously understaffed. The Terrorist Threat Integration Center or 

TTIC, which has primary responsibility for terrorism analysis and 

for the day-to-day terrorism analysis provided to the President, is 

seriously understaffed and is having trouble attracting qualified 

people. 

As Congress reviews the Commission’s recommendations for institutional organization, we must fashion programs to ensure the 

intelligence community can attract and retain the necessary professional workforce. We must ensure that we are training the right 

people in the right way to combat future threats. Right now, agencies are detailing analysts to serve in TTIC. Robbing Peter to pay 

Paul is not the best solution. We need to plan for training the intelligence analysts of tomorrow if it is true that today’s war on terrorism will take generations to fight. 

I would appreciate any additional insights you might have on 

this problem. We must do more to ensure that there are more than 

six undergraduate degrees in Arabic and that our future workforce 

can think globally. And this Committee has been looking seriously 

at this problem, also. 

So I am asking for any of your insights on this problem. 

Mr. KEAN. I think there are a lot more now in Arabic at all our 

universities, ones that I am familiar with, as a university president. Arabic, which was not a great subject that attracted a lot of 

students, is attracting more students now. 

We also have to take advantage, I believe, personally, as a college president. We have, in our university, just a wonderful group 

of Muslim students who want to pursue these subjects, are totally 

59

loyal to the United States. They are Americans. They just happen 

to be of that ancestry or that faith. I don’t think we make very good 

use of them. They are just as antiterrorist as we are. They want 

to get this subject solved just as fast as we can. They are in as 

much danger as we are, and I don’t believe we make much use of 

them. 

As far as the TTIC Center, I think because the Center is really 

not very powerful right now, it is not the place people want to go. 

People detail from these various other agencies—and this is anecdotal from talking to a number of people in the agencies—TTIC 

isn’t where they want to go because it doesn’t lead to advancement, 

and it doesn’t lead to success, it doesn’t lead to where you want to 

go in the agency. 

I believe that we recommend here, a really powerful TTIC, with 

real responsibility and real power, would attract some of the 

brightest and the best in the agencies. This would be the place people would want to serve, and I think it would attract some much 

more able people to serve in that regard, but I couldn’t agree with 

you more. And if the Congress wants to, at some point, to fly some 

funds to those of us in the higher education business to help us 

promote the study of some of these other subjects, on globalism and 

that part of the world in particular, we will do the job. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Senator, I think that one of the criticisms made 

of our report is that we make the CIA Director separate from the 

National Intelligence Director. We do that because we think the 

present CIA Director’s job is much too broad and really impossible, 

but we also do it because we think the CIA Director has an enormous task to achieve some of the things you are talking about in 

your statement. 

We want him to rebuild analysis in the CIA. We want him to rebuild, we have already talked about this HUMINT, human intelligence. We want him to build stronger language capabilities within 

the CIA, the very thing that you’re talking about. And we want 

him to recruit a whole new generation of officers that represent diversity. Your State is the leader, of course, for all of America with 

respect to diversity. 

And we think that those are not minor matters. We think the national security of the United States is tied up in the ability of the 

CIA Director to make those kinds of changes in the CIA. And so 

we think that’s a separate position. And one of the reasons we 

think it’s a separate position is the very thing that you’re mentioning. Somebody has to take leadership and work to develop that 

diversity. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. As you note in your report, the Goldwater-Nichols Act requires miliary officers to serve tours outside 

their service in order to win promotion. 

There appears to be no parallel requirement within the intelligence community. Legislation reported out of this Committee, and 

passed by the Senate last year, S. 589, the Homeland Security Federal Workforce Education Act, would establish a rotational assignment program for mid-level Federal employees in national security 

positions. This bipartisan legislation is awaiting action in the 

House. 

60

My question to you is do you or would you support requiring rotational assignments as a key consideration in promotion within 

the intelligence community? 

Mr. HAMILTON. I don’t know that we make a specific recommendation with respect to that, but at least my personal answer 

would be, yes, because you’ve got to get people with a broad view 

and get away from a very narrow focus. 

I think any—and you folks know a lot more about this than we 

do—but any step like that which will broaden the horizons, if you 

would, of your employees and get them to think beyond the purposes of the specific agency is desirable. 

Mr. KEAN. I would agree. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. My time has expired. Thank you, 

Madam Chairman. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you, Senator. 

I want to thank our distinguished witnesses for being with us 

today. You have performed an invaluable service to your country, 

and your service continues today by your rearranging your schedules to be here. I know that the hearing went longer than your 

schedules really allowed, and I appreciate your patience with that 

as well. 

It has been extremely helpful to the Committee to have you here 

today, and I appreciate your participation and the participation of 

the Committee Members. 

The record will remain open for 5 days, and our next hearing will 

be on Tuesday, August 3, starting at 10 a.m. 

Senator Lieberman, do you have any closing comments? 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks very much, Madam Chairman. 

Let me add my thanks to Governor Kean and Congressman 

Hamilton. It has been a very good hearing. It is the beginning of 

the next stage in this process. Some understandable, direct questions were asked about some of the proposals. I, for one, think you 

stood your ground very convincingly, certainly, to me. 

And what comes back to me is what was said earlier on, which 

is that your conclusion is that, when it comes to intelligence, there 

is still no one in charge. It is fine to say the President is, but it 

is not fair to this President or any President to expect him to be 

in charge on a daily basis, 24/7, of intelligence. So I think the urgent need is there. You have made very strong proposals. 

And I thank the Chairman for the pace of our consideration. We 

look forward to coming back next week for more detailed consideration. 

Thank you very much. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

This hearing is now adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 2:12 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 

(61)

A P P E N D I X 

PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR SHELBY 

Chairman Collins, Senator Lieberman I want to thank you for holding this hearing today to discuss the findings of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks 

upon the United States. I also want to thank Chairman Kean and Vice Chairman 

Hamilton for their diligent work on behalf of our country and for appearing before 

us to discuss the report. 

Last week the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, 

more commonly referred to as the 9/11 Commission, released its report. The Commission’s charge upon creation was to investigate the facts and circumstances relating to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 including those relating to intelligence agencies, law enforcement agencies, diplomacy, immigration issues and border control, the flow of assets to terrorist organizations, commercial aviation, the 

role of congressional oversight and resource allocation, and other areas determined 

relevant by the Commission. The Commission also issued recommendations that 

they ‘‘believe[d] to be the most important, [and] whose implementation can make the 

most difference.’’

The charge of this Commission and the recommendations borne from their labors 

are vitally important to our nation and to the memories of those who lost their lives 

on that tragic day. However, it is equally important that we not simply react but 

that we take specific, decisive action based on a broad range of knowledge and expertise in order to accomplish the goals set forth. I truly believe that decisions made 

hastily and without a full appreciation for the consequences may ultimately create 

more problems than they actually solve. 

Even before the Commission issued its findings and recommendations our country 

and our government, recognizing many of the failings that led to September 11, resolved to reform itself. In short order, Congress created the Transportation Security 

Administration (TSA) to address the many concerns and threats to the flying public. 

Congress then created a new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that consumed many of the departments and agencies that were once either part of other 

departments and agencies or were independent, including the TSA. However, before 

we can declare DHS a fully integrated, fully functional, fully effective Department 

we have much work ahead of us. 

The Commission has said that in order to look forward and make meaningful recommendations, it was necessary to look backward. While it is difficult for many to 

re-live that day or even recount the years and months that preceded it, I believe 

that if we truly want to define our shortcomings it is necessary. 

One significant shortcoming identified by the 9/11 Commission lies within our intelligence community. That shortcoming led us to September 11 and persists still 

today, despite efforts at reform and integration. While the Commission report states 

that ‘‘prior to 9/11 no single agency had more responsibility—or did more—to attack 

al Qaeda . . . than the CIA’’ it also sights numerous instances where there was a 

significant communication breakdown both within the CIA and within the intelligence community as a whole, particularly when it came time for agencies to work 

together. I believe that the Commission has rightly suggested that massive structural reform of the intelligence community is essential if we expect to properly connect the dots. 

The Commission identified no less than five different entities responsible for terrorism analysis located across the government and has clearly and appropriately articulated the need to eliminate this duplication. They suggest the establishment of 

a National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) to be a center for joint operational 

planning and joint intelligence. While I agree that the existing duplication should 

be eliminated in order to maximize efficiencies and minimize interagency friction, 

I do not believe we should reinvent the wheel in an effort to establish a central facilVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:29 Jan 24, 2005 Jkt 095505 PO 00000 Frm 00065 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 C:\DOCS\95505.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PHOGAN
62

ity. I believe that our efforts should capitalize on the important assets of each agency and fully integrate their assets, their information and their personnel. Only after 

such an integration occurs will our government truly have the capability to appropriately analyze all of the information it receives. 

Going one step further, the Commission recommends that this newly integrated 

NCTC be overseen by a new National Intelligence Director. The Commission argues 

that the current Director of Central Intelligence is flush with responsibility and yet 

has little real control over much of the budget and personnel he is required to oversee. I have long advocated the establishment of a National Intelligence Director—

one who holds a cabinet seat, who has strict budgetary control and one who is ultimately responsible for the successes and failures of our intelligence. 

The Commission also carefully scrutinized the issue of terrorist financing. This 

issue, as we all know, is central to the global war on terrorism. Their conclusion 

that the Central Intelligence Agency relegated minimal resources to tracking terrorist funds and demonstrated little regard for the financial component of terrorist 

investigations is particularly troubling, although not surprising given what was already known. The Banking Committee’s recent hearing on the nomination of Stuart 

Levey to be Under Secretary of Treasury for Enforcement and head of the newly 

established Office of Financial Intelligence emphasized the role this new office will 

have in working with the intelligence community to ensure the proper focus and resources are allocated to the issue of terrorist financing. 

Further, as Chairman of the Committee on Banking, which has jurisdiction over 

many money laundering and terrorist financing issues, particularly oversight of the 

Bank Secrecy Act and Title III of the U.S.A. Patriot Act, I will continue to investigate the manner by which terrorists use the financial system to facilitate their activities. The Committee has already held a number of hearings on this matter, and 

will continue to do so, including hearings specific to the information attained by the 

9/11 Commission. The Commission’s report provides the best available analysis to 

date on the means by which the September 11 hijackers funded their activities and 

operations while in the United States. The use of ATMs, for example, goes directly 

to the heart of the method by which terrorists exploit banks to fund their day-today operations. 

Madam Chairman, I have highlighted just a few of the issues that were raised 

in the Commission’s report. During my time on the Intelligence Committee I saw 

first hand how unwilling our different intelligence agencies are to share information. 

The CIA, for example, hoarded information from other agencies to the detriment of 

national security. I also observed incidents where the FBI did not ‘‘know what it 

knew’’ because of poor internal intelligence sharing. Had the CIA, FBI, NSA and 

other intelligence agencies worked cooperatively and had the technological framework in place to ‘‘connect the dots’’ about terrorist threats, perhaps 9/11 could have 

been prevented. 

I believe that reforming our intelligence community is one of the most important 

things that we can do in order to ensure that our country is in fact safer, stronger 

and wiser. However, I remain committed to ensuring that the actions and reforms 

we undertake are done with thoughtful, measured progress. Taking action simply 

for the sake of taking action will not secure our homeland and it certainly will not 

honor the memory of those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001. 

Thank you again for holding this important hearing today and I look forward to 

additional hearings to discuss these important issues further.

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