building was smoldering, and there were still bodies inside. Don Rumsfeld and I walked the crash site and thanked the work crews for their devotion. At one point, a team of workers atop the building unfurled a giant American flag. It was a sign of defiance and resolve, exactly what the nation needed to see. One of the last groups I met was the morgue team. Joe Hagin brought them over. They were covered in dust after performing the saddest duty of all. I told them how much I appreciated the dignity they brought to their work.
Visiting the Pentagon on September 12, 2001, with Don Rumsfeld.
The experience at the Pentagon convinced me I needed to go to New York as soon as possible. Joe told me there were some serious problems with that idea. The Secret Service wasn’t sure the area was secure. The advance teams did not have time to prepare for a presidential event. No one knew what the environment at Ground Zero would be like. These were valid concerns, but I had made up my mind. I wanted New Yorkers to know that they were not alone. I took the attack as personally as they did. There was no substitute for telling them face to face.
I decided to break the news Thursday morning. Ari Fleischer had suggested that we invite the press into the Oval Office to witness my phone call with New York Governor George Pataki and Mayor Rudy Giuliani. “I can’t tell you how proud I am of the good citizens of your part of the world, and the extraordinary job you all are doing,” I said. Then I dropped the surprise. “You’ve extended me a kind invitation to come to New York City. I accept; I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon.”
I agreed to take a few questions from the press after the call. They asked about the safety of the aviation system, the whereabouts of bin Laden, and what I was requesting from Congress. The last question came from a reporter for the
I had managed to suppress my emotion in public for the past two days, but this question brought it to the surface. I had been thinking about Ted Olson’s grief-stricken voice. I pictured the exhausted morgue team. I thought about the innocent children who had died, and those who had lost their mom or dad. The sorrow that had accumulated burst forth. My eyes filled with tears and my throat caught. I paused briefly as the cameras clicked rapidly. I regained my composure, put my hand down on the Resolute desk, and leaned forward. “Well, I don’t think about myself right now. I think about the families, the children. I am a loving guy, and I am also someone, however, who has got a job to do. And I intend to do it.”
Later that day, Laura and I went to the Washington Hospital Center to visit victims from the Pentagon. Some had been burned over huge portions of their bodies. I asked one if he was an Army Ranger. Without missing a beat, he answered, “No, sir, I’m Special Forces. My IQ is too high to be a Ranger.” Everyone in the room—his wife, his doctors, Laura, and me—cracked up. It felt good to laugh. I left the hospital inspired by the courage of the wounded and the compassion of the doctors and nurses.
Andy Card was waiting in the South Lawn driveway when we returned from the hospital. Before I could get out of the limo, he opened the door and jumped in. He told me there had been a bomb threat to the White House. The Secret Service had relocated the vice president, and they wanted to evacuate me, too. I told the agents to double-check the intelligence and send home as many of the White House staff as possible. But I was staying put. I was not going to give the enemy the pleasure of seeing me hustled around to different locations again. The Secret Service extended the security perimeter of the White House. We made it through the day. When we went to bed, I thought,
Nearly three thousand innocent men, women, and children were killed on September 11. I felt it was important for the country to mourn together, so I set aside Friday as a National Day of Prayer and Remembrance. I knew September 14 would be a grueling and emotional day. I did not expect it to be the most inspiring one of my life.
A little after 7:00 a.m., Andy Card met me in the Oval Office for my national security briefing. The CIA believed that there were more al Qaeda operatives in the United States and that they wanted to attack America with biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons. It was hard to imagine anything more devastating than 9/11, but a terrorist attack with weapons of mass destruction would qualify.
I asked FBI Director Bob Mueller and Attorney General John Ashcroft to update me on the progress of the FBI’s investigation of the hijackers. Bob told me they had identified most of the terrorists and determined when they’d entered the country, where they’d stayed, and how they’d executed the plot. It was an impressive piece of investigation. But it wasn’t enough.
With Bob Mueller.
With John Ashcroft.
“What are you doing to stop the next attack?” I asked. People nervously shifted in their seats. I told Bob I wanted the Bureau to adopt a wartime mentality. We needed to disrupt attacks before they happened, not just investigate them after they took place. At the end of the meeting, Bob affirmed, “That’s our new mission, preventing attacks.” Over the years ahead, he fulfilled his promise and carried out the most fundamental transformation of the FBI in its century-long history.
After a phone call with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel, a leader who understood what it meant to fight terror, I began my first Cabinet meeting since the terrorist attacks. As I stepped into the room, the team broke out in sustained applause. I was surprised, and I choked up at their heartfelt support. The tears flowed for the second time in two days.
We started the Cabinet meeting with a prayer. I asked Don Rumsfeld to lead it. He offered moving words about the victims of the attacks and asked for the “patience to measure our lust for action.” The moment of silence after the prayer gave me time to collect my emotions. I thought about the speech I would soon give at the National Cathedral. Apparently Colin Powell did, too. The secretary of state slipped me a note.
“Dear Mr. President,” he wrote. “When I have to give a speech like this, I avoid those words that I know will cause me to well up, such as Mom and Pop.” It was a thoughtful gesture. Colin had seen combat; he knew the powerful emotions we were all feeling and wanted to comfort me. As I began the meeting, I held up the note and joked, “Let me tell you what the secretary of state just told me. … ‘Dear Mr. President, Don’t break down!’?”
The National Cathedral is an awesome structure, with 102-foot ceilings, elegant buttresses, and sparkling stained glass. On September 14 the pews were filled to capacity. Former Presidents Ford, Carter, Bush, and Clinton were there with their wives. So was almost every member of Congress, the whole Cabinet, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the justices of the Supreme Court, the diplomatic corps, and families of the victims. One person not there was Dick Cheney. He was at Camp David to ensure the continuity of government, a reminder of the ongoing threat.
At the National Cathedral.
I had asked Laura and Karen Hughes to design the program, and they did a fine job. The speakers included religious leaders of many faiths: Imam Muzammil Siddiqi of the Islamic Society of North America, Rabbi Joshua Haberman, Billy Graham, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, and Kirbyjon Caldwell. Near the end of the service, my turn came. As I climbed the steps to the lectern, I whispered a prayer: “Lord, let your light shine through me.”
The speech at the cathedral was the most important of my young presidency. I had told my speechwriters —Mike Gerson, John McConnell, and Matthew Scully—that I wanted to accomplish three objectives: mourn the loss of life, remind people there was a loving God, and make clear that those who attacked our nation would face justice.
With my speechwriters (
“We are here in the middle hour of our grief,” I began. “So many have suffered so great a loss, and today we express our nation’s sorrow. We come before God to pray for the missing and the dead, and for those who love them. … To the children and parents and spouses and families and friends of the lost, we offer the deepest
