The Times and Democrat - Legislators disagree whether America safer since 9-11

He was in an Appropriations Committee meeting on the second floor of the U.S. Capitol building when the call came. Democratic lawmakers turned on the television and watched the second plane fly into the South Tower of the World Trade Center complex.

“I have often wondered what was going through my mind,” U.S. Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) said of watching the events unfold the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. “I don’t know that I fully understood what I’d seen.”

Fellow U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) recalled being in a breakfast meeting at the Lexington Chamber of Commerce, preparing for the opening of a campaign headquarters in West Columbia set for 10 a.m.

“My first thought was it was an air traffic control problem, that computers had made an error,” he said of the first plane flying into the WTC’s North Tower. “Within minutes, I realized ... our country was being attacked.”

Wilson called off the opening and suspended his campaign for U.S. Congress, instead reporting with a fellow National Guardsman to the state Adjutant General’s Office.

A staff judge advocate for the S.C. Army National Guard’s 218th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, Wilson said he spent much of Sept. 11 receiving phone calls from Guardsmen who said they were willing to serve when and where needed.

“My concern was the attacks appeared to be coming down the East Coast,” he said, adding that he was fearful of an attack on the Savannah River Site.

What Clyburn, Wilson and much of the world witnessed that day were attacks on American soil delivered by four highjacked airplanes, two of which destroyed both towers of the WTC and ultimately brought down all seven World Trade Center complex buildings. Another collided with the Pentagon.

The fourth plane – United Airlines Flight 93 – never made it to its destination but instead crashed in an empty field in Pennsylvania.

Clyburn said the destination of that final plane was determined to be the Capitol building, from which he and other members of Congress had been evacuated that morning.

“I suspect that many of us owe our lives to those who brought down that plane,” he said.

U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) said he was at the White House having breakfast with fellow lawmakers when they heard the news.

“When we first got word, everyone thought it was an accident,” he said. “The gravity of it was gradual in the sense that it seemed to be an accident, then it seemed to be intentional.

“I think over the period of an hour we got the sense that we were under attack. It went from being a very peaceful morning to a war zone in an hour, an hour and a half.”

The White House was evacuated, as were other government buildings, and DeMint said politicians were gathered at a central location and told to leave town.

But DeMint said instead of leaving, lawmakers were resolved to show the world – and those attacking America – that terrorists would not get the best of them.

“We didn’t know the fires would engulf and the towers would come down,” he said. “No one knew what was happening for a couple of hours. I think by the end of the day ... the feeling we had was mostly anger and resolve.”

Federal legislators gathered that evening on the steps of the Capitol and sang “God Bless America,” and DeMint said they plan to recreate that moment this year in remembrance of 9-11.

n Then and now

In the five years since Sept. 11, legislators seem split over whether America is safer today than it was prior to that fateful morning.

“I don’t know that we’re any safer,” Clyburn said. “I feel Americans are more aware than we were then.”

For example, he said prior to the attacks, foreigners were training to fly planes in the U.S. Officials have since learned they were uninterested in how to land them.

“Nowadays, we would pay attention to that,” he said. “There are all kinds of things that were happening (before Sept. 11) that we can say ... if we’d paid attention to those then, 9-11 would not have happened.

“If paying attention to detail makes us safer, I guess we are.”

DeMint said the problem before 9-11 is the U.S. didn’t know it was in danger.

“We’re safer because we know more about the danger and we’re engaged in stopping it,” he said.

Awareness of the enemy’s desires also makes America safer, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said.

“On Sept. 10, 2001, we did not realize the terrorists had declared war on us,” he said. “Many of the people who planned Sept. 11 have been killed or captured, and we’re fighting them over there as opposed to here.”

Having three sons in the military and having served in the National Guard for 31 years, Wilson said, “I know our military has never been more prepared, has never had a higher morale and has never had better equipment” than it does today.

“The leader of al-Qaida, Osama bin Laden, is hiding deep in a cave. His top lieutenant ... is dead,” he said. “In country after country, al-Qaida is on the defense.”

Wilson said the war on terror seems to be working but added that the U.S. must remain vigilant in fighting its dangerous enemy.

“This is a worldwide phenomenon,” he said. “This is not just a war against the U.S. – this is a war against modern society,” with the U.S. being the terrorists’ prime target and “death to America” being their slogan.

Wilson said he feels President George W. Bush and his administration are doing all they can to prioritize and show terrorists America will persist.

“These are cowards,” he said. “We’re fighting an enemy who values death over life. ... These people want to die and want to kill all Americans.

“What we cherish, they consider an insult to them,” Wilson said of America’s culture and ideals. “I would say all of America is vulnerable. So we need to be vigilant. We don’t need to cave in to terrorism, but we need to be vigilant.”

Clyburn said the war on terror has nothing to do with the Iraq war, which he calls “one of the worst foreign policy decisions America has ever made.”

“We took our eyes off the prize. The prize was Osama bin Laden,” he said. “I think Afghanistan is where the war on terror needs to be fought. I think that’s where our attention should have stayed.

“We opened another front (in Iraq) and made a case that did not exist,” he said, including the claim that weapons of mass destruction were being harbored and produced in Iraq. “We can’t find any. When all is said and done, there was nothing to be found.

“Was it a lack of intelligence in fact finding, or was it a lack of intelligence in intellect?”

DeMint said while those directly involved in carrying out the terrorist attacks in America were killed by their own bidding, the world has yet to hold those nations that continue to support terrorism accountable.

“It’s not al-Qaida. It’s not Hamas. It’s not Hezbollah,” he said. “Those are factions ... of a radical sect of Islam that thinks it’s a superior race.”

The threat, DeMint said, are jihadists and their ability to smuggle WMDs into the U.S.

“If we allow these groups to have weapons of mass destruction, that will happen sooner or later,” he said.

Part of Graham’s duties in Congress include creating a legal infrastructure that would allow for the trials of terrorists that have been detained during the war on terror.

“Once we capture a terrorist, it becomes about us, not them,” he said. “It’s something that’s very important to me. If we don’t do it right, it could come back to haunt us.”

Graham, who currently serves as a military reserve judge, said the system needs to be established quickly and would have to protect the American people, its ideals and its military.

The senator said even if the war on terror leads to the capture of bin Laden, it wouldn’t be the end of the conflict.

“We’re fighting an idea, not a person,” he said, and the only way to be successful in that is to empower moderate, open-minded people and keep religion and government separate – to promote tolerance over intolerance.

DeMint said America will capture bin Laden if he doesn’t die first.

“He’s become more of a figurehead, a symbol of the jihadist movement,” he said. “I think it would certainly be helpful as a signal to do away with bin Laden.”

Extra intelligence efforts to locate and capture bin Laden are being made, Wilson said. But he finds it hard to believe bin Laden is still alive and not communicating on a more frequent basis with the outside world, especially with the technology that’s available in today’s society.

Clyburn said he believes America will find bin Laden, but only if the U.S. looks in the “haystack.”

“If you want to capture bin Osama bin Laden, you have to catch him where he is,” he said, adding that he isn’t in Iraq or Iran. “If the needle’s in the haystack, you’ve got a chance to find it – if you’re looking in the haystack.”

Whether or not bin Laden is found, and whether or not the war on terror is working, the legislators agreed that South Carolina – and the U.S. on a whole – could be the target of future terrorist attacks.

“Generally, I think terrorists are going after targets with a larger loss of life,” DeMint said. “That doesn’t mean we’re not susceptible.”

He said it is important to continue giving first responders, local fire departments and other emergency agencies money through Homeland Security because they need to be prepared in the event an attack does occur.

“We don’t think any place in South Carolina is a target, but that’s the ability of terrorists – to change their strategy and target every day,” DeMint said.

He said while attacks may occur elsewhere in the world, “The U.S. is symbolic of the West, everything that is not Islamic.

“The U.S. is the ultimate target.”

All one has to do is look at the attack possibilities in South Carolina – nuclear facilities and one of the United States’ largest seaports, Clyburn said.

“Yes, South Carolina has some venues that could very well be attractive to terrorists,” he said.

Clyburn said Homeland Security could do more to beef up its security measures, including checking every bit of cargo making its way to the U.S. and providing the same security measures for trains and other mass transportation systems as are in place for planes.

“There are a lot of things we can do that we’re not doing,” he said.

Graham said all America has to do is be wrong once and the terrorists be right once to make an attack on America happen.

“It’s a threat to every group of people who believe in freedom,” he said, agreeing that South Carolina being home to a port, nuclear facilities and military bases makes it a potential terrorist target. “South Carolinians and all those who love freedom are threatened.”

And Graham said this is the first war in American history where the American people have not been asked to make sacrifices.

“The burden of this war has fallen on our military, law enforcement and other agencies,” he said, adding that the loss of American soldiers’ lives in Iraq is quickly catching up to the lives lost in the Sept. 11 attacks.

“Democracy is the only antidote for terrorism,” Graham said. “I do hope the Iraqi people will put aside their differences.

“The only way to win the war on terror is to defeat the ideas the terrorists stand for, and the only way to do that is through democracy.”

Wilson said war is making America more secure, but the country remains at risk. “This is not reflective of the religion,” he said of terrorists’ goals versus the Islamic faith. “I think al-Qaida and allied movements, they have a common enemy. They have different sects, but they do have one common enemy.

To one legislator, however, the Iraq war is not helping the situation.

“It’s ruining our reputation around the world,” Clyburn said. “The U.S can’t be Lone Rangers with our foreign policy. This is a global society we live in.” And America, he said, is more at risk because of its actions.

DeMint said by forging the battle overseas, the U.S. is not a sitting duck.

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