White House Failed to Disclose to 9/11 Commission Tenet Warning to Rice of Imminent Terror Attack

Brian Zick

Philip Shenon for the NY Times reports Members of the Sept. 11 commission said today that they were alarmed that they were told nothing about a White House meeting in July 2001 at which George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, is reported to have warned Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser, about an imminent Al Qaeda attack and failed to persuade her to take action. Details of the previously undisclosed meeting on July 10, 2001, two months before the Sept. 11 terror attacks, were first reported last week in a new book by the journalist Bob Woodward. The disclosures took members of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission by surprise last week. Some questioned whether information about the July 10 meeting was intentionally withheld from the panel.

The text is from the poem “QUADRENNIAL” by Golden, reprinted with permission. It was first published in the Poetry Project. Inside front cover photo by Golden.
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