The Secret History
"People can try to blame Bush for failing to act, but history will lay the intelligence blunders at Clinton's feet, where they belong." NOLA LEAHY Coto de Caza, Calif.
Your article "They Had A Plan," on the efforts by the Clinton and Bush administrations to take the offensive against al-Qaeda [Special Report, Aug. 12], was a gripping saga that underlines a sad history of misguided political maneuvering and ineptness in preventing attacks. The failure to respond quickly allowed the terrorists to carry out acts that still reverberate in the lives of innocent citizens not only in the U.S. but all over the world. Alas! We are waiting for the day when concern for human suffering transcends political intrigue. JAYANTA GUHA Chicoutimi, Que.
The entire Washington bureaucracy of both administrations will ultimately be held responsible for the failure to recognize the terrorist threat and take steps to counter it. But it was during the eight years of Clinton's presidency that the threat grew and metastasized into the cancer that we live with today. No amount of spin will ever change that. DOUG ISRAEL New York City
It is chilling to read that the Bush Administration was preoccupied with fantasyland projects like missile defense instead of focusing on the real danger of terrorist attacks. The Bush group has unfortunate priorities. Clearly it is not qualified for the job. SALLY RAYNES Alexandria, Va.
What about President Clinton's inadequate response to the first bombing of the World Trade Center, in 1993, and the October 2000 attack on the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen? Why didn't the Clinton team act quickly to retaliate in both those instances? That's the question. Why is it that when we have a President in the Oval Office with integrity, you want to blame him? You should be looking at the Administration that had a "good" time and a cigar in the Oval Office. CAROL (KERI) DEVINE York, Pa.
Perhaps the most frightening aspect of your report was the decision by the Clinton Administration to shelve its plan to attack al-Qaeda because it wouldn't have been "appropriate" to launch a major initiative against Osama bin Laden and hand a war to the incoming Bush Administration. Since when are decisions of national security based on political appropriateness? And when did Clinton begin considering the appropriateness of anything anyway? CANNON C. ALSOBROOK Alpharetta, Ga.
Future historians will reflect on the degree to which partisan politics and political correctness have weakened the West's resolve and crippled its ability to identify the enemy and defend itself. MICHAEL MONFILS Green Bay, Wis.
This report was one of the most ridiculous things I've ever read. To pretend that a real assault on Osama bin Laden and Afghanistan launched by the Clinton Administration before Sept. 11 would have been met with anything but howls of protest from the likes of Time and others in the media is amusing. Do you really want us to believe in a revamped image of Bill Clinton as a staunch antiterrorist crusader? TIM HAGEN Albertville, Minn.