THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

Internal Transcript September 5,

2002

INTERVIEW OF THE VICE PRESIDENT

BY
JIM LEHRER, THE NEWS HOUR
Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building

Q Mr. Vice President, welcome.

THE VICE PRESIDENT: Jim.

Q What has 9/11 done to us Americans?

THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, I think we're still sorting
that out, in a sense. Clearly, there are a lot of lessons
to be learned, if you will, out of that event, and what
we've got to do subsequently. And I think in terms of
\l security policy, for example, it has changed a lot
_,.;/ about the way we think about how we defend the country, and
about what (inaudible) are. Hark back to the 20th century
and the Cold War, where most of us sort of grew up and
thought about deterring the Soviet Union from launching an
attack, solid borders meant something, you could put at risk
the forces of another country and the things they valued to
deter them from attacking the United States.
September llth changed all of that, in a sense that it
was an attack launched from the soil of the United States --
and designed and planned in Germany, a good NATO ally. I
don't mean to be critical of Germany. But the nature of the
threat changed so dramatically now that we have to think
anew about how we defend ourselves.

It means that we've got to be concerned now about parts

of the world we didn't used to have to worry about, from a
strategic standpoint or a military standpoint. It may be
that some remote corner of country X now, which nobody ever
cared about before, all of a sudden is a place where a group
of terrorists come together, plan an attack, organize it,
maybe using biological weapons. A relative handful of
people with access to the international travel system and
finances to smuggle something into the United States and use
\t in a deadly attack that would be far more devastating

000453
 than what happened on September llth if they used a
biological weapon or even conceivably a nuclear weapon.
So our whole approach to thinking about how we defend
ourselves is dramatically different than it used to be.
Q On a personal level, are we less free than we
were, just as individual Americans, going about our lives?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I think most people are probably
taking extra precautions. If it fades over time, it
probably depends on what part of the country you live in or
how much you're concerned about this, how close we are to
9/11. But clearly there are continuing pieces of evidence
in our lives every day about the way in which we changed in
order to adapt to the potential threat.
The air traffic was where we had a significant impact
on air travel, just in terms of how we do something we
almost took for granted in the past. So it's clearly
affected that.
Q Are you concerned at all that the government, and
its role to react to this monumental event has maybe
overreacted in terms of taking some freedoms away from
Americans?
"^ THE VICE PRESIDENT: I don't believe that, Jim. I
^/ think -- I don't think we've taken freedom away from
~" Americans. We've tried to be very sensitive to that. We
have tried to alert people to the dangers here. And my
concern is that there will be another attack, and we will
find, once that attack has occurred, that there is something
we could have done that might have prevented it, but we
didn't do it. My concern in part is as we get farther and
farther away from September llth, that we gradually let our
guard down over time. It's hard to keep people sort of on
the cusp of being prepared (inaudible) a potential attack.
And what I think is a real danger here that we'll get
complacent. It's part of our nature. We're optimistic
people, we're resilient. As I said, well, yes, they hit us
on 9/11, but they'll never be able to do that again. Well,
I hope not. We're doing everything we can to stop it. But
of course the danger is that will be -- that as that fades
and recedes into history, that we'll let down our guard.
And we can't allow that to happen.
Q How do you account for the fact that there have
been no other attacks in this one year?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I think a combination of things.
t. You can argue it two ways. One is that we've had
8

000454
considerable success in disrupting the al Qaeda
organization.^ Our actions in Afghanistan, our military
operations against the al Qaeda and Taliban, our worldwide
efforts with the finances, with intelligence coordination,
the extent to which we've wrapped up a number of individuals
who were crucial in the organization, all of that I think
has disrupted their planning and their operations.
On the other hand, their normal pattern, if you look
back at -- at least the history was as much as two years
between major attacks. We had the attack on the East
African embassies in 1998; two years later we had the attack
on the USS Cole, one year later we had the attack on the
World Trade Center and the Pentagon. So a period of time
here between attacks wouldn't be that much out of the norm
for them.
Q You talk about complacency. Is part of the
complacency a result of all these alerts that we had, and
then nothing happens; and then we have another alert, and
nothing happens, another alert and nothing happens. It's
been a while now since we've even had an alert.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Right. But it's one of those
difficult dilemmas for government, in a sense. The more
often you go on alert, and nothing happens, then people
become sort of immune to the whole notion of crisis there.
On the other hand, if you don't go on alert, and something
did happen, you have a terrible problem then, too. So
you're trying always to seek the proper balance here.
But it's not easy. These are judgment calls that the
President and his senior advisors have to make on whether or
not a particular threat has enough credibility so that you
want to stand up the forces of the United States, if you
will, and put the American people on guard for the next 48
hours, the next two weeks, or whatever it might be.
Q But is it correct to interpret the lack of alerts
these last several weeks and months as meaning -- what it
appears to mean -- that the threat has in fact lessened?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I can't say that. I can't say
that. There is a fluctuation in the reporting. Our
intelligence probably is better and more comprehensive today
than it's been before. We've sort of got the mechanism
tuned up, focused on this particular problem, so we're
probably picking up more than we did before. We're also
picking up a lot of noise. We pick up false reporting.
But to say that there's no threat out there, or that
the threat has receded, I just can't say that based on what
I've seen today. It's not as though there's a one-to-one

000455
relationship there. Sometimes some of the threat reporting
we've had is a disgruntled ex-wife. In other cases, it's
been a real threat, where we've been able to wrap somebody
up and prevent something from happening.
But you just -- you don't know what you don't know.
That's the nature of the intelligence business. And you
have to work with what you can get your hands on. But it is
inexact; it's more an art form than it is a science. You've
got to continually work the problem, continually try, as the
President is, building an office of homeland security, doing
a better job of collecting intelligence, at getting the
domestic and the foreign agencies working together, of
reorganizing the government so we can really focus all of
our assets and our resources on this problem of defense,
dealing with the fact that we've got three different
agencies dealing with the security of our borders, and all
of those kinds of issues.
So we're constantly improving, we're constantly getting
better, we're constantly strengthening our defenses, if you
will. On the other hand, our adversaries are still out
there. There are thousands of them still loose within some
60 countries around the world that have al Qaeda cells in
them, and we know they're planning to try and mount
additional attacks against the United States.
Q Why are they still loose? Why are they still out
there? Why can't we -- it's been a year. Why can't we
round them up and put them out of business?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, most of them don't run
around with a label across their forehead that says, "al
Qaeda." We've found -- for example, we wrapped up a cell in
Singapore. Singapore, that's around the other side of the
world, not the Middle East. But in fact there were a group
of people there, some of whom had been through the training
camps in Afghanistan, and then returned to Singapore,
(inaudible) against the United States and launch an attack
against one of our naval vessels or (inaudible) against our
personnel in Singapore.
And these individuals were middle class professionals.
These were not poverty stricken folks who came out of the
Middle East, who have been discriminated against or had any
sense of injustice in society. But for one reason or
another, they had signed on for the jihad, and were prepared
to kill Americans. They were living and operating in
Singapore.
You've got that all over the world. We found cells,
evidence of al Qaeda, in the U.K., in Germany, in Spain, in
Italy, in Malaysia and Indonesia, Singapore, the

000456
 Philippines, a lot of places out there where they ve been
operating. Some of them have gone underground and may be
quiet for two or three or four years before they re
activated and launch an attack. There's evidence that they
planned several years in advance for the attack on the World
Trade Center.
0 You said that people are planning to kill
Americans. One of the things that was discussf* "^J*^
you and I talked about it, in an interview shortly after
9/11 that this came as a huge surprise to many Americans
that'there were all these people out there who hated us so
much that they would do what these folks did on 9/11. _And
then there are thousands more out there, as you just
confirmed, again, are out there prepared to do the same
thing. Is this something Americans have to also try -to
understand, why they hate us so?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: To some extent clearly we do. I
mean, we need to understand what's the dynamic in society
that's led these young men, primarily young men, to be
prepared to sacrifice their lives in order to kill
Americans. I don't want to overestimate how extensive the
hatred is. But the fact that it takes only two people to
launch a devastating attack — that's what we learned on the
llth -- and to take thousands of lives, depending on what
kind of attack they organize.
- 1
* And so they — and plus, I think it's important also,
'""" it takes a certain skill, a certain discipline, certain
training to be able to mount that kind of attack and avoid
detection by our law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
There are certainly people there who can do it, they did it
on 9/11 It doesn't mean it's easy, we'll make it as hard
as we can for them. But the fact is.that there clearly are
still a large number of people loose out there, and some of
them are clearly trying to mount attacks against the U.S.
Q Should we as Americans be concerned about it?
Should we try to mitigate this harsh feeling about us and
what we do as a government and as a people?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: That's not my view. My view is
that the United States has not conducted itself in such a
way as to be deserving of such an attack. I don't think
that's the case at all. I think, in fact, there are people
motivated to launch attacks against us partly because they
dislike some aspect of our policy. But to suggest that
somehow the United States has done something that merits
this kind of an attack or justifies what these people do, I
just don't think it's (inaudible).
^ ~--v

vJ 000457
 I think there's a fundamental difference in the world
view, perhaps. They seem to be motivated by a very
fundamentalist religious view, which (inaudible) -- extreme
form of Islam. I don't think that's generally
representative of the Islamic peoples around the world.
It's clearly representative of a small group that have
joined al Qaeda and committed themselves to supporting Osama
bin Laden, and to participate in jihad, in holy war against
the infidel -- us, in this case.
Q A lot of folks seem to not understand why we don't
know whether Osama bin Laden is alive or dead after one
year. What would you tell them?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: We don't know. We don't have hard
evidence either way. As the President said the other day,
he said, you know, if he's alive, we'll get him, and if he's
dead, we already got him.
There has been no hard sign of Osama bin Laden now for
several months. That could mean he's dead, perhaps at Tora
Bora, as some people speculate, where we did an extensive
campaigns (inaudible) last year. Or it could mean he's gone
underground.
He lives a fairly ascetic lifestyle anyway; this is not
a man, you know, who's got huge trappings of office. And he
might well be able to operate underground for a considerable
period of time, not communicate, or communicate only by
couriers in ways that make it difficult for people to know
where he is and what he's up to.
And I just (inaudible) factual, most honest answer I
can give you is: we don't know. He could be dead, he could
be alive, and we don't really know for sure.
Q So, a year later. The President said at the
beginning, right after 9/11, two of our major missions here
are to put al Qaeda out of business and get rid of Osama bin
Laden. And we haven't done either.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, he also said -- you know,
we're much closer to the front end of the war than we are to
the back end of the war. It's going to take a long time.
It's not something that can be done in a matter of weeks or
even months. We've made major progress, when you consider
what we've done in Afghanistan, with a relatively small
force. We (inaudible) the Taliban, liberated the Afghan
people, and did serious damage to the al Qaeda organization.
But it's not over. And you know, I think we tend to
think -- it's a part of our national character, perhaps,
that -- well, we've got a problem to solve, let's

000458
(inaudible) in two weeks. This one doesn't work this way.
And this is a struggle that will go on, I think, probably
for many years -- I expect as long as I'm (inaudible). And
you've just got to keep working at it day in and day out,
month in and month out. And that' s the nature of the
challenge we face.
Q What do you say to those who say, okay, we've got
this war against al Qaeda that's not finished. We're still
trying to find out about Osama bin Laden. Why are we
talking about starting a new war with Iraq?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, Iraq is a related, but
obviously a somewhat different proposition. And the
situation in Iraq is the culmination of many years of
effort.
Saddam Hussein signed up at the end of the Gulf War to
certain U.N. Security Council resolutions: to get rid of
all of his weapons of mass destruction, and to allow
inspectors to come in and verify that. He has complied with
virtually none of the resolutions that have been applied to
him. Between 1996 and 1998, on six separate occasions, the
Security Council took up this issue and found him to be in
flagrant violation and demanded that he grant access,
unfettered access to inspectors to come in and prove that he
was complying with these resolutions. And he absolutely
thumbed his nose at the United Nations, has never complied.
That was '96 through '98. Now, since '98, there
haven't been any inspectors in there at all. We know, based
primarily on intelligence reporting, as well as some of the
earlier work done by inspectors, as well as defectors who
come out and have told us what's going on -- we know he is
continuing to expand and improve his biological weapons
capability, both in terms of production and for other
systems.
We know he is working once again on a nuclear program.
The nuclear weapons program was much further along than we
thought at the time of Desert Storm; before we actually did
the liberation of Kuwait in 1991, I was told, as were most
of our senior officials, that he was some years away from
nuclear war. We found after the war, once we got people in
on the ground, that he was probably a year from actually
having a usable nuclear weapon. And this was '91, ten years
ago.
No inspectors have been in there since '98. We know
again that he has weapons design, we know he has the
technicians who know how to build a nuclear weapon. What he
lacks is fissile material

000459
 for a weapon. And we know that he has re-energized, if you
will, his efforts to acquire a nuclear weapon.
We know he continues to work on his chemical weapons
capabilities -- different capability, obviously, than the BW
and nukes, but that activity is underway. It's ongoing. We
know he's sitting on top of 10 percent of the world's oil
reserves. As he takes that wealth that is generated off of
that and is earning a lot of money now on the side, outside
the oil-for-food program, money that goes into his pocket to
be used for whatever purpose he wants, then he is going to
continue to ignore the United Nations and to build these
deadly capabilities.
If he had nuclear weapons -- and we don't know when
he'll get them -- there are various estimates on timing, but
we don't know everything we'd like to know about his program
-- once he's got a nuclear weapon, I think it would be
virtually impossible to put together an international
coalition to deal with this problem.
Q Why? Because he would use it as a --
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Because it would threaten -- think
of those 30 countries that signed up for the coalition in
\-
the Gulf War. Many of them will simply take a pass, faced
highly enriched uranium, plutonium -- that he could use
with that kind of problem. So time is not on our side.
Eventually, the international community has to come to grips
with the fact that this is a growing threat, and all of the
efforts to date to deal with it diplomatically and through
the U.N. have failed.
Q You said several times -- and (inaudible) just now
-- we know, we know, we know, we know. Are you prepared,
you and the President prepared to tell the members of
Congress and the American public and the international
community -- where there is, I think you would agree, a
singular lack of enthusiasm for doing what you and the
President are advocating -- are you going to lay all this
information out in a way that we can all see it?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: We are certainly going to share a
good deal of information with select members of Congress.
We've got a problem here in the sense that when we learn
information from sensitive sources and methods about what
Saddam Hussein is doing with respect to his weapons program,
it has to be treated in a confidential fashion, or it will
destroy our ability to continue to collect that information.
If you brief 535 members of Congress, it will probably
stay classified -- and I don't mean to be critical of
members of Congress; I was one for 10 years -- but with that

000460
many people, you're likely to have a leak in very short
order. So there's some happy medium here where we can go --
as we've done in the past; this is not unusual -- and you
brief just the senior leadership, for example, of the
Congress, say, the big four: the Speaker, the Minority
Leader of the House, and the Majority and Minority Leader in
the Senate, and maybe two committee chairman and ranking
members -- so that they have access to the same information
we have. And then, in effect, the Congress will act -- work
with its leadership, in terms of addressing this issue and
engaging in the debate.
We'll do everything we can to make as much as we can
public. That's (inaudible), there will be public hearings;
the President is going before the United Nations this week
to lay out the case there. But there are certain pieces .of
information that are highly classified and need to remain
highly classified, in terms of our ability to continue to
work these problems.
Q So then it could come down, in the final analysis,
to you and the President saying you just have to take our
word for it?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: No. I think clearly we elect
Presidents and expect them to make these decisions for us.
This is a Presidential decision, without question. He's
indicated he wants to work as closely as he can with
international leaders as well as members of Congress, and
we'll do all of that. As I say, we'll get as many members
of Congress read in to what we know as we can.
But there has to be some kind of understanding that
there's a limit beyond which we can't go without destroying
our capacity to be able to know what's going on.
(Inaudible.)
Q A lot of people suggested, after your two speeches
to the two veterans organizations you spoke at, you
essentially issued an informal declaration of war -- that we
are in fact in a state of war against Iraq, the United
States of America is. Is that a correct reading of it?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: No.

Q What is --
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I think that would be an incorrect
statement. I think it would be fair to say that the
President has not yet made a decision, other than to
conclude that doing nothing is not an option. We can't --
we cannot continue to ignore this problem.

000461
 He's going to address it with the United Nations, which
is a good place to do it, since they're the ones who have
passed a whole series of resolutions which Saddam has
ignored without consequences; there has been no penalty for
Saddam Hussein ignoring these requirements. And that his
growing capabilities increasingly represent a threat to the
region to U.S. forces in the region, and ultimately to the
United States itself, and that we have to come to grips with
that problem.
Now, that's in my mind sort of a statement of facts,
(inaudible) an organization, if you will, of things that are
known out there. And what I just said shouldn't be a
surprise to anybody, because in fact a recitation of recent
history and of what is generally available in the media with
respect to (inaudible).
Q Is it a fair reading, though, of what you and the
President are saying then, well, yes, the President's going
to talk to the U.N. , yes, we're going to go deal with
Congress, and yes, we're going to make as much information
available as possible. But if you all don't go along --
(inaudible) -- the United States of America will in fact
take unilateral action if it comes down to it?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I don't want to predict what the
President will ultimately decide, Jim. That's not my role.
%
} And he is clearly, as we all are who are part of this
administration, this national security team, deeply
concerned about what we see out there. And we do believe
that it must be addressed, that we cannot simply sit back
and allow these current trends with respect to Iraq to
continue.
Now next step: what are we going to do about it?
Well, that's what we're going to discuss with the Congress
and with the United Nations. And the President will lead
that discussion (inaudible).
Q Do you and the President have an open mind about
the final act that may have to be taken? In other words,
are you listening as much as talking over these next several
weeks, or whatever it takes, to other countries, to members
of Congress who may have reservations, who may have
objections to what you all are thinking?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I think we are open-minded about
it. I think it's important to understand the President of
the United States has special responsibilities here. But
first and foremost, he has an obligation, he's taken an oath
to defend Constitution of the United States against all
enemies foreign and domestic. He is the one who is charged,

000462
10
 that we will look to, to see to it that the United States is
defended against potential threat. That's a special
obligation that nobody else has except him.
Secondly, we've reached the point with respect to Iraq
where, from a military standpoint, the United States's
elimination (inaudible). There is no other nation in the
world that can deal with this threat militarily
(inaudible) should remember that. (Inaudible.)
Third, I think most of the rest of the world is not as
concerned as we are about vulnerabilities, because they
haven't been hit, they didn't lose 3,000 people last
September llth; we did. We understand to a greater extent
than ever before, I think, the vulnerability of modern
society to an attack. So I think it's perhaps more urgent
from our perspective. The President has greater
responsibilities than anybody else does in this respect.
And the final point I guess I'd make is the sense that
we have, that to date the traditional way of dealing with
this problem through the international organization, the .
United Nations (inaudible) has produced zero results.
Q So to be sure I understand what you're saying,
that you believe that the President of the United States has
i^,. x the right and the responsibility to act unilaterally in this
] situation -- if it comes to that?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: No, he has not made that decision
yet, and I don't want to pre-judge it. But I do think that
-- you know, question: if military action would have
allowed us to preempt what happened on 9/11, avoid the loss
of three thousand (inaudible), absolutely. I don't think
there's any doubt about it and .(inaudible) very many
Americans who wouldn't sign up with that proposition.
We have to be concerned now -- not sort of in light of
what the world looked like before 9/11, but what the world
looks like after 9/11, that we are prepared to make certain
that we can defend the United States against foreign
threats. And we are especially concerned about Iraq because
of the developments we see with respect to weapons of mass
destruction, because he has in the past, for example, had a
relationship with terrorist organizations and provided
sanctuary for terrorist organizations of various kinds; and
because of this continued failure over the years of the
international community to be able to cope with this
problem.
So as we've said -- the President said and I've
v repeated, time is not on our side. If you wait, his
\s are only going to go greater,- the threat will

000463
11
increase, and the difficulty of the world coming together,
the international community to deal with that threat will
(inaudible) .
Q What was the worst time for you, personally, on
9/11 or after 9/11?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, that day I remember the
collapse of the Trade Center and evacuated down there to the
Presidential Emergency Operations Center. There was a
report that came in, a plane was headed to the White House.
They evacuated me at that point to the shelter underneath
the White House. And that's the plane that ultimately
circled back and hit the Pentagon.
And, you know, all of those events -- when the second
plane hitting the Trade Center, when we understood this was
a terrorist attack, to the point where (inaudible)
aircraft on the ground, the early stages (inaudible),
perhaps this is something to watch as the World Trade Center
came down (inaudible) shock. (Inaudible.)
I didn't really expect that that would happen at that
time. But when you think about it, because you're busy in
those early minutes and hours trying to deal with the
problem and then all of a sudden watch in real time the
Center collapse, that was a startling moment. There is a
picture that's been taken of several of us who were in the
PEOC, itself, Mary Matalin, Condi Rice and my wife, Lynne,
at that moment. And the look on people' s faces as they
watch the Trade Center (inaudible).
Q Do you remember what your first reaction was to --
what is going on here? I mean, what did you think was
happening? ... .
THE VICE PRESIDENT: My secretary called in -- I was in
a meeting with my speechwriter -- she called in and said, a
plane hit the World Trade Center. So we turned on the
television and the first plane had already gone in. And we
looked at it and said, you know, how could that happen? It
was a clear day, there was no weather problem. How the hell
you can get an airplane hitting the World Trade Center?
And we talked about that for a few minutes. And then
as we watched, a second plane -- we actually saw the second
plane hit. And in that moment you knew, this is a terrorist
attack.
Q Difficult question, but you're Dick Cheney, an
individual. And you're also Dick Cheney, of the United
States. Did you have a — think, oh, my God, I'm THE VICE
PRESIDENT of the United States and our country is being

12 000464
attacked? I mean, what -- how did you adjust your thinking
to accommodate this awful event and your responsibilities?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, it's a fascinating question,
Jim. When it happens and -- as I say, the President
(inaudible) talked about it -- you've got a job to do. And
because you've got a job to do, you've got to focus on that,
so you don't have time for personal consideration. And you
don't think that you're maybe the target. Even after the
airplane was headed for the White House -- and, then, of
course, never hit, it circled back and hit the Pentagon.
I'm aware at that point what's transpired out there,
but you're thinking in terms of your official
responsibility. I mean, as Vice President, one of the
things I spend time on is the continuity of government.
That's the main reason I'm here, is (inaudible).
So my first reaction that morning, as soon as I heard
the third plane hit the Pentagon, was to pick up the
telephone and call the President, who was headed for his
airplane in Florida, and urge him not to return -- primarily
because we didn't know how extensive the attack was, we
didn't know what else was in store. We knew Washington was
under attack. It was important, I thought, to make sure he
did not come back to the middle of a continuing attack.
He didn't like that, but he agreed with me. And then
we made arrangements to get Denny Hastert out of town into a
secure facility, because he was third in line for the
Presidency. And we made arrangements to get some Cabinet
members located outside the city, in secure locations.
Because, you know, the key here is to protect the line of
succession, and make certain no matter what happens that you
need somebody there who is constitutionally, statutorily
certified to be the President of the United States, ~ if
something happens to those ahead (inaudible) on the list.
And you can say, well, you know, what about you?
You're number two. And at one point, the Secret Service did
recommend evacuating me from the White House complex and I
decided not to do that, because we had already provided the
line of succession: the President is safe, the Speaker was
safe, others, and it was important, I thought, for me to
stay connected, and I could do that, (inaudible) stay in the
PEOC, where I am. Communication with the President, with
the Secretary of Defense at the Pentagon and so forth, and
continue to work the problem.
You don't think of it in personal terms. You really do
think about it institutionally. This is your job and, to
some extent, you are -- you benefit from having a job to do
(inaudible) like this. And you have things that you have to

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make happen and you don't have time for (inaudible)
emotional reaction that might otherwise occur if somebody
were just sitting and watching these events unfold
(inaudible).
Q The sense that day -- have there been emotional
times for you, when you have felt fear for yourself or for
your wife or your children or your grandchildren?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Family members, on a couple of
occasions, when -- want to make sure who (inaudible) the
kids and grandkids were taken care of (inaudible). And, of
course, their lives have changed because security has been
significantly enhanced since September llth.
From a personal standpoint, I thought -- a couple of
times the thought has occurred to me that the reporting we
got from some of the people who were wrapped up in
Afghanistan was a fourth aircraft was headed for the White
House, (inaudible) Capitol building, (inaudible).
And the plane that went down in Pennsylvania, that was
taken down by the passengers -- had they not done that, had
they not engaged in a very courageous act and taken on the
terrorists (inaudible) destruction of the aircraft before it
could conclude its mission -- they all saved my life and
that of all of us who were in the White House complex that
day. And it's something that you think about periodically.
If it hadn't been for what they did, that we might not be
here today. You know, those kinds of thoughts occur
occasionally, especially when (inaudible) Shanksville,
Pennsylvania.
Q (Inaudible.)
THE VICE PRESIDENT: (Inaudible.)
Q Mr. Vice President, thank you very much.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Jim.
END

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