National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, testified under oath today, before the Commission investigating the 9/11 attacks and intelligence activities during the years prior to the attacks. The testimony came only after months of stalling by the White House, which had argued that no Presidential adviser should be required to justify his or her advice before a legislative body. The 9/11 Commission, however, is an independent body, with specific and narrow jurisdiction, set up by the Congress, to look into the security failure that became apparent on 11 September 2001.

In opening statements, the Commission's co-chair stated that the unique position of National Security Adviser requires complex intellectual choices, and that the commissioners will focus not only on the stated positions of Dr. Rice, but also on the apparent choices of focus which she made prior to 9/11. Dr. Rice stated that "I knew Dick Clarke to be an expert in his field," and emphasized her belief that the Clinton administration team was the group of people most attuned to the problem, for which reason she kept the entire team when the Bush administration moved in.

Dr. Rice stated that in the first months of the Bush administration, Sec. of State Powell urged Pres. Musharraf of Pakistan to abandon support for the Taliban, for which regime she says the Bush administration knew Al Qaeda to be "both a client and a sponsor". Dr. Rice lamented at length the vague nature of threat warnings from the summer of 2001, and cited a number of examples in which suspected terrorists were overheard saying something big was coming, but not specifying what, when or where. She referred to a briefing on 6 August 2001, in which the President was warned of possible hijacking, but insisted this briefing did not include the use of planes as weapons.

Dr. Rice neglected to mention intelligence that led to the Italian government installing missile batteries in Genoa for the G8 summit in July of 2001. At the time, numerous sources reported that Italian authorities feared possible "aerial incursion" or a terrorist attack from the air. The missile batteries were reported as defense against an Al Qaeda threat on the President's life, suggesting that there could be no doubt the President would have known of the reasons for the security measures.

In response to Gov. Kean's question about how seriously Mr. Clarke's warnings would have been taken, given that Al Qaeda was not an issue in the presidential campaign of 2000, Dr. Rice said her team was aware of the threat and took Clarke's warnings seriously, and a first priority was "to have no dropoff in what the Clinton administration was doing, because clearly they had been doing a lot".

"To the best of my knowledge, this kind of knowledge about the flying of planes into buildings was never briefed to us." Dr. Rice claimed never to have had access to intelligence regarding such a threat prior to 2 days after stating that "no one could have imagined" such a threat. She stated that at the Camp David strategy meetings after the 9/11 attacks, a map of Afghanistan was rolled out on the table. Iraq, she says, was by then a less prominent train of thought. Afghanistan "was daunting enough" a target to consider, according to Dr. Rice, and the team was focused on trying to avoid the "pitfalls that great powers had faced in Afghanistan". She did say that even when the focus was on Al Qaeda and the Taliban, some administration officials voiced fears that Iraq might "try to take advantage of us".

Co-chair Hamilton pressured Dr. Rice to explain the fact that "By our count there were some 100 meetings by the national security principles before the first meeting was held on terrorism, on September 4th." She responded by saying that by her count it was 33 'PCs', or principles meetings. Responding to Hamilton's concerns about Bob Woodward's quoting Bush as saying "I didn't feel that sense of urgency" of the Al Qaeda threat, Rice said that the President was responding to the question of whether he had planned to assassinate Bin Laden prior to 9/11. Dr. Rice said Bush terrorism policy was moving on parallel tracks, with one focus on maintaining Clinton era policies, the other developing a new strategy, possibly more aggressive. "The Clinton administration clearly felt it a very high priority" she said, and noted that aid to Uzbekistan was increased, in accordance with Clinton administration policy suggestions. She noted that no single act or method could have prevented the attacks, and blamed the failure of intelligence teams to coordinate their information and produce a more specific threat picture. She noted that this "absence of light on what was going on in the country" was "structural" and in her assessment was due to "an allergy to the notion of domestic intelligence" inherent in American democracy.

Richard Ben-Veniste noted: "You acknowledge that Richard Clarke told you that Al Qaeda cells were in the United States," and urged Dr. Rice to explain the level of concern over this threat. Dr. Rice did acknowledge having been warned about the presence of cells by Richard Clarke, but said she does not recall having warned the President prior to 6 August. She also elaborated on the gap between Clarke's warning and government action, saying she did not recall being warned that Al Qaeda sleeper cells in the US were anything she should do anything about.

She acknowledged that the title of the 6 August 2001 Presidential Daily Brief (PDB) was "Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States", but said that it was "historical" and did not warn of any future attacks. Mr. Ben-Veniste asked Dr. Rice if the 6 August PDB did not warn that Al Qaeda preparations for an attack on American soil were "ongoing" and urged that the entire briefing be declassified. He went on to ask if the President met with the FBI director between 6 August and 11 September 2001, to which Dr. Rice had no answer.

Commissioner Fielding, former counsel to Richard Nixon, reminded Dr. Rice that she told a radio station during the 2000 campaign that domestic and foreign intelligence bodies needed "better cooperation, because we don't want to wake up one day and find that Osama Bin Laden has been successful on our territory." Dr. Rice admitted that not enough was done prior to 9/11 to make those changes, and that the work is still not done.

Dr. Rice claimed that one of the lessons of 9/11, as illustrated by repeated assertions that the Bush administration should have done more about Afghanistan prior to 9/11. Sen. Kerrey informed Dr. Rice that he fears Iraq will descend into civil war if policy there is not changed. Kerrey went on to comment his displeasure with Dr. Rice's repeated citing of the President's being "tired of swatting flies", asking for one example of Bush swatting a fly. He asserted that only in 1998, in response to the African embassy bombings, did the US swat any flies, and that was Clinton. He questioned how the President could be "tired" of something he had not yet attempted. Dr. Rice said that her impression was that the President meant he was concerned that overseas measures were inadequate.

Dr. Rice noted that on 25 January 2001, when she received a briefing on the USS Cole bombings from Clinton officials, the evidence was still inconclusive, though Al Qaeda was the primary suspect. She added that "even till this day" she has never believed a military response to the Cole bombings was advisable, given the limited options.

Throughout her testimony, Dr. Rice repeatedly claimed that the Bush administration had sent out orders to the FBI to mobilize its field offices to look into possible sleeper cells, but her contention was rebuffed by fmr. Congressman Roemer, who said the commission has repeatedly tried to ascertain whether any such activity was undertaken and that they have been unable to find anyone at the FBI who recalls being "tasked" with such heightened security measures.

Afterward, victims' families expressed being disturbed by testimony that the National Security Adviser knew there were a number of threats related to the 9/11 planning, but that she did not deliver much of the information to the President himself.

Immediately after the hearings, the 9/11 Commission requested that the White House fully declassify the Presidential Daily Brief from 6 August 2001. The White House now finds itself confronting precisely what it had sought to avoid by refusing to allow Dr. Rice to testify: the task of explaining or justifying glaring contradictions in her testimony, regarding claims about measures undertaken or threat warnings available prior to 9/11.