The official explanation, of course, is that they were agents of Osama bin Laden, terrorists in the ongoing al-Qaida enterprise. What the congressional investigation told us was that the intelligence community didn't have any way to predict exactly what would happen on Sept. 11. In the language of the report, "Beginning in 1998 and continuing into the summer of 2001, the intelligence community received a modest, but relatively steady, stream of intelligence reporting that indicated the possibility of terrorist attacks within the United States." And what that language calls to mind is that the office of Homeland Security has told us that we should anticipate another attack in the near future.
How to prepare ourselves? Is there a further precaution to take, beyond removing our shoes at airports?
That question brings us back to Saudi Arabia. Whatever the detours taken, it was Saudi money that financed the terrorists of 9/11, and we continue to learn that Saudi money is circulating through U.S. foundations and charities, financing mischievous activity. The Saudis had, in the attack on Riyadh in May, a taste of terrorism on their own soil. There are reports that Saudi officials are cracking down on security risks.
But Saudi Arabia is a mess. They're good at chopping off the heads of people clearly guilty of high treason, but not so good at diligent measures to abort the gestation of such people. For all its wealth, Saudi Arabia is an incompetent, backward, bureaucratic, strategically illiterate rich lump. Tiny Qatar, operating in the bosom of Saudi Arabia, continues to sponsor al-Jazeera, the Goebbels of the Middle East. On Thursday, it broadcast one more message by Saddam Hussein urging more activity by al-Qaida. More killing. What do the Saudis need to stanch that nosebleed?