[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 18706-18707]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                    ESTABLISHING A BOARD OF INQUIRY

  Mr. TORRICELLI. Mr. President, when this Chamber was new and Members 
of the Senate were gathering in their first years, they were confronted 
with the reality of a civil war which had consumed over 860,000 lives 
and the rebuilding of our Republic. Even with those daunting tasks, 
there was a recognition that somehow the institutions of our Government 
had failed to deal with the crisis, to avert the struggle.
  Even in that atmosphere, those who preceded us created a board of 
inquiry as to the reasons of the war and how it was executed and what 
might lie ahead for the country.
  That civil war debate created a foundation which through two 
centuries has created a consistent pattern for this Congress. In times 
of national trouble or trauma, part of dealing with the realities of 
our problems and preparing for the future required a dispassionate 
analysis of the problem.
  While survivors were still being taken out of the North Atlantic from 
the sinking of the Titanic, a board of inquiry met to determine the 
failures of maritime safety.
  Three weeks after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, a board of 
inquiry began to examine why our Nation was not prepared and how the 
institutions of our country had failed to respond to the looming threat 
and the reality of the attack.
  In the ensuing years, we returned again and again to this trusted 
form of analysis that allowed our people to trust a result and the 
Congress to prepare to avoid the same circumstances in the future: a 
commission that was formed after the assassination of President Kennedy 
and the board that convened after the Challenger accident.
  In each of these instances, I have no doubt a Senator rose and said 
it is difficult to deal with examining the reasons for the war of 1861 
because our time is consumed with the reality of the situation. How can 
one deal with the reality of the situation if we do not know the 
reasons for the problem?
  How can we simply give more resources to the same institutions, more 
power to those institutions if we doubted they had the ability or used 
those powers or resources properly in the first instance? Indeed, one 
can only imagine when President Roosevelt required a board of inquiry 
on preparedness and the response to Pearl Harbor how admirals and 
generals, scrambling to defend the Nation and execute the war, must 
have felt about diverting resources to deal with the inquiry.
  It was recognized by those who sat in these chairs before us, as we 
should recognize now, that the credibility of the institutions 
involved, the confidence in their leadership, a dispassionate, removed 
analysis of their powers is a foundation before implementing a new 
policy to avert the same problems.
  A number of my colleagues are joining with me in the coming days in 
introducing legislation to create a board of inquiry regarding the 
terrorist attacks of September 11. It is my intention to offer it as an 
amendment to legislation that is currently working its way through the 
Senate dealing with this tragedy.
  As the Senate properly responds to the administration's request for 
more power in Federal institutions, the people need to know how those 
institutions use the power they possess and to restore confidence in 
those institutions as they execute these powers.
  The Senate properly allocates billions of dollars more for national 
security and law enforcement and the protection of our people. People 
of our country justifiably will want to know, as antiterrorist 
activities in the last 5 years increased by 300 percent, why that money 
was not sufficient or why it failed to protect our country.
  It speaks well of this Congress that we are willing to do so much to 
protect our country, to avert a future terrorist attack, but I have 
3,000 families in New Jersey who have a husband or a mother or a wife 
or a child who will never come home. Of the 6,500 potentially dead 
victims of the New York attack alone, and the hundreds of families in 
Virginia, the families of New Jersey are going to want to know not 
simply what are we doing in the future, but what happened in the past.
  How did an intelligence community that is larger financially than the 
military establishments of our largest rivals fail to uncover the 
intentions of these terrorists? How did all of our technology prove 
unable to intercept their communications? How, with all of the 
interceptions that have taken place, were we unable to analyze the 
information and predict the attack? How, indeed, in law enforcement, 
given the presence of these same terrorist organizations in previous 
attacks from the same locations on the same target, were we unable to 
infiltrate these organizations?
  It may well be that there is a good explanation for each of these 
failures. Indeed, it may prove that everything that was humanly 
possible was done to the fullest extent conceivable. It may be there 
are institutional failures and conflicts, so that all the money 
conceivable will not prevent a future attack if powers are not properly 
distributed or the proper people do not have authority or there are 
breakdowns in command or communication.
  I cannot predict any of these answers, but what is important is 
neither can anyone else in this Congress or the administration because 
without some analysis, as we have done throughout our country's 
history, we will never know. Indeed, if we fail to have a board of 
inquiry in the midst of this crisis about these circumstances, I 
believe history will instruct us it will be the first time in the 
history of the Republic that the Government did not hold itself 
accountable and subject to analysis when our American people have faced 
a crisis of this magnitude.
  The people deserve an answer. The Government should hold itself 
accountable, and only a board of inquiry, independent of the Congress 
and the Executive, has the credibility to do it.
  Dealing with the issue of accountability for the past, I want to, for 
a moment, deal with prevention in the future. This Senate is rightfully 
responding to the problem of the hijackings by comprehensive 
legislation dealing with airline security. It is only right and proper 
we should do so. Our Nation is dependent on the airlines. The economic 
contagion from this tragedy has affected every State in our Union. 
Cynics will decry that we are simply closing the barn door, but indeed 
there is no choice but to do so lest terrorists travel through that 
barn door again.
  What is significant is it is not adequate to respond to these 
terrorist attacks, enhancing the security of our people, by responding 
in one dimension. It is unlikely these terrorists or others who would 
conspire with them, or act in concert with their actions, will respond 
again in the same manner by the same mode as the last terrorist 
attacks. If indeed the bin Laden organization is responsible, the 
history of their actions suggests each time they strike they strike in 
a different mode,

[[Page 18707]]

in a different method, sometimes in a different place.
  Obviously, I support this airline security legislation but it is not 
enough. From our reservoirs to our powerplants to other modes of 
transportation, we need to secure the Nation. It needs to be more 
comprehensive.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time in morning business has 
expired.
  Mr. TORRICELLI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 5 
additional minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. TORRICELLI. Many of my colleagues have joined me in insisting the 
Airline Security Act also include rail security. We do so for the 
following reason: In my State alone, nearly a quarter of a million 
people ride railroads every day, many of them through old tunnels. The 
tunnels under the Hudson River were built between 1911 and 1920. As 
this photograph illustrates, they are largely without ventilation. This 
is a single fan to exhaust smoke from a fire in a two and a half mile 
tunnel.
  Every Amtrak Metroliner, if fully loaded, under the Hudson River or 
the Baltimore tunnels, or even the approaches to Washington, DC, 
carries 2,000 passengers, more than three times the number of people on 
a 747. The tunnels do not have ventilation and they do not have 
escapes.
  As this second photograph illustrates, under the East River of New 
York and under the Hudson River, a single spiral staircase serves to 
exit 500 to 2,000 passengers. The same spiral staircase would be used 
for firefighters getting to the train. It is obviously not adequate.
  Last August, before these attacks occurred, the New York State 
Commission said it was a disaster waiting to happen. Those are not the 
only problems. We need police officers on Amtrak trains. We need to 
screen luggage. We need to ensure that switching mechanisms are 
safeguarded and secure. This Congress will do a good deed for the 
American people if indeed we secure our airlines, but it is unlikely we 
would be so fortunate that terrorists will choose this same method and 
mode for the next attack.
  Securing Amtrak and commuter trains is essential. The legislation we 
will offer, $3.2 billion, will secure the tunnels, hire police 
officers, assure screening, and bring our train transportation network 
to the same new high standards as our aircraft.
  It is essential. It is timely, and I hope my colleagues around the 
country understand those of us in the Northeast and the great 
metropolitan areas of Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, and Boston cannot 
yield on this point, not with hundreds of thousands of commuters having 
their lives depending upon it every day.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.

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