Takedown: Inside the Hunt for Al Qaeda

1 The 9/11 Aftermath

C h a p T e r 1 the 9/11 afterMath The eISenhOwer executive Office Building stands next to the west wing of the white house, across the avenue inside the white house complex that passes by the permanent TV stands where commentators on the nightly news can report with the white house residence and the west wing as a backdrop. “Old eOB,” as it is known, is often described as a weddingcake building: an ornate edifice with black-and-white checkerboard marble floors and high-ceilinged offices. The building is lovely but too elaborate, too expensive, too spacious for a world in which scrutiny of government spending would mean that no one would think of designing a modern-day version. It is a relic of another age, when heels echoed down marble halls and decisions were considered behind mahogany desks without the speed of electrons or the 24-hour press of media, Congress, and life in the capital. For me, it was a wonder to come to washington as a junior government official—at the CIa—and find myself, fifteen years later, walking to work every day along the executive avenue that runs beside the west wing. It seemed more of a TV show set, not a daily commuting route. walking outside you might see some foreign leader you’d only ever heard of in the news getting out of a limousine to walk through the west wing doors, a nationally recognizable correspondent you’d only ever seen on TV, or a senior government official whose name had only ever been the title page of a document. all this 2 CHAPTER 1 coming to life in the compound that represented the political heartbeat of a political city that is at the power center of the globe. But it was not a wonder to live in that city on that day. On a remarkably clear morning that rivaled the best early fall days swampy, humid washington can offer, we thought that our office building might be the next target. During a chaotic few hours on September 11, we went quickly from a buzz about what appeared to be a tragic but isolated airplane hitting a tower in new York—I first thought it might be a wayward Cessna—to twin strikes by commercial airliners that had us believing there might be many more in the air. I met an old friend on that crisp, energizing morning at a local institution, Swing’s Coffee, across the street from the office. Swing’s coffee was good, but it never seemed out-of-the-ordinary special. Picking a new Starbucks over the old Swing’s, though, would have seemed like sacrilege, so a few of us regularly met there. we would trade insights about issues in the Middle east and South asia, which was my portfolio at the national Security Council, or talk about what was going on in washington, one of ten thousand similar conversations that make up the information exchanges that are the heartbeat of policymaking in the city. new York does money; washington does power, policy, and politics. none of us was rich, but we all had interesting jobs. Many of us working these issues had known each other for years, and we all talked. washington seems big, and daunting, to a newcomer, but it shrinks quickly in foreign policy circles. when I returned to the Old eOB office from the coffee shop, it was humming with the news that a plane had flown into the one of the world Trade Center towers. we all flipped on TVs, watching that tower while the regular workday waited. For those few desperate minutes, the mood was not yet frantic: the short-lived assumption was that this was a one-off event, a tragedy, certainly, but not a national emergency. Quickly, the second impact changed everything. It seemed like a dream, the rapid realization that this could be no accident, no coincidence. Then, within minutes, someone spread the word in our office—after the second strike and the rapid realization that this was an orchestrated terrorist strike on america—that we might be the next target for a commandeered aircraft approaching washington. It made sense, with the white house next door, and the lack of hard information meant that we could only speculate during the moments before evacuation. THE 9/11 AFTERMATH 3 The mundane thought crossed my mind, during those first frenzied moments , that even the seconds of searching for a...