The Daily Signal - Threat of Another Terrorist Attack ‘Is Higher Now’ Than in Months Before 9/11, Expert Says

Episode Date: September 11, 2024

It was 23 years ago Wednesday that terrorists hijacked four U.S. commercial airline flights, turned the planes into weapons, crashed them into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania, and in the process killed nearly 3,000 people. Today, America is at risk of another equally as deadly terrorist attack, a national security expert says. The threat of another 9/11-type terrorist attack on America “is higher now than it was in the months and years preceding 9/11 for a couple of reasons,” says Robert Greenway, director of the Allison Center for National Security at The Heritage Foundation.  First, Greenway says the terrorist threat level against the U.S. is high because of “our posture abroad, our approach to our adversaries, … [and] our neglected military capacity and capability and focus.”  But America’s greatest vulnerability to another terrorist attack, he says, is “the fact that we've invited terrorist organizations to exploit our open borders, and now they are really hiding within our own population and enjoying the benefits and concealing themselves in their activities inside of our own borders.”  Greenway deployed in support of Operation Relentless Pursuit and Operation Enduring Freedom in October 2001 in the war on terrorism. He also served as a senior intelligence officer at the Defense Intelligence Agency, and then on the National Security Council.  Listen to our interview with Greenway marking the anniversary of 9/11 on today’s edition of “The Daily Signal Podcast." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Circle podcast for Wednesday, September 11th. I'm Virginia Allen. Today marks the 23rd anniversary of 9-11. Nearly 3,000 Americans lost their lives in the terrorist attack, while two planes crashed into the World Trade Centers in New York City, another into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and a fourth crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. Robert Greenway was deployed in support of Operation Relentless Pursuit and Enduring Freedom 1 in October of 2001 in response to the terrorist attack on 9-11. Greenway went on to serve later on the National Security Council and as a senior intelligence officer at the Defense Intelligence Agency.

He currently serves as the director of the Allison Center for National Security at the Heritage Foundation. And he joins us on the show today to explain what the atmosphere was like, in the U.S. military in the weeks and months after September 11th. He also assesses the current threat level that America faces and warns that the U.S. is at risk of another 9-11. Stay tuned for my conversation with Robert Greenway right after this. This is Rob Lewy from The Daily Signal. In today's media landscape, it's more important than ever to have a trusted source of news and conservative commentary. That's why we are asking

for your support. Your donation helps us. continue our mission of delivering accurate, factual reporting on the issues that matter most to you. Whether it's $5 or $500, every contribution makes a difference. Visit dailysignal.com slash donate to help us keep Americans informed and fight for conservative values. The Daily Signal is your voice for the truth. It is my honor to have back with us today, Robert Greenway, he serves, as the director for the Allison Center for National Security here at the Hair. Heritage Foundation and also previously served on the National Security Council as the Senior Intelligence Officer at the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Rob, thank you so much for being with us today. My pleasure. Good to be with you. So today marks the anniversary of 9-11. It's a day that for so many Americans, we remember exactly where we were, what we were doing. You were already working in this kind of intelligence and security space at the time. Do you remember where you were on 9-11? Sure. I was a special forces officer in serving on active duty in the Army on Fort Bragg, North Carolina. And remember seeing, as most people do, I think the first planes hit the towers. And I remember thinking to myself with others that, well, having worked in and around those towers, my dad's a carpenter in Manhattan, spent his whole career working in the field, you know, thought those towers can take quite a bit of damage. The Empire State building had been hit famously with a B-25, you know, in the 40s and with, stood, so I thought it was, you know, an accident.

The first thing that occurred to me wasn't terrorism until the second one hit. And I don't think I went home for two weeks after that and then, you know, became part of the initial planning and response. And, you know, by October we were conducting operations in Afghanistan. You deployed in October, like you said, talk a little bit about that. What were you doing? What missions were you on when you deployed? Right.

So, you know, it was a hectic period of time. One, because we were still facing the potential for domestic threats. United States and responding accordingly as necessary. So, you know, any indication of another potential terrorist attack, we would have had to have been part of the response. Second, we started to look then at where the origin of the attacks came from. And once we knew it was terrorism, there was no question. We all knew who was responsible for it. Al-Qaeda had been planning for this for a number of times that had already struck the World Trade Center in 93, and they've been active and committed to doing it ever since the coal bombing, the bombing of the embassies and Dar Salam and Iraq.

in 98. And so we started planning how to respond in the sanctuary of Afghanistan. We had some history in the unit that I was serving with looking at these options. Very difficult to project force in a very remote part of the world. So we looked at the established terrorism training camps and we looked at the sponsoring government in the Taliban, who has a close year indistinguishable relationship to al-Qaeda then and now, and started preparing accordingly. And the first target for us was was actually in the northern part of Afghanistan, but reverted to the south. And so we focused our time and attention on Mullah Omar's house north of Kandahar. Okay. What was the atmosphere like among those you were working with in the military? What do you remember kind of marking that season?

Well, you know, I think we would have called ourselves busy beforehand, you know, spending a lot of our time and attention overseas, but it was nothing compared to what would follow. I don't think we realized, you know, that we were going to be at it for decades at the pace and scale and scope that we were. But at that point, the mood was outrage, just absolute outrage. It was, you know, the closest we can imagine being to, you know, United States mood, especially in the military, to after Pearl Harbor. And so the United States has been cleared, been attacked by an outside factor. Innocent civilians have been killed almost 3,000.

Our government economy targeted. And at that point, you know, we were, you know, that's what we signed up. to do, to respond, ideally to prevent, but certainly to respond to it. So there was a universal commitment that we were going to do whatever was necessary to visit the same sort of justice to those responsible as fast and as quickly and as completely as possible. What was a normal day like in October 2001 for you deployed? You know, it's about a 16-hour day. Most of the days eventually became, you know, a bit of a blur. One sort of looked a lot like the other.

And they picked up pace. So we executed, you know, the longest air assault raid in our nation's history. And in many ways, corrected the problems established after the failed attempt to rescue the hostages in Iran, which the unit at the time of the station was formed in response to. And so conducting that raid successfully and penetrating. the headquarters in the heart of the Taliban, their equivalent of the White House, this or their leader's residence, and sending a very clear message that we can go anywhere, anytime,

that we want and sustaining it afterwards for day and day out and inserting additional forces into southern Afghanistan, depleting their capability and capacity, striking terrorist targets and residents throughout the day on a recurring nonstop basis, as our fellow units were doing in northern Afghanistan. So it was busy times for sure, but we thought we were doing exactly what we were supposed to be doing, which is visiting vengeance upon those who had killed American civilians in 9-11. Yeah. How long were you over there that first time?

It was just a period of months and then rotated back and then started to prepare for deployments and operations worldwide. In South Asia, certainly. And the hunt for al-Qaeda terrorist leadership operations personnel began in earnest. So as we would conduct an operation, exploit material, and then we began pulling the string and finding other individuals and members of the organization, that resulted in a number of detentions of senior members of al-Qaeda and associated movements, which was a busy time. Yeah. What would you say was the greatest success looking back at those months immediately

following 9-11? What did the U.S. do really, really well, and what maybe could we have done a little differently. Well, I think on the do well column, we managed to put forces into probably the one of the most remote and difficult places on the planet, for which we had not really planned, prepared, or rehearsed. The military considers options and contingencies that are almost without number, and we're famous for it. But in this case, we hadn't really prepared a large projection of force into a country like Afghanistan. So to do that in weeks was no small effort, no mean feat. Second, I think, as I said, we validated the capacity to go long distance in project forces and recover. And that was, I think, a tremendous achievement for us in the

unit that I was a member of. And so validated a capability that, you know, been recognized as required, but wasn't successful decades previously. I think that was important. And I think we started to operate on a very rapid pace. And so we developed the capability to do that. And to operate with agility. And to do it, we had to revisit constraints and boundaries that had previously been established. So there were lots of obstacles to conducting operations. Those had to be re-evaluated. And they were. And I think that we evolved rapidly as a result of it. And, you know, in some measure, a lot of those things, those restrictions have returned. Yeah. Yeah. When you think about how our military has changed since then, it's been over 20 years.

what are the areas that maybe we've really improved and gotten even stronger and better, and then what are the areas that you would say, oh, man, we've dropped some balls. Yeah, there's a lot of ways to answer the question. I'd say to me, we became very efficient. And by that, I mean, we can conduct operations almost at a time and place of our choosing against any target that we determined was feasible. The problem is I think sometimes we would lose track of the value. So it was harder for us, I think, to determine which target was the most important and which actions necessary to take.

And those are two different questions. You can be efficient, but you don't necessarily mean you're going to be effective. And so we ended up, you know, capturing, killing, detaining a number of hostages, thousands over the years in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere around the world. I think in some cases, I don't know that we'd always say that that was the most effective. So we became efficient, but in some cases I think we compromised on effectiveness and what was the most important target to take. By that, I mean the supporting infrastructure and the resources supporting terrorist organizations. In some cases, their relationship to state sponsors. So that's one way to answer the question.

Second, as a military, I think, you know, we rightly emphasized counterterrorism operations and counterinsurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we evolved and adapted. I think we knowingly accepted risk in conventional conflict, and now we find ourselves having to restore that capacity and capability. And I don't know that we can say that we're necessarily as expert at both. So we're shifting now back to look at pure competitors like the People's Republic of China or even Russia in its current form having invaded Ukraine. And I think the military has been neglected. And as you know, we're experiencing the worst recruiting crisis in the history of the all volunteer force, which is saying something.

And that is after we have a large commitment to deployed forces overseas. So it's not when we were deployed, you know, year after year for two decades. It's after all of that. And I think, again, it goes back to you join the military to do. the things that you expect a military to do, to defend and protect our country and its interests and to respond to terrorist threats and threats against our country and our partners and allies, not to receive incoming fire without the ability to respond and to be distracted by things that have nothing to do with war fighting or merit or promotion on the basis of performance and character

and I think that that is a distressing thing to see in our force. Yeah. Where does our ability to respond stand today? God forbid, we have another 9-11 situation. How would we handle that? Well, I think in some measure, we'd probably be revisiting a lot of the lessons learned. We'd have to adapt again, I think. Two reasons.

First is, I think, again, we've, you know, we're rebalancing the force structure we have now to face a different kind of foe. One, we were comfortable with in the 90s. We weren't in early 2000s. Second, we don't have the forward presence that we had established. And so we're not where the terrorists are in many cases. and that leaves us blind, it leaves us also limited in our ability to respond. So I think we would have to adapt accordingly, and I think we would have to recommit ourselves to the fight as we did after 9-11.

And invariably, after 20-some years, those capabilities and capacity can be neglected. I think we're a little bit further off or further closer to our objectives, I should say, just because we have 20 years of relatively recent history and a lot of people who are involved. but those like myself who were part of the initial response 9-11, many, but not all, have retired. Okay. How high is the threat of another 9-11 terrorist attack on the United States right now? Unfortunately, I have to say that in my judgment, it's the highest it has ever been since 9-11. I would say I'd go further and say that it's higher now than it was in the months and years preceding 9-11 for a couple of reasons.

First, you know, our posture abroad or approached our adversaries, terrorists specifically are neglected military capacity and capability and focus. But most importantly, I think the fact that we've invited terrorist organizations to exploit our open borders. And now they are really hiding within our own population and enjoying the benefits and concealing themselves and their activities inside of our own borders. Eleven hijackers to perpetrate 9-11. I mean, getting nine or 11 individuals on the terrorist. Watch the west crossing the southern border right now would be an average day.

It's staggering to think of how many terrorists are present and planning and preparing inside of our own borders. And I know just over the weekend, a Pakistani man was planning its attack from Canada to enter and conduct a shooting at a synagogue in New York City. That's just one instance. And thankfully, law enforcement caught him ahead of time. But I fear too many are already here. And we will not necessarily see them before they perpetrate their attacks. And it's unfortunate. Like that instance where that man was apprehended before he had a chance to carry out that plot.

I was asking you before we hit record, what are our capabilities now versus back in 2001 to intercept those kinds of threats to be aware of the chatter and the messages that might be being sent online or through various apps like Signal or WhatsApp? How much more do we have that capability to be aware of the threats? So I think on the one hand, our technical capacity and capability has increased significantly, and we have resourced this in order to address this threat. Second, I think our capacity really determines on focus, and I think much of our capacity just with our conventional forces shifting to other near-peer competitors. So as 9-11 recedes in the rear-very mirror, we're shifting our focus and our capacity to exploit that technical advantage to People's Republic of China, to Russia,

and to other state actors like Iran and to North Korea. And as a result of that, I think we have diminished capacity, even if our technical capacity is increased. And then lastly, I'd say because our posture worldwide is receding, as a practical matter, it becomes more difficult for us to be able to discern these threats. Lastly, and most importantly, the volume of individuals that are exploiting the protections afforded to American citizens within our borders in the United States constitutes an unprecedented risk.

the number of individuals that can conceal themselves within the United States and our borders almost negates the advantages that we have, not entirely but significantly. And that's the greatest fear that I have and why I think we have at greatest risk now and even greater risk now than we were before 9-11. Rob, something I have wondered is, is the public always made aware of thwarted threats? Are there times when the U.S. military, when our government is thwarting possible terrorist threats, And for the interest of national security, peace of mind, that information is never made public. Oh, it happens all the time.

Always has, I think, and probably increased, you know, in the decades after 9-11. It may be decreasing slightly. It is hard to tell. There are lots of reasons why it isn't made public. In many cases, our partners will know or we would alert our partners to take action, and they'd prefer we not advertise the fact that it took place for a variety of reasons. And that happens on a very routine basis. And second, there are some instances where the reason we detected a threat is why we don't want to advertise the fact that we did something about it to prevent it.

And so it would tip our hand one way or the other and alert our adversaries. So there's lots of reasons why. But attacks are routinely thwarted. And I would hope that they continue to do so. But again, our capacity to detect those threats sometimes can be diminished, especially those inside our own borders. Yeah. So we're, of course, less than two months out from an election, and this is an issue that I think is really on the minds of so many Americans. We know border and immigration is the number one issue.

There's so much happening in the Middle East. This is on everyone's mind. How would you advise the next president, whether that's Donald Trump or Kamala Harris, what would your advice to them be in your wisdom to them be about how to prevent another 9-11? Well, I think you're right. It is an election issue. I think safety is. It's one of the principal responsibilities of government. you go back to the constitutional requirements.

It's probably the preeminent requirements for our government to keep our citizens safe. And because, as I judge, we are less safe now than we have been for a very long time. My counsel to anyone coming in is to address the sort of three major problems. First is the presence inside of our own borders of known terrorists and terrorists

that may be here but were undetected because they were never encountered as they crossed over. That population has to be identified. That's going to take emphasis, it's going to take capacity, and it's going to take intelligence work as well as law enforcement work, they're going to have to be removed as judiciously as quickly as possible.

And in the meantime, we're going to have to close the border to prevent the problem from getting worse while we're doing all that. So the problem inside our borders has to be addressed first and foremost. That is it's going to be an unprecedented undertaking because the scope and scale is unprecedented itself. Second is I think we have to find the right balance between addressing modern conventional threats, China and Russia, and the terrorist threat. And I think the best way to do that is to make sure that our capacity and our partners and allies are focused on this. One of the reasons I think October the 7th surprised, not just the Israelis, but the United States is because we took our eye off the ball. And when we and our partners do it, we both get unpleasantly surprised. That was a reminder that worse can happen, as horrific that day was, the most horrific in Israel's history, the second against American civilians since 9-11.

That should serve as a reminder that we cannot afford to take our eye off the ball over. overseas and with our partners. And third is we cannot resource our adversaries. We can't provide around $100 billion, the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism, currently providing sanctuary to al-Qaeda as senior leader, Saifal Adel. We can't allow the Taliban to use the $83 billion in military equipment and infrastructure against us. In fact, I think we're the Biden administration, Biden-Harris administration is paying tens of million dollars a month to the Taliban. That's got to stop because that's just going to be used against us. And when we're attacked overseas, the message that needs to be sent is we will not tolerate it. And so if we've been attacked some 220 times

in Iraq and Syria, we need to respond forcefully. Otherwise, we send the signal that we're not going to stop or resist. And that message is exploited by our adversaries. I think those three areas of focus have to occupy the attention of whoever's in the White House. You said the Biden-Harris administration is paying money to the Taliban? Explain that. Can't be explained. There's no logical reason for it. Although I suspect if asked, they would say it's, one, humanitarian assistance being provided. But unfortunately, you're giving it to a terrorist

organization who's going to use it for their own purposes, not the people of Afghanistan who are suffering now, as they did before 9-11 when they were under Taliban rule. And second, I think they would possibly attempt to claim that we're cooperating with the Taliban against the ISIS threat.

But that's working with one terrorist group against another. They do it anyway. They don't need our help. They certainly don't need our money. And again, They have $83 billion estimated worth of military equipment and infrastructure already. The world's largest terror sanctuary and the most well-equipped terrorist state in the history of the world. Eclipses even ISIS at its apache, which resulted from a premature withdrawal from Iraq and Syria by then Vice President Biden and then General Austin. Heritage Foundation's Rob Greenway. Rob, thank you both for your time today and thank you for your service and your insight.

I really appreciate it. My pleasure. Thanks for having me. With that, that's going to do it for today's episode. for joining us here for the Daily Signal podcast. Make sure to hit that subscribe button so you never miss out on new shows. We'll see you right back here around 5 p.m. for top news. The Daily Signal podcast is made possible because of listeners like you. Executive producers are Rob Louis and Katrina Trinko. Hosts are Virginia Allen, Brian Gottstein, Tyler O'Neill, and Elizabeth Mitchell. Sound designed by Lauren Evans, Mark Geinney, John Pop, and Joseph von Spakovsky.

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