[Page: S6877]
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I have sought recognition to discuss an amendment which has been circulated with both the majority and minority, which refers to establishing procedures for a report not later than 90 days after the enactment of the defense authorization bill, for the Secretary of Defense to submit to the congressional defense committees a report containing the following: No. 1, an assessment of the current policies and practices of the Department of Defense with respect to the protection of members of the Armed Forces against terrorist attack abroad, including any modifications of such policies or practices that are proposed or implemented as a result of the assessment; and, second, an assessment of the procedures of the military departments intended to determine accountability, if any, in the command structure in instances in which a terrorist attack results in the loss of life at an installation or facility of the Armed Forces abroad.
This report is being sought because of what happened on June 25, 1996, when a bomb detonated not more than 80 feet from the Air Force housing complex known as Khobar Towers in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, killing 19 members of the Air Force and injuring hundreds more, as many as 400 more.
This incident came under very intensive scrutiny by the Intelligence Committee, which I chaired last year. I have very serious reservations as to the adequacy of the Department of Defense response to the kind of threat which was posed by having those living quarters within 80 feet of a fence.
The Department of Defense had a report on June 13, 1996 from the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Department of State, highlighting security concerns in the region in which Dhahran was located. Previously, in January 1996, the Office of Special Investigations of the Air Force issued a vulnerability assessment for the complex, and that assessment highlighted the vulnerability of perimeter security at the complex, given the proximity of the complex to a boundary fence and the lack of the protective coating mylar on its windows. And then, just 8 days before the terrorist attack, the Department of Defense received an intelligence report detailing a high level of risk to the complex. That report went to the highest levels of the Department of Defense and had the picture of Khobar Towers on it.
Immediately after the incident occurred, the Secretary of Defense, William J. Perry, said that it was very unusual to have a bomb of the magnitude of 3,000 to 5,000 pounds used in the Mideast. I took issue with that statement on a factual basis that on October 23, 1983, according to the results of the Long Commission, a bomb weighing 12,000 pounds had killed 283 marines in Beirut, in the Mideast. That is the same region where, regrettably, terrorist attacks have become all too commonplace. So it struck me as strange that the Secretary of Defense would say that a bomb weighing 3,000 to 5,000 pounds was unusual in the Mideast, when there had been a bomb of 12,000 pounds, as I say, in 1983, detonated, giving tremendous warning for just this kind of attack; and that, in fact, a reading of the Long Commission report, for anybody who had read it, would have demonstrated the kind of threat which was posed by a high-powered bomb detonated near a fence in that area.
I personally saw that fence in August 1996 when I visited Khobar Towers in Dhahran as part of my effort and the Intelligence
Committee's efforts to try to find out exactly what had happened there. We had testimony from General Peay, who was the four-star commander in the area, who testified before a Senate committee in early July. Asked about the closeness of the perimeter fence to those living quarters, `Was it too close?' he said words to the effect of, `I don't know. I just don't know.'
Certainly after the fact it is hard to understand how a ranking general would not know that that fence was too close to the living quarters and, realistically, before the fact, it seems hard to understand how the commanding general would not know about the extraordinary and unwarranted danger which was faced by the airmen who were living in those quarters.
The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Shalikashvili, had visited Dhahran in the spring of 1996 and was within sight of Khobar Towers, although, as I understand it, he did not actually visit Khobar. But a question to be raised and a question to be answered, which has not yet been answered by the Department of Defense, is why the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when in the area, within sight of Khobar Towers, knowing what the security risks were, did not take a look at that facility and make an assessment as to the vulnerability, since he was on the spot. That is especially true in light of the fact that there had been an attack in Riyahd, Saudi Arabia, in November 1995, killing a number of Americans, and that four Saudis had been executed by the Saudi Government in late May 1996, which would give rise to a concern as to what the militants in Saudi Arabia would do next. That was especially troublesome to the United States from a number of points of view, one of which was that the FBI, charged with investigating those matters overseas, had not been given access to those terrorists before they were executed.
So, here you have the general on the spot, a brigadier general, with the fence 80 feet from the towers, you have the four-star general in command of the overall area even after the fact, not knowing whether there was an unacceptable risk, and you have the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the vicinity, within sight of Khobar Towers, and no corrective action taken notwithstanding all of these warnings which had been given in a number of contexts about the danger which was present there.
Following the attack on Khobar Towers, a commission was formed with General Downing, a retired four-star general, in command. When he testified before the Intelligence Committee on September 19, 1996, among other questions I asked him about a series of criteria established by the Secretary of Defense, Secretary William J. Perry, about what the responsibility was of the Secretary of Defense.
General Downing testified that even under Secretary Perry's two standards they were not met. The first two standards articulated by Secretary Perry were `establishing the policies and guidance for our commanders, including the policy and guidance for force protection.'
I asked General Downing:
[Page: S6901]
. . . Was there an adequate policy and guidance on force protection?
General Downing's response:
No, there was not, Senator.
Then I asked about Secretary Perry's second criterion, organizing and structuring the Department of Defense in such a way that force protection is optimal. Then the question was:
So did they meet the second criterion which stated `organizing and structuring the Department of Defense in such a way that force protection is optimal?'
General Downing:
The answer is no.
I ask unanimous consent, Mr. President, that at the conclusion of my remarks this extract from the hearings before the Intelligence Committee be printed in the Record.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibit 1.)
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, in sequence, the committee then learned that there had been a report on the force protection issue, `Force Protection in Southwest Asia, An Air Force Perspective,' dated September 17. Our committee learned about this as a result of a report in the press, the Washington Post specifically, on October 10, 1996. So by letter dated October 17, 1996, Senator Robert Kerrey, vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, and I, in my capacity as chairman, wrote to Secretary of the Air Force, Sheila Widnall, asking for a copy of that report.
I ask unanimous consent that the letter dated October 17, 1996, be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibit 2.)
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, the next sequence of events was a letter which I sent to Secretary Perry, with a copy to Air Force Secretary Widnall, dated November 5, 1996, which reads as follows:
This letter constitutes a formal complaint on the obstruction by you, others and the Department of Defense on the inquiry by the Intelligence Committee to determine whether there was an intelligence failure relating to the terrorist attack in Dhahran on June 25, 1996 on the following:
1. Prohibiting key witnesses from being interviewed by this Committee (Brigadier General Terryl Schwalier, Colonel Gary Boyle, Lt. Colonel James Traister).
Notwithstanding our efforts to interview these key personnel, the Department of Defense precluded the Intelligence Committee from conducting those interviews.
Second, in my letter to Secretary Perry, I pointed out the concerns we had on prohibiting General Downing from testifying before the Intelligence Committee except on the terms set forth by the Secretary of Defense with that questioning only being in closed session. With our interest in having an open session, with General Downing having told the Intelligence Committee that he was employed by the Department of Defense and had to comply with instructions not to testify in open session, the impact of that was obvious. When General Downing testified in closed session that Secretary Perry had not even followed the Secretary's own criteria for force protection, it was not much of an impact contrasted to what it would have been had it been in open session.
The third item:
Refusing to give this committee access to an Air Force report which, as reported in the Washington Post on October 10.
Then, finally, on November 6, after this letter was faxed on November 5, we received a response from General Trapp dated
November 6, 1996, which I ask unanimous consent be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibit 3.)
Mr. SPECTER. Then there is my reply dated December 5 stating that that reply was insufficient, and referring to other letters. I ask unanimous consent that my letter of December 5 be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibit 4.)
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I then note an article in the New York Times dated December 12, 1996, which discussed release of another report which apparently had been leaked to the New York Times for reasons set forth in the New York Times article, which said:
Officials sympathetic to the Air Force position made available Wednesday selected parts of a classified review the Air Force conducted into the bombing. The review, written by Lt. Gen. James F. Record, commander of the 12th Air Force, cites, for example, the assessment of a senior U.S. intelligence official in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, that the intelligence reports given to General Schwalier `did not give a target' for the terrorist attack.
So, by this time, some of the Air Force were dissatisfied with General Downing's report and wanted a report which would satisfy them. So another report had been commissioned, this time to be written by Lt. Gen. James F. Record.
On seeing that additional news leak of the report, which the Intelligence Committee did not have a copy of, Mr. President, I then wrote to Secretary Widnall on the same day, December 12, noting the access by the New York Times but no access by the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Again, I ask unanimous consent that the New York Times article of December 12, and my letter to Secretary Widnall dated December 12 be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibits 5 and 6.)
[Page: S6902]
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, in the next series of events, I note a story in the New York Times which, again, makes reference to these reports which the Intelligence Committee never had access to, quoting `Gen. Ronald Fogleman, the Air Force Chief of Staff, arguing that the case for accountability is nothing more than a Washington scalp hunt.'
I then wrote, again, to Secretary of the Air Force, Sheila Widnall, on April 25, 1997, noting the comments by General Fogleman and again asking that these reports be made available to the Senate, to me, and to the Senate Intelligence Committee.
I again ask unanimous consent that at the conclusion of my remarks copies of the New York Times article dated April 15, 1997, together with my letter dated April 25, 1997, be printed in the Record.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibits 7 and 8.)
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, all of these letters to Secretary of the Air Force went unanswered. Then, on May 21 of this year, the Air Force had the responsibility of coming to the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. I had an opportunity, finally, to ask Secretary Widnall these questions and why there had not been any response to any of these letters of inquiry and the question of General Fogleman on this subject.
Finally, subsequent to that meeting, I received a very brief letter from Secretary Widnall, in fact, after I had bumped into her in the hallway on the 7th floor of the Hart Building and said to her, `Madam Secretary, why don't you at least respond to the letters saying that you can't respond if that is your point because there is an inquiry underway?'
In the context of all the letters which had been written and that conversation, I finally received a letter saying she could not respond, the matter was being reviewed now by the new Secretary of
Defense, and that, in due course, a copy of the report would be obtained by Senators.
Here we are on July 7, 1997 and still no copy of the report has been made available to this Senator or, to the best of my knowledge, to other Senators, but copies of the report were made available to the news media as it suits the purposes of the Department of the Air Force and the Department of Defense.
Mr. President, in offering this amendment, it is my hope we will have a statement of law requiring a report so we know what action is being considered in the future to protect personnel of the Department of Defense from terrorist attacks. News reports of the past week, an article in the Washington Post a week ago yesterday, reported the Secretary of Defense expected to make a finding sometime during the month of July. It is my hope that when the Secretary of Defense speaks on the subject, that he will go beyond the conduct of General Schwalier, which was criticized in the early report, and will pick up the issues of the conduct of the Department of Defense generally.
Brigadier General Schwalier's conduct was criticized in the Downing report, but, to my way of thinking, that is not nearly enough of an answer as to the conduct beyond Brigadier General Schwalier, moving to a four-star general, moving to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Shalikashvili, and moving to the Secretary of Defense himself, William J. Perry.
In this context, it is my judgment that the record shows forcefully and conclusively that there were warnings all along the line; that when you have a fence 80 feet from living quarters of hundreds of Air Force personnel within easy distance of a large bomb, a bomb, according to defense estimates, the Secretary of Defense, of 3,000 to 5,000 pounds, substantially smaller than the experience of the 12,000-pound bomb in Beirut in 1983, that there was forceful, obvious, and conclusive neglect of duty. It goes beyond the brigadier general on the scene. It goes to the commanding four star general, it goes to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and it goes to the Secretary of Defense.
If we are to have confidence in what the Secretary of Defense does in putting young men and women in harm's way, then there has to be accountability for the 19 airmen who died on June 25 in Khobar Towers and for the 400 who were wounded. That, Mr. President, is what I hope will come from the findings of the Secretary of Defense.
In the meantime, this requirement for a report will be some help to the future. But if we permit on this record those responsible, those in the chain of command to go by unscathed, unreprimanded, unaccounted for, then it is a blank check and open invitation for this kind of conduct to be repeated in the future.
The problems of terrorism are too serious to turn our back on what happened at Dhahran on June 25, 1996. I personally consider inexcusable that we have had more than a year pass and nothing has been said in an official way by the Department of Defense, the Department of the Air Force, and all of the components, this is to say nothing about who the terrorists are who have escaped punishment, and that is a matter which yet has to be reckoned with.
But within our own Department of Defense, we have a right to expect better, and I, for one, am awaiting the report of the Secretary of Defense to see what the position of the Department of Defense is. But at least as to the future, we will have some indication as to what precautionary measures will be taken for the future, but there also has to be an answer for the past. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
Chairman Specter. I am going to try to finish up in the course of the next few minutes. It's been a long morning for you, I know, gentlemen.
I want to go to Secretary Perry's testimony on his articulation of the responsibility of the Secretary of Defense, and what I want to try to do is get your insights, your judgment, General Downing, having headed the task force and having done the investigation, having a lot of experience in the military, from 1962 when you graduated from West Point, to 1996, when you had retired, this is what Secretary Perry said as to his responsibility.
I manifest this responsibility in four important ways. First of all, by establishing the policies and guidance for our commanders, including the policy and guidance for force protection.
I think I already know your answer from your report, but was there an adequate policy and guidance on force protection?
General Downing. No, there was not, Senator.
Chairman Specter. Secondly, by organizing and structuring the Department of Defense in such a way that force protection is optimal. And I would include in that his testimony later where he said, quote, `But General Downing is correct in saying that we do not have a budgetary focus on force protection, nor do we have a budgetary focus in our resource allocation process, in the institutional process by which we decide how to pass funds out to different programs.' So did they meet the, quote, `organizing and structuring the Department of Defense in such a way that force protection is optimal.'
General Downing. The answer is no. We gave them some recommendations on how to do that better.
Chairman Specter. And third, and I guess this is included in what I just said, by allocating resources to our commanders, including resources for force protection.
General Downing. Sir, we--that was one where we did not find--we found that--there was not a good structure for it, but that they had not been denied funds for force protection. The field had not been denied funds for force protection.
Chairman Specter. And finally, by carefully selecting and supervising the military and civilian leadership in the Department of Defense--and I asked you if that was meant, first as to the Secretary, and then as to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who have these reports up from General Peay's unit as to delegation of authority and guidance, etc. Was that criterion met?
General Downing. Senator, I believe that the Secretary met that and that the inherent responsibility of commanders for force protection is something I don't believe the Secretary of Defense has to tell a commander he needs to do.
Chairman Specter. How about as to the Joint Chiefs of Staff?
General Downing. The Joint Chiefs of Staff, we felt and we recommended that they change those command relationships.
[Page: S6903]
Select Committee on Intelligence,
Washington, DC, October 17, 1996.
Hon. Sheila E. Widnall,
Secretary of the Air Force,
The Pentagon, Washington, DC.
Dear Secretary Widnall: As you know, the Committee is reviewing the adequacy of intelligence support and its use by consumers in the context of the recent terrorism incidents affecting your forces in Saudi Arabia. Recently it came to our attention that the Air Force completed a report entitled `Force Protection in Southwest Asia, An Air Force Perspective,' dated 17 September 1996. This report was quoted in Washington Post article appearing October 10, 1996.
Since we have been unable to obtain a copy of the report through your legislative liaison office, we are forwarding our request for a copy of this report directly to you and ask for your assistance. Given the widespread coverage of the report in the media and its importance to our ongoing oversight responsibilities, there can be little justification for not promptly providing a copy to the Committee.
Sincerely,
ARLEN SPECTER,
Chairman.
J. ROBERT KERREY,
Vice Chairman.
Department of the Air Force,
Washington, DC, November 6, 1996.
Hon. Arlen Specter,
Chairman, Select Committee on Intelligence,
U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
Dear Mr. Chairman: This is in response to your joint letter of October 17, 1996, regarding what you describe as a document concerning force protection in Southwest Asia that was referred to in a Washington Post article on October 10, 1996.
Contrary to the implications in the article, the Air Force has not issued a report entitled `Force Protection in Southwest Asia, An Air Force Perspective.' Rather, a preliminary briefing was prepared by the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff, Plans and Operations, for internal use on the consideration and evaluation of the protection of our forces against terrorism following the bombing of Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia. That preliminary briefing has now been given to Lieutenant General Record for his use in reviewing this matter and considering issues of accountability. When Lieutenant General Record's process is complete, we will be glad to provide the Committee with the results of his review and related official documents.
A similar letter is being provided to Vice Chairman Kerrey who joined you in your letter.
Sincerely,
Lansford E. Trapp, Jr.,
Director, Legislative Liaison.
Select Committee on Intelligence,
Washington, DC, December 5, 1996.
Hon. Sheila E. Widnall,
Secretary of the Air Force,
The Pentagon, Washington, DC.
Dear Secretary Widnall: I want you to know that I consider the letter from Brig. Gen. Lansford E. Trapp, Jr., of November 6, 1996, totally insufficient in response to the letter from Senator Kerrey and me to you dated October 17, 1996, and the copy of the letter which I sent to you dated November 5, 1996, with the original going to Secretary Perry.
Sincerely,
Arlen Specter.
Washington: The Air Force has concluded that the general in charge of a military housing complex in Saudi Arabia where 19 Americans were killed and 500 wounded in a terrorist truck-bombing last June took reasonable steps to protect against attack and should not be punished in any way.
The finding contradicts a major conclusion of a separate Pentagon investigation in September that singled out the Air Force officer, Brig. Gen. Terryl Schwalier, for failing to adequately safeguard the Khobar Towers complex in Dhahran, where the blast occurred.
Senior Pentagon officials, who described the results of the Air Force inquiry Wednesday on condition of anonymity, said the Air Force found the deaths a terrible tragedy, but not the fault of Schwalier.
The officials said the inquiry concludes that none of the 10 officers responsible for the safety of the troops in Dhahran violated any laws, Air Force regulations or codes of conduct.
Under military law, the Air Force decides who, if anyone, should be held accountable for a disaster like the Dhahran bombing. The punishments range from mild reprimands to court-martial proceedings that can lead to prison terms. In this case, the Air Force recommended that no punishment of any kind was warranted.
Officials said Air Force Secretary Sheila Widnall and Gen. Ronald Fogleman, the Air Force chief of staff, had approved the decision to exonerate the officers. They said that the finding was expected to be announced later this month. Defense Secretary William Perry has the authority to overrule the Air Force decision, but Pentagon officials said that he would be unlikely to do so.
`Surely there is a desire to hang somebody for this,' said a senior Pentagon official who supports the Air Force decision. `But as you look back over the evidence it's pretty hard without 20-20 hindsight to say, `I'd have done that.'
The truck bomb exploded on Schwalier's last day as commander of the air base and housing complex in Dhahran. He is now in a Pentagon job overseeing Air Force operations and is awaiting a promotion to major general.
`It's the wrong call,' one official involved in the initial Pentagon investigation said of the Air Force's decision to exonerate the general. `It just bothers me from standpoint of the families. It's not right.'
The question of responsibility in the bombing has caused deep strains among the armed services.
While some senior officers have been reprimanded for their roles in recent military disasters, it is rare for a general to face court-martial.
When two Air Force F-15 fighters flying over northern Iraq mistakenly shot down two U.S. Army helicopters in 1994, killing all 26 people aboard, only a captain serving as a weapons-control officer in an AWACS control place went to trial. He was acquitted.
Similarly, none of the 16 officers, including two generals, who were disciplined in connection with the crash in April in Croatia that killed Commerce Secretary Ron Brown and 34 others, were court-martialed.
But a Defense Department investigation, headed by a retired Army officer, Gen. Wayne A. Downing, issued a scathing report that said Schwalier `did not protect his forces from a terrorist attack.'
The Pentagon report said Schwalier did not heed intelligence reports that Khobar Towers was highly vulnerable to terrorist attack, even though there had already been one deadly terrorist bombing against U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia.
Among a number of warnings was one eerily prescient. A security officer wrote that the tightened security on the base could lead terrorists to strike with a truck bomb at the base's fence.
Air Force officials said they weighed the same evidence that Downing's commission examined, but came to very different conclusions about culpability.
Officials sympathetic to the Air Force position made available Wednesday selected parts of a classified review the Air Force conducted into the bombing. The review, written by Lt. Gen. James F. Record, commander of the 12th Air Force, cites, for example, the assessment of a senior U.S. intelligence official in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, that the intelligence reports
given to Schwalier `did not give a target' for a terrorist attack.
In addition, Record's review quotes the U.S. consul general in Dhahran, David Winn, saying, `No one really thought that anything would happen in Dhahran.'
Air Force officials also said Schwalier took several steps to protect the housing complex, from increasing the number of guard posts to installing a double row of concrete highway barriers around the fence-line.
Air Force officials acknowledged that those measures were inadequate. `There's no disagreement there,' said the senior Pentagon official who supports the Air Force decision. `The fact is, 19 people were killed. But then the issue becomes, was there dereliction of duty?'
Record, who had the power to recommend Schwalier face court-martial, concluded there was no such neglect of duty. Widnall and Fogleman concurred.
`People need to understand that accountability is a two-edged sword,' said the senior Pentagon official who supports the Air Force decision. `If you examine someone's actions and you find them wanting, you hold them accountable. But if you define that as court-martialing everyone, I can't live by your definition.
`At the same time, if you believe that person is not culpable,' the Pentagon official continued, `then it's every bit your obligation to stand up and defend that person. If you don't do that, you'll erode the fighting spirit of commanders. You'll have people looking over their shoulders. They'll always know they'll be second-guessed by people in Washington.'
The attack in Saudi Arabia continues to create thorny problems for the Clinton administration. In response to FBI complaints that Saudi officials had been uncooperative in what was to have been a joint inquiry, Riyadh has recently turned over information to support its contention that the bombing plot was heavily supported by Iran.
The information included videotaped interviews with some of the several dozens suspects arrested after the bombing. But some law enforcement officials expressed skepticism over the interviews, saying they lacked credibility because the confessions may have been obtained under duress.
The Air Force signaled months ago it did not believe Schwalier was to blame. In an internal review that paralleled Downing's inquiry, Air Force officials said Schwalier's responsibility extended only to the fenced perimeter of the base.
Beyond that, the responsibility for security belonged to the Saudis. The truck bomb exploded in a parking lot just outside the base's property.
[Page: S6904]
Select Committee on Intelligence,
Washington, DC, December 12, 1996.
Hon. Sheila E. Widnall,
Secretary of the Air Force, The Pentagon, Washington, DC.
Dear Secretary Widnall: Please reference my letters to you of October 17, November 5, and December 5, 1996.
According to The New York Times today, selected portions of the Air Force report on Dhahran have already been made available to the news media by representatives of the Air Force who are favorably disposed to the Air Force report.
I would like your prompt advice as to whether that news report is accurate.
In any event, this is a formal demand that the report be turned over to the Intelligence Committee forthwith.
Sincerely,
Arlen Specter.
It will be interesting to see if Defense Secretary William Cohen has the moxie to hold the Air Force accountable for security failures in Saudi Arabia last year. So far the Pentagon's handling of the terrorist bombing in Dhahran that killed 19 American airmen and wounded 500 has followed a dismally familiar script. The Air force high command has sloughed off responsibility, betting that top civilians will once again bow to the shopworn argument that punishing individual commanders is unfair and would damage morale.
Mr. Cohen, who knew how to cut through thicker Pentagon smokescreens as a Senator, can set an admirably exacting standard for his stewardship as Defense Secretary by overturning the Air Force decision. The principle of civilian leadership of the military requires the application of independent judgment in cases like this. Since Air Force Secretary Sheila Widnall seems a willing captive of her service, Mr. Cohen must show that accountability in the American military is not governed by the protective instincts of the officer corps.
The security breakdown at the Khobar Towers apartment complex in Dhahran last June is beyond dispute. Though safeguards were enforced to prevent a suicide truck bomber from entering the compound, the towers were left exposed to attack from a nearby parking area. When a large truck bomb was detonated there last June, the explosion sheared off the northern facade of two towers.
The perimeter security fence was barely 35 yards from the buildings. Despite intelligence warnings about a possible terrorist attack, Air Force commanders made only a feeble effort to extend the perimeter. Even the most elementary and inexpensive defense--covering windows with a plastic film to prevent shattering--was not used. Many of the deaths and injuries were caused by flying glass.
These and other lapses were made plain in a Pentagon investigation conducted by a retired Army general, Wayne Downing. The Downing report concluded that Brig. Gen. Terryl Schwalier, the Air Force commander in Dhahran, `did not adequately protect his forces from a terrorist attack.' General Schwalier did not even bother to make security a primary concern on his watch.
Now comes Gen. Ronald Fogleman, the Air Force Chief of Staff, arguing that the case for accountability is nothing more than a Washington scalp hunt. His view, in essence, is that General Schwalier and his staff did everything they reasonably could to secure the compound and that the method and explosive power of the bombing exceeded any threat that could have been anticipated.
Yet the destruction of the Alfred Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City 14 months before the Dhahran attack showed the power of a large truck bomb placed near but not inside a high-rise building. It was lesson enough for the Secret Service, which quickly closed a stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue to expand the security perimeter around the White House.
General Fogleman mistakes his own blind loyalty for leadership. Morale is not served by dodging responsibility and circling the wagons around a fellow officer. Perhaps honor and duty are just quaint notions these days, but Mr. Cohen might actually do wonders for the morale of Americans in uniform if he rules that the Air Force cannot escape responsibility for its failures in Dhahran.
Committee on Veterans' Affairs,
Washington, DC, April 25, 1997.
Hon. Sheila Widnall,
Secretary, Department of the Air Force, Washington, DC.
Dear Secretary Widnall: I have noted repeated press accounts on an Air Force report on the responsibility, if any, for the terrorist attack at Dhahran on June 25, 1996.
As you know, I have made repeated requests for copies of all DoD, including Air Force, reports on this incident.
According to press reports, Secretary of Defense William Cohen is personally reviewing this matter.
I would very much appreciate it if you would promptly provide to me a copy of any report on assessing responsibility for the Dhahran terrorist attack of June 25, 1996.
Sincerely,
Arlen Specter.