THURSDAY, May 16, 2002 — Today’s headlines are enraging. Enraging. I refer, of course, to the blockbuster news that President George W. Bush was informed in early August by the Central Intelligence Agency that Osama bin Laden’s men were preparing to hijack American planes. The news comes on top of another recent disclosure that an FBI agent in Phoenix warned, in writing, of the suspicious presence of Middle Eastern individuals in American flight schools — also mentioning bin Laden by name. Nobody, evidently, ever put the CIA’s warning together with that of the FBI agent, and nobody took the CIA warning alone very seriously.

" We were a peacetime society, and the FBI had a different mission, " Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer told the press.

It’s probably unfair to fault Bush for failing to put together a CIA warning he knew about with an FBI memo he did not. But it’s perfectly legitimate to fault Bush, who, after all ran a presidential campaign based partially on being able to out-hawk the feckless administration of President Bill Clinton, for not getting the FBI to take warnings of terrorism more seriously. Contrary to Fleischer’s assertions about the FBI and the claim that America was at peace prior to September 11, the facts say otherwise. We may not have been at war with Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network, but the al Qaeda was at war with us. Did they not in 1998 destroy American embassies in Africa — both considered American soil under international law? Was not Osama bin Laden the leading suspect in the suicide-bomb boating attack on the USS Cole off the coast of Yemen only weeks before Bush’s fight with Vice-President Al Gore ended in a tie in November?

Fleischer also states that the administration had no idea that these bin Laden operatives would attempt a suicide-plane attack. Maybe so. But examine the pattern — as any intelligence official should have. Suicide-bomb attacks in Africa. Suicide-boat attack in the Gulf of Aden. Hmmm. Bin Ladens’ men want airplanes. I wonder what they want with them.

Knowing this, and knowing that there was a hijacking threat to American airlines coming from bin Laden, at the very least, pilots and flight attendants could have been warned. Armed air marshals could have been placed on planes. Airport security could have been strengthened. Could we have seen the removal of hack private security firms at airports and the placement of real security measures in time to thwart the September 11 killings? Probably not. But what might have happened if pilots and flight attendants had been warned in advance?

Which brings me to my final point. With all this questioning of what the Bush administration knew and when it knew it, the aftermath of September 11 is resembles in yet another way Pearl Harbor, the terrible surprise attack where Japanese airmen took more than 3000 lives. Then as now, questions emerged about the president’s knowledge of a Japanese surprise attack. But unlike today, President Franklin Roosevelt promptly and forthrightly ordered an investigation. Almost immediately, Roosevelt dispatched Secretary of Navy Frank Knox to Hawaii to commence an investigation of the December 7 failings. Roosevelt did not hide behind the fact that America was at war to delay an inquest. There were, in fact, seven investigations into Pearl Harbor while Roosevelt was alive.

Not only that, but after Roosevelt died — and the war was over — Congress conducted its own joint investigation into Pearl Harbor. All that is what makes Bush’s post–September 11 activity even more vexing. Bush rebuffed Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle’s demand for an investigation into September 11. Bush’s supposed rationale was that a pending investigation would detract from the war effort. That didn’t seem to bother Roosevelt when America was immersed in fighting World War II. Now we may know the real reason: Bush didn’t want anyone to know he had been warned.

Daschle should commence an immediate investigation into the September 11 intelligence failings. Let the chips fall where they may.