Cheney Part2: "Four years ago, on a Tuesday morning in September..." [View All]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/08/20050818-4.html

Four years ago, on a Tuesday morning in September, a threat that had been gathering for years, in secret and far away, arrived in America and brought grief to the entire nation. And after 9/11, the United States made a decision: Having been attacked by stealth inside our own country, we will not sit back and wait to be hit again. We will do everything we can to prevent attacks by taking the fight to the enemy. (Applause.)

In these 47 months, we have been unrelenting in the effort to defend the freedom and security of the American people. In a multinational campaign, we continue to make progress on many fronts -- financial, legal, military, as well as others.

Defeating the terrorists and their ambitions requires that we deny them sanctuary and support, and the United States is leading a global coalition in that effort. We are dealing with a network that has had cells in countries all over the world. Yet bit by bit, through diplomacy and by force, with our allies and partners, we are acting to shrink the area in which the terrorists can safely operate.

Many countries have joined us in tracking the enemy, disrupting plots against America and our friends, destroying the training camps of terror, and closing off their access to funding. We have also enforced a doctrine that is understood by all: Governments that support or harbor terrorists are complicit in the murder of the innocent, and equally guilty of terrorist crimes.

We gave ultimatums to the brutal regimes led by the Taliban and Saddam Hussein. And when those regimes defied the demands of the civilized world, we removed them from power and liberated 50 million people.

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The war on terror has a home front, and we have taken extraordinary measures to protect the American people and our homeland. Yet for all the improvement in homeland security, we are mindful of a continuing danger to this country. Every morning President Bush and I receive an intelligence briefing that includes a review of the threats we face. The enemy that appeared on 9/11 is wounded, off-balance, and on the run, yet still very active, still seeking recruits, still trying to hit us.

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When our war on terror began nearly four years ago, President Bush told Congress and the country that we "should not expect one battle, but rather a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have seen." It may, he said, "include dramatic strikes, visible on TV, and covert operations, secret even in success." All of this has come to pass. And the greatest challenges are borne by the men and women who take the oath to serve.