Former President George W. Bush recalled how he formulated his first messages to the nation after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, saying he didn’t want the country to “lose our soul.”
The 43rd president spoke with former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Sept. 9 at the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas ahead of the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It marks the only public comments Bush plans to make about the anniversary, NBC Dallas-Fort Worth reported, citing his presidential center.
Bush and Rice recalled the early moments when they first learned of the attacks in 2001. The former president, who will be appearing at an anniversary event in New York City on Sept. 11, remembered reading to a group of schoolchildren in a classroom in Florida when he was told by an aide that a second plane had hit the World Trade Center in Manhattan.
“I didn’t have much time to process that, but it was pretty clear to me that if we were under attack, then my job was to defend the child that was reading to me, and her family, and her country,” Bush said, according to a broadcast of the event by C-SPAN. “And so it was a moment of clarity.
“In this case, I became a wartime president,” he continued. “There was no doubt in my mind that this was not a law enforcement event. This was a war, and the job of the president of the country and his team is to rally the nation to do what’s necessary to protect our people.”
Rice, 71, was in Washington, D.C., at the time of the attacks and called Bush.
“I did something I never would do again,” Rice said. “I raised my voice to you because you said, ‘I’m coming back.’ And I said, ‘Stay where you are. The United States of America is under attack. It’s not safe here.’”
Bush flew from Florida to a military base in Louisiana and then one in Nebraska. He chose to fly back to Washington, D.C., despite Rice’s warning, after aides suggested he needed to make a speech to the nation.
“I said you’re right I do, but I’m damn sure not going to give it from a bunker in Omaha, Nebraska,” he said. “I thought that would be a psychological victory for those who attacked us. And so I flew back.”
Rice and Bush also recalled the frantic moments involving United Airlines Flight 93. The plane was seized by terrorists, who turned the flight toward Washington, D.C. Passengers and crew fought back, and the plane crashed in a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing all on board.
At first, Rice and Bush said they thought Flight 93 had been shot down.
“For about 10 minutes we thought we’d shot down a civilian aircraft,” Rice said. “That always to me represented just how hard the decisions were that you had to [make] under a lot of pressure.”
Bush’s mind also turned to what he would tell the nation on Sept. 12.
“My main concern was as comforter-in-chief because I had a sense there was a lot of trauma,” he said. “How does one help America have the confidence that we can go forward as a nation?”
Rice remembered Bush stressing to her that he wanted the country to regain a sense of normalcy amid flights being grounded, banks being closed and the economy being “totally shut down.”
“I didn’t want us to lose our soul,” Bush said. “As we defended our freedoms, I wanted people to remember how precious they are.”
Bush also remembered visiting a mosque in the aftermath.
“I also made it clear that Islam was a religion of peace, not a religion of war, and that these people subverted their religion,” he said about the terrorists.
He also traveled to ground zero in Manhattan to visit with first responders and emergency personnel rushing to help others.
“Seeing those firefighters and policemen, it was just unbelievable what they did,” he said.
The 25th anniversary of the attacks will be commemorated with solemn ceremonies at ground zero, the Pentagon and Shanksville.
There also will be a focus this year on those who have died since the attack from 9/11-related illnesses, including a moment of silence in their memory. Former presidents Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Bush are all expected to attend the 9/11 Memorial in Manhattan. President Donald Trump will commemorate the anniversary at the Pentagon in Washington.
The names of the more than 3,000 victims will be read aloud as part of the annual ceremony in Manhattan. There also will be moments of silence to mark the exact times when the two planes hit the World Trade Center buildings and when the buildings fell.
