Vice President Dick Cheney delivers remarks on the war in Iraq Friday, Sept. 14, 2007, at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum in Grand Rapids , Mich
Vice President Cheney: In Beirut in 1983, terrorists killed 241 of our servicemen. Thereafter, the U.S. withdrew from Beirut. In Mogadishu in 1993, terrorists killed 19 Americans; thereafter, the U.S. withdrew from Somalia. This emboldened them still further, confirming their belief that they could strike America without paying any price. Indeed they did strike, and indeed they did not pay the price.We had the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York in 1993; an attack on U.S. facilities in Riyadh in 1995; the murder of U.S. servicemen at Khobar Towers in 1996; the attack on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998; the attack on the USS Cole in 2000. Ultimately, of course, they attacked the homeland on 9/11 and took the lives of 3,000 people aboard passenger jets, and at the World Trade Center, and at the Pentagon.
The terrorists have been at war with the United States for a long time. And after 9/11 we made a decision: We're at war with them. This is a long term commitment, not a passing phase. There will be no running, or relenting, until the problem has been dealt with -- decisively, systematically, and permanently.