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During the Clinton administration Pennsylvania Ave was closed in front of the White House and concrete devices were put up to protect the Capital Building and other govenment buildings. Lots of areas in Washington DC were blocked off for protection against terrorist attacks. Many of these anti terrorists defenses were done at the time of Desert Storm. There was much concern about Muslim Terrorist attacks on the USA as a result of the war in the Gulf.

These actions were all taken as a response to militant muslim threats, if not bin Laden directly. There were further protections installed after McVeigh. But those also involved Government buildings in Cities other than DC. The DC stuff was mostly done in reponse to the Muslim threat in 1991, and was explained as such at the time. But as I postulated we overestimated the attack. We were looking for suit case nukes, poisoned water systems, and huge trucks used as bombs.

From 1990 to 2001, Newsweek and Time did several stories on "Terrorism is coming to the USA, it is just a matter of time." 911 was not directly envisioned, but every foreign terroism attack anywhere in the world produced several stories with opinions about how long it would take terrorism to reach our shores. The stories always asked how long can the US escape terrorism and what the nature of the threat would be. They always talked of government plans to thwart it. The Democrats in the Sadam debate in 1991 talked a lot about terrorist retaliation. Even Perot made a big deal of it.

The Bush Sr. administration took steps to prevent attacks. Congress put in much tighter security in 1991. That was a response to Militant Muslim threats. Again we overestimated the type of attack. We prepared for car and truck bombs and biological weapons. Most if not all of the stories assumed Muslim terrorists. That is to be expected after we defeated Sadam. Many talked about government preparations. There was lots of talk and lots of speculation.

The first response to Timothy McVeigh was to have an Arab arrested as he landed in London. He was brought back to the USA in handcuffs. He had flown from Oklahoma to London shortly after the federal building was done in. He was the first suspect in the Oklahoma bombing. That had to mean the first suspects that came to the FBI's mind were militant Muslims.

You equate our governments lack of efforts to retaliate against the muslims attacks on us, with our governments attempts to prevent terrorist attacks against us. The two are not the same thing. Clinton was interested in preventing attacks, he was not interested in an American confict like NAM. The liberals (includeing Clinton) thought Afganistan would be a NAM like quagmire. Clinton had visions of LBJ's demise happening to him.

Clinton obviously didn't want himself tagged with another Viet Nam. But he was interested in preventing a major attack on the US. There would be nothing like a failed terrorist attack stopped by Billy Boy Clinton to make the old job ratings go up. In addition there were people in the FBI, CIA and the defense intelligence agencies that did in fact really want to protect us. There was the feeling that until we were hit the people would not stand for an effective defense.

The Secret Service people were certainly concerned for over 20 years. Actions were taken against car bombs, truck bombs, and other more convential and elaborate means of attack.

Clinton did not order any retaliation. But that did not mean that plans for protection and plans for retaliation were not made. They were. And plans for protection were implemented. I beleive they failed because they overestimated the attack the Muslims would make.

'tator