The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

From The Washington Post

Reviewed by Michael Dobbs

The report of the government commission investigating the events of 9/11 was published in July 2004 to bipartisan acclaim. "A tour de force," commented historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. "Riveting, disturbing, and revealing," wrote Time magazine. Democratic candidate John Kerry joined President Bush in praising the 567-page report, which sold more than 1.5 million copies.

Now, it's the revisionists' turn. In The Commission, New York Times reporter Philip Shenon claims to have discovered "stunning shortcomings in the Commission's work -- a series of oversights, omissions, and distortions that raise fundamental questions about 9/11 and the government's failure to prevent it." Readers are promised the inside scoop on "how the Commission was used to justify the invasion of Iraq" and why senior investigators felt "their work was being manipulated by the executive director to minimize criticism of the Bush administration."

Shenon's book has caused a minor furor in Washington. The commission's executive director, Philip Zelikow, has released his e-mail exchanges with Shenon in an attempt to disprove the charges. Former 9/11 commissioners, both Democrats and Republicans, leaped to Zelikow's defense, arguing in a Feb. 8 statement that there is "no basis for the allegations of bias." Thirteen senior members of the commission's staff, including some of Shenon's sources, also penned a statement of outrage over "the book's clear implication that Zelikow . . . used his position to try to distort the findings of the commission in order to protect the administration."

Shenon has provided a detailed narrative of the most important government investigative body since the Warren Commission. The Commission is full of vivid anecdotes, beginning with Sandy Berger, a former national security adviser to President Clinton, stuffing secret documents down his pants and smuggling them out of the National Archives. Shenon believes Berger acted from bureaucratic "paranoia": He wanted to avoid giving the Bush White House any ammunition to accuse Clinton of failing to prevent 9/11. Shenon goes on to describe how the Bush administration's first choice to head the commission, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger, was unable to answer a simple question from a relative of a 9/11 victim -- "Dr. Kissinger, do you have any clients named Bin Laden?" -- and resigned the following day.

But the hero, or anti-hero, of The Commission is Zelikow, a history professor at the University of Virginia, former State Department counselor and author of several books on foreign policy, including one written with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Shenon recounts several conflicts of interest that might have raised questions about Zelikow's suitability to direct the 9/11 investigation, such as his friendship with Rice, his role on Bush's transition team in 2000, and his authorship of a strategy paper justifying "preemptive war." Shenon also pounces on telephone calls between Zelikow and Bush adviser Karl Rove that Zelikow claims had nothing to do with the 9/11 investigation.

The Commission relates numerous rows that pitted staffers against each other and against Zelikow as they attempted to draft a report that would satisfy the commissioners, five Republicans and five Democrats. He makes a good case that Zelikow, for all his brilliance, was often arrogant and abrasive. Shenon is less convincing when he argues that Zelikow used his position to try to skew the final report. As the commissioners noted in their statement defending Zelikow, the "proper standard for judgment is the quality of the report" itself.

Take the question of ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda. Shenon contends that Zelikow bent over backward to promote the administration's claim of a relationship between Saddam Hussein and 9/11. He invited the "intellectual godmother" of the Iraq invasion, American Enterprise Institute scholar Laurie Mylroie, to expound her theories about an Iraq-bin Laden connection at a hearing. According to Shenon, "some members of the staff" suspected Zelikow of sharing Mylroie's views.

As it turned out, Mylroie's theories were rejected. To the dismay of commentators such as William Safire, the Republican commissioners joined the Democrats in finding no evidence of a "collaborative operational relationship" between Iraq and al-Qaeda. Given that top administration officials believed in the connection, the commission was right to hear Mylroie out. But far from justifying the invasion of Iraq, as Shenon claims, the commission ended up dismissing -- in a dispassionate, nonpartisan way -- one of the Bush administration's central arguments for war.

While Shenon has interviewed many commissioners and staffers, his sourcing falls short of the standard set by the 9/11 commission. His book includes 14 pages of often vague notes, compared to 114 pages in the 9/11 report. It can be difficult to tell who is drawing the key conclusions in Shenon's book: a named source, an anonymous source or the author.

The 9/11 report was not without its failings. Shenon argues that Zelikow shielded his friend Rice from harsh criticism. But Rice was not alone. As Shenon notes, the commission's chairman, former Gov. Thomas H. Kean (R-N.J.), and vice chairman, former congressman Lee Hamilton (D-Ind.), wanted no "finger-pointing" at individuals. You have to read between the lines to find criticism of senior officials under either Bush or Clinton. Harvard professor Ernest May, who helped draft the report, was correct in concluding that the commission was overly "indulgent" toward both administrations.

The non-judgmental tone is the 9/11 report's weakness and its strength. The narrative was stripped of anything that smacked of partisan controversy. Given the commission's makeup and the requirement that every word of its report be approved by all the commissioners, it was naive to expect anything else. What the 9/11 investigation did extremely well was assemble a large body of agreed-upon facts. The business of passing judgment was left to others. Future historians will almost certainly come across evidence that the commission overlooked. But four years later, the 9/11 report stands up pretty well -- despite Shenon's dogged revisionism.

Copyright 2008, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Review

Spellbinding new book... A series of gripping vignettes... dazzled by this surprisingly vibrant expose of the government of our time. -- Elizabeth Benedict, The Huffington Post, March 7, 2008

A history that's both reassuring and disturbing, a compelling primer on how Washington works -- and doesn't -- in times of crisis .... Hard to put down. -- Bob Hoover in Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, February 17, 2008

Fascinating! -- John Stewart, The Daily Show, Comedy Central, February 11, 2008

I found Mr. Shenon's book illuminating, because I discovered things I did not know, and disconcerting ...My hope is that Mr. Shenon's book becomes a bestseller... -- Senator Bob Kerrey, member of the 9/11 commission, www.prairiefirenewspaper.com, March 2008

I literally could not put it down... It owes a lot to Robert Ludlum. I felt I was reading a teleplay for '24.' -- Michael Duffy, Time Magazine, March 9, 2008

Lifting the veil to understand the 9/11 Commission ... exhaustively reported ... cumulative effect of reading all of it in one book is stunning. -- Colette Bancroft, St. Petersburg Times, February 17, 2008

Remarkable job ... A fascinating read and a real insight into the Bush White House and its amoral attitude toward governing. -- Richard A. Clarke, former White House counterterrorism director and author of "Against All Enemies," in Publishers Weekly, Feburary 12, 2008

Shenon is a skillful writer and storyteller as well as a dogged reporter ... he has a keen grasp of human frailty and folly -- Evan Thomas, The New York Times, February 4, 2008

Suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, this rich slice of investigative journalism turns into something still more substantial .... a masters' thesis in human frailty. -- Peter Preston in The Observer (U.K.), March 23, 2008

The Commission by Philip Shenon is a startling, riveting, disturbing read about the "uucensored" History of the 9/11 investigation. -- Publishers Weekly, February 2, 2008

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: Twelve (January 31, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446580759
• ISBN-13: 978-0446580755
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #392,781 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

48 of 54 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely riveting, February 8, 2008

By	stuartm "stuartm" (United States) - See all my reviews

Others will give their opinions on this book based on their political leanings or previously held opinions about 9/11. I would urge you to buy and read this book with an open mind. And I would tell you that it is absolutely impossible to put down. This is not a dry recitation of facts and dates, this is a well told, engrossing story that will raise your eyebrows and yes, anger you at points. It may also bring you close to tears as you read about what was known and not acted on up through and even after 9-11. Highly recommended.

69 of 80 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Half Great, Half Terrible, March 19, 2008

By	David R. Griffin - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"The Commission" by Philip Shenon has performed a great public service, letting the world know that there are good reasons to be suspicious of "The 9/11 Commission Report." The main problem is the fact that the Commission was almost entirely under the control of Philip Zelikow, who was closely connected to the Bush White House. Although my book "Christian Faith and the Truth behind 9/11" revealed some of the facts about Zelikow that showed him to be one of the worst possible choices for the Commission's executive director, Shenon has revealed even more facts.

It was already known that Zelikow had been on the National Security Council (NSC) with Condoleezza Rice during the administration of the first President Bush; that he wrote a book with her while the Republicans were out of power; that he helped her make the transition from the Clinton to the Bush NSC; and that he wrote at her request the 2002 version of "National Security Strategy of the United States of America" (NSS 2002), which enunciated a new doctrine of preemptive war that was used, in Shenon's words, to "justify a preemptive strike on Iraq."

But now Shenon reveals more: that in applying to Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton, the co-chairs of the 9/11 Commission, for the position of executive director, Zelikow failed to reveal some of his conflicts of interest, especially his authorship of NSS 2002 and his role on the transition team; that he continued, contrary to his promise, to be in touch with Karl Rove (who was very concerned about the Commission's work), as well as Rice; that Zelikow largely prevented direct contact between the staff and the Commissioners ("If information gathered by the staff was to be passed to the commissioners, it would have to go through Zelikow"); and that Zelikow largely "controlled what the final report would say."

Shenon also reveals that Zelikow, before the Commission's work had begun, had written a detailed outline for the Commission's report, complete with "chapter headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings," and that he and the Commission's co-chairs agreed to keep this outline a secret from the Commission's investigative staff. When the staff learned about this outline a year later, some of them circulated a parody called "The Warren Commission Report---Preemptive Outline," one chapter of which was entitled "Single Bullet: We Haven't Seen the Evidence Yet. But Really. We're Sure."

However, although all of this should have made Shenon suspicious that Zelikow might have used his power to cover up the truth about 9/11, it did not. Shenon believes that the falsehoods in the Commission's report were limited to covering up White House incompetence (especially by Rice) and foreign funding of al-Qaeda (by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia).

Because Shenon simply presupposed the truth of the official story as fully as did the Commission, his book is terrible as well as great. It is terrible because Shenon, in mentioning the contention that 9/11 was an inside job, assures his readers that this contention has been debunked, while showing no sign of having studied any of the books that provide evidence for this contention. In his bibliography, for example, he mentions two defenses of the official account: "Debunking 9/11 Myths," put out by Popular Mechanics, and "Without Precedent," coauthored by Kean and Hamilton. But he does not mention my "Debunking 9/11 Debunking: An Answer to Popular Mechanics and Other Defenders of the Official Conspiracy Theory," in which I responded at length to both of these books. Also, although one would expect his bibliography to include all major critiques of the 9/11 Commission, it does not include my book, "The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions," which has generally been considered the major critique of the Commission's report.

Shenon's ignorance of facts contained in this alternative literature is apparent in his assurances that all is well with the official account. For example, claiming that the evidence that al-Qaeda was responsible for 9/11 is "incontrovertible," Shenon points to a videotape in which a bin Laden boasts about the attacks. Shenon is evidently unaware that bin Laden expert Bruce Lawrence called this videotape "bogus" and that FBI spokesman Rex Tomb admitted that "the FBI has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11." Also, claiming that there is clear evidence that "nineteen young Arab men . . . were aboard the four planes," Shenon is evidently unaware that, as I showed in "Debunking 9/11 Debunking" (updated edition), all this supposed evidence falls apart under scrutiny. For example, although we were told that the presence of hijackers on American Flight 77 was proved by Barbara Olson's phone calls to her husband, Ted Olson, the evidence given to the Moussaoui trial in 2006 by the FBI said that no such calls occurred. This same report contradicted the widely held belief that cell phone calls from passengers on United 93 had reported the existence of hijackers.

Shenon could have remained neutral on the question of the truth of the official story. But because he chose to enter the fray, it was incumbent upon him as a journalist to study, and report, the arguments on both sides of the issue. He did not.

Shenon's book is terrible not only because he endorses the official account without engaging any of the serious critiques of that account, but also because his complacent acceptance of that account leads him to ignore dozens of signs in the Commission's report that Zelikow used his position as executive director to cover up far more than incompetence. In "The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions," I showed that it contains over 100 omissions and distortions of the type that would be expected if Zelikow had indeed used his position to cover up official complicity. Here are a few examples that Shenon fails to mention.

Believing that the claim "that the Twin Towers were brought down by preplaced explosives" had been debunked before the Commission began its work, Shenon does not mention the Commission's silence about the fact that over a hundred members of the Fire Department of New York, in giving oral histories of that day---which were made publicly available by Shenon's own New York Times----spoke of apparent explosions in the towers. Shenon also fails to mention the Commission's silence about evidence that steel in the buildings had melted and even evaporated---evidence that a New York Times article called the "deepest mystery uncovered in the investigation," because the fires could not have come close to the temperature needed to produce such effects. Was Shenon unaware of these revelations provided by his own paper?

Shenon ignores the Commission's failure even to mention the fact that WTC 7, which was not hit by a plane and had fires on only a few floors, also collapsed. Shenon perhaps considers this omission unimportant because there was no mystery. "[I]t was determined," he says, "that a fire that . . . destroyed WTC 7 on September 11 was probably caused by the rupture of the building's special diesel fuel tanks." That is indeed the official theory. But the FEMA report---which is still the only official report on this building---suggested what it considered the most likely version of this theory but then admitted that it had "only a low probability of occurrence."

Although Shenon mentions that Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta testified before the Commission, he does not mention Mineta's report that Vice President Cheney was in the bunker under the White House by 9:20 AM, which contradicted the Zelikow-led Commission's later claim that Cheney did not arrive there until almost 10:00.

Although Shenon mentions Cheney's appearance on "Meet the Press" five days after 9/11, he does not mention Cheney's statement that he learned about the attack on the Pentagon after (not before) he entered the bunker---which the Zelikow-led Commission later contradicted.

Although Shenon points out that Zelikow and Clarke hated each other, he does not point out that Clarke's book, Against All Enemies, is not mentioned by the Zelikow-led Commission's report and that it contradicted that report on several points, saying that Cheney was down in the bunker before 9:15, that Clarke received shootdown authorization from Cheney before 9:55 (not at 10:25), and that General Richard Myers was in the Pentagon between 9:00 and 9:45 AM (not on Capitol Hill).

Although Shenon points out that the Commission failed to ask Rudy Giuliani any tough questions, he does not mention the Commission's failure to ask the toughest question that should have been asked: How did Giuliani know in advance that the Twin Towers were going to come down?

In sum: Whereas Shenon's book has performed a great service by revealing things about the Zelikow-led Commission that should lead people to suspect that its account of 9/11 covered up the truth, it is also a terrible failure: Because of Shenon's lack of journalistic skepticism with regard to the official account of 9/11, he failed to raise the most important question about the Commission's report: Did it cover up complicity by forces within our own government? Although the Commission's report contains dozens of signs that it did just this, Shenon's book mentions not a single one.

97 of 115 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Dysfunctions of Democracy, February 5, 2008

By	cvairag (Allan Hancock College) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

In this well-crafted, important new study, the perfect companion to Griffin's magisterial The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, we get to see from a very human perspective why the 9/11 Commission did not finally produce the truth. Most fascinating to me (and the book is tough to put down), the 9/11 Commission stands as a paradigm case for analysis of the inherent problem plaguing our democracy - that the critical decisions are made by extremely small groups of decision-makers, selected with specific implications of partisan conflict, more than the more generalized public good, in mind. These groups are thus necessarily politicized, representing the interests - not of the whole of society - but of only the most powerful oligarchs. Such a group made the decision the drop the bomb on Hiroshima, and again such a group essentially closed the door to further publicly sanctioned investigation of the signal event of our young century.

The prospective reader must note that, evidently due to his extensive investigation, Shenon writes from a definite standpoint on the events 9/11. He believes that the Bush Administration is guilty of criminal negligence (not conspiracy) - allowing, either by incompetence or some other motive, a security breakdown - and that its representatives, when they found they could no longer avert a public investigation (they managed to delay it for over 400 days - it took only 4 to start investigating Pearl Harbor), made every move possible to promote and maintain damage control, from the selection of key members of the Commission and its staff (he draws out a fantastic array of bit players, a number of whom I was wholly unfamiliar with, who distinctly influenced the course of the investigation), to what was discussed in the actual hearings, to what lines of questioning were pursued, and what paths of inquiry were not. "Rove began rewriting the strategy for Bush's 2004 reelection campaign literally the day after 9/11. He knew that Bush's reelection effort centered on his performance on terrorism; almost nothing else would matter to the voters. If the commission did anything to undermine Bush's anti-terrorism credentials - worst of all, if it is claimed that Bush had somehow bungled intelligence in 2001 that might of prevented the attacks - his reelection might well be sunk."

Shenon deftly traces the political lineages as the intertwine with the crucial testimony given and not given. By discussing the character, motives, and felt obligations of the main figures involved, we get a much deeper perspective on where the Commission went astray and why. Much of the discussion centers of the role of Phillip Zelikow, whose extensive ties to central members of the Bush Administration, might give rise to a further investigative Commission.

All in all, a notably balanced rendering of a topic that will surely be discussed for decades to come. For those with an interest in the future of democracy, without question, the read of the season.