he National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the
United States has been working to determine what really happened on Sept.
11, and its accounting of that disastrous day must be as full and detailed
as possible. After some reluctance, the White House is cooperating. The
Pentagon has made tapes and transcripts available. Still, there is a key
figure stubbornly refusing to hand over important data: Mayor Michael
Bloomberg.
Since last July, the commission has been asking for the city's tapes of
911 calls and transcripts of interviews of firefighters who responded to
the attack. The city has continually resisted. Now, facing a federal
mandate to finish its report by May, the commission has issued a subpoena,
noting that the mayor "has significantly impeded" the investigation.
Mr. Bloomberg, who argues that this request is "ghoulish," insists his
concern is for the privacy of the people who made these emotional calls
and gave the interviews. And, he wants the right to edit the information
before turning it over. Certainly, it is not hard to imagine the pain and
horror being expressed on those tapes and in the transcripts. But it is
hard to believe that those involved would want to thwart the one federal
commission that might ultimately help set the record straight and perhaps
even help avert similar tragedies in the future.
The commission, headed by former Gov. Thomas Kean of New Jersey, noted
last week that the tapes and transcripts of 911 calls are critical to
understanding how the city and the public reacted that day. The
transcripts of oral histories, it said, will "contribute significantly" to
understanding the performance of firefighters at the site. The New York
Times and families of some victims have also demanded access to the
records.
Perhaps the city may be resisting any assessment of its own performance
as well as intrusion into the private pain of the victims and their
families. Whatever the reason, the mayor's argument falls especially short
right now as Americans remember the Warren Commission that investigated
John F. Kennedy's assassination 40 years ago. It is not what a commission
learns after a catastrophe that we may live to regret most. It is what we
fail to learn that haunts us.
