This is obviously a question that I have thought about much in the days and months after the attacks. Certainly when one looks back it is easy to see what could have been done differently, but I do not feel any personal responsibility for the attacks.

Based on the information that was presented to us, to my Administration, I think we acted fairly and appropriately. It would be fair to say in hindsight that the entire world was not prepared for 9/11. We had long believed that our oceans would protect us and we were overconfident. What is important now is that we learn from the mistakes that we made; that we fix our intelligence organizations and that we protect against the next attack.

This task is by no means easy, but there is no sense in passing around blame. This only widens the gap between America and Washington because Americans don�t want someone to blame (other than bin Laden) they just want to make sure that 9.11 doesn�t happen again. I believe that most Americans understand that we didn�t put as much time, money, and energy into terrorism before 9.11. At the same time I think they understand why � they would not have supported it, the world would not have supported it, and when it came to purposeful policy, there were limits to how far we could have gone.

Take Afghanistan for instance. Had we wanted to kill the Taliban, we would have had great difficulty militarily. Without the changes to our relationship with Pakistan and with other countries in the Caucus, we would not have had access to this country. 9.11 changed that and today, we are moving forward in many areas to protect ourselves and to plan a response if a terrorist succeeds in the future.

I don�t believe that I am in a place to apologize anymore than the average American is. We acted appropriately to the information that we had and we were caught unprepared. But let�s not forget, Al-Qaeda is responsible for the attacks on 9.11.

Our military is not giving them the opportunity to apologize, and we are doing everything we can to protect our country for the future.

Continued next month