should add again i went on to get his high school diploma, then his college degree, and then he went to car practice school and became a practicing chiropractor. unfortunately, his life was cut short at the age of 43. i was only five years old, so i don't remember much about him. i have some memories, but from what people have told me who knew him and what i've read, he was an extraordinary guy and i wish i had gotten to know him. the chief regret of my life. but this kind of makes up for it. my wife always said that thought. the reason i started the american veterans center was to be close to my dad. i don't know about that, but certainly wanted to honor people like him and the veterans that you're hearing from today. so for all cadets and midshipmen, the future leaders of our military, hope you take advantage of this unique opportunity you have this weekend to get to know these veterans, these great to hear their stories and to become

inspired by them. and with that i'm going to conclude thank you very much. it's been a great honor for me and for family. dave yoho and the merchant marine association. thank you very much. thank you so much. thank you. now of you, i've come to know the hard way because i've got. i hate saying this. i've got grandchildren. your and none of them have a vivid memory of that day that morning of september 11th, 2001. some of you weren't alive. but those that were or since may

have seen a photo or maybe a video clip of the the united states was talking to. i think some students i'm not sure about that. sturm just been told. yes, some students want to distinguish young man came over and leaned down and whispered into pnt bush's ear that the world trade center had just been attacked and we were as a na under attack. that distinguished young man is a distinguished old man. oh, no, i'm sorry. aren't we all. well, i don't know about the distinguished, but nevertheless it is truly my pleasure, my honor to introduce to you andrew card. thank you. how do i know america is here?

thank you very much. i'm andy card. i come massachusetts. so i parked the car at harvard. might not understand me all the time, but i live in bryant college station, texas, right now, proud to be a native land and proud to be associated with the georgian barbara bush foundation. president h.w. bush was my great hero. that picture. this is an iconic photograph. i am not iconic, but it defines an era most you in this audience either weren't born or you were just born when it happened 23 years ago. and i want to tell you, i'm was privileged to be the chief of staff to president george w bush. i was deputy white house chief staff for george h.w. bush, secretary of transportation for george h.w. bush. and i also got to work for president ronald reagan.

this is a great nation. it's a great nation because we the people all are active in it. and the constitution is a remarkable document. you are part of the way and many of you actually have accepted the invitation, be part of the government and you've made sacrifices to be part of the government. and i you honor that. and it's up to you to our democracy. it's up to you to say thank you for people who helped us have a great government. and i'm thrilled to here as we honor veterans that have made a difference and to see these medal of honor winners that you've had the privilege to listen to is a just a remarkable. so thank you. how many of you were born. after 911. thank you. you may look at what happened, on 911 and think of a video

game. it was not a video game. it was the real deal. and those of us who lived during that time remember the trauma of watching people literally jump out of a sixties, building because they couldn't the heat behind them. many of you don't think it's possible that some would fly a plane and use it as a weapon of mass destruction and class and crash and towers or the pentagon or have the first heroes in the war on who were not in the military if they were they would been presented of honors but they would just passengers on a plane and someone said, let's roll and they rolled and that plane crashed into the field. pennsylvania.

i was with the president. 911 the president had left boston. i mean, left washington, d.c. to go to jacksonville, florida. on september 10th to do an event for students back in washington, d.c. he had just come an event on a right honoring australia. and there partnership with us in every political battle we've had. and there was a big at the navy yard here in the washington d.c. area the prime minister of australia john howard was there, received a bell, was taken off of a ship that the australians helped protect during the world war two. there was great pomp and circumstance, so a 21 gun salute, remarkable remarks and tremendous gratitude for the people helping us when we were in harm's way and helping to win

world to and every war that we've been in the have been there to help us. so we left a fancy event in washington dc and we went in one air force one and flew to jacksonville and jacksonville president did an event at a school and after that event he flew to the other side of florida, sarasota, florida and we arrived at a hotel in the sarasota region right near. an elementary school that i'm able to school and i when we arrived and motorcade came to a stop and the secret service opened up the door to limousines and we stepped out. there was terrible stench in the air. the red tide killed some fish and there washed up on the shore. it just stuck. and i was struck by the terrible smell when i got out of the limousine, we rushed into the colony, dropped on our luggage and then we came out and piled

up into the limousines again, again. and did something that president bush did not do. very often we went out to a event that was not a political event, not a fundraising event. it was a dinner that brother, the governor of florida, had arranged. and it was just a funny evening that wasn't supposed take very long. the president actually stayed out late. we got back to the colony resort, unusually late. george h.w. george w we like to go to bed pretty early. and i remember i had work to do so. i went down to an office and did some and then i went to bed, woke the next morning and i went down to see the president. he was up and about getting on some jogging clothes because he was going to go for a run on the golf course. and i remember was lots of things going on. it was all good news, good news about education good news about our economy, good news about foreign affairs and the president was in jogging outfit getting ready to go a run and

then he realized the person that he had invited to go for a run was a reporter named stretch kyle. but the final stretch kyle had been an ncaa all-american cross-country runner. and he kept saying, i know why i invited him to go running, why didn't somebody tell me he was a cross-country runner in college and it was all preoccupied this and the bushes are very competitive. they won't even let the grandkids win at checkers. so he went out for a run and i said, when you get back, we'll do the cia briefing. it's going to be an easy day because going to go to an elementary school so he goes out for the run. i'm doing some work. one of the jobs of a chief of staff is you have to read everything that the president is going to read before president gets it. so i had a lot of homework to do and he came back from the run and he was full himself. he had a strut that texas strut because he beat stretch kyle and he felt very good about it and he starts say this is going to

be an awesome day and i said, yes, this is going to be an awesome next stop is memory booker elementary school and you're going to be reading books with second graders and he was all excited about it. we went down, get into the limousines to head over to booker school. and i remember the limousine line would be a little bit different and i had to chastise some of the advance team and say, we're going to move this vehicle here and change some changes in the motorcade that was going over to school. and then i heard to people ask everybody what a plane crash in new york city. one was karl rove, the other dan bartlett, both texans and didn't much about it. we arrived at the school president, got on a secure phone with condoleezza rice as national security adviser. i didn't hear that. i went into the school and into the classroom where the president was going to be to make sure it was ready for him. i remember stepping into the classroom and looking around,

and i was always looking for things that other people should have seen but didn't like. misspelled words. and i saw a word misspelled on a bulletin board and i said, let's get a book cover and cover up. i didn't want a dan quayle potato, ma'am. you don't remember that i, i then walked into the classroom and saw the teacher getting to bring the student said the press pool was gathering with fleischer, the press secretary, and he's got a friend that's right over here. and i looked over at the press pool. and the press pool. undisciplined, kind out of character. and the students were completely in character in very disciplined. it was a big contrast i then went into the room with the president and the principal the school when the acting national security adviser on the trip a captain at the time she would not become an admiral. deb lauer came up to me and said

and the president, she said it appears a small twin engine prop plane crashed into one of the towers of the world trade center in new york city. the president, the principal and i all had the same reaction oh, what a horrible accident. the pilot must have had a heart attack or something. and then the principal opened the door to the classroom and she and the president walked into the classroom. the door. and captain lauer came up to me and said, sir, it appears it was not a small twin engine prop plane. it was a commercial jetliner. my mind then to the fear of the passengers on the plane must have had they had to know it was losing altitude. i assumed it took from liberty airport, newark or maybe jfk or laguardia, and then that reaction caused to think what's going on. obviously. but i still thought it was an accident. but captain lauer came up to me and said, oh my god, another plane hit the other tower. the world trade center.

that caused me to have to do something. the chiefs of staff do all the time, including right now dealing with the question, does the president need to know. yes, the president would need. to know. i made a decision to pass on to facts and make one editorial comment and to do nothing, to invite a conversation with the president. i knew that he was sitting front of second graders in front of a press pool and probably underneath the boom microphone that would pick up the conversation. i made a decision what i would say. i opened the door to the classroom and stepped in and the students were conducting or in the middle a dialog with the president, the teacher was saying say good morning to the president. good morning, mr. president. the president would actually answer back. good morning, you. and there was this dialog going back and forth between the students and. the president and i didn't want to interrupt. ann compton from, abc news was in the press pool and she saw me

come the room and it was unusual for me to enter the room when the president had already entered. and it was certainly unusual for me to in from kind of backstage and walk up to him and she said and i said. and she said. and then i heard the teacher say to the students, take out your books and read, we're going to read with the president as the students were reaching under their desks to get their books. that's when i walked up to the president and i leaned down i whisperednto his right, a second plane hit, the second tower, america is under attack. i then stood back from him because i did not want him to talk with me. so i took two steps back. i saw his head bobbing up and down. he kind of glanced right, but

never turned around. and i was very pleased with how he reacted, because he did nothing to scare those graders. he did nothing to demonstrate fear to. the media that would have translated for the terrorists to be. instead, i think the president actually focused on what real job was. i don't want to say that's when he became president. he became president when he took the oath of office and then delivered his inaugural address. on this, i think he realized what his real job as president was, which was to keep his oath to preserve, protect and defend the united states. so i was pleased with how the president reacted. he focused on his job. the students were focused on their books. i went back to the door of the

classroom, looked around, saw the students again, eager to read the president still with his bobbing up and down. and then i saw the press and all of the reporters were turned around talking to ari fleischer. none of them were paying attention to president. i then stepped into the holding room. and the first thing i said to the staff was, get a line open to the fbi director, bob mueller. he'd only been the fbi director for ten days. we get a open to the vice president that a line opened in the situation room back at the white house that. the crew back on air force one, mark with the pilot. just your crew all back on air force one. were going to have to get out of here to the secret service. i said, get the motorcade turned around. we're to be going back to the airport to dan bartlett. i said, get some remarks written for the president. we've got 600 people in the gymnasium.

you'll have to talk to them. he can not say anything. we do not know. be the truth. the president then came out of that classroom. he excused himself to the students, to the media. and he came into the holding. and the first thing he said was, get the fbi director the phone and we to say he's here. mr. president. then you talk to the vice president. he talked to his national security adviser. he talked to the of new york, tried to reach the mayor of new york city. i then ran around the building and went into the room with the 600 people from the community. we were and stood at the back of the room. and i saw the president come in with secretary of education ron paige. and i stood there as the president walked and went to the podium and the first thing he said was, i'm going to have to be going back to washington, d.c. and then he explained what had just. it was a very short, but i was

not pleased because i don't think that it was true that we were going to back to washington d.c. we didn't know enough say that we could do that. so i kind of got a little angry with dan bartlett and i ran around the building to get into the motorcade with the president. i saw dan i said, dan, why did you let him say going back to washington, d.c.? he said, didn't. the president just said that he was going back to washington, d.c. i said, we do not know that yet. we drove very fast to the airport in saratoga and ended up getting on air force one. i should tell you that the motorcade showed up in the secret, opened the door to the beast. the presidential limo. i was struck by a protocol. no, no. the engines on force one were already running. and the protocol is that you do not turn the engines on until the president's safely on the plane. so i said mark tillman, the

pilot must really want to get out of here fast. we ran up the gangplank almost before the door was shut. the plane started rolling down the runway and took off at a very steep incline to 48,000 feet. we flew a serpentine way waiting for a fighter jets to catch up with us. and the president to saying, where are we going? we're going to washington, d.c., he tells me. i said, you don't know that yet. i don't. you want to make that decision yet? he says, i'm making the decision we're going back to washington, d.c. and i said, i don't think you really want to make that decision yet. i do. and i said, i don't think you want to make it right now. we'll have to make that decision later. and i looked up and talked to mike tillman. he says, we're not landing at andrews joint base andrews unless we know the can be safely so the president is not overriding. the secret service. we're not going back to

washington, d.c. we can know that we can protect the president when he gets there. we're also trying to learn what's been going on. and i'll fast forward and say, please go back and look at this in history and see what was going on. two planes crashing new york city, one plane crashing the pentagon another plane being driven down into shanksville, pennsylvania. and you should read the story of all of the people that were on planes and, the trauma that they went through. it's unbelievable. you have a duty to know about it. you have to help us. who are old. yes. the people in the audience that were alive were on 911 because we all made the same promise. we promised never to forget. we promised it. no matter what our station life was, no matter what our faith was, no matter what our emotions

were, we promised never to forget. and there were heroes. and you're going to hear from some heroes today on 911. i just plead with you and i'm jealous. i would like to, be your age. i'd love to be your age. but i can honestly tell you. i am not your age. but it's important for you to make sure people your age understand what happened on 911 and how it changed the world. it changed the world because. it changed bureaucracy in washington, d.c. it changed diplomacy around the world. it changed the partnerships that have with people around the world. and i watched the president be a phenomenal leader. the bottom line is, as we flew florida to barksdale air force in louisiana, where we took people off of the air force and said, you're extraneous to this trip. there were members of congress and guests who get off the plane. we're going to stratcom omaha,

nebraska, where there's great communications and way to deal directly with the faa and the military about all the work that they did. and i want you to recognize the leaders it took to do all of and it was great leadership from the president the very first thing he did that struck me in response what happened after he got on air force one. he wanted to make sure putin wasn't doing anything in thinking that we were doing using this as a way to attack russia. and he had condoleezza rice call, putin up and say this is what's happening. don't you overreact to anything very important that we did that he ended up becoming an ally for a short time in process. in fact, it was almost this time in 2001 where putin came to texas and went to crawford, texas, to the president's ranch. and it was in response the way the russians were actually helping fight some of the terrorism that faced.

so i'm pleading with you to go back and see why that picture is iconic. and it's not iconic because of me. but the day was iconic. was no tsa before that. there no security department before that. the cia and the fbi communities didn't talk to each other before that. so government changed. we the world changed. and we're still carrying most of those changes. right now. with that, i'm going to say thank you and i'm going to thank you in advance for keeping this conscience such that you will never forget what happened that day and respect the heroes that showed up to make a difference, especially the firefighters and the policemen that raced into the building. remember those people who jumped out of the building? remember the passengers on flight 93 that responded when one person said, let's roll? remember what happened? how we could say. the president called for the

world to stand with us. he called for world leaders to you're either with us or against us. and yes, i can remember moammar being the first leader to call back saying, i'm with you. i, i'm with you. do not bother me. and the president of pakistan saying, i want to be with you and you. but the held strong and he built coalition that made a difference with. i want you to bring up some of the heroes of 911 and have them tell their stories. as they're gathering. i you to take some questions. we'll have a i'll try to have an opportunity for some clues to come up. if you want to ask us some

questions. so. if you like to sit down. yes, we do. i'm going to sit they're going to introduce themselves as they sit down. some water for you. set change. to go ahead. okay. as we get organized here, i do. but i must admit, was quite surprised to see how many hands went up. when andrew asked if you're born before 911. how of you were not born before 911? there are a few times in our lives throughout history when you can remember exactly where you were, exactly what you were doing, when you got a certain piece of new. november of.

63, i was in san angelo, texas. and i remember exactly i was exactly what i was doing. when someone's to me, the president has been shot and i responded. the president of what? i remember exactly where i was and exactly what i was doing. 911. in 2001. and going to suggest to you that your parents and grandparents and many people here know exactly where they were and exactly they were doing on that fateful day. there are very few times in history throughout all history where you can ask people that were alive at the time that question and they will know without hesitation exactly where they were. and exactly what they what they were doing. so with that, we're going to ask 911 panel to please come up. we're going to thank andrew card

and for his service. his service and his leadership. pleasure to think. thank you for your. awesome. thank you you. it's great. i am not going to moderate the conversation. i'm going to ask them, introduce themselves, say why they're here and why we do honor. i'm tim brown. fdny obviously firefighter and 911 survivor of the collapse of both buildings. i was in seven world trade center when the first plane came in working. mayor giuliani. i survived but of 343 of my brothers did not survive. 70 plus law enforcement officers

did not survive. and every one of them knew the challenge in front of them and and took the challenge and fulfilled their oath. i am here to talk about their stories. the uniformed police officers and firefighters who are heroes that day as as the military and in a lot of the civilians who we here with us. so thank you. hi i'm ron difrancesco. i'm known as the last survivor out of the south tower of the world trade center. i was working that day on the 84th floor and. i saw the plane hit and i was still on our floor when the second plane hit, i had a harrowing experience trying to get out of the building and never got out. i ended up in the basement of the building and woke up three days later in the hospital.

coming here to talk to you, to see the veterans and the young cadets. just to give you some insight on you're doing what you have done in. the past is very important and i thank you all. i'm heather penny on the morning of september 11th, i was sent on a suicide mission in my f-16 to ram it into flight 93. the passengers flight 93 are the true heroes, though, because they were the ones prevented that airliner reaching our nation's capital. i'm here today not only honor and commemorate their sacrifice and their service, as well as those that are the panel here today, but also to share with you what, your service will mean and you can prepare yourselves.

good afternoon, everybody. my name is bill van. i work for morgan stanley and i was actually in charge of a class of 276 folks from all across the country that were on day of a three week training program. imagine being from outside of new york and from north dakota and alaska and everything else. new york is a pretty scary place in and of itself under regular circumstances. and the events that happened, obviously, no one had envisioned whatever would ever happen. but why do i come here year to talk about this? it's very simple. when i look at you and i see these young faces. this is my fourth year being out here to talk about this. it's important for me, having experienced it and seeing what i saw that day that all of you who god bless all of you we count on

depend and love more than anything, this world that you understand the resiliency of our country day. you understand the resiliency, strength of the human spirit that day. and you see what we should be appreciative of every single day in this country, which is the freedoms that we have, that freedom isn't free. and there's always someone the wolf is always at the door. so just be reminded of that. but thank you. it's a pleasure to be here. president bush had to make some very tough decisions. and on air force one soon after, we took off from sarah smarsh although i do remember the president getting a call from the vice president, vice president -- cheney. and i was sitting sitting with the president in his office on air force one. my office had him and i couldn't

hear -- cheney's conversation, but i could hear the president's responses. and i the president said i would approve that. yes i would approve that. yes, i would approve. and it was when -- cheney was saying can we authorize our fighter pilots to shoot down commercial jetliners that are not responding to the faa instructions to land? and i do remember the president authorizing it. i think actually cheney gave the authorization a little bit premature shortly, but nevertheless heard the president authorize. and when he hung up the phone, he leaned and he said to me, i was an air national guard pilot. i cannot imagine receiving that order. so ask you, kathleen, what was it like? receive the order? i in the d.c. air national

guard, a young lieutenant, i just got into my squadron that january and had earned my combat mission ready status that march. so i really wasn't any older than you. you're going to graduate. you're going to receive your commission. you will take your oath of office and then you'll go get your training and then go to your first operational unit. it's not too far in the future for. you. that's where i was that morning as the district of columbia air national guard. we have to chains of command one when we are federal ized and we deploy to go do the job that our nation has asked us to do to project to protect our nation and our nation's interests. when that happens, we essentially become part of the active duty air force. the rest of the time, national guard, the chain of goes up through their governor and this is we get guardsmen filling sandbags and responding to

hurricanes, things like that. but the district of columbia or an asteroid guard does not have a governor. and our commander in chief during peacetime operations is not the mayor. it goes all the way up to the president. so when vice president cheney called president, asked for authorization, that was what we had to for before we could launch. now, i have to back up a little bit, because this is september 11th of 2000, one. that morning, before the first aircraft hit, we were still living in a pre 911 world. the union had fallen. it had collapsed. we had won the cold war. it was the end of history. it was a unipolar world. and during the 1990s, the nation cut the air force in half, literally. so all of the alert units that had ringed the states to protect

our borders from incoming nuclear bombers that had been reduced to five of units in the entire united states. portland, fresno homes, dead langley and otis, new york. that was it. the district of columbia sitting over here just on the other side of the potomac river. the d.c. guard was no an alert unit because our nation could not imagine a threat to our homeland. our nation could not imagine. a world where. there would be countries, nation states or individual terrorist organizations that might want to challenge our influence the order that we had set post-world war two. so we don't have any missiles. we don't have any bombs.

we are not loaded up a go to war configuration. and as a matter of fact, the alert eight jets at those five units. they did not take off normally loaded with hot missiles. they just hot guns, 510 rounds each of high explosive, incendiary bullets. but we didn't even have that. we had our normal standard training rounds of 105 led nose bullets is like 20 millimeter b.b. guns and no missiles, no explosive realized come off the rails with rockets, blow up kind of missiles, and we wouldn't get them in time. that morning, the struggle it took for us to be able to work through that chain of command to get the missiles built up in time time to launch.

it really a consequence of the the insight and the teamwork of the senior officers within our squadron. again, remember, i'm just a i'm a lieutenant. i'm pretty green job is a snap. go right. it's job to make sure there's plenty of snacks fresh hot coffee and fresh in the bar. right. like, that's my. so what was going on that morning was our leadership. mark kass bill, who was our director of operations, dan kane, who was our officer. mark valentine who was our scheduler. david mcnulty who was our intelligence officer. phil thompson. who was our supervisor of flying. they were all coordinating and doing what they could off of what we knew when we go to war, to try improvise for something that we had never been trained for. there were no tactics, techniques, no air tasking

order. they were making it all happen. i could i will go into some detail later on, but absolutely want to make time for the other individuals to be able to tell their stories. what story would you like to tell them impacted you the most? well, i i'm a civilian. i was working i was training day. i traded eurodollars in, you european currencies. i love the fast pace. i'm a canadian. and so working the world trade center and iconic building and new york city was unbelievable. i got seriously blindsided that day. i was trapped above the zone as i was leaving our trading room. the second plane hit its i was on the 84th floor. it hit from the 78 to the 85th floor. the right wing slice straight through our trading room.

we got knocked by all the debris over and we made our into the stairwell. but the stairwell below was collapsed. and there were all kinds of people panicking. and from the 93 bombing, people thought if they went up, they would be rescued from up top. we climbed to about, i guess, the 110th floor and realized we couldn't get out of the building. and at that true panic started to set in so i started go back down and i was with whole bunch ofeaes and smoke wasite thick ae started to lie down. and people wg sleep. and i thought to die. but someone, me and of you who believe in a higher being a god knows who that is. others may think it was my adrenaline running over time. i got up, made my way into the

darkness to smoke, and pulled back a sheet of drywall. and i slid down that. i ran through three flights of stairs that were on fire about down. i ran into three fire fighters coming up and they i didn't know how badly been burned, but they just me to go down and i'd get help down below. when i got down there, i came out facing the courtyard in between the two buildings and it was war zone, folks. a war here and i hadn't been trained for any that. i was in a situation that i knew nothing about how to control. i was sent downstairs to get out towards the church street exit and as i was leaving, i ran into a colleague of mine who on the

best days had trouble walking. and as we walking towards the church street exit, that's when we heard the building start to come down. i ran as fast as i could and that's all iemr. i woke up three days later. ha on 60% of my body. mn head. my contact lenses were melted to my eyes and my. but i was alive and thankful for everybody helped me. after 11 to get me where i am. i still struggle on a daily basis and talking about this now is challenging, but i want you to know what you're doing is a good thing and that's it. the new york city fire

department had so many heroes we can't list. in all honesty and their traditions go on today that there's generation generation saying i want to be their. i had the privilege of meeting with several members of the new york city fire department even within the last year that they would be here telling their story because they want you to know but they actually would rally and do it again a moment's notice. yes. so don't you talk about some of your colleagues and you know this. thank you. thank you, sir. am here for them. i am for my friends. 100 of those firefighters were my friends in the operations command.

so 343 new york city firefighter were murdered on september by a radical islamic terrorists, 100 of them were from our special operations command. so basically, if were working in our special operations command, 911, the before or the date or it was the end of your life because they all went up in the towers. i'd like to tell little vignette quick that is an example of what they all did and what the police officers did. and i i came into the north tower pretty quickly after the first plane struck and i was at the plaza level. so to go down one level, i had to go down an escalator or there were hundreds of civilians onto that escalator, like a funnel. and i got i got into that group and i as i went down the

escalator, if you can imagine with me the lobby of the north started to reveal itself to me and there were hundreds of firefight ers in their gear with 80 or 100 pounds of equipment awaiting their orders go up in their protective gear with the yellow. the reflective stripes and i had very reluctantly admit to myself in that moment something that is hard for me to do in was to say, the cops called us bumblebees.e and now i saw hundreds of firethebyith their yellow stripes and it looked just like a beehive. and i had never seen it that that way before. but i would reluctantly admitted that the cops were right in. cops will get that way. but i got to the bottom of the escalator and in right there to

my right hand side was a bumblebee. and i up at his face and it my friend firefighter chris blackwell rescue three the bronx harlem fire where i worked i worked with chris for seven years on the same shift and so he was like a real brother to me. we everything together. we to a terrible, terrible building collapses, fires, car crashes and things like that. and not only was chris this bad -- bronx harlem elite firefight, but when he went home to connecticut, he was a paramedic at home. so all he did with his whole life was help other people. right. because that's that's who we are that's what we do. we're helpers. we're protectors. and that was chris whenever we had a patient especially if it was a child patient, we always look for chris's hands to put that child in because we knew when his hands that child had

best shot at life. and chris and i always greeted each other the same way that no matter what disaster were about to take, we always took a second to greet each and we did this on the morning of september 11th in the north tower lobby. so i get to the bottom of the escalator and. here is the bumble bee firefighter, chris blackwell. as soon as he saw me, both turned toward each other. we came to attention he was standing right here and he would make a big motion with his arm and take unlit stub of a cigar out of his mouth. and he would put it down this side and we would both lean in at the waist, kiss on the lips, come back to attention. and he put the cigar back in his mouth. and we did it for two reasons. we did because we were like real brothers. i grew up with brothers. we always kissed on the lips, kissed my dad on the lips. it was no big deal.

and and we did because we loved each other. but it freaked out all the cops environment around us. was we loved watching that reaction around us in the middle of this chaos and in after we did, chris said to me, tell me this is really bad. and for us to say that to each other, a significant thing. i said, i know chris, careful. i love you and he said, i love you too. and after those words, firefighter blackwell turned around and went in the stairwell and went up to save the lives of people he didn't know why he could have turned around and gone home to his family, to his loving wife and children but he didn't he went up that stairwell. why? because years earlier, he took

an oath oath in that oath and said he promised to give his own life for his friends, neighbors or strangers. but this was the moment he those words were tested. and he fulfilled his oath, i call it, because it's written about in the bible. i call it the greatest love. so that's what i want you to remember from. the heroes of 911, the police officers, the firefighters, military, military who stepped up on that day and civilians who took it upon themselves to at the end of their life, the very last act of their life. every one of them performed an act of the greatest love.

if you don't mind, i'd love to tell you the story of my most memorable days as white house chief of staff and. it's a phenomenal privilege to be the chief of staff to the president. and i would caution if you ever apply to be the chief of staff, you will not become the chief of staff. and i had no idea that the president was recruited to be his chief of staff. i actually tried to talk him of it, but watching the president on 911 and remember george w bush got elected president by the supreme court there, a very controversial election, and he took office with some people refusing to call him. mr. president. he maintained honor and his obligations, and he believed in the authority and he couldn't

wait to take it. but he also had trimmed endless empathy for those who took an oath. he took an oath because presidents don't get to implement any of their orders, other people do it. and it ended up expanding through the whole country. america came together not of president bush, but because of heroes like these heroes. so i want to tell you my four most memorable days days, the dust had settled. we knew about the attacks. we knew where they happened. we saw the carnage the president had been to the hospitals to see people he'd been to funerals and he convened a meeting.

in the white house where he to meet with the fbi and, find out what they were doing. so called. this meeting was on the thursday after the attacks. and the president said, do you want to convene the cabinet on friday? so thursday, friday came and we got together. bob mueller, the fbi director, came in with the assistant and he was asked at the end of the security briefing that the president had from the cia. i'd like to know what the fbi is doing. and the briefer said. this is what the fbi is doing. they're investigating crime and they were a crime and they talked about the material that they would find, the witnesses that they had. and the president interrupted and said i that's all very

important. but of greater concern to me is what are you doing to prevent next attack. and i will admit the briefer didn't know how to react to that and looked down the couch to the fbi director, bob mueller. and bob mueller looked at the attorney general. the attorney general looked back at the briefer. the briefer looked back at the fbi. and bob mueller says, president, we'll have to get back to you on that one. it sounds weird and out of touch, but that's where the mindset was i then the meeting ended and i went stood at my favorite spot in the oval office. i was always looking for a corner to hide in in the oval office. but there are no corner. so i would stand beside the grand clock as everybody was leaving the room and there and bob mueller and the briefer walked by me and bob mueller turned the briefer and said, when we get back to the we're

changing the mission of the bureau. it's now to prevent the next attack. and that not sound like a big deal, but you know how much effort it takes to change mission of a government agency. they really did change their mission and it made a difference for the president. also he said to me after everyone had walked out of the room, i want you to convene the war tomorrow at camp david. and i'm thinking to myself, there's no such thing as the war council, but i know what you mean and i said. how about 10:00 saturday, camp david, national security council? who would you have together? he said, yes, do that. so i run off and do homework and call people and make arrangements to get everything done. i then go back down to the oval office to report that everyone is on set. i'll sit with it and he's meeting with the person in charge of cabinet and, getting

ready for a cabinet meeting and president is being handed a stack of cards. these are what supposed to use at the cabinet meeting. these are the issues we want to talk about and i remember the president looking at them and going through them and then the cabinet starts to arrive and. we walk into the cabinet room. everybody stands for the president as he goes in, he sits down, they down the cards out. he puts them on the table and then he puts his hand over the card and is not going to read them. instead, he says, we are at war, but while we at war, we have a job of governing to do so with phenomenal specificity. he addressed every member of the cabinet about their and it was tour de force in terms of knowing what the responsibilities were. this wasn't from a script. he talked about the priorities of those departments and agencies and then he adjourned

the meeting after a prayer. we started with a prayer. we ended with a prayer, and then everybody went out and piled into limousines and they came to this part of washington dc, the national cathedral, not far away from here. and in there. and it was packed every was filled. there were representatives of every in america. and we said prayers. we sang hymns. we listened to four nominal responsibilities that come from faith. and it was a very moving summer ceremony. and then we left that we piled into limousines and we drove out andrews air force base and we got on that 747 that becomes air one as soon as the president gets on it and we fly to new jersey, to lakehurst, jersey, and we get off the plane and, we

get on a helicopter met by the governor of new york and the mayor of new york city. and we fly out to the coast of north from new jersey, fly up coast. and there she is. and she is so beautiful the statue of liberty, the torch was glowing it was beautiful. and then you see a pillar, black smoke coming out of the tip of manhattan. and the pilot of marine one goes over to that pillar of smoke and circles it twice. no one says a word. we're looking out the windows and we see thousands of people on the ground with hardhats on on. we land over by wall street. we drive through the streets of new york. i've been there many time with presidents, and usually there's of hellos. some of them are single digit hellos. but there's lots of people this time. there weren't lots of people,

but there were lots of people. hard hats on getting ready to go down to ground zero to do their to rescue. and the president says to a secret service agent. i want to out and i can hear the community within the secret service. don't let them get out. these people haven't been through magnetometers, haven't run their names on the computer. and he says, i want to get out. they pull over and stop. and they get out and there they are with their hardhats. and some of them are cheering. some of them are crying. some of them want a hug. and the president them and the crowd starts chanting, usa, usa, usa. i look over and hanging off some of the scaffold and cheering us the usa with canadian flags, their uniforms or japanese

flags, their uniforms, and then president is standing there a crushed fire vehicle. and i say to them, would you be to say something? and he said, do you think it's appropriate? i said, if you think it's appropriate, it's appropriate if you don't want to do it, it's not appropriate. where do i go? said, i think we can get you up there. i went to a secret service agent. i said, can we stand up and have the president stand up there? he jumps up on it and jumps up and down and says, thumbs up, karl rove finds a firefighter. bob beckwith says, hold a spot for the president. the president said, what do i use? talk. i said, we're going to get you a bullhorn. i don't how we found a bullhorn. we found a bullhorn. i remember that. and the president gets up there, puts his arm around bob beckwith and he starts to speak. and someone in the crowd says, we can't hear.

we can't hear. and the president says, i can hear you. and whole world will hear us. that and the chants, usa usa echo. and at the same time, congress is passing a declaration to go to war with only one dissenting vote. and of all of the senators and all of the congressmen. the president finishes a brief, brief statement and the crowd is pumped and we're excited and all in it together. and we pile limousines and go to the jacob javits center is a huge conference room and we see of these blue pipe and drape booths. but in the booths are teams from every state in the union and 38 other countries who are sending people help us go through the rubble and rescue people.

and the president went to every booth. he took his picture, patted the dogs, and then he thinks we're going home. no, we're not. take a turn at the jacob javits center is a big enough building to take a turn. and we go to another room made of white pipes and blue drapes. then this one is filled with people. and the president, who are these? and we had invited family members of the folks who were missing down at ground zero to come and the advance man said, there's a podium and a microphone for brief remarks and leave. and the president said, i'm not going to the podium and he just charges in the room ahead of the secret service. and there's a woman who stands up. she was only about four feet, five inches tall. great, awesome. and then he goes, he talks to literally every single person in

there, stayed there for over an hour. and everyone he prayed them, cried with them, hugged them. he's getting ready to leave and. he goes to the woman that's his first, greeted him and she stands up and looks him right in the eyes. and she holds out her hand and she says to the president, mr. president, i want you to have this. this is my son's badge. his name is george howard. don't ever forget. and she drops the badge in the president's hand. he puts it in his pocket, tears streaming down his cheeks. and he says to george, how is mother america will forget? you'll move on, but you don't have to worry about me. i will never forget george howard. he's. relieved. we get in the limousine the president reaches into his. i'm sitting beside him. he takes out george howard's badge. badge ten, 12. and you squeezes it shuts his

eyes. believe he's praying, puts it in his pocket. we then fly back to lakehurst, a helicopter, then fly on air force one, a very small to go to camp david. i'll never forget the president doing that. and guess what? we went to war american answered the call to duty records. number of people signed up to join the military. the fire department, the police department, medical assistance. so thank you. never forget george howard and don't what happened on 911. thank you very. what a terrific thank all very much for your for what you've done what you've seen and what you continue to do to keep to ensure that we never forget. thank you much thank you.

thank you of that you've gone you again. i'm come on. come on. if you've got to go before leave the stage, you've got a minute. right, we've got a couple minutes to take some questions from the audience. well, i don't believe that, you know okay. then i'll go back there. all we're waiting for questions. there are a few things that i want to leave with as you finish up your school and you get ready to take your oath with us. he did not. the why. we're here to talk about 911 is not only so that you do not forget, but also so that you understand why you take that what that ultimate sacrifice may require you and not only is it an obligation, a duty, but it is a privilege to serve our nation

because who america is, what she stands for what she how she brings all of us together is something that is more important and it's greater than any one of us individually individually. and every individual, every every first responder, every police officer that rushed into the towers, not the passengers on flight 93, they all intuit haveli knew that. but it's something that you will need to know every day when you wake up and you put on the clock of. our country know your job when you get trained be the first in your class. because i didn't have time to go through normal start procedures you're going to have to know job inside and out know team develop trust with your team love your team because when the chips are down you're going to be getting through it together.

be willing to take risk. there's a point where as an officer, you may be in a situation where you don't have the opportunity to, mother, may i? you've got to buy your own bomb. be willing to take risk, but do it smartly because you know that that risk comes with a potentially not just your reputation or your valuation form, but it could come at the cost of lives and understand what that is. but do not let that make you afraid. you still have to be bold and know your mission, know your purpose. thank you. be the chance to hear from you. i'm sorry i got to had not at all. in fact, this is a rather difficult group of people to follow. so i'll do my best. and by the way, i know we met. i will never refer to you as snack go. so just real quick, just amazing listening to to all of their stories.

and i just i don't know what to i'll give you how i feel and my interpretation of what happened on day quickly. you know, i did not serve in us military, not because i didn't want to, but because my mother would not let me do it. my spent four years in the navy in world war two. he was actually on a destroyer outside of nagasaki, turkey, right after they dropped the bomb in hiroshima. old joke was, well, that explains why your came out the way they did because you were exposed to radiation. but he spent four years there and my mother lost brother ernest pasquale is named after my my uncle, who was a bombardier pilot. his bunkmate was clark gable, if you can believe that he was handsome guy and so was clark. and i still have the handwritten letters that he would send to my grandmother about their escapades when they'd go out, which was kind of fun, but so i came from a family that served the military, and i remember growing up and going to the american legion an awful lot, a

kid, and just the amount of respect i have for all of you and all of you out there is immeasurable. and, you know, i thank god for all of you and i pray for all of you and consistent basis. 911 let's talk about it. you know, i had just ironically begun for at that time dean witter in 1995, i was set to become a police officer, believe it, or but there was a hiring freeze my hometown. and i was getting itchy because i didn't have a career. i was getting sick of delivering and parking cars. so someone convinced me and their ultimate wisdom to get into the world of finance. they thought be good at it. so i did that and figured i'd kill time doing it until i became a police officer. and lo and behold, it of became very interesting to me. i enjoyed my mother was happy because she was worried was going to become, you know, police officer and potentially get killed. so decided to stick with it about three years after i did that, somebody decided in their

infinite wisdom, again that i'd be good in management. so sent me down from white plains, new york, the world trade center, to begin a career as a management training associate. the way we were to work, just to kind of try to frame this for you, we were eight managers or eight managers in training that were assigned a rotating class, a three week class of individuals that passed the qualifying exams to become a financial and were basically shipped to new york city for a three week sales training each of us would rotate and, run the class and it's ironic because my date in this program was 911 of 2000. believe it or not and i was running a class which was scheduled be my last class because it was a two year program that be in charge of before they started sending me out to the field to get some field experience, i was super excited. this is going to be the greatest class ever and everybody from

the ceo of my firm down plan 2 to 10 this and it was and the first day went off without any hitch at all. it was awesome. everybody was great. we are the largest class ever to run at 76 people. life good. so that morning when i woke up full disclosure i went to the yankee red sox game tonight before that didn't end up happening because it got rained out. but then the giants were playing the broncos and i had the going to a bar so let's say i got home all the way down i should but but i got up at 5 a.m. get ready to go in. it's about 630 and i'm walking in the building and it's a gorgeous day. i mean, the sun is out, it's beautiful and. i'm like, this going to be a fabulous day. i can't wait to get through it. and when we had gotten in, we started our training sessions. usually quarter to eight. the first speaker that came in actually showed up 15 minutes early. ironic in life, which showed up 15 minutes early.

so i said, do you want me to put you on now? i said, we have pretty much everybody in here. and he's like yeah, he goes, i'd like to get out of here early. okay, fine. so i put him on at 730. he finished 15 minutes early and so you know, i decided let me everybody on break give you an extended break. you got a half hour now. you can go downstairs and do your stuff. so i did that about 2 minutes after i did that. someone came running in from another room and they go, hey, did you see what's going on? and i go, no, not really. they said, come with me. so i look and you know, i started again in september 2000, which was just in time, the yankees, when they beat the mets and they had ticker tape parade in new york. and the only i could equate what i saw was the ticker tape parade was happy. i had all these wonderful flying around. this was like the ticker tape parade from hell. there was stuff coming out of it just on fire. there were office equipment, chairs. like what happened here. and so i got back immediately to

the room i contact and for the year that i had been there, the head of our security was a gentleman by name of rick ross scala. if you don't know who rick is, you should know who rick is. and i would encourage you to them up. rick was not only a hero that day, rick was a hero in vietnam. there's a movie called we were soldiers, mel gibson, that was based on rick's platoon and rick. wow. i didn't know rick personally very well, but i certainly went through training classes and. rick, beat into your head, if something happens here, exit the building. he was there for the bombing in 1993. it took 2 hours to get out of the building and rick became obsessed with the fact that if something wrong, exit the building, leave so my first inclination when thought about that was, let's get whoever is still up here and let's get them

out of here. let's go. okay, i'll make the decision i'll take it if it's wrong. but i'll take that decision and make it and then. by the way, you never take the elevators. rick taught us that. i learned that just from watching disaster when i was a kid, that you never take the you open up the stairwell and send people down. so we start down the building, you go, excuse me. walking down the stairwells. and we get to around 50th floor. i was up on 61, which was a reentry floor, and there was an announcement that was made, i believe, by the port authority. but i'm not going throw them under the bus. but there was a made that said building one was hit by an aircraft. building two is secure. go back to your desks so at that point quite frankly i said i'm out, i'm done. okay, i'm walking. i talked to a group of people that were with me. i said, let's just get downstairs, we'll regroup and we'll figure this out.

probably. 120 seconds or so after that we get it right, then there when you get hit the trade center, the way it was designed, there was a huge building. if you're a guy and you went to the bathroom and, you were standing there trying to go to the bathroom, the building would sometimes with wind, which made it a little bit difficult. but, you know, so when it got hit. the building took the impact. but it swayed like a pendulum from way to another. and then listening to was said before. real quickly, i remember thinking i wasn't married at the time, but i remember thinking like, man, i wish i spoke to my this morning because i don't know if i'm going get out of here and. it was amazing. you would think were ridiculously panicked and it was absolute chaos. the two worst obstacles to overcome believe it or not, were people that were a little bit heavyset and couldn't walk down

61 flights of stairs and the ladies were taking their high heels off and flinging like guided missiles on a tight little stairwell there. so you had to be very mindful of. but let me tell you, people bonded and people were very, very organized despite. the chaos. that's probably the only way i could describe. and we ended up, you know, getting to the eighth floor, which is the observance three deck. and this is what i saw, rick. and i saw rick coming up the escalator on the other side with his mega horn megaphone, just like george had. okay. and he's singing singing corniche anthems and saying that this is a great day. be an american and we should all be proud. and i remember looking at him and going, well, i'm coming out of this building. and i'm certain he's going back into it. to save people. so i would tell you it resonated

with me because we got out of the building. i had a decision to make. i said, you know, i went over a police officer and i said, hey, i've got a group of people here. what do i do? he goes, answer, you get out of downtown. he goes, we heard there's another plane coming. okay. and they been what you were assigned. so i said to, the people. i said, look, i said, walk back to hotels. we're we're housing you. we were people in three different hotels. the the east gate and the hotel story for those familiar with manhattan, southgate, right across from madison square garden. i said, go there. i said, i'll get up there eventually. we'll figure it out now. i sent them there, but i had a choice in decision to make myself and the decision as follows. i lived across the street in battery park city, and the decision could have been, let me go hole up in my apartment okay. quite frankly, i drank at that time. so probably with a bottle of vodka. but let me go hole in the

apartment and this out, too. i could get on the west side highway and walk back to my parents. my parents lived in yonkers, about 12 mile walk, but were three. i could do the right thing, which is walk back these hotels and begin the process of figuring out out of 276 people, did we get successfully out of this building? now? it took about a half a second for me to make that decision. and i thought about rick real quick. i thought about rick back in the building and i said, you know what? i'm walking to midtown and i'm going to do my job and i'm going to make sure all these people are good. and, you know, i did that. it was an incredible, incredible. 10 hours of my life trying to account for all of the folks that we in these training classes and, you know i wasn't exactly you know educate it on dealing with disaster relief but

i had folks coming up to me and going, you know, do i do like i like i'm like people were just frantic. so i was giving my credit, the ones that i had to people and just sending them to the bar because i don't know what else do. so around 1:00 that morning, we had been at about 80% of the 276 people accounted. and i said, i'm done spent a long day. okay. so i went downstairs and went outside. i said i'd better stop at the bar and close out my tab. this one's going to be painful. and i'll never forget they were so incredible at this hotel. they didn't me at all. and then i went outside and i said, okay, you know what? maybe it's time for me to to relax little bit here and get my bearings. and i started talking to we had the state troopers and we had the us marshals based out of the hotel at that time. so i started talking a group of them when i went, i remember walking around and behind the

south gate hotel there was there was a fire station that we talked about and i remember seeing similar to the president, there was a crushed fire truck that i imagine when he pulled out this beautiful bright red and gorgeous. and it was in soot and etched in the back. god bless. and i remember thinking, my god, what today? all i can tell is you saw the worst in humanity on that day. and you saw the best in humanity. because i will tell you, people together, regardless of anything or any reason that people throw out there, why shouldn't bond together, which is all nonsense. at the end of the day, people bonded. they came together and they fought for the spirit, this country, and they fought the

spirit of humanity. and although i don't like to think about what happened day. i do enjoy thinking what i witnessed, which was just the strength of people coming and unifying. so god bless all of you. thank you for what you do and always remember the power of this country and the power of the human spirit. thank you very much. i'd like to thank andrew card and all the members of the panel. thank you very much. unfortunately we're not going to have time for questions, but these people will be around. so please please go up to them, introduce as no question, engage with, learn from them, thank yourself. yeah.

you've heard from a number of folks today about doing things that have in some respects, never been done before, facing challenges that have never been faced before, and making decisions that have never needed to be made before. we've got some a particularly interesting panel here to finish out this day on people that face their own set of challenges as they contributed in their individual fields, rose up and head on occasion needed to push back so that they could move forward. so i'm very pleased to introduce dr. sarah spradlin. yep. all right. i got it right. i'm a marine corps veteran, and she will introduce her panel. so thank you very much from. thank you. thank you. we are very excited to be here to