Isaac Yeffet Quotes

If terrorists attacked New York, Washington, or San Francisco with a weapon of mass destruction, the next day we will all be asking what steps we might have taken to prevent it. So the question is, “Why do we not take those steps now?”

How many terrorist attacks has TSA thwarted? We're never going to know the true answer to that question.

But I warn my colleagues that we will fail in our efforts to protect the homeland if we do not take additional steps to avoid a trade-off between protecting ourselves against terrorists attacks and preparing for and responding to natural disasters.

The prompt assimilation of that intelligence will be essential if we are to avoid another September 11th.

The FBI. is a massive culture. It's been a culture that served America well, and it's been focused on prosecution. But what we need in terms of terrorism is prevention.

Louis Freeh said on national TV that actionable intelligence could have allowed us to stop the hijackings.

Let us learn from the lessons of September 11 and not wait for a major strike before we act. We must work together - Democrats and Republicans, Congress and the White House, government and the private sector - to make our country a safer and more prosperous place.

In the wake of the September 11 attacks, it became clear that the FBI's number one priority must be the prevention of another terrorist attack.

Geraldo has returned to the states. See? I told you airline security was a joke.

It urges policy makers and the Supreme Court to make the mistake of curing what could prove to be an isolated problem by disarming the government of its principal weapon to stop future terrorist attacks.

Once the attacks occur, as we learned on Sept. 11, it is too late. It makes little sense to deprive ourselves of an important, and legal, means to detect and prevent terrorist attacks while we are still in the middle of a fight to the death with al Qaeda.

Congress has greatly tightened the loopholes terrorists can use to harm Americans. We need to do more. We need controls immediately on what forms of ID are adequate to board planes and enter secure sites.

It does not make sense that we are allowing known potential weapons, not unlike those the 9-11 hijackers used to overcome the crews of four airplanes, to be taken aboard passenger aircraft.

We want to look at how we would respond because, as hard as we work to prevent terrorist attacks here North America, if we have a catastrophic terrorist attack, it is the military that is going to have to go in at the request of civilian authorities.

And so every one of us in the FBI, I don't care if it's a file clerk someplace or an agent there or a computer specialist, understands that our main mission is to protect the public from another September 11, another terrorist attack.

The attacks of September 11 persuaded many Americans that what might seem to be obscure or distant potential threats can very quickly materialize and it therefore makes sense to attend to them even before they become urgent.

In a brave new world, a post-September 11 world, anyone is going to make certain mistakes. The mistakes that have been made on homeland security, on protecting our Nation from another terrorist attack, are mistakes of omission. We are simply not doing enough.

It's very difficult to tell someone how to protect themselves from a terrorist attack, whether it occurs in the U.S. or on foreign soil, particularly when you have terrorists with no concern for human life.

America will be far safer if we reduce the chances of a terrorist attack in one of our cities than if we diminish the civil liberties of our own people.

There is no priority higher than the prevention of terrorism.

We have to think outside the box, inside the Constitution, find ways to do things that will elevate our security, reduce the risk of the incidence of terrorist attack.

I think the idea that you would do everything you can to prevent what is coming at you by way of something very disruptive - a 9/11 - it's a no-brainer.

I believe the public's confidence would be increased if the federal government took over the functions of airport security screening for all passengers.

One of the essential elements of government responsibility is to communicate effectively to the American people, especially in time of a potential terrorist attack or a natural disaster.

Governments in countries across the world have a duty to do everything possible to keep the public safe from terrorist attacks.