The Unlikely Odyssey of George W. Bush: History, Education, Presidency, Legacy (2002)

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• published: 11 Nov 2015
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President Bush's first policy response to 9/11 came on October 8, 2001, when, during a speech to Congress, he announced the creation of the Office of Homeland Security and appointed Tom Ridge, a former governor of Pennsylvania, as its director. This was the first new executive-level office to be created since 1988, when President Ronald Reagan had appointed a head of the Department of Veterans Affairs. The stated purpose of the Office of Homeland Security was "to develop and coordinate the implementation of a comprehensive national strategy" and "to secure the United States from terrorist threats or attacks." This department's most public accomplishment came on March 12, 2002, when the Homeland Security Advisory System was unveiled, a system of color-coded alerts designed to warn the population of the United States of the assessed level of threat from terrorist activity, based on the evaluation of credible intelligence reports. The "terror alert" level was posted on a daily basis. Bush's military response to the terrorist attacks began in October 2001, with the deployment of 11,000 troops to Afghanistan. The invasion was supported by many countries, but especially by troops from the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Germany. This military invasion was supported also by the Afghan Northern Alliance, a large group of allied Afghan tribes that had been waging a civil war against the Taliban for many years. The invasion was supported by the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). The stated goal of the mission was to overthrow the Taliban government, an Islamic fundamentalist regime thought to be allowing terrorist training camps directed at western targets to operate in Afghanistan and believed to be harboring Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaeda, the terrorist organization that was blamed for the 9/11 attacks, and which later claimed responsibility for them. On Tuesday, September 24, 2001. President Bush signed a bill authorizing the building of a national memorial to the passengers and crew who died aboard Flight 93 when it crashed into Shanksville, in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, during the September 11 terrorist attacks. George W. Bush's first term as president of the United States began on January 20, 2001 and continued until his second term commenced on January 20, 2005. By far the most memorable event of this first term in office was the 9/11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. Bush was instrumental in pushing forward legislation in education and national security, in bringing about tax-reduction and allocating funds for global warming. He withdrew the United States from participation in the 1998 Kyoto Protocol on world climate change and from the 1989 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, as well as withdrawing U.S. support for the International Criminal Court, but his legacy was defined by his response to the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. Shortly after the terrorist attack, a U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan resulted in the overthrow of the Taliban government in Kabul, a region which had allowed terrorist training camps, directed at western targets, to operate in Desert Storm. This approach was symptomatic of a change in the perception of the world and of the international treats to the United States, one expounded in Bush's 2005 State of the Union Address and known subsequently as the Bush Doctrine. The United States gave itself the right to pursue its enemies wherever they could be found. In 2003, a U.S.-led military force invaded Iraq, to remove the alleged Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) under the control of Saddam Hussein. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush%27s_first_term_as_President_of_the_United_States