Summary

Response to the Congress on Actions Taken by the Department of State in Response to the Program Recommendations of the Accountability Review Boards on the Embassy Bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, April 1999

SUMMARY

I agree with all of the recommendations of the Accountability Review Boards convened to review the circumstances of last year's terrorist bombings of the United States Embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

I intend to implement the Boards' recommendations aggressively with only slight differences in tactics on a few. Some recommendations are already substantially implemented. Others will require major investments in buildings, equipment, and people. The Department has made a vigorous start, but much remains to be done.

I strongly agree with the Boards' urgent calls for more secure physical facilities, more and better security and crisis-response equipment, more security personnel, and broader, more intensive and more sustained antiterrorism and crisis-response training. The Department is already embarked on a broad-scale program of property and equipment upgrades and replacements, hiring, and training.

The FY 1999 emergency security appropriation of $1.4 billion for security allowed the Department to launch this process. The appropriation provided for:

• Creating temporary embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam while designing and building replacement embassies;
  
  
• Providing posts with basic security equipment packages;
  
  
• Expanding local guard coverage at facility perimeters;
  
  
• Hiring additional personnel to provide security expertise at more posts and implement additional security measures;
  
  
• Upgrading emergency radio communications to all posts;
  
  
• Temporarily relocating, upgrading, or constructing new facilities at posts identified as the highest priority;
  
  
• Increasing anti- and counter-terrorism activities; and
  
  
• Providing assistance to Kenya and Tanzania.

However, as the Boards recognized, this appropriation for security is only the first installment in a long-term effort. The Boards estimated a cost of $14 billion over 10 years to carry out their recommendations. The Administration has requested $304 million in FY 2000 to fund the recurring costs of the projects undertaken under the emergency security appropriation and to fund the design of up to eight additional posts and the acquisition of up to two sites. The Administration's request also includes $3 billion in advanced appropriations (FY 2001-FY 2005) to begin a multi-year construction program for new embassies and consulates.

In the end, our success will require the long-term commitments of this Administration and Congress, and of our successors. I am ready and eager to work with the Congress in this critical effort.