t I

Thomas H. Kean August 19, 2003

CHAIR

Lee H. Hamilton
VICE CHAIR
Lieutenant General Michael V. Hayden, USAF
Richard Ben-Veniste Director
Max Cleland
National Security Agency
9800 Savage Road
Frederick F. Fielding Fort George G. Meade, MD 20755-6272
Jamie S. Gorelick
Dear General Hayden:
Slade Gorton

John F. Lehman
Public Law 107-306 directs the Commission to investigate the facts and
circumstances surrounding the September 11,2001 terrorist attacks, including
Timothy J. Roemer the nation's preparedness for and immediate response to those attacks. We are
James R. Thompson
also mandated to identify and evaluate lessons learned and make
recommendations for the future. The statute authorizes the Commission to
secure needed information directly from any agency. The Commission has
Philip D. Zelikow
EXF^'TtVE DIRECTOR thus made numerous requests for documents and discussions with officials
from your agency. Given the extraordinary character of the 9/11 events and
our mandate, the scope and sensitivity of our requests have few, if any,
precedents.

We are therefore all the more grateful for the efforts you and your colleagues
have made so far to deal with our many, necessary requests. With so many
other issues confronting you and your staff, we do understand how hard this
can be. We try to make appropriate allowances when we know people are
doing their best. In July the Commission issued an interim report on our
progress so far. In that report we said the coming weeks would be critical.
We promised another report in September that would appraise whether the
level of voluntary cooperation is sufficient so that we will be able to do the job
we are charged to do under the statute.

That time is now approaching. You are entitled to some advance notice of
what we need. To make such a decisive appraisal and properly evaluate your
agency's cooperation, we will assess:

1. Your policy choices—one way or another—on every access issue posed by

our pending requests.

2. Whether we actually receive the most important categories of documents

that are already overdue. We will follow up to be sure our points of
contact know which overdue documents we regard as litmus
301 7 th Street SW, Room 5125
tests for effective cooperation.
Washington, DC 20407
T 202.331.4060 F 202.296.5545
www.9-llcommission.gov
Lieutenant General Michael V. Hayden, USAF
August 19,2003
Page 2

We understand that you and your staff may need a few more weeks to finalize
policy choices and push through delivery of key documents. Therefore we
think it is reasonable to wait and assess the situation based on positions
communicated with us and documents that have actually been delivered or
otherwise made available to us by COB on Friday, September 5,2003.

As the second anniversary of the devastating attacks on our country

approaches, we thank you for working with us to meet the challenge of
understanding how and why America suffered such a devastating attack, and
how to prevent another.

Sincerely,

Thomas H. Kean Lee H. Hamilton

Chair Vice Chair

cc: Karen M. Valentine

 aON ON

August 28,2003

Thomas H Kean MEMORANDUM

CHAIR

Lee H. Hamilton
VICE CHAIR To: Karen Valentine, National Security Agency
Richard Ben- Veniste
From: Daniel Marcus, General Counsel
Maxdeland

Fred F. Fielding Subj: Most Important Overdue Documents

Jamie S. Gorelick

Skde Gorton As a follow-up to the letter to General Hayden dated August 19, 2003,
here are the most important categories of documents requested by the
John Lehman
Commission that are overdue:
Timothy J. Roemer
NSA Document Request No. 1 - Items 1, 4,5 and 7
James R Thompson

We look forward to the Agency's prompt production of these overdue

Philip D. Zelikow
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR items, as well as positions on access to all of the documents responsive to
all of our outstanding requests, as set forth in the August 19 letter. If you
have any questions, please give me a call.

cc: Dan Levin, DOJ

TEL (202) 331-4060

FAX (202) 296-5545
•www.9-1 lcommission.gov