John Ashcroft

eroes teach us. But the ways of terrorists hold lessons as well. We have learned, for example, that the Sept. 11 terrorists geographically separated the different stages of their plan in order to minimize the possibility that they would be detected. The hijackers trained in camps in Central Asia. They planned most of the attacks in Europe. And they executed their plot here in the United States.

This geographical distribution has had a great influence on how we go about identifying and dismantling terrorist networks. And it has an important lesson for emergency responders as well. We have all heard the saying: "Necessity is the mother of invention." . . . A modified version of that saying, directly relevant to the current war on terror, would read something like this: "Necessity is the mother of cooperation." No agency, department, state, county or local government can do this job alone.

Our No. 1 priority is the prevention of terrorist attacks. But we understand that our best efforts at prevention will not always be successful. . . . We at the Justice Department, working with state, county and local first responders, have continued to promote coordinated programs and cooperative systems.

-March 4, 2002
Before the National Association of Counties.