Their request takes on a new urgency with the closing of Gitmo and the ending of proceedings against the mastermind of the attack. “USS Cole Families Press Obama to Open Commission to Investigate Attack,” by Catherine Herridge for FOXNews.com, February 12 (thanks to O.):
President Obama was pressed by families of the sailors killed in the terrorist strike on the USS Cole to establish a 9/11 Commission-like panel to investigate the attack, FOX News has learned.
Obama met with relatives of Cole sailors and 9/11 victims Friday in the wake of three executive orders he signed last month ordering the closing of the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, where the alleged mastermind of the attack is being held.
The deadly strike is considered a seminal event in the days leading up to 9/11. Seventeen American sailors were killed off the coast of Yemen Oct. 12, 2000, when a suicide bomber rammed his boat into the hull of the Cole.
As the Obama administration prepares to review the cases of the 245 detainees held in Guantanamo, the president called in the concerned families to explain his plan to prosecute the detainees outside of military courts.
Some of those present at the meeting have criticized Obama’s plan to close the prison, and looked for reassurance that they will see justice served after years of waiting. The family of Cherone Gunn, a 22-year-old seaman killed on the Cole, broached the subject of opening an investigation….
According to three sources at the closed-door conference, the president was warned by a member of the Cole contingent that a commission would be unpopular with the Navy and would require investigating the Clinton administration’s actions against Al Qaeda. That could be politically tricky — one democratic administration investigating the possible intelligence failures of another democratic administration….