What the FBI Needs--and Doesn't Need

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Another FBI strength is that its more than 11,000 agents are scattered throughout the country, not only assigned to big cities but distributed geographically. Over the years, these agents have developed working relationships with other federal, state, county, city and tribal law-enforcement officers that multiply the FBI's eyes and ears, hands and feet, and also can be said to form a tight grid that spans every part of the country. The importance of this unique coverage cannot be overstated when it comes to detecting terrorists, who may be anywhere. A new domestic-intelligence bureaucracy would not only need time to get up to speed but would probably never be able to duplicate the FBI's geographical spread.

So where, beyond the reforms already undertaken, should we focus our efforts to make improvements? Rather than despair at the size of the challenge before us, it's important for us to remember that the impact of the 9/11 plot was, to a huge extent, lessened (and thereby, in a sense, prevented) by the actions of the brave passengers on board United Flight 93 who, by confronting their hijackers, quite likely averted an attack on the Capitol or the White House. They did not let themselves be deterred by the difficulty--the near impossibility--of the task. In the same way, the courage of rescue workers and other heroes that day at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon saved countless lives. Like those men and women, we don't need to remake our world so much as to steel our resolve, use our common sense and try our hardest.

FBI agent Rowley, a TIME Person of the Year in 2002, wrote a memo to FBI headquarters that year accusing the bureau of obstructing measures that might have disrupted the 9/11 attacks. Here she is expressing her personal views, not those of the FBI.