Newly-released images taken on day of 9/11 attacks

They show president George W Bush, Mr Cheney, and other senior administration figures including national security advisor Condoleeza Rice and secretary of state Colin Powell in conference during the hours following the attacks that left nearly 3,000 dead in New York, Washington DC and Pennsylvania.

The most striking image (above) shows Vice President Dick Cheney with a foot up on his desk as he watches the Twin Towers belching smoke on TV.

Behind the scenes… US Vice President Cheney with Condoleezza Rice in the President’s Emergency Operations Center (PEOC). More than 350 of those never-before-seen photos have been released after a Boston-based documentary producer’s Freedom of Information requests over a decade.

Now pictures taken by a White House photographer have been released, showing how the President and Vice-President reacted as the 9/11 terrorist attacks unfolded. Later, images were captured of Cheney and his wife, Libby, as they flew to Camp David.

In the above image, taken in the secure basement of the White House, shows Cheney, head in hands and talking on the telephone.

The pictures shed additional light on the White House’s internal reaction to the worst terror attack in U.S. history. But how did the people on the inside – government officials who have often been blamed for failing to take sufficient precautions to prevent the attack – respond?