upnorthkyosa said:
The scramble time for NYC and Washington is less then ten minutes according to the CAP. They had plenty of time. The fighters were in the jets...and told to stand down. Why would that have happened? I hope this comes up at the 911 commission.
Some arguement for and against this at ...
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/wot/sept11/whatwasthegovernmentdoingon911.html
but many military types disagree with that.
6 Official reasons why the Air Force jets were not promptly dispatched to intercept the troubled airliners.
a In General
i ‘The U.S. doesn’t have fighter jets on standby, ready to take off.’
(A) Warren B. Rudman, former New Hampshire Senator, veteran of the Korean war, and a national security expert
(1) "This country is not on a wartime footing. We don't have capable fighter aircraft loaded with missiles sitting on runways in this country. We just don't do that anymore. We did back during the '70s, the '60s, along the coast, being concerned about Russian intrusion, but to expect American fighter aircraft to intercept commercial airliners, who knows where, is totally unrealistic and makes no sense at all." [
Boston Globe 9/15/01]
(B) Air Force Col. Robert Marr Jr., Commander of the North East Defence Sector.
(1) According to Marr, the threat of such an attack had
never been considered. Consequently, there were only four armed combat-ready fighter jets available in the Northeast Air Defense Sector, covering the area from Minnesota to Maine to Virginia and only 10 other armed jets available to protect the rest of the U.S. [
BBC 8/29/01]
ii ‘Presidential approval was needed to shoot down the aircraft.’
(A) Statements that the presidentÂ’s approval was needed to shoot down the planes.
(1) Dick Cheney.
(a) He stated the following, referring to the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania: “The president made the decision...that if the plane would not divert...as a last resort, our pilots were authorized to take them out. Now, people say, you know, that's a horrendous decision to make. Well, it is. You've got an airplane full of American citizens, civilians, captured by...terrorists, headed and are you going to, in fact, shoot it down, obviously, and kill all those Americans on board? ...It's a presidential-level decision, and the president made, I think, exactly the right call in this case, to say, ‘I wished we'd had combat air patrol up over New York.’ He didn’t feel it was necessary to put the jets to flight earlier because ‘It doesn't do any good to put up a combat air patrol if you don't give them instructions to act, if, in fact, they feel it's appropriate’.” [
NBC, 9/16/01]
(B) Statements that the presidentÂ’s approval came too late.
(1) Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold, then commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD)
(a) During the May 23 hearings before the 9/11 Independent Commission, he said that the presidentÂ’s approval to shoot down commercial aircraft had come too late, noting that the order wasnÂ’t made until 10am [the record shows the decision was made shortly after 9:56]. He also claimed that he hadnÂ’t been notified about the decision until after Flight 193 had already crashed in Pennsylvania [which occurred at 10:06]. [
New York Newsday, 5/23/03;
Knight Ridder, 5/23/03;
Dallas Morning News, 5/24/03]
(C) Statements suggesting that the fighter jets could have reached Washington in time to intercept Flight 77 - had the shootdown order been given earlier.
(1) Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold then commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD)
(a) During the May 23 hearings before the 9/11 Independent Commission, Gen. Larry Arnold admitted it was “certainly physically possible” that fighter jets from Langley Air Force Base could have made it to Washington to intercept Flight 77 had the shootdown order been made earlier. [
Dallas Morning News, 5/24/03]
(D) Criticism.
(1) Presidential approval is not needed for a jet to monitor, track, and intercept a commercial airliner.
iii ‘We weren’t prepared for it.’
(A) NORAD was operated as a “Cold War Vestige”
(1) Statements.
(a) Major General Craig McKinley, commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD)
(i) Major General Craig McKinley told the 9/11 Independent Commission on May 23, 2003 that NORAD’s system operated like “a Cold War vestige,” insisting, “It was developed during the Cold War, to defend against long-range Soviet bombers.” He claimed that although U.S. intelligence had been aware that terrorists were considering using hijacked planes as missiles, this information was never shared with NORAD. [
New York Newsday, 5/23/03]
(ii) McKinley told the commission that NORADÂ’s ground communications with its pilots were not designed to coordinate a defense operation against an attack from within the country. As a result, NORAD was unable to communicate directly with its pilots and had to go through the FAA, McKinley said. [
New York Newsday, 5/23/03]
(iii) McKinley also told the commission that NORADÂ’s radar system had been designed only to defend the U.S from overseas attacks. Consequently, on 9/11 NORAD had to use radar information provided by the FAA. [
New York Newsday, 5/23/03]
(B) NORAD was unaware of intelligence suggesting that terrorists were considering using hijacked planes as missiles to attack targets in the U.S.
(1) Statements.
(a) Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley, in response to Richard Ben-Veniste’s question: “Given the awareness of the terrorist use of planes as weapons, how was it that NORAD was ... not better prepared to protect against the hijacking of commercial jets?”
(i) McKinley responded, “In retrospect, I would agree with your comment.” He later added, however, that his agency “had no intelligence information of a terrorist threat using commercial airlines.” [
New York Newsday, 5/23/03] When members reminded him that there had been
several indications that terrorists were considering to use airplanes in this manner, “NORAD and transportation officials continued to insist that they were never apprised by the nation's intelligence community of the potential for a U.S. jetliner to be used in such a way.” [
New Jersey Star Ledger, 5/24/03]
(2) Evidence suggesting otherwise.
(a) Statement made by General Ed Eberhart of the Air Force's North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD)
(i) General Ed Eberhart of the Air Force's North American Aerospace Defense
01. Slate MSN reported on February 16, 2002, that General Ed Eberhart of the Air Force's North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) admitted that NORAD had been aware of the possibility that hijacked airliners might be used as missiles by suicidal terrorists.
Slate reported: “NORAD had practiced responding to a hijacked plane trying to slam into a target in the United States, the exercises assumed that the flight had originated overseas, giving intercepting jet fighters more time. More important, he also said that even if his aircraft had practiced the domestic scenario, it wouldn't have mattered. Why? ‘I really think that, for sure in the first two instances, and probably in the third, the time and distance would not have allowed us to get an airplane to the right place at the right time’.” [
Slate 2/16/02]
(ii) Statement made by NORAD spokesman Marine Corps Maj. Mike Snyder.
01. On June 4, 2002, Snyder said plans to conduct a training exercise for a commercial airliner-hijacking scenario had been made before the Sept. 11 attacks. The exercise did not happen, however, until June of 2002. [
American Forces Press Service, 6/4/03]
(iii) In late October 2000, the Pentagon conducted a training exercise involving a plane crash at the Pentagon.
01. In late 0ctober 2000, the Pentagon, concerned about the ability of its emergency response teams to respond to a major accident at the Pentagon, conducted an exercise involving a mock plane crash at the Pentagon. [
Military District of Washington News Service, 11/3/2000]
iv ‘I don’t know.’
(A)
Air Force General Myers, acting Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staffs on 9/11.
Senate Armed Services Committee Holds Hearing On Nomination of General Richard Myers to be Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff, Washington, D.C. , SEPTEMBER 13, 2001
SENATOR LEVIN: Was the Defense Department contacted by the FAA or the FBI or any other agency after the first two hijacked aircraft crashed into the World Trade Center, prior to the time that the Pentagon was hit?
GENERAL MYERS: Sir, I don't know the answer to that question. I can get that for you, for the record... That order, to the best of my knowledge, was after the Pentagon was struck. ... I was with Senator Cleland when this happened and went back to the Pentagon. And they were evacuating, of course, the Pentagon at the time. And I went into the National Military Command Center because that's essentially my battle station when things are happening.
SENATOR LEVIN: Was the Defense Department contacted by the FAA or the FBI or any other agency after the first two hijacked aircraft crashed into the World Trade Center, prior to the time that the Pentagon was hit?
GENERAL MYERS: Sir, I don't know the answer to that question. I can get that for you, for the record.
SENATOR LEVIN: Thank you. Did the Defense Department take -- or was the Defense Department asked to take action against any specific aircraft?
GENERAL MYERS: Sir, we were . . .
SENATOR LEVIN: And did you take action against -- for instance, there has been statements that the aircraft that crashed in Pennsylvania was shot down. Those stories continue to exist.
GENERAL MYERS: Mr. Chairman, the armed forces did not shoot down any aircraft. When it became clear what the threat was, we did scramble fighter aircraft, AWACS, radar aircraft and tanker aircraft to begin to establish orbits in case other aircraft showed up in the FAA system that were hijacked. But we never actually had to use force.
SENATOR CLELAND: General, it's a good thing that, as I look back at that morning, that you and I were meeting. It's a good thing we were meeting here and not us meeting in the Pentagon because about the time you and I were having our visit, discussing the need to boost our conventional forces, to look at the question of terrorism and attacks on the United States, at just about that very moment, the Pentagon was being hit.
GERERAL MYERS: Yes, sir.
SENATOR BILL NELSON: ... General Myers, The second World Trade tower was hit shortly after 9:00. And the Pentagon was hit approximately 40 minutes later. That's approximately. You would know specifically what the timeline was.
The crash that occurred in Pennsylvania after the Newark westbound flight was turned around 180 degrees and started heading back to Washington was approximately an hour after the World Trade Center second explosion. You said earlier in your testimony that we had not scrambled any military aircraft until after the Pentagon was hit. And so, my question would be: why?
GENERAL MYERS: I think I had that right, that it was not until then. I'd have to go back and review the exact timelines.
SENATOR BILL NELSON: ... If we knew that there was a general threat on terrorist activity, which we did, and we suddenly have two trade towers in New York being obviously hit by terrorist activity, of commercial airliners taken off course from Boston to Los Angeles, then what happened to the response of the defense establishment once we saw the diversion of the aircraft headed west from Dulles turning around 180 degrees and, likewise, in the aircraft taking off from Newark and, in flight, turning 180 degrees? That's the question.
I leave it to you as to how you would like to answer it. But we would like an answer.
GENERAL MYERS: You bet. I spoke, after the second tower was hit, I spoke to the commander of NORAD, General Eberhart. And at that point, I think the decision was at that point to start launching aircraft...
In this case, if my memory serves me -- and I'll have to get back to you for the record -- my memory says that we had launched on the one that eventually crashed in Pennsylvania. I mean, we had gotten somebody close to it, as I recall. I'll have to check that out.
SENATOR BILL NELSON: ... Commenting from CNN on the timeline, 9:03 is the correct time that the United Airlines flight crashed into the south tower of the World Trade Center; 9:43 is the time that American Airlines flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon. And 10:10 a.m. is the time that United Airlines flight 93 crashed in Somerset County, Pennsylvania.
So that was 40 minutes between the second tower being hit and the Pentagon crash. And it is an hour and seven minutes until the crash occurred in Pennsylvania.
SENATOR LEVIN: The time that we don't have is when the Pentagon was notified, if they were, by the FAA or the FBI or any other agency, relative to any potential threat or any planes having changed direction or anything like that. And that's the same which you will give us because that's . . .
GENERAL MYERS: I can answer that. At the time of the first impact on the World Trade Center, we stood up our crisis action team. That was done immediately.
So we stood it up. And we started talking to the federal agencies. The time I do not know is when NORAD responded with fighter aircraft. I don't know that time.
SENATOR LEVIN: Or the time that I asked you for, which was whether the FAA or FBI notified you that other planes had turned direction from their path, their scheduled path, and were returning or aiming towards Washington, whether there was any notice from any of them, because that's such an obvious shortfall if there wasn't.
GENERAL MYERS: Right.
SENATOR LEVIN: And in any event, but more important, if you could get us that information.
GENERAL MYERS: It probably happened. As you remember, I was not in the Pentagon at that time, so that part of it is a little hazy. After that, we started getting regular notifications through NORAD, FAA to NORAD, on other flights that we were worried about.
And we knew about the one that eventually crashed in Pennsylvania. I do not know, again, whether we had fighters scrambled on it. I have to . . .
SENATOR LEVIN: If you could get us those times then. We know you don' t know them.
GENERAL MYERS: But we'll get them.
b Regarding specific flights
i Flight 77, the plane that crashed into the Pentagon.
(A) "There were no jets available."
(1) Comments to this effect.
(a) "Andrews Air Force Base, home to Air Force One, is only 15 miles [sic!] away from the Pentagon, but it had no fighters assigned to it. Defense officials won't say whether that has changed." [
USA Today 9/16/01]
(2) Evidence to the contrary.
(a) "The District of Columbia National Guard maintained fighter planes at Andrews Air Force Base, only about 15 miles [sic!] from the Pentagon, but those planes were not on alert and not deployed." [
USA Today 9/16/01]
(b) The
San Diego Union Tribune observed on September 12, "Air defense around Washington is provided mainly by fighter planes from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland near the District of Columbia border. The D.C. Air National Guard is also based there and equipped with F-16 fighter planes. . . . But the fighters took to the skies over Washington only after the devastating attack on the Pentagon." [
San Diego Tribune 9/16/01]
(B) ‘We had no idea there was a plane heading our way’
(1) Summary.
(a) According to NORADÂ’s official timeline, the agency was not formally notified of the Flight 77 hijacking until 9:24, 14 minutes before the Pentagon was hit.
(2) Statements indicating NORADÂ’s alleged ignorance regarding Flight 77.
(a) Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Vic Warzinski, a Pentagon spokesperson, told
Newsday, "The Pentagon was simply not aware that this aircraft was coming our way, and I doubt prior to TuesdayÂ’s event anyone would have expected anything like that here." [
Newsday 9/23/01]
(3) Statements that suggest NORAD was aware that Flight 77 was heading towards Washington.
(a) Former FAA administrator Jane Garvey told the 9/11 Independent Commission on May 23, 2003 that FAA officials made several “informal” notices to NORAD during the morning of Sept. 11 prior to the formal notice at 9:24. [
New York Newsday, 5/23/03] In fact, the Washington Post reported that according to Garvey, “FAA officials were in a conference call with NORAD after the first plane crashed into the World Trade Center” [
Washington Post, 5/24/03]
(b) During the May 23, 2003 Sept. 11 hearings, an unnamed military person said that a regional NORAD office had spoken with the FAA well before 9:24. [
Washington Post, 5/24/03]
ii Flight 11 and Flight 175 in New York
(A) "We didnÂ’t have enough warning."
(1) Marine Corps Major Mike Snyder, spokesman for the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD)
(a) "We scramble aircraft to respond to any aircraft that we consider a potential threat. The hijacked aircraft were normal, scheduled commercial aircraft on approved flight plans and we only had 10 minutes prior notice to the first attack, which unfortunately was not enough notice. . . . This is an unprecedented event, unfortunately, and we're just going to have to adjust accordingly." [
Boston Globe 9/15/01]
(B) NORAD claimed it had lost Flight 11 on radar.
(1) Official account.
(a) Aviation week and Space Technology.
(i) On June 3, 2002, the magazine reported, "Back at the NEADS Operations Center, identification technicians were sorting thousands of green dots on their radar scopes, looking for American Flight 11. Since terrorists had turned off the Boeing 767's transponder, FAA controllers could only tell NEADS technicians where the flight had last been seen. The NEADS radar screens showed ‘primary’ or ‘skin-paint’ returns, the raw radar pulses reflected from an aircraft's surface. … ‘We were trying to determine which [radar return] was him. But we couldn't get what we needed just from our scopes,’ said MSgt. Maureen Dooley, a noncommissioned officer in charge (NCOIC) of NEADS' identification technicians. She and other troops were constantly on the phone with the FAA, airlines and others, looking for clues. ‘If we could get good last-known-positions and tail numbers, that would help the fighters pick out the right aircraft’." [
Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/02]
(2) Contradictory reports.
(a) Christian Science Monitor
(i) On September 13, the
Christian Science Monitor interviewed some of the air traffic controllers who had been tracking Flight 11. The article explained, "Flight 11's transponder had stopped working. It was no longer sending a radar pulse. The plane's altitude also became a matter of guesswork for controllers,
though the Boeing 767 was still visible on radar. Still, the controllers hoped that the plane simply had an electrical problem." The plane remained visible, according to the controllerÂ’s account, until it collided with the World Trade Center: "Two F-15 jets were reportedly dispatched from Otis Air Force Base [at about 8:46AM]. Just before or after the military planes got off the ground, however, the controllers report they lost site of Flight 11's radar signal over Manhattan. The controller who had handled the plane from the beginning of the ordeal was stunned."
(b) The Washington Post.
(i) On September 17, the
Post reported, "Controllers scrambled to direct other planes out of the way of both United 175 and American Airlines Flight 11 -- which also originated in Boston -- as they headed toward the twin towers." [
Washington Post, 9/17/01]
(c) The Wall Street Journal.
(i) On October 15, the
Wall Street Journal reported, "The FAA had tagged the radar blip that Flight 11 had become, and it was now isolated on an Aircraft Situation Display, a big radar-tracking screen. All eyes watched as the plane headed south. On the screen, the plane showed a squiggly line after its turn near Albany, then it straightened." [
Wall Street Journal, 10/15/01]