911 Commission Testimony: Remarks of Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta

National Commission on September 11 Terrorist Attacks
May 23, 2003

Excerpt from Secretary Mineta’s opening remarks regarding September 11, 2001

When I got to the White House, it was being evacuated. I met briefly with Richard Clark, a National Security Council Staff member, who had no new information. Then the Secret Service escorted me down to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center, otherwise known as the PEOC. I established contact with two lines - one with my Chief of Staff at the Dept. of Transportation and the second with Monte Belger, the acting Deputy Administrator of the FAA and Jane Garvey, both of whom were in the FAA Operations Center. And as the minutes past, the developing picture from air traffic control towers and radar screens became increasingly more alarming. Some aircraft could not be contacted. While on a normal day, that may be just a communications snafu, we were faced with trying to quickly sort out minor problems from significant threats. We did not know how many more attacks might be in progress.

The FAA began to restrict air travel in the Northeast United States by a combination of actions which included sterilizing air space in certain regions and at various airports. And ultimately, a nationwide ground stop of all aircraft for all locations regardless of destination.

Within a few minutes, American Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon. At this time, as we discussed the situation with the North American Aerospace Defense Commander and his staff, we considered implementing an emergency system of coordinated air traffic management to allow maximum use for defensive activities. It was clear that we had to clear the airspace as soon as possible to stop any further attacks and ensure domestic airspace was available for emergency and defensive use. And so at approximately 9:45 A.M., less than one hour after I had first been notified of the airplane crash in New York, I gave the FAA a final order for all civil aircraft to land at the nearest airport as soon as possible. It was the first shutdown of civil aviation in the history of the United States.

Within minutes, air traffic controllers throughout the nation, had directed 700 domestic and international flights to emergency but safe landings. Within another 50 minutes, air traffic controllers working with skilled flight crews made sure that another 2800 airplanes returned safely to the ground. By shortly that afternoon, less than four hours after the first attack, U.S. airspace was empty of all aircraft except military and medical traffic. A total of approximately 4500 aircraft were landed without incident in highly stressful conditions.

Additionally, all international inbound flights were diverted from U.S. airspace and U.S. airports. Unfortunately, during this time, we also learned that United Flight 93 crashed in Stoney Creek Township, Pennsylvania. As America knows, but it is important to keep repeating, that aircraft never reached the terrorist target due to the heroic actions taken by the passengers and crews on United Flight 93.

The question has been asked whether or not there is evidence that other hijackings and attacks were prevented by the actions that were taken that day. There are classified reports, media reports and investigative documents that indicate that other attacks may have been planned. But the evidence on this question is speculative at best. And I do not believe that anyone can assert that other attacks were thwarted on that day unless he or she is the one who either planned the attack or planned to carry it out.

I also want to tell the Commission that although the focus of this Commission’s interest is on the airplane crashes on September 11th, as Secretary of the United States Coast Guard, I was involved that day in the mass evacuation of more than 350,000 people from Manhattan. In addition to the largest maritime evacuation conducted in the history of the United States, our department’s agencies were working with the various New York authorities on the devastating infrastructure damage suffered there.

Over the next days, our department spent hours working with various state, local and federal agencies to reopen roads, tunnels, bridges, harbors, and railroads while getting the essential relief supplies into the area.

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Questions to and responses of Secretary Mineta after his opening remarks

Thomas Kean, Chairman
Thank you, Mr. Secretary. When you were being prepared, in the sense of preparing yourself, to take your role in the cabinet, were you briefed in any way or what part of the possibility of terrorism occurring was part of your preparation? As you look at all the vast things, you have to understand from your position, was the possibility of terrorism and what you might have to do as a result of terrorism a large part of that briefing, small part of that briefing?

Secretary Mineta
The nature of what was happening in the civil aviation industry in the United States at that time did not put terrorism high on the list of priorities. We were still dealing with the whole issue of delays, of congestion, of capacity issues, and so terrorism was really not something that I was prepared to deal with – except as it came up on that tragic day.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
So you had to improvise in a sense, based on what was happening and with the news reports you were getting.

Secretary Mineta
Absolutely. And in terms of what motivated me to bring all the aircraft down, as you see one thing happen, that’s an accident. When you see two of the same thing occur, it’s a pattern. But when you see three of the same thing occur, it’s a program. And so, at that point, I decided to bring all the aircraft down.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
In a sense, what you get out of it I guess is that the government was really unprepared for this kind of an event. Nobody had anticipated it – this event or any kind of major terrorist event. So, you – amount of major preparation, you weren’t prepared. You had to do your best under very difficult circumstances.

Secretary Mineta
That’s correct, sir.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
There’s been some confusion as to the issue of box cutters. You testified, I gather, that as of September 11th, the FAA did not prohibit box cutters, before Congress. Yesterday, we got testimony from the ATAs and checkpoint operation guides that box cutters were classified as restricted items – which could be kept off an aircraft if identified. What was the status of box cutters within the aviation system as a whole and certainly in Boston where those checkpoints were?

Secretary Mineta
The FAA regulation referred to blades of four-inches or greater as prohibited items. And so a box cutter was really less than four-inches. Now on the other hand, the airline industry had a guideline and in that guideline, they did prohibit box cutters, as it was in that guideline. But in the FAA regulations, that was not the case. All they referred to was the length of the blade and that was four-inches. So, under the FAA regulations, box cutters would have been okay on an airplane.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Mr. Secretary, we are very pleased to have you here this morning. I understand that your time is short and you will only be able to spend a few minutes with us. We are grateful for the time you are able to make available. It might very well be that we’ll have some questions that we will want to submit to you in writing, subsequently.

Secretary Mineta
And I will submit those to the Commission in writing.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Well, we thank you for that. I want to focus just a moment on the Presidential Emergency Operating Center. You were there for a good part of the day. I think you were there with the Vice President. And we had that order given. I think it was by the President, that authorized the shooting down of commercial aircraft that were suspected to be controlled by terrorists. Were you there when that order was given?

Secretary Mineta
No, I was not. I was made aware of it. During the time that the airplane was coming in to the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President, “The plane is 50 miles out.” “The plane is 30 miles out.” And when it got down to “the plane is 10 miles out,” the young man also said to the Vice President, “Do the orders still stand?” And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said, “Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?” Well at the time, I didn’t know what all of that meant. And ...

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
The flight you are referring to is the ..

Secretary Mineta
..flight that came into the Pentagon. And so I was not aware that that discussion had already taken place and, but in listening to the conversation between the young man and the Vice President, then, at the time I didn’t really recognize the significance of that. And then, later I heard of the fact that the airplanes had been scrambled from Langley to come up to D.C. Those planes were still about ten minutes away. And so, then at the time we heard about the airplane that went into Pennsylvania, then I thought: Oh my God, did we shoot it down? And then we had to, with the Vice President, go to the Pentagon to check that out.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Let me see if I understand. The plane that was headed toward the Pentagon and was some miles away, there was an order to shoot that plane down.

Secretary Mineta
Well, I don’t know that specifically. I do know that the airplanes were scrambled from Langley or from Norfolk, the Norfolk area, and so I did not know about the order specifically other than listening to that other conversation.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
But there very clearly was an order to shoot commercial aircraft down.

Secretary Mineta
Subsequently, I found that out.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
With respect to Flight 93, what type of information were you and the Vice President receiving about that flight?

Secretary Mineta
The only information we had at that point was when it went into, when it crashed.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
I see. You didn’t know beforehand about that airplane.

Secretary Mineta
Did not.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
And so there was no specific order there to shoot that plane down.

Secretary Mineta
No, sir.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
But there were military planes in the air in position to shoot down commercial aircraft.

Secretary Mineta
That’s right. The planes had been scrambled, I believe from Otis, at that point.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Could you help me understand a little the division of responsibility between the FAA and NORAD on that morning?

Secretary Mineta
Well, FAA is in touch with NORAD and when the first flight from Boston had gone out of communications with the Air Traffic Controllers, the Air Traffic Controller then notified, I believe, Otis Air Force Base about the Air Traffic Controller not being able to raise that American Airlines flight.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
A final question and then we will let other Commissioners ask a question. And this is a kind of a broad sweeping one. What worries you most about transportation safety today? What are the most vulnerable points do you think in our transportation system today? A lot of steps have been taken obviously to improve security, a lot of progress made. What would be towards the top of your list or would there be two or three items that worry you the most?

Secretary Mineta
I would say today the most vulnerable would be the maritime ports. With the number of containers coming into this country, we really don’t have a good handle on what’s in those containers and to me that is one that we still haven’t really been about to put our hands on. I know that the Transportation Security Agency is looking and working on that matter diligently. But with the number of containers that come off of ships everyday – something like 16 million a year – it’s a formidable task.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. I understand the Secretary’s time is very tight now.

Thomas Kean, Chair
One question and then we’ll go to Commissioner Roemer. Is there one recommendation you know pending now either in the administration or the Congress or wherever that you believe would be most important to making the traveling public feel safer?

Secretary Mineta
I suppose the, in terms of aviation, I think that we are probably as confident about the security relating aviation issues today. In terms of where we were before the 11th of September and the improvements that were made subsequent to the 11th of September and in terms of each month, each day, it gets better. But again, I would go back to my maritime containers as still the most vulnerable and the one that really needs the funding and to get to the bottom of that issue.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Commissioner Roemer.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Nice to see you, Mr. Secretary and nice to see that you are feeling better and getting around as well, too. I want to follow up on what happened in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center and try to understand that day a little bit better. You said, if I understood you correctly, that you were not in the room. You were obviously coming from the Department of Transportation where you had been busy in a meeting on official business. But you had not been in the room when the decision was made to what you inferred was a decision made to attempt to shoot down Flight 77 before it crashed into the Pentagon. Is that correct?

Secretary Mineta
I didn’t know about the order to shoot down. I arrived at the PEOC at about 9:20 A.M. and the President was in Florida and I believe he was on his way to Louisiana at that point when the conversation that went on between the Vice President and the President and the staff that the President had with him.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So when you arrived at 9:20, how much longer was it before you overheard the conversation between the young man and the Vice President, saying: Does the order still stand?

Secretary Mineta
Probably about five or six minutes.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So about 9:25 or 9:26. And your inference was that the Vice President snapped his head around and said, “Yes, the order still stands.” Why did you infer that that was a shoot down?

Secretary Mineta
Just by the nature of the, of all the events going on that day. The scrambling of the aircraft and, I don’t know, I guess just being in the military you do start thinking about an intuitive reaction to certain statements being made.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Who was the young man with the Vice President?

Secretary Mineta
Frankly, I don’t recall.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And was there another line of communication between the Vice President, and you said you saw Mr. Richard Clark, on your way in. Was Clark running an operations center as well on that day?

Secretary Mineta
Dick was in the Situation Room.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So there was a Situation Room making decisions about what was going to happen on (crosstalk) as well as the PEOC?

Secretary Mineta
I don’t believe they were making any decisions. I think they were more information gathering from various agencies.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Could it have been in the Situation Room where somebody in the Situation Room recommended the shoot down and the Vice President agreed to that?

Secretary Mineta
Commissioner Roemer, I would assume that a decision of that nature would have had to be made at a much higher level than the people who were in the Situation Room.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So, take me through that. The Situation Room is monitoring the daily minute-by-minute events and they find out that Flight 77 is headed to the Pentagon. Somebody has got to be getting that information. The Situation Room is then communicating with the PEOC and saying that we’ve got another flight that’s on its way toward the Pentagon. Here are the options. Then the Vice President talks to the President and says here are the options. We have a shoot down recommendation. Do you agree, Mr. President? Is that what happens?

Secretary Mineta
Again that would be speculation on my part as to what was happening on that day. So I just wouldn’t be able to really answer that inquiry.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
I know because you had been conducting official business and I’m sure you were hurriedly on your way over there.

Secretary Mineta
As I was listening..

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
I’m just trying to figure out how the Situation Room, which is gathering the minute-by-minute evidence and information and talking probably to a host of different people and how they are interacting with the PEOC. And then how the PEOC is interacting with the President who is at that point on Air Force One. How a decision is made to shoot down a commercial airliner and then would you say – let’s say we’re trying to put that part of the puzzle together. Then would your inference be that they scrambled the jets to shoot down the commercial airliner, it failed? And the commercial airliner, therefore, crashed into the Pentagon? That the jets were not able to get there in time to succeed in a mission that they had been tasked to do?

Secretary Mineta
I’m not sure that the aircraft that were scrambled to come up to the DC area from Norfolk were under orders to shoot the airplane down. As I said, I just...

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
But it was an inference on your part.

Secretary Mineta
It was an inference, without a doubt. And that’s why when in thinking about the United plane that went down in Pennsylvania, the question then arose in my mind...

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
..right away, was that shot down? Did you ever get an answer to that?

Secretary Mineta
Yes sir, the Vice President and I talked about that. We then made the inquiry of the Department of Defense. They then got back to us saying no it is not our aircraft

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
..that no shots were fired and that no effort was made to shot that down.

Secretary Mineta
That’s correct.

Thomas Kean, Chair
I want to go to another question.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Thank you.

Thomas Kean, Chair
The Secretary’s time is limited. Commissioner Lehman.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Mr. Secretary, I have one question and that is we had testimony yesterday that there were many intelligence reports leading up to 9/11 and actual plots uncovered to use aircraft as missiles. Do you feel that the system was set up to provide to you, as Secretary of Transportation, the latest intelligence bearing on your responsibilities, such as that subject, was adequate before 9/11? If not, have measures been taken to see that you are provided with the best possible product on a daily basis as to threats to the broad range of transportation assets under your purview? Could you comment on before and after?

Secretary Mineta
I do get a daily briefing, intelligence briefing. And I did during that time period – prior to the11th of September and subsequent to the 11th of September. And there is no doubt that the nature of the intelligence data has improved and so - but again, there was nothing in those intelligence reports that would have been specific to anything that happened on the 11th of September. There was nothing in the preceding time period about aircraft being used as a weapon or of any other terrorist types of activities of that nature. And so, but I do get briefings and I think that since the 11th of September 2001, the nature of the briefings have improved.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Just a follow-up, Mr. Secretary, given the fact that there were in the preceding couple of years about a half a dozen novels and movies about hijackings being used as weapons and the fact that there were reports floating around in the intelligence community. Did you personally think that that was a possibility that it could have happened or when it happened did it just take you totally by surprise? Because yesterday we had testimony from the former FAA Administrator that, in effect, it never entered her mind.

Secretary Mineta
Well, I would have to again say that we, I had no thought of the airplane being used as a weapon. I think our concentration was more on hijackings and most of the hijackings as they occur in an overseas setting or the hijacking, if it were to be a domestic one, was for the person to take over the aircraft to have that aircraft transport them to some other place. But it wasn’t, I don’t think we ever thought of an airplane being used as a missile.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Given that there was so much intelligence, not of specific plots, but of the possibility and the fact that some terrorists had, in fact, started planning, wouldn’t you view it as failure of our intelligence community not to tell the Secretary of Transportation that there was such a conceivable threat that the people like the Coast Guard and the FAA should be thinking about?

Secretary Mineta
We had no information of that nature at all. And, as to whether that was a failure of the intelligence agencies, I think it would have been just even for them hard to imagine.

Thomas Kean, Chair
We recognize your time constraints, we have two more commissioners with questions: Commissioner Gorelick and then Commissioner Fielding.

Secretary Mineta
Absolutely.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Secretary Mineta, again thank you for being here. We all know that in the spring and summer of 2001, the intelligence community was putting out reports of a, I would say, near frantic level suggesting that we were expecting there to be some type of terrorist attack somewhere in the world. It was clear that we didn’t know where, we didn’t know the modality but a very high level of concern. So my first question to you, and I’ll just give them to you all at once, is (1) were you called to any meeting or summoned at a cabinet level, or was there any sort of cross-functional group put together across the government to say what can we do as a government to respond to this very heightened level of intelligence warning that we are getting generally? Second, even though in response to Commissioner Roemer’s questions, you’ve indicated that this particular modality of attack was not made known to you. Clearly hijackers and use of aircraft or bombings, bombs on aircraft were a favorite tool, if you will, of terrorists. Did you, yourself, do anything within the agencies under your control to seek out mechanisms for being on alert and for heightening our security in this period of reporting? What did you, what did you know, what was anyone telling you and what did you do in response?

Secretary Mineta
Well, first of all, on the first question, I would say no – that we had no meetings of an interagency nature given the nature of the intelligence that you are describing. I think most of the response at that time was to the, what you might call the chatter. Because the chatter is just really increased, communication between people, but nothing specific as to the nature of the kind of attack that might be coming. We’re at orange level now. And what prompted that was again, increased chatter. But it wasn’t anything specific about the nature of what the threat might be.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Well, let me just contrast perhaps the chatter, the same kind of chatter level right in advance of the millennium. As I understand it, that information was widely disseminated in the government. There were cabinet level, and sub-cabinet level, meetings. And each agency essentially searched to do what they could to harden our country against attacks. Now clearly when you don’t know where the attack is coming from or what mode will be used, it’s difficult but .. What I’m asking essentially is did this higher level of chatter, the what I believe to be a frantic quality to the intelligence warnings result in any action across the government and particularly in the area of transportation. I take it that your answer to that is no.

Secretary Mineta
That’s correct.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Mr. Fielding?

Fred Fielding, Commissioner
Mr. Chairman, I would like a further explanation of the, of the division of responsibility between the FAA and NORAD on the morning of 9/11 because there seemed to be some confusion about that. I would like the Secretary – I’d be very happy in respect for his time to submit that in writing to him.

Secretary Mineta
Alright, I’ll submit that in writing.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Mr. Secretary, thank you very much

Secretary Mineta
Very well, thank you very much to the commission.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Mr. Chairman.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Mr. Hamilton

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
I just wanted to be recognized for a moment to comment on a headline really in the Washington Post that appeared this morning. The headline states that a, and I’m quoting it now, “New Panel Independent of 9/11 Commission is Sought.” End of quote. And I want to observe that I don’t see how it’s possible to get that headline out of the article. And the article really does not say anything at all about a separate panel. When I first saw the headline, it occurred to me that maybe I had attended a different meeting yesterday than the Washington Post reporters and headline writers had attended. But I hope that the Post will see fit to prominently correct that headline which is quite erroneous.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Thank you very much. I would certainly agree.

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