911 Commission Testimony: Remarks of NORAD Personnel: Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley, Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold, Col. Alan Scott

(NORAD Timeline Presentation and Question and Answer Session only)

National Commission on September 11 Terrorist Attacks
May 23, 2003
[transcribed from: http://www.c-span.org/VideoArchives.asp?Cat=Issue&Code=DESE ]

NORAD Timeline presented by Col. Scott (ret.)

Col. Alan Scott
Good morning Mr. Chairman, Commissioners. It is my pleasure to be here with you today. General Arnold and I worked together that day on September 11th. What I will walk you through here is a chronology of the attacks and I presented it in a matrix form. And the only thing I lay claim to is having studied all of the attacks and how they were interwoven together. This was not a linear sequence of events where one attack began and ended and then a second attack began and ended. This was a coordinated, well-planned attack. We had multiple airplanes in the air. The fog and friction of war was evident everywhere in the country both on the civil side as well as the military side.

And this hopefully will show you how those interwoven events came about. I will tell you that the times on this chart come from our logs. The time on the chart is the time that’s in the log. It may not be the exact time the event happened. It may be the time when the log keeper was advised or became aware of the event.

The first thing that happened in the morning, related to, related to the events at 9:02, or I’m sorry, 8:02 A.M., EST, is when American Airlines 11 took off out of Boston. American Airlines 11 was a 767 and it was headed, I believe, to Los Angeles

Fourteen minutes later, also coming out of Boston Logan, United Airlines 175, a 757, also headed to Los Angeles, took off out of Boston and initially took roughly the same ground track as American 11. Three minutes later American Airlines 77 took off out of Dulles here in Washington, also headed to Los Angeles and also a 757 and proceeded westbound towards the West Coast. So now the first three airplanes are airborne together.

The first time that anything untoward and this was gleaned from FAA response and anything out of the ordinary happened was at 8:20 when the electronic transponder in American Airlines 11 blinked off, if you will, just disappeared from the screen. Obviously, the terrorists turned that transponder off and that airplane, although it did not disappear from the radar scope, it became a much, much more difficult target to discern for the controllers who now only could look at the primary radar return off the airplane.

That was at 8:20. At 8:40, in our logs is the first occasion where the FAA is reporting a possible hijacking of American Airlines Flight 11. And the initial response to us at that time was a possible hijacking; it had not been confirmed.

At that same moment, the F-15 alert aircraft at Otis Air Force Base, Massachusetts, about 153 miles away were placed immediately on battle stations by the Northeast Air Defense Sector Commander.

At 8:43, as this is going on, the fourth airplane, United 93 takes off out of Newark, New Jersey. It’s a 757; it is headed for San Francisco.

At 8:46, our next log event, we get the last and by the way, much of this radar data for these primary targets was not seen that day. It was reconstructed days later by the 84th Radar Evaluation Squadron and other agencies like it who are professionals at going back and looking at radar tapes and then given that they are loaded with knowledge after the fact, they can go and find things that perhaps were not visible during the event itself.

At 8:46, the last data, near the Trade Center. 8:46, the first impact on the Trade Center.

At that minute is when the Otis F-15s were scrambled and, again, they are 153 miles away. And that scramble came and Gen. Arnold, I’m sure can address this, based on the conversation between the Northeast Sector Commander and himself.

Those F-15s were airborne in six minutes. That is well inside the time that is allowed for them to get airborne. But because they were on battle stations, the pilots were in the cockpits ready to start engines, that scramble time was shortened by a significant amount of time.

At 8:53, that’s a minute later, in the radar reconstruction, we are now picking up primary radar contacts off of the F-15s out of Otis.

At 8:57, which is seven minutes after the first impact is according to our logs when the FAA reports the first impact. And about this time is when CNN coverage to the general public is beginning to appear on the TV, not of the impact, but of the burning tower shortly thereafter. So, you can see what in the military, I’m sure you have heard us talk to the fog and friction of war. And as the intensity increases, the lag tends to also increase for how quickly information gets passed.

At 9:02, United 175, the second airplane, which by the way, never turned off its transponder before impact, crashes into the North Tower, at 9:02. The distance of those fighters which had been scrambled out of Otis, at that particular point they were still 71 miles away, about 8 minutes out and going very fast.

At 9:05, FAA reports a possible hijack of United 175. Again that’s 3 minutes after the impact in the Tower. It’s how long it is taking now for the information to flow through the system to the command and control agencies and through the command and control agencies to the pilots in the cockpits.

At 9:09, Langley F-16s are directed to battle stations just based on the general situation, and the breaking news and the general developing feeling about what’s going on. And about that same time, kind of way out in the west is when American 77, which in the meantime has turned off its transponder and turned left back toward Washington, appears back in radar coverage. And my understanding is the FAA controllers now are beginning to pick up primary skin paints on that airplane and they don’t know exactly whether that is 77 and they are asking a lot of people whether it is, including a C130 that’s westbound toward Ohio.

At 9:11, the FAA reports a crash into the South Tower. You can see now that lag time has increased from 7 minutes from impact to report, and now it’s 9 minutes from impact to report and you can only imagine what’s going on on the floors of the control centers around the country.

At 9:11, I just mentioned that, 9:16, now FAA reports a possible hijack of United Flight 93, which is out in the Ohio area. That’s the last flight that is going to impact the ground.

At 9:24, the FAA reports a possible hijack of 77. That’s some time after they had been tracking its primary target. And at that moment as well is when the Langley F-16s were scrambled out of Langley.

At 9:25, American 77 is reported heading toward Washington, D.C., not exactly precise information, just general information, across the chat log.

9:27, Boston FAA reports a fifth aircraft missing, Delta Flight 89. And you people have never heard of Delta Flight 89. We call that the first red herring of the day because there are a number of reported possible hijackings that unfolded over the hours immediately following the actual attack. Delta 89 was not hijacked. It enters the system. It increases the fog and friction, if you will, as we begin to look for that. But he lands about 7 or 8 minutes later and clears out of the system.

At 9:30, that Langley F-16s are airborne. They are 105 miles away from the Washington area.

At 9:34, through chat, FAA is unable to precisely locate American Airlines Flight 77.

At 9:35, F-16s are reported airborne. And many times, reported airborne is not exactly when they took off, it’s just when the report came down that they were airborne.

At 9:37, we have the last radar data near the Pentagon and 9:40, immediately following that, is when 93 up North turns it transponder off, out in the West toward Ohio and begins a left turn back toward the East.

At 9:49, FAA reports that Delta 89, which had been reported as missing, is now reported as a possible hijacking so again, he is.... I’m sorry 9:41. Again he is in the system. He is kind of a red herring for us.

Now the only thing that I would point out on this chart is that this says 9:43, American Airlines 77 impacts the Pentagon. The timeline on the impact on the Pentagon was changed to 9:37. 9:43 is the time it was reported that day. It was the time we used. And it took about two weeks to discover in the parking lot of the Pentagon this entry camera for the parking lot, which happened to be oriented toward the Pentagon at the time of impact. And the recorded time is 9:37. And that’s why the timeline went from 9:43 to 9:37 because it is the best documented evidence for the impact time that we have.

Getting toward the end now, 9:47 is when Delta 89 clears the system by landing in Cleveland. So he is not a hijack. Lots of things are going on now in the system as the Sectors begin to call both units that are part of First Airforce and NORAD as well as units that have nothing to do with us. We are beginning to call everyone now and the 103rd Air Control Squadron, for instance, stationed in Connecticut is an Air Control Squadron, a radar squadron, and they got their radar online operational and begin to link their radar picture into the Northeast system. They are not normally part of NORAD. This is really the initial part of a huge push the rest of that day to link as many radars in on the interior as we can, and to get as many fighters on alert as we can.

At 10:02, United 93, last radar data and the estimated impact time for United 93 is 10:03.

At 10:07, FAA reports that there may be a bomb on board 93. That’s four minutes after the impact.

At 10:15, they report that it’s crashed and you can see now the fog and friction lag time has increased from 7 minutes to 9 minutes to 15 minutes because of the level of activities that are going on.

And there are notations here about other airplanes as we begin to divert other airplanes that are just out intended for training that day. We’re picking up the phone, calling Syracuse the Air National Guard. They are beginning to get flights airborne. They are beginning to arm those aircraft with whatever weapons they have handy so we can posture that defense.

That is how the timeline unfolded. As you can see, there is a fabric of interwoven actions, which is not just a linear event. So lots of things going on, lots of activities, lots of CQ centers. Sir, that concludes my piece

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Mr. Chairman, we thought, right up front, we’d put that on the record so that we could have that as a departure point for your questions. I again caveat by saying that this is the North American Aerospace Defense Command and Continental NORAD Region timeline. Other agencies may have other logs that may have different times. But this is the best and most accurate data that we could piece together for your Commissioner, sir. With that, I open up to questions.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Thank you very much. Commissioner Ben-Veniste

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Good morning Gentlemen. First I would like to personally commend each of you and the dedicated men and woman who serve our nation through NORAD. I’d like to explain to you what you probably know already and that is that our mandate as the Commission is to provide the most detailed and accurate exposition in our final report of what occurred leading up to the 9/11 tragedy and the events subsequent thereto. And so, please understand that our questions may be very pointed. We mean no disrespect but we have our mission, as well. Now, Gen. McKinley, is it fair to say that the mission and the primary responsibility of NORAD is to defend our homeland and our citizens against air attack?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
On the day of September 11, 2001, our mission was to defend North America, to surveil, to intercept, to identify and if necessary to destroy those targets, which we were posturing were going to come from outside our country. In fact, that tracks originating over the landmass of the United States were identified friendly by origin. Therefore, those alert sites that were positioned on the morning of September 11th, were looking out, primarily on our coasts at the Air Defense Identification Zone which extends outwards of 100 to 200 miles off our shore. So that was the main focus of NORAD at the time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
I asked you about your responsibility, Sir. And I ask you again whether it was not your responsibility as NORAD to protect the United States and its citizens against air attack?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
It is and it was and I would just caveat your comment by saying that our mission was, at that time, not designed to take internal FAA radar data, to track or to identify tracks originating within our borders. It was to look outward as a Cold War vestige, primarily developed during the Cold War to protect against Soviet long-range bomber penetration of our intercept zone.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well I think Sir, you have used a good term – not good for the United States but accurate, in terms of the vestigial mandate operationally to look outward toward the borders rather than inward. And by vestigial, you mean I’m sure, as a result of our decades of confrontation with the former Soviet Union.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Correct, Sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
And so, on the day of September 11th, if you can see these dots, I know it may be difficult to see, NORAD was positioned in a perimeter around the United States but nothing in the central region, nothing on the border with Canada.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
That’s correct, Sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Now let me ask you sir, whether the concept of terrorists using an airplane as a weapon was something unknown to the intelligence community on September 10th, 2001?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Very good question...

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Thank you.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
And I asked our staff to provide me some data on what they had that morning. As I said, Gen. Arnold was at the helm that morning. But basically, the comments I received from my staff was that there was no intelligence indication at any level within NORAD or DOD of a terrorist threat to commercial aviation prior to the attacks. And information from the daily Joint Chiefs Intelligence Report on the morning of September 11th indicated no specific dangers or threats within the country.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
My question Sir, and I mean no disrespect but we will save time if you’ll listen to what ask you. My question is: the concept of terrorists using airplanes as weapons was not something which was unknown to the U.S. Intelligence community on September 10th, 2001. Isn’t that fair to say?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I would like the Intelligence community to address that. I would find it hard to believe that they hadn’t speculated against that. But it was unavailable to us at the time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well, let’s start for example with September 12th, 1994. A Cessna 150L crashed into the south lawn of the White House barely missing the building and killing the pilot. Similarly, in December of 1994, an Algerian armed Islamic group in Paris hijacked an Air France flight in Algiers and threatened to crash it into the Eiffel Tower. In October of 1996, the Intelligence community obtained information regarding an Iranian plot to hijack a Japanese plane over Israel and crash it into Tel Aviv. In August of 1998, the Intelligence community obtained information that a group of unidentified Arabs planned to fly an explosive-laden plane from a foreign country into the World Trade Center. The information was passed on to the FBI and the FAA. In September of 1998, the Intelligence community obtained information that Osama bin Laden’s next operation could possibly involve flying an aircraft loaded with explosives into a U.S. airport and detonating it. In August 2001, the Intelligence Community obtained information regarding a plot to either bomb the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi from an airplane or crash an airplane into it. In addition, in the Atlanta Olympics, the United States government and the Dept. of Justice and my colleague Jamie Gorelick were involved in planning against possible terrorist attacks at the Olympics, which included the potential of an aircraft flying into the stadium. In July 2001, the G8 Summit in Genoa, attended by our President - among the measures that were taken, were positioning surface-to-air missiles, ringing Genoa, closing the Genoa airport and restricting all airspace over Genoa. Was not this information, Sir, available to NORAD as of September 11th, 2001?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
It’s obvious, by your categorization that those events all took place and that NORAD had that information. I would only add, Sir, that the intelligence data that we postured our forces for and the training, and the tactics, and the procedures that we used to prepare our missions for support of the Combatant Commander of NORAD, had hijacking as a primary intercept tactic. And we have some of the finest fighter pilots as you know in the world who are some of the best people in the world, who can do their mission extremely well. But we had not postured, prior to September 11th, 2001, for the scenario that took place that day.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well, obviously, it would be hard to imagine posturing for the exact scenario but isn’t it a fact, Sir, that prior to September 11th, 2001, NORAD had already in the works, plans to simulate in an exercise, a simultaneous hijacking of two planes in the United States.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Col. Scott, do you have any data on that? I’m not aware of that, Sir. I was not present at the time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
That was operation Amalgam Virgo.

Col. Alan Scott
Yes, Sir. Specifically, operation Amalgam Virgo, which I was involved in before I retired, was a scenario using a Third-World United, not United, uninhabited aerial vehicle launched off a rogue freighter in the Gulf of Mexico. General Arnold can back me up, at the time, one of our greatest concerns was the proliferation of cruise missile technology and the ability for terrorists groups to get that technology and get it close enough to our shores to launch it. In fact, this exercise, in this exercise we used actual drone, MQM 107 drones, which are about the size of a cruise missile to exercise our fighters and our radars in a Gulf of Mexico scenario.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
You are referring to Amalgam ’01, are you not?

Col. Alan Scott
Yes, Sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
I’m referring to Amalgam ’02, which was in the planning stages prior to September 11th, 2001, Sir. Is that correct?

Col. Alan Scott
That was after I retired and I was not involved in ’02.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Will you accept that the exercise involved a simultaneous hijacking scenario?

Col. Alan Scott
I was not involved in ’02.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, I do have some information on ’02, if you would allow me to read it for the record?

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Please.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Amalgam Virgo, in general, ’02, was an exercise created to focus on peacetime and contingency NORAD missions. One of the peacetime scenarios that is and has been a NORAD mission for years is support to other government departments. Within this mission falls hijackings. Creativity of the designer aside, prior to 9/11, hijack motivations were based on political objectives, ie: asylum or release of captured prisoners or political figures. Threats of killing hostages or crashing were left to the scriptwriters to invoke creativity and broaden the required response for players.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well, isn’t that a bit fatuous given the specific information that I’ve given you? It wasn’t in the minds of scriptwriters when the Algerians had actually hijacked a plane which they were attempting to fly into the Eiffel Tower and all the other scenarios which I’ve mentioned to you. I don’t mean to argue with you but my question is, Sir, given the awareness of the terrorists’ use of planes as weapons, how was it that NORAD was still focusing outward in protecting the United States against attacks from the Soviet Union or elsewhere and was not better prepared to defend against the hijackings scenarios of a commercial jet, laden with fuel, used as a weapon to target citizens of the United States? When you say, our training, our mission was vestigial, I think you said it in capsulated form but would you agree that on the basis of the information available, that there could have been better preparedness by NORAD to meet this threat?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
In retrospect, Sir, I think I would agree with your comment.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
With respect to the bases that were available for protecting the East Coast, and Col. Scott has gone through the scrambling of aircraft, I want to focus just on one flight, Flight 77, and then, Secretary Lehman will ask you some more specific questions. With respect to Flight 77, Sir, you testified previously before the House Armed Services Committee and you were – I’m sorry, General Eberhart was questioned. You are familiar with his testimony, Sir?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Yes Sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Okay. He was questioned about Flight 77 and because of the use of Langley Airbase, which is 105 miles from our Capitol, as opposed to say Andrews Air Force Base, which is in the neighborhood, the question arises again about the positioning and the thought behind the positioning of fighter planes to protect our Capitol in an enhanced terrorist threat situation, such as existed on September 10th, September 9th, 2002. Let me ask you about Flight 77 again. The question was, the timeline that we’ve been given is that at 8:55 on September 11th, American Airlines Flight 77 began turning east, away from it’s intended course and at 9:10, Flight 77 was detected by the FAA radar over West Virginia, heading east. That was after the two planes had already struck the Trade Center towers. Is that correct Col. Scott?

Col. Alan Scott
Yes Sir

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Now, 15 minutes later at 9:25, the FAA notified NORAD, according to the statement, that Flight 77 was headed toward Washington. (reading from the record)

“Was that the first notification at 9:25 that NORAD or DOD had that Flight 77 was probably hijacked? And if it was, do you know why it took 15 minutes for the FAA to notify NORAD?”

General Eberhart said, “Sir, there is one minor difference, I showed it as 9:24 which you do as well that we were notified and that’s the first notification that we received.“

“Do you know if that was the first notification to DOD?”

“Yes, Sir, that’s the first documented notification that we received”

And I want to focus on the word “documented” because it’s very important for us to know when NORAD actually received notification given the fact that the planes had already crashed into the World Trade Center and given, I’m sure, the assumption that these were terrorist acts and there could be more coming, more planes coming. Is it, in fact correct Sir that the first notification of any type that NORAD received was not until 9:24 with respect to Flight 77?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
With your concurrence Sir, I would like to ask Gen. Arnold to address that. He was on the floor that morning.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
The simple answer to your question is that I believe that to be the fact. That 9:24 was the first time that we had been advised of American 77 as a possible hijacked airplane. Our focus, you’ve got to remember, that there is a lot of other things going on simultaneous here, was on United 93, which was being pointed out to us very aggressively, I might say, by the FAA. Because our radar is looking outward and not inward, the only way for us to know where anything was for the FAA to pass along that information to us.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Is it not the case, Gen. Arnold, that there was an open line established between FAA, NORAD and other agencies, including CIA and FBI that morning?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Well, I wasn’t on that line at that particular time if that were the case. In fact, there was an open line established between our sectors at really the tactical level where they’re controlling the aircraft, talking to the FAA controllers from time-to-time. We did not have an open line at that time with the FAA. That is not accurate.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
You did not. You were not, NORAD was not in contact by...

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
The Continental United States NORAD region, my headquarters, we are responsible for the Continental United States air defense, did not have an open line with the FAA at that time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Was there some NORAD office that had an open line with the FAA (crosstalk). Excuse me, let me finish my question, please. Was there some NORAD office, and you’ll forgive us because we had asked for this information prior to the hearing from FAA and did not receive it. But we are advised that there was indeed an open line between either the net or some other name given to a essentially an ongoing conference, whereunder, in real-time, FAA was providing information as it received it, immediately after the first crash into the towers, we are told, with respect to each of the events that were ongoing of any remarkable nature. I see Gen. McKinley is nodding.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I’d like to, if I may, address this based on my research and review for this Commission. It’s my understanding that the FAA was in contact with our Northeast Air Defense sector at Rome, New York. Understanding the relationship of how we defend North America from threats, NORAD located in Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado Springs, our Continental NORAD region, our Air Operations Center located at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida. That’s where the Joint Force Air Component Commander resides. And then we have three sectors based on the size and volume of our country that handle that. It is my understanding from talking with both FAA and our supervisors at the Northeast Air Defense Sector in Rome that those lines were open and that they were discussing these issues.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
So, is it fair to say that, at least, the NORAD personnel in Rome, New York had information available to it in real-time - once it saw, and we were advised that this occurred at approximately 9:02, within 22 minutes earlier, that Flight 77 first was observed deviating from its course – something which in the context of what was going on that day, would be quite interesting if not remarkable.

Col. Alan Scott
Sir, I think it is also important to understand that like the CONUS region, the FAA is also broken down into subordinate command and control centers, as well. I know that the Boston Center was talking directly to the Northeast Sector. I don’t believe that Flight 77 was in Boston Center’s airspace. They were in Cleveland...

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I think the FAA can report accurately on this but I believe 77 was in Cleveland Center airspace when it developed the problem where they lost its radar image. And I believe, and the FAA can again testify better to this, they would take action based on losing that identification in Cleveland.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well actually, I think, according to the information that we have, the first indication was not a loss of radar contact but rather a course deviation, with respect to Flight 77. Now, I don’t mean to take up anymore time on this because we are going to want to follow-up on all this information in great detail. But, let me ask whether there is regularly made a tape recording of these open-line communications?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Not to my knowledge

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Not to my knowledge

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Does FAA, to your knowledge, keep a recording of these crisis situations?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I’m unaware but I would certainly direct that to them, please.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
To the best of your knowledge, you don’t have anything further to shed light on when you first learned, you NORAD, first learned of Flight 77’s probably hijack status, prior to 9:24 A.M.?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I can provide that for the record. I do not have any further knowledge at this time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
We would ask that you do so.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Yes Sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Thank you Mr. Chairman. I will have some other questions after.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
Secretary Lehman

John Lehman, Commissioner
Thank you Generals. I would also like to echo my colleagues _expression of great admiration for you and your predecessor, your command and your pilots, even though they might require long runways to land. (Laughter)

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We understand.

John Lehman, Commissioner
One of the most serious responsibilities we have in addition to air security is identifying the real dysfunctions in our intelligence system that contributed to the tragedy. And we had prior, as you know, to your testimony Secretary Mineta, who indicated despite the fact of this long litany of events and intelligence reports of the growing probability that aircraft would be used as weapons. Nothing ever got to him and nothing apparently got to you. And I assume, General Arnold, nothing got to you. This would seem to be a pretty significant failure of our system because it exists to provide product precisely to you, the most important users tasked with defending us. So, I’d to ask, we’ll provide you a copy of this which is from the Joint Inquiry Staff statement, if you could give us your studied assessment of what went wrong in the way you interact with, your command interacts with the intelligence community? And why the product did not get to you? These were pretty dramatic events, facts, and intelligence reports. It would be very helpful to us to have your assessment as a customer of the system, to what went so seriously wrong, that you were still only looking out.

There is another, an issue that I would ask perhaps General Arnold to address, because there is a great deal of unease and distress, I think, understandably among many of the families, that somehow those aircraft could have been shot down if people had not made mistakes. And, I wonder if you would just take us through each flight, given the posture that NORAD was in at the time, which was national policy and not whatever based on erroneous intelligence perhaps. But given that posture, and given the times that NORAD was notified of the deviation from, suggesting the possibility of hijacking. Could the aircraft on alert, for instance, at Otis have intercepted? And then, if you could also take us through 77 and 93, as well, with the F-16s which. And if you would, tell us as you take us through what the armament was on the F-15s and on the F-16s that were scrambled against 77 and 93.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Thank you, Sir, and I’ll try to do that to the best of my ability. And perhaps, Gen. McKinley has some data that he could shed light on because I have been retired a little while and don’t have access to the staff for some of the very specifics on that. But I will try to do my best. As you know through previous testimony from Gen. Eberhart to Congress, we were in the middle of a NORAD exercise at that particular time. Which means, that basically our entire staff was focused on being able to do the air operations center mission, which was our job to do. We had just come out of a video teleconference with the NORAD staff and with our folks at that particular time when I was handed note that we had a possible hijacking in Boston Center. And it had come from the Northeast Air Defense Commander Col. Bob Meyer (phonetic) who is commander up there and he had requested that I call him immediately. And I was upstairs in our facility. I immediately went downstairs and picked up the phone, asking on the way to my staff, is this part of the exercise? Because quite honestly and frankly, we do do hijacking scenarios as we go through these exercises from time-to-time. But I realized that it was not – that this was real-life. And I also remember as I went downstairs before I even talked to him that it had been a long time since we had had a hijacking but the fact that we’d reviewed the procedures, what it is that we do for a hijacking, because we were in the middle of an exercise. So we were pretty well familiar with those procedures. And, of course, we have our own checklist that we follow.

As I picked up the phone, Bob told me that Boston Center had called a possible hijacking within the system. He had put the aircraft at Otis on battle stations and wanted permission to scramble them. I told him to go ahead and scramble the airplanes and we’d get permission later. The reason for that is that the procedure, hijacking is a law enforcement issue as is everything that takes off from within the United States. And only law enforcement can request assistance from the military, which they did, in this particular case. The route, if you follow the book, is that they go to the duty officer of the national military command center, who in turn makes an inquiry to NORAD for the availability of fighters, who then gets permission from someone representing the Sec. of Defense. Once that’s approved, then we scramble aircraft. We didn’t wait for that. We scrambled the aircraft, told them to get airborne and we would seek clearances later.

I picked up the phone, called NORAD, whose battle staff was in place because of the exercise, talked to the deputy commander for operations. He said, I understand and we’ll call Pentagon for those particular clearances. It was simultaneous almost with that decision that we’d made that I’m looking at the TV monitor of the news network and see the smoking hole in the north tower, of what turned out to be the north tower of the World Trade Center. Wondering, what is this? And like many of us involved in that, does it have anything to do with this particular incident? Which, we didn’t think it did because we’re talking Boston Center and we are not thinking of the immediate New York Metropolitan area.

Shortly after that, of course, our airplanes became airborne after that. It just so happens that Col. Duffy, who was the pilot of that first F-15, had been involved in some conversation because as the telephone calls were made, he was aware that there was a hijacking in the system. And that was kind of interesting because he had concluded that that indeed might have been that airplane and self-elected to hit the afterburner and to speed up his way towards New York. Excuse me.

It was then very shortly thereafter that we saw on television the second airplane, the United 175 crash into the south tower. And the first thing that I think most of us thought was this a re-run of the first event. But then it turned out to be the second event. We had no warning of that, whatsoever. There was, from my staff a call, in fact, that airplane was called hijacked or possibly hijacked later on, which in the, as General McKinley referred to as the fog and friction of war. It actually caused further confusion because we were not aware that which aircraft had actually crashed into the towers. We just knew that by now we had two airplanes that are crashed into the towers. We have two airplanes that are called hijacked. Again, we were still minutes away. I think the record said eight minutes away from New York City with F-15s that are moving very rapidly in that direction.

Now, we have, before I get to 77 if it were, we get a call of United Flight 93.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Well, before you go to that, I just wanted to make clear, there was no possibility, given the lateness with which you were notified from FAA of a possible hijacking, that those airplanes in full afterburner, flying supersonic could have gotten there in time to intercept either of those two planes. Is that correct?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That’s correct. That’s correct. The first aircraft, of course, American 11, crashed before our interceptors were airborne. We ordered the scramble almost simultaneously; our record shows the same minute. I’m not even sure which occurred first. But it was almost simultaneous that we ordered the scramble of the aircraft and the impact into the north tower had occurred. And so, by the time, even the pilot accelerating to 1.5 mach, moving pretty fast, was still eight minutes out by the time the second aircraft had crashed into the tower. And though, when the second aircraft crashed into the tower, by now, I think as Sec. Mineta said, “This becomes a pattern.” Certainly, I’d like to tell you that I was absolutely certain at that time that we were under attack but I was not absolutely certain that we were under attack at that particular time. But we knew that this pattern had to be dealt with at that particular time. And then very shortly thereafter, we got a call on the United 93 flight being a possible hijacking. And that aircraft, as you, well, I don’t know as you know, but it wandered around. That aircraft wandered around and flew up over the northern part of Pennsylvania and Ohio. Mixed in with this was a call about a Delta flight that was possibly hijacked. So, now our focus is we are under attack. What are we going to do in order to be in position to intercept another aircraft should it threaten someplace in the United States? And that place, of course, we would not know.

In the Northeast, at this particular time, we had no other aircraft available. The aircraft out of Otis had taken off. We looked at aircraft that were returning from a Michigan, a Michigan Air National Guard aircraft, returning from the range. Because at one time, we thought either the Delta flight or the United 93 might pose a threat to Detroit. We tried to get airplanes airborne out of the Toledo Air National Guard, at that particular time. Can you get anything airborne? Because we had this United 93 and this Delta flight. We need to intercept it and see what is going on with those particular aircraft.

Syracuse, New York, its Air National Guard Unit, we inquired with them their ability to get airborne and ultimately they did, somewhat later, at that particular time. And so in the record, you see the time we were notified of the American flight 77 as being possibly hijacked. I can tell you that I did not know and I don’t believe anybody in our NORAD system knew where that airplane was. We were advised that it was possibly hijacked. And we had launched, almost simultaneously with that, we launched the aircraft out of Langley to put them over top of Washington, D.C. – not in response to American Airlines 77 but really to put them in position in case United 93 were to head that way. They were the closest fighters that we had and we started vectoring them to move toward the Washington, D.C. area.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Did they also go into burner?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
No Sir.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, they, based on their configuration traveled at .98 mach, roughly 575 knots, 660 miles per hour about ten nautical miles per minute.

John Lehman, Commissioner
If they had gone into burner, could they have gotten there in time to get 77?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I think if those aircraft had gotten airborne immediately, if we were operating under something other than peacetime rules where they could have turned immediately for Washington, D.C., and gone into burner, it is physically possible that they could have gotten over Washington, D.C.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Why did they head out to sea first?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Our standard, we have agreements with the FAA. And by the way, we are looking outward, this is an advantage to us. And so we have agreements for clearance. When we scramble an aircraft, there is a line that’s picked up and the FAA and everyone is on that line and the aircraft take off and they have a predetermined departure route. And, of course, it’s out over water because our mission, unlike law enforcement’s mission is to protect things coming towards the United States. And I might even add in all of our terrorist scenarios that we run, the aircraft, if we were to intercept an aircraft, it is usually always from outside the United States coming towards us. So, our peacetime procedures are (garbled) to de-conflict with civil aviation so as to not have, endanger civil aviation in any particular way.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Secretary Lehman, also if I may add, the complexity of the air traffic over the Northeast corridor is so complex that to just launch fighters, as you know Sir from your background, into that air traffic system can cause potential damage or mid-air collisions. So we rely on the FAA to de-conflict those corridors. And that is another reason why it vectored east originally.

John Lehman, Commissioner
The armament on the F-15s and the F-16s was?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
The armament, as I recall and Gen. McKinley can correct me on that, we had full-up armament on all those aircraft with both radar and heat-seeking missiles, as well as guns.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
(garbled)

John Lehman, Commissioner
So to continue with 77, it’s fair to say that if you had got a more timely notification from FAA and particularly with regard to where it was heading, that those F-16s launched from Langley could possibly have gotten there before they hit the Pentagon?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It is certainly physically possible that they could have gotten into the area. And the speculation as to whether we could actually intercepted the aircraft by that time – because everything we were doing remember was being relayed from the FAA. We have no visibility on those aircraft, couldn’t see, we had no radars, couldn’t talk to our pilots. FAA did a marvelous job during that period of time in doing radio relays and assisting us in being able to.....

John Lehman, Commissioner
Now, if 93 had not crashed, would it not have been possible for the F-16s to have intercepted 93? And do you think they would have?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It was our intent to intercept United Flight 93. In fact, my own staff, we were orbiting now over Washington, D.C. by this time and I was personally anxious to see what 93 was going to do. And our intent was to intercept it. But we decided to stay over Washington, D.C. because there was not that urgency and, if there were other aircraft coming from another quadrant, another vector, we would have been pulled off station and we would not have been able to – there might have been an aircraft that popped up within the system closer that would have posed a larger threat to the Washington, D.C. area. So we elected to remain over D.C. until that aircraft was definitely coming towards us. And as you know, the brave men and women who took over that aircraft prevented us from making the awful decision which the young men that were flying those aircraft would have lived with for the rest of their lives if they had had to do that.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Now, in a short answer, why with the previous attempt of a light plane to hit the White House wasn’t Andrews Air Force Base with F-16s and marine F-18s available part of the alert? And I understand, I’d also like to have you comment on what the role of the Secret Service was in scrambling those F-16s?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Are you talking about..

John Lehman, Commissioner
the Andrews airplanes

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
the Andrews airplanes. It is my understanding that the Secret Service – obviously they worked with the 113th because the President, Air Force One, is located out at Andrews Air Force Base, so they had personal knowledge of those, of the people out there and the telephone number, and I cannot speculate whether they knew what we were doing or not. But in the urgency to get something done, they made a phone call to the 113th, I learned later. I did not know that at the time. And asked them to get anything they could airborne. And I think the quote was: “To protect the House.”

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
And the 113th is the 113th Fighter Wing at Andrews, the District of Columbia Air National Guard F-16 Wing.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
And not part of NORAD.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Now you said that the clear delineation was you were looking outward and to do anything inward, you had to get authorization from a law enforcement agency. And that is covered, as I understand it, by JCS Instruction 3610 on Aircraft Piracy. In that instruction, as I read it, which I believe is still in effect...

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
That’s correct, Sir.

John Lehman, Commissioner
You don’t have any delegated authority to interdict. In fact, there is no mention of interdiction in that it’s purely an escort function. This is still in effect. Now, presumably, you are not following it to the letter and I would like you to speak to what the chain of command is now. Who has authority to interdict, to shoot down and where is it delegated and are there published rules of engagement as to what criteria apply to make that decision?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, I’d be happy to answer that. And I thank Gen. Arnold for his comments about the actual day. I appreciate him being here today. Quite frankly Sir, since September 11, 2001, the Dept. of Defense, United States Air Force has put a lot of resources into what we call Operation Noble Eagle. As President Bush said, it’s the second front in the war on terrorism. And as I said in my opening remarks, we flown 30,000 sorties. In fact, overhead, today, here, our Noble Eagle pilots are flying, in addition, to being supplanted with ground-based air defense artillery. A lot of effort has gone into taking a look at the things that were not done right prior to, to prepare ourselves for the aftermath. And it is an honor for me to represent the men and women who do that. Quite frankly, our relationships began at 9/11 and the aftermath with Gen. Arnold and our staff to work with the Federal Aviation Administration, to bring in those radar facilities so that our controllers at our Northeast, Southeast, and Western Air Defense Sectors have visibility internally now. And that has been completed. In addition to seeing internally to the United States, we must be able to communicate to the pilots who fly our interceptor missions so that we can have clear lines of control back to our command element, Gen. Eberhart, in Colorado Springs.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Just to interrupt, on the radar visibility, are you dependent on the FAA radars which have very little capability in a non-transponder environment or can you, do you have the better air defense radar?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, we try to put the best radars in effect for the mission. Most of those are FAA radars. Most of them are old radars but they’ve been maintained properly and we are actually putting Dept. of Defense people out to make sure those radars are calibrated for our missions. So, therefore, we are using their radars. We are using air control squadrons, both active duty, Guard, and Reserve to supplement those. We, in fact, use the United States Navy every chance we can because their Aegis cruisers are so capable that we link their pictures into our air combat command center at Tyndall. So we are doing the absolute best job with the resources we’ve been given to make sure that internal picture now is transparent to our air battle managers. So that military controllers when asked now can pinpoint immediately an aircraft in distress, that we can find the nearest suitable fighter location, which I can say is substantial today. In open testimony I’d not like to go into the details of the numbers of alert facilities but it goes up and down depending on the threat. But it is internal now to the United States, which it wasn’t on the 11th of September. So this capacity, this Operation Noble Eagle which gives the military far more responsibility and latitude to do this mission now has allowed us to be far more capable. And we have been involved in every airline incident that we have been asked to perform with, with the Federal Aviation Administration, subsequent to 9/11, whether there be a disturbance on board, whether it be an aircraft emergency, whether it be to protect critical infrastructure or major population centers, we are there.

John Lehman, Commissioner
To follow-up on that, General Arnold, did you have authority to shoot down 93 when it was heading towards Washington and where did you get it?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
A lot of discussion on that. Our intent on United 93, the simple answer is to my knowledge, I did not have authority to shoot that aircraft down. We were informed after that airplane was already, had hit the ground. The simple answer.....

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
I’m sorry, could you say that again, you were informed of what after it hit the ground?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
We were informed of Presidential authority some five minutes after that aircraft had hit the ground, according to our records.

John Lehman, Commissioner
So you were given it after the fact – Presidential authority to shoot it down.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
To my knowledge. Now I can tell you that in our discussion, in our discussion with the NORAD staff at that particular time, that we, we intended to intercept that aircraft at some point in time and attempt to deviate that aircraft away from the Washington, D.C. area. There was discussion at that particular time whether or not that aircraft would be shot down. But we, I did not know of Presidential shoot-down authority until after that aircraft had crashed.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Uh-huh, and General McKinley can you take us to the present and where those authorities lie now.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Yes, Sir. Subsequent to 9/11, the President delegated to the Secretary of Defense, delegated to the Combatant Commander of NORAD and now United States Northern Command has the authority to declare a hostile target. Our fighter interceptors will be in position to accept that hostile declaration and the clearance authorities will be passed up to the highest authority. We’ve improved our communications equipment. We have secure telephones that allow us to contact, immediately, the powers in the chain of command and I, as the the Joint Force Air Component Commander, have delegated emergency authority. In the very rare occasion where either a telephone fails or we cannot get authority and under emergency powers, can exercise that authority. So the clearances now in place. Gen. Eberhart is in place in Colorado Springs or his designated representative. We exercise this in real world, not exercise, probably between 8 and 15 times a week. So it’s been well documented. Any national security event will bring together the forces and those lines of communication are open now. Clearances are there.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Thank you. As you know, our rules of engagement are many (tape swap)

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
From what source did you receive the shoot down authority?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I did not receive shoot-down authority.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
You say it was received subsequent to the crash of 93?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Yes, that’s correct.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
From what source was that received?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It was passed down to us from the NORAD, from Cheyenne Mountain, that they had received shoot down authority. Then, the time frame escapes me at the moment, but you know for example over the Washington, D.C. area, it was declared a no fly zone. And just by the fact that any aircraft was present, if we could not determine if that aircraft was friendly, then we were cleared to shoot that aircraft down.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
When was the declaration of no fly zone authorized?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I don’t know. It was shortly during that timeframe.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
So, are you saying that that declaration gave you shoot down authority?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It gave us, that particular declaration that I’m referring to is a Class Bravo airspace within the Washington, D.C. area was shut down to aviation, except for military or for law enforcement, emergency response aircraft, at that particular time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
So, help me understand, does it mean once that condition exists, that unless you are able to determine that this was a friendly aircraft, which under the circumstances I suppose means under the control of the terrorists at that time, making it unfriendly aircraft, that you had authority, by whatever means to bring it down?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That’s true. Yes.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
At what time during this process was that order issued and who issued it?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I do not know who issued it. It’s my understanding it was issued by the President or the Vice President, in his stead, that that order was issued. And it was issued around the time that we decided to put all the aircraft on the ground as Mr. Mineta, or Secretary Mineta, had referred to, at that particular time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
We would ask you to supplement your testimony today with specific information about that. At what point was, to the best of your knowledge, any order received from either the President or the Vice President of the United States with respect to action to be taken by the military in connection with the on-going situation?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It was my understanding that that occurred, the direct communication, to me, I can’t answer if it was done at a higher level at some point in time, around 5 minutes after the United 93 has crashed into Pennsylvania.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commission
And so you would be able to check the records of NORAD generally, or the DOD generally, to find out when a Presidential directive was issued.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I’m sure Gen. McKinley will do that for me.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Thank you. And if I understand the context of what you’ve said about closing the perimeter around Washington, the President’s directive or the Vice President’s directive would have been moot because of the prior order which would have enabled you to shoot down an unfriendly plane in that sector.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Well, you know, we develop a certain, I guess the short answer again is correct. But it’s very specifically in the Washington, D.C. area by presence, that aircraft was hostile unless we could determine that it was friendly.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Let me go to the issue, again to revisit Flight 77 because as we understand it, tragically it appears that that was the only plane which reached its intended target which might have been interdicted that day, if everything had gone right. Are you in agreement with that?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I think, you know from a physics perspective, yes that’s correct.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well, let’s go beyond physics, for a moment. And let me ask you about the planes which were scrambled from Andrews Air Force Base. Now from Andrews Air Force Base by the Secret Service of the United States, who gave the order to scramble jets, F-16s also, I believe, out of Andrews?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It is my understanding that the FAA, that the Secret Service requested that they launch anything they could to get them airborne.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Of whom did they make that request?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I’m not sure if it was Gen. Worley (phonetic), Dave Worley himself. Gen. Worley is the wing commander, Gen. Dave Worley. And I think they actually talked to him and I did not know this at the time, of course. But just in, they called him up and said what do you have that you can get airborne? He had some airplanes returning from the range on the training mission.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
What would be the flight time from Andrews Air Force Base of two F-16s to the Pentagon?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
From the time they were notified?

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Yes

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Probably 15 to 20 minutes because it takes about 10 minutes to get airborne. And they are not set up on alert for scramble. In fact, it could have taken – they didn’t have any airplanes immediately ready to go; it could have taken them 20 or 30 minutes.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
And, under the circumstances.....

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
We already had airplanes airborne, by the time those airplanes were airborne, we had airplanes over Washington, D.C.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Right, now if the order had been given to Andrews even simultaneously with the order that you gave to scramble your planes, is it not fair to say that those planes would have reached the Pentagon sooner?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
They might have but they would have been unarmed.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, yes that would be my comment, sir, is those aircraft are not prepped or built-up for that mission.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
And in fact, we have received reports that are almost incredible in terms of the bravery of the two pilots who went up that day in unarmed aircraft with the mission, I presume, authorized somewhere in the executive to use their airplanes to bring down Flight 77 or 93 if they could interdict them. That means to clip their wings, crash into them, perhaps, the pilots at the risk of their own lives. Is that correct?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, as I evacuated the Pentagon that morning, as I came out the river entrance and looked up, virtually simultaneously those F-16s coming back from the range, had been airborne, had dropped their weapons, were returning low on fuel, were visible to ten to fifteen thousand people. And it was a very heartening sight to see United States Air Force fighters overhead the Pentagon. And it is my understanding from the review of the records that that was their guidance.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
And who provided that guidance to them? Was that a decision made internally by Secret Service or did Secret Service require higher executive order in order to launch those planes on that mission?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I do not know that.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I’m unaware of the answer to that, sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much, gentlemen.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
I’ve got one question. Suppose for a minute that this weekend, God forbid that some terrorist got onboard another plane in Boston and headed for New York, what would be different?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Sir, I’m very proud to say that I think the interagency process has worked very, very well. The Transportation Security Administration under the direction of Secretary Ridge has implemented stringent procedures on the ground. Let’s face it, solving this problem before the terrorists get on the airplane, I think is the most critical step to protecting commercial aviation because once the airplane is in the air, then it resolves back to the Dept. of Defense to take the appropriate action. So, TSA deserves a great deal of credit. Federal Aviation Administration with their procedures and the way they are lashed up with us now in the military. And the formation of the Northern Command, I think is vitally important to the security of the United States of America. And, I think, those things in context make it far less likely for this to happen. But, as my boss says, we are not 100% safe. We can never be 100% safe. I take nothing for granted when I’m in our Air Operations Center when any aircraft fails to communicate or fails to make a turn, or fails to do what it’s being – it’s flight plan said it was supposed to. So, we are very, very serious today about what’s happening in the skies over America.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
But if it were able to get into the air, headed for New York, would you be, what procedures exist now that didn’t exist then? Would you be able to intercept it?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
It’s my understanding and firm belief that the Federal Aviation Administration would immediately notify us at the first sign of any impropriety in any aircraft, whether it’s commercial, cargo or civilian. We would immediately take action to get our fighters airborne from the nearest suitable location. And we have that location set now where we didn’t have it prior to the 11th. We should be able to protect our critical infrastructure, our major population centers. But there is, as in any case in the military effort, there are some risks but we are postured to accept that responsibility. So the example you gave us out of Boston is the F-15s out of Otis would be immediately scrambled, they would immediately intercept the aircraft and we would stand by for further authorities from those above us.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I would just point out that if the question were if it happened today. You have airborne interceptors that would be vectored into those aircraft, to intercept.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
Commissioner Hamilton

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
I just want to clarify a few things after listening to all this testimony; it’s not all that clear to me. As of September 11th, only the President had the authority to order a shoot down of a commercial aircraft?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That’s correct, Sir.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
And today, who has the authority?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We see the President, delegated to the Secretary of Defense, delegated to the Combatant Commander of Northern Command and the North American Airspace Command and there are emergency authorities if that fails.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
So you have authority.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Yes sir and others.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
And how many others?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I’d prefer not to say in this forum sir, but I can provide it for the record.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
And you do not have to go up the chain of command at all in the event of an emergency...

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We certainly will try.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
I know that.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We will make every effort to try.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
I’m sure you would. But you don’t have to.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
In an emergency situation, we can take appropriate action. Yes sir.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Now one of the things that’s curious to me is, General Arnold you said that you did not learn of the Presidential order until after the United 93 had already crashed. That was about a little after ten o’clock in the morning. The first notice of difficulty here was at 8:20 in the morning when a transponder goes off on the American flight 11. I don’t know how significant that is but twenty minutes later you had notification of a possible hijack. So there is a long lapse of time here between the time you are initially alerted and you receive the order that you could shoot that aircraft down. Am I right about that?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That’s correct.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
In your timeline, why don’t you put in there when you were notified?

Col. Alan Scott
For which flight, Sir?

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
(Crosstalk) Well, getting the notification from the President of the United States that you have the authority to shoot a commercial aircraft down is a pretty significant event. Why would that not be in your timeline?

Col. Alan Scott
I don’t know when that happened.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Have you ever received that kind of a notice before?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Not to my knowledge.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
So this is the first time in the history of the country that such an order had ever been given, so far as you know.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Yes, sir. I’m sure there is a log that would tell us that and I appreciate the question.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Yeah, maybe you could let us know that. And then finally, as I understand your testimony, it was not possible to shoot down any of these aircraft before they struck. Is that basically correct?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That is correct. In fact, the American Airlines 77, if we were to have arrived overhead at that particular point, I don’t think that we would have shot that aircraft down.

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
Because?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Well, we had not been given authority to shoot down (crosstalk)

Lee Hamilton, Vice Chair
You didn’t have authority at that point.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
And, you know, it is through hindsight that we are certain that this was a coordinated attack on the United States.

John Lehman, Commissioner
But had you gotten scrambled earlier, notified earlier of 77’s deviance about when it turned east, for instance, certainly you could have gotten the F-16s there and presumably there would have been time to communicate to either get or be denied authority, no? For 77.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I believe that to be true. I believe that to be true. It had to happen very fast but I believe that be true.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
What efforts were made that day to contact the President to seek that authority?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I do not know.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Who would have been in the chain of command seeking authority from the President with whom anyone at NORAD was communicating?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Can you answer that?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
The command director in Cheyenne Mountain is connected with the Combatant Commander who would have had the telephone lines open at that point. But I don’t have knowledge of what happened that day – but that would be the way it would be done.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
The flow would be through the Secretary of Defense obviously to ....

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
But the Secretary of Defense was under attack in the Pentagon.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
He was evacuating – yes sir.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Now in terms of anything you know today, looking backwards, including all the after-action reports and various studies which I’m sure have been conducted internally and I’m sure which we will wish to review. Can you not tell us whether there was any effort made to contact the President to seek authority in dealing with what appeared to be a coordinated attack?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I don’t have knowledge at this time to make a comment on that, sir.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I don’t have knowledge of that. Our actions, our actions were to try to get aircraft in position to intercept if necessary.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Just going back because now I’m confused by on the one hand your statement that the closing of the airspace over Washington provided de facto authority to take whatever measures were necessary to deal with hostile aircraft and your statement that we probably would not have shot down 77 if we had arrived in time.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
The airspace had not been shut down over Washington, D.C. at that time.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
What time was that? Is that on the timeline?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I believe it is. I believe it was reported by Secretary Mineta – the timeline that that occurred.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
It’s not on your timeline.

Col. Alan Scott
No sir, it’s not.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
Well do you know what time that was?

Col. Alan Scott
Sir, the only thing I’ve seen is we have a copy provided by Gen. Worley (phonetic) of an Andrews Tower transmission that announced to all aviation traffic that Class B airspace was closed and that air traffic that did not cooperate would be shot down.

Richard Ben-Veniste, Commissioner
What time was that, Col. Scott?

Col. Alan Scott
Sir, we’d have to go to the tower logs and we can get that for you. The tower log will show us what time that transmission was made but I don’t know what time it was made.

Richard Ben-Veniste
And on whose order was that directive given that any plane in this sector would be shot down?

Col. Alan Scott
Unknown to me, sir.

John Lehman, Commissioner
Would you be able to provide that to the best of your ability...(crosstalk)

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We’ll do everything we can to provide that for the record, sir.

John Lehman, Commissioner
as from the higher authority, as well, so we can get on the record that chain of command during that period. I have one last question on 175, that never turned its transponder off and apparently you were never notified that it was a possible hijacking. Was that because it continued not to communicate with ATC? Or did it deviate from its course?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I can’t tell you why we were not notified. You would have to ask the FAA but that aircraft was a very, as I understand it, a fairly short flight. And we were not notified; I can’t tell you why.

Thomas Kean, Chair
Commissioner Gorelick

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Thank you Mr. Chairman. I would actually like to follow-up on some of your questions about the respective roles of NORAD, Northern Command, and the Defense Department generally, vis-a-vis, law enforcement. As Commissioner Ben-Veniste averted to, when I was at the Justice Dept. and we were planning for the Atlanta Olympics, we rehearsed a number of scenarios with the Defense Department and the various components thereof who were responsible for providing support to the Olympics. And when we got to the scenario of a domestic hijacking of a plane headed into a stadium and I asked what they thought the proper division of labor should be, I was told, and it won’t come as any surprise to you Gen. Arnold given your testimony, that this is a law enforcement matter. And that the armed services will provide technical support to the FBI to shoot the aircraft down. And my response, of course, was that’s preposterous. And, in fact, Gen. Arnold, I am glad to see and hear that when faced with a judgment of whether you should do your job in defending the United States or wait for someone from the FBI to call you, you decided to get the authority later because that is the only rational response. You probably could have gotten court martialed but one appreciates that sort of leadership. I say this because it is clear that before September 11th, we know that the Defense Dept. discussed for decades what the appropriate role of our military should be in defending the domestic United States. This is not a new question. It was discussed up and down and across and I see Gen. McKinley nodding. Anyone who has been in the service for the period of time that you gentlemen have been know that. And clearly September 11th served if anything else, if nothing else, to break the resistance that had occurred to having a different view of what the appropriate role of the military should be.

So with that, with that background, I would like to just be very clear as to what has changed and what has not. As I understand it, the requirement of prior law enforcement requests has been eliminated. Is that correct?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We are able under Operation Noble Eagle, which we are under presently, to respond to an event as a military entity, to be in position to support. As you said eloquently, we don’t have time to wait anymore to launch our fighters. So we have to take proactive action to do that.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Thank you for that. And second of all, you, your radars are now as you put it are pointed inward as well. Is that correct?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We have incorporated the radars that were there all along so that our military controllers can now see them, see those tracks of interest.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Now you remain reliant to a certain extent on the efficiency of the FAA’s radar system, as Sec. Lehman pointed out. Are you completely comfortable that they are more than adequate to your mission?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Ma’am, you are absolutely right, we are dependent upon the FAA. We are working closely with them and their programmers because there are some financial disconnects. The FAA looks at radar differently than the military does. They are optimizing their radar to control traffic for commerce. We, the military, need to see very specific data which the FAA doesn’t need – it costs money to do that. Our programmers, along with the FAA have identified some disconnects in programmatics and senior leadership is aware of those disconnects. We want to make sure the radars last so that this mission can be done properly and effectively.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
I would ask you to supply for the record, if you could, a statement of what would be necessary in the professional opinion of you and your colleagues to bring the FAA system, upon which you are now reliant, up to the standards that you think are required to defend the domestic United States.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Yes ma’am.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
The other issue which you have raised in your testimony is that of communication between the FAA and NORAD, or lack thereof. And one of the questions that came immediately to mind is why you would not be co-located with FAA so that there is no such communication issue. Are you now co-located with FAA and have a presence in its command center that opens up when there is an emergency?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Ma’am, we’ve done a little of both. We, after Gen. Arnold had this tragedy occur on the 11th, the FAA provided us with liaisons at all our air defense sectors and our continental NORAD region and at NORAD. So we have real-time people that we can turn to and say, please use your communications channels so that we can get information. In addition, the National Capitol Region has stood up a coordination center at Herndon, Virginia, in the FAA building, where we have military personnel, members of Transportation Security, Secret Service and other federal agencies where they can coordinate the efforts in this area. So, that has helped us tremendously and we think we can continue to do that.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Thank you for that answer. And finally, in my list, are you comfortable that you now have the pre-placement of your resources, in terms of aircraft, etc., where they need to be to adequately defend our critical infrastructure in the United States?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Yes ma’am, I believe at the present time, we have an adequate force structure to do that. The requirements change daily, weekly, based on the event. For example, if a space shuttle were to take off, we’d want to have aircraft at the Cape. So whenever we have a security event, the Olympics, the State of the Union, we move our fighters around in a flexible manner to respond to that. So we do have the capability based on intelligence and real-world need to do that.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
We may want to follow-up in closed session on that issue. As the charter for NORAD and the existence of Northern Command were being changed and created, there clearly would have been debate within the Pentagon over what the scope of that charter should be – and I speak as someone who served there twice. And I can imagine what some of those discussions might have been. What authorities were contemplated to be given to Northern Command that haven’t been and what authorities if you were writing that Charter on you own, would you give it?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Ma’am, I don’t mean to dodge the question but I don’t know if I have the level of knowledge that you require for that answer. I will tell you, as a component commander who needs to employ resources in defense of United States citizens, I will tell you that the bi-national arrangement with Canada that NORAD has had for over forty years has worked exceptionally well for the threat period that we went through, the cold war and subsequently. The stand-up of Northern Command has given us the ability to now tailor our forces and to work with local law enforcement so that we can respond to a critical need far more quickly. And we do it in a joint fashion with Navy, Marine Corp, Army, our Guardsmen, our Reservists and our United States Air Force. So, the Northern Command framework, as I see it, and we’re still in initial operating capability. We’ll become fully operational, capable when Gen. Eberhart says they are. We are learning, we are training together and exercising together and from my perspective, working exceedingly well.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
And one final question of Gen. Arnold, we get some of our most candid advice from people who have taken their uniform off. And I use that phrase as well for civilians who no longer play whatever role they have happened to have played. Having lived through the searing moments of 9/11 and having had the awesome responsibilities that you had on that day and having had limited resources as you had on that day, legal and physical, to help prevent harm, what advice to you have for us about changes that we should make as a country.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Well, I wrote a paper, no I didn’t write a paper on that. But I think one would have to, that is probably where you are going to go. We are very fortunate that we have a country with so many resources. And let me point out, if I could, the, well you might, there could be criticism of what we did in response. It worked pretty well in terms of the after-action reports. Airplanes were getting airborne because people knew they had to get airborne. And I don’t have the timelines for all of these things but as the President told the military to prepare to defend the country, we started gathering up all the aircraft that traditionally had not supported NORAD. And as soon as we could get armament to them, we either put them on orbit, as you recall we were on orbit for sometime throughout the country. The Navy responded magnificently, as well. It was in the press. I had Adm. Dawson, Vice Admiral Dawson called me. He was on the George Washington at the time and he said we understand that Gen. Eberhart is the supported CINC and that you have been appointed the JFACC, the Joint Force Air Component Commander and we want to roll under your air tasking order. Had Vice Admiral Bucky of Third Fleet who was steaming an aircraft carrier toward the West Coast to do the same thing. So the system, in terms of military cooperation worked tremendously well.

I would also hasten to say that during the course of time, as we were on orbit and our resources were extremely limited in many cases because we initially could not see even what the FAA could see, we used our very straight AWACs aircraft, our warning aircraft that are used all over the world, and Brig. Gen. Ben Robinson was stretched very thin. But he continued to do what he could. The United States Customs provided us with E3s, with radars that gave us coverage in other parts of the area. And as Gen. McKinley alluded to, we were able to bring in units, Air National Guard and active duty computer air control units – units that are designed to be deployed and integrate them into our air picture – not only for air but also for voice. So we did a lot of things early on. But the things that were missing, in particular, immediately were: number one, we couldn’t see into the interior of the country, we couldn’t talk to our aircraft that were airborne to the interior of the country and we did not have a command and control system that would absorb the number of radars. And we were able to do that very rapidly. That coupled with the creation of the Dept. of Homeland Security and with the Northern Command has provided defense in depth to, in my opinion, to protect this country in a way that it has never been defended before. It’s in depth at the present time. So it’s, we need to continue down those avenues. I’m sure there are ways to improve it. I’m sure that Gen. McKinley will find those ways. Gen. Eberhart is engaged in that, as well. But I feel comfortable that we have done those things that we ought to have done in order to provide security before a certain hijacking would occur. And, of course, God forbid, if that were to occur again, we are now positioned to be able to see, to be able to talk, to be able to provide command and control, and we have exercised repeatedly our capability to pass an order, a military order, down to the pilot in the airplane or the soldier next to his air defense artillery.

Jamie Gorelick, Commissioner
Thank you very much.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
Our last questioner is Congressman Roemer.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Thank you Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I want to again commend you and our Vice Chairman and the staff for all the work that you have put into this hearing. Especially this panel, this is very helpful to us and plowing ground that the Joint Inquiry did not get into. And I just want to make sure that you recognize how important that is and we are very grateful for your time, gentlemen, and your help and the good work that has gone into setting this hearing up. Gen. Arnold, you were there that day. Correct?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Yes sir.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And you had been there how long?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I’d been the commander since Dec. 19, 1997. So I had been there for some time. I was approaching the end of my tour.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Let me keep you on the hot seat, as Jamie Gorelick has put you there, and ask you a question about military threats, threats to the United States and the way we try to get intelligence, as the world changes from a cold war to terrorist threats that can come at us from almost anywhere, at anytime in nimble quick dynamic ways. Were you aware at all of the fatwa that Osama bin Laden had put out in February of 1998 that said he wanted to kill Americans, all Americans, everywhere he could, whether that was in the Middle East or in the United States of America?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
The answer to that is yes and we had briefings that, our own briefings I think we could even provide date back to 1998 where we called Osama bin Laden the most dangerous man in the world. And our focus, with the demise of the Soviet Union Warsaw Pact, in accordance with the Hart-Rudman study, was that we felt like the greatest threat to the United States would come from a terrorist, a rouge, or rouge nation. Or I should say a nation of concern.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And then were you aware of George Tenet’s statement in December of 1998 that the United States was at war with Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I don’t recall that but I suppose I was generally aware of that - that the United States was at war with terrorism around the world.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
One of the frustrations is that in looking at this issue very carefully over the last year and a half, a lot of our people responsible for these kinds of things did not know of George Tenet’s declaration or did not know of Osama bin Laden’s declaration. If Vladimir Putin had made that declaration, as the leader of a nation state, we would probably all be aware of it. If Kim Jung Il of North Korean or Saddam Hussein had made those statement in ’98, we would probably all be aware of it. And that combined with the intelligence that was coming in over the decades of the 1990s that pointed to planes as weapons, we need to look back not to blame anybody but to try to make sure that this kind of information can get into the right hands in the future so that we can respond nimbly and quickly to this very nimble and quick threat that is directed directly at the heart of America. And I would be very, very attentive to any suggestions you would have now that you have stepped away from that most important job that you took on for our country and for our people, and performed very well, I’m sure. What do we need to do to breakdown these barriers of communication and increase the exchange of information so that we can respond quickly to this threat that will continue to come at us.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Mr. Commissioner, I think I’ve stated that earlier – what I thought we had done. In terms, of the intelligence community and awareness, I think we are at a greater awareness today than we ever were before and I would leave that up to, perhaps, to Gen. McKinley, not trying to duck the question but I think I’ve answered that pretty much before.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Well if you think of more specific answers, please provide those for the record. Let me ask you a question about the time difference between the scrambling and the battle stations and getting airborne. The F-15s at Otis, which was about, what was the total timeframe there with the F-15s at Otis?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I believe that from the time they were notified to the scramble, it was six minutes.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Six minutes

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Yes sir

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Notified, scrambled and then airborne.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Notified, scrambled, and airborne, I believe that was six minutes as Col. Scott has (garbled)

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So, a total of ...

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
No, there were on battle stations because the Northeast Air Commander had put them on battle stations. But once we said scramble, then I believe it was six minutes.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And then comparatively, for the F-16s at Langley, what was the total time it took to ....

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Again, if I can look at our data here, I believe it was, they were reported airborne at 9:35 and I think we would show that we actually...

Col. Alan Scott
We got fresh radar data at 9:30. I believe they were ordered to scramble at 9:24. The 9:35 report is .....

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Correct

Col. Alan Scott
when they were reported to have been airborne.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
Six minutes

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Six minutes, again

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
And these fighters, Sir, have up to 15 minutes to get airborne. And it is very intricate, as Secretary Lehman knows, to get an airplane without anybody in it, started, cranked, inertialized, to the runway, get it clearanced, get it in the air. Then six minutes is exceedingly quick.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So at 9:35, those F-16s are airborne.

(crosstalk)
Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I think they were airborne at 9:30, actually. And that they were reported airborne at 35, I’ll correct my error here, if I could, please.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
Okay. You were in the room when Secretary Mineta talked a little bit about arriving at the White House at about 9:20 and then overhearing a conversation at about 9:24 or 9:25 between the Vice President and a young aide, where he inferred that there was already an order in place for a shoot down. And he assumed it was for American Airlines 77. So sometime even before 9:20, there was an order in place that he overheard in the Presidential Executive Operations Center, that had some exchange between, I assume, the Vice President, the President, and maybe the Special Ops situation room. And they had determined that they would have the authority communicated to somebody to shoot down American Airlines Flight 77. Were you at all aware of anything sometime after 9:15 or 9:20 to shoot down American Airlines Flight 77?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I was never aware of any order given to shoot down American Airlines 77.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So nothing was ever conveyed to you by the White House or by the FAA Administrator or by the Secretary of Transportation on Flight 77?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That’s correct.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So the only time you ever received information on a shoot down was on Flight #93 and that was ...

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
After the fact.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
That was, excuse me?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
After the fact.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
That was after the fact and that was after 10:00.

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
That’s correct

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And that was from who?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
It was from Cheyenne Mountain, I assume from the commander of North American Air Defense Command.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So your assumption is is that the White House communicated that to Cheyenne Mountain and then Cheyenne Mountain communicated ...

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
through the National Military Command Center. Correct.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And when you had that after the fact, as Commissioner Hamilton asked you, that was at what time?

Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold
I believe the time, we do not have a record of this, I remember the time being somewhere around 10:05. But we do not show that in this ....

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
We’ll try to find that accurately and depict it for the record, Sir, because that’s probably an important time you’d like to have.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
I think it’s critically important. Col. Scott, were you in on any of that information about the Presidential authority to shoot down Flight 93?

Col. Alan Scott
No Sir, at the time I was upstairs with the Crisis Action Team.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
And Gen. McKinley?

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
I was trying to get out of the Pentagon which was on fire, Sir.

Tim Roemer, Commissioner
So, Gen. Arnold, with respect to this decision, if you can get anymore details on the timing and any information on Flight 77, that would be very helpful to us. Thank you again for your great service to the country.

Thomas Kean, Chairman
Col. Scott, Maj. Gen. Arnold and Maj. Gen. McKinley, thank you very much. You have been very helpful today and we appreciate it and thank you.

Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley
Thank you Mr. Chairman and members of the Commission. Thank you very much.

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