NORAD hijack exercises, 1999
“http://killtown.911review.org/oddities.html#1999-NORAD_exercises
1999 - NORAD starts conducting exercises in which airplanes are hijacked and crashed into targets which include the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
http://killtown.911review.org/oddities.html#1999-NORAD_exercises
NORAD had drills of jets as weapons
“In the two years before the Sept. 11 attacks, the North American Aerospace Defense Command conducted exercises simulating what the White House says was unimaginable at the time: hijacked airliners used as weapons to crash into targets and cause mass casualties.
One of the imagined targets was the World Trade Center. In another exercise, jets performed a mock shootdown over the Atlantic Ocean of a jet supposedly laden with chemical poisons headed toward a target in the United States. In a third scenario, the target was the Pentagon — but that drill was not run after Defense officials said it was unrealistic, NORAD and Defense officials say.
NORAD, in a written statement, confirmed that such hijacking exercises occurred. It said the scenarios outlined were regional drills, not regularly scheduled continent-wide exercises.
“Numerous types of civilian and military aircraft were used as mock hijacked aircraft,” the statement said. “These exercises tested track detection and identification; scramble and interception; hijack procedures; internal and external agency coordination and operational security and communications security procedures.”
A White House spokesman said Sunday that the Bush administration was not aware of the NORAD exercises. But the exercises using real aircraft show that at least one part of the government thought the possibility of such attacks, though unlikely, merited scrutiny.
On April 8, the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks heard testimony from national security adviser Condoleezza Rice that the White House didn’t anticipate hijacked planes being used as weapons.
President Bush said at a news conference Tuesday, “Nobody in our government, at least, and I don’t think the prior government, could envision flying airplanes into buildings on such a massive scale.”
NORAD officials have acknowledged that “scriptwriters” for the drills included the idea of hijacked aircraft being used as weapons.
“Threats of killing hostages or crashing were left to the scriptwriters to invoke creativity and broaden the required response,” USA Today (4/18/04) Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley, a NORAD official, told the 9/11 commission. No exercise matched the specific events of Sept. 11, NORAD said.” -
(See also:? 1996 - U.S. officials considered possibility a plane could be flown into the main stadium at Olympics in Atlanta; 1998-99 - Federal Report warned the executive branch that Osama bin Laden’s terrorists might hijack an airliner and dive bomb it into the Pentagon or other government buildings; April 2001 - NORAD planned an exercise about a hijacked plane crash into the Pentagon, but was rejected)
NORAD had drills of jets as weapons
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-04-18-norad_x.htm
By Steven Komarow and Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — In the two years before the Sept. 11 attacks, the North American Aerospace Defense Command conducted exercises simulating what the White House says was unimaginable at the time: hijacked airliners used as weapons to crash into targets and cause mass casualties.
One of the imagined targets was the World Trade Center. In another exercise, jets performed a mock shootdown over the Atlantic Ocean of a jet supposedly laden with chemical poisons headed toward a target in the United States. In a third scenario, the target was the Pentagon — but that drill was not run after Defense officials said it was unrealistic, NORAD and Defense officials say.
NORAD, in a written statement, confirmed that such hijacking exercises occurred. It said the scenarios outlined were regional drills, not regularly scheduled continent-wide exercises.
“Numerous types of civilian and military aircraft were used as mock hijacked aircraft,” the statement said. “These exercises tested track detection and identification; scramble and interception; hijack procedures; internal and external agency coordination and operational security and communications security procedures.”
A White House spokesman said Sunday that the Bush administration was not aware of the NORAD exercises. But the exercises using real aircraft show that at least one part of the government thought the possibility of such attacks, though unlikely, merited scrutiny.
On April 8, the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks heard testimony from national security adviser Condoleezza Rice that the White House didn’t anticipate hijacked planes being used as weapons.
On April 12, a watchdog group, the Project on Government Oversight, released a copy of an e-mail written by a former NORAD official referring to the proposed exercise targeting the Pentagon. The e-mail said the simulation was not held because the Pentagon considered it “too unrealistic.”
President Bush said at a news conference Tuesday, “Nobody in our government, at least, and I don’t think the prior government, could envision flying airplanes into buildings on such a massive scale.”
The exercises differed from the Sept. 11 attacks in one important respect: The planes in the simulation were coming from a foreign country.
Until Sept. 11, NORAD was expected to defend the United States and Canada from aircraft based elsewhere. After the attacks, that responsibility broadened to include flights that originated in the two countries.
But there were exceptions in the early drills, including one operation, planned in July 2001 and conducted later, that involved planes from airports in Utah and Washington state that were “hijacked.” Those planes were escorted by U.S. and Canadian aircraft to airfields in British Columbia and Alaska.
NORAD officials have acknowledged that “scriptwriters” for the drills included the idea of hijacked aircraft being used as weapons.
“Threats of killing hostages or crashing were left to the scriptwriters to invoke creativity and broaden the required response,” Maj. Gen. Craig McKinley, a NORAD official, told the 9/11 commission. No exercise matched the specific events of Sept. 11, NORAD said.
“We have planned and executed numerous scenarios over the years to include aircraft originating from foreign airports penetrating our sovereign airspace,” Gen. Ralph Eberhart, NORAD commander, told USA TODAY. “Regrettably, the tragic events of 9/11 were never anticipated or exercised.”
NORAD, a U.S.-Canadian command, was created in 1958 to guard against Soviet bombers.
Until Sept. 11, 2001, NORAD conducted four major exercises a year. Most included a hijack scenario, but not all of those involved planes as weapons. Since the attacks, NORAD has conducted more than 100 exercises, all with mock hijackings.
NORAD fighters based in Florida have intercepted two hijacked smaller aircraft since the Sept. 11 attacks. Both originated in Cuba and were escorted to Key West in spring 2003, NORAD said.
April 2001 - NORAD planned to practice a scenario in which a terrorist group hijacks a plane and crashes it into the Pentagon, but it was rejected by the Joint Chiefs of Staff as being too unrealistic.
“Five months before Sept. 11, 2001, the officers responsible for defending American airspace wanted to test their ability to prevent a hijacked airliner from being crashed into the Pentagon, but the scenario was rejected by the Joint Chiefs of Staff as impractical, a Joint Chiefs spokesman confirmed yesterday.
The disclosure was made after a government watchdog group released a leaked e-mail from a former official at the North American Air Defense Command. In the message, the official told colleagues a week after the attacks that in April 2001 NORAD requested that war games run by the Joint Chiefs include an ”event having a terrorist group hijack a commercial airline . . . and fly it into the Pentagon.”
Last night, Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant Commander Dan Hetlage confirmed the account, saying: ”That scenario was rejected because it would have become a whole exercise in and of itself. It wasn’t looked on at the time as being practicable.”
The NORAD proposal is the clearest sign yet that national security officials were worried before 9/11 about terrorists using hijacked airliners as missiles, despite testimony that senior leaders, including National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, didn’t know of such concerns.
Peter Stockton, chief investigator for the Project on Government Oversight, said yesterday he was told by the source who provided the memo that a special forces officer attached to the NORAD command at the time had first proposed the Pentagon scenario be practiced.
Concerns that terrorists might use hijacked airliners as missiles dates back to the 1996 Olympic games in Atlanta, when jets were placed on patrol to guard against such a threat.”
- Boston Globe (04/14/04)
(See also: 1996 - U.S. officials considered possibility a plane could be flown into the main stadium at Olympics in Atlanta; 1998-99 - Federal Report warned the executive branch that Osama bin Laden’s terrorists might hijack an airliner and dive bomb it into the Pentagon or other government buildings)
http://killtown.911review.org/oddities/2001.html#April2001-NORAD_exercise
Pentagon crash ‘too unrealistic’
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/
2004/04/14/pentagon_crash_too_unrealistic?mode=PF
By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff, 4/14/2004
WASHINGTON — Five months before Sept. 11, 2001, the officers responsible for defending American airspace wanted to test their ability to prevent a hijacked airliner from being crashed into the Pentagon, but the scenario was rejected by the Joint Chiefs of Staff as impractical, a Joint Chiefs spokesman confirmed yesterday.
The disclosure was made after a government watchdog group released a leaked e-mail from a former official at the North American Air Defense Command. In the message, the official told colleagues a week after the attacks that in April 2001 NORAD requested that war games run by the Joint Chiefs include an ”event having a terrorist group hijack a commercial airline . . . and fly it into the Pentagon.”
Last night, Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant Commander Dan Hetlage confirmed the account, saying: ”That scenario was rejected because it would have become a whole exercise in and of itself. It wasn’t looked on at the time as being practicable.”
The NORAD proposal is the clearest sign yet that national security officials were worried before 9/11 about terrorists using hijacked airliners as missiles, despite testimony that senior leaders, including National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, didn’t know of such concerns.
A secret Aug. 6, 2001, memo prepared for President Bush said Al Qaeda terrorists in the United States might be planning to hijack airliners, but it did not raise the possibility that Al Qaeda could slam those planes into buildings — let alone the Pentagon, which was struck by American Airlines Flight 77.
Rice testified before the commission investigating the 9/11 attacks last week that ”it did not raise the possibility that terrorists might use airplanes as missiles.”
However, she held out the possibility that some government officials might have raised concerns, without senior officials’ knowledge, about such a mode of attack.
Officials at NORAD apparently were concerned. But the e-mail said, the US Pacific Command, which was overseeing the exercises simulating a war with North Korea, ”didn’t want it because it would take attention away from their exercise objectives, and Joint Staff action officers rejected it as too unrealistic.”
The author of the message, a former NORAD official, could not be located yesterday.
Peter Stockton, chief investigator for the Project on Government Oversight, said yesterday he was told by the source who provided the memo that a special forces officer attached to the NORAD command at the time had first proposed the Pentagon scenario be practiced.
Concerns that terrorists might use hijacked airliners as missiles dates back to the 1996 Olympic games in Atlanta, when jets were placed on patrol to guard against such a threat.
Testifying before the 9/11 commission yesterday, former FBI Director Louis Freeh said that ”I believe it came up in a series of these, as we call them, special events.”
But Freeh said, ”I never was aware of a plan that contemplated commercial airliners being used as weapons after a hijacking.”
Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
