WASHINGTON – Air Force F-16s patrolled the skies over Washington, Navy
warships were sent to Manhattan and military commanders ordered forces on
highest alert after Tuesday's terrorist attacks.
President Bush, in an Oval Office address, vowed to find those responsible.
"We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and
those who harbor them," he said.
At a Pentagon briefing earlier, Joint Chiefs Chairman Henry H. Shelton said,
"I have no intention of discussing what comes next. But make no mistake about
it, your armed forces are ready."
Some 10 hours before that briefing, a Boeing 757 plowed into the Pentagon,
after two hijacked airliners had struck the towers of New York's World Trade
Center.
But what would happen next – including potential retaliatory strikes – wasn't
exactly clear.
President Bush put U.S. forces around the globe on the highest possible
alert, "Threatcon Delta."
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld denied that U.S. forces were responsible
for the explosions heard Tuesday night near Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan.
"In no way is the U.S. government connected," he said at the Pentagon briefing.
A senior defense official said the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, which was
due to come home from the Persian Gulf, was ordered to remain in the area
indefinitely. A second carrier, the USS Carl Vinson, remains in the area as
well, the official said.
Officials at military sites across the country reported that only essential
military personnel would be permitted on their bases. All unnecessary military
flights were canceled, and the North American Aerospace Defense Command took
steps to protect the military's computer systems from hackers, a spokesman said.
NORAD – which also defends U.S. airspace from foreign invasion – was also on
its highest alert. Around the country, fighters, airborne radars and refueling
took the skies, officials said.
NORAD controllers did track one of the hijacked planes, but it crashed into
the World Trade Center even as fighters were scrambling, said Col. Mike Perini,
NORAD spokesman.
Fighters did not shoot down any of the hijacked aircraft, he said. In
general, however, they "are prepared to engage aircraft deemed to be a threat to
the civil population," he said. "Shooting an aircraft down is not out of the
question."
Two U.S. F-15 fighters also escorted two Korean Air Lines airliners entering
U.S. airspace to Whitehorse, in Canada's Yukon Territory, he said. He had no
further information.
Air Force fighter jets patrolled over Washington shortly after the attack,
Perini said.
"We did have F-16s up," Pentagon spokesman Adm. Craig Quigley told reporters
who had gathered across a highway in full view of the still-smoking Pentagon.
The Navy dispatched the carriers USS John F. Kennedy and USS George
Washington to New York to assist with defense and medical needs.
"We have been attacked like we haven't since Pearl Harbor," said Adm. Robert
J. Natter, the commander of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet at Norfolk Naval Station.
The carriers, bristling with dozens of fighter aircraft, also contain full
medical units and operating rooms. The USNS Comfort, a hospital ship in
Baltimore harbor, also was being sent into action, Navy officials said.
Natter put all installations under his command on the highest security
condition. He is in charge of 188 ships, 1,223 aircraft, 37 shore stations and
more than 125,000 sailors, Marines and civilian employees. The Atlantic Fleet
provides combat-ready forces to support American and NATO commanders in regions
of conflict throughout the world.
Missouri Rep. Ike Skelton, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services
Committee, said he had been told by military officials there were about 100
casualties at the Pentagon. He said he had no details on whether they were
deaths or injuries.
Rumsfeld, who was in his offices on the second floor when the aircraft tore
into the opposite side of the building, pledged that the Pentagon – the
workplace for some 24,000 men and women – would function Wednesday.
Bush visited a number of military sites Tuesday, heading first to Barksdale
Air Force Base, La., and then to Orfutt Air Force Base, Neb., where he visited
the deep underground bunkers of the U.S. Strategic Command.
Military fighter jets – an F-16 and two F-15s – escorted the presidential
aircraft.
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On the Net:
Atlantic Fleet: www.atlanticfleet.navy.mil
APNP-09-11-01 2213CDT