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Civilian CIA Contractor Charged with Afghan Detainee Death; 14 Fighters Total Patrolled All U.S. on Morning of 9/11
Aired June 17, 2004 - 13:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Live from the Pentagon this hour, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld briefing reporter. We've got it when it happens.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Also live this hour, Attorney General John Ashcroft expected to announce some indictments over prisoner abuse in Afghanistan. We're on that one for you, as well.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody move, please. We are going back to the airport. Don't try to make any stupid moves.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Tapes of terror. The 9/11 Commission releases recordings of the hijackers, as it recreates that fateful day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Contact with aircraft has failed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your mission, instant shadow, commit, bulls eye, 100-158, 21,500 track west.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do we have an engagement authority?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) flares are authorized.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aircraft diverted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Secret Service has been informed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Could it happen again? An exclusive report. We're in- depth on securing American skies since the 9/11 attacks.
From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Miles O'Brien.
PHILLIPS: And I'm Kyra Phillips. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM... starts right now.
O'BRIEN: Utterly unprepared for an unprecedented challenge. That's the bottom line on a top-down incredibly detailed analysis of September 11, 2001, from 8:00 a.m. Eastern, to 10:03:11, to be precise. It points to miscommunication, confusion and indecision on the part of air traffic controllers, the military and their overseers at the highest levels of government. CNN's Sean Callebs has more on the final day of the final public hearing of the independent 9/11 Commission -- Sean.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And what a day it has been, indeed. Tense confusion, missed communication, inaction, and at times wildly inaccurate information. The 9/11 Commission said all combined it showed the U.S. military and its civilian officials were simply unprepared to deal with hijackers who had seized commercial airliners to turn them into missiles. For those who lost loved ones in the attacks on New York and Washington, at times, this final public hearing stirred emotions.
For the first time, the public heard detailed audiotapes involving cockpit transmissions by some of the hijackers, including this exchange, it came from Flight 11 before it slammed into the World Trade Center. It's believed to be the voice of lead hijacker Mohamed Atta.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody move. Everything is OK. If you try to make any moves, you'll endanger yourself and the airplane. Just stay quiet.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CALLEBS: The hearing also detailed the crooked and jagged flight paths of the doomed airliners. This as officials scrambled to track information about the planes. Now all of this highlights how U.S. air defense commanders and aviation officials were unprepared in, quote, "every respect," to stop the al Qaeda attacks that claimed nearly 3000 lives.
At one point, a senior FAA official directs Air Force fighters to chase American Flight 11. However that plane had already crashed into the Trade Center Tower. And NORAD, the North American aerospace command, was not notified of the hijacking of Flight 175 until after it hit the South Tower. Similar problems were noted with Flight 77 that crashed into the Pentagon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MONTE BELGER, FMR. FAA ACTING DEP. ADMIN.: On the morning of 9/11 it became clear that the historical procedures, the protocols and the communication links were not adequate. The FAA and other agencies were reacting to a scenario that had not been practiced or modeled. Decision-makers, including myself, were reacting quickly and in my opinion, professionally, but in an untested environment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CALLEBS: Untested, indeed. The report also said that President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney acted quickly to authorize fighter jets to shoot down any plane that appeared hostile, targeting the White House or the U.S. Capitol. However by then, the last of the four hijacked planes had already crashed in a field in Pennsylvania -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Sean Callebs in Washington, thanks much.
The head of NORAD says if the same horrific scenario were to happen again, military commanders would have as much as 17 minute of reaction time and fighter jets would be in firing range for eight of those. Clearly, a lot more than airport security has changed in the past two years and nine months, so we hope. Retired Air Force major general, and now CNN analyst, Don Shepperd joining us with some insights on the military capabilities, then and now.
General Sheppard, good to have you back with us.
MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: My pleasure, Miles.
O'BRIEN: Let's not belabor too much the situation before 9/11 because I want to talk about how things have changed. But on that morning, the ability to intercept aircraft of any kind was very limited in the United States, wasn't it?
SHEPPERD: Yes, it was simply in reality, not there, Miles. We had seven alert sites, 14 airplanes protecting the entire United States. Two in the Northeast, one up in Massachusetts, one down in Virginia. Nothing in place and no scenarios practiced. Nobody envisioned this type of scenario. We simply weren't prepared at all for this, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. So you can go through step by step, timeframe by timeframe, the bottom line is nobody expected this, nobody was prepared for it. We were still really thinking post-Cold War, and really had not anticipated this. Let's talk about what's going on right now. Clearly, we have more planes on alert. I assume that number is classified number. Can you give us a sense of how much more protection there is right now?
SHEPPERD: Well, again, the morning of the attack, we had 14 airplanes on alert. There are considerably more on alert. And it is classified. My guess it's upward of 40 airplanes on alert. It does cost a lot of money. And the entire United States is not covered all the time. What we have is the ability based upon notice to come up rapidly in many locations. And we also have roving CAPs over the important population centers in the United States. But it's not covered all the time.
SHEPPERD: And when you say CAP, let's define that for folks. Combat air patrol, which means essentially fighters kind of orbiting overhead on standby, being refueled as they go, watching out. That of course happened quite a bit right after 9/11, especially up and down and the East Coast. Today that is happening sporadically, and is not announced, correct?
SHEPPERD: That's correct. It's rotated -- on a regular basis, it's rotated. Also the alert sites are rotated. They come up and they go down. We have the ability to rapidly enforce those alert sites. The key to all of this is the ability to put airplanes up over cities. That's not the key to our safety. It's one part of it, but we do have the ability, if alerts are given in the proper amount of time and if we have the cues to know that airplanes are being hijacked, we do have the ability to put people in place much better than 9/11, but not perfect, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. So when we talk now about more alert sites, we're still not anywhere near the numbers of fighters that were on standby in the absolute darkest days of the Cold War, the '60s, for example. Do we need to ramp this up?
SHEPPERD: No, we don't. In the '60s, of course, we had the Soviet air threat. We worried about air attacks on America by bombers. We had about 2500 airplanes in air defense. Again, on the morning of 9/11, we had, really, four dedicated air defense alert sites. That's 60 airplanes, down from 2500, others that could be called upon. But it took some time to do that. We don't need that kind of air defense posture. What we are postured against now is, again, these terrorist-type attacks. And again, it's not perfect. It's better but it's not perfect. Still, things could happen, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right, right now, you say we have a quicker response. Why do we have -- how much quicker? Why is it quicker? And is it based on some of the false alarms we've seen over the past couple years? Is it working?
SHEPPERD: It is quicker in that we have more alert sites, many more than the seven that we originally had. And, again if something happens in the vicinity of these alert sites, we can get them airborne. We practiced these scenarios. The pilots have been trained. So we're all on alert for this type of thing. So indeed we can put airplanes in the air quicker.
I want to stress one more time that the safety of Americans is not basically there by putting fighters up to shoot down Americans on American airliners. That isn't quite the safety. But we are able to put airplanes up, to keep airplanes from impacting, if the right things happen at the right time, in the right place, and notice is given.
O'BRIEN: You have told me often about the so-called fog of war, and watching what I watched this morning, that's what I thought of. The miscommunications, the misunderstanding, the confusion, to what extent can you guarantee there's better confusion -- better communication, I should say, between all these agencies that would have to respond so quickly in order to thwart something like this?
SHEPPERD: Well, I think it's better because that we're being told by 9/11 Commission and others that they have practiced this scenario. So we're now looking inward, whereas before we were always looking outward. So again, it's clearly better. And we've thought through this problem. But it can happen again. If I were the hijackers, I wouldn't try again against the U.S. air transportation system. I would take other means in other areas. O'BRIEN: All right. Major General Don Shepperd, retired U.S. Air Force, always a pleasure having you join us, we appreciate it -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Unrest continues in Iraq as the handoff approaches. Today, two separate attacks claimed dozens of lives. The first, a bloody car bombing outside an Army recruitment center in Baghdad where applicants had lined up for jobs. None of the recruits was injured or killed, nor were any coalition or Iraqi trooped. But the attack did kill at least 35 civilians and wounded 145 more. Many of the wounded were aboard a passing bus. One Iraqi official suspects insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as behind the attack.
A separate blast killed six members of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps just east of Balad, and wounded four others. Iraq's interim interior minister says that he believes suicide bombers in such incidents are not Iraqis. And adds if more actions like today's continue, he will consider declaring martial law.
Who is the Iraqi prisoner that some soldiers call XXX and why was he ordered held in secret detention last October? Well, the Pentagon has disclosed Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld issued that order at the request of the then head of the CIA, George Tenet. Officials say the secrecy surrounding the prisoner was meant to protect U.S. troops and not compromise intel.
They deny that they were trying to hide the prisoner from the Red Cross but concede he was classified as a type of enemy combatant that does not have to be immediately disclosed. The prisoner has been identified only as a high official and paramilitary leader of the Ansar al-Islam terrorist group and remains at the U.S.-run Camp Crawford detention facility.
O'BRIEN: In the run-up to the war, the Bush administration cited alleged terror ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. You've heard those. After meeting with his cabinet today, President Bush insisted such ties did exist, despite a report by the 9/11 Commission to the contrary.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The reason I keep on insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda, because there was a relationship between Iraq, and al Qaeda. This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda. We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. For example, Iraqi intelligence officers met with bin Laden, the head of al Qaeda, in the Sudan.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Just yesterday, the 9/11 panel said bin Laden explored possibly hooking up with Iraq, but apparently Iraq never responded.
LIVE FROM... the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld will brief reporters shortly. We'll bring that to you when it happens, of course.
Also ahead, monitoring the skies for terrorists. We'll talk with a man who is responsible for that.
And an unexpected visitor sends a hospital staff scrambling. We're on Code Blue here on LIVE FROM..., stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: What really happened on September 11? What did the FAA know about the hijacked aircraft? What was the military ordered to do? For the first time since 9/11, we're hearing the bone-chilling radio calls and testimony of what went wrong that fateful day. But within the heart-wrenching mistakes also comes massive improvements in air security.
I had the chance to fly with the pilots who have now taken on a new operation, exclusive access to a training mission that shows you if a commercial plane is hijacked, not only will military jets intercept it, but if thousand of lives are at stake, the call to shoot that plane down may come, an extremely difficult decision that now comes with extremely detailed training.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aircraft diverted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Contact failed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Secret Service has been informed.
PHILLIPS (voice-over): They call it the air war against terrorists. And this is the battlefield. The potential enemy, a civilian aircraft under terrorist control. The strategy, to end every incident without firing a shot. But 9/11 spawned a new kind of war with chilling new rules of engagement. In this war, the military is forced to think the unthinkable.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think the public would have stood for anything -- us firing on commercial airliners in the past. But it has been proven that, yes, something worst might happen. So we're just kind of an extension of the public will.
PHILLIPS: This Lieutenant Colonel T.G. Karazez (ph) and Major John Black of the 125th Fighter Wing are getting ready for a routine patrol in Southeast U.S. airspace. These Florida Air National Guard F-15 fighter pilots are battle-ready.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Check the back end of the gun. Make sure it's all hot and the bullets are loaded in the chambers. Make our heat seeker -- make sure that all looks good.
PHILLIPS: We're going along on a mission that shows what might happen if a commercial airliner is hijacked.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rapid (ph) one copies, type and tail. PHILLIPS: It doesn't take long before this mission is diverted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All attempts to contact this aircraft has failed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: FAA, can you give me a mode three on that one?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five-zero-one-two, Jimmy (ph).
PHILLIPS: Something is not right with a passenger plane over the Atlantic Ocean.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Break-break, this is (UNINTELLIGIBLE) battle commander. We have a NORDO airliner.
PHILLIPS: NORDO, no radio contact.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your NORDO aircraft is (UNINTELLIGIBLE) airlines 401, Miami to Wilmington, metroliner.
PHILLIPS: Military intelligence and the FAA want to know everything about this airliner.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get the range, how far they can fly on 3400 pounds of gas.
PHILLIPS: Could this aircraft reach critical infrastructure?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It has deviated from its flight path --
PHILLIPS: These commanders take no chances.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have committed (UNINTELLIGIBLE), one flight of two out of the Jaguar CAP.
. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your mission, intercept shadow, commit bulls eye, 100-158-21,500 track west.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. We're tasked now.
PHILLIPS: Fighters now monitor Falcon Flight 401's every move. Then...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The aircraft is now squawking at 7,500 squawk.
PHILLIPS: 7,500 is the code for hijack.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Assess conditions of the fighters to do intercept.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: See if they can give us any indication of who is in control of the aircraft.
PHILLIPS: Pilots attempt hand signals. No response. Pilots rock their wings, still no response.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should acknowledge with the wing rock, but she's not doing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two generals are brought in and briefed. One from the Canadian air force, one from the United States.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Souls on board?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sixteen, 14 passengers, two crew.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One Pakistani, one Saudi, one French, the others are presumed to be of United States descent. Fighters are on it now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My concern is we could have something else in this country so we've got to keep our focus on this thing, but we've also got to keep focus on the rest of the country.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The JPAC (ph) has authorized the use of flairs to get the pilot's attention.
PHILLIPS: Now is the final attempt to get this pilot to respond. If he doesn't, the order could come to shoot this aircraft down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do we have an engagement authority?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir, we have engagement authority on- line.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roger, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) these flares, they are authorized.
PHILLIPS: Flares are released.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now the guy realizes he's serious, now he's coming left, following the eagle.
PHILLIPS: The pilot finally responds.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think we should ever relax. And we're going to have to continue to prosecute this enemy until they no longer present a threat.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Active air scramble, active air scramble.
PHILLIPS: A new kind of war, a new way of fighting. A battle in which a commander's best choice may be the lesser of two evils. And the battle cry is "never again."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: Now the man who commands pilots that may have to be in that position to fire, Colonel Jim Firth is the Florida Air National Guard's 125th Fighter Wing commander. He's also a pilot for a major airline. He joins us live from Jacksonville, Florida. Sir, it's nice to have you with us. Colonel, can you hear me OK?
COL. JIM FIRTH, FLORIDA AIR NATIONAL GUARD: Yes, I can hear you.
PHILLIPS: OK. Very good. We're going to begin the interview. As we are standing by actually for Attorney General John Ashcroft. OK. So we might have to break away but we will come back to you. That piece that obviously we just aired. You and I worked together on that.
I learned a lot about this operation. We've heard a lot about what went wrong with regards to 9/11 today in the hearing. Let's talk about what has been done now to change the communication process and the real-time relationships and how the U.S. military is going forward and making sure that that never happens again with regard to mistakes in communication.
FIRTH: Right. Kyra, we feel that one of the main keys to an effective prevention of another 9/11 is to make sure we have an accurate picture of what's going on, all the agencies that need to be involved in discussing what's going on, and coming up with accurate decisions, are all involved. And that's where a lot of the improvements have taken place.
Pre-9/11, not only the military being but the entire U.S. strategy, was basically oriented towards defending outward from our borders. We had no radar pictures and communication capabilities designed for this type of scenario in the interior. Today, post-9/11, tremendous improvements in that are. We have got vastly improved ability to have an accurate picture. What's going on inside the borders of the U.S. and to communicate and handle that.
PHILLIPS: And Colonel, I'm going to ask you to stand by, please, just for a moment. We're going to take you now to Attorney General John Ashcroft on that prisoner's death in Afghanistan and the civilian's indictment.
JOHN ASHCROFT, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: ... Agency for brutally assaulting an Afghan detainee in a U.S. military base in Afghanistan.
David A. Passaro, age 38, a resident of Lillington, North Carolina, faces two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon and two counts of assault resulting in serious bodily injury. Each of the four charges carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
I note that an indictment is merely an accusation, and the defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.
Passaro was arrested this morning in Fayetteville, North Carolina, and he is scheduled for an initial appearance before a federal magistrate judge in Raleigh today. The charges Passaro faces relate to his alleged activities in Afghanistan working as a contractor on behalf of the Central Intelligence Agency.
As the indictment details, Passaro was in Afghanistan, working in support of United States military personnel at a base near the town Asadabad. The military base was called Asadabad base.
Asadabad is located in the northeastern province of Konar. It is a mountainous region, and Asadabad is about five miles from the Pakistani border.
During the past two years, U.S. Army special forces units and Air Force bombers have been active in this area. It is an area in which remnants of al Qaeda and the Taliban remain active.
As alleged in the indictment, on June the 18th, 2003, a local Afghani man named Abdul Walli was suspected of participating in rocket attacks on the Asadabad base.
ASHCROFT: He surrendered voluntarily at the front gate of the base. Defendant Passaro allegedly assisted military personnel in detaining Walli, who was held in a detention cell at the base.
The indictment alleges that beginning on the day after Walli's detention began, Passaro began interrogating him about the rocket attacks. During these interrogations on June 19 and June 20, 2003, it is alleged that Passaro beat Walli repeatedly, using his hands and feet and a large flashlight.
Walli died in a cell on Asadabad base on June the 21st, 2003.
Authorities immediately began an investigation and the CIA formally referred the case to the Department of Justice last fall.
After the Criminal Division determined that venue was in the eastern district of North Carolina, the matter was sent there earlier this year for a grand jury investigation. The American people are, by now, familiar with the images of prisoner abuse committed in detention facilities overseas.
Today a wholly different and, frankly, more accurate picture of our nation emerges. Today we see a nation dedicated to its ideals of freedom, its respect for human dignity, to its insistence on justice, and the rule of law.
Regarding other prisoner abuse allegations, I can report that the Justice Department has received one referral from the Department of Defense and additional referrals from the CIA.
ASHCROFT: These are ongoing investigations, of course, and I cannot offer further details at this time.
I have assigned all of our other ongoing prisoner abuse cases to a prosecution team at the United States attorney's office in the Eastern District of Virginia, and any new referrals will also be assigned to that office whose jurisdictional boundaries encompass both the Pentagon and the CIA.
The Eastern District of Virginia has shown consistently its ability to handle complex cases involving national security, classified information, military intelligence and associated personnel. I also note that this case would have been more difficult to investigate and prosecute were it not for the Patriot Act. The Patriot Act expanded U.S. law enforcement jurisdiction over crimes committed by or against U.S. nationals on land or facilities designated for use by the U.S. government.
In the reports of abuse of detainees by United States personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past two months, the world witnessed a betrayal of our most basic values by a very small group of individuals.
Their actions call us to the defense of our values, our belief in decency and our respect for human life, through the enforcement and the rule of law.
President Bush has made clear the United States will not tolerate criminal acts of brutality such as those alleged in this indictment.
ASHCROFT: The types of illegal abuse detailed run counter to our values and our policies and are not representative of our men and women in the military and associated personnel serving honorably and admirably for the cause of freedom.
Those who are responsible for criminal acts will be investigated, prosecuted and, of course, if found guilty, punished.
I thank Chris Wray, assistant attorney general for the Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Frank Whitney and his team in the Eastern District of North Carolina for their leadership and their work in this criminal matter. And I also note with appreciation the investigative efforts of the CIA's Office of Inspector General for their prompt attention to this matter and their referral of this matter...
PHILLIPS: David Passaro, independent contractor working for the CIA, charged with a prisoner's death in Afghanistan, charges, the first of their kind to come out in public here. Attorney General John Ashcroft announcing it to the reporters right now. David Ensor, our national security adviser -- or our national security correspondent, who advises us quite a bit, with more on this case -- David.
DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kyra, CIA officials first started telling people like myself about this case more than a month ago, telling us that the inspector general would likely refer the case to the Justice Department, because the facts of the case suggested that a particularly brutal attack had been made by this contractor working for the Central Intelligence Agency.
I believe I'm right in saying this is the first time that a civilian has been indicted in one of these abuse of prisoner cases since the whole matter of Abu Ghraib and the rest of the questions raised about treatment of prisoners overseas first came up.
Obviously, the Justice Department wants -- and the Bush administration, want to send a signal that the rule of law is still the rule in this country; and that this young man, David Passaro, age 38, of North Carolina, will face justice and if he's found guilty, he'll be punished.
He apparently used, as Attorney General Ashcroft mentioned, a flashlight, a large heavy flashlight, to beat this suspect. The context of course is that the base had been under attack. Clearly, the men there were worried about their own lives. There was a lot of pressure on them. But still, to do this kind of thing, pretty serious, and obviously, it's a criminal act. So there have been four indictments now, four assault charges against this young man -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: National security correspondent David Ensor, thank you so much.
PHILLIPS: And before that developing news with Attorney General John Ashcroft, we were talking about the 9/11 hearing today, the breakdown in communication among the FAA, the military, the administration, the Pentagon, and what led to what happened on 9/11.
And now we're talking about the changes. We showed you a piece about the training that's been taking place to prevent another 9/11, at least with regard to problems with communication. We're talking with Colonel Jim Firth of the Florida Air National Guard's 125th Fighter Wing. He is the commander of that fighter wing. He is also a pilot for a major airline. He joins us live once again from Jacksonville, Florida.
Colonel, I'm sorry about that. We'll get back to talking about the training. Let's start, once again, just quickly, remind our viewers of command and control, What we were talking about in that -- with regard to the changes that have been made since 9/11, and how the communication process has improved tremendously.
FIRTH: Sure. A lot of our efforts are going into an increased ability to know what's going on, to talk about it, to get all the agencies involved that need to be to discuss a course of action, to share the indications they're seeing. And then get all the right senior government officials rapidly, efficiently, involved in the making of very accurate, appropriate decision.
As I mentioned, before 9/11, the entire nation, not just the military, was really oriented towards an outward strategy, looking from our perimeters outward. Today, dramatically improved radar and communication capabilities in the interior, FAA, military, customs, Coast Guard, all these agencies, as well as senior government officials have well practiced, established procedures for getting involved and making a very quick, timely and accurate decision.
PHILLIPS: Colonel, there are more alert sites now for response, correct? So if indeed an aircraft was hijacked there are more jets to respond to it quickly and efficiently, right?
FIRTH: That's correct. A lot of effort was put into looking at the types of areas that we should defend. And, clearly if you have more alert site, the chances that an event takes place close to an alert site increased, and that's the case.
PHILLIPS: And real quickly -- actually -- Colonel, we've got to head to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, side by side with General Peter Pace. Let's listen in.
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Aired June 17, 2004 - 13:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Live from the Pentagon this hour, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld briefing reporter. We've got it when it happens.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Also live this hour, Attorney General John Ashcroft expected to announce some indictments over prisoner abuse in Afghanistan. We're on that one for you, as well.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody move, please. We are going back to the airport. Don't try to make any stupid moves.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Tapes of terror. The 9/11 Commission releases recordings of the hijackers, as it recreates that fateful day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Contact with aircraft has failed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your mission, instant shadow, commit, bulls eye, 100-158, 21,500 track west.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do we have an engagement authority?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) flares are authorized.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aircraft diverted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Secret Service has been informed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Could it happen again? An exclusive report. We're in- depth on securing American skies since the 9/11 attacks.
From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Miles O'Brien.
PHILLIPS: And I'm Kyra Phillips. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM... starts right now.
O'BRIEN: Utterly unprepared for an unprecedented challenge. That's the bottom line on a top-down incredibly detailed analysis of September 11, 2001, from 8:00 a.m. Eastern, to 10:03:11, to be precise. It points to miscommunication, confusion and indecision on the part of air traffic controllers, the military and their overseers at the highest levels of government. CNN's Sean Callebs has more on the final day of the final public hearing of the independent 9/11 Commission -- Sean.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And what a day it has been, indeed. Tense confusion, missed communication, inaction, and at times wildly inaccurate information. The 9/11 Commission said all combined it showed the U.S. military and its civilian officials were simply unprepared to deal with hijackers who had seized commercial airliners to turn them into missiles. For those who lost loved ones in the attacks on New York and Washington, at times, this final public hearing stirred emotions.
For the first time, the public heard detailed audiotapes involving cockpit transmissions by some of the hijackers, including this exchange, it came from Flight 11 before it slammed into the World Trade Center. It's believed to be the voice of lead hijacker Mohamed Atta.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody move. Everything is OK. If you try to make any moves, you'll endanger yourself and the airplane. Just stay quiet.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CALLEBS: The hearing also detailed the crooked and jagged flight paths of the doomed airliners. This as officials scrambled to track information about the planes. Now all of this highlights how U.S. air defense commanders and aviation officials were unprepared in, quote, "every respect," to stop the al Qaeda attacks that claimed nearly 3000 lives.
At one point, a senior FAA official directs Air Force fighters to chase American Flight 11. However that plane had already crashed into the Trade Center Tower. And NORAD, the North American aerospace command, was not notified of the hijacking of Flight 175 until after it hit the South Tower. Similar problems were noted with Flight 77 that crashed into the Pentagon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MONTE BELGER, FMR. FAA ACTING DEP. ADMIN.: On the morning of 9/11 it became clear that the historical procedures, the protocols and the communication links were not adequate. The FAA and other agencies were reacting to a scenario that had not been practiced or modeled. Decision-makers, including myself, were reacting quickly and in my opinion, professionally, but in an untested environment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CALLEBS: Untested, indeed. The report also said that President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney acted quickly to authorize fighter jets to shoot down any plane that appeared hostile, targeting the White House or the U.S. Capitol. However by then, the last of the four hijacked planes had already crashed in a field in Pennsylvania -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Sean Callebs in Washington, thanks much.
The head of NORAD says if the same horrific scenario were to happen again, military commanders would have as much as 17 minute of reaction time and fighter jets would be in firing range for eight of those. Clearly, a lot more than airport security has changed in the past two years and nine months, so we hope. Retired Air Force major general, and now CNN analyst, Don Shepperd joining us with some insights on the military capabilities, then and now.
General Sheppard, good to have you back with us.
MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: My pleasure, Miles.
O'BRIEN: Let's not belabor too much the situation before 9/11 because I want to talk about how things have changed. But on that morning, the ability to intercept aircraft of any kind was very limited in the United States, wasn't it?
SHEPPERD: Yes, it was simply in reality, not there, Miles. We had seven alert sites, 14 airplanes protecting the entire United States. Two in the Northeast, one up in Massachusetts, one down in Virginia. Nothing in place and no scenarios practiced. Nobody envisioned this type of scenario. We simply weren't prepared at all for this, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. So you can go through step by step, timeframe by timeframe, the bottom line is nobody expected this, nobody was prepared for it. We were still really thinking post-Cold War, and really had not anticipated this. Let's talk about what's going on right now. Clearly, we have more planes on alert. I assume that number is classified number. Can you give us a sense of how much more protection there is right now?
SHEPPERD: Well, again, the morning of the attack, we had 14 airplanes on alert. There are considerably more on alert. And it is classified. My guess it's upward of 40 airplanes on alert. It does cost a lot of money. And the entire United States is not covered all the time. What we have is the ability based upon notice to come up rapidly in many locations. And we also have roving CAPs over the important population centers in the United States. But it's not covered all the time.
SHEPPERD: And when you say CAP, let's define that for folks. Combat air patrol, which means essentially fighters kind of orbiting overhead on standby, being refueled as they go, watching out. That of course happened quite a bit right after 9/11, especially up and down and the East Coast. Today that is happening sporadically, and is not announced, correct?
SHEPPERD: That's correct. It's rotated -- on a regular basis, it's rotated. Also the alert sites are rotated. They come up and they go down. We have the ability to rapidly enforce those alert sites. The key to all of this is the ability to put airplanes up over cities. That's not the key to our safety. It's one part of it, but we do have the ability, if alerts are given in the proper amount of time and if we have the cues to know that airplanes are being hijacked, we do have the ability to put people in place much better than 9/11, but not perfect, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. So when we talk now about more alert sites, we're still not anywhere near the numbers of fighters that were on standby in the absolute darkest days of the Cold War, the '60s, for example. Do we need to ramp this up?
SHEPPERD: No, we don't. In the '60s, of course, we had the Soviet air threat. We worried about air attacks on America by bombers. We had about 2500 airplanes in air defense. Again, on the morning of 9/11, we had, really, four dedicated air defense alert sites. That's 60 airplanes, down from 2500, others that could be called upon. But it took some time to do that. We don't need that kind of air defense posture. What we are postured against now is, again, these terrorist-type attacks. And again, it's not perfect. It's better but it's not perfect. Still, things could happen, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right, right now, you say we have a quicker response. Why do we have -- how much quicker? Why is it quicker? And is it based on some of the false alarms we've seen over the past couple years? Is it working?
SHEPPERD: It is quicker in that we have more alert sites, many more than the seven that we originally had. And, again if something happens in the vicinity of these alert sites, we can get them airborne. We practiced these scenarios. The pilots have been trained. So we're all on alert for this type of thing. So indeed we can put airplanes in the air quicker.
I want to stress one more time that the safety of Americans is not basically there by putting fighters up to shoot down Americans on American airliners. That isn't quite the safety. But we are able to put airplanes up, to keep airplanes from impacting, if the right things happen at the right time, in the right place, and notice is given.
O'BRIEN: You have told me often about the so-called fog of war, and watching what I watched this morning, that's what I thought of. The miscommunications, the misunderstanding, the confusion, to what extent can you guarantee there's better confusion -- better communication, I should say, between all these agencies that would have to respond so quickly in order to thwart something like this?
SHEPPERD: Well, I think it's better because that we're being told by 9/11 Commission and others that they have practiced this scenario. So we're now looking inward, whereas before we were always looking outward. So again, it's clearly better. And we've thought through this problem. But it can happen again. If I were the hijackers, I wouldn't try again against the U.S. air transportation system. I would take other means in other areas. O'BRIEN: All right. Major General Don Shepperd, retired U.S. Air Force, always a pleasure having you join us, we appreciate it -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Unrest continues in Iraq as the handoff approaches. Today, two separate attacks claimed dozens of lives. The first, a bloody car bombing outside an Army recruitment center in Baghdad where applicants had lined up for jobs. None of the recruits was injured or killed, nor were any coalition or Iraqi trooped. But the attack did kill at least 35 civilians and wounded 145 more. Many of the wounded were aboard a passing bus. One Iraqi official suspects insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as behind the attack.
A separate blast killed six members of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps just east of Balad, and wounded four others. Iraq's interim interior minister says that he believes suicide bombers in such incidents are not Iraqis. And adds if more actions like today's continue, he will consider declaring martial law.
Who is the Iraqi prisoner that some soldiers call XXX and why was he ordered held in secret detention last October? Well, the Pentagon has disclosed Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld issued that order at the request of the then head of the CIA, George Tenet. Officials say the secrecy surrounding the prisoner was meant to protect U.S. troops and not compromise intel.
They deny that they were trying to hide the prisoner from the Red Cross but concede he was classified as a type of enemy combatant that does not have to be immediately disclosed. The prisoner has been identified only as a high official and paramilitary leader of the Ansar al-Islam terrorist group and remains at the U.S.-run Camp Crawford detention facility.
O'BRIEN: In the run-up to the war, the Bush administration cited alleged terror ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. You've heard those. After meeting with his cabinet today, President Bush insisted such ties did exist, despite a report by the 9/11 Commission to the contrary.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The reason I keep on insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda, because there was a relationship between Iraq, and al Qaeda. This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda. We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. For example, Iraqi intelligence officers met with bin Laden, the head of al Qaeda, in the Sudan.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Just yesterday, the 9/11 panel said bin Laden explored possibly hooking up with Iraq, but apparently Iraq never responded.
LIVE FROM... the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld will brief reporters shortly. We'll bring that to you when it happens, of course.
Also ahead, monitoring the skies for terrorists. We'll talk with a man who is responsible for that.
And an unexpected visitor sends a hospital staff scrambling. We're on Code Blue here on LIVE FROM..., stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: What really happened on September 11? What did the FAA know about the hijacked aircraft? What was the military ordered to do? For the first time since 9/11, we're hearing the bone-chilling radio calls and testimony of what went wrong that fateful day. But within the heart-wrenching mistakes also comes massive improvements in air security.
I had the chance to fly with the pilots who have now taken on a new operation, exclusive access to a training mission that shows you if a commercial plane is hijacked, not only will military jets intercept it, but if thousand of lives are at stake, the call to shoot that plane down may come, an extremely difficult decision that now comes with extremely detailed training.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aircraft diverted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Contact failed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Secret Service has been informed.
PHILLIPS (voice-over): They call it the air war against terrorists. And this is the battlefield. The potential enemy, a civilian aircraft under terrorist control. The strategy, to end every incident without firing a shot. But 9/11 spawned a new kind of war with chilling new rules of engagement. In this war, the military is forced to think the unthinkable.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think the public would have stood for anything -- us firing on commercial airliners in the past. But it has been proven that, yes, something worst might happen. So we're just kind of an extension of the public will.
PHILLIPS: This Lieutenant Colonel T.G. Karazez (ph) and Major John Black of the 125th Fighter Wing are getting ready for a routine patrol in Southeast U.S. airspace. These Florida Air National Guard F-15 fighter pilots are battle-ready.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Check the back end of the gun. Make sure it's all hot and the bullets are loaded in the chambers. Make our heat seeker -- make sure that all looks good.
PHILLIPS: We're going along on a mission that shows what might happen if a commercial airliner is hijacked.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rapid (ph) one copies, type and tail. PHILLIPS: It doesn't take long before this mission is diverted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All attempts to contact this aircraft has failed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: FAA, can you give me a mode three on that one?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five-zero-one-two, Jimmy (ph).
PHILLIPS: Something is not right with a passenger plane over the Atlantic Ocean.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Break-break, this is (UNINTELLIGIBLE) battle commander. We have a NORDO airliner.
PHILLIPS: NORDO, no radio contact.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your NORDO aircraft is (UNINTELLIGIBLE) airlines 401, Miami to Wilmington, metroliner.
PHILLIPS: Military intelligence and the FAA want to know everything about this airliner.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get the range, how far they can fly on 3400 pounds of gas.
PHILLIPS: Could this aircraft reach critical infrastructure?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It has deviated from its flight path --
PHILLIPS: These commanders take no chances.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have committed (UNINTELLIGIBLE), one flight of two out of the Jaguar CAP.
. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your mission, intercept shadow, commit bulls eye, 100-158-21,500 track west.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. We're tasked now.
PHILLIPS: Fighters now monitor Falcon Flight 401's every move. Then...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The aircraft is now squawking at 7,500 squawk.
PHILLIPS: 7,500 is the code for hijack.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Assess conditions of the fighters to do intercept.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: See if they can give us any indication of who is in control of the aircraft.
PHILLIPS: Pilots attempt hand signals. No response. Pilots rock their wings, still no response.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should acknowledge with the wing rock, but she's not doing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two generals are brought in and briefed. One from the Canadian air force, one from the United States.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Souls on board?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sixteen, 14 passengers, two crew.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One Pakistani, one Saudi, one French, the others are presumed to be of United States descent. Fighters are on it now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My concern is we could have something else in this country so we've got to keep our focus on this thing, but we've also got to keep focus on the rest of the country.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The JPAC (ph) has authorized the use of flairs to get the pilot's attention.
PHILLIPS: Now is the final attempt to get this pilot to respond. If he doesn't, the order could come to shoot this aircraft down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do we have an engagement authority?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir, we have engagement authority on- line.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roger, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) these flares, they are authorized.
PHILLIPS: Flares are released.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now the guy realizes he's serious, now he's coming left, following the eagle.
PHILLIPS: The pilot finally responds.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think we should ever relax. And we're going to have to continue to prosecute this enemy until they no longer present a threat.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Active air scramble, active air scramble.
PHILLIPS: A new kind of war, a new way of fighting. A battle in which a commander's best choice may be the lesser of two evils. And the battle cry is "never again."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: Now the man who commands pilots that may have to be in that position to fire, Colonel Jim Firth is the Florida Air National Guard's 125th Fighter Wing commander. He's also a pilot for a major airline. He joins us live from Jacksonville, Florida. Sir, it's nice to have you with us. Colonel, can you hear me OK?
COL. JIM FIRTH, FLORIDA AIR NATIONAL GUARD: Yes, I can hear you.
PHILLIPS: OK. Very good. We're going to begin the interview. As we are standing by actually for Attorney General John Ashcroft. OK. So we might have to break away but we will come back to you. That piece that obviously we just aired. You and I worked together on that.
I learned a lot about this operation. We've heard a lot about what went wrong with regards to 9/11 today in the hearing. Let's talk about what has been done now to change the communication process and the real-time relationships and how the U.S. military is going forward and making sure that that never happens again with regard to mistakes in communication.
FIRTH: Right. Kyra, we feel that one of the main keys to an effective prevention of another 9/11 is to make sure we have an accurate picture of what's going on, all the agencies that need to be involved in discussing what's going on, and coming up with accurate decisions, are all involved. And that's where a lot of the improvements have taken place.
Pre-9/11, not only the military being but the entire U.S. strategy, was basically oriented towards defending outward from our borders. We had no radar pictures and communication capabilities designed for this type of scenario in the interior. Today, post-9/11, tremendous improvements in that are. We have got vastly improved ability to have an accurate picture. What's going on inside the borders of the U.S. and to communicate and handle that.
PHILLIPS: And Colonel, I'm going to ask you to stand by, please, just for a moment. We're going to take you now to Attorney General John Ashcroft on that prisoner's death in Afghanistan and the civilian's indictment.
JOHN ASHCROFT, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: ... Agency for brutally assaulting an Afghan detainee in a U.S. military base in Afghanistan.
David A. Passaro, age 38, a resident of Lillington, North Carolina, faces two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon and two counts of assault resulting in serious bodily injury. Each of the four charges carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
I note that an indictment is merely an accusation, and the defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.
Passaro was arrested this morning in Fayetteville, North Carolina, and he is scheduled for an initial appearance before a federal magistrate judge in Raleigh today. The charges Passaro faces relate to his alleged activities in Afghanistan working as a contractor on behalf of the Central Intelligence Agency.
As the indictment details, Passaro was in Afghanistan, working in support of United States military personnel at a base near the town Asadabad. The military base was called Asadabad base.
Asadabad is located in the northeastern province of Konar. It is a mountainous region, and Asadabad is about five miles from the Pakistani border.
During the past two years, U.S. Army special forces units and Air Force bombers have been active in this area. It is an area in which remnants of al Qaeda and the Taliban remain active.
As alleged in the indictment, on June the 18th, 2003, a local Afghani man named Abdul Walli was suspected of participating in rocket attacks on the Asadabad base.
ASHCROFT: He surrendered voluntarily at the front gate of the base. Defendant Passaro allegedly assisted military personnel in detaining Walli, who was held in a detention cell at the base.
The indictment alleges that beginning on the day after Walli's detention began, Passaro began interrogating him about the rocket attacks. During these interrogations on June 19 and June 20, 2003, it is alleged that Passaro beat Walli repeatedly, using his hands and feet and a large flashlight.
Walli died in a cell on Asadabad base on June the 21st, 2003.
Authorities immediately began an investigation and the CIA formally referred the case to the Department of Justice last fall.
After the Criminal Division determined that venue was in the eastern district of North Carolina, the matter was sent there earlier this year for a grand jury investigation. The American people are, by now, familiar with the images of prisoner abuse committed in detention facilities overseas.
Today a wholly different and, frankly, more accurate picture of our nation emerges. Today we see a nation dedicated to its ideals of freedom, its respect for human dignity, to its insistence on justice, and the rule of law.
Regarding other prisoner abuse allegations, I can report that the Justice Department has received one referral from the Department of Defense and additional referrals from the CIA.
ASHCROFT: These are ongoing investigations, of course, and I cannot offer further details at this time.
I have assigned all of our other ongoing prisoner abuse cases to a prosecution team at the United States attorney's office in the Eastern District of Virginia, and any new referrals will also be assigned to that office whose jurisdictional boundaries encompass both the Pentagon and the CIA.
The Eastern District of Virginia has shown consistently its ability to handle complex cases involving national security, classified information, military intelligence and associated personnel. I also note that this case would have been more difficult to investigate and prosecute were it not for the Patriot Act. The Patriot Act expanded U.S. law enforcement jurisdiction over crimes committed by or against U.S. nationals on land or facilities designated for use by the U.S. government.
In the reports of abuse of detainees by United States personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past two months, the world witnessed a betrayal of our most basic values by a very small group of individuals.
Their actions call us to the defense of our values, our belief in decency and our respect for human life, through the enforcement and the rule of law.
President Bush has made clear the United States will not tolerate criminal acts of brutality such as those alleged in this indictment.
ASHCROFT: The types of illegal abuse detailed run counter to our values and our policies and are not representative of our men and women in the military and associated personnel serving honorably and admirably for the cause of freedom.
Those who are responsible for criminal acts will be investigated, prosecuted and, of course, if found guilty, punished.
I thank Chris Wray, assistant attorney general for the Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Frank Whitney and his team in the Eastern District of North Carolina for their leadership and their work in this criminal matter. And I also note with appreciation the investigative efforts of the CIA's Office of Inspector General for their prompt attention to this matter and their referral of this matter...
PHILLIPS: David Passaro, independent contractor working for the CIA, charged with a prisoner's death in Afghanistan, charges, the first of their kind to come out in public here. Attorney General John Ashcroft announcing it to the reporters right now. David Ensor, our national security adviser -- or our national security correspondent, who advises us quite a bit, with more on this case -- David.
DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kyra, CIA officials first started telling people like myself about this case more than a month ago, telling us that the inspector general would likely refer the case to the Justice Department, because the facts of the case suggested that a particularly brutal attack had been made by this contractor working for the Central Intelligence Agency.
I believe I'm right in saying this is the first time that a civilian has been indicted in one of these abuse of prisoner cases since the whole matter of Abu Ghraib and the rest of the questions raised about treatment of prisoners overseas first came up.
Obviously, the Justice Department wants -- and the Bush administration, want to send a signal that the rule of law is still the rule in this country; and that this young man, David Passaro, age 38, of North Carolina, will face justice and if he's found guilty, he'll be punished.
He apparently used, as Attorney General Ashcroft mentioned, a flashlight, a large heavy flashlight, to beat this suspect. The context of course is that the base had been under attack. Clearly, the men there were worried about their own lives. There was a lot of pressure on them. But still, to do this kind of thing, pretty serious, and obviously, it's a criminal act. So there have been four indictments now, four assault charges against this young man -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: National security correspondent David Ensor, thank you so much.
PHILLIPS: And before that developing news with Attorney General John Ashcroft, we were talking about the 9/11 hearing today, the breakdown in communication among the FAA, the military, the administration, the Pentagon, and what led to what happened on 9/11.
And now we're talking about the changes. We showed you a piece about the training that's been taking place to prevent another 9/11, at least with regard to problems with communication. We're talking with Colonel Jim Firth of the Florida Air National Guard's 125th Fighter Wing. He is the commander of that fighter wing. He is also a pilot for a major airline. He joins us live once again from Jacksonville, Florida.
Colonel, I'm sorry about that. We'll get back to talking about the training. Let's start, once again, just quickly, remind our viewers of command and control, What we were talking about in that -- with regard to the changes that have been made since 9/11, and how the communication process has improved tremendously.
FIRTH: Sure. A lot of our efforts are going into an increased ability to know what's going on, to talk about it, to get all the agencies involved that need to be to discuss a course of action, to share the indications they're seeing. And then get all the right senior government officials rapidly, efficiently, involved in the making of very accurate, appropriate decision.
As I mentioned, before 9/11, the entire nation, not just the military, was really oriented towards an outward strategy, looking from our perimeters outward. Today, dramatically improved radar and communication capabilities in the interior, FAA, military, customs, Coast Guard, all these agencies, as well as senior government officials have well practiced, established procedures for getting involved and making a very quick, timely and accurate decision.
PHILLIPS: Colonel, there are more alert sites now for response, correct? So if indeed an aircraft was hijacked there are more jets to respond to it quickly and efficiently, right?
FIRTH: That's correct. A lot of effort was put into looking at the types of areas that we should defend. And, clearly if you have more alert site, the chances that an event takes place close to an alert site increased, and that's the case.
PHILLIPS: And real quickly -- actually -- Colonel, we've got to head to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, side by side with General Peter Pace. Let's listen in.
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