Inside the Bunker
By WILLIAM SAFIRE
nytimes.com
WASHINGTON
At 9:03 a.m. Tuesday, as Vice
President Dick Cheney was
staring at the TV screen, the second hijacked airliner
exploded against the Twin Towers. At that moment his
Secret Service detail grabbed him and hurried him down
to "PEOC."
The President's Emergency Operations Center is an
underground facility hardened to withstand blast
overpressure from a nuclear detonation. On the way to the
tubular structure, Cheney was told that another plane, or a
helicopter loaded with explosives, was headed for the
White House.
Cheney promptly called the president in Florida, who had
just boarded Air Force One, and urged him not to come
back to Washington immediately.
In the PEOC, the vice president was joined by
Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, and
Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, among others.
They were told that six commercial aircraft were
unaccounted for, all of which were potential missiles. One
had supposedly crashed in Kentucky (not true), and
another in Pennsylvania (that report of a crash was valid;
its passengers or crew, apparently struggling with the
hijackers, may have saved the White House).
According to a high White House official speaking to me
on background, the airliner that had taken off at Dulles —
AA Flight 77 — "did a 360" (meaning it changed
direction from the White House) and at 9:45 slammed into
the Pentagon.
About that time, accounts began coming into PEOC that
four international flights were headed toward Washington
over the Atlantic and another from Korea. It could not be
immediately determined that they were not hostile and part
of the terrorist scheme. U.S. fighter aircraft and an Awacs
control aircraft were scrambled aloft.
A threatening message received by the Secret Service was
relayed to the agents with the president that "Air Force
One is next." According to the high official, American
code words were used showing a knowledge of
procedures that made the threat credible.
(I have a second, on-the-record source about that: Karl
Rove, the president's senior adviser, tells me: "When the
president said `I don't want some tinhorn terrorists
keeping me out of Washington,' the Secret Service
informed him that the threat contained language that was
evidence that the terrorists had knowledge of his
procedures and whereabouts. In light of the specific and
credible threat, it was decided to get airborne with a
fighter escort.")
After the president put down at an Air Force base in
Louisiana and made a tape for broadcast (presumably no
satellite was available for a live feed), he was, in Rove's
term, "pretty antsy" about not being at the center of
command.
Bush made clear to Cheney, says my source who was in
the bunker, his intense desire to return to Washington
immediately. The Secret Service objected strongly. The
vice president, a former secretary of defense, suggested
Air Force One go to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska,
headquarters of the Strategic Air Command, with a
communications facility where the president could
convene the National Security Council.
"It would have been irresponsible of him to come back,
pounding his chest," says my source, "when hostile
aircraft may have been headed our way. Any suggestion
that he should have done so is ludicrous."
Confession: I made just that suggestion in yesterday's
column, which stimulated two set-it-straight calls. Why
didn't the V.P. make an appearance during that long
afternoon in Bush's stead? The official reason is that
Cheney was busy in the basement; the real reason, I think,
is that he was unduly concerned it would appear
presumptuous.
The most worrisome aspect of these revelations has to do
with the credibility of the "Air Force One is next"
message. It is described clearly as a threat, not a friendly
warning — but if so, why would the terrorists send the
message? More to the point, how did they get the
code-word information and transponder know-how that
established their mala fides?
That knowledge of code words and presidential
whereabouts and possession of secret procedures
indicates that the terrorists may have a mole in the White
House — that, or informants in the Secret Service, F.B.I.,
F.A.A. or C.I.A. If so, the first thing our war on terror
needs is an Angleton-type counterspy. |
