Interesting article about the airforce on 9/11

[sachmo71]

There are audio links in the article, and they really add to the story. It's pretty long, but presents an interesting view of 9/11.

http://www.vanityfair.com/features/general/060801fege01

[KevinNU7]

I found this part absolutely incredible

He tells the Battle Cab he wants Fox to launch two more fighters from Langley Air Force Base, in Virginia, to establish a greater presence over New York, but the request is refused. The order from the Battle Cab is to put the Langley jets on battle stations only—to be ready, but not to launch.
"The problem there would have been I'd have all my fighters in the air at the same time, which means they'd all run out of gas at the same time," Marr later explained.
Incredibly, Marr has only four armed fighters at his disposal to defend about a quarter of the continental United States. Massive cutbacks at the close of the Cold War reduced NORAD's arsenal of fighters from some 60 battle-ready jets to just 14 across the entire country. (Under different commands, the military generally maintains several hundred unarmed fighter jets for training in the continental U.S.) Only four of NORAD's planes belong to NEADS and are thus anywhere close to Manhattan—the two from Otis, now circling above the ocean off Long Island, and the two in Virginia at Langley.

[Klinglerware]

The lack of planes does seem incredible at first glance, but not completely unreasonable given the lack of a comparable threat. The Russian air force, the US' biggest potential threat with any capability was in even sorrier shape...

[flere-imsaho]

The lack of planes is a red herring. It doesn't address the real issue. Yes, if a plane get hijacked, we want to be able to take it down, but how about avoiding the hijacking in the first place?

We're now 5 years removed from 9/11, and reporters continue to be able to get "banned" implements on planes. "Watch lists" still don't appear to work right. And just earlier this week, federal investigators reported to Congress that they had an easier time entering the country with fake documentation than they did in 2003, in some cases using the same bogus documentation and names they did in 2003. And let's not even mention that only 5% of shipping containers are inspected coming into this country.

Everyone wants to talk about the "sexy" solution to the problem, but the real solution to the problem is to get down to work on the nuts and bolts issues.