After 10:14 a.m. September 11, 2001: Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Myers Fails to Tell NORAD about Vice President Cheney’s Shootdown Authorization

General Richard Myers, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, apparently fails to tell NORAD about Vice President Dick Cheney’s authorization for the military to shoot down suspicious aircraft. Myers has been in the National Military Command Center (NMCC) at the Pentagon since around 9:58 a.m. (see (9:58 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [US Department of Defense, 9/11/2001 ; 9/11 Commission, 2/17/2004 ] At some unspecified time after reaching the NMCC, he begins a phone call with General Ralph Eberhart, the commander of NORAD, who is at NORAD’s Cheyenne Mountain Operations Center (CMOC) in Colorado, in which the two men discuss “rules of engagement” for fighter pilots (see (Between 10:15 a.m. and 10:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 3/1/2004 ; George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies, 8/3/2012] Cheney, meanwhile, gave the military authorization to shoot down a suspicious aircraft that was approaching Washington, DC, shortly after 10:10 a.m. (see (Between 10:10 a.m. and 10:18 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and personnel in the NMCC are told about this over the air threat conference at 10:14 a.m. and again at 10:19 a.m. (see 10:14 a.m.-10:19 a.m. September 11, 2001). [US Department of Defense, 9/11/2001 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 41-42]
Myers Will Be Unable to Recall Discussing Cheney’s Authorization – However, Myers apparently fails to tell Eberhart about it. When asked by the 9/11 Commission in 2004 whether he communicated with NORAD “to inform them of the vice president’s authorization and ensure that they understood their instructions,” he will give a confused and inexplicit answer. “To the best I can recall, I’m not sure I didn’t have that conversation with Eberhart on this,” he will reply. “I don’t remember… that being a simple issue we worked our way through,” he will add. [9/11 Commission, 2/17/2004 ] Eberhart will imply that Myers fails to tell him about Cheney’s shootdown authorization when he is interviewed by the 9/11 Commission. He will recall being told about Cheney’s authorization not by Myers but by Major General Rick Findley, NORAD’s director of operations, sometime after around 10:15 a.m., when he arrives at the CMOC. [9/11 Commission, 3/1/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 3/1/2004]
Myers Does Not Hear of Cheney’s Authorization on the Conference Call – Furthermore, Myers will be unable to recall whether he is even monitoring the air threat conference when Cheney’s shootdown authorization is reported over it. He will be under the mistaken impression that Cheney only gives the authorization after Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld joins him in the NMCC, at around 10:30 a.m. (see (10:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001). “My recollection is that before we got the vice president’s authorization, the secretary [of defense] and I had this conversation and I made him aware of the authorization we were going to need if we had [a hijacked] aircraft coming in,” he will tell the 9/11 Commission. [9/11 Commission, 2/17/2004 ] And yet in his 2009 memoir, Myers will contradict what he told the 9/11 Commission and describe hearing Cheney’s shootdown authorization being reported over the air threat conference. “Vice President Cheney has forwarded the president’s authorization to go weapons free if that plane [that is approaching Washington] is confirmed hijacked and threatens the White House or the Capitol,” he will recall hearing a military aide at the White House saying. [Myers and McConnell, 2009, pp. 152]