A number of senior government officials who left the White House or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building when these buildings were evacuated return to the White House and join other senior officials in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC), the bunker below the East Wing. [Sewanee Today, 2/24/2003; Bridgeland, 2012, pp. 5; LBJ Presidential Library, 9/3/2013] The officials were among dozens of government employees who went to the office of DaimlerChrysler in Washington, DC, after they were evacuated from the White House or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to it (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Anita McBride, the acting director of White House personnel, contacted the White House Situation Room and let officials there know who was with her at the DaimlerChrysler building, and arrangements were then made for a few senior officials to go back to the White House (see (Shortly After 9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Politico, 9/9/2011] These officials head from the DaimlerChrysler building to the White House around midday. [LBJ Presidential Library, 9/3/2013] They are escorted through downtown Washington by members of the Secret Service. [Lindsey, 2008, pp. 86; Crescent, 10/3/2011] The officials who go back to the White House include Nicholas Calio, assistant to the president for legislative affairs; Larry Lindsey, assistant to the president for economic policy; Albert Hawkins, secretary of Cabinet affairs; Clay Johnson, assistant to the president for presidential personnel; Tucker Eskew, director of the White House Office of Media Affairs; and Logan Walters, President Bush’s personal aide. [Draper, 2007, pp. 142; Crescent, 10/3/2011; Bridgeland, 2012, pp. 5] After arriving at the White House, the officials go to the PEOC, where they join Vice President Dick Cheney, members of the Cabinet, and other senior White House staffers. [Lindsey, 2008, pp. 86; Bridgeland, 2012, pp. 5]
12:00 p.m. September 11, 2001: Attorney General Ashcroft’s Plane Lands in Washington
The plane carrying Attorney General John Ashcroft finally arrives in Washington, DC, landing at Reagan National Airport. [Washington Post, 9/28/2001; Federal Aviation Administration, 3/21/2002] Ashcroft has wanted his plane, a small government Cessna jet, to return to Washington since he learned of the attacks in New York while flying out to Milwaukee (see Shortly After 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001 and After 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Newsweek, 3/10/2003; Ashcroft, 2006, pp. 115-118] Despite his plane being instructed to land on more than one occasion (see 10:40 a.m. September 11, 2001 and 11:11 a.m. September 11, 2001), Ashcroft has insisted on returning to the capital. [USA Today, 8/13/2002; Spencer, 2008, pp. 258, 272]
Plane Lands, Passengers Met by Agents with Machine Guns – Ashcroft’s plane has finally been cleared to land in Washington, and an F-16 fighter jet escorts it in to Reagan Airport. [Washington Post, 9/28/2001; 9/11 Commission, 12/1/2003] After touching down, the plane taxies to the tarmac near Signature Aviation, the private executive aircraft terminal. When Ashcroft and the other individuals with him get off, they are met by numerous agents, some with machine guns at the ready. Apparently concerned about possible snipers, the agents quickly cover Ashcroft with a bulletproof trench coat and pass out bulletproof vests to the others with him. All of them are hustled into a hangar, where several vans are waiting. Ashcroft and his deputy chief of staff, David Israelite, get into a heavily reinforced SUV, while their colleagues disperse to other vehicles.
Ashcroft Advised to Go to Classified Site – Ashcroft calls the White House Situation Room to ask where he should go to set up operations. He is connected to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, who suggests that he head to the remote, classified site, where other Justice Department personnel have gone, until it is known if any more attacks are forthcoming. Ashcroft’s vehicle heads toward the site, but due to the roads being clogged with traffic, it turns around and goes instead to the FBI’s Strategic Information and Operations Center in Washington, where Ashcroft will spend much of the rest of the day. [9/11 Commission, 12/17/2003 
; Ashcroft, 2006, pp. 118-120, 129]
Conflicting Accounts of Landing Time – The time when Ashcroft’s plane lands at Reagan Airport is unclear. According to a 2002 FAA report, it lands “just before noon.” [Federal Aviation Administration, 3/21/2002] According to USA Today, it does not arrive in Washington “until afternoon.” [USA Today, 8/13/2002] And a federally funded report on the emergency response to the Pentagon attack will claim that an unidentified aircraft—later determined to be Ashcroft’s plane—is approaching Washington and leads to an evacuation of the Pentagon site at around 2:00 p.m. (see (2:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [US Department of Health and Human Services, 7/2002, pp. A30 ; Vogel, 2007, pp. 453] Ashcroft’s plane is one of the last aircraft to land in the United States on this day, according to the Washington Post. [Washington Post, 9/28/2001]
September 11, 2001: Former New York Counterterrorism Official Blames Bin Laden, Discounts Use of Explosives in Towers’ Collapse
Within hours of the 9/11 attacks, Jerome Hauer, director of New York City’s Office of Emergency Management (OEM) from 1996 to 2000, appears on CBS News with Dan Rather. Rather asks him if pre-positioned explosives could have been used to bring down the Twin Towers. Hauer discounts the possibility, saying: “[M]y sense is that just the velocity of the plane and the fact that you have a plane filled with fuel hitting that building that burned, that the velocity of the plane certainly had an impact on the structure itself. And then the fact that it burned and you had that intense heat probably weakened the structure as well. And I think it was simply the planes hitting the buildings and causing the collapse.” [CBS News, 9/11/2001] Why Hauer already believes the plane crashes and subsequent fires alone caused the collapses is unclear. In fact, when he testifies before the 9/11 Commission in 2004, he will be asked whether OEM had, before 9/11, conducted “any planning for what would be the response if a commercial or a private plane were to accidentally [hit] either the World Trade Center or some other building in New York City?” He will reply: “We had aircraft crash drills on a regular basis. The general consensus in the city was that a plane hitting a building… was that it would be a high-rise fire” (see 1996-September 11, 2001). Yet he will not say that the building collapsing had been considered a possibility. [9/11 Commission, 5/19/2004] Rather also asks Hauer if the attacks could have been carried out without state sponsorship. Hauer replies: “I’m not sure I agree that this is necessarily state-sponsored. It… certainly has the fingerprints of somebody like bin Laden.” [CBS News, 9/11/2001]
September 11, 2001: Former Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu: 9/11 Very Good for Israeli-US Relations
Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, when asked what the 9/11 attacks means for relations between the US and Israel, replies, “It’s very good.” Then he edits himself: “Well, not very good, but it will generate immediate sympathy.” [New York Times, 9/12/2001] A week later, the Village Voice states, “From national networks to small-town newspapers, the view that America’s terrible taste of terrorism will finally do away with even modest calls for the restraint of Israel’s military attacks on Palestinian towns has become an instant, unshakable axiom.… Now, support for Israel in America is officially absolute, and Palestinians are cast once again as players in a global terrorist conspiracy.” [Village Voice, 9/19/2001]
12:00 p.m. September 11, 2001 and After: FBI Searches Pentagon Surroundings for Plane Debris
Beginning shortly before midday on September 11, 2001, and continuing until September 12, the FBI conducts a careful search across the grounds of the Pentagon, looking for remnants of the aircraft that hit the building. [PBS, 9/12/2001; Washington Post, 9/12/2001; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 159] FBI Special Agent Tom O’Connor is in charge of the initial evidence recovery operation at the Pentagon. His first priority is to locate and gather all the airplane parts and other pieces of evidence from the lawn on the west side of the building. He sends out all available agents to conduct a grid search. The lawn is divided into quadrants, and then agents walk back and forth, sticking a small flag near any evidence they find, getting the evidence photographed in its place, and then scooping it into a bag. [Creed and Newman, 2008, pp. 180] Arlington police officers, military personnel, and others also participate in the search. [Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 159] They also look for evidence across grass and roadways several hundred yards from the Pentagon. [PBS, 9/12/2001] Some pieces of the aircraft that hit the Pentagon are found nearly 1,000 feet away from the building, on the other side of Washington Boulevard. Thousands of tiny pieces of aluminum have also carried forward over the Pentagon, into its center courtyard. Other pieces of debris landed on its roof, along with body parts from at least one victim. [Creed and Newman, 2008, pp. 29] According to the Defense Department’s book about the Pentagon attack, the searchers find “many scraps and a few personal items widely scattered on the grass and heliport. Plane remnants varied from half-dollar size to a few feet long.” [Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 159] Authors Patrick Creed and Rick Newman will describe: “Agents found what looked like a big Plexiglas windowpane on the lawn, which might have been part of an airplane window, except it was too big.… Somebody suggested it could be one of the blast-proof windows from the Pentagon, somehow blown 500 feet from the building.” [Creed and Newman, 2008, pp. 180]
12:00 p.m.-6:30 p.m. September 11, 2001: AWACS Plane Takes Off from a Base in Oklahoma and Then Escorts Air Force One
An Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) plane takes off from Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma and subsequently accompanies Air Force One as it makes its way back to Washington, DC, after leaving Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. [Air Force Print News, 9/9/2011; Kennedy et al., 2012, pp. 61] An AWACS, also called the E-3 Sentry, is a modified Boeing 707 that provides surveillance, command, control, and communications to military commanders. [New York Times, 9/23/1995; GlobalSecurity (.org), 4/16/2006; US Air Force, 9/22/2015] The AWACS that scrambles from Tinker Air Force Base is apparently piloted by Air Force reservists Major Doug Lomheim and Captain Greg Miller. The two men had been preparing for a student training sortie on their E-3 early this morning but then learned of the crashes at the World Trade Center during a delay due to one of the plane’s engines failing to start. After being told they would be assigned to do something in response to the terrorist attacks, they sent their students back to the training squadron and gathered their “NORAD material.” Lomheim and Miller take off from Tinker Air Force Base at around midday and check in with NORAD’s Southeast Air Defense Sector (SEADS). SEADS instructs them to head to Barksdale Air Force Base, where Air Force One, with President Bush on board, recently landed (see 11:45 a.m. September 11, 2001). “We want you to escort [Bush] wherever he goes,” they are told. Their plane goes into an orbit over western Louisiana while Bush is at Barksdale. They then accompany Air Force One after it leaves the base (see 1:37 p.m. September 11, 2001) and orbit overhead after it lands at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska (see 2:50 p.m. September 11, 2001). They continue following the president’s plane after it takes off from Offutt and heads toward Washington (see (4:33 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [Air Force Print News, 9/9/2011; Kennedy et al., 2012, pp. 61] An AWACS plane that had been flying a training mission was instructed to accompany Air Force One earlier on, after it took off from Sarasota, Florida (see Before 9:55 a.m. September 11, 2001). Whether that plane is escorting Air Force One while Lomheim and Miller’s plane follows it is unclear. [Filson, 2003, pp. 86-87]
September 11, 2001: Assessment States that Any Domestic Hijacking Would Be a ‘Suicide Hijack’
An assessment is published, apparently by the FAA, which states that if an aircraft hijacking took place within the United States, it would be part of a suicide attack. This is according to John Hawley, who works for the FAA’s intelligence division as a liaison to the State Department. Hawley will tell the 9/11 Commission that on this day, a “strategic assessment” is published, which says that “if they”—presumably meaning terrorists—“conduct a hijacking domestically, it will be a suicide hijack.” It is unclear who publishes this assessment, but presumably it was produced by the FAA. Hawley will apparently provide no further details about the assessment. He “didn’t elaborate on this point,” the 9/11 Commission will state. [9/11 Commission, 10/8/2003 ; 9/11 Commission, 3/17/2004]
September 11, 2001: French Bank Allegedly Makes ‘a Fortune’ in Response to Attacks
French bank Société Générale supposedly makes “a fortune” through trading, in response to the 9/11 attacks. This is according to rogue trader Jérôme Kerviel, who is employed by the bank between 2000 and 2008. In a 2009 interview with the French newspaper Le Parisien, Kerviel will say: “The best trading day in the history of Société Générale was September 11, 2001. At least, that’s what one of my managers told me.” He will add, “I don’t know how much they made, but apparently the gains were colossal.” Kerviel will not state how the bank makes these gains, but indicates it is through the short-selling of stock. He will continue the interview by saying, “I had a similar experience during the London attacks in July 2005” (see July 7, 2005), and then describe how he’d bet on a fall in the share price of German insurance company Allianz a few days before those attacks. The London bombings will cause the price of Allianz stock to crash, thereby earning Kerviel ”€500,000 in a few minutes.” [Evening Standard, 1/22/2009; London Times, 1/23/2009] Société Générale is France’s second largest bank, and one of the largest banks in Europe. [Guardian, 1/24/2008; International Herald Tribune, 1/24/2008] At the time of his interview with Le Parisien, Kerviel is alleged to have caused it record losses of almost €5 billion through his rogue dealings. He is under investigation for breach of trust, fabricating documents, and accessing computers illegally. [London Times, 1/23/2009]
12:00 p.m. September 11, 2001: Defense Intelligence Agency Director Says Al-Qaeda Responsible for Attacks
The director of the Defense Intelligence Agency informs military leaders in the National Military Command Center (NMCC) at the Pentagon that al-Qaeda is responsible for the morning’s attacks. General Richard Myers, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will later describe: “At noon, Vice Admiral Tom Wilson, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, confirmed what everybody at the conference table had already surmised: The attacks had undoubtedly come from al-Qaeda.” [Myers and McConnell, 2009, pp. 156] Later in the day, Wilson will inform General Henry Shelton, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, of a single piece of intelligence that had suggested a terrorist attack may have been imminent (see 5:40 p.m. September 11, 2001). [Myers and McConnell, 2009, pp. 159]
12:00 Noon September 11, 2001: Senator Hatch Repeats Intelligence Community’s Conclusion that Osama Bin Laden Is Responsible
Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT), a member of both the Senate Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, says he has just been “briefed by the highest levels of the FBI and of the intelligence community.” He says, “They’ve come to the conclusion that this looks like the signature of Osama bin Laden, and that he may be the one behind this.” [Salon, 9/12/2001]
