Decision Points

let terrorists scare me away. “I’m the president,” I said firmly. “And we’re going to Washington.”
    They stood their ground. I hated the image of terrorists putting me on the run. But as much as I wanted to get back, I recognized that part of my responsibility was to ensure the continuity of government. It would be an enormous propaganda victory for the enemy if they took out the president. The military aide and Secret Service agents recommended that we divert the plane to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, where we could refuel. I relented. A few minutes later, I felt Air Force One bank hard to the west.

    One of my greatest frustrations on September 11 was the woeful communications technology on Air Force One. The plane had no satellite television. We were dependent on whatever local feeds we could pick up. After a few minutes on a given station, the screen would dissolve into static.
    I caught enough fleeting glimpses of the coverage to understand the horror of what the American people were watching. Stranded peoplewere jumping to their deaths from the top floors of the World Trade Center towers. Others hung out of windows, hoping to be rescued. I felt their agony and despair. I had the most powerful job in the world, yet I felt powerless to help them.
    At one point, the television signal held steady long enough for me to see the south tower of the World Trade Center collapse. The north tower fell less than thirty minutes later. I had held out hope that the desperate souls trapped on the upper floors would have time to escape. Now there was no chance.
    The collapse of the towers magnified the catastrophe. Fifty thousand people worked in the buildings on a typical business day. Some had been evacuated, but I wondered how many were left. Thousands? Tens of thousands? I had no idea. But I was certain that I had just watched more Americans die than any president in history.
    I kept up-to-date on the latest developments by calling Dick and Condi in the PEOC. We tried to establish an open line, but it kept dropping. In the years ahead, Deputy Chief of Staff Joe Hagin oversaw major upgrades to the communications systems of the PEOC, Situation Room, and Air Force One .
    When we did receive information, it was often contradictory and sometimes downright wrong. I was experiencing the fog of war. There were reports of a bomb at the State Department, a fire on the National Mall, a hijacked Korean airliner bound for the United States, and a call-in threat to Air Force One. The caller had used the plane’s code name, Angel, which few people knew. The most bizarre report came when I was informed of a high-speed object flying toward our ranch in Crawford. All of this information later proved to be false. But given the circumstances, we took every report seriously.
    One report I received proved true. A fourth plane had gone down somewhere in Pennsylvania. “Did we shoot it down, or did it crash?” I asked Dick Cheney. Nobody knew. I felt sick to my stomach. Had I ordered the death of those innocent Americans?
    When the fog lifted, I learned about the heroism aboard Flight 93. After hearing about the earlier attacks in phone calls to loved ones on the ground, the passengers had decided to storm the cockpit. In someof the last words recorded from the doomed flight, a man named Todd Beamer can be heard rallying the passengers into action by saying, “Let’s roll.” The 9/11 Commission later concluded that the revolt of the passengers aboard Flight 93 may have spared either the Capitol or the White House from destruction. Their act of courage ranks among the greatest in American history.

    I had been trying to reach Laura all morning. She had been scheduled to testify before a Senate committee in support of our education initiative around the same time the planes struck the World Trade Center towers. I placed several calls, but the line kept dropping. I couldn’t believe that the president of the United States couldn’t reach his wife in the Capitol Building. “What the hell is going on?” I snapped at Andy Card .

    Venting my frustrations to Andy Card.
White House/Eric Draper
    I finally connected with Laura as Air Force One descended into Barksdale. Laura’s voice is always soothing, but it was especially comforting to hear that day. She told me she had been taken to a safe location by the Secret Service. I was very relieved when she told me she had spoken to Barbara and Jenna, both of whom were fine. Laura