The First 109 Minutes

Presents a chronological history of four American commercial planes hijacked by suicide pilots against the United States on September 11, 2001 and the response of the North American Aerospace Defense Command.

Tuesday, Sep. 11, 2001, dawned cool and clear, with sunny skies all along the eastern seaboard. For Air Force aviators like Lt. Col. Timothy "Duff" Duffy of the 102d Fighter Wing at Otis Air National Guard Base, Massachusetts, the day held the promise of perfect flying weather, at a time when the U.S. civil aviation system was enjoying a period of relative peace, despite concerns about a growing terrorist threat. More than ten years had passed since the last hijacking or bombing of a U.S. air carrier. That morning, however, the country came under a shocking, coordinated aerial assault by nineteen al Qaeda hijackers...The attack plan carried out by the suicide operatives had been years in the making. It was intended to cause mass, indiscriminate casualties and to destroy or damage the nation’s financial, military, and political centers, four high value U.S. targets selected by bin Laden, independent operator Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and al Qaeda operations chief Mohammed Atef... By the time 1 World Trade Center, North Tower, collapsed at 10:28 a.m. EDT, almost three thousand people had been killed or were dying; the financial center of the U.S. had been reduced to burning, toxic rubble; the iconic symbol of the military strength of the country had been severely damaged; the tranquility of a field in Pennsylvania had been shattered; U.S. Air Force and Air National Guard fighter aircraft had set up combat air patrols over Washington, D.C., and New York City; and the administration of President George W. Bush and the Department of Defense (DOD) had begun shifting major resources of the federal government and military services to a new national priority, homeland defense.

“A maddening, essential study in misinformation, jingoism, bad intelligence, and other hallmarks of the recent American past.”—Kirkus (starred review) Anyone who experienced the attacks on September 11 cannot forget the imagery: the smoking, falling towers, the Pentagon smoldering, the Shanksville crash site, the first responders. But there is an invisible story hidden in the wreckage, one that required years of patient investigation and the piecing together of a sequence from many scattered sources. By establishing the most definitive timeline of how that day unfolded, William M. Arkin shows how the US government failed in the face of the unprecedented attack. It is a story of laughable airport security, vulnerable airspace, blind intelligence, poor communications, muddled orders, Pentagon chaos, and presidential isolation. Everything about the emergency procedures of the governments—from White House security to continuity of government to military alerts—went wrong. On That Day is a stunning, nightmare journey through a government reeling in confusion while many civilians performed individual acts of heroism. It is a chilling exposé of government negligence and overreach, and a constitution in crisis.

This unique USAF publication provides a comprehensive and authoritative review of the 9/11 attacks and the response of the U.S. Air Force. * Introduction * NORAD Air Defense Structure on 9/11 * Overview of the 9/11 Attacks and Summary of the Air Defense Response * American Airlines Flight 11 * United Airlines Flight 175 * American Airlines Flight 77 * United Airlines Flight 93 * The Immediate Post-Attack Period * Epilogue The four al Qaeda hijacker-pilots and their teams commandeered the four fuel-laden commercial jets in which they were passengers and intentionally crashed them into 1 and 2 World Trade Center, in New York City; the Pentagon, in Arlington, Virginia; and an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. This final hijacking, of United Airlines Flight 93, fell short of its intended target in Washington, D.C., because of heroic efforts by its passengers to take back control of the aircraft. The 9/11 attack, which began with the hijacking of American Airlines Flight 11 and was followed by the hijackings of United Airlines Flight 175, American Airlines Flight 77, and United Airlines Flight 93, would become, over the next two and a quarter hours, the deadliest, costliest terrorist strike in U.S. history. The 109-minute attack period itself began when American Airlines Flight 11 was attacked at or just after 8:14 a.m. EDT. It ended when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed at 10:03 a.m. EDT, but the loss of life did not. By the time 1 World Trade Center, North Tower, collapsed at 10:28 a.m. EDT, almost three thousand people had been killed or were dying; the financial center of the United States had been reduced to burning, toxic rubble; the iconic symbol of the military strength of the country had been severely damaged; the tranquility of a field in Pennsylvania had been shattered; U.S. Air Force and Air National Guard fighter aircraft had set up combat air patrols over Washington, D.C., and New York City; and the administration of President George W. Bush and the Department of Defense (DOD) had begun shifting major resources of the federal government and military services to a new national priority, homeland defense.

Venturing into the ever-shifting panorama of airborne terrorism, this book immerses the reader in a vivid retelling of pivotal incidents from recent history, while delving into the terrorists' favored methods of attack. These include hijackings, in-flight bombings, and precision missile strikes, as well as the rising peril of cyberattacks aimed at airports and commercial airliners mid-flight. Readers will encounter the controversial TWA Flight 800 disaster and the baffling vanishing act of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. These events ignited enduring discussions about terrorism and governmental transparency. The book ventures into the unsettling world of the September 11th attacks, where jetliners were transformed into guided missiles. Also witnessed are the chilling tales of "Black Widows"--Chechen female suicide bombers leaving their indelible mark on Russian soil. Also explored are Libyan culpability in the bombings of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, and UTA Flight 772 over the Sahara Desert. The evolution of security measures in air travel is chronicled and an examination is given of emerging biometric technologies along with security protocols relevant to the post-Covid era.

Is preparing for war the best means of preserving peace? In Sisters in Peace, Kate Laing contends that this question has never been solely the concern of politicians and strategists. She maps successive generations of twentieth-century women who were eager to engage in political debate even though legislative and cultural barriers worked to exclude their voices. In 1915, during the First World War, the Women’s International Congress at The Hague was convened after alarmed and bereaved women from both sides of the conflict insisted that their opinions on war and the pathway to peace be heard. From this gathering emerged the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), which to this day campaigns against militarism and nuclear weapons. In Australia, the formation of a section of WILPF connected political women to a worldwide network that sustained their anti-war activism throughout the last century. In examining the rise of WILPF in Australia, Sisters in Peace provides a gendered history of this country’s engagement with the politics of internationalism. This is a history of WILPF women who committed to peace activism even as Australia’s national identity and military allegiances shifted over time—a history that has until now been an overlooked part of the Australian peace movement.

First published in 1968 and 1976, the two volumes of this work still constitute the only authoritative study of the broad geo-political, economic and strategic factors behind the inter-war development of the Royal Navy and, to a great extent, that of its principal rival, the United States Navy. Roskill conceived the work as a peacetime equivalent of the official naval histories, filling the gap between the First World War volumes and his own study of the Navy in the Second. As such it is marked by the extensive use of British and American sources, from which Roskill extracted shrewd and balanced conclusions that have stood the test of time. Picking up the story in 1930, this volume covers the rise of the European dictatorships on the one hand, alongside continuing attempts at controlling arms expenditure through diplomacy and treaties. Eventually, Italian, German and indeed Japanese aggression diminished the prospects for peace, to the point where Britain felt forced to rearm. How the Navy used the precious few years leading up to the outbreak of war is a crucial section of the book and forms a fitting conclusion to this important study of the inter-war years.