What if the 4th plane on 9/11 had hit the White House?

In My Humble Opinion
21

We debate the fourth target here. You may note that in that thread I say the target was the White House. I now believe that to be an error.

In May 2002 was leaked to at least two media outlets that Abu Zubaydah claimed that the target of the fourth plane was the White House.

And yet, in September 2002 Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, [as published in The New York Times on September 9, 2002,] said the target of Flight 93 was indeed the U.S. Capitol. The U.S. government, in the Trial of Zacarias Moussaoui on 04/18/2006 provided a document “Substitution for the Testimony of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed”(pdf pops) in it KSM talks about bin Ladin wanting to target, among others, to be the White House – but that Flight 93 was targeted at the Capitol.

The 9/11 Commission split the difference by saying that the actions of the crew and passengers prevented the destruction of “the White House and more likely the United States Capitol” as targets.
I have always wanted to re-visit this subject and correct my error and this thread gave me that opportunity.

Miles O’Brien talks to Mike Brooks a veteran of the D.C. Police assigned to the FBI’s Joint Terrorist Task Force

O’BRIEN: All right, now, I think the perception among the public would be, and among this reporter, that there has got to be at least one Stinger missile on the roof of that White House, some kind of surface to air capability. Am I wrong? And what is the capability for the White House to defend itself should the F-16s fail, as apparently they would have in this case?

BROOKS: Well, let’s just say there’s safeguards in place. I still really can’t talk about what kind of protection that the White House does have. After September 11, they did increase the restricted air space out about 14 miles, because there are restricted air spaces in Washington, D.C. around the U.S. Capitol Building and also around the White House.

O’BRIEN: Well, but now the restricted air space was in place. He strayed right into it. The F-16s scrambled and he still probably could have gotten to the White House if he wanted to. The fact is I think that without giving us some trade secrets, can we rest assured that if the scramble doesn’t work, somehow, some way they’d be able to knock that thing out of the sky?

BROOKS: Well, I can’t say we can rest assured.

O’BRIEN: OK.

link

22

IIRC, the White House and Capitol Building had both already been evacuated before Flight 93 was even over Pennsylvania.

Assuming that’s true, the destruction of the Capitol would have caused more disruption. Where would the Senate and House convene? How long until they would have another permanent building, and how much would it cost taxpayers? How much data and paperwork in the offices could be recovered? Major headache. But the destruction of the White House would have had greater visceral impact. There’s a lot of history in that building, and I don’t see Laura Bush pulling a Dollie Madison and grabbing some valuable icon on her way out. Of course, there’s history in the Capitol, too; George Washington is buried there, for instance. But how many people know that.

If I’m wrong, and people were vulnerable, I think the Capitol still would have been a greater loss. The VP is prepared to take office at any time, and the House Speaker no doubt has that in the back of his mind as well. But with 100 senators, and however many reps there are, if even a quarter of those were taken out…again, major headache. Again, though, people wouldn’t really feel the impact until afterwards.

23

There is a room in the Capitol called Washington’s Tomb, and it was intended that he be interred there, but he never was. He’s at Mount Vernon. The catafalque used for Lincoln, Reagan and others is stored in Washington’s Tomb.

24

I think things would be hugely different if the White House was destroyed, but not because of the building or its symbolic importance to America.

The difference would be that George Bush would interpret the attack as a direct assassination attempt upon him – which it might or might not be. I think he would be MUCH more focused on capturing and punishing (ie, killing) Osama bin Laden and the other planners/facilitators of the attack.

Instead, he and his pals had the cool-headed evil plot to spin this into a war with Iraq.

Yes, it probably would have been much better for America if the plane had hit the White House rather than a field in Pennsylvania.

25

I disagree. The White House tends to require identifying as such. The Capitol Building doesn’t. If that was destroyed, it would equate to the American government being destroyed. The White House’s destruction basically just means the President may be dead, or if he’s alive he’s looking for another roof over his head.

26

According to unsubstantiated rumor (no cite), this is no longer true.

Allegedly, the tomb area has been converted into an electronically secure meeting room for Military & Intelligence Subcommittees.

27

I don’t know about this secure meeting room. (My guess is that the tomb wouldn’t be large enough to use for that purpose.) My point was that Washington is not in Washington’s Tomb, despite what Rilchiam said. (Sort of a variation on the old “Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb?” riddle.)

28

Again, this is a guess, but I think on that night no legitimate flights would be allowed over the capital, so any plane flying in that general direction would be shot down early enough to prevent this.

29

I know it’d be very hard to pull off pre-9/11; now it’s all but impossible (short of planting a small nuke in DC). But just imagine what our lives would be like if Osama managed to pull it off.

30

What would our lives be like? We’d be living in a Tom Clancy novel.

31

Had the Vice President been at his own official residence in this scenario, he would’ve survived and taken over. The Veep’s official residence is the Naval Observatory in Northwest DC.

32

Well, :smack: on Washington’s Tomb. And I forgot to say that the Capitol Building is far more handsome, architecturally, than the White House.

33

The White House is a pretty small building. They had to do a ‘go around’ to hit the Pentagon.

Even if there were/are SAM batteries protecting the White House on 9/11 they still have to be ordered to fire and that takes time.
Here is a link to a very interesting and informative article in Vanity Fair about the response to the hijackings that day by the military and air traffic control.

34

Correct. Both buildings were evacuated at 9:43 am, and Flight 93 crashed in western Pennsylvania at 10:03 am.

However, Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 am, six minutes before the Capitol building or the White House were evacuated.

35

I’m not that sure that an approach from the south would be that difficult. The only obstacle would be the Washington Monument and it might be quite possible to construct a path that misses the monument and hits the White House. The Capitol would be a much easier shot.

The impact would not have been as traumatic as the sight of two giant towers falling. And after all, it wouldn’t be the first time the White House was targeted though of course the plane would have done a much better job of total destruction than what the British did.

36

I heartily disagree; I think the Iraq invasion was planned from the beginning of this Administration, and all they needed was any excuse to do so.

We’ve gone through five years of playing “Where’s Osama?” (aka “I just don’t spend that much time on him”); a White House attack wouldn’t have made that much of a difference.

37

Jack Ryan would become president.

Seriously, I felt like I was living in a Tom Clancy novel when 9/11 happened. I seem to recall one of the news networks having Clancy on to discuss the events as if he were some sort of expert on crashing planes into buildings.