[Defender2]

Clinton cutting back our air defense alert strips from 26 to 7 was a major factor!!!! One of those strip alerts cut back from duty prior to that infamous day, happening under Clinton, was Atlantic City, N.J. only minutes away from N.Y.. President Bush after 09/11/01 reinstated alert at those 26 sites.

[stevem99]

Clinton may have cut the air defense strips (I really don't know) but if you've read anything about 9/11 and NORAD it's clear that a large part of the problem was that the FAA didn't notify NORAD when they first learned about the hijackings (13 minutes after the first hijacking, flight 11, was reported).

NORAD scrambled planes out of Otis (Cape Cod) six minutes later, just one minute before Flight 11 hit the WTC North tower. In the case of flight 77 which hit the Pentagon, there were operational air bases within 2 minutes or less (Bolling and Andrews) although they scrambled from Langley, again there was a delay from FAA to NORAD.

The fact is that NORAD didn't have Presidental authorization to shoot down passanger jets until 10 am, so it's doubtful it would have made a difference even if the jets had intercepted them.

So, explain to me exactly which base was cut that would have made a difference on 9/11?!