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I think we should have had an opportunity to knock down the planes, and apparently we didn't. We couldn't even scramble our fighter coverage in time. The issues in DC are apparently continuing. And yes, we need to be prepared to scatter debris, at least to have the choice. If we don't, this will happen again. Our post Cold War decline in readiness really hurt on 9/11/2001. That can never happen again.

We need to improve but we will never be a fortress...It just isn't possible.I live far enough away from the city that I only worry about those who would be most likely targeted and my family who flies frequently.

I don't think they will use the same method again because we are more apt to attack the hi jackers.....!

What we found was that the FAA isn't really in control once flights are in the air.

If you read the transcripts and listen to the calls from the airplanes to the ground (not the ones from passengers), the bureaucratic BS of the airlines was horrendous. But the FAA would have been worse.

Also, the terrorists were trained well enough to know how to turn off many of the anti-hijaking features the planes had.

Four planes from three different airlines changed course. By the time they even got organized it was too late. Thankfully, the FAA under Cheney's orders forced all flights to the ground or their is no telling how many more they had planned. There were reports of people getting off some of those flights that could have been terrorists.

It's still widely speculated that the Pennsylvania flight was shot down by our own fighters. They were in place at the time and the order was given to shoot down any plane that didn't respond. I believe they story about the passengers trying to takeover is true, but we had a chance to shoot that one down.

It also shows that although we had the capability, the act was so unexpected I don't think any chain of command decision to shoot them out the sky could have been made in time to stop the ones hitting New York. Maybe the Pentagon and definitely the PA plane.

We were just lulled into complicity after the fall of the Soviet Union. Regardless of how many revisionist want to change the facts, Clinton did nothing and before that Reagan didn't do much. Bush 41 at least fought a war but everyone thought once it was over that everything would be done with.

I don't buy the "Bush didn't finish the job in 1991" BS from the liberals (the ones that demanded sanctions be allowed to continue while after the war they complained the sanctions were bad and starving "women and children") since they didn't want to fight to begin with.

But Bush and company did a bad job of the post-war effects by letting Saddam's military keep too many weapons and still pretending Saddam was legitimate. And then they used words that made Shiites and Kurds think we'd back them if they tried to overthrow the Iraq government. Bay of Pigs all over.

Now all the left wing idiots complain the son finished the job they said the father should have accomplished even though they never wanted the father to do it in the first place.

Talk about two-faced opportunism.