The Command Post - Op-Ed - Courage Versus Hate

July 23, 2004

Courage Versus Hate

It was Courage versus Hate....from the moment they stormed the cockpit to the second they brought down the plane.

Some in the Arab world will make the case that hate won -- that Al Qaeda's merciless terrorists, after murdering the pilots, brought down Flight 93 before the rebelling passengers could get to them. But, in reality, Courage won -- because the passengers weren't going to take it and signalled in that instant that the days of passive passengers trusting thugs who take over their airplanes were definitely over.

The bipartisan 911 Commission report contains a chilling account of what went on board on that plane. It's a story for the ages.

But it won't need the impact of ages: as soon as you read it you realize that in that moment when the passengers rebelled, the terrorists job became that much more difficult forever more. You can read it all here but we offer these key highlights from a New York Times report:

----(After Captain and passengers knew about the other hijackings and got warnings about possible attempts to enter the cockpit..JG)Two minutes later, the hijackers attacked Captain Dahl and his first officer.

Unlike the three other hijackings, Flight 93 continued transmitting over the radio during the struggle in the cockpit. The captain or first officer declared "Mayday," and 35 seconds later, one of them shouted, "Hey, get out of here get out of here get out of here." Later, passengers reported seeing two bodies outside the cockpit, injured or dead, probably the pilots....

---A lot of the passengers used cell phones to call the ground. --They were stormed by the passengers. And they knew it. And they knew they were losing...so:

At three seconds after 10 a.m., Mr. Jarrah is heard on the cockpit voice recorder saying: "Is that it? Shall we finish it off?"
But another hijacker responds: "No. Not yet. When they all come, we finish it off."

The voice recorder captured sounds of continued fighting, and Mr. Jarrah pitched the plane up and then down. A passenger is heard to say, "In the cockpit. If we don't we'll die!"

Then a passenger yelled "Roll it!" Some aviation experts have speculated that this was a reference to a food cart, being used as a battering ram.

Mr. Jarrah "stopped the violent maneuvers" at 10:01:00, according to the report, and said, "Allah is the greatest! Allah is the greatest!"

"He then asked another hijacker in the cockpit, `Is that it? I mean, shall we put it down?' to which the other replied, `Yes, put it in it, and pull it down.' "

Eighty seconds later, a hijacker is heard to say, "Pull it down! Pull it down!"
"The hijackers remained at the controls but must have judged that the passengers were only seconds from overcoming them," according to the report, which seems to indicate that the hijackers themselves crashed the plane. "With the sounds of the passenger counterattack continuing, the aircraft plowed into an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at 580 miles per hour, about 20 minutes' flying time from Washington, D.C," according to the report

So there you have it: hijackers consumed with hatred for the West and the United States, determined to use an airplane as guided missle, in control of a plane after murdering the pilots and seeking their own and the passengers' deaths. Courageous passengers of all backgrounds and sexes, not sitting back and taking it. THOSE PASSENGERS launched the war against terrorism...in that plane.

In the end, the hijackers -- knowing they would lose control of the plane -- in their final contemptuous act thinking they would "win" by crashing it into the ground and killing everyone. So they aimed the plane down. And when it was over, the passengers' souls ascended and the terrorists souls descended into eternal damnation.

And the story of Flight 93 lives on in history.

Posted By Joe Gandelman at July 23, 2004 09:46 AM | TrackBack

Comments

No question -- Flt 93 was Heroism at its finest.

Once the passengers found out what was going on, their actions became obvious, brave and necessary. But first, they had to find out what was happening elsewhere. Had they not found out, chances are they would have continued to cooperate -- just like the passengers and crew on the other planes did.

Till that point, they were following airline and FAA policy directives on what to do in a hijacking -- cooperate with the hijackers and get the plane on the ground asap. Deal with the problem from there. Every airline had that policy, and it was endorsed by the FAA.

It was that weakness that al Qaeda exploited -- the knowledge that during a hijacking, the passengers and crew would cooperate with them.

That assumption is now ended. Events after 911 indicate clearly that if someone even appears to take a step toward a hijacking or placing the aircraft in actual danger, the passengers and crew will Immediately pile on to subdue them. It's a perfectly rational choice -- not to do so is to ensure that they will die. There is at least a Fighting Chance if they oppose the hijackers.

That, more than any other single deterrent, is the reason why it is unlikely that another aircraft will be successfully hijacked in the future -- the operative assumption now is that the hijackers will be immediately opposed by the passengers and crew. The aircraft may be blown up -- that was always a CAPD. But it will not be commandeered so easily ever again.

The danger from aircraft now is not the in-flight hijacking of passenger planes, but the commandeering of cargo aircraft. Just so's ya know.

As for the folks on Flt 93, once they figured out that their chances of survival were essentially nil if they continued to cooperate, their course of action was clear and unambiguous.

Good on 'em!

Posted by: Don at July 23, 2004 11:18 AM

My spouse travels on business a great deal, we've had this conversation, and as much as typing this makes my stomach churn, I know some version of "Let's Roll" will be said before action is taken.

Posted by: Feste at July 23, 2004 04:39 PM

Norman Lear once took great delight in proposing, through his buffoon Archie Bunker, that the only way to stop a hijacking was to arm everyone on the plane.

Norman made a lot a mistakes. Archie became a national icon, much to his chagrin, for all the wrong reasons. Norman also underestimated the average American, as most elites are wont to do.

With billions spent on defense every week, for all the sophistication of our weaponry and detection systems, isn't it interesting to note that the only terrorist plane that didn't reach its target that day was taken down by passengers armed with nothing more than food carts and pots of boiling water from the galleys?

We rely too heavily on a government that frequently can't find its ass with both hands. Does that give you a nice warm feeling at night? The failures of 9/11 were institutional. Another word for that is bureaucracy - the defense of this nation depends on bureaucracy. FBI, CIA, Pentagon - all bureaucracies.

Think about that for a second. Thirty-seven states allow right-to-carry. Average citizens prevent crime millions of time each month because theyr'e armed. In most cases, the gun isn't even discharged - it is shown - and that's the end of it. And the crimes committed by average Americans with gun permits approaches ZERO.

A modest proposal: if you are flying from one state with right-to-carry to another, call the airline 2 days in advance. Tell them "Hi, I'm John Smith and I have a carry permit. I'm heading to Florida this Thursday and I'll be taking my .357 with me." At check-in you are directed to another room behind the ticket counter. You meet with local law enforcement and are provided with disintegrating rounds. You read and sign a short statement taking total responsibility for your actions, promising not to drink either before or during the flight. You are then run through another check-in up to the terminal. A line considerably shorter than the one everyone else is forced into.

Before everyone starts swallowing their tongue, realize the expense and effort the Federal government has gone through (and has foisted on failing airlines through unfunded mandates) to safeguard the plane: armed sky marshalls (maybe), reinforced cockpit doors (certainly), armed pilots (again, maybe).

Have we not, as citizens of this country, surrendered our 2nd amendment rights at the gate in exchange for a false sense of security? Are we any less an American citizen because we happen to be on a plane?

And before I hear about the OK Corral at 33,000 feet, or shoot-outs over the lavatories, remember that the federal government's own solution for a hijacked plane at this time is to have an F-16 stick a AIM-7L up the port engine, blow the wing off and have the entire plane auger into the cornfield.

Oh yeah, that makes LOTS more sense, doesn't it?

So at what point do we wake up and start trusting our citizens instead of our failed bureaucracies?

At what point do we take this country back and start watching after ourselves?

And what will Mohammed have to consider on his sprint up to the cockpit that he didn't have to before?

Posted by: torpedo_eight at July 23, 2004 08:34 PM