honoluluadvertiser.com

Sponsored by:

Comment, blog & share photos

Log in | Become a member
The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Friday, September 28, 2001

The September 11th attack
Shoot-down authority separate for Hawai'i

By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer

Thomas C. "Doc" Waskow has made tough decisions during 31 years in the Air Force and 4,300 hours in the air, more than 900 of them in combat beginning in 1971 at Tan Son Nhut Air Base in Vietnam.

Air Force Maj. Gen. Thomas C. "Doc" Waskow was given the shoot-down authority for Hawai'i air space.
Pacific Air Forces operations chief here since 1999, Maj. Gen. Waskow already makes life-and-death military choices.

But this husky, bemedaled Air Force Academy graduate with schooling at MIT and Harvard now has a new and awesome power: He can shoot down any hijacked airliner on a suicide mission to Hawai'i.

That authority was first given Waskow by Adm. Dennis Blair, the U.S. commander of Pacific forces, on Sept. 11 after the terrorist attacks. It was renewed yesterday as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld laid out "homeland defense" rules.

Other states are under the North American Aerospace Defense Command , which has designated two other two-star Air Force generals, in Florida and in Alaska, with shoot-down powers.

Waskow declined comment yesterday, but a spokesman released a curt statement: "The national command authority has developed procedures for response to hostile acts over domestic airspace since Sept. 11 to ensure the safety of our citizens and critical infrastructure. ... If a hostile act were to take place in Hawaiian airspace, and there was time, the decision to act would go all the way to the President.

"Otherwise, the standing orders to protect our citizens from similar attacks have been delegated to Gen. Waskow as commander, Hawaiian Air Defense Region."

Waskow took control of Hawai'i airspace from the Federal Aviation Administration at about 7 a.m. Sept. 11 and scrambled four Hawai'i Air National Guard F-15 jet fighters to check out 10 aircraft headed for O'ahu.

Blair told Gov. Ben Cayetano and Mayor Jeremy Harris that pilots would shoot down planes if they appeared aimed at targets such as Pearl Harbor.

Waskow gave control back to the FAA two days later. Guard jets since have routinely scrambled twice for aircraft with mechanical problems, according to Capt. Charles Anthony, a Guard spokesman.

The Guard has provided Hawai'i's air defense since 1956, although other military services have had fighter craft stationed or exercising here.

The Guard has 19 F-15s here, and about two dozen pilots and crews. "A number" of pilots are on alert within a few feet of their aircraft 24 hours a day, seven days a week, Anthony said.