White House, Air Force One targeted in attacks

WASHINGTON -- The White House and Air Force One, two potent symbols of the American presidency, were targets of Tuesday's suicide bombers, government officials said. \nSketching a scenario that is normally the stuff of Hollywood thrillers, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer cited "real and credible information" that the hijacked airplane that slammed into the Pentagon was originally intended to hit the White House. \nAir Force One, which was with Bush in Florida at the time of the attacks, also was in the terrorists' sights, Fleischer said Wednesday. "That also is one of the reasons why Air Force One did not come back to Andrews (Air Force Base, Md.) where some people may have thought it would." \nHe refused to say what kind of attack might have been aimed at the presidential jet. \nAsked if evidence pointed to an assassination plot that went awry, Fleischer said he would tell reporters only what he knew about the prospective targets, "and I think you can draw your own conclusions."\nThe astonishing disclosure came seven years to the day after a Maryland man with a history of mental illness crashed a stolen light plane against the south side of the White House, an act that showed how vulnerable the mansion can be. It was reopened Wednesday for regular tours and some 400 people streamed through, receiving small American flags as they left. \nThe Bush administration was eager to explain Wednesday, in considerable detail, why Bush did not return immediately to Washington and take clear charge after the terrorists who struck at New York's World Trade Center turned to the nation's capital. \nThroughout Tuesday, images of the Pentagon in flames, smashed by a hijacked airliner, and White House aides fleeing across Pennsylvania Avenue provided a sharp contrast with pictures of Bush heading for an underground bunker hundreds of miles away. \nFleischer said national security officials learned that both the White House and Air Force One were targets just as Bush's Boeing 747 lifted off Tuesday morning in Sarasota, Fla., where the president was to make an education speech. He already had announced on national television that he was hastening back to Washington. That plan was scrambled in mid-flight, and all who were aboard Air Force One, for a destination then unknown, were ordered to turn off their cell phones lest signals from the phones give away the plane's location. \nBack in Washington the White House had been evacuated and Secret Service snipers with automatic rifles sealed off a two-block perimeter. Vice President Dick Cheney remained inside the complex and was shuttled among several "secure locations," including the Situation Room in the basement of the West Wing, where he and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice were in touch with Bush by telephone and videoconference. \nUnder a tight wrap of secrecy, Bush first flew to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana and then to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, home of the U.S. Strategic Command and an underground bunker with specialized equipment allowing Bush to meet via video teleconference for 65 minutes with his national security team at the White House. \nHe joined them there at dusk, helicoptering from Andrews to the South Lawn under cover of three decoy Marine choppers. \nSensitive to any suggestion that Bush was in hiding and not at the helm, officials said at the time they were only adhering to the Secret Service and military playbook for national emergencies when they bounced Bush around from one secret destination to another. On Wednesday, Fleischer said the main plan was to land Air Force One where no one expected it. \nSecurity remained extraordinarily tight Wednesday at Andrews, home base for the presidential air fleet. The main gate was blocked by a Humvee, a heavy truck and a bus. Guards were armed with machine guns.