Offutt Air Force Base

The, that night, you know, he finally got to go home.

He spent most of the day in the air at Barksdale Air Force Base and then Offutt Air Force Base, and then they, the Secret Service was finally satisfied it was safe for him to return to Washington.

He goes home.

That night, he's in bed.

I'll tell you that story.

And so they decide on Offutt Air Force Base, which is head of STRATCOM.

STRATCOM's in this exercise.

They've got loaded B-52s sitting on the runways.

Tell him not to come.

He's not welcome at NORVAD.

So they finally settle on Offutt, and they touch down.

And he does a national security briefing, and he does all the briefings he has to do.

Rice as well as the vice president were asking him to loiter and to stay away from Washington until they could confirm it was safe for him to come back.

How did the decision process go to move then from Barksdale to Offutt from one base to another before ultimately at the end of the day returning to Washington, D.C.?

You know, after the president addressed the American public, the plan was then, OK, let's get him to a location where he can be safe, deep underground, where he can talk with the National Command Authority.

He can, you know, take time where he's not worried.

Mm.

And then, then he, a couple days later, they, he's on a radio show and they said, "There's a call for you," and then it's a guy from, uh, from, uh, uh, Offutt Air Force Base.

Mm.

And he said, "You're the only guy who knows what you're talking about." This happened, like within 10 days he had these two phone calls.

My wife, Ingra.

During her meeting with a business owner in downtown Bellevue, she witnessed pl-- airplanes taking off and landing at Offutt Air Force Base.

Uh, I was hearing those planes overhead as well.

My school was in South Omaha, which borders Bellevue, where Offutt, the home of the US Strategic Command, STRATCOM, is located.

Boy, very vivid.

So anyway, so my family and I, we were stationed at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, Nebraska at the time.

Uh, the first plane hit the, the Twin Tower at, uh, 8:46, uh, Eastern Time, if I recall.

So it was 7:46, uh, Nebraska time, Central Time Zone.

President, in order to have a conference with all of the leadership, you know, the head of the CIA, the head of the FBI, et cetera, um, you know, we can't do it at the, at, at your current location.

But there is a facility at, uh, uh, uh, Offutt Air Force Base in, in, uh, Omaha, Nebraska, where we can connect all the command structure, the national command structure, uh, for a full briefing.

And so we recommend that you fly to there.

It's an hour and a half north of you." Uh, and of course, it, when, when the president agreed, reluctantly again, but he told me, he said, "Th- this is a dodge.

They, they don't want me to go back to Washington, so ...

But this is the last thing I'm giving them." So we, we got back on the craft, aircraft.

It flew north for an hour and a half, hour 45, landed at Offutt.

Offutt was made to be resistant in a case of an atomic bomb attack, nuclear attack, so the runways are, like, huge.