In the most detailed accounting yet of the air defense situation last September 11, there's an interesting article in Aviation Week. It says that the inadequately-armed pilots of the Air Guard F-16s considered ramming Flight 93.

Hutchison was probably airborne shortly after the alert F-16s from Langley arrived over Washington, although 121st FS pilots admit their timeline-recall "is fuzzy." But it's clear that Hutchison, Sasseville and Lucky knew their options were limited for bringing down a hijacked airliner headed for an undetermined target in the capital city. Although reluctant to talk about it, all three acknowledge they were prepared to ram a terrorist-flown aircraft, if necessary. Indeed, Hutchison--who might have been the first to encounter Flight 93 if it had, indeed, been flying low and fast down the Potomac--had no other choice.

Sasseville and Lucky each had 511 rounds of ammo, but that only provided roughly a 5-sec. burst of the 20-mm. gun. And where should they shoot to ensure a hijacked aircraft would be stopped? Sasseville planned to fire from behind and "try to saw off one wing. I needed to disable it as soon as possible-- immediately interrupt its aerodynamics and bring it down."

He admits there was no assurance that a 5-sec. burst of lead slugs could slice an air transport's wing off, though. His alternative was "to hit it--cut the wing off with my wing. If I played it right, I'd be able to bail out. One hand on the stick and one hand on the ejection handle, trying to ram my airplane into the aft side of the [airliner's] wing," he said. "And do it skillfully enough to save the pink body . . . but understanding that it might not go as planned. It was a tough nut; we had no other ordnance."

Amazing. And note the difference: while those guys were trying to kill as many as possible, all he wanted to do was to stop the plane and save his carcass.

Your use of "kamikaze" is exact: Sasseville was placing himself into an almost-guaranteed-lethal situation to stop the plane, which itself had become a military target. However, since the terrorists were intending to strike civilian targets, the terrorists on Flight 93 wouldn't fall into the same category. (At the very least, even if the Capitol building or the White House were considered "military targets", the terrorists would've killed the civilians on the plane.)

Rand - I also blogged something about this at http://avoyagetoarcturus.blogspot.com/2002_08_01_avoyagetoarcturus_archive.html#85400856

which points to a story at
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20020830/ap_on_re_us/attacks_last_ditch_defense_4

Enjoy!

Ramming the target aircraft as a tactic of last resort may not be all that new for the USAF. There was an Air Defense Command (as it was known then) F-101 unit at the base where I did my AFROTC field training in 1967. Some of those pilots discussed ramming Russian bombers if all munitions were expended. As I recalll, the vertical stabilizer was the preferred target. Then again, they may have just been trying to impress rookies, but it sounded pretty well thought out.

I'm flashing back to the RC-130 that was struck by a clumsy Chinese fighter pilot last year.

Seriously, those ANG pilots are gems, as are all of our citizen military. Reading stories like that makes me want to go throw tomatoes at my local college's political science department!

The pilots that are doing CAP over the US may need to read some of the accounts of the coup attempt in 1972 in Morocco. Rebel Air Force units tried to shoot down a 727 carrying the King. A friend worked for Boeing at the time an said that what saved the plane from being shot down was that the pilots aimed their guns at the fuselage, as they had been trained. Most of the 20mm shells went through the plane, causing minor damage. Shots at the wings, where the fuel is, would have been fatal.