Pentagon Tracked Deadly Jet but Found No Way to Stop It — “During

the hour or so that American

Airlines Flight 77 was under the control of

hijackers, up to the moment it struck the

west side of the Pentagon, military officials

in a command center on the east side of

the building were urgently talking to law

enforcement and air traffic control officials

about what to do

…controllers in New England knew about

8:20 a.m. that American Airlines Flight 11,

bound from Boston to Los Angeles, had

probably been hijacked. When the first

news report was made at 8:48 a.m. that

a plane might have hit the World Trade

Center, they knew it was Flight 11. And

within a few minutes more, controllers

would have known that both United 175

(the second plane to hit the World Trade

Center) and American 77 (which hit the

Pentagon) had probably been hijacked.

But despite elaborate plans that link

civilian and military efforts to control the

nation’s airspace in defense of the country,

and despite two other jetliners’ having

already hit the World Trade Center in

New York, the fighter planes that

scrambled into protective orbits around

Washington did not arrive until 15 minutes

after Flight 77 hit the Pentagon.” New York Times