Dept. of Homeland Security wants authority to shoot down planes
Reported by Chrish - May 24, 2005
Judge Andrew Napolitano was sitting in for John Gibson today, 5/24/05. (Yay, no "My Word"...) Napolitano introduced the segment with "A lost Cessna wandering into restricted airspace over Washington earlier this month, creating a PANIC (his emphasis) earlier this month. Now the Department of Homeland Security may ask for authority to use LETHAL FORCE in these situations. But could this shared responsibility with the Pentagon work in a real emergency?"
He interviewed Dr. Lt. Col. James Calafano, US Army Retired and now with the Heritage Foundation.
Napolitano asks the Big Question, who should have shoot-down authority? Calafano believes it would be better to get the Dept of Defense out of the business of tracking and disabling small planes which fly into restricted airspace over Washington DC, saying that using an F-16 to go after a small private plane is like using a sledgehammer on a fly. Small jets and helicopters belonging to Customs and Border Patrol are more maneuverable and able to get up close to the offenders to check them out and if necessary "shoot at it with a high-powered rifle. It's not the best kind of thing."
Then he said that "There's actually technology that's probably out there right now, things you could probably do today or in the very near term with directed energy, for example, to divert and incapacitate flights."
Napolitano then asked "Is that right? You'd actually fly up there with a helicopter, take out a rifle (miming), and shoot the gun rather than some heat-seeking missile from the earth, that would just (snaps his fingers) take the plane out?"
Comment: This is an excerpt from a longer segment about who, what, how and when to shoot down airplanes which violate restricted airspace around the capitol. The entire segment, complete with videos of fighter jets, Black Hawk helicopters, black SUVs racing through the Capitol streets, sirens screaming, and crowds of people running in the streets, goes to the Fox fear-mongering agenda.
What I found of interest was how quickly and completely Napolitano skipped over Calafano's reference to "directed energy" technology, going back to the more acceptable image of a heroic soldier shooting the "bad guys", as Gibson would have said. Please don't think of any unexplained plane crashes, especially ones that killed pesky Democrats, and go getting any wild conspiracy ideas.
