Answers from the Pentagon

Jose Paul Corona

Nearly a year after the terrorist attacks people are still yearning

for answers.

Pentagon Rear Admiral Casey W. Coane tried to provide some of those

answers to a group of nearly 100 Huntington Beach residents at a town

hall forum held last week.

One Huntington Beach resident wondered if an end to the war on

terrorism is near.

“I think we’ll be in this for years. I don’t see it lasting 40 years

like the Cold War, but politics are strange,” Coane told the audience.

Coane spoke at the Huntington Beach Cultural Center Library Theatre

last week and discussed the terrorist attacks, military readiness and the

continuing war on terrorism.

Coane currently serves as the Reserve Deputy for Space Information

Warfare, Command and Control, and is also the director of the Naval

Reserve Space and Network Warfare Program.

He spoke and answered audience questions for more then an hour.

“I thought it went very well, he was very knowledgeable,” said World

War II Navy veteran Cameron Harriet.

His wife Deb, a 20-year Navy veteran, agreed.

“I appreciated his openness and honesty,” she said.

He told the crowd, frankly, the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 were not

a random act of violence.

“It was a carefully planned operation,” he said “The attack was

intended from the outset to cause mass casualties.”

violence committed by individuals or extremists groups are done to

gain the attention of the media. The actions of Al Queda are much more

calculated, Coane said.

“Osama Bin Laden has much larger objectives,” he added.

He described the Sept. 11 attacks on the Pentagon and the efforts that

are being made to rebuild the damaged military institution.

The Pentagon took a direct hit, he told them.

“One hundred and eighty four people were murdered [at the Pentagon]

that day,” he said.

Although a formal declaration of war has not been made, there is no

mistaking that we are at war, Coane continued.

“We have been attacked,” he said. “Most of us in this room don’t know

what it’s like to be attacked.”

Regardless of whether or not Americans want to be involved in a war,

they are, he said. The war has come to them.

But finding terrorists is a job that the military has had to undertake

since Sept. 11, and it’s an endeavor that they are ready for, he assured

the crowd. Regardless of personal feelings or disagreement with President

George W. Bush, the military’s job is to do what he orders, Coane said.

But the military can’t do it alone.

“Rooting out terrorism will take your continued support,” Coane

implored the audience.