Washington: US air defences were completely unprepared and faltered during the unprecedented suicide attacks by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network in which hijacked aircraft were crashed into the World Trade Centre and Pentagon on September 11, 2001, said a report by the independent Commission of enquiry released today (June 17, 2004).

The report said Vice President Dick Cheney did not issue orders to shoot down hostile aircraft on 9/11 until long after the last hijacked airliner had already crashed near Pennsylvania and the order was never passed along to military fighter pilots searching for errant aircraft that morning.

A painstaking re-creation of the faltering and confused response by military and aviation officials on Sept 11 also shows that fighter jets never had a chance to intercept any of the three doomed airliners, partly because they had been sent to intercept a plane, American Airlines 11, that had already crashed into the World Trade Centre.

The jets also would probably not have been able to stop the last airplane, United Airlines Flight 93, from barrelling into the White House or US Capitol if it had not crashed in Pennsylvania, according to the report.

Panel investigators also concluded that authorities with the North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) repeatedly misinformed the Commission in testimony last fall about its scrambling of fighters from Langley Air Force Base.

NORAD officials indicated at the time that the jets were responding to either United 93 or American Airlines 77, which struck the Pentagon.