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These coins were made in commemoration of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps members of US Strategic Command, Offutt Air Force Base, Omaha. This was the military post where the majority of responses to the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, were devised, optimized, and launched, including the decision to ground all commercial flights in US airspace. It is where President Bush came upon leaving Emma E. Booker Elementary in Florida, after a brief pit stop at Barksdale Air Force near Shreveport, LA.
Once at Offutt, a bunker under the historic 55th wing hosted the president as he attempted to regain control of US airspace and learn more information about what was unfolding in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington D.C. With him was Chief of Staff Andrew Card. The bunker was designed to withstand a nuclear blast, and built some 40 ft. underground. The 55th wing bunker has since been dismantled, and STRATCOM itself moved command and control operations to a new facility on Offutt Air Force Base in 2019.
These coins were presented to a family friend, a Colonel at STRATCOM, for his service on Sept. 11, 2001, where he helped in coordination of the grounding of all commercial air flights that morning. One was given to him by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs in 2002, Gen. Richard Meyers; the other by the USSTRATCOM J5 Base Commander on retirement. I’ve never been able to find or even see seen others like it, not in trade mags, online, military memorabilia stores, sellers, and services, or challenge coin guides. Truly rare pieces of history.
