September 11 Attacks - U.

September 11 Attacks - U.S. History. I INTRODUCTION September 11 Attacks, coordinated terrorist strike on the United States in 2001 that killed about 3,000 people and shook the nation to its core. On the sunny morning of September 11, 2001, 19 terrorists, working in teams of 4 or 5, hijacked four commercial jetliners and turned them toward targets chosen for destruction. Two of the planes, loaded with fuel and passengers, were flown at full speed into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in the financial district of New York City. The buildings burst into flame and then collapsed, killing thousands. A third terrorist crew smashed their plane into the Pentagon, headquarters of the U.S. military in Arlington, Virginia. The hijackers of the fourth airliner apparently intended to hit another target in the Washington, D.C., area, but passengers on the plane realized what was happening and fought back. This airplane crashed in a field in rural Pennsylvania. The 19 men who carried out the hijackings came from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and other Arab states. They were affiliated with the al-Qaeda network, a radical Islamic group led by Saudi exile Osama bin Laden and dedicated to waging a holy war against the United States. The targets they chose to destroy perfectly symbolized U.S. financial, political, and military power. Years in the planning, the attacks in New York and Washington constituted the first major foreign assault on the continental United States since 1814, when the British army invaded Washington, D.C., and burned the White House. More people were killed on U.S. soil on September 11 than on any day since the American Civil War. United States citizens, feeling their country under attack, rallied behind their leaders in a display of national unity, patriotism, and generosity unseen in decades. The country celebrated anew the values of courage and heroism, exemplified by the New York firefighters and rescue workers who unhesitatingly rushed into the World Trade Center towers to save as many people as possible. Before long, it was clear that September 11 would alter the course of U.S. history. President George W. Bush announced that fighting terrorism and preventing future attacks would be his administration's top priority. Governments around the world were told they must decide whether to stand with the United States in this antiterrorist effort or face U.S. wrath. Americans had to accustom themselves to new security measures that complicated their travel, work, and recreation. United States agencies rearranged their action agendas, and local governments scrambled to make preparations for new terrorist attacks, possibly involving biological, chemical, or even nuclear weapons. II TERROR FROM THE SKY The twin towers of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were constructed to withstand attacks. But the organizers of the September 11 strike devised a plan that had not been anticipated and for which no effective defense had been prepared: to use a large fuel-laden commercial airliner as a highly explosive bomb. No trained airline pilot would willingly fly his or her aircraft into a building full of people, even at gunpoint, but the terrorists had a way around that problem. They would do it themselves, as part of a suicide mission. After checking passenger lists for each of the hijacked flights and correlating names with passport records and other identity documentation, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) concluded that 19 men were involved in the hijackings, some as pilots and some as accomplices. Several had taken flight lessons in the United States. They needed only basic training to accomplish their mission: Since they planned to hijack planes already in flight, they did not have to learn takeoff procedures, and since they intended to crash, they did not need to know how to land. Preparations for the mission seem to have been extensive. Officials later concluded that the tactical leader for the entire September 11 operation was an Egyptian named Mohammed Atta, who was apparently at the controls of one of the planes flown into the World Trade Center towers. He and the others who were to receive flight training arrived in the United States in 1999. In addition to learning to fly, the men are believed to have scouted potential routes and flights and traveled extensively around the country. Investigators later determined that large sums of money were transferred to the hijackers in installments at different points in 2000 and 2001. The accomplices for the operation arrived later. These men, who would be responsible for physically subduing crew members in the first moments of the hijackings, spent much of their time during the months preceding the hijackings working out in gyms. The hijacking leaders eventually selected transcontinental flights from the East Coast to the West Coast, which meant that the aircraft would be carrying extra fuel. They chose flights on a midweek day that would be less likely to have a full load of passengers, meaning there would be less chance of someone interfering with their plans. Since U.S. airline screening procedures make it virtually impossible to smuggle guns aboard, the hijackers used pocketknives, utility box-cutting knives, and cans of Mace or pepper spray as their weapons. A World Trade Center The first two planes, American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175, left Boston within minutes of each other, around 8 AM. Both were Boeing 767s bound for Los Angeles, and they carried between them 137 passengers and 20 crew members. The first indication of trouble came at about 8:25 AM, when air traffic controllers in Boston heard a strange voice from the Flight 11 cockpit saying, "We have some planes. Just stay quiet, and you will be OK. We are returning to the airport." A few minutes later the plane turned off course, heading south toward New York City. Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center north tower at 8:46 AM, hitting the 110- story building between the 93rd and 99th floors. The hijackers of United Flight 175 followed a similar route. Flying much faster, they slammed their airplane into the World Trade Center south tower, also 110 stories tall, between the 77th and 85th floors 16 minutes later, at 9:03 AM. New York firefighters rushed to the scene from stations across the metropolitan area and helped thousands of people evacuate the towers and buildings nearby. Nearly all of the World Trade Center workers caught in offices above the floors where the planes hit had no means of escape. Many, realizing they were doomed, jumped from their office windows rather than waiting to suffocate or burn to death. The tower structures, built from 1966 to 1973, were designed to withstand the impact of a jetliner crash, and initially remained intact. However, Boeing 767s are much larger than 1960s-era jetliners, and carry much more fuel. In both towers the intense heat from the burning jet fuel eventually melted their interior steel supports. At 9:58:59 AM the south tower collapsed: The steel supports gave way in the burning part of the tower, the floors above fell into the lower portion of the building, and the weight of the falling sections swiftly caused the lower floors to pancake. The north tower fell in a similar fashion 29 minutes later, at 10:28 AM. More than 400 rescue workers, including more than 300 New York firefighters, were crushed in the ash and rubble. Including the World Trade Center workers who died and the aircraft crews and passengers, the total death toll in the New York attack was about 2,750. B The Pentagon American Airlines Flight 77, meanwhile, took off from Washington Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C., at about 8:20 AM with 6 crew members and 58 passengers. Like the Boston flights, the airplane was bound for Los Angeles, and its fuel tanks were full. About 40 minutes later, the hijackers turned the Boeing 757 around and flew it back toward Washington, D.C. Flying low and fast, the airplane hit the Pentagon at 9:37 AM. In a bit of good fortune, the plane crashed into the west side of the building, which had recently been reinforced with stronger construction and blast-resistant windows in order to withstand a terrorist attack. Even so, the plane penetrated three of the Pentagon's five concentric rings, taking a chunk out of the building and incinerating dozens of offices and the people who worked in them. The plane's burning fuel spilled through the ruins as military and civilian workers groped their way through smoky and burning offices to rescue colleagues. In all, 184 people died at the Pentagon, including everyone aboard the plane. C "Let's Roll": Flight 93 The fourth aircraft hijacked on September 11, United Airlines Flight 93, took off from Newark, New Jersey, at about 8:40 AM, bound for San Francisco. The Boeing 757 was the last of the four planes to be hijacked, and its passengers heard about the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks through telephone conversations with family members or friends. Several male passengers, realizing what was happening, decided to rush the cockpit and try to wrest control of the aircraft away from the hijackers, even if it meant crashing. One passenger, Todd Beamer, told a telephone operator of the plan. After asking the operator to pray with him, Beamer set down the phone. The operator heard him say, "Are you ready?" Then, "OK, let's roll." It is unknown where the hijackers of Flight 93 intended to crash the plane, but the aircraft was headed toward the Washington, D.C., area when it crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at about 10:03 AM. The phrase "Let's roll" would become a U.S. rallying cry in the subsequent war on terrorism. III THE TERRORISTS AND THEIR MOTIVES Almost immediately after the September 11 attacks, suspicion centered on Osama bin Laden as the person responsible. As the leader of a terrorist organization known as al-Qaeda, Arabic for "the camp," bin Laden had long advocated violence against the United States and its citizens. "To kill Americans and their allies--civilians and military--is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it," bin Laden declared in a published communiqué in 1998. As the heir to much of his father's fortune, bin Laden had access to millions of dollars, and he had used the money to build an international terrorist network with cells in several countries. Evidence had linked al-Qaeda operatives to four previous attacks on U.S. interests: a bomb in an underground World Trade Center parking garage in 1993 (the first attempt to destroy the twin towers) that killed 6 people; an attack on a U.S. military housing complex in Saudi Arabia in 1996 in which 19 U.S. soldiers were killed; the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 that killed more than 200 people; and a suicide attack on the USS Cole, a Navy destroyer, off the coast of Yemen in the fall of 2000, that killed 17 U.S. sailors. Bin Laden's known determination to attack the United States caused U.S. officials to identify him immediately as the prime suspect in the September 11 attacks. In addition, the fact that the hijackings were so clearly coordinated suggested they were the work of a highly organized terrorist group with vast resources, and bin Laden's al-Qaeda network met that description. Before long, investigators had determined the identities of most of the hijackers of the September 11 flights. The men had worked closely together in the United States in the months preceding the flights and maintained al-Qaeda connections. Mohammed Atta, the alleged tactical leader, had lived previously in Hamburg, Germany, and officials there found evidence that Atta had links to al-Qaeda agents. United States investigators, meanwhile, uncovered financial ties between Atta and al-Qaeda. United States officials also reported that several of the hijackers had received training in al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan, where the network was based. An independent, bipartisan commission that investigated the attacks later concluded that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the operational mastermind of the September 11 attacks. Mohammed brought his plan to bin Laden because he lacked the resources to carry it out himself, the commission found. A Al-Qaeda The origins of the al-Qaeda organization date to the 1980s. Osama bin Laden, like many Muslims, was eager to support the Afghan forces that were resisting the occupation of Afghanistan by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), which had invaded in 1979. Bin Laden was in a good position to help. His father had made hundreds of millions of dollars directing construction projects for the Saudi royal family. Trained as a construction engineer, Osama had originally prepared to take over the family business, and he inherited much of his father's wealth. With that money, bin Laden was able to finance anti-Soviet resistance in Afghanistan, recruiting Arab volunteer fighters to join the cause and even leading them into battle. After the Soviets were forced to abandon Afghanistan in the late 1980s, bin Laden turned his attention to other places where Muslims were being "corrupted" by foreign influences. The stationing of U.S. military forces in Saudi Arabia, home to Mecca, the most sacred of Muslim holy cities, outraged bin Laden, and he was determined to drive the U.S. troops out of the country. He believed in a strict form of Islam that left little room for compromise and he was deeply opposed to Western influences. In later writings, he also attacked the United States for supporting Israeli policies toward the Palestinians (see Arab-Israeli Conflict). Such views were popular in the Islamic world, especially among young men, many of whom were alienated from their own governments and resentful of the power and prosperity associated with the United States and other Western countries. Bin Laden was seen as a hero by some Muslims for his willingness to stand up against the United States, and he found many followers for his cause. He transformed al-Qaeda into a secret terror network, to be funded with his own inheritance. When his family and Saudi authorities realized what bin Laden was doing, he was disowned and expelled from the country. In 1996 he settled in Afghanistan, where the ruling Taliban regime shared his radical Islamic views. In exchange for refuge in Afghanistan, bin Laden shared his wealth with Taliban authorities and supported and equipped the Taliban armed forces. With Taliban support, bin Laden organized and funded al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan, where volunteers learned how to carry out terror strikes such as the 1998 embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania and the attack on the USS Cole. B The "Martyrdom Operation" A videotape discovered in Afghanistan in November 2001 provided insights into bin Laden's thinking and evidence of his ties to the September 11 attacks. The videotape, apparently recorded earlier that month, documented a social conversation between bin Laden and a visiting Arab sheik. Bin Laden tells the sheik that he and his associates had thought carefully about what would happen when the planes hit the World Trade Center towers in New York. "We calculated in advance the number of casualties from the enemy--who would be killed," bin Laden says. "We calculated that the floors that would be hit would be three or four floors.... Due to my experience in this field [construction engineering], I was thinking that the fire from the gas in the plane would melt the iron structure of the building and collapse the area where the plane hit and all the floors above it only. This is all that we had hoped for." Bin Laden also said in the tape that the "brothers" who carried out the September 11 attacks knew that it would be a "martyrdom operation," even though they did not know all the details. Release of the tape prompted new thinking into the motivations of the September 11 hijackers and terrorists in general. Suicide bombers have played significant roles in many national struggles, in the Middle East and beyond. Most of them, however, have died in pursuit of a specific political cause, viewing their death as a sacrifice to be made toward realization of a goal. The September 11 hijackers seem to have seen death itself as a goal, as if martyrdom were a form of worship to God. This thinking is revealed in a handwritten document, copies of which were found in the luggage of Mohammed Atta, in a car that had been used by the terrorists, and in the wreckage of the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. The document, which seems to have been written as an instructional manual or guide for the hijackers, urged the hijackers to "seek" death and even to crave it. Nowhere in this document or in any letters or messages sent by the September 11 hijackers is there any indication of what specific goal they thought might be served by their deaths. Some scholars noted how this idea of martyrdom departs from traditional Islamic beliefs, which generally underscore the sanctity of life and accommodate martyrdom only in extreme circumstances, when the survival of a community is at stake. Most Islamic theologians and Muslim leaders have argued that the September 11 attacks--with their deliberate aim of causing mass civilian casualties--have no basis in the Islamic tradition. The attacks, instead, seem to have been motivated simply by hatred of the United States and a desire for retribution in the face of what some Muslims see as the globally dominating, corrupting, and destructive role of the United States in the world today. A poll of attitudes in the Islamic world carried out by the Gallup Organization and released in February 2002 showed that many Muslims view the United States as "ruthless, aggressive, conceited, arrogant, easily provoked, [and] biased." Most of the respondents disapproved of the September 11 attacks, but a significant minority found them morally justifiable. IV U.S. RESPONSE The attacks in New York and Washington prompted a massive display of solidarity, both in the United States and abroad. Many Americans hung U.S. flags from their windows, tied them to their car radio antennae, pasted flag decals and patriotic bumper stickers on their cars, and took to wearing flag pins on their lapels. Charitable contributions poured in to funds set up to aid people affected personally by the attacks. Overseas, anti-American sentiment was blunted, at least for a while. For example, state-controlled media in Iran--which once denounced the United States as the "Great Satan"--carried sympathetic stories about the World Trade Center victims. Federal, local, and state government agencies in the United States found themselves suddenly redefining national security to include the defense of U.S. soil against foreign attack, a new and unfamiliar idea. In a speech before a joint session of Congress nine days after the September 11 attacks, U.S. president George W. Bush said he was creating a new White House office, the Office of Homeland Security. The new office was to coordinate the work of more than 40 federal agencies, including the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), in order to prevent and respond to future terrorist attacks on U.S. territory. A War on Terrorism In the same speech to Congress, Bush suggested that the top priority of his administration would be a campaign to end terrorism. He affirmed that all the evidence collected at that point indicated that al-Qaeda was the organization responsible for the September 11 attacks, and he promised that a U.S.-led war on terrorism would begin with a drive to eliminate that organization. But in a key expansion of U.S. antiterrorism efforts, Bush said the United States would not only target the terrorist organizations themselves, but also those governments that support them. "Every nation in every region now has a decision to make," Bush said. "Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime." That warning, new in U.S. foreign policy, came to be known as the Bush Doctrine. The administration of previous U.S. president Bill Clinton had launched cruise missiles against al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan after the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in East Africa, but did not hold the Taliban regime itself responsible for al-Qaeda's activities. Bush, on the other hand, said the Taliban leaders must "hand over the terrorists or they will share in their fate." The Taliban authorities ignored the warning. On October 7, 2001, a U.S.-led international coalition launched military operations in Afghanistan intended to dislodge the Taliban regime from power and eliminate alQaeda activities there. Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld advised that the war against the Taliban and al-Qaeda forces would be unconventional and partly covert. However, it started as a typical modern military operation, with heavy U.S. air strikes aimed at eliminating the enemy's air defense system. There was widespread skepticism about the prospects for early success, given the difficulties the USSR encountered in Afghanistan in the 1980s and the supposed fanaticism of Taliban and al-Qaeda followers. Indeed, progress in the war was slow at first, but by mid-November the Taliban and al-Qaeda forces were in trouble. After some hesitation, U.S. commanders decided to work closely with the Northern Alliance, an anti-Taliban rebel force in northern Afghanistan. CIA operatives and elite Special Operations troops secretly entered the country and worked in close coordination with Northern Alliance troops. The U.S. military advisers helped the rebels with their military tactics and arranged U.S. air strikes in support of rebel offensives on the ground. The advisers included trained "forward air controllers" who carried with them technological devices that enabled them to pinpoint enemy troop positions or military equipment and then guide U.S. pilots to drop bombs precisely on those targets. United States bombs were subsequently dropped with greater accuracy than in any previous military operation. The combination of anti-Taliban rebel forces, acting under the advice and counsel of U.S. advisers, and precision U.S. bombing proved decisive. Taliban and al-Qaeda forces were routed across the country, and by December 2001 the Taliban regime had been driven from power. Hundreds of al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters were taken prisoner. However, Osama bin Laden himself and other top al-Qaeda leaders evaded capture, as did the leader of the Taliban, Mullah Mohammed Omar. Hundreds of al-Qaeda fighters scattered into the mountains of eastern Afghanistan or crossed into Pakistan, where they continued to pose a security threat. The remaining pockets of alQaeda strength prompted renewed fighting in Afghanistan in March 2002, but by then the war on terrorism was already shifting elsewhere. United States Special Operations forces had been deployed in support of antiterrorism operations in the Philippines. United States officials reported that al-Qaeda cells were active in more than 50 countries, and Bush cautioned the United States that the war on terrorism would be a long one. Some success in that war came in early 2003 when Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind behind the September 11 attacks, was arrested in Pakistan and taken into U.S. custody. Some of the war on terrorism would consist of military action, but as the hunt for al-Qaeda spread to other countries, it became more of a law enforcement operation. Success depended on tracking the finances and communication network of al-Qaeda, and these efforts required close cooperation with other governments. At times, however, the war on terrorism was a lonely path for the United States. Bush's admonition that countries must decide whether they are "with us" or "with the terrorists" sounded to some governments as if the United States were dividing the world into zones of good and evil, much as it had during the Cold War. And Bush administration officials made it clear that other countries should defer to U.S. leadership in the worldwide war on terrorism. "The United States and only the United States can see this effort through to victory," said Vice President Dick Cheney in February 2002. This unilateral stance displeased some U.S. allies in Europe, who felt they should be treated as partners. B The Home Front United States domestic policy was also transformed in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. Local governments around the country, seeing how the New York City police and fire departments had been burdened, realized they needed to improve their own preparations for a terrorist attack. Of particular concern was the prospect of an attack involving chemical or biological weapons. Several letters containing potent anthrax spores were mailed to the offices of prominent media figures and politicians in October 2001, and five people died of inhalation anthrax, apparently after being exposed to the spores. The rash of anthrax cases sparked fears that terrorists were carrying out a biological attack. No link between terrorists and the anthrax mailings was found, but the fear prompted renewed efforts by public health organizations to prepare for such a calamity. For some in the U.S. government, the lesson of the September 11 attacks was that authorities needed greater ability to identify potential terrorists within American society and take whatever actions were necessary to stop them from carrying out attacks. In October 2001 the U.S. Congress passed a bill known as the Patriot Act that expanded police powers, allowing for more wiretapping of conversations and for the surveillance of computers and electronic mail. Civil libertarians expressed concern that the law could be misused, leading to the infringement of constitutional rights to privacy and liberty. Advocates of the law, including Attorney General John Ashcroft, argued that the need to be able to track down and intercept terrorists and prevent future attacks outweighed such concerns. United States officials were especially alarmed that the September 11 terrorists had been able to live, work, and freely move in the United States without anyone realizing what their plans were. The new antiterrorism law included a provision that would allow immigrants suspected of terrorist activities to be detained for seven days without charges and in some cases held for an additional six months. In November Ashcroft announced additional measures designed to keep terrorists out of the United States. It would henceforth be harder for foreign visitors to obtain U.S. visas, and U.S. authorities would have greater latitude to bar entry to people suspected of having links to terrorist organizations. The daily living and working patterns of Americans changed in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. Identity checks became more common. Air travel grew more complicated, as security personnel tightened screening procedures. Another legislative product of the attacks was the Aviation and Transportation Security Act, signed into law in November. As of January 18, 2002, all checked luggage had to be either screened by explosive detection machines or bomb-sniffing dogs, searched by hand, or at a minimum, only loaded onto a plane if the passenger who checked the bag was confirmed to be on board. In airports across the country, armed National Guard troops were stationed at security checkpoints. Armed federal marshals flew on many flights, especially those considered to be at a higher risk of hijacking. President Bush strengthened the domestic side of his counterterrorism program by signing a law in 2002 that created a new Cabinet-level department, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The mission of the DHS was to prevent terrorist attacks in the United States, reduce the country's vulnerability to terrorism, and plan responses and recovery in case of an attack. Bush chose Tom Ridge, previously head of the Office of Homeland Security, to be secretary of the new department. The DHS combined dozens of federal agencies, representing the largest reorganization in the federal government since the present-day Department of Defense was created in 1947. As the government worked to strengthen its defenses against terrorism, it also looked back at its failure to prevent the September 11 attacks. Two investigations of the circumstances surrounding the attacks began in 2002. The first, a joint inquiry of the intelligence committees of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, examined the activities of the FBI, CIA, and other intelligence agencies prior to and after the attacks. Its report, publicly released in 2003, detailed systemic problems among these agencies, including poor organization, inadequate staffing and training, and, above all, a failure to share crucial information with one another that might have led to detection of the September 11 plot. A second and larger investigation, by a bipartisan, independent commission chaired by former New Jersey governor Thomas H. Kean and formally known as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, released its findings in July 2004. The commission echoed many of the findings of the congressional inquiry, particularly regarding the failure of the CIA and FBI to share information. However, the commission's report differed from the congressional inquiry on the issue of Saudi Arabia's role in the attacks. The joint inquiry by Congress raised questions about whether members of the Saudi Arabian government helped finance the hijackers and provided them with intelligence, but the commission found no basis for these allegations. The commission also found that Iraq played no role in the attacks, saying there was no evidence of a "collaborative relationship" between the regime of Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda, a finding that was also made by the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee. Those findings challenged a major reason given by the Bush administration for its invasion of Iraq in 2003, and both President Bush and Vice President Cheney disputed the findings. See also U.S.-Iraq War. After the September 11 attacks, life in the United States slowly returned to normal. Much of the physical evidence of the attacks was removed. The section of the Pentagon destroyed by American Airlines Flight 77 was rebuilt, and the site of the World Trade Center towers was cleared of debris. An international design competition was held to decide how to rebuild the World Trade Center site. However, New York City, and the country in general, remained scarred by the September 11 attacks. Fear and uncertainty were newly important characteristics of the U.S. way of life. Contributed By: Tom Gjelten Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.