A Nation Challenged

I interrupt this retirement to bring you this edited version of a post from a few years ago.

Each year, on the day before Thankgiving, the Wall Street Journal runs the same two pieces on its editorial page. One is about the arrival of the pilgrims, the other about the promise of America. In that tradition, I offer my annual piece on the September 11 attacks.

Today marks the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks against the United States. The world is dramatically different in ways that have now become commonplace (new employees at my office are issued a gas mask), and yet the horror of that day itself has begun to fade into memory. As President Bush said in a speech nine days after the attacks, "Even grief recedes with time and grace."

My father grew up in Hawaii. He once described what it was like to be in Honolulu on December 7, 1941. He was working as a caddy when he saw plumes of black smoke rising in the distance. That day marked the beginning of a long struggle. I work in Washington and my sister in New York, so I can easily remember September 11, 2001. Like my father, I think I witnessed the start of a long war.

The first indication that something was wrong was a small news story on Yahoo that reported that a "small plane" had crashed into the World Trade Center. (You can see an archive of Yahoo from later that day here.) I thought that was a very strange accident. Not long after that, there was a flash about a second plane crashing into the World Trade Center. At that point, rumors began to fly. My friend R., who worked at the World Financial Center during the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, called me from London. "Do you know what's happening?" he asked. "Two planes have been crashed into the World Trade Center!" We have no televisions in our office, only the Internet.

My boss is out of the office at a large meeting in another part of the city. Instead of being instructed to evacuate, we are told by building security to stay inside. At about 9:45, news about the Pentagon circulates inside the building. Rumors swirl: a plane has crashed on the National Mall, a truck bomb has exploded at the State Department, the bridges have collapsed. My phone rings; it's my brother-in-law. "My sister told me to tell you to get out of there," he saids calmly. "Huh? What?" I ask. "My sister told me to tell you to get out of there. She can't reach you by phone, so she told me to tell you to get out of there." He is amazingly calm. My wife works in another part of Washington. Later I learn that she couldn't leave because there was a suspicious vehicle parked in front of her building.

At this point, I feel slightly disoriented, but figure that given the multiple attacks, it's better to defy orders and go home. As I head for the stairwell, the security guards make the rounds, shouting orders to evacuate. Once I step outside, it's near chaos. My building is next to a daycare center and the workers have led all of the kids outside into an open area. Children are screaming for their parents as the workers struggle to retain control. "Is the Metro running?" someone asks. "No!" comes the answer. I live in Virginia, on the other side of the Potomac River. I have only two options to get home: Metro or walk. I head for the Metro and find, to my amazement, that it is indeed running. My stop is Pentagon City on the Blue Line, which is the stop right next to the Pentagon. The train slows as it approaches the Pentagon, but it doesn't stop. The platform at the Pentagon is empty, but I don't see any damage. I get off at the next stop and walk through the eerily empty Pentagon City Mall. As I step outside, I'm struck by how bright and clear the day is. My wife makes it home a few hours later. The night is filled with the sound of sirens and helicopters.

I get a call from a friend in California asking about travel to New York. I remind him that all flights have been grounded. "I have to get to New York," he says. "My brother works at Cantor Fitzgerald." Later I learn that Cantor's offices occupied five floors at One World Trade Center and nearly two-thirds of Cantor's employees were killed that day. I remember meeting my friend's brother a few years ago. C. was a true foodie so we all went out to dinner at Galileo, one of the top restaurants in Washington. We ate and drank so much that by the end of the evening, I gasped, "We ate like kings!" He had a five-year-old daughter.

Later I learn that the passengers of United Flight 93 refused to capitulate. They seized control of the aircraft from the terrorists and crashed it into the ground. My office is very close to the White House, so I believe in my heart that those passengers saved my life.

Less than a month after the attacks, I have to fly to another country on business. About an hour before landing, the purser comes down the aisle, shakes each person's hand and says, "Thank you for flying."

America has long struggled between its impulse to serve and do good in the world and the desire to retreat into a shell and let the rest of the world hang itself. Thus the nation that produced George Marshall, Bretton Woods, and the Peace Corps also produced Lou Dobbs, Smoot-Hawley, and the Minutemen Project.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan hasn't caused much disruption to the lives of most people. There is no rationing, no blackouts, and life continues as it did before. As a result, we don't feel that we are at war, but I believe we are. (Here I speak not of the wars specifically, but more broadly.) You can call it a "clash of civilizations," or a war against Islamofacism. However you label it, I believe that liberal democracy is under assault and this conflict will continue for many years. This is a war we can't afford to lose.