Today Is:

Iraq’s Smoking Gun by Sam Pender (Nov 2003)
Chapter 1.
September 11th Changed Everything
-Sorta

We all have our stories from that day. No one will forget where they were when the planes started crashing, or when the reports came in of one attack and then another. Where were you? What did you think? Did you know it was a terrorist attack right away, or-like this author-did you hope in vain that the first plane to hit the World Trade Center was some sort of fluke air traffic control problem?
Here’s my story (warning: it’s the tale of a commoner).
I was working in the administrative office of a small tool and die manufacturer in Twinsburg, Ohio. Of the 10 people in the company, 3 were family members. The rest of us had been there for years and developed a relationship that resembled similar kinship. It was early morning, and I had just finished my routine of turning on computers, collecting timecards, entering payables into the computer, and getting some of the guys in the shop setup with fresh machining jobs for the day.

I heard the machines in the shop all stop at once, and then I heard the guys start yelling across the floor to each other. There was still a lot of white noise coming from the compressors, filters, and some of the machines that rarely powered down, so I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but it was clear there was a problem. Just as I was about to walk out and see what was wrong, Brian-one of the new guys in the shop came into the office with his radio. He wasn’t nervous, but there was a clear air of anticipation, confusion, and a bit of shock in his voice. “A plane just hit the World Trade Center.”

I sat back down and immediately logged on to CNN Online, and there was the picture of smoke billowing from one of the towers. Around the world, hundreds of millions of other people were doing the same thing. I know this because CNN’s website was swamped, and almost impossible to update from that point on.

After telling the rest of the people in the office, and letting the guys in the shop come in to see the picture on my computer, everyone went back to work. I called my wife at Goodyear Headquarters in Akron, Ohio.
She tried to log on too, but couldn’t. Thankfully, they had a TV in their office, and already a crowd had gathered. She was also able to get some more details on what was happening. I was talking with her as she watched the second plane hit the second tower. Not 10 seconds later, Brian came back in and announced it to us in our office. With his radio, he was our ears for the day. My wife and the slow-to-refresh CNN website would be our eyes.

Before the second plane had hit, we had all immediately assumed it was a terrorist strike, but as the resident military and political knowledge source/aficionado, I had tried to calm everyone-including myself-by coming up with hopeful theories. This included the pipe dream that maybe both planes were the result of a terrible air traffic control issue. We all knew it wasn’t true, but we hoped.
Just a few minutes after the second plane hit, my wife told us that FOX News-the channel they were watching-had just announced that it was a terrorist attack, that an unknown number of planes had been hijacked, and that as many as 50,000 people could be inside the WTC. In that instant, it was clear…America was at war.

I’ve always been a history buff. I liked learning the little tidbits of information that lead to the big events in the record of the human experience. I knew that on one night in 1945, American General Curtis LeMay used B-29 bombers with napalm to kill 100,000 Japanese in Tokyo. I knew that the bombing of Hiroshima killed over 60,000 people, and that the same was roughly true of Nagasaki. I knew that 1,000,000+ had died at the Battle of Stalingrad, or that almost 2,000,000 died at the WWI Battle of the Marne. I knew all kinds of stats that gave scale to some of history’s most pivotal events, and I knew that 50,000 people in two burning, New York City buildings would have been similar to a nuclear strike. It was common knowledge in movies, books, and news that terrorists would love nothing better than to use a nuke against the United States-the Great Satan. If 50,000 people died, they’re nuclear-level casualty goal would have been achieved.

Believe it or not, all these thoughts passed through my mind in an instant as though the entire thing was happening in slow motion. Brian and the other guys in the shop all kept coming in and giving me updates as though I were some sort of HQ. The phone rang from family, friends, vendors, and customers all wanting to share information with me too. Certainly there was nothing that I could do from the office of a small manufacturing shop in Twinsburg, Ohio. I guess everyone knew that I was someone who kept track of military history, terrorists, and the like. It seemed everyone wanted to share their information and see what else I had heard. I became information central for many.

People told me that at least a dozen planes had been hijacked, and that the people on the planes were being told by the hijackers to use their cell phones and call home to say goodbye. We heard phone calls from the people in the burning towers. There was a report that a plane had hit the Capitol building. The White House was frantically evacuated with press and staff seen running for their lives. A hijacked plane was forced to land at Cleveland Hopkins airport a few miles to the north. A mysterious white van was stopped by Ohio highway patrol and closed down 2 major highways. The President was being flown to a nuclear war bunker. There was a report that the Pentagon had been hit and the entire building had collapsed. All of the aircraft in North America were being ordered to land immediately. I was on the phone with a customer who actually saw a passenger plane flying low directly over his business (later, it was determined that this was in fact Flt 93!).

Now, I don’t know if it was because I was at a machine shop, or if it was a common feeling in the world, but overpowering the feeling of confusion and nervousness, there was a very very strong attitude of retribution. The guys in the shop were pissed, and that is a huge understatement. More than one advocated nuking the entire Middle East. One even went so far as to suggest nuking it, and then turning everything from Morocco to India into a giant parking lot-asphalt and everything!

By this point-about 30 minutes after the second plane had hit the WTC, it was undeniably a terrorist attack, but there was not a shred of public evidence pointing to Al Queda. Still, the people I was with, and the people I spoke to on the phone were almost unanimous in their disdain for the Arab and Muslim world. In hindsight, I wonder what would have happened if America’s nuclear arsenal had been in control of an average American, and how many millions of lives would have been lost to nuclear rage?

The smoke and flames at the WTC and Pentagon were shocking. The unconfirmed reports of other attacks were unnerving. The skies devoid of contrails from civilian air traffic was stunning, but the real horror of the day didn’t hit home until pictures started appearing on internet news sites and on TV new broadcast-pictures of people jumping from the WTC towers. I for one will never forget them. There were pictures of blackened and burnt businessmen jumping headfirst to a quick and painless end. We saw couples jumping-with their hands grasped together-rather than being burned alive. We saw pictures of hundreds of people crowded together and hanging out of broken windows so that they could get a last gasp of air. For all these hundreds and thousands of people, there was little hope of rescue, and everyone in the world knew it-themselves included. Many called home to say their goodbyes in the same manner that those on the hijacked planes were doing.

As 50,000 people evacuated the WTC, and another 20-30,000 evacuated the surrounding buildings, thousands of firefighters, police, and other emergency workers rushed into the dying buildings. They climbed stairwells packed with fleeing civilians. They carried hundreds of pounds of gear all the way up to the fires, and they did the impossible. They got the people out of harm’s way. Over 600 gave their lives in the effort to save tens of thousands. Those 600+ denied the terrorists a nuclear level casualty count. To a man, they were some of the greatest heroes in American history. Without their sacrifice, instead of 2,800+ dead, it’s very easy to imagine 28,000 dead in just the two WTC towers. You can call that Miracle #1 of the day.

Not long after people began jumping from the towers, the first one fell, and then the second. It was a shocking sight, but no one doubted it was going to happen. The only real surprise was that they fell in upon themselves, and not sideways into the rest of NYC. You can call that Miracle #2.

As the second tower fell, and the Pentagon collapse was finally seen for what it was-just a section and not the entire building, the rest of the attack became clearer. The possible car bomb on the Ohio highway was just a stolen van. The hijacked plane at Cleveland Hopkins Airport was little more than radio confusion on a day that should have had many more such incidents. The dozen hijacked planes were only 3, but one more remained missing. It was presumed hijacked over Cleveland, then flew south to (surprise) the Twinsburg, Ohio area. From there, it turned east and followed the Pennsylvania Turnpike toward Washington. Over the PA border, it dropped down and was periodically lost to radar coverage. U.S. Air Force fighters had been ordered to find it and shoot it down, but it was later learned that the planes sent were unarmed and would have had to ram the plane-though the pilots were readily prepared to do so.

Flt 93 crashed about 10 minutes away from Washington. It nose-dived into a Pennsylvania field-a reclaimed strip mine-in the small town of Shanksville. The USAF pilots were just seconds away from ramming it. Early reports from the scene indicated that the plane had hit with such force that nothing larger than a telephone book had survived. The plane was blown to bits. In fact, the explosion was so powerful that fuel from the wings was thrown into the air and arced over a nearby wooded area creating a ring of fire instead of a giant splash.

Within an hour, the news media had interviews with family members who had spoken with loved ones on Flt 93. They had informed the passengers about the attacks on the WTC and Pentagon, and-knowing their fate-the passengers voted to try and re-take the plane. Days after the fact, when the plane’s voice data recorder was recovered, it was clear that the passengers had at least made it into the cockpit, but whether they crashed the plane or the hijackers crashed it is lost to history. In any case, it was clear that the plane was headed for Washington D.C. and years later, it was determined that the hijackers’ objective was the Capitol building. That handful of people who voted to try and retake the plane were acting to save their own lives, but they also knew that retaking the plane would save others on the ground. Their decision-their vote-can be called nothing short of heroic, and that courage was Miracle #3.

After the plane was reported down, and the smoking pit was seen on the internet, I went outside and looked at the sky. It was a beautiful blue morning, but there wasn’t a single white line from a passenger plane. From Bangor, Maine to San Diego, California, from Seattle, Washington to Miami, Florida, the only things in the sky were birds and the USAF. I felt safe knowing that American pilots were above and guarding the nation. I looked up and saw a different sky-a different America. I saw a sky that held warplanes someplace-warplanes looking for enemy targets over Ohio. This was no dream, no fiction, but a new reality. The world was different.

My story certainly has no personal heroism in it. There are thousands and tens of thousands of people who were in those towers, the Pentagon, in air traffic control centers, rushing to hospitals, or on immediate alert at military bases around the world. At embassies around the world, Marines locked and loaded their machine guns and took up posts. On aircraft carriers and all the ships at sea, there was an immediate wartime footing. As the Pentagon’s National Command Center filled with smoke, the last thing that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld did was to order a carrier to NYC to assist in medical ops. Then he transferred control to a secondary location and went outside to drag wounded people from the burning building. All I did was gather information and try to keep people informed-something that tens of thousands of media people did a lot better than I.

Many readers have will have memories of crawling out of a burning building, or organizing emergency response activities. Some were on one scene or another gathering information in an effort to keep the world informed and calm people by quelling uncertainty. Others-like this author-watched and wondered. In any event, everyone in the entire world who watched the events of September 11, 2001 was a participant in one way or another. We all wondered what would happen next, and we all wondered about our own safety at one time or another-even if for a brief instant. In that moment, we were all attacked by the terrorists.

The next few pages of this book are blank for a reason. Everyone has a 0911 story. While this book might change hands quite a bit, the pages are blank for original owners to write down their personal 0911 story. Of course, if this is a library book, it’s advised that readers all use separate paper to write down their story rather than write in a library book. In any case, please take a moment to just log a few things anonymously if you wish.

Where were you when you first heard about the 0911 attacks?

Did you know right away that it was a terrorist attack?

When you heard that the planes had been hijacked before being used as missiles, did you suspect Middle Eastern terrorists?

What feelings did you have on 0911, and was anger one of them?

If you were President on 09/12/01, what would you have done?

So, it’s been said that 0911 changed everything. The phrase of the year was, “If we (change in anyway), then the terrorists win.” That statement was paralleled by the “September 11th changed everything” line. The fires were still burning, the bodies were still being counted, and as unified as the world seemed on the surface, there was already a deep split in what was learned from that day’s horrors. There was a bit of truth to both statements, but that truth was swept aside in lieu of comfort and a desire to return to the way it was on September 10th. 9/11 Marked the day when America’s oceanic walls of protection finally came down. From that day forward, it should have been clear that the global economy, the global environment, the world of international terrorism all changed. From that day forward, the words international and global would no longer mean everyone else on the planet. From 9/11 forward, American’s would have to face the fact that troubles on the other side of the oceans could not be ignored.

Time and distance from the events of September the 11th will not make us safer unless we act on its lessons. America is no longer protected by vast oceans. We are protected from attack only by vigorous action abroad, and increased vigilance at home.
(-President Bush’s January 29, 2002 State-of-the-Union Address)

The post Vietnam populist preference of military isolationism would have to give way to a new policy and commitment of involvement. Every administration since LBJ had been trapped by a public that was simply afraid of getting involved in the disputes of other nations. This lead to an American history and reputation of involve + retreat=defeat (see also Appendix re: pre-cursor models for the war in Iraq). After Saudi terrorists-trained in Afghanistan-had used aircraft to attack 50-100,000 people in New York, it was clear that technology and commitment have rendered oceans useless as defensive walls, but that day was rooted in history and watered in warnings.