Here’s what I wrote on this day two years ago:
What happened on this day was by far the worst thing I’ve seen in my
life.I’ve been through a major earthquake, and while it was scary, it was
only a local disaster and didn’t come anywhere close to the destruction
caused by this attack.I was born after Pearl Harbor, so I don’t really know how people felt at
the time, but I’m pretty sure this will go down in history as being much
worse. Pearl Harbor was a military target and less than 3000 people
died. This attack was on a civilian target in the largest city in the US
and another attack was on one of our government’s offices. Over 50,000
people worked in the WTC and I’m sure the death toll will be many times
higher than Pearl Harbor.I can’t believe the WTC is gone. I’ve been in those buildings many times
and I’m familiar with that area. New York’s skyline is permanently
changed and tens of thousands of people are out of work. Many children
lost their lives and even more lost their families.I grew up during the 60s & 70s at the height of the Cold War, and when I
turned on the TV and saw the WTC on fire I immediately flashed back to
that time and thought “the Russians bombed us”. It was so much easier
during that time. We knew exactly who our enemies were. It was like a
Western with good guys & bad guys – “Us” & “Them”. Now it isn’t so easy.
We don’t know who our enemies are and there isn’t one big “Evil Empire”
any more. There are hundreds or thousands of terrorist groups all over
the world and we can’t possibly wipe them all out. Even if we do,
there’ll be so much resentment that more will spring up. There will be
more attacks in retalliation and we’ll be targets of terrorists all over
the world.