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-- Well Written view on what happened on Tuesday
Well Written view on what happened on Tuesday
http://www.michaelmoore.com/2001_0912.html
Death, Downtown
Dear friends,
I was supposed to fly today on the 4:30 PM American Airlines flight from LAX to JFK. But tonight I find myself stuck in L.A. with an incredible range of emotions over what has happened on the island where I work and live in New York City.
My wife and I spent the first hours of the day � after being awakened by phone calls from our parents at 6:40am PT � trying to contact our daughter at school in New York and our friend JoAnn who works near the World Trade Center.
I called JoAnn at her office. As someone picked up, the first tower imploded, and the person answering the phone screamed and ran out, leaving me no clue as to whether or not she or JoAnn would live.
It was a sick, horrible, frightening day.
On December 27, 1985 I found myself caught in the middle of a terrorist incident at the Vienna airport � which left 30 people dead, both there and at the Rome airport. (The machine-gunning of passengers in each city was timed to occur at the same moment.)
I do not feel like discussing that event tonight because it still brings up too much despair and confusion as to how and why I got to live� a fluke, a mistake, a few feet on the tarmac, and I am still here, there but for the grace of�
Safe. Secure. I�m an American, living in America. I like my illusions. I walk through a metal detector, I put my carry-ons through an x-ray machine, and I know all will be well.
Here�s a short list of my experiences lately with airport security:
* At the Newark Airport, the plane is late at boarding everyone. The counter can�t find my seat. So I am told to just �go ahead and get on� � without a ticket!
* At Detroit Metro Airport, I don�t want to put the lunch I just bought at the deli through the x-ray machine so, as I pass through the metal detector, I hand the sack to the guard through the space between the detector and the x-ray machine. I tell him �It�s just a sandwich.� He believes me and doesn�t bother to check. The sack has gone through neither security device.
* At LaGuardia in New York, I check a piece of luggage, but decide to catch a later plane. The first plane leaves without me, but with my bag � no one knowing what is in it.
* Back in Detroit, I take my time getting off the commuter plane. By the time I have come down its stairs, the bus that takes the passengers to the terminal has left � without me. I am alone on the tarmac, free to wander wherever I want. So I do. Eventually, I flag down a pick-up truck and an airplane mechanic gives me a ride the rest of the way to the terminal.
* I have brought knives, razors; and once, my traveling companion brought a hammer and chisel. No one stopped us.
Of course, I have gotten away with all of this because the airlines consider my safety SO important, they pay rent-a-cops $5.75 an hour to make sure the bad guys don�t get on my plane. That is what my life is worth � less than the cost of an oil change.
Too harsh, you say? Well, chew on this: a first-year pilot on American Eagle (the commuter arm of American Airlines) receives around $15,000 a year in annual pay.
That�s right � $15,000 for the person who has your life in his hands. Until recently, Continental Express paid a little over $13,000 a year. There was one guy, an American Eagle pilot, who had four kids so he went down to the welfare office and applied for food stamps � and he was eligible!
Someone on welfare is flying my plane? Is this for real? Yes, it is.
So spare me the talk about all the precautions the airlines and the FAA is taking. They, like all businesses, are concerned about one thing � the bottom line and the profit margin.
Four teams of 3-5 people were all able to penetrate airport security on the same morning at 3 different airports and pull off this heinous act? My only response is � that�s all?
Well, the pundits are in full diarrhea mode, gushing on about the �terrorist threat� and today�s scariest dude on planet earth � Osama bin Laden. Hey, who knows, maybe he did it. But, something just doesn�t add up.
Am I being asked to believe that this guy who sleeps in a tent in a desert has been training pilots to fly our most modern, sophisticated jumbo jets with such pinpoint accuracy that they are able to hit these three targets without anyone wondering why these planes were so far off path?
Or am I being asked to believe that there were four religious/political fanatics who JUST HAPPENED to be skilled airline pilots who JUST HAPPENED to want to kill themselves today?
Maybe you can find one jumbo jet pilot willing to die for the cause � but FOUR? Ok, maybe you can � I don�t know.
What I do know is that all day long I have heard everything about this bin Laden guy except this one fact � WE created the monster known as Osama bin Laden!
Where did he go to terrorist school? At the CIA!
Don�t take my word for it � I saw a piece on MSNBC last year that laid it all out. When the Soviet Union occupied Afghanistan, the CIA trained him and his buddies in how to commits acts of terrorism against the Soviet forces. It worked! The Soviets turned and ran. Bin Laden was grateful for what we taught him and thought it might be fun to use those same techniques against us.
We abhor terrorism � unless we�re the ones doing the terrorizing.
We paid and trained and armed a group of terrorists in Nicaragua in the 1980s who killed over 30,000 civilians. That was OUR work. You and me. Thirty thousand murdered civilians and who the hell even remembers!
We fund a lot of oppressive regimes that have killed a lot of innocent people, and we never let the human suffering THAT causes to interrupt our day one single bit.
We have orphaned so many children, tens of thousands around the world, with our taxpayer-funded terrorism (in Chile, in Vietnam, in Gaza, in Salvador) that I suppose we shouldn�t be too surprised when those orphans grow up and are a little whacked in the head from the horror we have helped cause.
Yet, our recent domestic terrorism bombings have not been conducted by a guy from the desert but rather by our own citizens: a couple of ex-military guys who hated the federal government.
From the first minutes of today�s events, I never heard that possibility suggested. Why is that?
Maybe it�s because the A-rabs are much better foils. A key ingredient in getting Americans whipped into a frenzy against a new enemy is the all-important race card. It�s much easier to get us to hate when the object of our hatred doesn�t look like us.
Congressmen and Senators spent the day calling for more money for the military; one Senator on CNN even said he didn�t want to hear any more talk about more money for education or health care � we should have only one priority: our self-defense.
Will we ever get to the point that we realize we will be more secure when the rest of the world isn�t living in poverty so we can have nice running shoes?
In just 8 months, Bush gets the whole world back to hating us again. He withdraws from the Kyoto agreement, walks us out of the Durban conference on racism, insists on restarting the arms race � you name it, and Baby Bush has blown it all.
The Senators and Congressmen tonight broke out in a spontaneous version of �God Bless America.� They�re not a bad group of singers!
Yes, God, please do bless us.
Many families have been devastated tonight. This just is not right. They did not deserve to die. If someone did this to get back at Bush, then they did so by killing thousands of people who DID NOT VOTE for him! Boston, New York, DC, and the planes� destination of California � these were places that voted AGAINST Bush!
Why kill them? Why kill anyone? Such insanity�
Let�s mourn, let�s grieve, and when it�s appropriate let�s examine our contribution to the unsafe world we live in.
It doesn�t have to be like this�
Yours,
Michael Moore
Good letter Swamper, I read this earlier and totally understood his feelings about inadaquacies in what happened. This is what we should be worrying about, not who did it, or Nostradamus. This puts more crap information in our lives.
I went home from the train to NYC on Tues, and just realize that I couldn't do anything about what happened. Then I thought about if my family is safe. This blow took alot of our securities away from ourselves.
America will be stronger after this, but we will be more cautious in our relations and policies.
God Bless everyone and their families. Please give blood if you are in the US.
Payce
Wow thats some of the most honest journalism i've seen in a long long time. He's got guts to write something like that at a time like this and i respect that a lot. Sadly this stuff is so true, i know you americans may not like to hear this stuff but it's dead true.
I abhor violence and i want nothing more then the apprehension of the purpetrators brought to justice in ANY way shape or form but lets make sure we get the right person responsible for it. And the old adage is true you know. When you point your finger at someone there's four left pointing at you.
The US is the most violent country on the planet (outside of South Africa, and i was there). It has helped keep regimes in power and financed wars and all for political power. Who do you think sponsored Saddam back when Iraq and Iran were at war with each other. Why the US were giving him arms and CIA personal to teach him how to use those arms. And now Saddam is the biggest vilest baddie on the planet (well second to bin laden of course) because he got a bit greedy and decided to take back land that actually did belong to Iraq years ago. And of course to show off a bit of might and get some more oil barrels.
Well what did the US do but step in right fast. Why? because it wanted to free the Kuwaiti's? nah...because Saddam was gonna have a big monopoly on the Oil and it would rise the oil prices for the average american. So off to war we go!!
There's thousands of war vets that weren't even told that the shells they were firing from their tanks were depleted uranium tipped. Hundreds are suffering from Gulf war syndrome that the government hasn't even admitted to being dangerous. Some interesting information about the sanctions on Iraq and the effect it's having on it's people
http://www.flonnet.com/fl1812/18120630.htm
What about Bosnia? Did the US step in to protect the people there? No there's no Oil there so they didn't bother for a few years till it was necessary.
I'm sure someone is going to knock what i have to say but before you do go do some research on what I've said and then come back and knock me
Why can't the world just get along and live harmoniously? Why do we see the need to put down/make fun of/hurt/kill/bomb someone just because they're different then us and have a different culture or religion. I'm just sick of it!! Lets just live in peace and harmony and get along with our fellow man. Lets not be too quick to point the finger or pass the blame here. And as the Bible says...He that has no sin among you, let HIM cast the first stone
Sorry if i've ranted but it's been bugging me.....
Read this is if you're looking for more information
http://www.stateterrorism.freeservers.com/newpage1.htm
I'm speechless.......this man should run for president! He shows intelligence and logical thinking, rationality and he doesn't start to be violent towards possible suspects....man! if only bush could think this way.....
yeah this guy definetly has some perspective on the issue...it was terrible what happened...but there are alot of things that people have over-looked when trying to understand the reasons for the attack. people get hot-headed and just want instant revenge without thinking about how we could change so this wouldn't happen again.
Sincerly that's the best analysis i've read since the events of tuesday ... he said it all , now America shouldn't be surprised if a lot of people in other countries hate them . Like we say in french : ils ont recolt� les fruits de ce qu'ils ont sem� (they collected the fruit of what they sowed) ... Anyways , i still agree that civilians must stay out of this kind of things , if there's a war then it should be between politicians (not even soldiers , soldiers don't decide) .
wow im speechless not for same the reasons you all posted about but for the opposite i cant beleive all the replies to this article i will agree this attack should somewhat be expected and our airport security is very lax but for all the statements or inacurracy after make me sad
america does have a strong influence over the world both politically and financially (look at the worlds stock markets now) and when the us helped arm bin laden and the other jihad freedom fighters were when the soviet union invaded afganastan the usa has always publicly stated we will help any country in need and we have i know there is a large anti american sentiment world wide and it is soooooo unfair i received this article in my email from a friend in canada its an editorial page artcle from a paper up there
it goes as follows
"You have to wear your heart just like a gun."-Jack Ingram
>
>Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2001 12:09:36 EDT
>
>Subject: America
>
>I just received this from a friend and it is thought provoking to say the
>least. I am proud to call this great country my home and hope you will
>share this article with the people you know.
>Elizabeth
>
>TRIBUTE TO THE UNITED STATES
>
>This, from a Canadian newspaper, is worth sharing.
>
>America: The Good Neighbor.
>
>"Widespread but only partial news coverage was given recently to a
>remarkable editorial broadcast from Toronto by Gordon Sinclair, a Canadian
>television and radio Commentator. He can be heard daily on CJAD 800 AM
>radio. What follows is the full text of his trenchant remarks as printed
>in the Congressional Record:
>
>"This Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the most
>generous and possibly the least appreciated people on all the earth.
>Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy were lifted out
>of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars
and
>forgave other billions in debts.
>
>None of these countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining
>debts to the United States. When France was in danger of collapsing in
>1956, it was the Americans who propped it up, and their reward was to be
>insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris. I was there. I saw it.
>
>When earthquakes hit distant cities, it is the United States that hurries
>in to help. This spring, 59 American communities were flattened by
>tornadoes. Nobody helped. The Marshall Plan and the Truman Policy pumped
>billions of dollars into discouraged countries. Now newspapers in those
>countries are writing about the decadent, warmongering Americans.
>
>I'd like to see just one of those countries that is gloating over the
>erosion of the United States dollar build its own airplane. Does any
other
>country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the
>Lockheed Tri-Star, or the Douglas DC10?
>
>If so, why don't they fly them? Why do all the International lines except
>Russia fly American Planes? Why does no other land on earth even consider
>putting a man or woman on the moon? You talk about Japanese
>technocracy, and you get radios. You talk about German technocracy, and
>you get automobiles. You talk about American technocracy, and you find
men
>on the moon - not once, but several times - and safely home again.
>
>You talk about scandals, and the Americans put theirs right in the store
>window for everybody to look at. Even their draft-dodgers are not pursued
>and hounded. They are here on our streets, and most of them, unless they
>are breaking Canadian laws, are getting American dollars from ma and pa at
>home to spend here.
>
>When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through
>age, it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania
Railroad
>and the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose.
>Both are still broke.
>
>I can name you 5000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other
>people in trouble. Can you name me even one time when someone else raced
>to the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even
>during the San Francisco earthquake.
>
>Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I'm one Canadian who is damned
tired
>of hearing them get kicked around. They will come out of this thing with
>their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose
>at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada
>is not one of those."
>
>Stand proud, America! Wear it proudly!!"
>
>This is one of the best editorials that I have ever read regarding the
>United States. It is nice that one man realizes it. I only wish that the
>rest of the world would realize it. We are always blamed for everything,
>and never even get a thank you for the things we do.
>
>I would hope that each of you would send this to as many people as you can
>and emphasize that they should send it to as many of their friends until
>this letter is sent to every person on the web. I am just a single
>American that has read this, I SURE HOPE THAT A LOT MORE READ IT SOON
>
>
when i recieved this it brought more tears to my eyes as all this weeks activities have done its too late now but i would really love for us to get a president who would say ok america we do need to help our country so from jan. 1 to the following jan 1 we will NOT aide any foriegn country or entity for one entire year and see how the world does on its own. im trying to be mightier than thow but but im sick of people looking at the small picture instead of the large
godbless america this is the greatest country in the world!
For those of you who don't, please subscribe to his mailing list, this man is a really cool guy and has such a great view on things.
His monthly (usually) emails are always a great read, and if you didn't know he has some great documentaries, Roger and Me, and the Big one.... Highly recommend them both if you appreciate his writing.
Thanks for posting that Swamper, people need to see some honesty right now, its so easy to get caught up in all this mess.
signing up right now 
Juzfugen, if we d hold a pop quiz with like 5000 ppl, from all around the world, bout the world, and all countries, religions, nations etc in it, i bet the Americans will FAIL the test, cuz u dunno whaz goin on in the world, damn, id be amazed if 6 out of 10 ppl from the US can locate 5 random countries on this planet!!! the other day we dedicated like an entire class on the USA, analizing what happened, how and why... we came to the conclusion that most Americans r short minded, believe EVERYTHING the press says, think they know everything the best and think America rules the world, well, to all those Americans who believe that: GET FUCKING REAL!!!!!!!! America is big, ok, so a lot of ppl live there, ok, so when u got a lot of ppl, u got a bigger chance that THEY discover smth, or do smth good, ok, so iz more than reasonable a big country makes more money, ok, so it has a big influence on the world, ok, but that doesnt mean u r the best!!!! just for fun, compare Americas numbers (any of them) to those of the rest of the world, not absolute, no, cuz ofcourse America will come out best, but now, take it relative, see how bad America will come out!!!!
and the "American freedom", id like to know what they think IS freedom?? cuz i dont really got a clue how u can call urself free, in a country that strangles itself in rules...
just some random rant, thanx for ur time
impressive letter...
I found this article somwhere , i donno if u guys interested :
| quote: |
>On December 27, 1985 I found myself caught in the middle of a terrorist >incident at the Vienna airport -- which left 30 people dead, both there and >at the Rome airport. (The machine-gunning of passengers in each city was >timed to occur at the same moment.) > >I do not feel like discussing that event tonight because it still brings up >too much despair and confusion as to how and why I got to live. a fluke, a >mistake, a few feet on the tarmac, and I am still here, there but for the >grace of. > >Safe. Secure. I'm an American, living in America. I like my illusions. I >walk through a metal detector, I put my carry-ons through an x-ray machine, >and I know all will be well. > >Here's a short list of my experiences lately with airport security: > >* At the Newark Airport, the plane is late at boarding everyone. The counter >can't find my seat. So I am told to just "go ahead and get on" -- without a >ticket! > >* At Detroit Metro Airport, I don't want to put the lunch I just bought at >the deli through the x-ray machine so, as I pass through the metal detector, >I hand the sack to the guard through the space between the detector and the >x-ray machine. I tell him "It's just a sandwich." He believes me and doesn't >bother to check. The sack has gone through neither security device. > >* At LaGuardia in New York, I check a piece of luggage, but decide to catch >a later plane. The first plane leaves without me, but with my bag -- no one >knowing what is in it. > >* Back in Detroit, I take my time getting off the commuter plane. By the >time I have come down its stairs, the bus that takes the passengers to the >terminal has left -- without me. I am alone on the tarmac, free to wander >wherever I want. So I do. Eventually, I flag down a pick-up truck and an >airplane mechanic gives me a ride the rest of the way to the terminal. > >* I have brought knives, razors; and once, my traveling companion brought a >hammer and chisel. No one stopped us. > >Of course, I have gotten away with all of this because the airlines consider >my safety SO important, they pay rent-a-cops $5.75 an hour to make sure the >bad guys don't get on my plane. That is what my life is worth -- less than >the cost of an oil change. Too harsh, you say? Well, chew on this: a first-year pilot on American Eagle >(the commuter arm of American Airlines) receives around $15,000 a year in >annual pay. > >That's right -- $15,000 for the person who has your life in his hands. Until >recently, Continental Express paid a little over $13,000 a year. There was >one guy, an American Eagle pilot, who had four kids so he went down to the >welfare office and applied for food stamps -- and he was eligible! Someone on welfare is flying my plane? Is this for real? Yes, it is. > >So spare me the talk about all the precautions the airlines and the FAA is >taking. They, like all businesses, are concerned about one thing -- the >bottom line and the profit margin. > >Four teams of 3-5 people were all able to penetrate airport security on the >same morning at 3 different airports and pull off this heinous act? My only >response is -- that's all? > >Well, the pundits are in full diarrhea mode, gushing on about the "terrorist >threat" and today's scariest dude on planet earth -- Osama bin Laden. Hey, >who knows, maybe he did it. But, something just doesn't add up. > >Am I being asked to believe that this guy who sleeps in a tent in a desert >has been training pilots to fly our most modern, sophisticated jumbo jets >with such pinpoint accuracy that they are able to hit these three targets >without anyone wondering why these planes were so far off path? > >Or am I being asked to believe that there were four religious/political >fanatics who JUST HAPPENED to be skilled airline pilots who JUST HAPPENED to >want to kill themselves today? > >Maybe you can find one jumbo jet pilot willing to die for the cause -- but >FOUR? Ok, maybe you can -- I don't know. > >What I do know is that all day long I have heard everything about this bin >Laden guy except this one fact -- WE created the monster known as Osama bin >Laden! > >Where did he go to terrorist school? At the CIA! How embarassing is that? > >Don't take my word for it -- I saw a piece on MSNBC last year that laid it >all out. When the Soviet Union occupied Afghanistan, the CIA trained him and >his buddies in how to commits acts of terrorism against the Soviet forces. >It worked! The Soviets turned and ran. Bin Laden was grateful for >what we taught him and thought it might be fun to use those same techniques >against us. > >We abhor terrorism -- unless we're the ones doing the terrorizing. > >We paid and trained and armed a group of terrorists in Nicaragua in the >1980s who killed over 30,000 civilians. That was OUR work. You and me. >Thirty thousand murdered civilians and who the hell even remembers! > >We fund a lot of oppressive regimes that have killed a lot of innocent >people, and we never let the human suffering THAT causes to interrupt our >day one single bit. > >We have orphaned so many children, tens of thousands around the world, with >our taxpayer-funded terrorism (in Chile, in Vietnam, in Gaza, in Salvador) >that I suppose we shouldn't be too surprised when those orphans grow up and >are a little whacked in the head from the horror we have helped cause. > >Yet, our recent domestic terrorism bombings have not been conducted by a guy >from the desert but rather by our own citizens: a couple of ex-military guys >who hated the federal government. > >From the first minutes of today's events, I never heard that possibility >suggested. Why is that? > >Maybe it's because the A-rabs are much better foils. A key ingredient in >getting Americans whipped into a frenzy against a new enemy is the >all-important race card. It's much easier to get us to hate when the object >of our hatred doesn't look like us. > >Congressmen and Senators spent the day calling for more money for the >military; one Senator on CNN even said he didn't want to hear any more talk >about more money for education or health care -- we should have only one >priority: our self-defense. > >Will we ever get to the point that we realize we will be more secure when >the rest of the world isn't living in poverty so we can have nice running >shoes? > >In just 8 months, Bush gets the whole world back to hating us again. He >withdraws from the Kyoto agreement, walks us out of the Durban conference on >racism, insists on restarting the arms race -- you name it, and Baby Bush >has blown it all. > >The Senators and Congressmen tonight broke out in a spontaneous version of >"God Bless America." They're not a bad group of singers! > >Yes, God, please do bless us. > >Many families have been devastated tonight. This just is not right. They did >not deserve to die. If someone did this to get back at Bush, then they did >so by killing thousands of people who DID NOT VOTE for him! Boston, New >York, DC, and the planes' destination of California -- these were places >that voted AGAINST Bush! > >Why kill them? Why kill anyone? Such insanity. > >Let's mourn, let's grieve, and when it's appropriate let's examine our >contribution to the unsafe world we live in. > >It doesn't have to be like this. > >Yours, > >Michael Moore >[email protected] |
Great to see an individual who`s thinking logically, and shares the same facts&ideas as me, not just someone "going with the crowd" ...
Indeed as i mentioned @ another forum, CIA & USA ows it to themselves in fact...what is called Blowback...
Thank you!
Ooooooooooooooooooooops
Sorry Swamper ! hahaha i didnt realize its the same cuz i posted mine b4 i read urs!
Its the same .... it was emailed to me too lol
Sorry dood...
Anyway its pretty interesting quote.
michael moore is the man, he is always thinking ten steps ahead of most americans. i cant say that i agree with gekhous' comments on americans failing whatever test he refers to. it may seem that we americans have a gross superiority complex, but this is untrue. the makeup of our country(by arrogance or however you judge us) prolly follows the same curve that the rest of the world fits into. i cant really say the same for our military, government or especially those in control of the media. mr. moore summed up so many ideas floating through my head, none of which the media has ever touched, simply cause they arent sensationalist. everyone around the world prolly gets their depiction of our country throught our media and this is wrong. two things that this tragedy should teach EVERYONE, not just americans, is that we must learn that we are all the same, all family and all affected, no matter how much you find americans offensive, arrogant or otherwise. we also need to continue with our lives; terrorists(no matter what creed or country they derive from) are trying to rile up their victims, by moving on with our lives and showing respect and love, we truly fight this war. late...biz
Great article, I like how everyone kinda has their own opinion or little story to tell about what happened. I actually don't think the US is responsible no matter how bad airport security is. Or the fact that they trained Bin Laden. That is politics at its best, the US will always be complicated and will always stick their nose sometimes were it doesn't belong. However... what happened on tuesday was ridiculous. No one deserves that. I really hope this makes the Americans stronger. 9/10 Americans want to see retaliation, I think it's about time the US fucking kicks some ass again. =))
*just a lil two cents from a fellow neighbor from the north*
Jon
Sydney Morning Herald 15 Sept 2001
There were subtle warnings a big terrorist attack on the US was imminent, writes Paul McGeough.
This week the United States stands before the world wounded in body and soul. Shell-shocked by brilliantly executed terrorist assaults on New York and Washington, President George Bush is struggling to assure 275 million Americans he will deal with the enemy.
This is the superpower that likes to think it rules the world, that triumphed after 45 hard years of the Cold War. But now two of the greatest symbols of its prowess and world domination - the Wall Street financial district and the Pentagon military bunkers in Washington - are damaged beyond belief. Fortress America has been breached by terrorists armed with little more than Stanley trimmers, but driven by a fanatical determination that made it more than the equal of US strategic might. And now Americans want to know why.
On Tuesday thousands died. The symbolism of this loss is a huge victory for the terrorists. Then came some of the darkest hours as Americans, transfixed by the real-life horror on their TV screens, wondered about their sense of security and confidence at the top of the world.
For almost a day terrified citizens were unsure of just where their president and commander-in-chief was. His words were relayed on TV, but he had gone to ground. The Secretary of State, Colin Powell, was in South America.
And as thick clouds of smoke and debris turned day into night in lower Manhattan, the Capitol building in Washington was cleared and Congressional leaders were spirited to a bunker at an undisclosed destination.
The CIA and the FBI were left scrambling after their failure to detect even a hint of the elaborate conspiracy that preceded the biggest mass murder in US history. It is hardly a decade since the Western world rejoiced in winning the Cold War, a victory for the so-called forces of light. And as the old Soviet Union and its satellites collapsed, the US ensured its place as the only world superpower by organising Operation Desert Storm in the Middle East.
But this week the US seemed so fragile, so vulnerable as it braced itself for retaliation, dubbed by The Washington Post as the US's first war of the new century.
The military superiority of the US is not in doubt. But the attacks were a devastating confirmation of the critics' warnings that the US has failed to position itself to confront one of the greatest security threats of the post-Cold War era. Analysts single out three areas of failure by US governments and agencies, which they say have badly hampered any attempt to deal with the rise and risk of a new brand of terrorism.
First, the political, defence and intelligence establishments are too squeamish. They will not tolerate any risky operation - such as the pursuit of Osama bin Laden - unless there is a guarantee that US lives will not be put at risk.
Second, there has not been enough money. Since the end of the Cold War, military and intelligence chiefs have been fascinated with satellite and other high-tech forms of surveillance and eavesdropping, all of which have been funded at the expense of the traditional and well-tested - but out of fashion - spy-craft of people behind the wire.
The last - and newest - criticism centres on Bush and his near-obsession with a high-tech national defence system to guard against missile attacks on the US mainland by rogue states. The critics say it comes at a huge cost; that it has limited accuracy; and that inevitably it will soak up funds that otherwise would go to critical areas of the defence and intelligence programs.
Increasingly, today's terrorists do not make demands. Much of the terrorism in the 1970s and early 1980s was about winning world attention or sympathy for a cause. But today the attack is often the cause - designed to inflict a punishment so fearful that the US will retreat from the Middle East.
And the rise of the suicide bomber as a cornerstone in the new terrorism makes the plotting easier - these hit men do not need an escape route. In the jargon of the 21st century the contest has been dubbed asymmetric warfare. It means David can kill or maim Goliath.
The terrorists use suicide bombers to inflict maximum hurt and pain on civilians - a battering ram to weaken government resolve. By contrast, the Western military ethos of countries such as the US usually calls for precision strikes on military targets that are intended to cause minimal collateral damage.
Up to the mid-'80s, American people and installations abroad were regular targets for terrorists. But the attack that signalled a big change, the switch from propaganda to punishment, was the most sensational act of airline terrorism before the events of this week - the death of 270 people when Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988.
That bombing was organised from Libya. But the dubious honour of being accused of masterminding the first foreign terrorist act against the US on American soil goes to bin Laden. The year was 1993 and the target the World Trade Centre, the building bin Laden's operatives, it is assumed, finally managed to demolish this week. The attack seven years ago took six lives and did only relatively minor damage to the building.
But it was not until after the simultaneous bombing in 1998 of the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, when 224 people died and more than 5,500 were injured, that the US decided to pursue bin Laden into the mountains of Afghanistan.
The political distaste for images of flag-draped coffins forced a decision to pursue him only with Cruise missiles - long-range and remotely fired. It was an attack that failed. Similarly, fear for American lives made the US look like it was running away from bin Laden earlier this year.
As a result of listening in on mobile phone conversations between bin Laden associates, the US withdrew an FBI team that was investigating last year's attack on USS Cole in Yemen, also believed to be the work of bin Laden; it withdrew US Marines units from a training exercise in Jordan; and it pulled the ships of the US Fifth Fleet out of the port of Bahrain and stationed them in the Persian Gulf.
Writing in the Los Angeles Times in February, Edward Luttwak, a senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, accused the US Joint Chiefs of Staff of a predisposition to block virtually any combat role in counter-terrorism.
Lamenting the military chiefs' refusal to sanction an attempt to capture two men accused of some of the worst war crimes in the Bosnian war, Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, Luttwak said: "US intelligence agencies have no great incentive to precisely locate bin Laden or his henchmen, because even if they can find them, the terrorists are bound to disappear again long before the Joint Chiefs of Staff approve even a feasibility study [on going after them]. Action entails the risk of failure and casualty. If only zero-defect, zero-casualty operations are authorised, none will be."
But Joseph Cirincione, of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, senses this week's attacks may generate a realisation in the Bush Administration that it needs to use overwhelming force against terrorist targets.
"After Tuesday's events I think the fear of US casualties will be less of a constraint."
It is too soon after Tuesday's attacks to talk about formal investigations of the intelligence agencies' performance. But in Congress the anger is palpable. Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican, said: "It's probably the biggest intelligence blunder in any of our lifetimes. The people that we have given billions of dollars to, to protect us, have left us at the mercy of this type of major terrorist operation."
Human intelligence - called humint in the spy trade - is a vital part of the process. But while the US spy effort is highly rated for its technical gathering of information, satellite photos and communications intercepts, it has been unable to infiltrate the terrorist cells. And a former CIA operative went some way towards explaining why in the latest Atlantic Monthly: "The CIA probably doesn't have a single truly qualified Arabic-speaking officer of Middle Eastern background who can play a believable Muslim fundamentalist and who would volunteer to spend years of his life with shitty food and no women in the mountains of Afghanistan. For Christ's sake, most case officers live in the suburbs of Virginia. We don't do that kind of thing."
Since the 1970s the US has been decreasing its network of intelligence agents around the world. And it was not until May this year that there was a call for a complete review of counter-terrorism policy. CIA and FBI numbers matter as much as the background and training of staff. But analysts like Bruce Hoffman, of the Rand Corporation, argue that the capacity of US counter-terrorism agencies to pre-empt or respond to attacks is rudimentary and unfocused.
"The fundamental architecture was created more than 50 years ago to counter the communist threat. The question is whether this structure, which has remained largely unchanged since the post-World War II era, and is primarily oriented towards military threats, is relevant to contemporary security challenges posed by trans-national, non-state adversaries."
Robert Gates, director of the CIA when George Bush snr was president, complained earlier this year that for 15 years the agencies had been under-funded, they had been doing more work with fewer people and there was no centralised control of more than a dozen budgets. This year's counter-terrorism budget is about
$A24 billion, almost double that of 1995. But despite the increased spending and tighter security at government buildings, the perpetrators of this week's attacks revealed extraordinary failures in the national security.
As debate raged this week about the US having prepared itself for the wrong kind of attack, Bruce Hoffman identified one of the strategic openings used by the terrorists this week.
"We focus on the low end - the car-bomb and the truck-bomb - and more exotic high-end threats (like biological warfare). But we neglect the middle."
Arguably, this week's terrorists came through the middle of that equation. A string of intelligence spokesmen openly admitted they had no advance warning of the attacks, that they had totally failed to detect any of the activity that might have alerted them.
And yet there were warnings. This northern summer, bin Laden himself circulated a videotape in the Middle East and in parts of Central Asia, where the gap between the globalised rich of the West and the unending poverty of Muslims in countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt and Jordan drives young men to queue up in droves to be taken in to his desert training camps.
On the tape he talks of preparing attacks on US targets that would dwarf those he had perpetrated in the past. Perhaps showing how well he understood his enemy, he said: "With small capabilities, and with our faith, we can defeat the greatest military power of modern times."
Bin Laden issued a similar tape before the attack last year on USS Cole as it refuelled at Aden, in Yemen, killing 17 US sailors. Three weeks ago his associates were warning the staff of an Arabic-language newspaper in London that a big attack was imminent. And earlier this year there was even a warning from within the US.
It was a high-level report on the threats to US national security by former senators Gary Hart and Warren Rudman, and it was disturbingly prescient: "A direct attack against American citizens on American soil is likely over the next quarter-century. The risk is not only death and destruction, but also a demoralisation that could undermine US global leadership. In the face of this threat, our nation has no coherent or integrated governmental structures."
The terrorists who attacked New York and Washington showed they were able to wreak havoc using weapons that were easily acquired, rather than going through the difficult process of acquiring missiles.
Hoffman said: "The most salient threat to US citizens and interests comes not from exotic biological and chemical weapons, but from explosives, including homemade bombs assembled from ordinary, commercially available materials. The bomb used at the World Trade Centre [in 1993] cost about $400 to fabricate, yet the cost of the damage done and revenue lost by that attack exceeded $1,100 million."
In the same vein, it could be said that the bombs used this week - hijacked aircraft that came at no cost to the terrorists - cost even less than that.
Voices like that of historian and author Samuel Huntington have been accused by some of over-egging their world commentary with predictions of a "clash of civilisations" between the West and Islam. But looking at the gaping hole in the map of Manhattan this week, suddenly he seems a little less extreme, a bit more plausible.
Dominique Mo�si, deputy director of the French Institute of International Relations, asks: "Has the East-West competition of the Cold War era been
replaced not by a North-South conflict, but by the ideological struggle between the west - represented above all by the US - and the most radical elements of Islam?
"We have entered a new world. It's not the Third World War, [but] it's a war of a new type, in which the war is between the representatives of the Western world and the terrorists."
And though the US is the representative of the West, Washington faces difficulty in getting co-operation from other countries. Others are reluctant to share all their intelligence - particularly France and Russia, because they fear it will be leaked, but also because of the commercial interests they have in countries such as Iraq and Iran.
In a world in which the US has become more self-centred and, at times, a bully rather than a partner to its traditional allies, Mo�si warns: "If Americans want to protect themselves from the world they will have to engage more directly in the affairs of the world. Terrorism has won a battle by catching America by surprise. It cannot win the war unless its agents succeed in making the West closed, intolerant and suspicious."
amen to that Tranzmit!!!
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