It's been on my mind all day, but I'm only just now getting the chance to sit down and collect my thoughts about the events of September 11, 2001.
Hot Air has clips of CNN's coverage from the morning of 9/11. There's something about seeing a repeat of the live news coverage -- it strips away the 20/20 hindsight and lets us remember the confusion and shock of the moment.
The third clip on that page deserves your attention, especially if you've been hearing the wild claim that no plane hit the Pentagon. It features a phone interview with a pilot who had a view of the Pentagon crash from his high-rise Arlington apartment building. Later in the same clip, CNN reporter Jamie McIntyre describes the debris on the scene. These are contemporaneous eyewitness accounts of the crash and its aftermath.
I watched the beginning of ABC's "The Path to 9/11" last night, up through the explosion of Ramzi Yousef's lab in Manila. Very powerful, very well organized and presented -- it reminded me of Ron Howard's Apollo 13 in that regard. I don't normally get riled up watching TV -- it's a "cool" medium, after all -- but the opening sequence showing the terrorists checking in for their flights and going through security made my blood boil.
I can't be the only Oklahoman who was struck by several things in the section about the 1993 World Trade Center bombing: the rented Ryder truck, the type of explosive used, and the central clue, the discovery of a bit of the frame showing the vehicle identification number of the otherwise vaporized truck. The Oklahoma City bombers also filled a rented Ryder truck with a fertiliser and fuel oil bomb, and it was a piece of the axle that allowed law enforcement to track the truck back to a rental location in Junction City, Kansas.
Two years ago I wrote about one of the victims of the 9/11 attack, Jayesh Shah. Jay was a native of India, but he and his younger brother Niloy went to Memorial High School and then on to the University of Tulsa. I met the Shah brothers through Hal O'Halloran's "Sports Night" talk show on KXXO 1300, sometime around 1979 or 1980. They were fierce competitors in Hal's weekly trivia contests. I remember Jay as the quieter of the two, but he had a mischievous streak. In the late '80s, post-college, the two brothers made a number of trips with others in our circle of friends to play blackjack in Las Vegas. Both brothers wound up in Houston with their families, working for Amoco. I'd see them on holiday visits to Tulsa.
When I heard that the World Trade Center towers had been hit and then that they had collapsed, I had no idea that I knew anyone who might have been in there. It was only later that day that I learned that six months earlier, Jay had left Houston to take an executive position with a division of Cantor Fitzgerald. His office was in the north tower, on the 103rd floor. Niloy had tried to call Jay as usual that morning, but hadn't been able to reach him. Niloy and family left Houston for to New York as quickly as they could and began days of searching for Jay, hoping that somehow he had made it out. I remember scanning survivor's lists online and the moment of false hope when someone with the same name turned up on one of them -- but it wasn't him. (Here is a note that was sent out sometime around September 20, 2001, about the status of the search for Jayesh and plans for a prayer service.)
As part of a worldwide effort to remember the victims of the attack as individuals, not just a number, nearly 3,000 bloggers are each remembering one of them. Judge William of Right Indignation has posted this rememberance of Jayesh Shah.
Comments (4)
Yeah yeah yeah. Whateveeeeeeeeeer, Bates. Give in to the kooky Islamo Fascist conspiracy theories too. EVERYBODY knows WHITE MEN CAN'T BOMB.
Posted by Paul Tay | September 12, 2006 12:30 PM
Posted on September 12, 2006 12:30
To defeat this enemy, we need to get born again HARD.
You don't defeat our enemies from the Religion of Peace with pity-party celebrations like yesterday.
You defeat this enemy by hearing him beg for mercy, which you judiciously withhold until he is totally prostrate, while you put fire up his ass, fire in his eyes, fire in his baby's diaper, and fire in his wife's twat. And save some fire left over from anyone else wearing a rag on their head that gets in our way.
The Afghanistan Campaign was brilliant, simply brilliant; A combined arms + Special Forces unconventional warfare treatise: Minimal U.S. footprint with massive success, retaining all of the advantages of the U.S.'s potent military and using proxies to accomplish our strategic objectives, i.e. removing the Al Queda-supporting Taliban Government of Afghanistan by using the Northern Alliance.
We brought Pakistan wholly into the fight on our side, because they knew that their country would NOT survive with the U.S.A. and India allied against the Islamicists, and PAKISTAN in between. We made them understand. Diplomacy.
The Iraq War was totally, totally unnecessary. Just a clueless King GW Bush the Lesser trying to erase the blot on King George I the Elder's failed legacy in Gulf War I. A waste of time, $500 Billion in treasure, and 15,000 serious casulties with nearly 3,000 K.I.A.
Saudi Arabia was a much better target for our attention, and the center of the problem. We knew their oil for now; we don't need them.
At the core of conflict of Civilizations is THEOLOGY.
It is their Wahhabbi version of Islam that sprews hate in thousands of mosques and madrassas, financed and promoted by the Saud Family, ALL OVER THE WORLD. The Saudis' Religion of Hatred is the root of the problem, not old Secular Sunni Saddam.
Besides not being a friend of Al Queda, Saddam was neutered by us, cornered by enemies on ALL sides, and not going anywhere on WMD. He didn't like us, but nobody liked him either, and he had no regional support. He also indirectly was an effective COUNTER-BALANCE against the Mad Mullah's in Iran because he was just next door, stuck like a couple of scorpions together in the same glass jar, stinging at each other.
Our slow-motion 2003 invasion of Iraq with the Turks stabbing us in the back by not allow a back-door invasion of northern Iraq lost us the war.
We found out that no two wars are fought alike, and our present and future enemies learned from our military prowess demonstrated too well in 1991. The REAL WAR started after our bond-headed occupation of Iraq.
Now, our Army is stuck to hundreds of thousands of square miles of: Fly Paper. Driving around in Humvees with great big Bulls-Eyes painted on them, saying USA.
Having LOST every advantage of our potent armed forces by compromising every one of the Principles of Warfare.
So, get born again HARD, or expect many, many more 9-11's in our children's future.
Posted by Bob | September 12, 2006 2:43 PM
Posted on September 12, 2006 14:43
Jeez Louise, Bob. Do you talk to your mother like you did in that third paragraph?
Next thing you know, Bates will need a "Parental Advisory" sticker on his blog.
Posted by W. | September 13, 2006 1:58 AM
Posted on September 13, 2006 01:58
Sorry if I sugar-coated my comments.
Try this:
The females breed Islamo-fascist terrorists.
Vanquish our foes laid prostrate before us, and relish in the lamentations of their women.
Spread the fire all around their world.
Make them tremble at the HELL THAT IS COMING.
Posted by Bob | September 13, 2006 7:23 AM
Posted on September 13, 2006 07:23