9/11/2001

[05C40]

HIjackers
American Airlines Flight 11
Mohamed Atta - Egypt, tactical leader of 9/11 plot and pilot
Abdul Aziz al Omari - Saudi Arabia
Wail al Shehri - Saudi Arabia
Waleed al Shehri - Saudi Arabia
Satam al Suqami - Saudi Arabia

United Airlines Flight 175
Fayez Banihammad - United Arab Emirates
Ahmed al Ghamdi - Saudi Arabia
Hamza al Ghamdi - Saudi Arabia
Marwan al Shehhi - United Arab Emirates, pilot
Mohand al Shehri - Saudi Arabia

American Airlines Flight 77
Hani Hanjour - Saudi Arabia, pilot
Nawaf al Hazmi - Saudi Arabia
Salem al Hazmi - Saudi Arabia
Khalid al Mihdhar - Saudi Arabia
Majed Moqed - Saudi Arabia

United Airlines Flight 93
Saeed al Ghamdi - Saudi Arabia
Ahmad al Haznawi - Saudi Arabia
Ziad Jarrah - Lebanon, pilot
Ahmed al Nami - Saudi Arabia

I don't recall the Saudi Govt ever apologozing , explaining.......Or Little bush discussing the threads of how certain Royal Family members funded this effort

IIRC, most, if not all, of those hijackers spent the days leading up to 9/11 in strip clubs. I guess they figured that had a pre-approved passport to Paradise/Heaven/etc. Once people become convinced of their own righteousness, they are capable of unspeakable evil. In the words of Oliver Cromwell, "I beseech you in the bowels of Christ think it possible you may be mistaken."

ETA, IIRC, even more to the point, in the words of Jacob Bronowski while at Auschwitz, "Into this pond were dumped the ashes of four million people. They weren't killed by bullets. They weren't killed by gas. The were killed by arrogance. They were killed by the blind belief that the ends justify the means. This is what happens when man thinks he knows the mind of God."

 

[finesse]

IIRC, most, if not all, of those hijackers spent the days leading up to 9/11 in strip clubs. I guess they figured that had a pre-approved passport to Paradise/Heaven/etc. Once people become convinced of their own righteousness, they are capable of unspeakable evil. In the words of Oliver Cromwell, "I beseech you in the bowels of Christ think it possible you may be mistaken."

Something everybody should ask themselves in some form almost every day. I read that a long time ago and consider it often. Pairs really well with "Know thyself"

 

[Peppers49]

He’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but this Hunter S. Thompson article on ESPN Page 2 is imo some of his best work. Written in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 (published like a week later I believe).

Thompson: Fear & Loathing in America

Hunter S. Thompson predicts a 'guerilla warfare on a global scale' between the United States and the merciless fanatics responsible for the four plane crashes Tuesday.

www.espn.com

This quote from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is apt for 9/11: “We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave... So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high water mark — that place where the wave finally broke, and rolled back.”

On an unrelated note, I really miss Page 2 on ESPN. Hard to find good long form articles like that these days.

 

[Kraftyheel89]

There is a pretty detailed explanation of that call and how it was "Hollywooded" up. There is a snopes link right on the bottom of nyc's link.

There was in fact a call placed to that operator by that passenger. It still sums up what it must have been like on that plane.

Not trying to diss nyc in ANY way or be a Debbie Downer. Just trying to help with all the questions above after someone posted it was somewhat fake. Snopes breaks it down very well.

 

[heelslegup]

 

[HandsonFire]

Don't believe I ever heard to words by any one person change world opinion so much. Literally everybody was on our side until this except the most fanatical of the Islamists. Wtf was he thinking?

President Bush vowed on Sunday to "rid the world of evil-doers," then cautioned: "This crusade, this war on terrorism, is going to take a while."

At that time I embraced retaliation but I envisioned a strategic kind of thing. Father intelligence and destroy targets in whatever country they were in. I believed

My wife and I were living with her parents while having a house built. I remember coming out of the bedroom, into the living room, and seeing my mother-in-law sitting on the couch with her hands over her mouth, staring at the TV in shock.

We went to NY during covid and went to the 9/11 memorial site where the twin towers used to be. It was VERY surreal. Almost nobody talked and whispered if they did. I'm sure many here have seen it, but the memorial consists of two large square holes going deep into the ground with waterfalls on all sides. Around the perimeter are metal plates with cutouts of all of the names of those who died on 9/11.

NY puts a white rose in the name of the person on their birthday.

i spent about 4 hours here and in the museum/meemorial. It is something that I think everyone should do once but damn it hits hard.

 

[NOVAHEEL13]

I was 26 and working at the newspaper here in Greensboro. I was on the copydesk so I worked nights. My now-husband also worked nights, but happened to be working dayside for a couple of days of training. He had to call several times to wake me up. I turned on the TV and watched and we were calling back and forth. Around 11, he told me to get dressed and get to the newsroom because we were going to put out an extra edition for that afternoon.

I will never forget driving to the office in downtown Greensboro that day. It was around noon and it felt like no one was on the road. Quite eerie.

I was working for a law firm in the Bank of America building in downtown Greensboro that day. Most of the buildings were cleared because several bomb threats were made to finacial buildings, municipal buildings, and court houses. The Federal court, County Court House, the JP building, BOA, the old Wachovia building and I think one or two others (like the one across the street from the wachovia) and First Citizens (? maybe) or the one where Smith Helmes law firm is at (the old First Union building maybe?) were all cleared and we were told to go home so your recollection was accurate. No one was downtown...well most of us weren't but it wasn't because of everyone watching a TV.

 

[nycfan]

 

[ronjon]

I have no idea what we did to deserve two allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia.

We got addicted to oil.

 

[mpaer]

We got addicted to oil.

yea

 

[akillesheel]

lol, it sounds like Mark "it wouldn't have gone that way if I was there" Wahlberg has entered the chat. I mean I guess if your move is to criticize all the passengers on those planes as cowards, then that's your right.

But really this whole framing just strikes me as very dishonest. Box cutters are not the only threats to plane security. The lesson to take from 9/11 wasn't just "next time we'll be ready for box cutters" it was "planes are much more vulnerable and dangerous targets than we ever considered before." So the idea that all TSA does, or is needed for, is keeping box cutters off of planes is silly. One might note that there has not been a commercial airline crash in the United States since 2009, and hardly even any fatal accidents during that time (I can think of only one - that unfortunate person who was partially sucked out of a plane). I think it's pretty clear that heightened airport security, along with airline industry regulations, have done a good job keeping air travel safe in the last two decades. You're basically acting like someone who has been standing under an umbrella for 20 years and says "I haven't gotten wet in 20 years so I don't think I need this umbrella any more." At least for me personally, it's gonna take a lot more than "TSA makes me wait an extra half hour in line sometimes" to convince me that it's a bad thing.

Every single time the TSA undergoes internal testing, they fail miserably, failing to identify threats at anywhere between 75 and 95% of the time. At best, the security theater they provide dissuades would-be hijackers and that's why US flights haven't had any incidents since then, rather than their actual procedures. On the other hand, agents groping women is considered "business as usual," South Asian and MENA Americans are routinely racially profiled and harassed in American airports, and flying/travel are significantly worse experiences now than they were 25 years ago because of silly rules about liquids.

I am not one of the right-wingers or libertarians who thinks the TSA is an example of government bloat and should be replaced with private solutions - but the TSA is definitely a bad thing.