“After the horrific attacks of September 11th, it was evident that our government need to be transformed to meet the new challenges of this dangerous world” – Jim Ryun.

September 11th is a day that will forever be in our nation’s heart. Terrorist attacks are something America always knew, but never feared, like we were unstoppable. But in all reality, our country has so much to lose, that were really the ones in the greatest danger. Al Quaeda wanted to hurt our country, and unfortunately they did. Thousands of people lost their lives, and for what? They were just caught in the middle of our great nation and a war that wasn’t theirs to fight. Those terrorist came here, trying to kill as many Americans as they could and honestly they succeeded. This attack caused more damage than the Soviet Union did in the Cold War. It’s astonishing how only 19 men destroyed the World Trade Center and parts of the Pentagon. Al Quaeda is the main cause for this horrifying event, and the many effects we could be listed for days. When those two towers collapsed, so did the hearts of all Americans, the belief that we are safe to live in America was demolished along with the buildings.

As a result, there are many different conspiracies about what really caused the terrorists to attack our country, but most people understand that the main cause was the Saudis and Al Quaeda. Osama bin Laden himself even admitted that Al Quaeda was the solely responsible for 9/11. Some people blame it on poverty in the Middle East, but those attackers were all men involved in the upper class of their people. Even Madrasas were blamed for teaching young boys of the Middle East to become violent and hate America. But most of these theories are not true. One of the main explanations was that American was “humiliating” the Islamic world. On tape, Osama was recorded saying “What American is tasting now is something insignificant compared to what we have tasted for scores of years. The Islamic world has been tasting this humiliation and this degradation for 80 years…Neither America nor the people who live in it will dream of security before we live in it in Palestine, and not before the infidel armies leave the land of Muhammad”(September 11th quotes). The U.S foreign policies in the Middle East and the support of Israel is also something that didn’t please the Islamic people. Especially the support we gave Israel during the invasion of southern Lebanon in 1982, was the first thing to trigger Bin Laden’s Anti-Americanism. Al Quaeda studied America, and the way they handle attacks and war. In 1983, when the U.S was attacked in their barracks, they lost 241 American servicemen. The U.S retreated and from that and other things, Bin Laden concluded that we were capable of withstanding only a few strikes before withdrawing. Bin Laden and al Quaeda truly hate our country, and this attack was for revenge. “After the chaos and carnage of September 11th, it is not enough to serve our enemies with legal papers”, America will never stop fighting( September 11th quotes).




Also, the effects of this tragedy are still among us all today, from healing families, to cleaning up debris left around the world trade center, recovering from the attacks will still go on for many years. Evan Bayn once said “America is stronger than ever. We will forever remember those we lost on September 11, 2001. In honoring their memory, we will remain true to our commitment to freedom and democracy”(September quotes). Not one of the 3,000 people killed that day, woke up thinking about losing their lives in a fight that they had nothing to do with. Even though it was a horrifying scene to witness, many firefighters and paramedics were on scene as soon as it happened trying to help as many people as they could. 343 firemen and paramedics were killed that day, trying to save peoples’ lives. NYPD officers were also their trying to help people as best they could and 23 of them died that day. These men and women became heroes that day, even though they lost their lives, they will always be in the hearts of the people rescued, and they are all an inspiration. New York was in need of help; George E. Pataki once said “After September 11th, nations from across the globe offered their generous assistance to the people of New York. And whenever our friends around the world need our assistance, New York is there”(September quotes). When other countries see people in need, they are there to help, just as America is as well. But along with innocent people losing their lives, cost of rebuilding and cleaning up the destruction of the buildings, another problem is our nation is in more debt than before. Just by counting the value of lives lost as well as property damage and lost production of goods and services, losses exceed almost $100 billion. If you also include the loss in stock market wealth, the price tag is almost at $2 trillion. Our country is obviously one of the wealthiest countries in the world, but even America has been in debt for quite some time, and with these attacks I don’t see that changing for a very long time. The cost alone for clean-up is $1.3 billion and for the damage to the Pentagon was up to $1 billion. People can go on and on with the damage for so many different things, but this is money being spent, for an attack we didn’t deserve. Billy Graham once said “No matter how hard we try words simply cannot express the horror, the shock, and the revulsion we all feel over what took place in this nation”(September quotes). Honestly, 100 years from now people will still be feeling the impact of this attack.
However, just imagine waking up on a normal morning, going through your same routine walking your way to work, but suddenly 2 airplanes crash into buildings just blocks away from you, what would you do? This is a question many citizens of New York had to ask themselves on that morning of September 11th. People were in shock, some unable to comprehend what was happening, and some so scared, they were paralyzed with fear. There was a report that 30% of New Yorkers suffered post-traumatic stress disorder over the next six months in the form of sleeping disorders, nightmares, alienation/estrangement and depressions. Lanford Wilson said “I am one of the 11.5% of New Yorkers who remain traumatized by the events of September 11”(September quotes). George Bush said “After the chaos and carnage of September 11th, it is not enough to serve our enemies with legal papers” (September quotes).They deserve much more than that. Those people were affected in a way that can’t be fixed; the memories of that day will always be with them. And as if attacking the buildings wasn’t enough, just a few weeks after 9/11, there was a series of terrorist activities in the form of anthrax mail. This put people in to an even greater form of fear and shock because this could happen to anyone in the entire country. People felt as if their government wasn’t protecting them. So, the government decided to take action. Airports were the first thing the government decided to change. Restrictions on certain items such as OEM hand carts and OEM luggage by not allowing people to have locks on their bags. People are also no longer allowed to greet their families and friends right out of the gate anymore, because it may cause distractions. Security is now also allowed to serve random searches to any person who they may think looks suspicious, which some people think is only used on Arab related religion. Also, new drug tests are being used to check carry on bags by swiping the bags with a round cloth, which is then put into a machine to check for anything suspicious. These changes are slowly helping our country to become safer for all citizens.

September 11th has taught everyone in American that we are not invincible. That we do have enemies from all over and that taught our government better protection is needed for everyone. Every person that lost their lives that day were innocent people caught in the cross fire of terrorism. There are many different reasons for the 9/11 attacks, but Al Qaeda will always be looked at as the main cause. This attack gave our country strength, to come together to get revenge on the people that hurt us the most. That took innocent lives, and destroyed buildings. George Bush once said “The terrorist attacks on September the 11th were a turning point for our nation. We saw the goals of a determined enemy: to expand the scale of their murder, and force America to retreat from the world. And our nation accepted a mission: We will defeat this enemy. The United States of America is determined to guard our homeland against future attacks. As the September the 11th Commission concluded, our country is safer than we were three years ago, but we are not yet safe”(September 11th quotes). The United States of America will always be the strongest, and in our weakest moments, it only makes us ever stronger.



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