Everything Has Changed

N.B. First published as Volume II:26 on JamesKBishop.com, September 12, 2001. I wrote it from Internet America, then the largest independent ISP in Texas. The security team stayed on duty more than twenty-four hours. We were sure a cyber attack against the Internet itself was coming. It did not. The planes had already done the work. This is what I filed while we waited.

On Tuesday, the world became smaller. The hijacking and suicide mission of four commercial flights caused the destruction of the World Trade Center, severe damage to the Pentagon, and a loss of life that we may not yet be able to comprehend.

Those responsible may have sought to strike fear into the heart of America by destroying great symbols of our commerce and our military. But they have been severely mistaken. America has united. And our response shall be grave.

Like most Americans, I am overwhelmed and still in a state of shock. We are angry, but our suspicions notwithstanding, we don’t yet know at whom to be angry. Soon we will. We haven’t heard any real casualty figures yet. The numbers will be staggering.

There were 266 deaths among the passengers and crew of the four aircraft, the Pentagon may have anywhere between 100-800 deaths, and there were possibly up to 50,000 people working in the World Trade Center towers. Many thousands have yet to be accounted for.

Scenes of destruction on our streets were contrasted with the scenes from Palestinian neighborhoods overseas showing a sick celebration. Men, women, children, and the elderly danced and jumped for joy at the deaths of so many innocents. These attacks will far outweigh the impact of Pearl Harbor.

The architect of that December 7th attack, Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto said at the time, “I feel we have awakened a sleeping giant.” He was correct. Admiral William “Bull” Halsey said after the attack, “By the time we are through with them, the Japanese language will be spoken only in hell.” Those in perdition will soon be speaking Arabic.

For our precious liberty to persevere, it must be preserved with a steadfast resolve. The reach of resistance to tyranny must extend beyond our borders. The defense of our liberty must be swift and extreme, lest freedom fall.

The price of yesterday’s attack in our homeland is incalculable. No ransom of diplomacy can pay it, nor should it. There can be no bargain made with terrorists and these acts of war can only be responded to in kind.

Everything has changed. Once the events of yesterday set in, national outrage is going to be high. Our morale will be high and our will galvanized. And whoever did this or whatever state or states have supported or seek to shield those who did this need to be wiped from the face of the earth.

The American Resolve

N.B. First published as Volume II:27 on JamesKBishop.com, September 14, 2001. The column names Thomas Burnett, Jeremy Glick, and Mark Bingham because those were the calls that had reached the papers by Friday. Todd Beamer’s thirteen minutes with GTE supervisor Lisa Jefferson, the Lord’s Prayer, the open line, and “Are you guys ready? Let’s roll,” were not yet public. Jefferson was cleared to call Lisa Beamer that same Friday. The Post-Gazette printed the account on Sunday the 16th. I did not omit him. I did not yet have him.

On Tuesday morning, United Airlines Flight 93 lifted off from Newark on a trek across the country bound for San Francisco. Shortly after 10 am local time Flight 93 crashed in a field in southwestern Pennsylvania, killing all aboard. The morning was filled with terror in the skies over America. But in the face of that terror, a burning resolve and a singular desire was reborn.

Thomas Burnett called home to tell his wife Deena that his plane was being hijacked. Deena informed him that other hijacked planes had hit the World Trade Center. Burnett told Deena that the hijackers were most likely lying about the bomb they claimed to have. She pleaded with him not to draw attention to himself, but Burnett said, “No. If they are going to take the plane down then we are going to have to do something.”

“We may never know exactly how many helped him or exactly what they did, but I have no doubt that airplane was bound for some landmark and that whatever Tom did and whatever the guys who helped him did they saved many more lives. And I’m so proud of him and so grateful,” Deena said.

Jeremy Glick was also on Flight 93. He called his wife Lyzbeth and told her to have a good life and to take care of their three-month old baby girl. Glick’s brother-in-law Douglas Hurwitt said, “They were going to stop whoever it was from doing whatever it was they’d planned. He knew that stopping them was going to end all of their lives. But that was my brother-in-law. He was a take-charge guy.”

There were others with them who resisted. Some of Thomas Burnett’s last words to his wife were, “I know we’re all going to die – there’s three of us who are going to do something about it.” Probably among the three brave leaders in resistance was Mark Bingham, who called his mother on a mobile phone to say, “I want to let you know that I love you.”

There is a growing resolve in America. It has shown itself before in times of great crisis and has returned in the face of the circumstances thrust upon us. Our country now has realized the duty we owe to our posterity is the same that our Fathers preserved for us. We will follow in their footsteps. And though the struggle will be severe, our faith will lead us to victory and liberty shall prevail. This is our prayer.

The brave, the fearless, the tireless rescuers who have worked around the clock tearing their hands through twisted and burning masses of steel, mountains of concrete, shards of shattered glass, endless breaths full of dust and soot, and the smell and sight of constant death around them have also inspired us. They will not be deterred in their mission to save lives. That hope guides them.

And I can assure you that in the last moments aboard United Airlines Flight 93 – learning from calls placed to wives and mothers – that planes had crashed into the World Trade Center towers and understanding their own lives would be ended by terrorists, Thomas Burnett, Jeremy Glick, Mark Bingham and others decided that those bastards would not see their mission succeed. Those men gave their lives so that others would live. And we will remember.

The Reckoning

N.B. First published as Volume II:28 on JamesKBishop.com, September 21, 2001. The column pointed the war outward: the men who did it, the states that hosted them, the hunt with no bargain. That hunt ran twenty years. What the sermon did not yet say is that the country fought the war abroad and, at the same time, walked the camel’s nose under the tent at home. Muslim immigration was expanded. The enclaves formed. Dearborn, Hamtramck, Minneapolis, and the quieter versions in the suburbs learned to live as something other than a melting pot. We spent a generation in the Hindu Kush and called the same argument at the county line a different subject. It was not a different subject.

Beyond crime and beyond tragedy, the terrorist strikes of September eleventh were acts of war. Our nation has been moved to weep for those we have lost, but we are not inconsolable. For rising above grief and above mourning, we are resolute and united. We will go forward indefatigable and we will be victorious. Our triumph will not be easy. It will come, and it has come, at an awful price.

The price is not inconsequential. To the contrary, it teaches the fundamental lessons of life and of liberty. Times such as these shake us from our slumber and serve to remind us that what we often perceive as our daily toil through life is meaningless when we forsake the very freedoms that allow us grow (sic) complacent and remiss. Now we know. We are very much aware of the precious nature of our Creator’s endowment, and it is an awesome mantle to behold and to bear.

Terrorists have long sought to advance their twisted desires against the cause of freedom and thrust destruction upon civilization. And we know them – their names, interchangeable; their faces, only passing shadows of a hidden evil that lurks in a seemingly boundless world of darkness. Their clerics are ministers of hate, and their leaders learned in the methods of every cancerous thug in the hall of history. Each step on the paths of the past is the same. For those dealing in death are dealt with in death and their future is predetermined; it is doom.

The Taliban regime grasping to maintain control of Afghanistan has hosted Usama bin Ladin under their protection. They have refused to do anything but pander to the world with weak protestations about being presented with evidence and they threaten jihad should they be attacked – as if calls for jihad are supposed to send America reeling in shock and surprise. Not hardly. Usama will meet his fate soon, for this act and for others. He is the ever-present symbol of terrorist evil, but he is not its end.

To the practitioners of terrorism, know this: You have never known jihad, until you have attacked America. Soon you will know not only the power of America’s military might, but you will know – intimately – the resolve of the United States of America to vanquish those who threaten civilization and freedom. You will not succeed, because you count on us to fail. And you will see how quickly the distractions of our decadence and our division are cast away for a singular goal: the security of the blessings of liberty.

This is very much a war between cultures. It is our jihad, not against the peaceful followers of Islam, but against the infidels who would destroy all that is good in the world. It is a jihad against terrorism and against the terrorist-chic that has embraced evil and called it holy. And it is a jihad against the states that would direct the instruments of terror against those they cannot equal when brought into the light.

We were all born with a purpose. Generations may arrive with a flash and then quietly fade into the mists of time, but our generation now has a mission. It is our duty to our posterity that we succeed. We cannot settle for less that (sic) victory. Yet we must understand the cost will be great. Draw near to your families and friends and do not embrace in haste. Remain prayerful, steadfast, and be courageous. Faith is the knowledge of a certain destination reached via an uncertain journey. Our journey to victory will be marked by perseverance and sacrifice, but have faith; we will prevail.

There are those among us who wring their hands and spew forth pronouncements of peace. They discount reality and pay lip service to our loss in the pursuit of their own selfish desire to benefit from the sacrifice of others who give so that they may be easy in their discord. These are the voices of small minds that all at once fear greatness, yet seek to revel in the glory of the great. Their craven greed for comfort at the expense of others seldom exposes itself more fully than in times such as these. We know them, too, and they will be rememebered (sic).

As we stand together in this time of national crisis, we know the road ahead and we accept the journey. Our ardor will not be stilled, nor will we be deterred from our mission to end terrorism and states that harbor and direct its evil against the civilized world. We will smoke them out of the walls, rout them out of the ground, and find them where they seek to hide. We will bring the war to them through air, on land and sea, through wires, through financial markets, and through their associates who will betray them. This war will be an infinite hunt, for those who prey on the innocent are our prey. There will be no simple retaliation and no measure of revenge. There must be a reckoning.