Terrorism threats and attacks

There are 9 replies in this Thread which has previously been viewed 816 times. The latest Post (September 12, 2026 at 5:43 PM) was by Rice.

    I was in my room doing homework with MTV in the background when the news broke. At first, I thought it was a scene out of a movie. Then I switched channel and it was the same images across all channels. I felt very scared and went into fight or fly move. I remember having nightmares of the war for many nights. My concern was that we didn't have a fire extinguisher at home (?!) and how to get ahold of the cats to run away as soon as possible in case of an emergency. Kind of silly, in retrospective, but it was the first time ever I considered I could live through a war.

    We were driving back home from Milford Haven, Wales, listening to Steve Wright on Radio 2 having spent an idyllic week on our boat. The news broke that 'a small plane' had hit the WTC, then another and the whole tone of the radio changed in an instant. We turned on the TV when we got home and were both transfixed and horrified, much like we were when Diana was killed in that car crash.

    We were having oatmeal and tea for breakfast in our hotel room in Shreveport, Louisiana, where we were about to start the work day. Had tv news on as wallpaper as we finished eating. As you said, Splinter , the first announcement was that a small plane had apparently hit one of the towers, and initial speculation ranged from a pilot heart attack to the then-far-out thought that the pilot of a private plane could possibly have been so desperately crazed by an unfaceable life situation that he could have deliberately run into the bldg in order to end his own life.

    Our mourning as a nation was ameliorated by the instant outpouring of emotional support by countries around the world (yes, the same countries now being insulted, ridiculed, and tariffed by the USA 25 years later. And yes, the now-disparaged NATO countries who then rushed to military defense of the USA, the only time NATO's article five has ever been in play).

    Fast-forward to 2026, and look back.
    What a different country we had then, before we had leaders reviling opponents as "enemies," and urging their followers on to threaten those not in the cult, and to violently follow through on those threats. The conservative Heritage Society has found that, in a nation of 344 million people, in the 2020 election there were approximately 100 people who voted although ineligible. Yet Americans let themselves be persuaded that the election was "stolen," and they committed acts of violence on the police at the US Capitol and on their fellow Americans.

    We were a better country when we were united against a common enemy, rather than letting ourselves be lured into believing that the enemy is within.