The World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks

Complete Salon coverage from Sept. 11 to Sept. 30

See the main index page for more recent stories

Saturday, Sept. 29

Democracy held hostage
We are fighting for freedom -- including the right to vigorously debate. But the war fever crowd wants us all to march in step
By David Talbot

No end in sight
On the anniversary of the new Palestinian intifada, a resolution between Palestinians and Israelis seems as far away as ever
By Flore de Préneuf

It's time for Rudy to go
New York's mayor has done a great job in a time of crisis. But extending his term is a power grab that reminds his critics of the old Giuliani
By Anthony York

Stay, just a little bit longer
Giuliani isn't trying to hurt democracy by proposing a term extension, but to make it work better
By Stephanie Zacharek

Image conscious
The single most miserable Chihuahua on the face of the planet
By Laura Miller

Friday, Sept. 28

Return to Pakistan
On Sept. 11, the region where I was born suddenly became the center of the world -- and I knew I had to go back
By Asra Q. Nomani

Introducing Salon's Central Asia correspondent
A Muslim born in India, a woman traveling alone in Pakistan, a Westerner covering the war against the West, Asra Nomani sees the fault lines of the post-Sept. 11 world from many angles

Friends like these
Why did so many of the Sept. 11 hijackers have ties to Saudi Arabia? Why can't the U.S. use Saudi bases to fight the war on terrorism? What Americans don't know about their best Muslim ally
By Eric Boehlert

Good neighbor policies
After Sept. 11, we are of the world, not apart from it. So maybe we'll stop saying no to vital international agreements
By Bill McKibben

Get educated
For those hungry to learn more about the crisis facing the U.S., a reading list
By Salon staff

What's so funny about peace, love and understanding?
As we struggle to define courage under the threat of terrorism, we can't dismiss the power of nonviolence
By Jennifer Foote Sweeney

Lynda Barry
Unspeakable

Formez vos bataillons!
Once fond of clucking at us, France has found a new love for America
By Kristin Hohenadel

Thursday, Sept. 27

America the ignorant
After Sept. 11, Americans have rushed to educate themselves about Islam, the Middle East and foreign affairs. But how did we get so benighted in the first place?
By Laura Miller

Creating "many, many Osamas"
Novelist William Vollmann says if the U.S. convinces Afghans of bin Laden's guilt, they'll support the move against him. If not, only "genocide" will defeat them
By Steve Kettmann

White House whitewashers
Bush staffers chastise NBC for a Clinton interview, Fleischer whacks Maher and the Bush-was-in-danger story falls apart. Tension mounts between the White House and the media
By Jake Tapper

The president's secret weapon
If he really wants to be bipartisan in the war on terror, Bush should appoint Bill Clinton as a roving ambassador
By Jim Hershberg

Allen Barra
If you write that "Michael Jordan boosted our morale," I will track you down and bring justice to you

Oily insecurity
After Sept. 11, conservatives call again for drilling in Alaska -- but environmentalists say the real danger is our addiction to oil
By Damien Cave

Vigil at the Armory
As family members waited for news of survivors, they had to contend with prank phone calls, Tony Soprano jokes and the dull ache of dwindling hope
By Jay Dixit

Toward peace
There's prayer, and then there's the wife and money trouble and Billy Graham
By Alan Rifkin

Wednesday, Sept. 26

Islam's flawed spokesmen
Some of the groups claiming to speak for American Muslims find it impossible to speak out against terrorist groups
By Jake Tapper

At long last, Peres meets with Arafat
The talks are more symbol than substance, but hard-liners on both sides denounce them anyway. Still, it's a small victory for U.S. diplomacy
By Flore de Préneuf

Robert Scheer
Falwell should have listened to the feminists: Right-wingers ought to thank women's groups for raising alarms about the Taliban early and often

David Horowitz
Noam Chomsky is a pathological ayatollah of anti-American hate -- and the leader of the treacherous fifth column Left

"Why can't I die?"
The surviving firemen of Engines 202 and 279 and Ladder 101, which lost more than a dozen men, sit in a garden in Red Hook around a bucket of iced beer
By Christopher Ketcham

There is no alternative to war
Blame-the-U.S. pacifism misses the point. Bin Laden wants to eradicate Western modernity, not liberate Palestine, and the U.S. has no choice but to fight him
By David Rieff

Salon's war reader
Don't know much about Central Asian history? Osama bin Laden? The Web provides a crash course in what's needed to understand "America's new war"
Compiled by Anthony York

Peer-to-peer terrorism
Bad news from the Napster wars: The harder you fight against decentralized networks, the more enemies you create
By James Grimmelmann

Deciphering suicide
Fourth in a series. The hijackers lacked the heroism of martyrs. All they had was the violence
By Jeffrey Eugenides

Paranoid like me
The country becomes afraid and my alienation begins to fade
By Gary Greenberg

"I can't believe this is America"
At the Arab Club of a Manhattan college, slurs and accusations make it hard to grieve
By Rebecca Segall

Single survivor
In the aftermath of disaster, dating becomes an absurd folly. Who has the luxury of spending a few hours with someone you may never see again?
By Jennifer Howze

Tuesday, Sept. 25

Our scary new best friends
Afghanistan's Northern Alliance may be the enemy of our enemy, but it has its own grim history
By Ken Silverstein

There is no alternative to war
Blame-the-U.S. pacifism misses the point. Bin Laden wants to eradicate Western modernity, not liberate Palestine, and the U.S. has no choice but to fight him
By David Rieff

The Central Asian chess game
If the United States goes to war in Afghanistan, it will need the cooperation of former Soviet republics
By Steve Kettmann

Joe Conason
In addition to limited military action against bin Laden, the U.S. should blanket Afghanistan with food, clothing and medicine

The media's Islamic blind spot
News reports are obsessing about how the terrorist attacks happened, but not why
By Eric Boehlert

Irony is dead! Long live irony!
As jingoists call for a New Sincerity, we need irony -- the serious kind -- more than ever
By David Beers

Emotional rescue
A young violinist serenades battered rescuers in the concert of a lifetime
By William Harvey

What's up with Generation Y?
Will the largest teen generation in history prove to be a mass of zombie consumers -- or an awakened giant filled with a terrible resolve?
By Jim DeRogatis

Dark garland
September 2001: Leaves from my commonplace book. I have shored these fragments against my ruin
By Lawrence Weschler

Monday, Sept. 24

Terror's first victims
When fanatics like the Taliban seize control of Islamic countries, women are the first to suffer
By Janelle Brown

Arianna Huffington
The fatwa against politically incorrect Bill Maher

Dispatches from Afghanistan
Like Vietnam chronicler Michael Herr, Russian journalist Artyom Borovik captured the hallucinatory hell of war -- but these days it's Borovik's account of Afghanistan that seems the most relevant
By Douglas Cruickshank

The greatest TV benefit show ever
Neil Young, Stevie Wonder, U2 and -- Fred Durst!? -- somberly and tastefully raise millions for the families of the victims of the Sept. 11 disaster
By Jeff Stark

Wartime peace
For many ex-lovers, the tragedy on Sept. 11 kicked up more than just dust
By Ann Marsh

Saturday, September 22

God bless Big Brother
Law enforcement officials are taking advantage of the war on terrorism to get everything they ever wanted.
By Damien Cave and Katharine Mieszkowski

It isn't just "freedom" they hate
Those who rained terror upon the U.S. may have had real grievances -- and we shouldn't feel guilty about discussing them.
By Sara Pursley

Blasts from the past
The weaponry the Taliban could turn on us may be our own, the relics of a $7 billion Cold War campaign.
By Ken Silverstein

Solidarity forever?
At an emergency meeting, European leaders back a "targeted" campaign against terrorism and applaud Bush's new internationalism.
By Steve Kettmann

How big a war?
Hawk Paul Wolfowitz wants the U.S. to attack Iraq. Colin Powell doesn't -- and nobody knows who has Bush's ear.
By Anthony York

Anger in the bazaars of Peshawar
The Taliban has strong support in the tribal areas of northwest Pakistan. If there is civil war, it will start here.
By Sean Kenny

Friday, Sept. 21

A Saddam connection?
While the world focuses on Osama bin Laden, some experts argue that Iraq was a likely conspirator
By David Neiwert

The view from Beirut
An American in Lebanon warns that despite Bush's efforts, Arabs will likely view an attack on terrorism as a war on Islam
By Paul Wachter

Why Americans can't find Islam on the map
Few colleges offer comprehensive courses in Arabic or Middle Eastern studies, and even fewer students seem to care
By Eric Boehlert

What Bush didn't say
He didn't compare his war strategy to its real predecessor: The War on Drugs. And he made no offer to build an international coalition
By Bruce Shapiro

Bush: America "called to defend freedom" In the most momentous speech of his presidency, Bush calls for a long, hard war against terrorism
By Gary Kamiya

Networks of terror As television hypes the coming war, the nation watches passively. Stunned by grief, we've shut ourselves up
By John Leonard

No more street fighting man In the wake of the terrorist attacks, the anti-globalization movement is trying to rein in violence -- and preparing for a hard road ahead
By David Moberg

Will the war on terrorism be a recession buster? Some economists are predicting that an upcoming flood of government spending will kick-start a flagging economy
By Katharine Mieszkowski

Carina Chocano: Dark times. Dark humor Memo to Jeff Greenfield (and Bill Maher): Irony lives

Sex in a time of terror People in New York are coming together physically as if it were the end of the world
By Cole Kazdin

King Kong's home away from home A moviegoer's elegy for the World Trade Center
By Stephanie Zacharek

How not to understand the enemy A joint Discovery Channel-BBC documentary on terrorism fails to provide the insight Americans so desperately need
By Eric Boehlert

No more high heels Third in a series: Go ahead, rip up my luggage and take down my license plate number. Life is newly serious after Sept. 11, and I want to feel it
By Janet Fitch

Lynda Barry Emily Dickinson poem No. 341

Letters Readers respond to "Round Up the Usual Suspects," Damien Cave's article on profiling and civil liberties

Thursday, Sept. 20

How the U.S. will fight
A combination of special forces, lethal stealth, diplomacy and old-fashioned military power will be used to battle terrorists
By Damien Cave and Anthony York

The shadowy world of Special Operations
Any strike against bin Laden will rely heavily on the military's Special Forces, known for daring, high-risk raids that are all too often disastrous
By David J. Morris

Lessons on how to fight terror
A message from the United Kingdom: Don't torture. Don't shoot boys who throw stones. And don't imagine for a moment that there is any guarantee of success
By Andrew Brown

Welcome to the death zone
The U.S. can't win a ground war in Afghanistan, says a British special forces officer who helped train the mujahedin
By Tom Carew

"The golden age of intelligence is before us"
Robert Kaplan says fighting terrorism will require new rules for spying, but he predicts that fighting an "almost comic book evil" will lead to a revival
By Laura Rozen

Hunting Osama
The author of "Black Hawk Down" and "Killing Pablo" says that American special forces have been training to go after bin Laden for years and are more than ready
By Max Garrone

Arianna Huffington
Public safety was not a Washington priority for a simple reason: There was no industry paying off politicians to make it one

Guns in the sky A congressman wants to arm pilots, crew and a sky marshal. Will that fly in our post-9/11 world?
By Jake Tapper

Infinite justice? Recall the Pentagon's new code name for the war against terror -- before it's too late
By Scott Rosenberg

The war economy What will be the fiscal impact of the campaign to extirpate terrorism?
By Katharine Mieszkowski

Consciousness on overload Second in a series: A memoirist seeks to untangle the mass of contradictory emotions following the terrorist attack
By Caroline Knapp

Terrorist wannabes In the wake of such devastation, what kind of person phones in a bomb threat?
By Christine Kenneally

How not to understand the enemy
A joint Discovery Channel-BBC documentary on terrorism fails to provide the insight Americans so desperately need
By Eric Boehlert

A song for Africa -- and the terror victims
Bono, 'N Sync, Michael Stipe and Britney Spears come together to rerecord "What's Going On." An exclusive report from the studio
By Jesse Kornbluth

Letters Readers react to Andrew Sullivan's commentary "Stand by Our Man"

Letters Readers respond to "Hell No, They Won't Go -- Yet" by Janelle Brown and King Kaufman

Letters Readers respond to the essay by Russell Morse, "Good to Go"

Wednesday, Sept. 19

Hell no, they won't go -- yet
Even those college students who passionately support the U.S. war on terrorism aren't sure they want to die in it
By Janelle Brown and King Kaufman

Stand by our man
Is it too much to ask those who have long disliked Bush to take a moment and give him a chance?
By Andrew Sullivan

A season in Hell
Among the rescuers at ground zero of the World Trade Center collapse, worlds and lives are ground to dust
By Christopher Ketcham

The dig
Searching for bodies in the rubble, a volunteer comes face to face with horror and death -- and discovers that there are still heroes in America
By James Croak

Shields up!
A missile defense system couldn't have stopped the terrorist attacks, but so what? Star Wars is suddenly more popular than ever
By Damien Cave

The "enemy" we barely know
A writer who has traveled extensively in Afghanistan talks about how little we understand its people, how dangerous it is to underestimate them and why they have cause to resent the U.S.
By Laura Miller

Dan Rather's tears
Journalists don't cry on camera. That was before last week
By Stephanie Zacharek

Robert Scheer
Despite the desire for quick retaliation, the U.S. will be shadowboxing with the devil for a long time

Norah Vincent
We faced death, and saw the world through the eyes of the brainsick bag ladies we used to ignore. Will we remember their insights?

Allen Barra on sports
Teach the Afghans the pick and roll! The corny sentiment and just plain vulgarity of Western sports would do wonders for the more stiff-necked elements of Islamic society

Tuesday, Sept. 18

Life will never be the same
Ever since last Tuesday, that's been our mantra -- but what does it mean?
By Chris Colin

Rally round the flag
I love Old Glory. I just wonder if I can take it back from the creeps who've waved it all my life
By King Kaufman

Has bin Laden made himself expendable?
Now that the Taliban's main opposition leader is dead, a scholar argues, the group may be more willing to hand over Osama bin Laden
By Max Garrone

Setback for Arab-Americans
On Sept. 11, Muslim leaders were to meet with President Bush about the civil rights concerns of ethnic Arabs. Now they're more concerned about their physical safety
By Jake Tapper

No more Lone Ranger
European leaders like the internationalist Bush who has emerged from last week's terror attacks
By Steve Kettmann

Why can't Uncle Sam spy?
The problem is red tape, turf battles and no spies on the ground, say experts
By Anthony York

Monday, Sept. 17

The bloody Jordan river now flows through America
A sword will hang over the U.S. until we convince Israel to make peace with the Palestinians
By Gary Kamiya

Israel's pivotal role
Palestinians celebrate World Trade Center attacks and Israel balks at truce talks. Will this threaten the U.S.'s global coalition?
By Flore de Préneuf

New York's most disliked building?
The World Trade Center represented the essence of American financial power, but critics hated the towers and the public never embraced them
By Eric Boehlert

Writing in the dark
For those of us charged with making sense of life after the attack, the hard work is just beginning
By Rick Moody

Letters
Readers respond to Gary Kamiya's "The Bloody Jordan River Now Flows Through America"

Letters
Readers respond to David Horowitz's "Bin Laden's American Blood Brothers: The Return of the '60s Bomb Throwers"

Can Bush channel Churchill?
The president admires the World War II leader, but he hasn't yet copied Churchill's candor about the hardships ahead as he prepares the nation for war
By Jake Tapper

David Horowitz
Bin Laden's American blood brothers: The return of the '60s bomb-throwers

Can't we all just get along?
As the cry for vengeance grows louder at home, American pacifists call for restraint
By Suzy Hansen and Jeff Stark

Nostradamus called it!
Internet conspiracy theorists are having a field day after the attacks
By Janelle Brown

Nothing Personal
From Sting and Britney to the Backstreet Boys and Madonna, the entertainment business is grappling with how best to respond to last week's nightmare
By Amy Reiter

This Modern World
This tragedy has brought out the best in us, but will it also bring out the worst?
By Tom Tomorrow

Friday, Sept. 14:

Send in the online spooks?
In the aftermath of terrorism, civil libertarians are running for cover. But are they protesting too much?
By Katharine Mieszkowski

Round up the usual suspects
How far should ethnic profiling go in the quest to nab the World Trade Center terrorists?
By Damien Cave

Good news, bad news
Experts say that terrorists will probably strike again, soon, but that biological and chemical attacks are still unlikely
By Max Garrone

An Afghan-American speaks
You can't bomb us back into the Stone Age. We're already there. But you can start a new world war, and that's exactly what Osama bin Laden wants
By Tamim Ansary

Too much God?
When the Rev. Jerry Falwell blamed the ACLU and other liberals for Tuesday's attack, he proved he's America's answer to the Taliban. But that doesn't mean there's no place for God in our expressions of national mourning
By Joan Walsh

Now more than ever
Witnessing hell has made me a born-again atheist
By Lauren Sandler

Use your words
How do we explain the inexplicable to our children?
By Jennifer Foote Sweeney

Spying eyes and ears
Congressional leaders make the case for a new emphasis on "human intelligence"
By Jake Tapper

Joe Conason
Despite our crisis, we shouldn't automatically cede our constitutional rights

Running against the grain: A survivor's tale
He was 17 floors from the tower's top just minutes before the jet hit. Luck and his contrary nature got him and two friends out alive
By Ann Marsh

New York gets a dose of Clinton
The former president appears in Greenwich Village and calls for solidarity
By Steven Manning

Lynda Barry
With you

Thursday, Sept. 13:

Search for survivors continues
The overview: Bomb scare empties Congress. Cheney moved to Camp David. New York airports close as arrests reported. Death toll could hit 5,000
By Salon staff

How to defeat bin Laden
Treat him as a criminal fugitive, not an enemy of war
By Michael T. Klare

Congress balks at giving Bush a blank check
Legislators work behind closed doors to limit the president's request for unprecedented power to wage war
By Jake Tapper

South Asia is like the Middle East, except everyone has nuclear weapons
The U.S. wants Pakistan to use its influence with the Taliban to hunt bin Laden and his allies, but regional geopolitics will make that tricky
By Max Garrone and Anthony York

The kamikaze factor
There was nothing high-tech about this week's suicide attacks -- their terror was psychological, not technological
By Scott Rosenberg

Anti-Arab passions sweep the U.S.
Despite Bush's calls for tolerance, firebombings, shootings and other acts of violence strike Islamic faithful and their places of worship
By Janelle Brown

"We are all Americans"
With the news that several hijackers studied in Hamburg, Germans throw their support behind Bush, and the tensions of his early months in office melt away -- for now
By Daryl Lindsey and Steve Kettmann

Living with terrorism
In Israel, a day without an attack "is a miraculous day," and a public eager for escapism turns to soap operas
By Flore de Préneuf

The unfriendly skies
Airports are reopening, but will anyone get on board after the worst air disaster ever?
By Damien Cave and Katharine Mieszkowski

"These are big strong guys. They ain't going down easy"
A day in the life of a decimated firehouse
By Suzy Hansen and Amy Reiter

Audio: "I felt the wind in my back and knew it was time to dive"
The fire safety director of WTC Tower No. 2, retired firefighter Kevin Horan, was in the building when it started to collapse and barely made it out alive

One man's war?
Is Osama bin Laden really the mastermind behind the atrocities, experts wonder, or simply the front man for a growing group of terrorists?
By Joshua Micah Marshall

Arianna Huffington
Obsessed with sharks and Gary Condit, the media, like the White House, missed earlier warnings about possible terrorist attacks at home

View from the box
For a day the cable news networks converged -- then they went back to their old tricks
By Bill Wyman

Comfort in coming together
Vigils, gatherings and ad hoc demonstrations offer solidarity and prayer -- from New York to Texas to San Francisco
By Karen Croft

Too many volunteers, not enough survivors
New Yorkers flock to help, but find, devastatingly, that there's little to do.
By Michael Scherer and Manya Brachear

Wednesday, Sept. 12:

FBI: We know who they were
The overview: Mueller says no arrests have been made; passengers tried to stop hijackers aboard the fourth plane, which may have been headed for another target in the Washington area
By Salon staff

"We predicted it"
A panel led by Gary Hart and Warren Rudman warned the White House and Congress that a bloody attack on U.S. soil could be imminent. Hart wonders: Why didn't anyone listen?
By Jake Tapper

The enemy with a thousand faces
In Osama bin Laden, the U.S. is confronting one of the most stealthy and formidable foes in its history
By Gary Kamiya

A venture capitalist for terrorists
Stephen Cohen explains how Osama bin Laden's organization functions and what the U.S. has to look forward to if it really wants to fight terrorism
By Max Garrone

Diminished intelligence
Ex-spies say the CIA isn't up to the task of out-smarting Osama bin Laden -- despite billions of new spending in the wake of his embassy bombings
By Jeff Stein

America's crumbling sense of immunity
There is no magic shield to protect us from the reality that global power carries global consequences
By David Beers

Terrorists are made, not born
America's bomb and assassinate crowd are part of the problem, not the solution
By Bruce Shapiro

Giuliani's moment
One leader has risen to the awful occasion -- and, so far, it hasn't been President Bush
By Joan Walsh

Manhattan in wartime
"To my darling Cookie, I have prayed up above and I will see you again"
By Eric Boehlert

Is shopping the new patriotism?
Shaken consumer confidence could sink the global economy -- but not if we all spend enough at the mall
By Damien Cave, Andrew Leonard and Katharine Mieszkowski

"Everything went black"
People who were inside and outside the World Trade Center at the time of the terrorist attack describe what they experienced
By Roman Milisic

"They said people came and the city's in trouble"
Brooklyn kids tell the story they were told.
By Amie Barrodale

Flying with phantoms
A pilot waves goodbye to the World Trade Center.
By Phaedra Hise

Letters
Readers share thoughts about the World Trade Center disaster and David Horowitz and Bruce Shapiro's takes on it

This Modern World
Words fail me
By Tom Tomorrow

Tuesday, Sept. 11:

U.S. attacked
The overview: World Trade Center towers destroyed by crashing planes. Pentagon also hit in wave of terrorist actions. Thousands feared dead or injured. U.S. says those responsible may have ties to bin Laden. Kabul, Afghanistan rocked by explosions -- U.S. denies involvement.
By Salon staff

Chaos erupts
Eyewitness accounts from the streets of New York and Washington.
By Salon staff

What does it all mean?
Reactions -- Horowitz: "America is soft." Vincent: "Proud to be a New Yorker." Military expert: Signs point to "the Afghan group." Former Bush official: Attacks required "inside help" Plus: More reactions from the experts.
By Salon staff

A new breed of terrorism
An expert discusses what motivated the attacks, why they're worse than ever before and what role the Internet probably played in organizing them.
By Laura Miller

Bush, challenged
The president's reaction is literally up in the air, as the world tunes in for an official -- and unofficial -- response from the government.
By Jake Tapper

Rejoicing in the streets of Jenin
While many Palestinians celebrate the attack on the U.S., Yasser Arafat denounces it as "unacceptable" and Israelis mourn.
By Flore de Préneuf

"Our fight is for Jerusalem, not New York"
In Paterson, N.J., Arab-Americans worry about their loved ones in New York and fear retribution.
By Eric Boehlert

"Purge our society," online bigots shout
Post-disaster threats and expressions of racism bubble up on the Web.
By Janelle Brown

Why the towers collapsed
The jetliners hit the World Trade Center buildings at a vulnerable point.
By Bill Wyman