Description: The morning of September 11, 2001 changed the face of America. Terrorism is no longer a word reserved for television broadcasters when describing events taking place halfway around the world. Watching the smoke billowing into the clear blue skies that September day Americans knew that we were on longer safe at home or at work. Terrorism had come to America. This abstract idea of killing innocent people which has always been associated with places with names like Lebanon, the Gaza Strip and Columbia was not just knocking at our door it had kicked it in taking thousands of people along with it. As we sat glued to our television sets, the fact that terrorists were no longer a foreign problem was repeated over and over by commentators and we watched the safety of our nation burn and fall as the buildings collapsed into a pile of rubble. When the first plane hit the World Trade Center most of us assumed it was a tragic accident. Something terrible must have gone wrong. The plane must have veered off course due to a mechanical failure or pilot error, but when a second plane rammed the second tower right before our eyes, it was clear this was no accident. A choreographed terrorist attack on the United States was underway and we were helpless to stop it. The vulnerabilities of America became clear to the world in those few moments. As the smoke cleared and the rubble was cleaned up, it would be naive to think this was the last asymmetric attack that terrorists will inflict on America. We need to ask hard questions and be ready to make hard changes so we can maintain the very freedoms we hold so dear. How did these terrorists cause so much death and destruction within our borders? What made these buildings the targets of choice? In addition, could we have prevented it? The answer to the fist two are simple, they watched how we live in this land of the free and discovered our weaknesses.
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