9/11: The Day That Never Really Ended

There are dates that belong to history, and then there are dates that belong to memory. September 11 is both. Twenty-five years ago, America experienced a day that changed the course of history and altered the way a generation understood the world. It is a day we must never forget.

History sometimes gives us warnings before it gives us answers.

Charles Lindbergh was the American aviator who rose to international fame in 1927 by making the first nonstop flight from New York City to Paris. Lindbergh later drew widespread criticism after a speech on September 11, 1941, in which he blamed “the British, pro-Jewish groups, and the Roosevelt administration” for trying to draw America into World War II.

Less than three months later, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, and America entered the war.

Exactly 60 years after Lindbergh’s controversial speech, America would again be confronted with an attack that would draw the nation into a very different kind of war.

The year was 2001.

“2001: A Space Odyssey” was the epic science-fiction film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick in 1968. For decades, its futuristic title seemed to describe a distant world. Then time caught up with fiction. 2001 had arrived. We were witnessing the beginning of the 21st century and the third millennium.

Technology was transforming the way we lived, communicated and conducted business. America was prosperous and powerful, and there was a widespread expectation that the new century would bring greater peace and opportunity.

On January 20, George W. Bush was sworn in as the 43rd President of the United States. He was only the second president in American history to be the son of a former president, the first having been John Quincy Adams.

But beneath the surface, a very different threat was developing.

The militant Islamist organization al-Qaeda, founded by Osama bin Laden, had already demonstrated its willingness to attack American interests. On October 12, 2000, the USS Cole was attacked while being refueled in Yemen’s Aden Harbor. Two suicide bombers detonated explosives aboard a small boat near the guided-missile destroyer, killing 17 American sailors and injuring 39 others.

Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility, and Osama bin Laden praised the operation.

The organization had demonstrated its ability to operate in different places, employ different tactics and exploit different grievances. It was difficult to predict where it would strike next—or what form that attack would take.

On September 11, 2001, we received our painful answer.

It was a brilliant, clear Tuesday morning. At 8:46 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767 carrying thousands of gallons of jet fuel, crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. The impact left a massive, burning hole in the skyscraper and trapped hundreds of people on the floors above.

Eighteen minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 appeared from the sky, turned sharply toward the World Trade Center and crashed into the South Tower.

Millions of Americans watched the events unfolding in New York.

At 9:37 a.m., American Airlines Flight 77 slammed into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. Meanwhile, United Airlines Flight 93, hijacked after leaving Newark International Airport, was headed toward another target. After learning what had happened in New York and Washington, passengers and crew members fought back against the hijackers. At 10:03 a.m., Flight 93 crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The intended target was never reached.

America was under attack.

By the end of that day, 2,977 people had been killed. They were fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, coworkers and friends. They came from across the United States and from countries around the world. The attacks were a profoundly shocking event to the American people and the U.S. government.

Not since the British burned Washington in 1814 had the nation’s capital itself come under enemy attack.

The consequences were immediate. Civilian air traffic across the United States was grounded. The New York Stock Exchange remained closed for several days. Airports, government buildings and public spaces were transformed by new security measures. The American conception of national security changed forever.

On September 20, President George W. Bush addressed a joint session of Congress and the American people, defining what would become known as the “War on Terror.” The United States would pursue not only the terrorists responsible for the attacks, but also those who harbored and supported them.

In October, the administration established the Office of Homeland Security. Later that month, Congress passed and President Bush signed the USA PATRIOT Act.

The United States demanded that the Taliban government in Afghanistan surrender Osama bin Laden and dismantle al-Qaeda’s sanctuary. The Taliban refused. In October 2001, the United States and its allies launched military operations in Afghanistan. By the end of the year, Taliban forces and al-Qaeda had been driven from many of their major strongholds. But Osama bin Laden escaped.

The stage had been set for a remarkable transformation in America’s foreign policy, military strategy and homeland security.

The War on Terror was just beginning.

Twenty-five years later

A quarter-century has now passed. That fact is difficult to comprehend. For those who lived through September 11, 2001, the memories remain remarkably vivid.

For millions of younger Americans, however, 9/11 is something they learned about in school. They were not alive when the towers fell. They did not hear the silence over American skies when commercial aviation was grounded. They did not experience the uncertainty, fear and extraordinary sense of unity that followed.

For them, September 11 is history. And that makes remembering more important—not less.

The terrorist threat facing the United States today is not the same threat America confronted in 2001. That does not mean the threat has disappeared. It means it has evolved.

Today, extremist organizations can operate without the physical infrastructure they once required. The battlefield has expanded into the digital world. Recruitment can occur online, propaganda can cross borders instantly, and extremist messages can reach individuals through social media, encrypted communications and other online platforms.

Increasingly, the individual carrying out an attack may never have met a terrorist operative face-to-face.

John Halinski, a former Deputy Administrator and Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Transportation Security Administration and CEO of SRI Group, has spent much of his career examining the evolution of the terrorist threat. In his assessment of rising extremist attacks and the U.S. homeland threat in 2026, Halinski warns that ISIS and its sympathizers have adapted to the changing environment.

Traditional terrorist strongholds may have been weakened, but extremist organizations have developed other means of maintaining relevance. Recruitment, propaganda and online radicalization can allow an organization to influence individuals without providing the logistical support once necessary for a major terrorist operation.

Attacks carried out by individuals or small groups can require little money or infrastructure yet still create widespread fear and publicity.

Halinski believes the threat from ISIS recruitment and ISIS-inspired attacks against the United States could increase significantly. That warning deserves attention—not because the next September 11 is inevitable, but because the nature of terrorism has changed.

The warning signs may be different. The perpetrators may be different. The tactics may be different. The technology is certainly different. But the objective remains familiar.

We have already seen reminders.

The January 2025 attack in New Orleans demonstrated how ISIS ideology could inspire an individual to use a vehicle as a weapon against civilians. At the end of 2025, federal authorities announced that they had disrupted an alleged ISIS-inspired New Year’s Eve attack in North Carolina.

And in December 2025, an attack at Sydney’s Bondi Beach targeted people gathered for a Hanukkah celebration, killing 15 people and demonstrating again that extremist violence can emerge far from the terrorist organization’s former territorial strongholds.

None of these attacks was September 11. The lesson is more complicated. Terrorism evolves.

The ideology can survive the destruction of its headquarters. The technology changes, the tactics change, the targets change and the people carrying out the attacks change. But the capacity to exploit fear remains.

Remembering…

Twenty-five years later, we remember the nearly 3,000 lives lost, the families forever changed, and the extraordinary courage displayed on a day when America was attacked.

We remember, too, what followed—a nation wounded, grieving and, for a time, remarkably united.

A generation has now grown up that does not remember September 11. It is our responsibility to tell them. Not to teach them to live in fear, but to understand what happened, what changed and what we learned.

Because the threat has changed—our responsibility has not.

On September 11, 2026, pause and remember the names. Remember the sacrifice. Remember the courage. Remember the unity.

And remember the promise.

Never forget.