New York, Tuesday morning, 11 September
2001, 8.44 a.m. New Yorkers were hurrying to
start the day; the Path Line had emptied its pas-
sengers from New Jersey at the World Trade
Center a few minutes earlier. Hundreds were
already at work in downtown Manhattan in this
mini-city of banks, shops and offices, the skyline
dominated by the Twin Towers. A minute later
incredulous spectators in the street below saw a
plane approach and slam into one of the towers
creating a ball of fire. A short time later another
plane smashed into the second tower with similar
devastating effect. It was certain now that this was
no accident. The US was under terrorist attack.
After an agonising interval the towers collapsed
killing some 2,792 office workers and firemen in
the upper storeys. The whole horrifying scene was
broadcast from coast to coast on television emo-
tionally involving every American. A third plane
hit the Pentagon like a flying bomb causing great
damage and loss of life. A fourth was also heading
for Washington, probably aiming at the White
House or the Capitol but was brought down by
the action of courageous passengers en route in
Pennsylvania killing everyone. The president was
hastily flown to safety, the skies were cleared of
all commercial aircraft, and fighter planes took to
the air. The term 9/11 became the shorthand for
identifying a threat from a different kind of enemy- from terrorist groups sheltered by countries far
weaker than the US, sympathetic to their cause
of hatred of the US and Jews the world over. By
carrying the attack to the heart of the US, to the
icons of the powers of finance and government,
9/11 proved a catalyst in the strategic thinking
of the administration of George W. Bush and
marked a sombre opening to the new millennium.When George W. Bush was inaugurated on 20
January 2001 the severity of the challenges that
would soon test him lay not far into the future.
At home he was determined to learn the lessons of
his father’s defeat. What appeared to matter most
to the voters was the economy and it was poten-
tially not in good shape in a world downturn.
Aggressive cutting of interest rates by Alan
Greenspan, the chairman of the Federal Reserve,
kept the consumers going as house prices soared.
Wall Street with prices driven to extravagant
heights began to slump as the dot.com computer
upstarts with little earnings and projections to the
sky imploded. The year 2001 was in business the
annus horribilis. The unacceptable face of capital-
ism came into full view. Corporate greed, the con-
nivance of respected Wall Street investment
bankers and tax accountancy practices allowed the
crooks to make hay at the expense of the innocent,
it was also the decade of greedy punters buying
shares. Exemplary was the bankruptcy of a huge
company, Enron, in December 2001, followed by
World Com and others in its wake. Spectators
were regaled with millionaire directors being
escorted in handcuffs to waiting police cars.
Respectable Wall Street bankers had hyped their(^1) Chapter 79
THE ‘WAR ON TERROR’