In their own words
NYC, 11 September and since

The way we are

Mimi Gauthier LeBien, an "Accidental tourist at ground zero," evokes how those phantasmagoric first days felt.

"6:26 p.m. | 2001-09-11
Third entry today. We still haven't heard from my oldest friend's husband who was on the 102nd Flr. of WTC building Number Two. She has asked my roommate and I to search local hospitals. And so we are off." "I bet you like to watch"--a weblog by someone who pursued that harrowing search around the clock for several days, lost a half-dozen friends, and continued a fascinating journal of the last four years of "Partygirl's" 20s in turn-of-the-millennium NYC through a farewell entry just after Independence Day 2003.

"[W]hen we hit Fifth Avenue I see why our cab was never going to move. It's the Columbus Day Parade, going full gear one day after we began bombing Afghanistan, with the city on Omega alert against the threat of a second terrorist attack. And we're holding the parade anyway, because it's Columbus Day and this is New York and fuck you. I have never been so happy to see a parade": "Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: My Glamorous Life" (stick with this 'blog--click <previously> link at the bottom of each page to work Pinteresquely back in time; no <next> options that I can find, so the first link is for an entry a few weeks after the attack).

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"[...] It was then that we heard the roar and jumped back from the window as a United jet hurtled past. It looked massive flying through the concrete canyons of Manhattan. I heard the engine accelerate as the pilot throttled forward and knew instantly that the original pilot had to be dead. This was someone else at the controls, someone evil, guiding the jet with deadly precision at the heart of Tower Two. [...]"

"[...] In a nearly full subway car an old Jewish man, sporting a fur hat covered in pro-Israel pins, some in English, some in Hebrew, tries to hand out Zionist literature. The pages condemn anyone against Israel, and promote a hard stance against `enemies.' He is talkative and friendly, and a number of people take the pages. One young Latino man, with a thin Dutch beard that traces the line of his jaw, says, `Aw shit, this is not the time, man. Now is not the time. Now is not the time.' He keeps repeating it. Now everyone else hands their pages back like children turning in homework. [...]"

"[...] The barriers into the lockdown zone are the kind of challenge that New Yorkers appreciate. The goal is to get to the other side. You're only qualified if you have identification with the right information: a driver's license, a business card, someone who will come from the other side and vouch for you. All of Houston Street is Checkpoint Charlie. [...]"

"[...] I'm breathing asbestos. The Yemenis in the deli are telling everyone they're Gypsies--all of us with obvious Arab blood are tentative. Four of my fish have somehow picked this time to die. [...]"
... a sampling of observations at fray.com

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"A ground zero diary: 12 days of fire, fear and grit," by C. J. Chivers; NYTimes, 30 September 2001

"[A]fter 2.5 days of watching and listening to bad reporting," Steve Forbis snuck into ground zero to see for himself what was going on: "A report from ground zero"; 1 October 2001, Acid Logic ezine

"The surreality continues. At the diner down the street, everyone acts like nothing has happened. And all the while bulldozers and debris-removal trucks and fuel tanks and ambulances are driving towards Manhattan": "And for what? A love letter from New York, in ruins, September 12, 2001," by Laleh Khalili; The Iranian, September 2001

"To my astonishment, the whole peace vigil was draped in flags. The stars and stripes appeared on signs pleading `Don't Turn a Tragedy Into a War," `Islam is Not the Enemy,' and `Justice Not Revenge,' and on head scarves, T-shirts, wrapped around shoulders and piled in the shrines. Flags were on doggie sweaters and quickie `America Under Attack' T-shirts. What was this hawkish symbol doing at my peace vigil? I began asking people wearing or carrying the flag `what does this mean to you now?'" "Flagged for approval," by Virginia Vitzthum, AlterNet, 19 September 2001

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Most links in "Frozen Zone" text display photos at the KiwiClub site, where you can see many more of Rod Bicknell's vivid pedestrian-distance images.

In their own words

11 September

The text that accompanies this large gallery of news photos--in effect, a debriefing of the photographers--is, if anything, even more dramatic than the images, many already familiar as published photos, presented by the Digital Journalist, a kind of trade journal of, by, and for professional photojournalists. Many of these pros are seasoned combat photographers; without warning, the combat situation they were covering was in their hometown, in some cases in their front yard. They tell what they saw and felt while--as disoriented as the rest of us--they kept doing their job even as the walls came rumbling down around them. Two died, at least one was severely injured. Some of the last images shot by a photographer killed on West Street appeared in the next issue.

The view from six blocks away: text from an email Hayden Planetarium director Neil deGrasse Tyson, who witnessed the attack from his apartment, sent to his family and friends the next day

"Bearing witness: Taking refuge under, then in, a van: My escape from New York," by WSJ senior editorial page writer Jason Riley (email sent to colleagues at 4.17 p.m. ET 11 September); Wall Street Journal OpinionJournal Extra, 12 September 2001

My friend the novelist/ screenwriter/ journalist, who has an engineering degree, told me that as soon as he saw the towers burning on tv he knew the steel was getting so hot they would collapse. This eyewitness on Bleecker Street knew that too: "[W]ith that intensity of heat in a building in which the steel girders were insulated with asbestos, it had to collapse within one hour. I called the fire department, police, etc. and told them the building was guaranteed to collapse. I was told that 911 was only for emergencies, and I should call somewhere else. After about 40 minutes, as I saw the top segment of the building listing about 3 degrees, I left my apartment and went out to walk in the street. Buidlings collapse if they list more than 3 degrees": "What a way to go," by "Ray C. Dougherty"; email to NYU Linguistics Departmental Forum, 0:15 a.m. 12 September 2001

"My roof, like the others nearby, was brimming with the emotional discoveries, the slow realizations, the unacceptable knowledge of the lives being lost in those moments": "What I saw," by David France; Newsweek Web Exclusive

"I knew my world would never be the same": "Eyewitness, attack on New York: So low, so wrong," by Haleh Nazeri (an email to friends); The Iranian, 21 September 2001

"A personal recollection from a day of horror," by Barry L. Ritholtz, U.S.-based market strategist for London-based brokerage Weatherly Securities

"New York state of mind, an eyewitness account of the WTC attack": Pat Kearney was visiting Hoboken; The Stranger, 13-19 September 2001

analysis

"Spinsanity-- countering rhetoric with reason": This useful site "exposes and analyzes the increasingly pervasive use of manipulative and subrational rhetoric in American politics"--and see "Spin me right round," by Richard Byrne, Washington City Paper: Press Corpse, 30 November-6 December 2001.

Constructing the image: "`We're more dependent than ever on his top aides because everything is so closely held,' says the White House correspondent for Newsweek. `Hopefully you're not just the tool of the administration.' [F]ormer media critic for Inside.com: `There's been a collective decision to re-image the president[. ...] When you have people with agendas serving as your eyes and ears, I just don't think you're necessarily getting the truth. It's just a more patriotic version of spin'": "What Bush said and when he said it," by Howard Kurtz; Washington Post, 2 October 2001

More on the insulation of the administration's (s)elected representative from journalistic scrutiny: "The White House doesn't need the press," by Ryan Lizza, NYTimes Magazine, 9 December 2001

"At Snopes.com, Barbara and David Mikkelson debunk conspiracies and quash urban legends": "The rumor busters," by Katharine Mieszkowski; Salon, 31 October 2001. After disproving rumors about employees of various businesses celebrating the attack, e.g., they confirm that an NYC Starbucks charged ambulance drivers treating shock at the WTC $130 out-of-pocket for three cases of water, then the corporation ignored complaints till the (true) story started getting national attention.

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At a loss for words
 

The aerial image of the frozen zone on another page here is a rotated (to put north at the top) and cropped version of one that a favorite federal agency of mine, the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, has buried at its site in a variety of resolutions. If you have a large-screen monitor and massive amount of bandwidth, graphics memory, and motivation, download the 14mb image. Otherwise, check out the cropped and lower-res versions. (It's the image that's described but not displayed, and it's easy to see why. The site might well have lurched under the load if word of the image had spread on the Web when NOAA released it.)
 

A photos mirror site, source of the Terry Schmidt shots used on these pages.
 
Owen Bossola shot these images from the campus of Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey.
 
Another mirror: Jon Anhold's mirror of 11 September graphics.
 
Links on these pages to 11 September photos refer to images at sites above, except one that is from the wtcGroundZeroRelief.org gallery and one from NOAA.

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Everything you ever wanted to know about the World Trade Center as an architectural entity: valuable facts, pix, links
 

Only in New York

The images on these pages and many others by Mark Mozaffari are available at Trilogy Photo, 79 Chambers Street, a few doors west of Broadway.
 

Not for the faint of heart: Each of the scores of photos of the attack and its aftermath that Here Is New York is displaying is wrenching, the cumulative effect is staggering. The makeshift exhibit is in a crowded makeshift gallery on the south side of Prince Street between Wooster and Greene streets (the space Agnes B. just vacated). The September 11 Photo Project also is exhibiting pro and amateur images, at 26 Wooster Street, between Grand and Canal streets. Both welcome more images.
 
Net proceeds from Here Is New York sales benefit the Children's Aid Society. The September 11 Photo Project "is a not-for-profit project in partnership with the NYC Firefighters Burn Center Foundation."
 
<update, June 2003: both shows of course long since closed>
 

Another spontaneous, downtown, arts community response is the Art Science Research Lab's wtcGroundZeroRelief.org, which answers rescue workers' special needs that fall between the cracks of FEMA, city agencies, and the big charities, delivering directly to ground zero and the Fresh Kills dump. Read the needed-items list and bring donations to the warehouse at 304 Spring Street between Hudson and Greenwich streets, NYC--or send a check (address at the site; email; voice 646-230-1664). Among most-needed supplies, 25 November: black flexible ankle-high/steel toe boots, all sizes 4 to 16; thermal tops and bottoms; winter-insulated Carhardt coveralls. <mission accomplished, early summer 2002>

Haslam Septic Service

            

As the shockwaves spread on 11 September, everyone called upon seemed to rise to the occasion.

"In Gander, the hospitality of perfect strangers": Nazim-Amin was a member of the cockpit crew of a Delta airliner that was diverted to Gander; JD's Blog: New Media Musings, 5 October 2001

Gander's suddenly needed to accommodate thousands of passengers aboard 53 diverted flights grounded in the tiny Newfoundland town.

A U.S. sailor's email home, with photo, describes the spontaneous gesture of support the German destroyer Lutjens delivered to crewmen aboard the U.S.S. Winston S. Churchill.

            

reconsidering Oracle

A local account of the last call from one of the guys who brought down flight 93 near Pittsburgh--and who worked for Oracle
 

Uh ... not so fast with that reconsideration. "[Lisa Beamer, who before marriage also worked for Oracle] is trying to copyright her husband's endlessly regurgitated parting salvo, `Let's roll!' `We believe we own "Let's roll" because Todd said it and it was attributed to him,' says Beamer's attorney, Paul Kennedy. `We're going to do all that's necessary to protect that.' Well, a widow's got to do what a widow's got to do": "Let's Roll! Let us now praise famous widows," by Steve Perry, Native Son, The Rake, April 2002
 
"They're eerily calm. They smile and crack jokes and laugh out loud. They're the scourge of the media:" The irreverent Ted Rall's "Terror Widows" cartoon

for the record

Daily timeline: "September 11 News has captured the news event with archived news, images, photos, pictures, news graphics, headlines of the day, web site archives, and the world's reaction."
 

kottke.org September 2001 archives
 

An attempt at a comprehensive 11 September archive
 

Yahoo! terrorism news full coverage
 

The Internet Archive and the Library of Congress are "defining and preserving the Web record of the attacks." They invite surfers to forward relevant URLs to webArchivist.org, which also offers a software tool for the purpose. CNet has more.

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If you know of other first-person accounts, with or without or exclusively photos, I'd appreciate your emailing me the URL. I hope to build a larger section of links to unmediated eyewitness pages. (Alas, I have the resources to handle only URLs of accounts that already have been published elsewhere on the Web, not unpublished articles.)

N.B. ...

Six months after:

"At the Winter Garden, the rebuilding begins"!!! by Glenn Collins, NYTimes, 22 March 2002.

Minneapolis scavenger and handyman Joe Temeczko, 86, joyously decided what to do with the surprising $1.3 million he'd saved: He bequeathed it to the City of New York, "to honor those who perished in the disaster of September 11, 2001," and two weeks later, on 14 October 2001, he died. If he'd hired a big-bucks flack, the Big Apple might have greeted his sweet open-heartedness with something better than bureaucratic indifference: "Leaving it all to New York," by Carla Baranauckas, NYTimes, 22 March 2002

"To a British ear perhaps `Ground Zero' seems self-dramatising[. ...] Perhaps if I had stayed in London, I would have an unambiguous response, viewing all this as sentimental, hysterical, excessive": "Why the Big Apple was ripe for Miller's return" by Richard Eyre, New York Diary, The Guardian, 16 March 2002.

"Manhattan three months on," by Michael Ellison,

The Guardian, 11 December 2001: a fairly accurate appraisal once you get past the "New York's brash confidence has been replaced by enduring uncertainty" nonsense. (At least the reporter knows St. Paul's Chapel when he sees it. Margot Adler committed the customary journalistic gaff in her NPR three-month anniversary piece on ground zero when she called St. Paul's Trinity Church.)

On the eve of the three-month anniversary, another moving piece about ground zero (although the reporter calls what surely must be St. Paul's Chapel St. John's Church--St. John's?!?): "At the pit, a night shift to numb the body and soul," by Charlie LeDuff, NYTimes, 10 December 2001

About that Rector Street dig--etc: "Rebuilding WTC area from the ground down," by Daily News Staff Writer Greg Gittrich, New York Daily News Online, 11 December 2001

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"Glenn Corbett, professor of fire science at John Jay College: `It's shocking that the engineering community would be saying they knew the building would come down. [...] If they knew that, then they had an obligation to communicate it to the fire service.'" Uh, tell that to the NYU faculty member who wrote on 11 September that he tried and was told 911 was for emergency calls only. "Learning from towers disaster," by Daily News Staff Writers Joe Calderone and Thomas Zambito, New York Daily News Online, 28 October 2001

"The firefighters at Lillie's [...] don't wave flags, there is no calling on God or looking for enemies": "`Why can't I die?'," by Christopher Ketcham; Salon, 26 September 2001

"FDNY's second-darkest day: Marking '66 fire an annual ritual,"; by Daily News Staff Writer Michele McPhee; New York Daily News Online, 17 October 2001

"[... E]veryone wandering the streets of Manhattan knew the face of a victim. [...] We knew these faces because the photographs of the missing were everywhere[. ...] Everyone seemed to lock on to one face in particular": "How a grief ritual is born," by Marshall Sella; NYTimes Magazine, 7 October 2001

"A toxic nightmare at disaster site: Air, water, soil contaminated," Daily News Exclusive by Juan Gonzalez; New York Daily News Online, 26 October 2001

"The economic crisis caused by the World Trade Center attack has not trickled down to low-income New Yorkers--it has hit them like a tidal wave": "Low-pay workers, poor also feel devastated; economic pain mounts," by Daily News Staff Writer Brian Kates; New York Daily News Online, 29 October 2001

"The preacher from Kentucky went store to store on the edge of ground zero. He listened to hard luck tales. He said, `We'd like to help out.' Then he cut the checks--$1,500 to Muyang Jo at the deli, $2,000 to Salvatore Borgognone at the pizzeria, $2,300 to Grace Koh at the children's clothing store. And he wrote `Jesus loves you' on the bottom left-hand corner of each one. The preacher, Dave Stone of Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, is part of a loose-knit alliance of evangelical clergy members in the midst of handing out nearly $850,000 in World Trade Center relief. So far, more than $100,000 has gone to small-business owners and employees. The idea is to give immediate financial help, along with a message of Christian love, without the due diligence of more established charities": "At edge of ground zero, gospel and giving," by Daniel J. Wakin, NYTimes, 1 December 2001

"We're all just heartbroken here. What can we do to help make New Yorkers feel better?" asked Hans von Waardenburg, owner of the Dutch company B&K Bulbs. "Posy memorial to WTC victims a Dutch treat," by Daily News Staff Writer Michael O. Allen; New York Daily News Online, 20 October 2001 ...

photo: adpFisher

When the Dutch flowers bloomed in spring, Barrow Street residents posted signs asking dog owners not to let their pets kill them with urine. "Don't use the tragedy to bash dog owners!" one caninophile crabbed.

... "In Brooklyn, the Botanic Garden gave more than 100,000 bulbs to schools, community gardens and civic groups. The Parks Department distributed 50,000 bulbs. To keep track of all the places daffodils are popping up, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden added a map to its Web site": "Daffodil-blooming map planted on Web," by Daily News Staff Writer Joyce Shelby, City Beat, New York Daily News Online, 20 March 2002

But absolutely no offer was good enough to lure organizers of the New York International Orchid Show back downtown: "Orchids still herald spring, but not at Winter Garden," by Glenn Collins, NYTimes, 19 March 2002.

"Bond with New York is felt in fire truck-building town," by Jodi Wilgoren, NYTimes, 1 December 2001

"Shrine to ground zero: St. Paul's Chapel inspires, comforts work crews," by Daily News Staff Writer Don Singleton; New York Daily News Online, 20 October 2001

"Hundreds of people across the Valley on Sunday mourned the slaying in Mesa of a Sikh gas station owner whose only crime, his loved ones say, was that he looked Arabic and wore a turban. Balbir Singh Sodhi's death may be the first homicide in the country related to the backlash against Arab-Americans after Tuesday's terrorist attacks": "Valley mourns apparent backlash killing," by Kelly Ettenborough, Adam Klawonn, and Christina Leonard; The Arizona Republic, 17 September 2001

"Almost lost in the chaos of the collapse of the World Trade Center is a mystery that under normal circumstances would probably have captured the attention of the city and the world. That mystery is the collapse of a nearby 47-story, two-million-square-foot building": "Engineers suspect diesel fuel in collapse of 7 World Trade," by James Glanz, NYTimes, 29 November 2001. ... Summary of a NYObserver March 2002 update.

"Ask Will Heyniger for his take on the state of the world after Sept. 11 and he'll answer in cool, measured tones. He understands the physical and emotional devastation. He understands the agonies of war. It's just that he can't quite feel them. `It all has this sort of mediated quality to it,' says Heyniger. Ask Heyniger's wife, Christina, about her reaction and you'll get plenty of feeling. On occasion, traveling to or from work, she'd break into tears. `I just could not let it go,' she says": "The great worry divide," by Washington Post staff writer Paul Farhi, washingtonpost.com, page C01, 29 November 2001

Give self-defense a chance

"As Americans, we have our own brutalities to answer for--as well as the brutalities of other states that we have armed and funded. None of this, however, excuses terrorism; none of it even makes terrorism morally understandable": "Excusing terror: The politics of ideological apology," by Michael Walzer; The American Prospect, 22 October 2001

"Not every attack on a foreign land is unjust. Civilians will die in this affair, and they shouldn't. But the answer is not teach-ins and protest marches. I want us to find the terrorists in their cells and wipe them out before they wipe out more of us." "Let's not give peace a chance--Yet," by Anne Roiphe; The New York Observer, 22 October 2001

"[I]f, as the peaceniks like to moan, more bin Ladens spring up to take his place, I can offer this assurance: Should that be the case, there are many, many more who will also spring up to kill him all over again": While I'm ordinarily no fan of Christopher Hitchens, Salon has r"eprinted" a perfectly delicious rejoinder to Arundhati Roy et al that he wrote for the Guardian: "Guess what, the bombing worked like a charm," Salon, 14 November 2001.

What kind of "victory" is this that leaves Afghan women feeling too insecure to cast off their burkas? "The Fear beneath the burka," by Rina Amiri, NYTimes Op-Ed, 20 March 2002

No, no, no

"The algebra of infinite justice," by Arundhati Roy, Guardian, 29 September 2001

"Why America must stop the war now," by Arundhati Roy, Guardian Unlimited, 23 October 2001: "Imagine if the Taliban government was to bomb New York City, saying all the while that its real target was the US government and its policies." ... Yeah. Just imagine. If the subject weren't so tragically serious, I'd recommend this second, even more patronizing piece for its unintentional humor.

Blueprint for how to spin the anti-self-defense pitch: "With every call to halt the military action [the anti-war movement] should continue to condemn the bombing of the World Trade Centre, express sympathy, unconditionally and without qualification, for the victims and join the call to bring those proved responsible to justice. [...] The movement must keep its eyes on the prize": "Peace by precision," by Gary Younge; The Guardian, 29 October 2001.
 

Perhaps this Salman Rushdie essay implicitly explains Arundhati Roy's sangfroid about the mass murders? "Religion, as ever, is the poison in India's blood," The Guardian, 9 March 2002: "The horrible truth about communal slaughter in India is that we're used to it. It happens every so often; then it dies down. That's how life is, folks."
 

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Note: The NYTimes requires registration and cookies; after a few days pieces revert to a pay-per-view archive.

index

In their own words:
      NYC, 11 September and since
      The attack

Other images

N.B.

Only in New York

Analysis

Bill of Rights, R.I.P.?

Some sites that don't
      watch what they say

Tired of biased U.S. media? Try
      biased offshore alternatives.

Intelligence gathering

Israel and the Palestinians

Afghanistan

Give self-defense a chance
       No, don't

Archives

If we forfeit our freedom, what is it we're defending?

"Terrorists have no ability to destroy our democracy--but we do, simply by surrendering it, by keeping our mouths shut while it is dismantled by the authorities. The real test is going to be of our democratic resolve. Will we citizens settle for life in a guarded and gated corporate empire? `Everything has changed,' we're told. No, it hasn't. This pitiful wail by politicians and pundits [is] the prevailing excuse used by those who tell us that to defend freedom we must surrender freedoms, to stop terrorist assaults on our democracy we must militarize our society." "In a time of terror, protest Is patriotism," by Jim Hightower, Hightower Lowdown, 14 November 2001

"Democracy held hostage," by David Talbot: On watching what we say; Salon, 29 September 2001

Also, for breaking news on watching what we say and the squeamishness of American media, keep an eye on Jim Romenesko's weblog.

"As we were interviewing photographers who had covered the events of September 11, several asked that we delete any remarks about the oppressive atmosphere created by the police, or the Mayor's office, for fear of losing their press passes": "Fear in New York," editorial, The Digital Journalist, December 2001

"A Sacramento journalist is taken into custody by police and forced to destroy photos by an over-zealous National Guardsman": "Homeland insecurity," by R. V. Scheide; Sacramento News & Review, 25 October 2001

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A few sites that don't
watch what they say

Let cursor.org do the dirty work. A blog of pointers to mainstream coverage of issues of concern here. Many are articles you'd read anyway (NYT, WP); enough are pieces you'd never have known about without this resource to justify a daily (weekday) visit.

Before access to news became subscription-only,

The American Prospect

TomPaine.com

Alternet Salon's continuing coverage was excellent; probably still is.
 

Israel and the Palestinians

"Separate and unequal on the West Bank," by Amira Hass, the correspondent for Haaretz in the Palestinian territories and author of "Drinking the Sea at Gaza"; NYTimes, 2 September 2001

"[A] bad Ramadan for the Palestinians is an ominous development for us, too. If more Israelis would show a little more compassion for the fate of the Palestinians, or at least internalize the awareness that as long as things are bad for them they are going to be bad for us too, things might look different": "A sad Ramadan," by Gideon Levy, Ha'aretz, 18 November 2001:

"Upon arrival the hosts tell us a guest who lives in another Ramallah neighborhood will not be coming. There is heavy shooting and he's afraid to leave his house. He shows up a bit later, apologizing for his cowardice, but assures us, it was really heavy tonight": "Life under occupation," by Lori A. Allen, a University of Chicago anthropology graduate student conducting research in the West Bank, AlterNet, 23 October 2001

Afghanistan

back when:
"The First Anglo-Afghan War"

"Joanne and I taught for three years in Mazar-i-Sharif, 1968-71": William Allen, who teaches now at Arkansas State University, remembers those days with photographs of his students, a photo of the burning towers his son shot from his Brooklyn rooftop, and some questions that may be unanswerable.

on the brink:
"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": "An Afghan-American speaks," by Tamim Ansary, a writer in San Francisco and the son of a former Afghani politician; Salon, 14 September 2001--an article whose impact was noted in "One e-mail message can change the world," by Laura Miller, NYTimes Magazine, 9 December 2001

"Weakest link: Why the Taliban isn't so tough," by Michael Rubin, who had grown a beard and can get by in Persian, which most Afghans understand, and wandered for more than a week interviewing teachers, policemen, gravediggers, merchants, the unemployed, and the Taliban; The New Republic, 1 October 2001

intelligence gathering

"The counterterrorist myth," by Reuel Marc Gerecht, a former CIA operative; Why bin Laden has little to fear from American intelligence; The Atlantic, August 2001

"What went wrong," by Seymour M. Hersh: "The C.I.A. and the failure of American intelligence"; The New Yorker, 8 October 2001 (if you find a different article at that url, check The New Yorker's "September 11th File")

Does anybody even care what went wrong? "Intelligence test," by David Corn; The Nation, 3 October 2001.

"Through mismanagement, arrogance, and fear of the unknown, the National Security Agency has become a victim of the high-tech world it helped to create." "The intelligence gap," by Seymour M. Hersh: The New Yorker, 6 December 1999

"An abandoned Taliban building in Kabul contained an alarming document that advised would-be atomic bomb builders to `[w]ash your hands with soap and warm water after handling the material, and don't allow your children or pets to play in it or eat it. [...] Any left over Plutonium dust is excellent as an insect repellant.' A webmaster who'd viewed news footage of the document recognized it": "Phoney bomb humor fools Taliban?" by David Cassel, AlterNet, 19 November 2001

Tired of biased U.S. media? Try biased offshore alternatives ...

You hear every day about reports from Al Jazeera, often characterized as "the Arabic CNN." Ahmed Ahmed updates Al Jazeera news at approximately 7.30 p.m. on weekdays; WBUR exclusive "Special Coverage." Describing Al Jazeera as the Arabic CNN doesn't make it so; Sharon Waxman and Mamoun Fandy write that that characterization is far from true.

Ha'aretz (English): "an independent [Israeli] daily newspaper with a broadly liberal outlook both on domestic issues and on international affairs. It has a journalistic staff of some 330 reporters, writers and editors. The paper is perhaps best known for its Op-ed page."

DEBKAfile: another Mideast site. You sometimes may read it here first; more often, what you read is simply not true.

The Guardian's WTC weblog. (Beware of any publication that misspells World Trade Center.)

Not sure exactly what this link is that I borrowed from A&LD--a blog, apparently. Anyway, the self-described screed annotates, sometimes hilariously, one of those insufferably patronizing Brit press accounts of unwashed U.S. masses observed in native habitat.
 

The Iranian, an interesting Iranian-American 'zine, maintains a toc of its writers' reactions to 11 September. This Afshin Levy plea deserves a read before every 11 September (Patriots Day?!?) anniversary: "[...] I declare September 11 International Enough Day. Enough flag-waving, enough violence, enough nationalism. Enough already! September 11 was not an American tragedy. [...] It was a tragedy for the human spirit, regardless of nationality, religion, and anything else. On September 11, let's say Enough. [...]"

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"[T]here was almost a sense [...] that the Post wasn't in New York and somehow hadn't experienced the same thing that everyone else had experienced. (When there was emotion, it was expressed as out-of-control political rage--[...] referring to Christiane Amanpour as CNN's `war slut.')": "Post mortem?" by Michael Wolff, New York Magazine, 22 October 2001
 

photos: Richard Kopperdahl

Lower East Side Rooftop
Sept. 1999
Sept. 2001