Alongside the COVID-19 pandemic, which, as of this writing (January 1, 2022), is still not over, the horrifying terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 are likely to be the most significant events that end up defining the United States in the 21st century. But while a lot of the focus in the media has gone to those agonizing moments witnessed either first hand or on TV, and rightly so, what has frequently gone missing are the political and sociological conditions that actually led up them-some of which, regrettably, five American presidents (Jimmy Carter; Ronald Reagan; George H. W. Bush; Bill Clinton; George W. Bush) unintentionally may have had a hand in help bringing about. The two-part 2006 National Geographic Channel special INSIDE 9/11, without political bias or spin one way or the other, gets really to the heart of the build-up to those 102 minutes of horror that led to the deaths of nearly 3,000 people, and, subsequently, our involvement in two overseas wars that caused even more death and destruction to American soldiers and innocent civilians alike.
INSIDE 9/11, which all told runs close to three and a half hours but wastes not a nanosecond, gives us a glimpse into the ancient history of Afghanistan in Part One, leading up to the invasion of it by the Soviet Union in the late fall of 1979, and the start of the United States, still smarting from the humiliation that was Vietnam, only wanting to get involved peripherally by funding what became known as a "mujahadeen". That Islamic movement was what eventually morphed into the Al-Qaeda jihadist network, putting at its head a Saudi exile named Osama Bin Laden. Once the Soviet Union was ousted, in the summer of 1988, after nine years of fighting that was as futile for Moscow as Vietnam had been for us, that's when Al Qaeda became a very big deal, as did the subsequent Taliban regime that came to rule Afghanistan with an ironclad Islamist fist. But once the U. S., under Bush I, set up shop in Saudi Arabia to oust Saddam Hussein from Kuwait, both Al Qaeda and Bin Laden became vengeful against its former ally. This resulted in a car bomb being set off in the parking garage of the World Trade Center on February 26, 1993, resulting in the deaths of eight people and at least one thousand others being injured. As it turned out in retrospect, this was just a warm-up for what would be coming out way eight and a half years later.
Part 2 shows us the security lapses that allowed the nineteen hijackers to board the planes that they eventually took over with violent results. Although much of the footage used is familiar to us, it is still painful to look at; and some of it had rarely been shown on TV before that point, including the actual live segment of American Airlines Flight 11 making its impact into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, followed by United 175 impacting the South Tower; American Airlines Flight 77 hitting the southwest side of the Pentagon; and United 93 plunging into the ground in Pennsylvania (the last one bought down by the quick reaction of the passengers aboard, who may have kept this flight from hitting the U. S. Capitol building). Most importantly, we see how easy it was for the impact of the two jets and the extreme heat of the jet fuel to compromise the structural integrity of both WTC towers and cause them to basically implode on everyone still inside them. Of course, it's never been enough to dissuade conspiracy theorists that say 9/11 was an "inside job", but it makes the case for people who are truly thinking clearly.
September 11, 2021 marked twenty years since those horrifying events, which were marked by ceremonies televised all around the nation and the world; and INSIDE 9/11 is an incredible addition into our understanding of the who, what, where, and, most importantly, the Why of this, one of the most ghastly examples of Man's inhumanity to Man since the Holocaust.
