TEN YEARS on, the 9/11 atrocities continue to cast a long shadow over the United States and the world. Undeniably one of the defining events of our era, the attacks on New York and Washington killed 2,996 people, destroying the sense of invulnerability that gave the United States much of its international power.
The assertive US response in Afghanistan and Iraq changed the world, at huge cost and with even as yet uncertain results. An initial wave of global solidarity for the victims and their nation was then transformed into more polarised attitudes towards US military actions and alliances. Aggravated relations between Muslims and other faiths are another baleful legacy.
Primarily at the time this was a US story, full of heroism, bravery and suffering and infused with a spirit of popular determination to recover and rebuild. Precisely these qualities made it global, vividly illustrating the appealing human qualities that make them universal. That feeling endures on this 10th anniversary – not least in Ireland from where many of the victims could trace their ancestry. Harnessing such worldwide sympathy was a challenging task for the US government, particularly one so disinclined to use the United Nations and its institutions in response.
The efforts to bring the rest of the world along with this “war on terror” fell short in Iraq especially, with consequences that are still being worked out there and in the wider Middle East region. While major terrorist acts have been prevented in the US by a massive increase in the security and intelligence apparatus, and while the spectacular killing of Osama bin Laden this year removes the main planner of the attacks, the threat involved still stands and has not been definitely deterred or contained, as events in Bali, Madrid and London made clear.
Wider consequences include an associated geopolitical shift in patterns of economic and political power during these ten years. They frame the definitive emergence of China and the Asian region into the foreground of world economic activity, an achievement that happened when US attention was concentrated on Middle East and central Asian security threats. These longer- term developments were clearly highlighted during the global financial crisis since 2008 and now loom large over efforts to put it right in the US and Europe. Politically these previously dominant regions must make room for Asian and other emerging states in the landscape and structures of international power like never before. The 9/11 events are part of that continuing story.
Those events are nonetheless being gradually superseded by newly emergent issues and concerns, for the United States, its allies and protagonists throughout the world. The “war on terror” is no more, although it has left a trail of prejudice and hate for the succeeding generations. There is renewed hope of more open social and political change in the Middle East region that deserves maximum support. Above all, economic uncertainty has displaced the fear of physical insecurity as a popular and governmental preoccupation.