New post on Joel C. Rosenberg’s Blog
The ghastly attacks of 9/11 were not a failure of intelligence but of imagination. (Some personal reflections on that fateful day.)
by joelcrosenberg
Sept11-3
“The most important failure was one of imagination. We do not believe leaders understood the gravity of the threat.” — The 9/11 Commission Report, Executive Summary, page 9.
(Jerusalem, Israel) — Few will ever forget what they were doing on September 11th, 2001, when they first heard the news that the United States was under attack by radical Islamic jihadists using jet planes on kamikaze missions. I certainly never will.
On that beautiful, sunny, crystal clear Tuesday morning, I was putting the finishing touches on my first novel, a political thriller called The Last Jihad. It opens with radical Islamic terrorists hijacking a jet plane and flying an attack mission into an American city. What’s more, I was writing the book in a townhouse barely fifteen minutes away from Washington Dulles Airport, where at that very moment American Airlines Flight 77 was being seized and flown right over our home towards the Pentagon.
At the time, I had no idea anything unusual was underway. I had begun writing Jihad in January 2001. A literary agent in Manhattan had read the first three chapters that spring. He was convinced that he could get it published, and urged me to finish it as quickly as possible. I took the advice seriously, working feverishly to get the book done before my savings account ran dry.
As had become my morning ritual, I had breakfast with my wife, Lynn, and our kids, threw on jeans and a t-shirt, and settled down to work on one of the novel’s last chapters. I didn’t have radio or television on. I was simply typing away on my laptop when, about an hour later, Lynn burst into the house and said, “You will not believe what’s going on.” She quickly explained that after dropping off two of our kids at school she had turned on the radio and heard that the World Trade
