--- title: Why This is the Hardest 9/11 Anniversary of Them All description: As American faces political chaos, polarization, and global disorder, this is the scariest 9/11 anniversary yet, writes Ian Bremmer. canonical: https://time.com/5674474/hardest-9-11-anniversary/ author: Ian Bremmer article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-09-11T18:16:46.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:06:06.604Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Why This is the Hardest 9/11 Anniversary of Them All og:description: As America faces grave political polarization and global disorder. og:url: https://time.com/5674474/hardest-9-11-anniversary/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt032cb848a3e44352/698a02ad656a3f499abd8e6a/911-memorial.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5650 og:image:height: 3178 og:image:alt: New York City Commemorates 18th Anniversary Of The 9/11 Terror Attacks og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why This is the Hardest 9/11 Anniversary of Them All twitter:description: As America faces grave political polarization and global disorder. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt032cb848a3e44352/698a02ad656a3f499abd8e6a/911-memorial.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Why This Is the Hardest 9/11 Anniversary of Them All > Sponsored content. 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It explains how TIME's journalism is made, from the first pitch through the editorial decisions behind a finished story or cover. #### How can I read about how TIME chooses its covers? Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=9f84b194-53ca-4eb4-a568-55d7169bfc06&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Behind the Scenes: TIME’s Original 9/11 Cover Story [Watch (HLS stream): Behind the Scenes: TIME’s Original 9/11 Cover Story](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/PEonnIyg.m3u8) (6:48)  _Published 2011-09-09. Deputy Managing Editor Nancy Gibbs recounts her experience writing of TIME’s original 9/11 cover story, with the help of reporters across the country_  by [Ian Bremmer](https://time.com/author/ian-bremmer/)  ## Ian Bremmer Sep 11, 2019 6:16 PM UTC  Friends and family of victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, pause at the National September 11 Memorial during a morning commemoration ceremony for the victims of the terrorist attacks Eighteen years after the day on September 11, 2019 in New York City. Friends and family of victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, pause at the National September 11 Memorial during a morning commemoration ceremony for the victims of the terrorist attacks Eighteen years after the day on September 11, 2019 in New York City. Spencer Platt—Getty Images  by [Ian Bremmer](https://time.com/author/ian-bremmer/)  ## Ian Bremmer Sep 11, 2019 6:16 PM UTC Every 9/11 anniversary that passes gets both easier and harder. Easier, because time numbs pain, even the most searing and awful kinds of pain. Harder, because with time comes perspective, and 18 years later, the shock and enormity of those despicable acts continue to stand as one of the most atrocious deeds humans have ever perpetrated against one another. The passing of time also makes it harder because we can see more clearly the disastrous chain the events of that day kicked off, how they led to war in [Afghanistan](https://time.com/tag/afghanistan/) and then to war in Iraq, both wars that the U.S. is currently still waging. It’s hard to say that the world is safer place to live as a result of those wars. What we can say is that these wars have cost the U.S. plenty; trillions of dollars have been spent, thousands of lives have been lost, and [U.S. global leadership](https://time.com/4606071/american-global-leadership-is-over/) has been forever tarnished, both in the eyes of those living in the U.S. and in the eyes of those living outside it. It’s also worth remembering that after 9/11, the U.S. came together like never before; so too did the rest of the world. Bush’s approval ratings [hit 90%](https://news.gallup.com/poll/116500/presidential-approval-ratings-george-bush.aspx), and every U.S. ally supported the war against Taliban; even Russia helped by supporting U.S. use of bases in central Asia. Winning a war in Afghanistan and stabilizing the country afterwards was always going to be a mammoth challenge; it became impossible once Iraq was tacked on. 9/11 is a day of reflection, and it’s hard not to reflect on the fact that should another 9/11-type of attack strike American soil—heaven forbid—the world won’t rally around to the U.S. side like it did back in 2001\. This is not to say that the failed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are the sole reason of our fracturing relationships with the rest of the world, but looking back in hindsight, they were a key contributor to it. So too to our fracturing as an American people—wars being commanded by political and military elites but fought on the backs of working-class men and women who were then not properly cared for upon their return didn’t create the inequality that is currently roiling America today, but it did lay it bare for all to see. Standing on this side of 2019, it’s becoming clear that too much bad blood has developed between countries for the geopolitical developments of the last two decades to be swept under the rug in times of crisis like they were after 9/11\. Even more depressing? It’s far from clear that the U.S. would come together like it did in 2001 given the current political polarization the country is currently facing. I have never felt prouder as an American as I did in the days after 9/11, when Americans of all creeds, colors, religions, sexual orientations and ethnicities lined up to give blood to those in need. Back then, it took a tragedy on the scale of 9/11 to remind us all how united we really are in our humanity; given where we are today, I doubt that would be enough. That’s what makes this 9/11 anniversary the hardest one of all. ## Transcript I was at home up in West Chester. My four year old was home sick and [ SOUND ] it was that beautiful day. And the phone rang, and I picked it up. And I recognized Michael Duffy's voice, our bureau chief in Washington. And he said, turn on the TV. So we were where everyone was. [ SOUND ] We were watching and we were horrified and the phone rang probably next at about, [ UNKNOWN ] maybe 10: 30. And it was Jim Kelley, the managing editor of the magazine. And Jim had this marvelous calm. Almost. You know, sort of solicitous. So, how are you doing? With the understanding that, of course, we both knew, we were both native New Yorkers. He had grown up in Queens, I'd grown up in Manhattan. This was very much an attack on our home. And, and yet he managed to have this, this extremely kind of calm controlled tone. And. He said, " Let me tell you what we're thinking about doing ", and he explained how he had investigated whether it would be possible for us to publish a special issue of the magazine. Until he was looking into whether all the logistics of that, can we get the printing capacity in, you know, to print four million issues of the magazine when we're not normally scheduled to. Could we get the paper? Could we even... Transmit. So, so there were a lot of logistical things to work out. While that was being sorted out, he said I, I wanted to know if you, you were game to write for it. I said of course, which story do you want me to? He said, well I only want one story, and that was sort of startling, he said, he said, look, there is so much we don't know. And we won't know in the next 24 hours. He says, I don't want you to worry about who might have done, what our response might be, all of the things that we can't possibly know today. He said, I just want you to tell the story of what happens today, what happens in the next 24 hours. And he says, everyone else at the magazine will go out and report that and file to you. But that's, think of it as a time capsule. You are just going to take a snapshot of today. He knew that where I was, it was a beautiful fall day, and I couldn't smell the smoke from where I was, I couldn't hear the sirens from where I was. And having just that amount of distance From it, not withstanding, you know, waiting through the afternoon, to hear about my neighbors, we ended up losing three neighbors that day. It wasn't that it wasn't touching us, but it was nothing like, what it was like for the people who were, here in this building, you know, 50 blocks, north of the, of the towers. And, so, everyone in, this building, in, midtown Manhattan. Even as, building all around the city are being evacuated, even as the sound of sirens, was everywhere. Even as the smell of smoke, was, drifting up town, even as people, worried, for, their family, their safety, their friends who worked downtown, even as all of these. Pressures and uncertainties were, were rising. Everyone just went to work, from, like, every researcher, every reporter, every writer, every correspondent, every editor, fanned out across the city to the hospitals downtown to the police department. The people in Washington, the same thing. The emails started coming in within a few hours and [ UNKNOWN ] continued coming in all through the day, all through the night, overnight. Probably you know a 1, 000, 1, 200 messages by the time we were done. And. It was clear to me early on that there was, this was not a story that you, there would be time to outline. Or to write a beginning, and a middle and an end. That it would just. The story never got written. It sort of just got put together. It wasn't just our reporters based in New York and Washington. Our reports all across the country. Were sending in dispatches as well. And that really told you something about the event that was not clear to us when we were right in the middle of it. The parents in Birmingham, Alabama went and got their kids out of school. That Mt. Rushmore was shut down and monuments all across the country and the Sears Tower getting evacuated that nobody knew what this was. Nobody knew, how widespread, the threat might be. And so, it was being experienced all over the country. People ask me about when did the, when did the, sort of, the shock of the whole thing hit me. And, it's. While it's nothing like what a surgeon does in one sense the, I felt very emotionally removed from it at the time. I felt I have a job to do, I know what I need in order to do it which is mainly going to be a great deal of coffee, and, and I was not I, I kept myself at, at an emotional distance. The response that I cared about most came at about 6 a. m. Thursday morning when the phone rang, and it was Jim. And he said, I'm holding the issue in my hand, and I don't think you'll ever be prouder of. Anything we've done. But what I then heard again and again and again after that was people saying I've put this in our family album. I've put this in the family Bible. I've saved this. Everyone talked about saving it. I'm saving this for my children. and. That, that this was something they needed. And that they knew that they wanted to keep. So I wrote the introduction to the special issue that we're doing and what I love about it, and I love the approach that we ended up taking, is that. When I was writing ten years ago, by definition, I'm looking at this from the outside. We now went back to all the people who were on the inside. And there is a certain closure in that. I feel like, now, this issue, in their words, can tell all of the things that we couldn't know. Then, about what really happened and what it really felt like and what they were thinking as they made decisions that were literally life and death decisions. And so, hearing them talk about what happened and what that was like 10 years later is just extraordinary. 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