This morning, a coordinated terrorist attack was launched against the United States. Two U.S. airliners were hijacked by as-yet unidentified terrorists, and crashed into the World Trade Center's twin towers and another hijacked airliner crashed into the Pentagon. A fourth plane was hijacked and crashed in a field in Western Pennsylvania, just south east of Pittsburgh. The victims number in the tens of thousands.
I almost can't believe that this has happened. It's like something out of a movie. I've seen the footage of the second plane crashing into the trade center tower played over and over again and it still doesn't seem quite real. This attack seems designed to create horror - more than a bombing, the thought of one of our own airplanes crashing into the greatest symbols of American commerce and military strength is so horrific... I don't even know what to say.
This is undoubtedly the worst attack on American soil in my lifetime. All day I've been struggling back and forth between feelings of sadness and anger. My heart goes out to the victims' families, and we can only hope that this cowardly and vicious attack on America doesn't lead to full-scale war, although thoughts of revenge do come to mind. President Bush has said that the perpetrators of this atrocity will be hunted down and punished, and I think he speaks for all of us, expressing our national horror and anger at this attack.