Dr Nishant A.Irudayadason
Professor of Philosophy and Ethics, Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth, Pune.

To pay tribute to the 2,977 people who died in the deadliest terror attacks in the history of the United States twenty years ago, solemn ceremony was held on September in the presence of President Joe Biden at the very impressive memorial in Manhattan, New York, where the twin towers of the World Trade Centre stood. After New York, Joe Biden and his wife went to the two other emblematic places of the attacks where tribute ceremonies were also held: in the Pentagon site, near Washington, then in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where a plane hijacked by terrorists had crashed. In total, six minutes of silence and musical tributes followed one another until 12:30 p.m. to mark the tragedies of that fateful morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, the worst attack perpetrated on American soil.
Twenty years later, the United States has never seemed so alone. The debacle in Afghanistan – the haste of the US withdrawal, the collapse of the Afghan army in the face of the brutal acceleration of the Taliban’s advance and, finally, the deadly August 26 attack perpetrated by ISIS at Kabul airport – puts a tragic end to two decades of stalemate in the “war on terror.” In just six months, Joe Biden has ruined his efforts to repair the bond with his allies, damaged by four years of the Trump administration.
The new occupant of the White House had announced, as soon as his presidential campaign, his desire to end this “endless war”. The withdrawal, promised before the symbolic date of September 11, was to mark the opening of a new American chapter. This project already initiated by Donald Trump, who had signed an agreement with the Taliban, could have reached consensus. But the images of the army’s rout, the chaos at the airport and the ballet of helicopters over the Afghan capital were starkly reminded of Saigon and defeat to Vietnam in 1975. A new humiliation for Washington, after the collapse of the twin towers of Manhattan.
The September 11 attacks had first led – like Pearl Harbour in 1941 – to a declaration of war by the Americans, who led a coalition against terrorism. But, while the victory against the Taliban was final and Bin Laden on the run, the United States then embarked on a crusade against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, justified by a lie: the existence of weapons of mass destruction. The use of torture of prisoners of war and global surveillance in the name of anti-terrorism has weakened democracies and international organisations such as the United Nations and NATO. And the world has changed, much to the delight of Beijing, Moscow, Tehran and Ankara, which are now trying to recover the positions abandoned by the West.
America’s past and present became entangled on Saturday, September 11, during ceremonies commemorating the attacks committed twenty years ago by Al-Qaida. At the sites of the attacks, the United States paid an emotional and dignified tribute to the thousands of victims. But the country was also mourning a lost unity and wondering, in hollow, about the meaning of its commitments during these decades of illusions, disappointments and denial, eleven days after the complete military withdrawal from Afghanistan. “Is America safer today than it was twenty years ago?” This question, repeatedly addressed by TV presenters to their guests, never elicited a clear-cut and optimistic answer.
As the terror attacks have moved away from American soil, they have hit Europe hard, and even more so in the Middle Eastern counties, Africa and, of course, in Afghanistan. This is where the terrorists have claimed most of their 180,000 victims in twenty years, sometimes despite the presence of international forces. It is on these lands that they regenerate, capitalizing on this great disruption of the world. From the attacks on the Twin Towers to the recent debacle in Afghanistan, twenty years of deadlock in the war on terror have allowed the terrorist movement to profit from the mistakes of American politics.