I had the pleasure of participating in France 24’s panel discussion program, The World This Week, on Friday. The program focused on the impact of Sept. 11 on America and the world over the past decade. The other guests were Ahmed Rashid, Newsweek’s Christopher Dickey, the IHT’s Eric Pfanner, Nooshabeh Amiri and France 24’s Loick Berrou. Part I can be found here. Part II can be found here.
I was especially struck by Eric Pfanner’s observation that this is the first Sept. 11 anniversary where we can consider its impact from the perspective of historic closure. The anniversary has already changed in significance from year to year over the past decade, most dramatically from 2002 to 2003. But the killing of Osama bin Laden and the upheaval of the Arab Spring have finally allowed us to consider it as a historical event, as opposed to an ongoing one.