9/11 Links

Here’s what I said a year ago today.

Anger is Sheila O’Malley’s theme.

Scalzi found a small silver lining the day after.

Chris Mathew Sciabarra remembers the Towers.

The Social Reject knows all about defiance.

Like many of us, 9/11 turned Don Watkins into a blogger.

Sgt. Mom wrote to some friends.

Dan speaks to those who would have us get over it.

Tanya has pictures of the cleanup effort.

Discover what 9/11 means to al Qaeda, over at Chuck Simmins.

Mr. Lion explains what it was like.

David will deliver this address to the men and women of Malmstrom Air Force Base today.

Start at the top of American Digest, and scroll down until it’s over.

Wretchard of The Belmont Club wants you to understand why our enemies surrender, but we don’t.

Need some place to vent? You’ll find one here at Little Green Footballs.

And of course, there’s Michele’s “Voices.”

I’ll be adding to this list throughout the day as I find remembrances elsewhere on the web, but there will be no other blogging.

UPDATES:

Kim du Toit finds traitors among us.

It really is that simple, explains Chris Muir.

Sean Kirby keeps it short and fast, like a kidney punch.

Everything I missed so far, they caught at Winds of Change.

Steve at Begging to Differ is still defiant, also.

Zombyboy feels like his writing isn’t enough — but it is.

If you don’t know what debridement is, or even if you do, read this post from Beldar.

Arthur Silber pays tribute to 9/11 hero Abe Zelmanowitz.

Still angry? So is Dean Esmay.

Lesley lost friends in the attack.

Don’t miss Michael Totten’s photo essay.

Today, Jeff Jarvis is blogging from the WTC site.

Lola refuses to be afraid anymore.

E.G. Ross comments on America’s “terrible swift sword.”

Here’s a good collection of links, and a “never again” from Moe Freedman.

Christopher Kanis thanks you for your indulgence on this day.

Brooke reminds us: “Be redeemed! Set others free!”

One picture, too many words to count.

Another photo essay, this one from Bill Hobbs. I’d forgotten about those satellite images.

Chuck Freund give us a WH Auden poem I’d never read before: “There Will Be No Peace.”

Did the heroes of Flight 93 give us our swagger back? Brad Todd says yes.

They each had a name.

Here’s another impressive collection of links, courtesy of Judith Weiss.

Tom provides us with some historical perspective.

Al Barger is getting messages from God, and She wants us to win.

You just knew Mike Hendrix would have something to say worth reading.

Bill Whittle.

Not even Allah seems to approve of His followers work.

Matt Welch wonders if we have changed at all.

9/11 wasn’t a tragedy, it was an attack.

More from John Scalzi.

Dawn Olsen asks why Allah hates us.

Moxie was, of all places, at Disneyland.

“Let them hate, so long as they fear.”

T. Bevan still keeps the 9/11 newspapers in his desk drawer.

Starhawk has fond memories of the Towers.

Verse from the DoggerelPundit.

Jack O’Toole shares a fundamental truth.

We can’t afford to move on, argues Misha.

For Rachel Lucas, 9/11 means anger and celebration.

Kate shares an old joke, but a good one.

Lawren Mills was at the WTC the month after the attack.

Sensible shoes, Virginia?

“Have no doubt” that this is war.

Meryl Yourish was twelve miles west.

Liz, the Cybrarian, offers this poem.

No matter how well I think I sometimes write, Lileks does it better.

Jeralyn Merritt reminds us there are battles to be fought here at home, too.

Will Collier doesn’t have a blog, but he is one of the smartest (and most frequent) contributors to this site. He’s been kind enough to let me post his behind-the-scenes recollections. Just click on “More” below.

For all the news I won’t be covering today, go to Rantburg.

Doug Dever honors the firemen.

The future is still open.

Look up.

Suman Palit chooses not to forget.

Orin Judd has what might be the best collection of 9/11 links.

For Max Jacobs, life goes on and gets better.

From Will Collier:

It occurred to me this morning that very little has been reported about what happened in the military circles two years ago today. Other than the Air Force units from Andrews AFB and Atlantic City, scrambled too late to stop the hijacked airliners, I never saw much in the press about what happened on the bases and in the air back then.

I used to work for a fighter squadron at Tyndall AFB (Panama City, FL) as a civilian contractor. On September 11, I’d been gone from the 83D FWS for about six months, and I don’t have a personal story of any note from that day (I watched online and on television like most others), but Tyndall was a hive of activity almost from the first moment the horrible facts began to appear.

The first jets in the air were a pair of National Guard F-16s from the Tyndall DET. These are always armed, fueled, and on alert at the end of the runway. At that time, those two lone fighters were just about the only homeland defense jets in that posture in this part of the country (this has obviously changed quite a bit since). For the first hour or so, they were almost alone in the sky as traffic controllers ordered all civilian traffic to land immediately.

Other jets were launched from Eglin (some of these defended Atlanta for weeks afterwards), as well as the Air Guard and Navy bases at Jacksonville. No doubt some of these were assigned to protect Air Force One, which carried the president on a long criss-cross from Orlando to Louisiana to Nebraska and back to Washington before that long day was over.

In Panama City, it took a while to get other jets off the ground. Unlike Eglin, Tyndall is a training base for F-15s, but not a tactical “warfighter” base. There were plenty of Eagles, and a good number of highly-trained pilots (instructors, commanders, project managers from the 53D WEG), but almost no weapons for the jets. The only air-to-air ordinance available was at my old unit, the 83D, and all of those missiles had been converted to test status, their warheads removed and replaced with telemetry packs (lack of weapons was a huge problem early on; the interceptors that did manage to launch in the Northeast did so unarmed, their pilots resolved to ram a hijacked airliner if they encountered one).

The 83D “bomb dump” went to work almost immediately, converting the missiles back to war rounds. A call went out around the base, recalling anybody who’d previously worked at the bomb dump to hustle over there and pitch in. I don’t know how many missiles they re-converted that day, but by early afternoon, F-15’s were launching with war-shot missiles. By nightfall, every qualified pilot on the base was in the air. A friend of my brother-in-law, who was at that time a Tyndall instructor, told us later that September 11 was the first time in his 17-year career that he’d ever flow with live weapons.

He and many others flew with them a lot over the next few months. Some of Tyndall’s jets were deployed to protect New Orleans and other potential targets along the Gulf coast. Fighter CAPs (Combat Air Patrols) continued into that December over all the major cities. The ops-tempo was brutal on pilot and aircraft maintainer alike, but I daresay there weren’t any complaints, not in mid-September of 2001.

I doubt any of us will ever forget the eerie silence of the skies for those two weeks when the airlines were shut down. The previously-ignored sound of a passing jet was cause for surprise and a little fear in those days–and then you’d see the jet yourself, an American fighter, and that little icicle in your heart would melt a little.

–Will Collier
F/A-22 Ops Support IPT