The September 11 attacks
Hijacked aircraft destroy the World Trade Center, and two decades of war follow.
- When
- Era
- Contemporary, Holocene
Nineteen al-Qaeda hijackers crash four aircraft on 11 September 2001, killing 2,977 people. The United States invades Afghanistan within a month and Iraq in 2003 on the basis of weapons claims that proved false. The consequences include hundreds of thousands of deaths in the region, mass surveillance regimes, indefinite detention, and a durable reshaping of how Western states treat security against civil liberty.