Most people remember all their life a few events that, in some ways, changed their lives. Apart from personal occurrences like the death of close relatives, most people living at that time remember clearly what they were doing the day President Kennedy was murdered in Dallas, Texas. Most adults alive on September 11, 2001 will also remember that day. Everybody was horrified to hear that terrorists attacked the USA and that, according to the first evaluations, there could have been more than 10,000 dead between New York City, Washington DC and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It was difficult to believe that some hijackers, or better some terrorists, could have taken over four civilian planes, direct two on the towers of the World Trade Centre in New York City, one on the Pentagon of all places, as well as crashing the last one near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

All these events occurred within one hour and, obviously, the authorities were taken completely by surprise, they did not notice anything until the planes hit their targets, and there was no attempt to stop the planes. It was immediately obvious in the US, but also all over the world, that something important had taken place, and the people waited impatiently to know how the American authorities would react. They had to do something, they could not simply lick their wounds, mourn the dead, act as if nothing serious had happened, and ask the American people to go on with life and business as usual. This is not the way Americans behave and, soon, it was obvious that they would react very strongly. They would use all their power to bring the people who organised these acts to justice or, even better, to destroy their organisation, and kill the leaders.