Research Guide: 9/11, Causes & Impact: Home

Contains eight essays in which the authors, including four historians, a career diplomat, a law professor, a political scientist, and a molecular biologist, share their thoughts on the lessons, goals, and cautions they believe should guide Americans as they recover from the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001.

A collection of interviews in which America's most distinguished journalists and news executives explore how the media was impacted by the September 11 terrorist attacks, the Iraq war, the Bush administration, and the growing influence of large corporations.

Explores how the war on terrorism has impacted Americans' civil liberties in the classrooms, newsrooms, and courtrooms, and explains the dangers of limiting civil liberties in the name of national security.

A gripping narrative that spans five decades, The Looming Tower explains in unprecedented detail the growth of Islamic fundamentalism, the rise of al-Qaeda, and the intelligence failures that culminated in the attacks on the World Trade Center. Lawrence Wright re-creates firsthand the transformation of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri from incompetent and idealistic soldiers in Afghanistan to leaders of the most successful terrorist group in history. He follows FBI counterterrorism chief John O’Neill as he uncovers the emerging danger from al-Qaeda in the 1990s and struggles to track this new threat. Packed with new information and a deep historical perspective, The Looming Tower is the definitive history of the long road to September 11.

Discusses the history of Islamophobia and how it has changed with the "War on Terrorism."

In While America Sleeps, Russ Feingold details our nation's collective failure to respond properly to the challenges posed by the post-9/11 era. Oversimplification of complicated new problems as well as the
cynical exploitation of the fears generated by 9/11 have undermined our ability to adjust effectively to America's new place in the world.

In Chain of Command, Hersh takes an unflinching look behind the public story of President Bush's "war on terror" and into the lies and obsessions that led America into Iraq. With an introduction by The New Yorker's editor, David Remnick, Chain of Command is a devastating portrait of an Administration blinded by ideology and of a President whose decisions have made the world a more dangerous place for America.