September 11, 2001, is a day that will never be forgotten by Americans. When 9/11 occurred, it was a shocking and fearful day for the United States. No one could have expected something so tragic to happen on any day. Thousands of innocent people were killed.
al-Qaeda, the group responsible for 9/11, is an international Islamist-extremist terrorist group founded by Osama bin Laden, in the late 1980s. (FAQ about 9/11) al-Qaeda means “The Base” in Arabic. They began as a logistical network to support Muslim fighting against the Soviet Union during the Afghan war. al-Qaeda was based in Sudan for a period of time then reestablished its headquarters in Afghanistan with the backing of the Taliban militia. They established camps for Muslim militants from throughout the world, training tens of thousands in paramilitary skills. (Britannica Encyclopedia) Their goal is to overthrow governments in the Middle East and elsewhere in the Muslim world. (FAQ about 9/11)
al-Qaeda involvement in world terrorism can be traced back to 1993 with the first World Trading Center bombing. (History) On February 26, 1993, al-Qaeda set off explosives in a van parked underneath the South Tower. Six people were killed and thousands were injured. (FAQ about 9/11) al-Qaeda implicated a series of attacks on U.S. forces. They shot down two American Black Hawk helicopters in Somalia, killing nineteen Americans in a bombing at a military housing complex in Saudi Arabia during 1996. They also bombed the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, Dar es Saalm, Tanzania and a suicide attack on the USS Cole in 2000, killing seventeen servicemen and injuring 93. After the 1998 embassy bombings, the FBI placed bin Laden on their Ten Most Wanted list, offering a reward of twenty-five million dollars. (History)
The attacks against the United States were intended to reduce American support for many of the governments al-Qaeda wanted to overthrow. U.S support was viewed as a major obstacle to...