What we saw
Posted: Wednesday, September 12, 2007 4:20 PM by Daily Nightly Editor
Filed Under:
Conflict in Iraq, Brian Williams
by Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
The test of a writer is the ability to paint a picture in the absence of one. I'm going to attempt to describe what I saw last night -- which may indeed defy simple description, because it bordered on the spiritual.
Producer Subrata De and I boarded the 8:30 p.m. Shuttle to Washington after Nightly News. A few minutes after takeoff from LaGuardia, after we had climbed out to 10,000 feet and had reached our initial leveling-off on a southern heading, the flight attendant on the sparsely-populated plane called my attention to the window next to me, on the left side of the aircraft. It was a stunning sight.
The two powerful beams of blue light, switched on each year at nightfall on September 11th, marked the spot amid the twinkling lights down below, in Lower Manhattan, where the towers once stood. They sliced open the sky -- brilliant, powerful poles that shot up past our aircraft through the humid, boisterous air over the city. The only impediment to their skyward progress up to the heavens was a passing cloud about 5,000 feet above us as we passed by. The cloud caught the light and trapped it -- gathering up the powerful upshot of blue and absorbing it completely, until it moved on, yielding that spot in the sky, and clearing the way for the beam to shoot up, past a point where the human eye could follow it.
I lost sight of the blue beams as our aircraft made its unsentimental progress above the Jersey Shore, heading south to Washington. We could feel the acceleration as the pilots pushed the throttles forward, having received permission to step up to our given cruising altitude. I looked back at the blue light until I couldn't anymore. I was a bit surprised that the pilots hadn't brought it to the attention to those on board. I looked forward and saw them all sitting in the dark, unaware. I wanted to tell everyone on the aircraft what they were missing, but common sense took over, and I assumed that such a mission (going from seat to seat to inform my 20-or-so fellow passengers of a striking sight out the window) would violate one of the many in-flight rules instituted after the very same attack that the blue lights were meant to commemorate. The aviation rules we now live under are the least of what has happened in the name of that attack. Our pilots last night were all business. So were the National Guardsmen who watched me go through security. It all goes back to the blue lights.
Subrata and I talked about what we had just witnessed. The flight attendants crammed around the window in the row behind us, discussing the same thing. Soon, the process the airlines euphemistically call "beverage and snack service" was underway, and before too long, we were landing in Washington. During the ride to the hotel, past the fortified monuments and the police cars that now stand watch outside places like the Department of Agriculture, I thought about what I had seen on the plane.
Six years later, many of us consider it an embarrassment that there's no memorial to 9-11 inside the sad, tragic expanse of Ground Zero -- just a commuter train station and a lot of construction equipment. What we saw from the air was a towering memorial.
The arrival of September 11th each year is always a setback for many of us who live and work in New York. While some of us were affected by the attack more than others, we all deal with it in our own way. In my experience, the day always feels sullen and heavy, and the evening hours begin to bring a sense of coming relief, when the clock and calender both approach "12." That was not the case last night. More than any other event during the day -- the tolling bells, the long list of names, the wreaths and roses and the steady rain -- the two blue towers of light visible off the left wing of our aircraft were as impactful in the darkness of evening as anything in a long day of remembrances. Exactly as they were intended to be.
Questioning the General
We're in Washington today to interview General Petraeus. While he's had no shortage of television exposure this week, this was the day scheduled for interviews with the network television anchors. Our order was determined by lottery, and so -- to paraphrase a well-worn expression -- when Charlie Gibson stood up, I sat down. And Katie after me. I had last seen the General over dinner in his quarters in the former Saddam Hussein palace he (and the U.S. Command structure) now occupies in Baghdad.
He said to me that evening, "The job of the commander is to understand his mission." I reminded him of that today, by way of asking him his understanding of the current mission. We also talked about his use of the term "al-Qaeda" to describe those who were once known to us as "insurgents." I think people will find his answer interesting.
We'll put the entire interview on the Web -- and we'll run our choice of the most illuminating highlights tonight.
Embattled President, Unpopular War
"Seldom has a nation been so mistrusted in its purposes or so frustrated in its efforts...People of other nations are simply not buying American." The speaker was presidential candidate Richard M. Nixon, his target was President Lyndon Johnson, and Nixon's speech -- a major assault on Johnson's foreign policy -- was delivered on September 12, 1967. It was 40 years ago today.
Of the war in Vietnam, candidate Nixon said: "It is not enough to moralize about our being there to defend democracy or guarantee freedom of choice...Nor will we be believed as long as we engage in sanctimonious sermonizing that irritates our friends, bores our enemies and leaves the cynical unconvinced."
On that same day, yet another presidential hopeful took aim at Johnson's Vietnam policy, calling for a "sharp escalation" in the war, saying that the administration should "do whatever is necessary to win," including using "the full technological resources of the United States." That speaker was California Governor Ronald Reagan.
Please read today's Medal of Honor biography, and we'll look for you from Washington tonight.
