I can still remember where I was on Sept. 11, 2001 with vivid clarity. I was living in Upstate New York, Rockland County, and I was 13 years old in eighth grade at Felix Festa Middle School. I was perfectly fine and content living in suburbia. That day, when the two planes hit the Twin Towers and caused them to collapse and explode, no one knew for sure what was going on, at least, none of the students. The teachers were under strict orders not to let us know that a plane was intentionally flown into the WTC as an act of terrorism and war. However, you can't really hide things from kids for long, especially a large group of kids with access to the internet and cell phones and suburban parents who couldn't care less what the teachers say. Still, nobody knew for sure what was going on and I'll never forget the rumor among the students that an alien ship had landed on the Twin Towers. Do you know that, for one moment, I was hopeful that was the truth? I was a somewhat strange kid.

There was at least one person who WAS fully aware of what was happening that day, however. It wasn't someone from the media, it wasn't one of the people (at least not initially), it wasn't the celebrities, nor was it the rich. It was first National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Counter-terrorism specialist Richard A. Clarke. Not only did he know what was happening in the highest levels of command in the country, but he was in the very thick of it, organizing America's response to the immediate as well as long-term concerns, almost single-handedly. Not only that, but he was fully aware of the steps and occurrences happening in the world that lead up to that day. He defines and explains in astounding detail the roles he and his government cohorts played in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks from its initial occurrence to its aftereffects in his tell-all memoir titled "Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror." He also exposes the REAL motivations of President George W. Bush in dealing with Iraq, Al Qaida, and the terrorist perpetrator of the attacks, Osama Bin Laden. In his memoir, Clarke takes the reader with him into his mind and along his personal journey as the first National Coordinator of Security of the United States during the War on Terror. He also consistently alludes to the ideas that many people believe, but few say out loud for fear of sounding unpatriotic or paranoid: that there was some form of foul play by the U.S. Government in the war against terror, and that some of the rumors that are being said about Bush’s agenda are in fact TRUE.

Richard A. Clarke was originally appointed by President Clinton as the National Coordinator for Security. In President George W. Bush’s administration, he continued this position. During George H.W. Bush’s administration, he was the Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs. Before that, he was a member of the Office of the Secretary of Defense, as an analyst of nuclear weapons and European security. Under the Reagan administration, Richard Clarke was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State of Intelligence. It can be seen that Clarke has had decades of experience working under numerous Presidents and many different branches in the Defense department of the United States. During the Sept. 11 attacks and the events that took place afterward, Richard A. Clarke was a key member in the orchestration of America’s response.

While reading his memoir, I can tell that on some level Clarke chose to write in a way that is action-packed and therefore more interesting to the reader. I think he knew on some level that despite the subject matter he's discussing, a memoir is not most people's cup of tea and he wanted to make it readable for anyone who picked up the book. Part of that worries me; when someone chooses to write in order to capture peoples' attention through entertainment, there is also room for his own personal bias. It is written in a way that makes me feel like I am watching a movie like "Olympus Has Fallen" too, which makes me suspicious. Clarke uses an enormous amount of detail to describe what people said as well as the actions they took. It could be that Clarke has a powerful memory and forgets nothing dealing with his job as the National Coordinator for Security. However, my cynicism forces me to question his authenticity and his accuracy with everything he says. After all, he is from the government and us common folk know how much the government can and does pull the wool over the eyes of the people. With that being said, I do believe Clarke is speaking his truth, or at least attempting to, about “who said and did what” during 9/11 and the war in Iraq.

In Clarke’s retelling of the day of, he lists in detail the actions of those behind the scenes responding to the news of the planes hitting the Twin Towers as it corresponds to the images that the media gave to the public. For example, he corresponds where he was (a Secure Video Conferencing Center, on the same floor as the Situation Room in the White House) to the image that the media showed of Bush receiving the news at the kindergarten class he was visiting that day. From what I see, he does this for specific reasons. One reason in particular is to show readers that what goes on behind the scenes is FAR more complex than the media can hope to show to the public.

The organization of the body of people in response to 9/11 was STAGGERING. Every single position or role that can be thought of has already been designated, and there is no question of what is to be done. It has to be read to be believed how organized the government actually is. All the people in charge of the various and most powerful positions have been a part of the government for years and have the highest level possible training and clearance, from the FCC, CIA, FBI, and any and all things connected to air travel. Not only that, but the dedication of these people to their work is an unspoken service until death. “I huddled everyone together just outside the Video Conferencing Center and asked them to leave. Lisa spoke for the group: 'Right, Dick. None of us are leaving you, so let’s just go back in there.' 'Hold on. We will be the next target. It’s no shame to relocate. Some of you have kids too—think about them,' I said, looking at Roger, whose second child was due in a few months. Roger did not hesitate. He said, 'If we don’t hold this thing together, no one will and we don’t have time for this.' Then he brushed by me and walked back into the Video Conferencing Center. Frank Miller grabbed a legal pad and said, 'All right. If you’re staying, sign your name here.' 'What the hell’s the point of that?' Paul Kurtz asked. Frank slowly scanned the group, 'I’m going to email the list out of the compound so the rescue teams will know how many bodies to look for.' Everyone signed and walked back in” (10).

After reading this scene thoroughly and mulling it over, I came to the realization that on some level, everyone who works on the upper levels of the Government also has a form of military training as well, which makes them soldiers. As normal people (I’m trying to refrain from using the term commoners), we often do not realize the depth of what it takes to work within the government. We know it is a “heavy” job, or a job with most likely a lot of perks. We don't see it as a job where it is more honorable to serve until death. Most people would NEVER have that level commitment towards their job, but within the government, it is not only commonplace to have that level of commitment, it is also on some level expected. No matter what Clarke says, if someone did not sign that list and opted to leave the compound before it was bombed, he would have thought less of them... in fact, I believe most people would have thought less of them.

Clarke is trying to make the readers understand in "Against All Enemies" the points that many people argue as to what was wrong with the War on Terrorism and America’s role in the events. He says that the attack on 9/11 was a culmination of events that span the Reagan administration in terms of the Cold War and the Iran-Contra scandal, the Bush Sr. administration in terms of Desert Storm and inaction during the Libyan murder of 259 passengers on Pan Am 103, the Clinton administration in terms of successfully identifying terrorism as the most significant post-Cold War threat, but doing little to nothing about it, and perhaps the most disheartening administration of all in terms of 9/11, the failure of Bush the jr.’s administration to act on intelligence reports dealing with an Al Qaeda attack on the United States prior to 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. Clarke details a firsthand account of what has outraged Americans since its reveal: not only did the government know how dangerous Al Qaeda was and they were aware of an impending attack by them, they ignored all Intelligence reports of an attack by Al Qaeda two years before 9/11 had actually occurred, as well as another warning months before 9/11. Not only was the location of Al Qaeda’s true base of operations ignored (and known), but there was a clear shift from 9/11, Al Qaeda, and Afghanistan (the true base of operations of the terrorists) to Iraq that even Clarke was dumbfounded by; “I expected to go back to a round of meetings examining what the next attacks could be, what our vulnerabilities were, what we could do about them in the short term. Instead, I walked into a series of discussions about Iraq. At first I was incredulous that we were talking about something other than getting al Qaeda. Then I realized with almost a sharp physical pain that Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were going to try to take advantage of this national tragedy to promote their agenda about Iraq. Since the beginning of the administration, indeed well before, they had been pressing for a war with Iraq. My friends in the Pentagon had been telling me that the word was we would be invading Iraq sometime in 2002” (38).

*Part 2 of the review of Richard A. Clarke's "Against All Enemies" will be published next week!