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| George W. Bush, Dept. of Defense Photo |
“This is a day when all Americans from every walk of life unite in our resolve for justice and peace. America has stood down enemies before, and we will do so this time. None of us will ever forget this day, yet we go forward to defend freedom and all that is good and just in our world.”
Let’s unpack that critical passage from Bush’s speech:
First, Bush assumed that the nation would unite. He did not say, “let us put aside partisanship and unite.” No, instead, he took it for granted that Americans would all stand together: “This is a day when all Americans from every walk of life unite.” In the face of a terrorist attack, Bush assumed, that the United States would be resolved to mourn the victims, praise the rescue workers, and deal with the threat. For the most part, that assumption was correct.
Second, Bush aimed at positive values. He did not say that we would unite out of fear. Instead, he said that we would “unite in our resolve for justice and peace.” That short phrase gave his audience much to think about. Bush, like most of us, took it for granted that America was the land of justice and peace. Indeed, citing “justice and peace,” Bush undertook to give subsequent American policies a moral foundation. Subsequent struggles would represent, so he implied something greater, more noble than a mere response to fear. Instead, the United States would be responding to a moral cause. Yes, earlier in the speech, Bush had said that, “Thousands of lives were suddenly ended by evil, despicable acts of terror.” So, he had already set up the contrast between the terrorists’ evil and America’s goodness.
Whether subsequent American policy was or was not moral is something that historians will debate for centuries. I have my doubts. Bush recognized, however, that the quasi-religious doctrine of American exceptionalism would give any subsequent conflict a positive moral foundation. Bush’s persuasive goal was to go beyond immediate questions of attack and defense. From the outset, the war on terror would be, in Bush’s rhetoric, a struggle for what was right and good.
Of course, “justice and peace” can be subjective. After all, the Roman historian Tacitus commented that, “where they make a desert, they call it peace.” In a brief, largely ceremonial speech like Bush’s, however, the speaker could go easy on the details. Who gets to define justice? Who gets to define peace? Those devilishly hard questions would only haunt him later.
Third, Bush promised to oppose the United States’ enemies: “America has stood down enemies before, and we will do so this time.” There is, as we all know, a long tradition that the best way to achieve peace is by war. That explains the Peacemaker bomber and the Peacemaker missile. Still, the nation, shocked by the terrorist attacks, mostly expected the President to display strength and resolve. Logic tells us that war and peace are opposites, but they came together in Bush’s speech.
Fourth, Bush predicted that, “None of us will ever forget this day.” Indeed, today, the 20th anniversary of the attacks, the United States plans a series of commemorative events. But what do Americans remember? That we were attacked? That we were caught by surprise? That we had enemies that the public barely knew about? Today, however, on the 20th anniversary of the attacks, it is proper and fitting for us to remember the thousands of innocent people who lost their lives, the heroes of Flight 93, and the rescue workers who underwent great hardships to help the victims.
Fifth, Bush returned to his speech’s moral center: “we go forward to defend freedom and all that is good and just in our world.” American exceptionalism, again, was Bush’s implied value.
Bush’s speech was remarkably vague. What things were just, and which things were good? Exactly how would the United States “stand down” its enemies? Would the nation go to war? If so, where? For how long? And with what goals? Those questions have hovered around the center of America’s foreign policy ever since.
For the things that Bush said in this speech were essentially unimpeachable. Of course the United States should not stand still while terrorists attack civilian targets. Of course justice and peace are good. Does that mean that Bush’s impending war in Iraq, a nation that presumably had little to do with the 9/11 attacks, was a war of justice and peace? Furthermore, we have seen in the past few weeks that the war in Afghanistan, a nation that indeed harbored the 9/11 terrorists, dragged on for 20, largely tragic, and possibly futile years. It might be said that Bush expressed wise values, but that his subsequent violent policies were a mixed bag at best.
And, yes, Bush’s message of joint resolve seems almost naïve in hindsight. Indeed, a few days after 9/11, Bush gave a speech of solidarity at the Islamic Center in Washington DC. Would it not seem unthinkable for a Republican politician to give such a speech today?
Commemorative speeches like this one often imply policies. There’s nothing new about that. It is, however, a long stretch from expressing values, on the one hand, to coming up with wise policies to deal with complex threats. At the time, Bush said what needed to be said. He said it well. Let us not forget, however, that justice and peace are not just assumptions, but also obligations to do what is right. In hindsight, the war on terror has been complex. The struggle against international terrorism has certainly had its ups and downs. Far more people died in the war on terror then on 9/11. The idealism that Bush expressed 20 years ago smashed into the hard realities that followed. War does not always make peace, does it? All the same, Bush’s call for national unity stands as this speech’s lingering message – a message that now sounds more like a desperate plea.
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