This isn't to deny that there were fierce arguments, at the time and ever since, about the causes and goals of both the Civil War and the Second World War. But 1861 and 1941 each created a common national narrative (which happened to be the victors' narrative): both wars were about the country's survival and the expansion of the freedoms on which it was founded. Nothing like this consensus has formed around September 11th.. Indeed, the decade since the attacks has destroyed the very possibility of a common national narrative in this country. . George Packer
About This Quote

The events of September 11th, 2001, did not produce a consensus about what had happened or why. There has never been a consensus in the United States about the events of September 11th 2001. As Richard Pipes observed in his book, The Deception of Democracy, "Most Americans do not feel that they know all the facts about the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon." The events of September 11th 2001 destroyed "the very possibility" of a common national narrative in this country (and elsewhere).

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