Richard Ben-Veniste Quotes

And so we were asleep there in San Diego. And our pilot called us. And his brother was on one of the other planes. And when he was leaving the airport, he saw in his rear view mirror that there was an explosion.

How could a guy sitting in a cave in Afghanistan, have... plotted so perfectly the hijacking of four planes and then guaranteed that three of them would end up precisely on their targets?

We were trying to get all of the planes down out of the sky. And we watched as the towers of the World Trade Center collapsed - something no one expected and anticipated. And you could sit there and see and be aware that thousands of people were at that moment being killed as a result of the terrorist attacks that struck the United States.

We live in downtown Manhattan and we have pretty big windows that looked right at the World Trade Center. I was home along with Kai and we watched it all happen. I was holding him in my arms and we were looking out the window when the second plane hit.

Eleven days before 9/11, I was on a plane with the 9/11 hijackers who were carrying out a dry run.

Mohammed al-Qahtani was not alleged to be a leader of the Sept. 11 plot. He was not trained as a pilot. If he was involved, he was one of the 'muscle' hijackers.

The attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon shook our nation to the core. Americans were deeply frightened, sad, and angry, and they rallied around a President who, at the time, showed impressive certitude and calm.

The plane took off at 8:10 in the morning - or that's when it was scheduled to take off. And that's when I believe it took off. I had been in my office at the Department of Justice. Someone told me that there had been the two strikes that occurred at the World Trade Center.

On 9/11, that morning, I was in a Christian Dior Couture appointment at the Hotel Pierre.

I was in my office when - on 9/11. I think I had a number of meetings scheduled. I was just getting to know the bureau. And somebody walked in and said the first plane had - or a plane had struck the World Trade Center, one of the towers.

9/11 was a terrible, horrific, tragic day.

I worked in the White House on 9/11, where the vice president was given the authority to, if he deemed necessary, shoot down an American passenger jet.

I had a really hard time after 9/11. I was basically living across the street from the World Trade Center, and a big chunk of debris fell on top of my building, and the roof caved in. I thought I was going to die. Really. I'd never thought that before, but on that day I sat there and thought 'I cannot believe it's going to end this way.'

Unfortunately I was in New York when 9/11 happened.

I'm a New York kid, so when I saw that plane that hit the first building, I suspected it was terrorism - blue sky day.

I remember... seeing the first plane go into the towers and thinking: 'It's a beautiful day. Somebody really must have gotten off course to have the plane go into the towers.'

I remember waking up Tuesday, September 11th, 2001, to my wife telling me to put on the TV because I wasn't going to be going into N.Y.C. as planned. Dream Theater was working in N.Y.C. at the time mixing our album 'Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence,' and I would've been driving in that afternoon for our session.

I have a fascination with Flight 93. My emotions are mixed: awe, gratitude, fear, heartache, pride - even, in some ways, guilt.

I have the deepest regret about 9/11. Sept. 11, 2001, was one of the most difficult days I've ever had. I was in Lima, Peru, and had to fly back eight hours not knowing what happened in my own country, knowing thousands of my fellow citizens had died.

[9/11] was not meant to be argued with. It wasn't part of any negotiation. No message was intended with it. It spoke for itself, which is unusual.

Where were you when the world stopped turning on that September day?

Speaking as a New Yorker, I found it (9/11 event] a shocking and terrifying event, particularly the scale of it. At bottom, it was an implacable desire to do harm to innocent people.

A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack.

I didn't feel up to writing about 9/11. If I were to write about it, it would take me years.

Note that there was no claim for these attacks [on 9/11]. There were no demands. There were no statements. It was a silent piece of terror.