9-11 (Noam Chomsky)


9-11 is a collection of essays by and interviews with Noam Chomsky first published in November 2001 in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. The revised edition of 2011, 9-11: Was There an Alternative?, includes the entire text of the original book, together with a new essay by Chomsky, "Was There an Alternative?"

Content

''9-11'' (first edition of 2001)

In the original edition of 9-11 from November 2001, Chomsky places the September 11 attacks in context and traces the history of American intervention in the Middle East and throughout Latin America as well as in Indonesia, Afghanistan, India and Pakistan – at the same time warning against America's increasing reliance on military rhetoric and violence in its response to the attacks, and making a critical point that few other commentators were making, that any escalation of violence as a response to violence would inevitably lead to further, and bloodier, attacks on innocents in America and around the world.
The first edition of 9-11 was published in more than two dozen countries and appeared on several bestseller lists, including those of The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, and The New York Times. An article about it in The New Yorker stated, "9-11 was practically the only counter-narrative out there at a time when questions tended to be drowned out by a chorus, led by the entire United States Congress, of 'God Bless America.' It was one of the few places where the other side of the case could be found."

''9-11: Was There an Alternative?'' (extended edition of 2011)

The extended edition of the book, published in September 2011, includes a new essay by Chomsky which examines the impact and consequences of US foreign policy up to the killing of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and reflects on what may have resulted if the crimes against humanity committed on 9/11 had been "approached as a crime, with an international operation to apprehend the likely suspects."