11 December 2001
Transcript: Bush Leads White House Ceremonies to Commemorate September 11
(Similar ceremonies held in more than 80 countries around world) (860)
President Bush led ceremonies at the White House December 11 to
commemorate those killed and injured in the September 11 terrorist
attacks on the United States.
At 8:46 a.m. EST -- the exact moment the first hijacked commercial
airliner hit the World Trade Center -- the U.S. Marine Corps band
played the national anthem for guests and U.S. government officials
gathered in the East Room of the White House.
"We remember the cruelty of the murderers and the pain and anguish of
the murdered," Bush told the audience. "Every one of the innocents who
died on September the 11th was the most important person on earth to
somebody. Every death extinguished a world.
"Today a wrong is being righted, and justice is being done," said
Bush, referring to the military campaign to find the terrorists
responsible for the attacks.
"We still have far to go, and many dangers lie ahead," he said, "yet
there can be no doubt how this conflict will end." He was speaking to
an audience that included firefighters, police officers, rescue
workers and relatives of the victims, including the wife of Jeremy
Glick.
Glick was a passenger involved in an assault on the hijackers aboard
United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania. Many believe
that act kept that plane from crashing into the U.S. Capitol or the
White House.
Similar ceremonies to commemorate the attacks of September 11 took
place at the Pentagon, in New York City, and in more than 80 countries
around the world, many of them nations that lost citizens in the
destruction of the two World Trade Center Towers, where more than 3000
people died.
And, far overhead, in the orbiting International Space Station, U.S.
and Russian astronauts stopped their work to remember the attacks.
Following is the White House transcript:
(begin transcript)
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
December 11, 2001
REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT AT THE WORLD WILL ALWAYS REMEMBER SEPTEMBER
11TH CEREMONY
The East Room
8:46 A.M. EST
THE PRESIDENT: A great writer has said that the struggle of humanity
against tyranny is the struggle of memory against forgetting. When we
fight terror, we fight tyranny; and so we remember. We remember the
perfect blueness of the sky that Tuesday morning. We remember the
children traveling without their mothers when their planes were
hijacked.
We remember the cruelty of the murderers and the pain and anguish of
the murdered. Every one of the innocents who died on September the
11th was the most important person on earth to somebody. Every death
extinguished a world.
We remember the courage of the rescue workers and the outpouring of
friendship and sympathy from nations around the world. We remember how
we felt that day: our sadness, the surge of love for our country, our
anger, and our determination to right this huge wrong.
Today, the wrong is being righted and justice is being done. We still
have far to go. And many dangers lie ahead. Yet, there can be no doubt
how this conflict will end. Our enemies have made the mistake that
America's enemies always make. They saw liberty and thought they saw
weakness. And now, they see defeat.
In time, this war will end. But our remembrance never will. All around
this beautiful city are statues of our heroes, memorials, museums and
archives that preserve our national experience, our achievements and
our failures, our defeats and our victories.
This republic is young, but its memory is long. Now, we have inscribed
a new memory alongside those others. It's a memory of tragedy and
shock, of loss and mourning. But not only of loss and mourning. It's
also a memory of bravery and self-sacrifice, and the love that lays
down its life for a friend -- even a friend whose name it never knew.
We are privileged to have with us the families of many of the heroes
on September the 11th, including the family of Jeremy Glick of Flight
93. His courage and self-sacrifice may have saved the White House. It
is right and fitting that it is here we pay our respects.
In time, perhaps, we will mark the memory of September the 11th in
stone and metal -- something we can show children as yet unborn to
help them understand what happened on this minute and on this day.
But for those of us who lived through these events, the only marker
we'll ever need is the tick of a clock at the 46th minute of the
eighth hour of the 11th day. We will remember where we were and how we
felt. We will remember the dead and what we owe them. We will remember
what we lost and what we found.
And in our time, we will honor the memory of the 11th day by doing our
duty as citizens of this great country, freedom's home and freedoms
defender. God bless. (Applause.)
(end White House transcript)
(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S.
Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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