Opinion: 9/11 at 25: Has the US learned anything from its 'war on terror'?

Opinion: 9/11 at 25: Has the US learned anything from its 'war on terror'? A quarter century is enough time to separate history from hysteria, consequences from intentions and reality from propaganda.

On 11 September 2001, nearly 3,000 people were killed in horrific attacks that shocked the United States and the world.

The attacks of 9/11 could have been treated as a grave crime requiring an international effort to identify, apprehend and prosecute those responsible.

They could also have triggered a serious national debate about why such intense hostility towards the US had developed in many parts of the Muslim-majority world.

Instead, the US's political establishment chose a radically different path. President George W Bush famously declared that the terrorists attacked the US because "they hate our freedoms".

It was a convenient explanation because it absolved the American foreign policy establishment of any responsibility. Read more: Opinion: 9/11 at 25: Has the US learned anything from its 'war on terror'?

Opinion by Sami Al-Arian Men inspect a damaged house following a US strike near a wedding gathering that Iranian officials say killed four people, in Kuhestak, southern Iran, on 4 September 2026 (Majid Asgaripour/WANA via Reu