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We remember this weekend the nearly 3,000 who died Sept. 11, 2001.
That, some say, was the beginning of the war on terror, but it wasn't -- it was, for lack of a better term, the line in the sand.
The battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan were but a part of this war, in which we seemingly have put the terrorists who want to destroy this nation on their heels.
Thankfully, we have had no more attacks of that magnitude in the two decades since -- but there have been more, at least 14 incidents of Islamist extremism in the United States between 2009 and 2020. While we honor those who have paid the price, we must maintain our vigilance.
The war against our country by radical Islam began in earnest on Nov. 4, 1979, when Iranian students seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran, taking 66 hostages, 52 of whom were held in captivity 444 days.
It continued through the 1980s and 1990s with bombings and hijackings overseas -- a few on embassy grounds, considered U.S. soil.
In 1993, the first attack on the World Trade Center took place when a bomb exploded in a basement garage, killing six and injuring more than a thousand others.
In 2000, 11 months before 9/11, suicide bombers attacked the Navy destroyer USS Cole.
Several of these attacks were linked to Osama bin Laden and other members of al-Qaida.
But Sept. 11, 2001 -- now commemorated as Patriot Day, first marked a year after the attack -- stands out. As does our response as a nation.
A new World Trade Center graces lower Manhattan on the site of the original. The Pentagon remains the home of the U.S. Department of Defense.
And in a field in Southwestern Pennsylvania, we honor the civilian passengers of United Airlines Flight 93 who stood up to terror, representing America's resolve, that has cemented Sept. 11 as "a date which will live in infamy."
Those words, in the wake of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, spoke to a unified America. The same could be said of former President George W. Bush's speech from atop the rubble in New York just three days after the Sept. 11 attack.
"I want you all to know that America today, America today is on bended knee, in prayer for the people whose lives were lost here, for the workers who work here, for the families who mourn," Bush said. And when the workers said they couldn't hear him, the president replied:
"I can hear you! I can hear you! The rest of the world hears you."
Sunday, let us speak with that voice again.