This was September 11, 2001 for my family. My sister died two months prior and my dad was active military. Living on the west coast, the attack was very early for us and I’m not sure what got my mom to wake me up but she did and in a very weird way I’m thankful for it. I rather have known what happened than hear it afterwards. Being a child, it was a very surreal day. I thought I understood death and its magnitude after my sister died but I couldn’t comprehend this kind of scale.
I know we make light of it the event on the internet (I’m totally guilty of that too)… However I’ve been seeing videos of personal recounts of people there in the moment and it’s made me check myself. My families life changed fundamentally but it pales in comparison to so many others.
There’s a certain account that animates personal stories (that I believe are largely NY/east coast based) called Story Corps. Every single post has made me cry.
For all those whose lives were changed through this tragedy, I’m so sorry.
Yes. He had 6 to 9 month deployments from 2001 until about 2007. The most I got to talk to him was about once a month in a phone call. When he was home it was for about 2-3 months at a time. It was really hard on our family but we had a great support group.
My friends father was also deployed quite a bit after 9/11. I know it was hard on her too. I feel for all the military families that were missing their family members 🫂
This is the truth. Things can be two things and we should care for all humanity but also a little bit more for our own people's, however they choose to define that individually.
I am proud of my service.
I am glad that I joined, did my time, deployed twice (got stoplosted😆🤬).
Sadam was a maniac. Seriously terrifying.
He was our fault/responsibility?
But...
We messed those people up and cause so much instability it is an order of magnitude more than anything the US has suffered stateside since Indian Removal. War is hell, its what countries do, but that was all our fault and it was based on fake reports that came directly from the administration.
This will come back to bite us. I love my country, but I'd hate the US too in there shoes; even if I hated my own leaders. There's enough hate to go around. That whole thing was a disaster, let me tell ya, its hard to give words to a father carrying his dead 8 year old who got shot by random Johny Soldier day 1 with an itchy finger, terror, and no discipline. He demands justice, you have no idea who drove down that street... Here is a ticket to take to central, just mark "family member" on the damage form.
Sewage, garbage, rubble, outright violence and gang/tribe sectors. Guilty as #$*. If this were China invading the US, you better be sure that every redneck to gangbanger would be lighting their asses up every chance we got.
Worlds crazy... humans been doing it forever, gross. Conflicts are constant, it sucks. um, go team USA? 🤔🤷
As someone that was 19 when 9/11 happened, and the only reason I didn’t join the military is because I’m stubborn and know I don’t follow orders well, thank you for your service.
I’m happy you made it back, and I’m sorry for any friends you may have lost along the way.
My husband was with 3/1 as well. We lived in the little trailer park base housing and I will never forget convoys pulling up along the main roads in front of housing and putting up concertina wire. All ATMs, stores, everything closed down until they were certain there were no threats to the military bases. It was scary.
Kinda wild to think I was from the very beginning and was there almost at the very end.
Our generation's Vietnam. My entire living memory is of knowing that somewhere, Aussie Diggers were operating overseas with US troops, to protect us from something I only have the vaguest memories of.
I remember seeing it on TV when I was 4, and my parents in a state of utter shock. I can't imagine what i would've been like to be standing to, wondering when the next attack would arrive.
I never joined the Defence Force, but I've got plenty of mates who did, some of whom worked with the US. Did you ever cross paths with any Australian Defence Force personnel?
Nice! My mates always had positive things to say about US troops, too. I think one of them worked with some Green Berets once. They were crazy good, but also crazy, apparently xD
I don't know how you or anybody you served with can stay positive about the military after the last couple decades. I would be so fucking mad at the government for literally everything they do and how casually they throw lives away. You go from a bullshit war started over lies and misinformation so they can get oil money, and the destruction and death caused by that invasion Sparks the wave of hatred that leads to this attack, which then triggers another invasion that ends up accomplishing pretty much fuck all other than getting people killed, especially considering that the country which was largely responsible for the attack (SA) got away with it Scott free and is still an active trading partner with the government because they have...... Oil and money
I have a question for you since you were super involved in the middle east. (Skip to the bottom with the brackets if you don't wanna read much).
I am beginning a project to make an animated Series called "Caliber" made to really focus in on the aspects of war in the middle east (because I feel like we're hella forgetting all the fucked things the US soldiers alone had to go through), taking place in 2025 in a world where the 2021 pullout was fake, and soldiers were still fighting, but just unknown to the public (a tribute to my grandfather, who fought in Korea in 1956 and in Lebanon in 1957, but was undocumented and forced to keep quiet most of his years, making so much of his time there unknown for me), there is more but I dont want traceable things online to tell any of the other major plot points, because I have the whole thing pretty well planned out.
I plan to make this series go really in depth on the aspects of the US soldiers, their struggles as they're constantly put in danger, their jokes as they've been on "high alert" for a long ass drive and got bored, their longing for home and plenty of other things. I also would like to interview refugees who lived in the area, sympathizers, anyone I can talk to on the matter.
[SKIP TO HERE]
That being said, could I learn some of the stories you have that you lived through during the war? Not particularly all the popular things movies showed like Hurt Locker, American Sniper, Lone Survivor, 12 Strong, and all those other movies, but actual stories that can show the human behind them, the ones that hold the passion and feelings that were there. Not just a story that glorifies the US Marine Corp, but a story that shows their lives. It could even been the lighthearted things, the funny moments, the deep conversations, just the feeling when you manage to go home for a bit.
Any story that you could share would be perfect, because they'd all be true.
The way I'm writing it is, while the 2021 pullout still technically happened there were around 1000-2000 US marines that were still around, and still actively fighting, just probably a lot more considering the forces got SEVERALLY cut apart. They'd be mainly fighting for some corrupt unknown profit that the government has, although they wouldn't know what. Probably getting very few orders from the mainland (As in the US), and just, go around finding trouble spots, looking for noteable people, maybe trying to crumble terrorist regimes from inside, or cause them to split and fight amongst each other. They'd basically be a bunch of marines off a leash and have no clue what to do. Making the military force more separate from the Mainland's military. The only thing connecting the two would be Ammo and gun shipments, food, and the occasional replenishment of soldiers.
If you'd like we could go over to DMs so we could talk more in depth!
The US was just attacked. Your default reaction is similar to if it was a nuclear strike. And you're too busy mobilizing to really know what is going on.
I'm imagining that scene from Independence Day when Area 51 has to scramble right before and during they get attacked and everyone is just running around (not trying to make light of it, just saying how chaotic it must have been, I guess).
I was on a submarine in the Pacific ocean when it happened. We tried to rush to the Persian Gulf but we were diverted to Guam to load Tomahawks instead.
Ended up surveiling the coast of Africa near Mogadishu for about a month.
He was in the Air Force based out of Reno Nevada. He stationed in Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran. He’s been retired for a while now but I can ask him.
Edit: my dad wasn’t in Iran. I misspoke. He previously was stationed in Qatar. I fucked up on this and I’m sorry for any confusion. It’s been a long time but that’s not an excuse to not have my facts right.
My dad was in the Air Force during that time as well, stationed in Oman though. He worked on repairs before and after war damage, specifically C-130s. Doubt they would’ve crossed paths, but who knows!
My father eventually got medically discharged and was 100% disabled veteran status until he passed away June 17, 2025 from service-related illness.
This answered my burning question of did he ever get to come home and stay home. Panel 6 made me scared the end was going to be a coffin with the flag draped over it.
As a fellow daddy's girl, hold him tight and tell him you love him when you can. Have the conversations you keep putting off. I lost my dad earlier this year after a long health battle (not cancer for those wondering); I'm absolutely wrecked most days, and I was fully prepared for that day to come.
As an Air Force vet as well from the GWOT era. I highly recommend just sitting and talking with him. Put your phone on voicemail memo and ask him about his service. Basic training, tech school. First duty station, 9/11, everything. His funnies stories and best memories. Even his worst memories.
My mom never talked to my grandfather who was a Korean War vet about his time in uniform, and we don’t know much about his service. I think he’d also be happy to share.
Very, very few Americans died in the GWOT compared to previous wars like Vietnam. In context more American military personnel died by cancers, heart problems, and other “natural causes” during those twenty years than died in combat.
I know in comparison that America lost far fewer soldiers when compared to previous conflicts, but I also know that Dot is not one to shy away from using her comics as a form of therapy to get a traumatic/high stress out of her head entirely to share the emotions she feels in an effort to come to terms with whatever event. Such as when previous pet passed away.
Theres a non zero chance my parents may have met your dad. I was born a few months after 9/11 on that base but i think they'd be living there for a few years at that point. Crazy to think about
If my memory serves me right, one of the Truckee cops was stationed at the base in Reno went he rotated from active to reserves for a bit. I could be mistaken and he was just at Beale the entire time until he transferred over to the Navy, but it would have been mid-2000s to early 2010s.
Glad he made it back in one piece.
I was also a teen when this happened, left for boot camp the next year and did multiple deployments to the area.
I can’t fathom how hard that must have been for him after losing a child. Trauma stacked on top of trauma.
Never miss an opportunity to let him know how happy you are to still have him here. And if he hasn’t already, encourage him to try therapy. The generation ahead of me in service tended to stigmatize mental health services… but was seriously screws with your head. Some things didn’t hit me till over a decade later when my life had slowed down a bit and I had time to myself to think and process everything that happened.
Non zero chance our dads met in Qatar or Iraq. Dad was pretty high up in the enlisted side of the SF (MP) world out of McChord AFB. Was gone a lot during the immediate aftermath as well.
God, I can’t imagine. I was in kindergarten at the time but was fortunate enough to have both parents at home. Thank you for sharing your story. Hope you and your loved ones have had more peace and time in the years since. ❤️
I was in California and my father was a fighter pilot and we were on red alert status. Dad left but before he told my mom "do not take them to school"
He did laps on the west coast corridor in an F-18 protecting anything major for like 15 hours straight.
Weirdest thing is that I was my mother's alarm clock and would wake up and check out some morning cartoons for like 30 minutes, but answered the phone from a Navy wife friend and had to wake my mother up and watched the second plane hit together. Surreal day.
My mom was a us marshal. She had to go for like two months to this (now declassified) secret mountain base and was told to sit on the perimeter and if anyone came to shoot no questions.
My dad had a traveling job as a trainer and that time was so rough bc he had no idea what the hell to do with me and my younger brothers (we were 9, 2, and 1). Thankfully we happened to live in Texas when it happened and the moms in the neighborhood did a meal train for us.
What I remember most was only being able to talk to my mom 5 minutes a week and she couldn’t tell us where she was or what she was doing.
I had a similar experience. I lived on Camp Pendleton on 9/11. Aside from watching him go to work, I don’t think I fully understood what being a Marine meant.
My dad deployed soon after. When he was seriously injured by an IED, it made it even more real. When he was healed enough, he deployed again, and again, and again until he retired in 2007.
I joined in 2004 to get some type of “revenge” for my dad. How naive I was. All of my male cousins joined. All but one of us is still in or serving in some capacity. Dozens of deployments between us.
I don’t know what my life would be like without 9/11. That moment set a trajectory for my family that none of us would have predicted.
If he was in Cali he was most likely a Marine. If he was still stateside he probably didn't deploy until OIF (13th MEU was the primary responder for Marines and they were already deployed).
I was a LCpl in CA in the field when this happened.
To add another perspective, my dad was also active duty military. At the time, he was based in the Pacific, so he wasn't where he would be deployed. My parents had long been divorced, so it didn't impact my life much. He actually chose to get reassigned for deployment. He ended up doing two tours in Iraq I think, but as an officer, he spent most of his time in an air conditioned office with his own desk.
After leaving the military, he joined a PMC that trained the new Afghan security forces, and I know he made absolute BANK doing that. Enough that he was able to invest and now owns 12 homes as a landlord, besides his own legit mansion (not McMansion).
None of that PMC money was ever reported for purposes of child support. Mom and us kids grew up poor. Here's hoping I get anything in the will and he doesn't just leave everything to his wife, who then leaves it to her side of the family.
Some King Kong stuff is crazy 😭 I can’t imagine my mom telling me there was some Godzilla stuff goin on and turning on the news to thousands of my countrymen very realistically dead
Well this was before the second plane had hit and the news wasn't really clear what was going on. Also yeah she's kind of weird and has lived through some pretty horrible things so is a bit jaded
Most people thought it may have been some freak accident until the second plane hit. I was in the east coast in middle school and we switched periods in between. I remember the whole mood shifting immediately once everyone realized it was an intentional attack. Even then, I don't believe anyone thought they would collapse the way they did
I woke up around the time the South Tower fell, I was eating Foot Loops when mom screamed at what she heard from the radio in the kitchen and dad ran to turn on the TV in the living room as we watched the North Tower collapse live.
Story Corps is a wonderful organization. They do a great job at recording personal stories from all different kinds of people. So many of those stories strike right to the soul.
I have always loved your comics and never knew you were also a military kid.
I relate to this hard. My dad ended up basically not a part of my life for large part of my teenage years, and it shaped basically the next 15 years of my life. When it happened I was living overseas and life changed overnight.
🫂 omg your sister. I am so sorry for you and especially your parents that is the most awful thing to ever happen.
I was also woken up when my friend called me I was unemployed and sleeping in. I went over to my friends house in my pajamas watching as events unfolded. I am grateful my friend called because I likely would have slept through a bulk of it and not found out until my job interview later that day was canceled. Job hunting got extremely difficult for the next few months.
I was working overnights at the time and went to bed probably an hour or two before the first plane hit. I woke up ~8 hours later to a changed world. It was surreal.
Oh shit no doubt! The before and after was wild. It was the first time I truly struggled to find a software development job. We had been in such high demand for all the Y2K work happening that in 95+ i had no issues, even without a college degree. After 9/11 though everyone went on hiring freezes.
I was 15 at the time and at home sick from school..but same situation, my mom woke me up and told me something was happening. The 2nd plane hit right after I started watching. At first I thought “oh, how on earth did a plane accidentally strike a building?” But once the 2nd plane hit, the situation became much clearer.
And I just remember both of us sitting in front of the TV, becoming increasingly horrified. I remember feeling completely unable to conceptualize or process the scale of what was happening. And being completely confused about what to feel in the moment while I was watching this.
I was at MEPS that morning (military enlistment processing station). I was supposed to go to boot camp that day. We were in the middle of some physical when a civilian employee pops in, says, “y’all need to see this.” We watched the attacks in the break room. My parents had to come get me and I shipped out the next week to Fort Sill.
Ooohhh fuck that didn't even occur to me and I work under the Air Education and Training Command umbrella. Tuesdays are swear-in/ship-out days for the military. Chaotic on even our smoothest days, so I can't imagine what that was like. I'm so sorry that happened to you. A lot of young men and women that day probably woke up thinking they'd be traveling the world and doing stuff in east Europe at most. Desert Storm was a decade in the past at that point.
Right on. My story was a little different that day, since I never enlisted. In the blackest of humor, I can say that was the day my childhood ended, because I turned 18 the next day; 43 tomorrow.
Still had a lot of thoughts about what it meant though, especially with that Selective Service card freshly added to my wallet.
You have to be able to joke about horrible shit. Part of it is processing grief and tragedy. And part of it is because then at least you have horrible shit and a joke, instead of only having horrible shit.
I’m so sorry for your sister. My mom woke me up the exact same way. Then we watched the 2nd plane hit together and I was like “what does this mean?” I’m in Canada and my mom said we were safe and I went to school. But we were all very scared and all the adults were so sad.
My dad died very suddenly on August 31st, 2001 - 11 days before the attacks. I was also on the West Coast and my mom also woke me and my brother up early that morning and told us we weren’t going to school that day. When we asked why she just heaved a big sigh and told us to come cuddle with her in the big bed. She flipped on the news and within about 30 seconds we watched the second tower get hit live - I vividly remember her trying to stifle a sob as we watched the building collapse in real time.
As an adult, especially now that I’m married, I simply cannot fathom the grief and fear my mom was processing in that moment. She legitimately thought the world was ending, and that we were all going to nuke each other into oblivion before the day was done. She just held my brother and me there in the big bed with her. I remember thinking the bed must feel too big without my dad in it, so she needed us to take up some of his space for awhile. That was all my child’s brain could comprehend, so I just starfished and tried to be as big as I could for her.
My father said it would take a Pearl Harbor event to make him join. He was a construction foreman, his entire family was military. Said he didn't see the point with no active wars and he enjoyed his job.
I was born in May of 01. He was working towards a promotion I believe, an owner position, and Mom was settling into life as a new mother.
9/11 happened. Very next day, he was at the recruiters office.
The deployments changed him. The military broke him down and built him back up broken. Something had been wrong already, he had a history of mental illness, but something he saw over there just... made it worse. He became abusive and neglectful. Mom lost custody because she had no support system and he had cut her off. Then he married the worst possible person at the worst time.
I haven't spoken to him in 5 years. I believe he's disowned me. He didn't even call for his brother's funeral last year. His other brother had not spoken to him for 15 years. Sometimes I wonder about how life would've been if he had never joined. Kinda silly, since 9/11 changed so many lives, to blame this on the tragedy. Still feel a bit bitter though.
But I wouldn't have my brothers, my youngest sister and my fiancee and friends if things had gone differently so all I can do is remember the tragedy and maybe allow myself some slight bitterness only today. A senseless tragedy that never should have happened. If only the senseless death had ended then.
I was stationed at Travis AFB when this happened. I didn't have children at the time. But my wife knew what it was like to know that our lives where about to change. Sorry to hear about your sister. I hope your father was okay.
Omg thank you for shouting out Story Corps. Really help kid me understand other peoples perspectives and learn about what happened on 9/11 from a personal POV
I was 6 and my dad was in the Air Force Reserves. I remember getting ready for school when my mom turned on the TV and seeing the burning towers and at one point I asked if this meant dad would need to leave. He ended up being pulled into active service for the next 7 years, being gone for months at a time to various places like Kuwait and Germany.
I'm in the UK. It happened (edit: or was on the news, at least) just after I woke up. I reacted weird because I was a kid who'd just turned anarchist and my first thought was "fuck those rich capitalists", and (in that moment) I didn't think about the innocent victims. My own mother thought I was involved somehow, even years later. I don't feel that way now, it was just my first thought.
I had a friend who was in boot camp for the marines. When they joined, nothing much was going on in the world. He had finished high school, his dad was a police officer, he felt like he could do some military time and get college paid for.
Partway through boot camp the drill instructor halted the drill and sat them all down in a classroom. He rolled in one of those TV's on a cart, and turned on the news. Everyone watched as the towers fell.
At one point the drill instructor turned off the TV, slowly pointed at everyone and said, "Every single one of you is going to war."
I'm from a town close to Red Deer, Alberta. When it happened, the students somehow knew first and kept telling my social studies teacher about it. He didn't believe them because it seemed so preposterous to him that a plane it the twin towers, until he gave in and turned on the news and saw it. Nothing else happened that day.
Wow, I had a similar experience. I was in high school at the time, but grew up in San Diego and my dad was in the Navy. It was terrifying. He had gone overseas my whole life, but this felt so different. It was so overwhelming.
Hugs! I was west coast too, in middle school, and remember that wake up so vividly. I was sleepy and confused and will forever be ashamed that my first reaction was to giggle because it sounded so cartoonish.
My dad had been up and listening to NPR news in the kitchen and heard the broadcast cut out suddenly. The primary broadcast used a tower antenna then relayed across the country.
This was the day and event that scared me deeper into the cult I was raised in. It was the event that made me commit myself to the cult. The fear that it was the beginning of the foretold end of the world. It took 20 years more for me to get out of it. It was 6am, I was in grade 11. I made the decision that day to be baptised into the cult, that was 5 years later than average.
I know we make light of it the event on the internet (I’m totally guilty of that too)… However I’ve been seeing videos of personal recounts of people there in the moment and it’s made me check myself. My families life changed fundamentally but it pales in comparison to so many others.
I've got a friend whose birthday is on 9/11. He told us the story of his birthday on the day it happened in basically the funniest way possible. The thing is, humor is a coping mechanism. For him it was probably a horrible day since he was expecting it to be a happy one, but joking about things can help us move past them. Not everybody is like that, but I think it's fine if somebody is the kind of person who does that as long as they're still capable of recognizing the actual severity of the topic when the situation calls for it. I crack jokes about it too, but I also recognize that there were a lot of badass people who did everything in their power to respond to the situation appropriately and save as many lives as they could, and I also recognize that a lot of people lost their lives that day and that it led to further conflict and deaths.
If anything, the gravity of the situation makes it all the more important to have a coping mechanism, and if it happens to be humor for some people I don't think there's any shame in that if it helps keep you moving through life when the alternative is facing every day with despair.
I remember very vividly being shaken awake then running to the TV, similarly I thought I was old enough to understand death, but seeing the second plane hit and the collapse froze me to my core.
My mom was worried because my step dad had a flight out the east coast. His plane touched down so it was all good.
I am not sure howong they have been doing it but I have listened to excerpts on NPR for at least 20 years and every story is archived at the Library of Congress.
Basically this same thing happened to me. I was in high school and living in California. My parents woke me up and said “you need to come downstairs and watch this”. My parents, my brothers and I sat in silence watching the news. Wild fucking day.
Its too bad he got pulled into a manufactured war of false pretenses of WMDs, that killed millions of brown civilians for the sole purpose of profiteering off oil.
A tragedy that shook people that imagined having loved ones in it or really did. 2,996 people died that day through this act of terrorism.
But you know what? I'm totally indifferent to it. Always have been. Because the same day approximately 8,500 children under five died on the same planet and nobody shed a tear. 8,500 lives lost to a death that was 100% preventable...
And today we can't take a bottle of water onto the plane and are handled like potential terrorists as we board a plane and still... 8,500 kids die daily a total preventable death.
Why would I have more sympathy for less than 3,000 people I didn't know than for the 77,5 million kids that died since then?
See, normal people are capable of having sympathy for multiple people at the same time. Having sympathy for the people affected by 9/11 doesn't sap empathy they could have toward starving children because empathy is additive.
Acknowledging a tragedy on its anniversary doesn't require you to preface your comment with a list of every other equal or greater tragedy beforehand.
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u/reddot_comic Finessed Impropriety 15h ago edited 14h ago
This was September 11, 2001 for my family. My sister died two months prior and my dad was active military. Living on the west coast, the attack was very early for us and I’m not sure what got my mom to wake me up but she did and in a very weird way I’m thankful for it. I rather have known what happened than hear it afterwards. Being a child, it was a very surreal day. I thought I understood death and its magnitude after my sister died but I couldn’t comprehend this kind of scale.
I know we make light of it the event on the internet (I’m totally guilty of that too)… However I’ve been seeing videos of personal recounts of people there in the moment and it’s made me check myself. My families life changed fundamentally but it pales in comparison to so many others.
There’s a certain account that animates personal stories (that I believe are largely NY/east coast based) called Story Corps. Every single post has made me cry.
For all those whose lives were changed through this tragedy, I’m so sorry.