CANBERRA, Australia — Australian journalist James Grubel recalled covering then-Prime Minister John Howard’s visit to Washington on Sept. 11, 2001, when the terrorist attacks in the United States disrupted the delegation’s schedule and changed security concerns around the world.
Grubel, then the Australian Associated Press chief political reporter, accompanied Howard during his first meeting with then-U.S. President George W. Bush in Washington for the 50th anniversary of the ANZUS treaty.
The first day of the visit proceeded as planned. On the second day, Howard was scheduled to hold a news conference before delivering a speech later that day.
News that two planes had struck the World Trade Center in New York reached journalists in Washington shortly before Howard addressed the media.
“It had become a little bit more obvious that this was a serious event,” Grubel told AAP.
Howard offered his condolences during the news conference, while journalists initially expected the rest of the day’s schedule to continue.
That changed when journalists opened the curtains at the Willard Hotel and saw smoke rising across the Potomac River. A third hijacked plane had struck the Pentagon, about 5 kilometers away.
Authorities evacuated the journalists, who walked about a mile to the Australian embassy as thousands of people tried to leave Washington.
“The whole of Washington was in gridlock,” Grubel said.
“There were armed police and soldiers on the corners … I think every building in Washington and everybody was evacuating.”
Grubel said Washington looked completely different from the city he and other journalists had visited during the previous days.
At the Australian embassy, journalists continued filing reports as they followed developments from New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.
“The magnitude of this awful event slowly, slowly hit,” Grubel said.
He said journalists also faced uncertainty over whether further attacks could target cities including London, Paris, Sydney and Canberra.
Al-Qaeda militants hijacked four planes on Sept. 11, 2001. Two planes struck the World Trade Center towers in New York, one hit the Pentagon and the fourth crashed into a field in Pennsylvania. Nearly 3,000 people died, including 10 Australians.
Three days after the attacks, Howard decided to invoke the ANZUS treaty after receiving advice from his foreign minister. The move committed Australia to support the United States if it faced an armed attack.
Grubel said the security concerns that emerged after the attacks continue to shape Australian policy.
“Now with AUKUS, we’re still going through these issues and these debates about our national security,” he said.
The attacks also shifted political debate toward security and defense and helped strengthen support for Howard’s Liberal government ahead of the 2001 federal election, which it won.
Twenty-five years later, Howard said people should remain alert to security threats without allowing fear to dominate daily life.
“We must be alive to the threats that face us but not live in constant fear,” Howard said in a statement.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who served as a Labor backbencher during the attacks, told Parliament Thursday that the anniversary remained significant.
“Alongside the many Americans who lost their lives, were people from nations across the world, 10 Australians among them,” Albanese said.
“America was shaken to its core, but it did not yield. It did not break.”
