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9-1-1 Remembered.

It's funny how you think of things in different perspectives. Today is the anniversary of that terrible attack on the World Trade Center. This is the day I think that America started taking the threat of terrorism seriously. For me the day I started taking it seriously was a day like any other day in the green machine in 1974. Although I thought I was headed for Vietnam, much to my surprise, I was stationed in Frankfurt, Germany instead.

Vietnam was a lost cause and while no one wanted to admit that, we were no longer sending every able bodied soldier to the morass it had become.

By what others may call coincidence, I would call the Big Plan; I ended up working in the War Room at V Corps in what became known as the Abrams complex in downtown Frankfurt. I was doing graphics and maps for command and NATO briefings. My brush with terrorism was a nice clear day, some would say a beautiful fall day. It was just the right temperature to be comfortable with maybe just a hint of coolness of the coming winter. The city was bustling along as cities do. As I walked to work, I could hear the cacophony of traffic and people blending into the sounds of nature. My usual work day habit at the time was arriving at the mess hall early enough to have a big breakfast and some leisure time to read our daily military newspaper, the Stars and Stripes, over a cup of coffee.

Having finished my coffee it was just a quick walk around the grounds of the building to get to the main entrance. On the way I noticed a cardboard box sitting along the wall. I thought it odd at the time that a box had come to rest, up against the wall in such a way as to be completely square. It just sat there unobtrusively looking strangely out of place. I made a mental note of it just as you do when looking at extraordinary things in an ordinary manner. I never thought that much about it at all the rest of the morning. I arrived at work and began my day.

It wasn't until later that day that I had learned that it had been a bomb placed there by terrorists to kill and maim American troops. I was close enough to read the writing on the box. Closer than I would ever want to be or have been since. You see, this was 1974 in Germany. It was after the 1972 Olympics and the Israeli athletes having been killed. This was the time of the Six Days War, the Yom Kipper War, and the Oil Embargo. It was a year almost after several troops were wounded and an officer killed in the very place where I worked. The preeminent group, the Red Army Faction wanted to make a statement and the American military found itself as one of the obvious targets. We were fire bombed, involved in riots, shot at, and generally found ourselves learning to not only be vigilant, but more importantly to be ready. On this day and even six years later, I find that those habits have not left me entirely. Within minutes of finding myself in a public space, I can tell you where the nearest exits are, emergency lights, fire extinguishers, restrooms, and what the first three steps I would take, given a couple of different emergency situations. I will even make mental notes about suspicious looking people or groups. My wife called me that morning at work, upset and worried. "What will we do?" she asked me. I told her that nothing had happened in the last hour or so which means that the attack was over unless it took another form different than using airplanes. I was surprised by my calmness and insight. I reassured my wife over the telephone. When I hung up that phone it was then that I realized I was back in 1974. Some would say it's a terrible way to live. For me then as now, it was a way to stay alive.

Learn more about this author, Rick H. Blase.
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