Who Profited from Sept. 11?

9/11 has its 10th anniversary: The attacks served as justification for two wars and strict laws. Not only politicians profited from the fear of terror.

Ten years have passed since the devastating attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. The policies of the U.S. government at that time took an about-face — suddenly those things became possible in foreign and domestic policy that the conservative strategists would not have been able to carry through without the attacks.

Sept. 11 served as the direct justification for the Afghanistan War and made the rallying of the U.S. public behind the Iraq War possible. President George W. Bush and his vice president, Richard Cheney, surged ahead, suspending the “checks and balances” of the U.S. American government, thereby without encountering appreciable resistance from Congress or the public. New laws emerged; the security branch boomed; significant basic rights were suspended in “the war against terror”; the defense budget doubled.

“Political fear” characterized the Bush government, and his successor, Barack Obama, has not convincingly been able to or wanted to pursue the path back to a nation of law, in spite of big announcements.

Islamophobia and embittered animosity toward migrant communities have become strong internal factors in the U.S. and Europe, right-wing populist parties celebrate election successes, and Germany argues about the theses of one Thilo Sarrazin, which doubtlessly would have been received before Sept. 11 as the unrestrained racist nonsense that they are.

We ask: Who are the great profiteers of 9/11?