Twenty-Five Years Later: Remembering September 11
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For those who lived through that day on September 11, 2001, the passage of time has not erased the details:
- where you were
- who you were with
- what you saw
- the moment you understood that the world had changed
At Thayer Leadership, those experiences are deeply personal. Many members of our faculty were serving in the U.S. Army on September 11, and the attacks would shape the course of their service for years to come. For some, the impact was immediate.
Leadership in the Immediate Aftermath
Colonel (Ret.) Sean Hannah, Ph.D., a member of Thayer’s faculty since its inception, was sitting at his desk inside the Pentagon that morning. News had already arrived that planes had struck the World Trade Center when, at 9:37 a.m., American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon.
"Hannah later recalled feeling the force of the blast shake the building. But what followed would become an equally defining part of his experience."
In the aftermath of the attack, he was reassigned to help rebuild Resource Services-Washington, the organization that had suffered the Pentagon’s highest casualty rate. Hannah stepped into the role of a leader who had been killed, joining survivors who were grieving colleagues while simultaneously confronting an enormous organizational responsibility. The team was responsible for a multibillion-dollar budget operation, and many employees suddenly had to assume responsibilities two or three levels above their previous roles.
Their work offers a profound reminder of what leadership can require in a crisis.
"There was no opportunity to wait until the circumstances became easier. People had to grieve and act, support one another and accomplish the mission, all at the same time."
Hannah described what he witnessed in the survivors as a combination of “resolve, honor, and duty.” Yet he was equally clear about something that can sometimes be lost when stories of resilience are retold: the pain remained. The ability to continue serving did not erase the human cost of what had happened.
That distinction matters.
September 11 should not be reduced to a leadership case study. It was first and foremost a human tragedy. One that took nearly 3,000 lives and left families, friends, colleagues, communities, and nations forever changed.
But in the actions of people who confronted that tragedy, we can also see something important about leadership:
"Character becomes most visible when circumstances demand more from us than we expected to give."
A Generation of Service
For many members of the Thayer Leadership faculty, the impact of September 11 continued through the decades of military service that followed. Here are a few of their stories:
Colonel (Ret.) Greg Gadson served in every major conflict of the post-9/11 period, including Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom in Iraq. While in command in Iraq, he was critically wounded by an IED in May 2007, resulting in the loss of both legs, for which he received a Purple Heart. He co-authored a book, Finding Waypoints: A Warrior’s Journey Towards Peace and Purpose, about his personal transformation from battlefield leader to speaker and life coach.
Colonel (Ret.) Patricia George’s Army career included deployments to Baghdad, Iraq, and Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan, where she was known for helping soldiers turn values and leadership principles into practical action.
Colonel (Ret.) Joe Vongs led an intelligence company during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, returned to Iraq as an embedded intelligence trainer in 2007, and later deployed an intelligence battalion to Afghanistan.
Major General (Ret.) Tony Cucolo led soldiers in both Afghanistan and Iraq, commanding major counterinsurgency operations in each theater. He led initial trilateral efforts among U.S., Afghan, and Pakistani military leaders to address border disputes and improve information sharing. In Iraq, he successfully established a grassroots effort to build confidence between Iraqi Arabs and Iraqi Kurds along their disputed ethnic fault line crossing that nation from Syria to Iran.
Major General (Ret.) Malcolm Frost deployed to combat in a variety of leadership and command positions. He deployed twice to Iraq as commander of an 800-soldier Cavalry Squadron during the Surge in 2006-7, and commander of a 5K-soldier Stryker Brigade Combat Team in 2010-11. Additionally, he deployed as director of operations of a 4K-soldier airborne brigade task force in Afghanistan in 2002-3.
Thayer Co-President and faculty member Dan Rice had previously completed his active-duty Army service, but later voluntarily returned to military service with the New York National Guard and deployed to Iraq as an infantry officer. He was wounded there in 2005 and received the Purple Heart.
"These experiences differ dramatically, and no single story can represent what September 11 meant to everyone who served in the years that followed."
Together, however, they illustrate the reach of that day across an entire generation of leaders.
Their responsibilities changed. Their organizations changed. Their missions changed. And many found themselves leading in environments defined by uncertainty, complexity, personal risk, and consequences that could not be neatly separated from the people carrying them out.
What Crisis Reveals About Leadership
At Thayer, we often speak about closing the gap between knowing about leadership and acting like a leader when it counts. We believe that leaders build leaders, that character is foundational, and that leadership is developed over a lifetime of study, experience, reflection, and practice.
The experiences of September 11 reinforce why that preparation matters:
- A crisis rarely provides time to begin developing trust. Leaders must have built it beforehand.
- A crisis is not the moment to discover whether people understand the mission. Shared understanding must already exist.
- A crisis does not suddenly create character. It reveals the values, habits, relationships, and sense of responsibility that have been developed long before the moment arrives.
The survivors COL Hannah worked alongside at the Pentagon demonstrated another essential truth: leadership does not always come from the person with the most senior title. When circumstances changed in an instant, people stepped into responsibilities they had never expected to carry. They acted because others depended on them.
"That is one reason developing leaders at every level matters."
Responsibility of Remembrance
A quarter century creates distance, but it also creates responsibility.
As firsthand memories of September 11 gradually become history, those who remember the day have an opportunity to tell its stories. Not only stories of destruction, but of service, sacrifice, courage, compassion, and people caring for one another under extraordinary circumstances.
"Those who did not experience September 11 firsthand inherit a different responsibility: to listen."
At Thayer Leadership, we are privileged to learn from leaders whose lives and service were profoundly shaped by that day and by everything that followed. Their experiences remind us that leadership is ultimately about far more than authority or accomplishment. It is about the choices we make when other people are counting on us.
Twenty-five years later, we remember those whose lives were taken on September 11, 2001. We remember the families and colleagues who carried their loss forward. We honor the first responders, service members, civilians, and countless others who answered calls to serve.
We carry forward a responsibility of our own: to develop leaders of character who are prepared to serve others, especially in the moments when leadership matters most.