Three months on, Americans paused yesterday to remember those who died in the attacks of September 11th, and to take stock of how their lives have been affected since then.
At Ground Zero firefighters and construction workers stopped work and shut down their heavy machinery for a minute's silence at 8.46 a.m., the time the first hijacked plane smashed into the north tower of the World Trade Centre.
Broadway performer William Michael sang Let There Be Peace on Earth, bagpipers played Amazing Grace, and Christian, Muslim and Jewish clergy offered prayers at a ceremony attended by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and about 150 fireman and construction workers.
At the same time, preceded by a solemn drumroll and the playing of The Star-Spangled Banner, President George W Bush broadcast to the nation from the East Room of the White House, vowing to "right this huge wrong".
"For those of us who lived through these events, the only marker we'll ever need is the tick of a clock on the 46th minute on the 8th hour of the 11th day," said Mr Bush, speaking against a background of flags with the Israeli Star of David the most prominent. "We'll remember where we were and how we felt," he said. "We'll remember the dead and what we owe them. We'll remember what we lost and what we found."
At the Pentagon, the Defence Secretary, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, led a memorial ceremony for those who died when a hijacked plane was flown into the building an hour after the New York attacks. "We will remember until freedom triumphs over fear, over repression and long beyond," he said, after a gigantic American flag was unfurled in front of the gaping hole in the US military's nerve centre.
The US Solicitor General, Mr Ted Olson, whose wife, Barbara, died in the hijacked plane that crashed into the Pentagon, said at a
Justice Department ceremony: "We will never forget our loved ones who died or who were wounded on September 11th. We will fight this evil for as long and as patiently as it takes." Mrs Barbara Olson, a conservative television commentator, called her husband several times during the flight to say hijackers had taken over the Los Angeles-bound aircraft soon after take-off from Dulles International Airport outside Washington.
Mr Olson helped secure new anti-terrorism legislation giving the authorities broad new powers to wiretap phones, monitor Internet traffic and apprehend suspects. The measures taken by the authorities meant that yesterday was significant for a different reason to hundreds of US residents.
Many of 5,000 young men aged 18-33 who recently entered the United States from countries accused by the US of harbouring terrorists had been given until the beginning of this week to offer themselves for interview by federal prosecutors.
Such measures have prompted civil rights groups to express concern about an erosion of civil liberties in the three months since the attacks. However with less room for dissenting opinion in the US, the Bush administration is meeting little public opposition in the measures it has taken to combat terrorism. These include the detention of people with visa irregularities, and the holding of secret military tribunals for non-citizens accused of terrorist offences.
While there is still a sense of vulnerability in a country whose planes, people and open society were used to attack ordinary citizens, the swift progress in the war in Afghanistan has lifted the mood of apprehension appreciably and given Americans a growing confidence in its military invincibility. This is underpinned by the outpouring of patriotism which has hardly abated from the fervent atmosphere of the days immediately after September 11th.