The Looming Tower

infobox Book |
name = The Looming Tower
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = Hardcover first edition, 2006, Knopf
author = Lawrence Wright
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
genre = Modern history
publisher = Knopf
release_date = 2006
media_type = Print (Hardback & Paperback)
pages = 480
isbn = 978-0375414862

"The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11" is a historical look at the way in which Al-Qaeda came into being, the background for various terrorist attacks and how they were investigated, and the events that led to the 9/11-2001 terrorist attacks on the United States. The book was written by Lawrence Wright, and he received a Pulitzer Prize for it.

"The Looming Tower" is largely focused on the people involved; what they were like, why they did what they did, and how they interacted. The book starts with Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian religious scholar who visited the United States in the late 1940s and returned to his home to become an anti-West fundamentalist and eventually a martyr for his beliefs. There is also a portrait of Ayman al-Zawahiri, from his childhood in Egypt to his participation in and later leadership of Egyptian Islamic Jihad to his merging of his organization with Al Qaeda.

Osama bin Laden is the person described the most, from his childhood in Saudi Arabia in an incredibly rich family, to his participation in the jihad against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, to his role as a financier of terrorist groups, to his stay in Sudan, to his return to Afghanistan and his interactions with the Taliban. The 1998 United States embassy bombings in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Nairobi, Kenya are described, as is the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000.

Lawrence Wright also describes in detail some of the Americans involved in combating terror, in particular Richard A. Clarke, chief counter-terrorism adviser on the U.S. National Security Council, and John P. O'Neill, Assistant Deputy Director of Investigation for the FBI. John O'Neill's story is perhaps the most amazing one of all, considering that he was America's top bin Laden hunter until his retirement from the FBI in August 2001, after which he got a job as head of security at the World Trade Center, where he died in the 9/11 attacks.

The book also describes some of the problems with lack of cooperation between the FBI and the CIA and other American government organizations that prevented them from uncovering the 9/11 plot in time.

Because "The Looming Tower" is to a large extent focused on telling the story of the people involved it does not actually describe the 9/11 plot and its execution in much detail. It focuses more on the background and the conditions that produced the people who planned and staged the attack, and information about those who were combating terror against the USA. (For a detailed description of the 9/11 attack itself see "The 9/11 Commission Report").

About the title

The words "the looming tower" appear in the Qur'an. According to Lawrence Wright, Osama bin Laden at a wedding before the 9/11 attack quoted a line from the fourth Sura of the Qur'an, repeating it three times: "Wherever you are, death will find you, even in the looming tower." [ [http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people6/Wright/wright-con3.html Lawrence Wright Interview at The Institute of International Studies, UC Berkeley, page 3] ]

Minor mistakes

The book has a few minor mistakes, such as:
* The 14th-century Islamic thinker that inspires the Salafists is called "Ibn Tamiyyah" in the book instead of "Ibn Taimiyyah". The difference cannot be explained by different transcription variants of Arabic.
* The Pashtuns are said to be the largest population group in Afghanistan "and in Pakistan", while this is only the case in Afghanistan.
* The gun carried by Bin Laden is repeatedly described as a "Kalikov" AK-74 instead of a "Kalashnikov"

External links

* [http://www.metacritic.com/books/authors/wrightlawrence/loomingtower The Looming Tower Reviews at Metacritic]
* [http://www.authorviews.com/authors/wright/video.php AuthorViews video interview about The Looming Tower]
* [http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people6/Wright/wright-con1.html Lawrence Wright Interview: Conversations with History; Institute of International Studies, UC Berkeley]
* [http://uc.princeton.edu/main/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1734&Itemid=11 Lawrence Wright speaking at Princeton University on "Al Qaeda: Past, Present and Future". April 25, 2007]

References