President Donald Trump speaks Tuesday (local time) at the Ellipse near the White House during "Steel Across America," a privately organized event commemorating victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. [AFP]
President Donald Trump speaks Tuesday (local time) at the Ellipse near the White House during "Steel Across America," a privately organized event commemorating victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. [AFP]

President Donald Trump said Tuesday (local time), marking the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, that the United States has become "bigger, better and stronger than ever." He also defended the war against Iran, saying the country had come to the brink of acquiring a nuclear weapon but no longer has any chance to do so.

Trump made the remarks at the "Steel Across America" event held at the Ellipse, a park south of the White House in Washington, D.C., saying, "So much time has passed since 9/11, and now we gather on another Tuesday morning in September to reaffirm the sacred vow we made 25 years ago."

The event was organized by the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, a nonprofit, ahead of the 25th anniversary of the attacks to honor the victims. Since May, the foundation had toured the country with a steel beam recovered from the wreckage of the World Trade Center's South Tower, reviving memories of that day. It closed out the tour with a final display of the beam in Washington that day — the second Tuesday of September this year. The date matches the day of the week on which the 2001 attacks occurred.

"So much has changed since that day, but this dented piece of steel placed at the Ellipse today reminds us that America is a nation endowed with a strength that no fire can burn, no evil can conquer and no terror can destroy," Trump said in his speech.

During the event, Trump posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Welles Crowther, a stock broker who died when the World Trade Center's South Tower collapsed on 9/11. He was killed after helping rescue many people trapped inside the building.

In his speech, Trump also defended the war against Iran. "The reason we're fighting now is that there was a country that wanted nuclear weapons," he said. "They got right to the brink of having nuclear weapons, but now they have no chance at all. They will not have nuclear weapons, and they have paid a tremendous price."

The Sept. 11 attacks were carried out in 2001 by al-Qaeda, the Islamist militant group led at the time by Osama bin Laden. The attacks marked the deadliest tragedy in US history since the nation's founding. Al-Qaeda hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing two into the World Trade Center's twin towers and one into the Pentagon, headquarters of the US Department of Defense. It was an unprecedented terrorist attack. The hijackers had planned to crash the fourth plane into the White House, but passengers fought back, forcing it down in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. About 3,000 people died in the attacks.


kate01@heraldcorp.com