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Why We Don’t Forget Giuliani’s Leadership on 9/11

August 31, 2011 Sixteen hours had passed since the Twin Towers crumbled and fell, and people kept telling Rudy Giuliani to get some rest. The indomitable mayor of New York City had spent the day and night holding his town together. He arrived at the World Trade Center just after the second plane hit, watched human beings drop from the sky and - when the south tower imploded - nearly got trapped inside his makeshift command center near the site. Then he led a battered platoon of city officials, reporters and civilians north through the blizzard of ash and smoke, and a detective jimmied open the door to a firehouse so the mayor could revive his government there. Giuliani took to the airwaves to calm and reassure his people, made a few hundred rapid-fire decisions about the security and rescue operations, toured hospitals to comfort the families of the missing and made four more visits to the apocalyptic attack scene.

At 2:30 a.m., Giuliani finally got home. Since he couldn't sleep, he watched the day's events again on TV while reading the latest biography of Winston Churchill​. Instead of scoffing at the comparison, Pooley runs with it. "There is a bright magic at work when one great leader reaches into the past and finds another waiting to guide him," he wrote. Giuliani was impressed with the people of his city, and believed they deserved a leader to match them. The Churchill he looked to was the Churchill of 1940, during the Blitz.


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