From the terrorist point of view, the incidents of September 11 came together as the perfectly choreographed breaking news production. In their book The Theater of Terror: Mass Media and International Terrorism, Gabriel Weiman and Conrad Winn compare terrorism with theater:

Previously, even the coverage of major news events such as the assassination of President John F. Kennedy were limited by technology.

While the theater metaphor remains useful, I believe that September 11 showed us a terrorist production that transcends this metaphor. We are now talking about the perfect television news production that is broadcast worldwide. Particularly in terms of the audience reached, we can no longer think in terms of theater, or even of movie theaters. September 11 was staged for television transmission on a global basis.

	A hooded member of the Palestinian terrorist group Black September on the balcony of the Munich Olympic Village building, September 5, 1972. The group seized members of the Israeli Olympic team. AP / Wide World Photos

The 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Germany, were set up to transmit news about the competition as widely as possible. During the games, Black September, a Palestinian terrorist group, attacked members of the Israeli Olympic team. The terrorists killed some of the Israeli athletes and used others as human shields in their effort to gain free passage out of the country. The incident ended with a terrible massacre when the German police tried to prevent the departure of the terrorists from an airport outside Munich. Most of the terrorists and all of their captives died in that shootout.

Black September was tremendously successful in terms of transmitting news of its terrorist incident. The group had chosen to commit terrorism at the Olympics because it knew that communication means had been set up at the games to reach around the world. It is estimated that up to 800 million people watched as the incident unfolded. For the first time, many people learned of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or discovered that there were groups willing to resort to violence for the Palestinian cause. From the terrorist perspective, they must not only stage the incident but also ensure the availability of communications to transmit that incident to a global audience.