Guerre de 1812

The War of 1812 serves as a historical dividing line in Noam Chomsky’s account of the September 11 attacks. He argues that they were unprecedented for the United States not chiefly because of their scale or character, but because the targets lay on U.S. national territory: since the War of 1812, he says, the country had not experienced such an attack or even faced such a threat. The reference helps frame his larger claim that, for the first time, the direction of the guns had been reversed.

The Historical Threshold

Chomsky contrasts the attacks with Pearl Harbor, an analogy he considers misleading. On December 7, 1941, military bases were attacked in two U.S. possessions, but, in his account, neither lay on the national territory and the homeland itself was not threatened. He also challenges the language of territorial possession, describing Hawaii as a colony rather than treating its designation as a U.S. territory as settling the distinction. The War of 1812 thus marks the last earlier point in his comparison when the national territory had been attacked or threatened.

Reversal and Imperial History

The significance of the comparison depends on the long history Chomsky sets against it. He recalls the destruction of Indigenous populations, the conquest of half of Mexico, the acquisition of Hawaii and the Philippines, and the use of force across regions of the world. Against that background, the September 11 attacks register as a striking reversal: a country that had repeatedly projected violence beyond its borders now experienced an attack on its own territory. The reference to the War of 1812 makes the change legible as a break with a history extending far beyond any one military episode.

Political Meaning

Chomsky’s use of the War of 1812 is comparative, not a detailed account of that war. It establishes the historical interval behind his claim about the novelty of the September 11 attacks and redirects attention from their scale to the location of their targets. The distinction also underpins his criticism of the Pearl Harbor analogy: an attack on bases in possessions and an attack on national territory are not interchangeable. In his argument, the date marks a boundary between the United States’ long experience of outward force and the exceptional moment when the guns were pointed in the other direction.