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CNN Live At Daybreak

Pearl Harbor Survivors, Gathering to Mark 60th Anniversary of Attack, Reflect on September 11th

Aired December 07, 2001 - 06:40   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: A surprise attack on America killed thousands of people. Those words can be used now to describe two major events 60 years apart. And as CNN's Eric Horng reports for veterans of Pearl Harbor, the two tragic events could not be more different.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ERIC HORNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Two dark days, images of smoke and flame etched in the American psyche -- two moments of heartbreak, two moments when everything changed.

CLARK SIMMONS, PEARL HARBOR VETERAN: 9/11 was more frightening. I think it was 100 times worse than Pearl Harbor.

HORNG: Clark Simmons should know. On December 7, 1941, he was a 20-year-old mess attendant aboard the USS Utah, one of 21 ships the Japanese sank or damaged in Pearl Harbor. He survived by swimming ashore minutes before the ship was lost forever.

Six decades later, Simmons watched in disbelief from a window of his Brooklyn apartment, as a hijacked airliner crashed into Tower 2 of the World Trade Center. His thoughts immediately returned to a clear December morning in Hawaii that would forever define his life.

SIMMONS: Very similar to Pearl Harbor, because it really brought people together, and we never saw so many flags in the following weeks and up until now.

HORNG (on camera): Many have referred to the attacks of September 11 as another Pearl Harbor, but for many World War II veterans, gathered here this week in Hawaii for the 60th anniversary of the Japanese attack, there is no comparison.

UNIDENTIFIED PEARL HARBOR VETERAN: September 11 was not -- there's no excuse for it to happen -- innocent civilians, firemen.

UNIDENTIFIED PEARL HARBOR VETERAN: We knew when we went into the service, we were in harm's way. It was our duty --it was our duty, if necessary, to be killed.

HORNG (voice-over): Perhaps fittingly, hundreds of relatives of rescue workers, killed in the World Trade Center attack, have been invited to join veterans at Pearl Harbor anniversary events -- together for just one week, but joined forever, for better or worse, by history's comparisons.

Eric Horng, CNN, Pearl Harbor.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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