1993
Oslo Accords
On the White House lawn Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin shook hands as Bill Clinton beamed between them. The PLO recognized Israel; Israel recognized the PLO; a Palestinian Authority would administer parts of the West Bank and Gaza. A two-state solution felt, for a moment, within reach. It would not be.
First World Trade Center bombing
A Ryder truck packed with twelve hundred pounds of explosives detonated in a parking garage under the North Tower. Six died; more than a thousand were injured. The mastermind, Ramzi Yousef, wanted to topple one tower into the other. He failed this time. The new war nobody had yet named had announced itself in Manhattan.
EU formally established
With the Maastricht Treaty coming into force, the European Economic Community officially became the European Union. It would have a common foreign policy, justice cooperation, and a timetable for a single currency. A political structure without clear precedent in history was taking shape on the continent that had destroyed itself twice within living memory.
Black Hawk Down in Mogadishu
A US special operations raid to capture a Somali warlord's lieutenants ran into massive armed resistance. Two Black Hawk helicopters were shot down. Eighteen American soldiers died in a running battle through the streets of Mogadishu. The shock ended American intervention in Somalia and chilled US willingness to enter humanitarian wars for years.
Waco siege ends
After a fifty-one-day standoff at the Branch Davidian compound outside Waco, Texas, the FBI moved in with tear gas and tanks. The buildings caught fire. Seventy-six people died, many of them children. The siege became a grievance for American anti-government extremists. Two years later Timothy McVeigh bombed Oklahoma City on the anniversary.