President Biden

fresh from a four-day trip to Asia,

marked the anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on Monday by honoring service members and first responders in Alaska.

“We will never forget that we persevered when faced with evil and an enemy tried to tear us apart,” Biden told a crowd of more than a thousand people in a cavernous room.

airport

hangar at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage.

This year marks the 22nd anniversary

of the day that Al Qaeda

Terrorists hijacked two commercial flights and crashed the planes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan. A third

different

plane flew into the Pentagon and passengers overtook hijackers from a fourth plane before it crash-landed in an open field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

The 11th Airborne Division band boomed as Air Force One landed Monday afternoon

the snow-capped mountains glisten in the background

. There are lines in the hangar

young

troops, some of whom were

too young or

not

yet

born as the planes crashed into the Twin Towers, he heard Biden, standing in front of an oversized American flag and next to a CH-47 Chinook helicopter, emphasize the importance of the base to American national security.

‘We know that today

22 11

years ago, [

planes]

From this base they were called on high alert to escort aircraft through the airspace,” Biden said.

connecting the facility

to the terrorist attacks that took place 5,000 kilometers away

before an oversized American flag hung from the ceiling and a CH-47 Chinook helicopter stood behind him

. “Alaska communities opened their doors to stranded passengers.”

Biden and his predecessors have typically marked the anniversary of the terrorist attacks at one of the three locations

where that

almost 3,000 people died in New York,

Virginia Washington, D.C.

and Pennsylvania. But the president’s trip to India for the Group of 20 and Vietnam summit meant he wouldn’t reach U.S. territory until he made a stop on the West Coast.

Instead, several Biden administration officials spread out across the September 11 memorial sites to mark the anniversary. Vice President Kamala Harris attends the ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial in New York City. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N. Mayorkas and UN Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield also attended the commemoration in New York, as did the governor of Florida. Ron DeSantis, a Republican presidential candidate, and former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani.

was also present at the ceremony.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III hosted a memorial ceremony at the National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial

in Virginia

where First Lady Jill Biden placed a wreath.

Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff attends the commemoration in Pennsylvania. Secretary of Veterans Affairs Denis McDonough also attends a National Day of Service event at the department’s Baltimore National Cemetery in

Baltimore, MD

Maryland.

The president sought connection

tie

his visit abroad on the occasion of the sad event, during which he told the troops that during his trip abroad he had mainly thought about the victims of September 11

the last few days when I was there

Asia.

“These trips are a central part of how we will ensure that the United States is flanked by the broadest range of allies and partners who will support us,” he said. “Building a world that is safer for all our children, something we must especially remember today, cannot be taken for granted.”

Biden praised the military and resident first responders

who acted

in the days following the terrorist attacks

9/11 attack

and those who continue to serve, calling them the “soul of the nation.”

He took the opportunity to call for national unity and encouraged Americans to put aside their political differences.

“It is more important than ever that we come together around the principle of American democracy, regardless of our political backgrounds,” he said. “American democracy depends not on some of us, but on all of us. American democracy depends on the habits of the heart.”

The president concluded his remarks with a reminder of his relationship with the late Sen. John McCain, whom he honored earlier Monday at his final stop in Vietnam, the Arizona senator’s memorial in Hanoi.

Standing next to Truc Bach Lake, Biden had paid respects to his old friend, dropping a challenge coin at his memorial and saluting a Marine and a Navy officer standing on either side.

“One thing I have always admired about John is the way he put his duty first,” Biden told troops in Alaska as he concluded his remarks.

McCain was a reminder to “never lose that sense of national unity,” the president said. “Let that be the common cause of our time.”

McCain, who died of brain cancer in 2018, was a Navy lieutenant commander who was shot during the Vietnam War in 1967. He spent five years as a prisoner of war in the infamous “Hanoi Hilton” prison.

“I miss him,” Biden told reporters in Hanoi as U.S. climate envoy and former Secretary of State John Kerry, who served in the Vietnam War, and Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken stood nearby. “He was a good friend.”