24 Season Two

This post is part of a continuing series on the TV drama, 24. I am writing about the parallels between this innovative and powerful drama, and life in DC during the same period.

Season 2: Oct 2002—May 2003. Terrorists threaten to explode a bomb on US soil. President Palmer is attacked and collapses.

Season 2 aired beginning in October 2002, the same month that the Beltway snipers Muhammed and Malvo shot 13 victims in the DC area, killing 10 of them.  Terrorism at home and abroad seemed very real, forming a scary backdrop to the TV drama. 

By the time the season ended in May, US Forces had invaded Baghdad and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein. 

Forces on the ground in Baghdad included then-Major Robert T. with 3d Infantry Division. Robert would later come to work for me in the Pentagon and eventually succeed me as Chief of the Concepts Integration Branch. 

After Sadam's Army crumbled and Baghdad fell, President Hussein went into hiding. Soon, then-MG Odierno's 4th Infantry Division found the former President hiding in an underground "spider hole."

Many of us watched the war on CNN, then caught news about the Beltway snipers on NBC, and then tuned to 24 on Fox for entertainment. Many of us were thus exposed to a continual stream of counter-terror drama on TV. 

People like my colleague Robert, the current Army Chief of Staff GEN Odierno, and the men and women of America's Army lived that counter-terror drama in real life.

Other Posts in This Series

Overview of 24: http://philosfx.blogspot.com/2011/04/24.html

Season 1: http://philosfx.blogspot.com/2011/08/24-season-one.html
Season 3: http://philosfx.blogspot.com/2012/03/24-season-three.html