When the first hijacked plane hit the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, senior National Security Council official Zalmay Khalilzad was attending a meeting in the White House situation room. Khalilzad was the most senior Afghan American in the U.S. government.

For most Bush administration alumni and those from the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations, the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks will be a solemn time for remembrance. Many senior officials, whether Republican or Democrat, lost friends and acquaintances. Those in the State Department, Pentagon, and CIA lost colleagues. Many other Americans lost loved ones. Over the course of the 20-year war in Afghanistan, Taliban violence killed almost 2,500 American troops.