AFTER THE RUINS: THE 9/11 COMPLEX, MEMORY, AND THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR

A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF UNIVERSITY OF HAWAIʻI AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

IN

AMERICAN STUDIES

APRIL 2020

By

Tomoaki Morikawa

Dissertation Committee:

Karen Kosasa, Chairperson Elizabeth Colwill Vernadette Gonzalez Reece Jones Geoffrey White

Keywords: 9/11, Battleground, Commemoration, Interpellation, Memory, The Global War on Terror, Vulnerability

Acknowledgements

This dissertation project would have not been possible without the assistance of many people.

I want to thank Karen Kosasa who has pushed me this far. She has been the most avid reader of my writings. It is her dedicated guidance and numerous edits that enabled me to complete this dissertation. She was always willing to have a conversation with me either in person or online and provided generous support to me not only academically but also mentally.

I am also grateful to my committee members, Elizabeth Colwill, Vernadette Gonzalez,

Reece Jones, and Geoffrey White. Each chapter has sections that reveal how deeply I am influenced by their work. In my dissertation, I travel across time and space to the period of slavery in New York City, to Pearl Harbor, Hawaiʻi, and to the U.S.-Mexico border. Each journey was made possible because I was fortunate to work with my committee members.

I must say that the Department of American Studies at University of Hawai'i at Mānoa took very good care of me. Mari Yoshihara, now the department chair, said to me, “We are watching you,” when I joined the department, and I was watched over with care for the whole of my PhD program. The UH bureaucracy is not easy to deal with, but Rumi Yoshida pushed through many things for me. Without her presence in the department office, things would have been much more difficult.

I also want to express gratitude to many participants and TripAdvisor reviewers who shared their experiences and provided materials relevant to my research. They allowed me to critically reflect on my epistemological framework and complicate my thinking. Their voices added depth to my dissertation analysis.

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And I would like to thank my comrades. They made my graduate life more than bearable.

Special thanks to Yi-hung Liu and Andy Wang. While Yi-hung sometimes “trashed” my writings, she made me think harder, and Andy provided a space to focus on my work in Taiwan.

And thank you to Jayson Parba, who cooked me salty Filipino food from time to time and allowed me to stay at his place when I was in Honolulu for my defense.

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Abstract

While once a place that defined Lower Manhattan as the mecca of international business, the

World Trade Center was destroyed and turned into a site of national trauma called “Ground

Zero” by the events of 9/11. Right after the terrorist attacks, efforts to recover and reconstruct the site were quickly taken, and now, a memorial complex stands there. Naming it the Ground Zero memorial complex, this dissertation attempts to understand the significance of this place within the American landscape and American history. For this purpose, I closely trace the reconstruction process of the WTC site and examine the rebuilt memorial complex mainly consisting of the primary tower One World Trade Center, the memorial Reflecting Absence, and the National September 11 Museum. At the same time, I make a methodological decision to move beyond Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in time and space. Guided by the notion that the site is the focal point of the flow of violence that is foundational to the U.S., this dissertation shifts the sites of investigation from Lower Manhattan to Vietnam, the U.S.-Mexico border,

Hawai‘i, and Hiroshima. By situating the Ground Zero memorial complex within much larger contexts, I reveal that the WTC site was reconstructed into a place that sanctioned violence as a result of the American violence perpetrated globally following the 9/11 events. The Ground Zero memorial complex is thus a battleground where people may not physically lose their lives, but are encouraged to sanction the logic of the Global War on Terror as well as other ideological and physical wars waged on behalf of the U.S. To some visitors, the site may appear apolitical and neutral. It may appear to be dedicated to consoling and healing a wounded nation. However, the

Ground Zero memorial complex is much more complex than it seems.

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgements i

Abstract iii

Table of Contents iv

Table of Figures vi

Introduction 1

Chapter 1: Exclusions, Inclusions:

The Reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan 25

Chapter 2: The Cartography of Vulnerability:

Wars and U.S. Geographies 59

Chapter 3: The Museum as a Battleground:

Curating the Global War on Terror 90

Chapter 4: Encoding, Decoding:

Visitor Experiences at the Ground Zero Memorial Complex 132

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Conclusion 168

Appendix A: Email from 9/11 Memorial & Museum (Nov. 11, 2017) 175

Appendix B: Email from 9/11 Memorial & Museum (Nov. 11, 2018) 178

Appendix C: Questionnaire 181

Appendix D: Semi-Structured Interview Questions 182

Appendix E: Profile of Participants 183

Bibliography 184

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Table of Figures

Figure 1: “Hibaku Saigen Ningyō” 5

Figure 2: “Visitor Rules of Conduct” 26

Figure 3: Museum Map 94

Figure 4: “Last Column” 96

Figure 5: “Slurry Wall” 97

Figure 6: A Large Map and “We Remember” 99

Figure 7: “Trying to Remember the Color of the Sky on That September Morning” 102

Figure 8: “World Leaders, December 7, 1988” 108

Figure 9: “Al-Qaeda in the Context of Sunni Islam, circa 2000” 114

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Introduction

May the lives remembered, the deeds recognized, and the spirit reawakened be eternal beacons, which reaffirm respect for life, strengthen our resolve to preserve freedom, and inspire an end to hatred, ignorance and intolerance. —National September 11 Memorial and Museum1

Does the state gain anything in exchange? It certainly does, but what it obtains pertains only to its own territory with respect to its own citizens. The state gains the following: that the church will not interfere with but rather approve and uphold the exercise of power by the state. The church promises to obtain for the state the consent of a segment of the governed that the state implicitly acknowledges it cannot obtain on its own. —Antonio Gramsci, Prison Notebooks Volume II, 19752

Trajectory

While walking through the National September 11 Museum in summer, 2018, my memory kept turning back to my visit to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum a few years earlier. For a Japanese national trained in the field of American Studies, I understood the term

“ground zero” not only as a reference to the ruined World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan, but also as a marker signifying the hypocenters of the atomic bombings by the U.S. in August

1945 in Japan. For me, “ground zero” is a multifaceted term. Because my visit to the museum in

Hiroshima predated my visit to the National September 11 museum in New York City, I found some of its exhibits perplexing, especially in terms of how it viewed the topic of war. The museum in Lower Manhattan, as one of the following chapters shows, affirms the Global War on

1 “Mission Statement,” https://www.911memorial.org/mission-statement (accessed February 28th). Although the National September 11 Memorial and Museum is the institution’s official name, the word “national” is often omitted. The memorial museum is a product of private and state partnership and thus not a federal institution. Its logo plain and simple: “9/11 Memorial & Museum.” And yet, as will be discussed later, this institution is anything but national. In light of this national status, I will use the official name in this dissertation. 2 Antonio Gramsci, Prison Notebooks Volume II (Ed. and trans. Joseph Buttigieg, New York: Columbia University Press, 1975), 220.

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Terror.3 In contrast, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum is thematically antiwar—and this is in line with what I was taught in schools when I grew up in Japan. I was educated to believe that war is evil.4 The museum built adjacent to ground zero in the city of Hiroshima confirms this point. The mission of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum is to “[convey] to the world the horrors and the inhumane nature of the nuclear weapon and [spread] the message of ‘No More

Hiroshimas,’” or no more war, “[t]hrough belongings left by the victims, A-bombed artifacts, testimonies of A-bomb survivors and related materials.5 For me, war is not something to be celebrated. When I encountered the affirmation of war in the National September 11 Museum, I was confused by the differences between the U.S. war culture and the one in which I was raised.

That I found some exhibits in the museum in Lower Manhattan disconcerting does not mean that I am morally superior as a Japanese citizen in comparison to Americans. On the contrary, in Hiroshima, I was troubled by my own discriminatory responses towards others.

When I saw American-looking people touring around the Hiroshima Peace Memorial park and taking photographs in front of the Atomic Dome, I inwardly condemned them: “Shame on you.

You people caused this to us and you are having some fun out of it.” My reaction to them was probably no different from Americans who are troubled when they see “Japs” visiting the Pearl

Harbor Historic Sites and viewing the USS Arizona Memorial in Hawai‘i.6 Or, I am not unlike

3 This war is called the (Global) “War on Terror” in the United States. In a way, the adjective “global” is a misnomer, considering the fact that the war has been fought not for global society, but for the U.S. This dissertation, however, maintains the adjective. While this war is representative of U.S. unilateral foreign policy, actual battles have been fought in many parts of the world and the battlefront is globally spreading. 4 This was, by no means, a critical reflection on Japan’s past history in wars. I was taught about war’s evil nature only in the context that the Japanese experienced difficult times during and after World War II. In schools, at least during my K12 education, I was never thoroughly introduced to the atrocities that Imperial Japan committed in Asia. 5 “Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum,” http://hpmmuseum.jp/?lang=eng (accessed February 28th). 6 Geoffrey White, Memorializing Pearl Harbor: Unfinished Histories and the Work of Remembrance (Durham: Duke University Press, 2016), 53.

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American patriots who, as will be discussed later in this dissertation, categorically identify

Muslims as terrorists, or the “enemy-others” of the U.S., and refuse to include them in the commemorative practices for the victims of 9/11.

That I found some exhibits in the National September 11 Museum baffling does not mean that the Hiroshima Peace Memorial was a more satisfactory experience than my visit to the museum in Lower Manhattan. I saw some “shortcomings” in the former during my initial visit.

Its exhibits, for instance, do not discuss the racial aspects of the Pacific War. Although there is a panel about the background of the U.S. atomic bombing in Hiroshima, no reason is provided for why Japan and not Germany was bombed. The panel simply states, “In May 1943, the U.S. was planning to use the (atomic) bomb not on Germany but Japan. The following September, the

U.S. and British leaders agreed to use the bomb against Japan.”7 U.S. high officials, however, did not randomly choose Japan over Germany. As John Dower points out, the Pacific War was a

“race war,” and the Japanese were dehumanized in the American imagination.8 While using inhumane atomic bombs against Germans who were similar to white Americans in terms of their race was not imaginable in the popular consciousness of U.S. citizens, many Americans did not consider it morally wrong to exterminate the Japanese with atomic bombs because “[the

Japanese] were perceived as a race apart, even a species apart.”9

At the same time, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum remains silent on the racial politics that was central to the ideology of Imperial Japan. On the one hand, the Japanese Empire justified its imperial expansion in Asia as the construction of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity

Sphere, a project that supposedly decolonized Asian peoples from Western oppression. On the

7 The caption in the museum. 8 John Dower, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York: Pantheon, 1987), 4. 9 Ibid., 8.

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other hand, however, “the operative language of the new sphere was in fact premised on the belief that the Japanese were destined to preside over a fixed hierarchy of peoples and races.”10

The Co-Prosperity Sphere was only nominally Pan-Asian, which had “a hydra-headed ideology, involving not merely the frontal attack on the Western colonial powers and their values but also discrimination vis-à-vis the other races, nationalities, and cultures of Asia.”11 The Hiroshima

Peace Memorial Museum does not describe or critically reflect on the war atrocities committed by the Japanese under this ideology. Instead, by displaying the gory images and full-size mannequins of A-bomb victims (see Figure 1), the museum produces a simplistic narrative that war is evil because it could lead to atomic bombings.12

10 Ibid. 11 Ibid. 12 The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum underwent a massive renovation from September 2014. The museum’s exhibition was renewed and reopened on April 25, 2019. As a result of the renewal, the mannequins were removed from the display. Ostensibly, the City of Hiroshima attributed the removal to the inaccurate representation of the magnitude of the atomic bombing. In short, government officials claimed that the mannequins belittled the horror of the bombing and might let visitors believe that the bombing was not so horrific. See “About the Removal of full-size mannequins of A-bomb victims (平和 記念資料館の被爆再現人形の撤去について), http://www.city.hiroshima.lg.jp/www/contents/1371543633862/index.html (accessed February 28th). Whether those officials were politically or sincerely motivated remains to be examined, the overall narrative tone of the museum seemingly does not change, as some critics point out. For instance, Nodoka Odawara argues that the renewed exhibition is curated in ways to invite visitors to poignantly imagine the sorrow of seeing people dying and viscerally feel that the atomic bombing is unbearable and war is not acceptable. See “Two Atomic Museums and What Their ‘Exhibitions’ Tell. The Review of ‘The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum’ by Nodoka Odawara (2 つの原爆資料館、その「展示」が伝え るもの。小田原のどか評「広島平和記念資料館」),” https://bijutsutecho.com/magazine/insight/20226 (accessed February 28th).

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Figure 1: “Hibaku Saigen Ningyō”被爆再現人形 (The Replicating Dolls of A-Bomb Victims) [Photo: Tomoaki Morikawa]

This antiwar claim is not self-critical or self-reflexive. In the Hiroshima Peace Memorial

Museum, at least when I visited in summer 2013, there was no interpretive panel pointing out

Japan’s wartime atrocities and its history as an aggressive empire. Despite the antiwar claim for world peace, the museum does not problematize the colonization of Asian countries and peoples by Imperial Japan and the Japanese.13 As such, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum is

13 There are two panels briefly problematizing Japanese imperial practices in the Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims, which is located next to the Hiroshima Memorial Museum: “About 350,000 people are estimated to have been in Hiroshima when the atomic bomb was dropped. Among these were many from the Korean peninsula, which was then a Japanese colony, and include persons from China”; “We hereby mourn those who perished in the atomic bombing. At the same time, we recall with great sorrow the many lives sacrificed to mistaken national policy” (the captions in

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limited in many ways, and it is not my contention that the museum in Hiroshima is better or more enlightened than the museum in Lower Manhattan.

That I found some exhibits of the National September 11 Museum troubling, compared to the ones in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, only means that I had been indoctrinated into a different set of national ideologies. After all, I am a product of the so-called “post-war democracy,” a norm in Japanese society after the Pacific War, under which “peace” is upheld as a gospel truth. This norm or ideological education was the source of my confusion when I visited the National September 11 Museum, and my confusion informs this dissertation project. I began to think more and more about the links between the Global War on Terror and the museum in

Lower Manhattan, or, more broadly, the rebuilt WTC complex which includes the museum.

These links are the focus of this dissertation. Before September 11th, 2001, the U.S. had never been attacked on its soil other than the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 in Hawai‘i.

Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, therefore, occupies an important place in the American landscape as a site of national trauma. This is apparent in the usage of the term “Ground Zero.”

Having complex history behind it, the term signifies many places not in the U.S. but in the city of Hiroshima and in the world.14 Shortly after 9/11, however, New Yorkers started calling the

WTC site Ground Zero with the capital letters, or as a proper noun. This appropriation of the term “Ground Zero” decontextualized it from its complex history, and the site was reconstructed into what I call the “Ground Zero memorial complex”—the rebuilt WTC complex, including the primary tower called One World Trade Center, the National September 11 Memorial known as

the Memorial Hall). And yet, the ways in which the Japanese Empire and the Japanese violated those lives are never clarified in the hall and, by extension, in the park. 14 As will be unpacked in detail in Chapter 3, I acknowledge this complexity and yet, still utilize the term “Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan” to designate the ruined WTC site for its significance in the American landscape and American history.

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Reflecting Absence, and the National September 11 Museum.15 This dissertation argues that within the context of the Global War on Terror, the WTC, which was ruined by the events of

9/11, has become a memorial complex that sanctions this war.

This relationship, I argue, works both ways. On the one hand, the Global War on Terror dictated the reconstruction of the WTC site and the war’s logic informed the shape of the Ground

Zero memorial complex. On the other hand, the site enables the U.S. to continue the Global War on Terror by educating visitors and soliciting their consent. In this sense, the memorial complex has never been unrelated to the war. Rather, the site is one of the battlegrounds of the Global

War on Terror.

Theoretical Frameworks

“Hiroshima” theoretically informs this dissertation project. According to Lisa Yoneyama,

Hiroshima’s urban renewal was led by social and political elites. Under the influence of post-

WWII Japan’s dominant historical discourse, they sanitized and appropriated “representations concerning the war and the atom bomb.”16 Consequently, the city was, she argues, redesigned as a place through which to “[shape] our awareness of history and our understanding of present conditions,” or to “[rule] our ways of seeing.”17 As such, Yoneyama describes the reconstruction

15 This dissertation primarily deals with these three components of this memorial complex. While the site is yet to be completely rebuilt and thus is still evolving, these three sites nevertheless architecturally and discursively frame the new WTC complex. They were identified as the primary places that needed to be (re)built to properly commemorate 9/11 in Memory Foundations, the original mater plan for the reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan. See “Plan for Lower Manhattan” (hereafter Memory Foundations), http://www.renewnyc.com/plan_des_dev/wtc_site/new_design_plans/selected_libeskind/default.asp (accessed February 28th, 2020). The master plan will be analyzed in more detail in Chapters 1 and 2. 16 Lisa Yoneyama, Hiroshima Traces: Time, Space, and the Dialectics of Memory (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 64. 17 Ibid.

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of the cityscape of Hiroshima as a “vice-versal” process: while the cityscape of Hiroshima is a product of historical sanitation practices, this place in turn tells one to “empty [her/his] critical imagination” when remembering the past and to make sense of the present based on this sanitized memory.18 Moving from Hiroshima to New York, I argue that the Ground Zero memorial complex is also a vice-versal place: in accordance with the logic of the Global War on

Terror, the memorial complex invites its visitors to uncritically accept the war.

Louis Althusser’s concepts of “ideological state apparatus” and “interpellation” are also two important theoretical reference points for this dissertation. Although the Ground Zero memorial complex is literally a complex site upon which various stakeholders such as architects, family members of the victims of 9/11, and the city of New York have projected their visions, the U.S. as a nation-state is still predominantly looming over the site on an ideological level.

Moreover, as Geoffrey White points out, places built to remember national traumas help produce national subjects.19 I, therefore, refer to the Althusserian ideas and define the memorial complex as an “ideological state apparatus of memory” that “interpellates” visitors—in particular,

American visitors—to perpetuate state power in the context of the Global War on Terror by manipulating memories concerning 9/11, the war, and American history. The Ground Zero memorial complex, I argue, facilitates the formation of national subjects who mostly remember

9/11 as the state dictates, and thus consent to and/or serve the U.S. wars in the Middle East and around the world.

18 My choosing of the term “vice-versal” is indebted to Derek Gregory’s following insight: spatial structures cannot be theorized without social structures, and vice versa, and…social structures cannot be practised without spatial structures, and vice versa (Ideology, Science and Human Geography [London: Hutchinson, 1978], 121.). While, as a Marxist geographer, he means class conflicts by the term “social structures,” I see a type of vice-versality between space and history, following Yoneyama’s argument about the tangled relationship between the urban place of the city of Hiroshima and the dominant history in post-war Japan. 19 Geoffrey White, Memorializing Pearl Harbor, 13.

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At the same time, this dissertation attempts to attend to the complexity of interpellation.

The Althusserian conceptualization of interpellation is based on the top-down power relation.

And yet, interpellation is not always unidirectional. Or, to be more exact, the effects of interpellation can be wide-ranging. While interpellating calls are compelling and even coercive, they may invite unexpected responses and cause unintended consequences. In this dissertation, I approach this complexity of interpellation by using the following methods.

Methodology

This dissertation is a site-specific study. Given that 9/11 is one of the most recorded historical events, a comprehensive survey of all texts, films, or political movements that engage with the attacks is beyond the scope of this dissertation. Therefore, I focus on the site of the

Ground Zero memorial complex. Conceptually and physically situating myself in this site, I investigate how American identity and power have been constructed and reinforced through this place, by attending to the political culture and realities of the U.S. before, during, and after 9/11.

An official of the Bush administration once blatantly claimed: “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study.”20 Taking this statement seriously, this dissertation focuses on how the Ground Zero memorial complex creates particular realities while obscuring and ignoring others.

For this purpose, I examine the history of the Ground Zero memorial complex. By looking into the electronic archival materials of the Lower Manhattan Development

20 Quoted in “Faith, Certainty and the Presidency of George W. Bush” by Ron Suskind, The New York Times, https://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/17/magazine/faith-certainty-and-the-presidency-of-george-w- bush.html (accessed February 28th, 2020).

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Corporation—“a joint State-City corporation governed by an eight-member Board of Directors, half appointed by the Governor of New York and half by the Mayor of New York” in charge of

“the rebuilding and revitalization of Lower Manhattan”—that record the design process of the new WTC complex, I trace the reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan from its ruins to the rebuilt memorial complex.21

At the same time, this dissertation analyzes the memorial complex as it is now. In order to achieve this end, I immersed myself in the memorial complex and took extensive field notes while visiting the site. For this dissertation project, in particular for the investigation of the

National September 11 Museum, it is necessary to rely on these field notes because the National

September Memorial and Museum does not allow third parties to look through the museum’s archival materials, including its floor plans. In addition to this restriction, the National September

11 Museum prohibits visitors from taking photographs in the core exhibitions. Therefore, taking field notes is one of the few options available to researchers, and I did so. I took notes on the captions of the exhibitions, the script of the films screened in the museum, and words of the guides during the official tours offered at the Ground Zero memorial complex.

Along with my field notes, I collected “textual” evidence. Among them, texts provided by the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, such as the institution’s electronic newsletters, its blog posts, the museum brochures, and the museum’s official guidebook were included. At the same time, following the scholarly contribution made by scholars in the field of the new cultural geography such as James Duncan and David Ley, I deal with Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan, or its spatial features as a kind of text. Juxtaposing these many texts with one another, this dissertation engages in a close reading of the site.

21 “About Us,” http://www.renewnyc.com/overlay/AboutUs/ (accessed February 28th, 2020).

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I also closely read the material culture of the Ground Zero memorial complex. The site is filled with and surrounded by symbolic objects such as buildings, installation artworks, memorabilia, memorials, and photographs. They contribute to the creation of particular realities.

In order to reveal what they are, this dissertation carefully examines the materialities of those objects by attending to their aesthetics and physical properties.

The method of close reading that I use is indebted to Marita Sturken’s work on 9/11 and

American consumer culture. In Tourists of History: Memory, Kitsch, and Consumerism from

Oklahoma City to Ground Zero, she examines how certain “kitsch” objects such as teddy bears spread the discourse of national innocence in ways that prevent Americans from critically making historical and political inquiries into the role of the U.S. in 9/11, other than as the victims of historic events.22 Sturken, in other words, engages in a close reading of those objects, and, based on her analysis, she concludes that it is usually not critical inquiries but various forms of consumption activities that take place in American society when a tragic event happens.23

Her interpretive methodology, however, has its limitations. Joy Sather-Wagstaff points this out in an ethnographic research project that she conducted. Sather-Wagstaff interviewed people who sold or bought kitsch objects such as the souvenir trinkets found at the WTC site over an extended period of time. She found out that people interacted with those objects in much more complicated ways than Sturken assumes. There are those who do not consume kitsch objects only to evade critical engagements with the history and politics behind 9/11. In fact,

22 For her argumentation about American consumer culture, Sturken mobilizes the concept of kitsch. Pointing out that it originally “emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in Germany as a description of an aesthetic that was seen as banal, trite, predictable, and in bad taste,” she turns to Matei Călinescu’s insight that kitsch “has a lot to do with…the desire to escape from adverse…reality” ([quoted from and in] Tourists of History: Memory, Kitsch, Consumerism from Oklahoma City to Ground Zero [Durham: Duke University Press, 2007], 19.). Redefining this concept as that which is framed by escapism, Sturken problematizes the consumption of kitsch objects. 23 Ibid., 13.

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some people critically, even collectively, questioned the U.S. national image of innocence through their purchase of “kitsch” objects. Sather-Wagstaff introduces the case of a female tourist called Sheryl from Ohio as one of these people. “Once a staunch supporter of U.S. military actions in the Middle East,” Sheryl became a different person after her visit to Ground

Zero in Lower Manhattan.24 While she used to “[perceive] the WTC site as a place that represented justification for [the Global War on Terror],” Sheryl came to “[advocate] it as place that should negate violence, one where commemoration should enable positive remembrance, not more war.”25 Once she got home from her New York trip, Sheryl started sharing her experience of transformation to the community she belonged to by displaying the very objects that would be identified as kitsch by Sturken, hoping that her actions would change the course of

U.S. foreign policy. Informed by her study of tourists such as Sheryl, Sather-Wagstaff, challenges Sturken’s argument that the kitsch commemorabilia available at the WTC site caused

“the consumption of mourning and kitschfication of grief.”26 According to Sather-Wagstaff, it

“may be the case for some individuals” and yet not for all.27

This dissertation follows after the critical studies of Sturken and Sather-Wagstaff and uses them as methodological guides. On the one hand, through the method of close reading, I pursue the central argument that in the context of the Global War on Terror, Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan has been reconstructed into a memorial complex closely related to and ideologically aligned with the war. On the other hand, I intend to complicate this central argument by engaging with visitors to the Ground Zero memorial complex. Just as kitsch objects

24 Sather-Wagstaff, Heritage That Hurts: Tourists in the Memoryscapes of 9/11 (New York: Routledge, 2011), 182. 25 Ibid., 183. 26 Sturken, Tourists of History, 130. 27 Sather-Wagstaff, Heritage That Hurts, 184.

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do not necessarily have the same effects on people, not all visitors respond identically to the site’s interpellation. Through an ethnographic project, this dissertation considers the ways in which some visitors experience the memorial complex, and critically assesses and reassesses the site’s meanings for them.

In order to carry out these (re)assessments focused on a specific site, I also expand the scope of investigation in time and space. As briefly mentioned earlier, the term Ground Zero signifies many places other than the ruined WTC site. And, indeed, there are many other ground zeroes created by the U.S. Without contextualizing Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in relation to those other ground zeroes, I argue, it is not possible to unravel the complexity of the Ground

Zero memorial complex. Guided by this notion, this dissertation takes trans-temporal and trans- spatial analytical frameworks into account. By this, I mean that this dissertation puts the reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in conversation with American history, in particular with the social history of marginalized communities, and examines the site in New

York in relationship to other places in the world affected by U.S. hegemonic foreign policy. For this purpose, the site of investigation is constantly shifting from 9/11 to slavery, the Cold War, and the dispossession of Native peoples; from Lower Manhattan to Vietnam, the U.S.-Mexico border, Hawai‘i, and Hiroshima. Only by using trans-temporal and trans-spatial analytical frameworks, or by attending to the “flow” of violence, can one understand the significance of

9/11, the meanings and agendas of its national commemorative practices, and the function of the

Ground Zero memorial complex as an ideological state apparatus of memory for the U.S. empire.

In addition to the trans-temporal and trans-spatial frameworks, my own positionality as a non-U.S. citizen is integral to my methodology. Situating myself in the Ground Zero memorial complex and closely reading the rebuilt WTC site and its governing spatial aesthetics and

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rhetoric, I examine how the so-called national values and national truths are (re)presented in this place. Moreover I reflect on how visitors are interpellated by reading the site as a text and by conducting an ethnographic study. In so doing, I employ my positionality as a non-American citizen as an analytical asset. As a Japanese national, I am able to see that the Ground Zero memorial complex is not necessarily intended for international visitors. However, even though the intended or ideal visitors may be Amerian citizens, the meaning and messages at the site may also attrack and effectively address the concerns and sympathies of non-American citizens.

Literature Review

This dissertation refers to Henri Lefebvre’s intervention in the field of spatial theory and recontextualizes it for the analysis of the Ground Zero memorial complex. He points out that

“every society…produces a space, its own space” when theorizing on capitalism and how its mode of production facilitates the formation of a certain kind place or landscape for the continuation of capitalism.28 This perspective is of help to analyze the reconstruction of the WTC site in accordance with the logic of capital. One can argue that it has been rebuilt as a place that fits into and fulfils the economic needs of Lower Manhattan. This dissertation will emphasize the recapitalization of the site in Chapter One. However, what is important to note here is that this does not necessarily mean that Lefebvre’s work needs to be understood only in the context of the spatial analysis of capitalism. The theoretical implication of his intervention is much broader, as

28 Lefebvre, Production of Space. (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 1991), 31. He never uses the term “place” in this seminal work of spatial theory. According to John Agnew, “[t]he conflict between…space versus place,” namely between generalized space and particular places, “is longstanding” (The SAGE Handbook of Geographical Knowledge [Ed. John Agnew and David Livingstone, Los Angeles: SAGE Publications, 2011], 317). In theorizing the generalized space specific to capitalism, Lefebvre uses the term “space.” At the same time, he clings to this term, even when discussing “concrete places”—Lefebvre calls them “concrete space”—that are produced because of “the depredations…[by] capital” (Ibid., 324).

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it can be reinterpreted in the following manner: in post-9/11 American society, places are produced because of and for the continuation of the Global War on Terror. The Ground Zero memorial complex is, I argue, one of those places. In order to make sense of the memorial complex as such a place, I put this dissertation project in conversation with not only Lefebvrian, neo-Marxist spatial theory but also contemporary U.S. foreign policy studies and memorial/museum studies.

Culture and Empire

Over the past two decades, scholars have investigated how U.S. foreign policy has been executed through culture. In the early 1990s, Amy Kaplan addressed the neglected relationship between American culture and U.S. imperialism, compelling other scholars to take heed of “the absence of culture from the history of U.S. imperialism” and “the absence of empire from the study of American culture.”29 Kaplan’s critique advanced the “cultural turn” in the studies of

U.S. foreign relations. Melani McAlister’s Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, and U.S. Interests in the Middle East since 1945 published in the 2001, is one of the crucial works taking this turn to heart. Insisting on the intimacy between culture and politics, McAlister illustrates how the representations of the Middle East in U.S. cultural sphere interfaced with “the making of

[national] interests.”30 American knowledge of the Middle East, she argues, has been shaped through popular culture in ways that encourage American citizens to consent to U.S. interventions in the region.

29 Amy Kaplan, “‘Left Alone with America’: The Absence of Empire in the Study of American Culture” in Cultures of United States Imperialism, edited by Amy Kaplan and Donald E. Pease (Durham: Duke University Press, 1993), 11. 30 Melani McAlister, Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, and U.S. Interests in the Middle East since 1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005), xviii.

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The cultural turn in the field of American Studies is indebted to Edward Said’s notion that the cultural and political spheres “are not only connected but ultimately the same.”31 He points out the complicit relationship between culture and imperialism by identifying some imperialist ideologies explicitly and implicitly expressed in English canonical novels including

Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park. Scripted against the backdrop of the British empire’s oversea expansions, these literary texts supported imperial practices. According to Said, “the novel, as a cultural artefact of bourgeois society, and imperialism are unthinkable without each other” (Ibid., 70-1.). By this, he means that English canonical novels contributed to the formation of the hegemony of the British empire; “the structures of attitude and reference” of the empire were textured precisely through its canonical novels, or culture. Circulated in the empire, these literary texts, taught readers, including colonized elites, to accept the worldview that normalized the violence inflicted upon the colonized by the colonial power.

Following Said, Kaplan, and McAlister, this dissertation focuses on the political implications of the Ground Zero memorial complex as a cultural enterprise. While these scholars of literature and American Studies deal with many cultural products such as literary texts, films, and museums, this dissertation primarily investigates a memorial complex and how it is structured by and perpetuates the Global War on Terror, despite the fact that the U.S. government has not officially or directly organized this place to align with its political purposes.32

31 Said, Culture and Imperialism (New York: Vintage, 1993), 57. 32 On this point, this dissertation differs from the literature of the cultural Cold War. In this field, The Central Intelligence Agency and the CIA-subsidized organizations such as the Asia Foundation (TAF) and the Congress of Cultural Freedom (CCF), as well as the United States Information Agency (USIA), are primary objects of research. See Frances Stonor Saunders, The Cultural Cold War: the CIA and the World of Arts and Letters (New York: The New Press, 2000), and Nicholas Cull, The Cold War and the

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Memory, National Identity, and Place

As is evident from Yoneyama’s work on the memorialization of the atomic bombing in the city of Hiroshima, some scholars interested in memorials have paid attention to the issue of vice-versality. James Young and Kirk Savage are among them. Both Young and Savage thematize the reciprocal relationship between memory and memorialization. In The Texture of

Memory: Holocaust Memorials and Meaning, for instance, Young illustrates that the ways in which the Holocaust is remembered in Germany, Poland, Israel, and the U.S. determined what kind of memorial was produced in each country. At the same time, he argues that the Holocaust memorials in these countries “in turn” reinforce the national discourse of the Holocaust by interpellating visitors, or by immersing them in the narratives that those memorials produce. This

“in-turnness” is also a theme of Savage’s work, as he points out that “the monument manufactured its own public, but that public in turn had opinions about what constituted proper commemoration.”33 Savage reveals that how slavery was remembered in American society— powerless slaves were emancipated by heroic white American soldiers—made the design of “a standing soldier and a kneeling slave” popular for the monuments for the Emancipation, and this design reshaped the collective imaginary of the nation from a slave society to a country of freedom and democracy.

In addition to the works dealing with the issue of vice-versality, this dissertation focuses on the role that the U.S. plays as a nation-state at the site of the Ground Zero memorial complex.

United States Information Agency: American Propaganda and Public Diplomacy, 1945-1989 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008). Saunders’s The Cultural Cold War, first published in London in 1999, mines a wide range of documents to reveal how cultural diplomacy of the U.S. was done through the CIA. Cull’s The Cold War and the United States Information Agency, although published a decade ago, has remained the most complete study of the USIA. 33 Kirk Savage, Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves: Race, War, and Monument in Nineteenth-Century America (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), 7.

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For this purpose, I turn to Pierre Nora’s work on memory, which circles around the issue of the nation-state. In “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire,” he discusses the relationship between memory and history, juxtaposing them by contrasting memory as “multiple and yet specific, … collective, plural, and yet individual” with history that “belongs to everyone and to no one, whence its claim to universal authority.”34 However, by developing an overly simplistic binary opposition between memory and history, Nora argues that “[h]istory is perpetually suspicious of memory, and its true mission is to suppress and destroy it.”35 He laments that the collective memory that the French once shared as a nation, has been ruined by historical inquiries. Les lieux de mémoire, or “sites of memory,” are the residues of this ruined collective memory of France based on which Nora hopes to bind France as a nation-state again.

Expressing his nostalgia for France’s loss of collective memory as such, Nora keeps his focus exclusively fixed on the French national imaginary. Indeed, his les lieux de mémoire do not include “inappropriate” aspects of the French national past. As Anne Whitehead points out, Nora willfully “overlook[s] ‘the entire imperial history of the country, from the Napoleonic conquests, through the plunder of Algeria under the July Monarchy, to the seizure of Indochina in the

Second Empire and the vast African booty of the Third Republic.’”36 By selectively engaging with les lieux de mémoire that provide nothing but “appropriate” narratives of the French national past for the formation of the French national history, Nora illustrates the memory work in the French context, or how the French mainstream history is constructed through arbitrary acts of remembering.

34 Nora, “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire.” Representation 26. (1989), 8. 35 Ibid., 9. 36 Anne Whitehead, Memory: The New Critical Idiom. (New York: Routledge, 2009), 145.

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This dissertation follows his work on memory and its critique. In the first place, I identify the WTC site, reduced to a physical ruin after the attacks, as one of les lieux de mémoire. At the same time, taking seriously the criticism that Nora’s argument elicited, this dissertation problematizes the relationship between the site and the state. Once ruined and yet reconstructed as a memorial complex, Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, I argue, has become a place where the remembering of 9/11 is performed to consolidate American identity and power as a nation- state through the strategic historical forgetting of elements of the U.S. national past.

Museum and National Subject

The works of some museum studies scholars who emphasize the museum’s role in shaping identities and subjects also offer an important reference point for this dissertation project. One of those works is Eilean Hooper-Greenhill’s Museums and the Interpretation of

Visual Culture. In it, she defines culture as constitutive in the sense that it has “the power to shape cultural identities at both individual and social levels; to mobilise emotions, perceptions and values; to influence the way we feel and think.”37 In short, charged with cultural significance, museums interpellate the public. Resonant with Said and McAlister’s emphasis on culture, Hooper-Greenhill argues that the implementation of certain cultural codes in museums leads to the formation of national subjects. Introducing the case of the National Portrait Gallery in the nineteenth century in Britain, for instance, she illustrates the ways in which visitors honored the portraits of certain national figures and were made to internalize the national values exemplified by the portraits of mostly men. As such, according to Hooper-Greenhill, many museums transform their visitors into “good” national citizens.

37 Eilean Hooper-Greenhill’s Museums and the Interpretation of Visual Culture (New York: Routledge, 2000), 13.

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On this point, Carol Duncan also makes an astute argument. Driven by the question of what kinds of ideological and political practices are enabled by museums, she examines the relationship between states, citizenship, and museums—namely, the ways in which museums function to project ideal images of states and substantiate the concept of citizenship with those images. Museums, Duncan argues, are crucial for states in the sense that the former are where the latter are (visually) narrativized and their images are imposed upon “citizens.” Museums, in other words, are sites for the dissemination of state media. According to her, museums produce secular “truths” that “[help] bind the community as a whole into a civic body, identifying its highest values, its proudest memories, and its truest truths.”38 As “powerful identity-defining machines,” museums present the “legitimate” national history and invite visitors to accept it as truth.39 Visitors are, more or less, forced to “follow a route through a programmed narrative” and to consent to national values, national memories, and national “truths” showcased in museums.40

For Duncan, therefore, visitor experiences in museums are defined as transformative rituals through which visitors become good national subjects.

Based on this line of scholarship in the field of museum studies, I define the Ground Zero memorial complex as a ritual place of national culture. Although the degree of coercion involved in these places is not so much physically violent as it is culturally educative, it is nevertheless insistent and immersive. Through culture, the memorial complex presents a certain kind of national image and perspective to visitors—a “show and tell”—that helps them understand the world in accordance with nationalist ideologies. By investigating the site as such a ritual place of

38 Carol Duncan, “Art Museums and the Ritual of Citizenship,” Exhibiting Cultures: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display (Washington D.C.: Smithsonian Books, 1991), 90-1. 39 Ibid., 101. 40 Ibid., 92.

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state culture, this dissertation reveals the ways in which visitors are encouraged and educated to feel, think, and behave as good national subjects.

Battleground

Since Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan is a famous (and infamous) site, several scholarly studies have been done on it, but not necessarily within the context of the Global War on Terror. Elizabeth Greenspan’s Battle for Ground Zero: Inside the Political Struggle to

Rebuild the World Trade Center and Lynne Sagalyn’s Power at Ground Zero: Politics, Money, and the Remaking of Lower Manhattan are the two most important works focusing on the roles that various stakeholders played in the reconstruction process of the site.41 By highlighting the conflicting relationships among these stakeholders, Greenspan and Sagalyn downplay the state politics operating behind and through the memorial complex.

Even some scholars who argue that the Ground Zero memorial complex remains troublingly silent on the Global War on Terror do not necessarily see the correlation between them. Sturken, for instance, analyzes the memorial complex in her works and claims that both

Reflecting Absence and the National September 11 Museum are not engaged in critical inquiries on the meanings of 9/11. According to her, the former does not function as a “contemplative” place.42 And the latter is likely to make its visitors forget “the complex world of global politics that produced the events of 9/11 and its aftermath.”43 In other words, Sturken criticizes the rebuilt WTC complex as a place indifferent to the global turmoil, including the Global War on

41 See Elizabeth Greenspan’s Battle for Ground Zero: Inside the Political Struggle to Rebuild the World Trade Center (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2013) and Lynne Sagalyn’s Power at Ground Zero: Politics, Money, and the Remaking of Lower Manhattan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). 42 Sturken, Tourists of History, 273. 43 Sturken, “The 9/11 Memorial Museum and the Remaking of Ground Zero,” American Quarterly, vol. 67, no. 2 (2015), 489.

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Terror, of which the U.S. has been its primary instigator. And yet, she does not problematize the memorial complex as a place that actively instigates the war itself.

In addition, curators, educators, exhibition developers, architects, media producers and landmark preservationists who were involved with the reconstruction of the WTC site often consider the Ground Zero memorial complex ideologically transparent. Alice Greenwald, the president and chief executive officer of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, is one of them. She defines the National September 11 Museum as a place with two missions; “the obligation to present authentic, historical documentation and the equal imperative to honor and memorialize the victims.”44 In saying so, Greenwald detaches the site from realpolitik and describe it as “neutral.”45

While, there is a lacuna in terms of the contemplation of the Ground Zero memorial complex within the context of the Global War on terror, it is so-called patriots who are aware of the correlation between the memorial complex and the war. As will be discussed later in

Chapters One and Two, some patriotic Americans claimed that the WTC site needed to be reconstructed into a place that should service and support the U.S. Global War on Terror. And yet, scholars often casually dismiss those patriots as simple-minded bigots. This dissertation takes their claims seriously, but by historicizing their arguments and theorizing their logic(s).

Chapter Outline

44 No Day Shall Erase You: The Story of 9/11 as Told by at the National September 11 Memorial Museum (New York: Rizzoli Electa, 2016), 27. 45 “Neutral” is an adjective that is often used to explain about the Ground Zero memorial complex. For instance, David Layman, the designer of one of the core exhibitions of the National September 11 Museum known as the Historical Exhibition, claims that “the narrative (of the Historical Exhibition) maintains a neutral voice” (“The Heart of Memory: Voices from the 9/11 Memorial Museum Formation Experience,” Museum 93, no. 3 [2014]: 36).

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Chapter One “Exclusion, Inclusions: The Reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower

Manhattan” focuses on “others” who were excluded from Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan.

Here, I argue that precisely through such an exclusion, the WTC site has been (re)constructed as an important symbolic site. This chapter begins with the description of the Islamophobia at

Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and how this fear has affected the development of the site and its vicinity. Subsequently, the exclusion of “other others” such as enslaved and Native peoples from the reconstruction of the WTC site is described through a case study of the International

Freedom Center (IFC) and its eventual demise. Based on a discussion of the exclusion of those

“other others,” Chapter One illustrates that Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan is a venue where mainstream (or hegemonic) American history is reinforced. In addition, I identify those who are included inside the site and thus remembered, as well as those who are excluded and thus not remembered. In the end, the Ground Zero memorial complex exists as a place that is ideologically linked to an American history of exclusions in the past and the Global War on

Terror in the present.

I continue to trace the reconstruction of the WTC site into a memorial complex in

Chapter Two “The Cartography of Vulnerability: Wars and U.S. Geographies.” Its primary focus is on the simultaneous emergence of the reconstruction process and the Global War on Terror. In particular, by theorizing how the experience of vulnerability and a sense of fear have driven the war, this chapter points out that this sense of fear previously shaped U.S. geographies and geographic encounters in Vietnam, around the U.S.-Mexico border, and in Lower Manhattan. By doing so, I argue that the Global War on Terror is being fought not only in the Middle East but also at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan.

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Further pursuing the relationship between the war and the memorial complex, Chapter

Three “The Museum as a Battleground: Curating the Global War on Terror” argues that the

National September 11 Museum needs to be considered as one of several battlegrounds of the war. By examining the museum exhibits, I reveal how they are curated in accordance with the logic of the Global War on Terror and hence function to justify the war and post-911 U.S. military adventures, including domestic surveillance, immigration policy, strategic alliances and in multiple wars on local insurgencies. In so doing, this chapter argues that the National

September 11 Museum interpellates American visitors to become patriotic national subjects who consent to the war that the U.S. has globally fought.

The previous three chapters discuss the reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower

Manhattan and the rebuilt WTC complex in relation to the Global War on Terror. Building on this discussion, Chapter Four “Encoding, Decoding: Visitor Experiences of the Ground Zero

Memorial Complex” explores the realm of visitor experiences. Through an ethnographic research project involving both American and non-American visitors and the analysis of the comments on the Ground Zero memorial complex on the world’s largest travel review website, I investigate the ways in which some visitors “react” to interpellating calls at the memorial complex. This chapter focuses on the experiences of American and non-American visitors precisely because the previous three chapters claim that the memorial complex is a place intended for American citizens. By engaging in an ethnographic research project and data analysis, I intend to reflexively return to this claim and complicate arguments presented in this dissertation.

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Chapter 1

Exclusions, Inclusions: The Reconstruction of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan

There are many venues for education and freedom of expression, but there is only one ground zero.1 —Michael Kaplitt, 2005

In the more than 16 years since the attacks, the dedication to community and country shown by members of the armed forces remains a stellar example of courage and selfless devotion.2 —Alice Greenwald, 2018

Introduction

“All visitors and belongings are subject to security screening at the discretion of the 9/11

Memorial.” When one enters the memorial area of the Ground Zero memorial complex, s/he will encounter this “warning” stipulated in panels titled “Visitor Rules of Conduct” put up and posted at multiple locations on the site.

1 Michael Kaplitt, “Ground Zero without the Freedom Center,” https://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/04/opinion/ground-zero-without-the-freedom-center-972169.html (accessed February 28th). 2 See Appendix 1.

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Figure 2: “Visitor Rules of Conduct” [Photo: Tomoaki Morikawa]

Security screening is a common practice for many institutions in the U.S. in particular after 9/11.

And yet, at the Ground Zero memorial complex, this warning is not only literal but also symptomatic. It implies that the site defined as “a place of remembrance and quiet reflection” does not welcome every visitor; the Ground Zero memorial complex is a place where certain people and certain things are censored. This censoring practice, though it is supposedly implemented for security purposes, is not solely focused on visitors’ threatening misconduct

(e.g., concealing a weapon or sharp object). Certain “others” considered unfit for more than

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being a security liability have been excluded from the Ground Zero memorial complex and its vicinity.

This chapter revolves around the question of exclusions. In order to answer it, I will investigate the post-9/11 unrealized rebuilding plans for Lower Manhattan. They were abandoned precisely because certain others were denied a place around/at the WTC site, or from the remembrance practiced there. Through their exclusions, the Ground Zero memorial complex and its vicinity have come into existence. This chapter will identify those excluded from Ground

Zero in Lower Manhattan and the neighboring area, and will trace how their exclusions intimately guided the reconstruction and meaning of the memorial sites.

At the same time, those included inside the Ground Zero memorial complex or in the remembrance structures and programs of 9/11 will be also identified. Only when those included as well as those excluded are brought into the same analytic space, can one clarify what kind of place the memorial complex constitutes. To achieve this end, this chapter will focus on the commemorative practices performed at the Ground Zero memorial complex, including the commemoration ceremony conducted every September 11th. By revealing who/what is remembered along with who/what is not remembered, I will focus on the memory work carried out at the site, or how certain memories prevail over other memories and thus create a specific reality.

Islamophobia and Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan

One group of those excluded is Muslims. After 9/11, they came to national attention.

According to Lori Peek, a professor of Sociology at the University of Colorado Boulder, “[m]ore than twenty books on ‘Islamic menace’ were published in the one-year period following the 9/11

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attacks” and “[t]wo of those books became best-selling titles.3 Many Americans bought copies of those books to gain insight into the “violent nature” of Muslims or Islam.4 In the U.S., according to Mahmood Mamdani, 9/11 reified the notion that “every Muslim [is],” by definition, ‘bad’” and gave rise to the consensus among many Americans that Islam must be quarantined in one way or another.5 In fact, Muslims have been systematically excluded from Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan and its surrounding area.

The prohibition against Islam in Lower Manhattan is best illustrated by the history of the place called Park51 located two blocks away from the WTC site. Originally named Cordoba

House, it was slated to be developed as an Islamic community center in Lower Manhattan.

Because of the anti-Muslim sentiment in the post-9/11 American society, this place was transformed eventually into a luxury 43-story condominium building.

Cordoba House was a collaboration between a real estate developer, Sharif El-Gamal, and a local Muslim cleric, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, whose ministry was in lower Manhattan. It was to be built as a part of the Cordoba Initiative that Rauf established in 2002. The name

Cordoba was taken after the city in Andalucia, Spain where several religions once coexisted.

This city is renowned for Mezquita, also known as the Great Mosque of Córdoba, one of the

3 Behind the Backlash: Muslim Americans After 9/11 (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2011), 6. 4 In contrast, white people or their religion would never be held responsible for an act of terror, as Suheir Hammad, an Arab American poet, astutely points out in her poem “first writing since”: one more person ask me if i knew the hijackers. / one more motherfucker ask me what navy my brother is in. / one more person assume no arabs or muslims were killed. / one more person assume they know me, or that i represent a people. / or that a people represent an evil. or that evil is as simple as a / flag and words on a page. / we did not vilify all white men when mcveigh bombed oklahoma. / america did not give out his family’s addresses or where he went to / church. or blame the bible or pat robertson. This poem is collected in Trauma at Home: After 9/11, edited by Judith Greenberg (Lincoln: Bison Books, 2003), 141. While a white terrorist never disgraces white people as a race and the Christian faith, Muslims and Islam are racialized, or collectively demonized, because of the terrorists in charge of 9/11. 5 Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror, (New York: Pantheon Books, 2004), 15.

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most well-known examples of Islamic architecture. It was built in the eighth century during the

Umayyad dynasty (756–1031) over the foundations of a Visigoth church.6 Based on the idea that, for a “time in Cordoba, … Jews, Christians and Muslims lived together and built together the most tolerant and enlightened society on earth,” Rauf named his initiative after this city, hoping that it would serve as a “multifaith organization” that would bridge different religious communities.7 His goal was “to repair the damage done to Muslim-American relations in recent years and to use this formula of a partnership between faith traditions (i.e., the Cordoba Initiative and Cordoba House) to build such a new Cordoba.”8

And yet, Cordoba House’s role to reach out to the resident community of Lower

Manhattan as a multifaith center was questioned. In the spring of 2010, a group called “Stop the

Islamization of America,” co-founded and led by two political commentators, Pamela Geller and

Robert Spencer, started the protest by calling it the “Ground Zero Mosque.” Claiming that “a

Cordoba House mosque and Islamic ‘cultural center’ would plant al Qaeda’s battle flag at the scene of their greatest victory,” some family members of the victims of 9/11 also strongly opposed the construction of this center.9 It soon became the focus of racial animosity toward

Muslims.10

6 The mosque was converted back into a Catholic cathedral in the thirteenth century following the Spanish Reconquest. 7 Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, “Ground Zero and Islamophobia in America: Heling moderate Muslims,” https://www.wrmea.org/010-november/three-views.html (accessed February 28th). 8 Ibid. 9 Tim Sumner, “No Mosque; America’s Ruling Class never ‘Got’ 9/11,” https://911familiesforamerica.org/category/cordoba-house/ (accessed February 28th). 10 Islamophobia was also expressed at one of the sites of 9/11 attacks in Shanksville, Pennsylvania where hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 crashed. As a result of the multi-stage design competition that began on September 11th, 2004, Paul and Milena Murdoch’s Crescent of Embrace was selected as the memorial to be built. The design featured a “Tower of Voices,” which would “[reach] 93 feet into the sky” and “house 40 aluminum wind chimes”—one for each passenger and crew member who was on board Flight 93 [Paul Murdoch Architects, quoted in “Flight 93 National Memorial,” 81, https://ukla.ca.uky.edu/files/final_report_clw.pdf (accessed February 28th)]. The memorial’s crescent shape indicated by its name would have been formed by the perimeter of one-half of the Field of Honor.

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Although not every American was offended by Cordoba House, polls showed that the majority of the U.S. population, including New York State residents and New York City residents, found it objectionable. According to an Economist/YouGov national poll taken in the week of August 19, 2010, Americans thought that it would be wrong to build this Islamic center by a margin of 58–18%, with 25% undecided on the question.11

In addition, greatly offended by the mosque, some Americans explicitly expressed their hatred toward it. They produced a series of representations of a mosque in Lower Manhattan as a security threat. One of several anti-Muslim websites, for instance, used an image of an Ottoman mosque with an excerpt from a speech by the Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Erdogan, superimposed upon it to kindle fear in the minds of American citizens: “[t]he mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets, and the faithful our soldiers.”12

Despite or precisely because no design of the Ground Zero Mosque was presented to the public to counter negative portrayals, it acquired an image of militant Islam. As Kishwar Rizvi, a professor of Islamic Art and Architecture at Yale University points out, an Orientalist images of a mosque with “its monumental dome casting a shadow over Ground Zero, and its minaret

This area is the circular area “link[ing] the entire memorial through sight lines and pathways.” The crescent shape would have been lined with “40 Memorial Groves, each of which “contain[s] 40 trees, such as sugar or red maples, for a total of 1,600 trees that radiate toward the center of the Field” (Ibid., 81-2). Some critics condemned this design as “a ‘jihadist’ symbol of Islamo-fascist religious ideology” pointing toward Mecca and called Crescent of Embrace “a ‘terrorist memorial mosque’” (quoted in Memorial Mania, 176). For instance, Tom Burnett Sr., jury member of the design competition, said, “I explained this (the crescent) goes back centuries as an old-time Islamic symbol…I told them we’d be a laughing stock if we did this” [quoted in “Designer of Flight 93 Memorial Receptive to Changes,” http://old.post-gazette.com/pg/05259/572574.stm (accessed February 28th)]. In response to this kind of condemnation, the Murdochs agreed to modify the memorial’s design: the modified one has the plain shape of a circle. In such a manner, Muslims were also paranoiacally excluded from the construction process of the Flight 93 National Memorial. 11 “The Economist/YouGov Poll,” http://media.economist.com/images/pdf/Toplines08192010.pdf (accessed February 28th). 12 “Some Thoughts on Ground Zero Mosque,” http://www.crethiplethi.com/some-thoughts-on-the- ground-zero-mosque/usa/2010/ (accessed February 28th).

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piercing the New York City skyline, like a victory stele” were extensively “used in satire[s] as well as political propaganda” to equate Muslims with terrorists, or the enemy-others of the U.S.13

The controversy over Cordoba House damaged the partnership between El-Gamal and

Rauf. Eventually, its name was changed to Park51 by El-Gamal after its street address.

Recognizing the need to diffuse the aforementioned stereotypical images attached to this Islamic center, he brought in Michel Abboud, the principal of SOMA Architects. For the architect, “the immediate goal was to negate the virulent media onslaught, with its stock of caricatures of mosques … , with a more benign image; one that would resettle the project back to the context of

New York.”14 To achieve this end, while relying on ideas of Islamic geometric patterning,

Abboud gave form to Park51 by making use of computer programming. In addition, to make it less “threatening” to various communities of faith in New York City, he relegated the “prayer space” of this Islamic center to the basement area so that it would be hidden from public display.15

Despite this architectural concession, anti-Muslim sentiment against Park51 did not subside.16 El-Gamal, therefore, decided not to pursue it but to take a much more standard step in

13 “Transnational Architecture, Ethics, and the Reification of History: Park51 Islamic Community Center in New York City,” 47 https://arthistory.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/Rizvi_Park51%20Islamic%20Cultural%20Center(1).pdf (accessed February 28th). 14 Ibid., 48. 15 While the media and opponents described Park51 as a mosque, the term “prayer space” was deliberately used by its developers. For instance, Daisy Khan, Imam Rauf’s wife, in August 2010 also said, “We insist on calling it a prayer space and not a mosque, because you can use a prayer space for activities apart from prayer. You can’t stop anyone who is a Muslim despite his religious ideology from entering the mosque and staying there. With a prayer space, we can control who gets to use it” [quoted in “Zero Tolerance and Cordoba House,” https://www.ft.com/content/bf1110d8-a5b0-11df-a5b7- 00144feabdc0)]. This Islamic center was, they argued, disqualified as a mosque because it was to be built as a multifaceted complex consisting of a theater, performing arts center, fitness center, swimming pool, basketball court, childcare area, bookstore, culinary school, art studio, food court, and so forth. 16 “Condo Tower to Rise Where Muslim Community Center Was Proposed,” https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/realestate/muslim-museum-world-trade-center.html (accessed February 28th).

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New York City by transforming the site into “a very expensive glass and steel tower for the very rich.”17 The name Park 51 is gone. This tower is now a 43-story condominium with “a much smaller, three-story Islamic museum and public plaza, designed by Jean Nouvel, but no mosque.”18 It was, therefore, the crude exclusion of Islam in the post-911 American society that guided and dictated the development of Park51, a part of Lower Manhattan almost adjacent to the WTC site. Prevented from challenging the racial animosity toward Muslims, the former Park

51 turned into a prime real estate and capitalist’s venture. That Muslims were denied a place to practice their religion in the vicinity of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan eventually led to the abandonment of Park51.

Other others

The Ground Zero memorial complex itself—not unlike its surrounding area—has also been reconstructed through the exclusion of certain others, but not necessarily Muslims. There were, in other words, “other others” who have been kept out of the Ground Zero memorial complex. In order to clarify this point, let us review the unrealized plan for a cultural center named the International Freedom Center (IFC) and its unfortunate history. The plan for this center was eventually eliminated because certain other others were slated to be included in the remembrance of 9/11 at the WTC site.

The IFC was originally designed to be a part of the Ground Zero memorial complex. In

2004, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation selected this cultural center as the plan for the site’s museum. Through the support of many organizers such as George Soros, a billionaire

17 Ibid. 18 Ibid.

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supporter of progressive-liberal political agendas including human rights, public health, and education, Tom Bernstein, who served on the board of Human Rights First, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union Anthony Romero whose expertise lay in the areas of civil rights, affirmative action, immigrant rights, and lesbian/gay rights, and Eric Foner, a leading contemporary historian of the post-Civil War Reconstruction period, the IFC was promoted as an institution to “offer museum exhibits, educational programs, service and civic initiatives that

[would] explore freedom as a constantly-evolving world movement,” or to present “ongoing struggles for freedom.19

The IFC was conceptually far-reaching. It was an attempt to “[document] historical injustices … and [chronicle] campaigns against human rights abuses around the world” to situate

9/11 in a world historical context with an emphasis on freedom.20 “International” historical events that were not explicitly connected to the terrorist attacks in 2001 on American soil were proposed for this cultural center. Included in them were exhibits on the Holocaust by the Nazi regime, South Africa’s apartheid, the Soviet system of forced labor camps in the Stalin era called the gulag, and so forth.

Although the IFC’s scope was international as indicated by its name, national issues would also be discussed there. In an interview, president and chief operating officer of this cultural center, Richard Tofel, emphasized the importance of paying attention to chapters of oppression in American history to tell the full story of freedom in the U.S., by saying, “You can’t talk about freedom without talking about slavery.”21 According to him, in order to avoid being

“intellectually dishonest,” it was necessary to historicize how the U.S. had been founded upon

19 “The International Freedom Center: Content and Governance Report,” 2 http://www.renewnyc.com/content/pdfs/IFC_submission.pdf (accessed February 28th). 20 Greenspan, Battle for Ground Zero, 133. 21 Ibid., 134.

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the sacrifice of the enslaved who were forcibly brought from Africa through the Middle Passage during the time of the Atlantic slave trade.

Another national issue slated for inclusion in the IFC was the genocide of Native people.

Simply put, the U.S. was a product of this genocide because it was established and developed through the violent confiscation of Native land. The latter was expropriated by European colonizers who believed that their endeavor in America was justifiable; they claimed that they were only cultivating the land wasted by Native people.22 Consequently, in the process of the colonization of the territory later known as the U.S., irreparable damage was inflicted on Native people: millions of them were deceived, exploited, chased off, and killed by European colonizers.23 In order to avoid being “intellectually dishonest” and in order to be accountable to once thriving Native nations, an exhibit about the genocide of Native people was proposed for this cultural center.

Precisely because this cultural center would include a wider scope not limited to the events of 9/11, it drew strong opposition from some family members of the victims of 9/11.

Gathering under the slogan of “9/11 Not World History,” they protested against the IFC and its intention to juxtapose the terrorist attacks in 2001 on American soil with exhibits and displays

22 Tracing the genealogy of liberalism in terms of the freedom of commerce, Mark Neocleous reveals that the concepts of cultivation and waste theorized by thinkers such as Hugo Grotius were behind the process of the colonization of the Americas: “[t]hings which are ‘uncultivated’ and ‘untilled’ become open to appropriation in order that they might not be wasted” [War Power, Police Power (Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press), 71]. Driven by this kind of thinking, European colonizers took away the land from Native people with force. In European colonizers’ minds, “there exists a fundamental right to wage war to appropriate certain types of territory not being ‘properly’ used by indigenous peoples” and thus avoid being wasted (Ibid., 72). 23 Since the depopulation rate of the Native people during this process was extraordinarily high, David Stannard calls it “the great American Indian Holocaust” in his book titled American Holocaust: The Conquest of the New World. According to Stannard, “[w]ithin no more than a handful of generations following their first encounters with Europeans, the vast majority of Western Hemisphere’s native peoples had been exterminated” (x). For instance, “between 95 and 98 percent of California’s Indians had been exterminated in little more than a century” (146).

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about genocides and crimes against humanity not only in the U.S. but also throughout the world.24 In particular, Debra Burlingame, sister of Charles “Chic” Burlingame III, pilot of the hijacked American Airlines Flight 77, harshly attacked the concept of this cultural center. She denounced it while celebrating the visitation of three wounded Marines returning from Iraq at the

“wreath-laying ceremony at the empty pit of Ground Zero” performed on 2005 Memorial Day weekend:

The organizers of … the International Freedom Center (IFC) have stated that they

intend to take us on a “journey through the history of freedom”––but do not be

fooled into thinking that their idea of freedom is the same as that of those

Marines. To the IFC’s organizers, it is not only history’s triumphs that illuminate,

also its failures. The public will have come to see 9/11 but will be given a high-

tech, multimedia tutorial about man’s inhumanity to man, from Native American

genocide to the lynchings and cross-burnings of the Jim Crow South, from the

Third Reich’s Final Solution to the Soviet gulags and beyond. This is a history all

should know and learn, but dispensing it over the ashes of Ground Zero is like

creating a Museum of Tolerance over the sunken graves of the USS Arizona.25

On the one hand, Burlingame ostensibly acknowledged the need for remembering atrocities other than “the worst attack on American soil in the history of the republic.”26 On the other hand, however, she found it unacceptable to include them in the commemoration of 9/11 at the site of the terrorist attacks. For herself and other family members who regarded this site as the sacred, hallowed ground where innocent and heroic people had been killed and many of them still

24 Battle for Ground Zero, 133. 25 “The Great Ground Zero Heist,” https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB111810145819652326 (accessed February 28th). 26 Ibid.

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remained buried and unidentified, allocating a large part of it to the IFC was nothing but an “un-

American” act of desecration.27 According to those who condemned this proposed cultural center, at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, visitors should learn not about extraneous “world- historical” events but about the stories of those victims of 9/11 such as “the courageous young firefighter whose body, cut in half, was found with his legs entwined around the body of a woman”28

Pressured by those opposing the IFC, then-Governor of New York George E. Pataki barred its construction. He said, “[W]e will not tolerate anything on that site that denigrates

America, denigrates New York or freedom, or denigrates the sacrifice or courage that the heroes showed on September 11.”29 For Pataki, only a certain kind of sacrifice was worthy of recognition. By terminating the plan for the IFC, he denied acknowledging the sacrifices made by the enslaved and Native people in the formation of the U.S. For whatever reason, for Pataki, their inclusion at the Ground Zero memorial complex would denigrate America.

In the U.S., the exclusion of others is nothing new. They have been marginalized on many occasions. “Teaching Hard History: American History,” a report by the Teaching

Tolerance project of the nonprofit Southern Poverty Law Center, for instance, reveals that there has been a lack of attention to the enslaved in U.S. history education despite the following fact:

American enslavement of Africans defined the nature and limits of American

liberty; it influenced the creation and development of the major political and

27 “A Sense of Proportion at Ground Zero,” https://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/29/opinion/a-sense-of- proportion-at-ground-zero.html (accessed February 28th). 28 “The Great Ground Zero Heist.” 29 Quoted in Battle for Ground Zero, 140.

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social institutions of the nation; and it was a cornerstone of the American

prosperity that fueled our industrial revolution.30

In other words, slavery played a central role in the development of the U.S. And yet, educators are not required to teach about the horror of human bondage in at least 15 states where the research for “Teaching Hard History” was conducted.31 Furthermore, “[p]opular textbooks” used nationwide in the U.S. “fail to provide comprehensive coverage of slavery and enslaved peoples”32 Even when slavery is taught, it is often decontextualized, and students learn not

“about the lives of the millions of enslaved people, or about how their labor was essential to the

American economy,” but about…‘feel good’ stories” of abolitionists and emancipation.33 As such, the enslaved are denied a place in mainstream American history.

Likewise, the genocide of Native people has rarely received due recognition in mainstream American history. On this point, Shannon Speed, a professor of Anthropology at the

University of California, Los Angeles, makes an astute comment. Lamenting that “virtually none of [her] university students has had any education whatsoever in the history of this country’s treatment of the 10 million or so people who lived here before Europeans arrived,” Speed

30 “Teaching Hard History: American Slavery,” https://www.scribd.com/document/370618062/Tt-Hard- History-American-Slavery-1#from_embed (accessed February 28th). 31 Ibid. 32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. Students are, in other words, provided a whitewashed version of national history. On this point, “Teaching Hard History: American Slavery” identified the following seven key problems with the ways in which slavery is (not) taught in the U.S.: “[w]e teach about slavery without context, preferring to present the good news before the bad”; “[w]e tend to subscribe to a progressive view of American history that can acknowledge flaws only to the extent that they have been addressed and solved”; “[w]e teach about the American enslavement of Africans as an exclusively southern institution”; “[w]e rarely connect slavery to the ideology (of white supremacy) that grew up to sustain and protect it”; “[w]e often rely on pedagogy poorly suited to the topic”; “[w]e rarely make connections to the present”; “We tend to center on the white experience when we teach about slavery.”

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criticizes the “pro-American” history which those students have been exposed to in schools.34

This is, she argues, a sanitized version of national history in which the “negative aspects” of the

U.S. such as the fact that the U.S. expanded by systematically eliminating Native Americans via official policies and acts of Congress with names like ‘removal,’ ‘reorganization,’ ‘termination,’ and ‘relocation’” are omitted, and this version of history is what students usually receive in the history education in the U.S.35

The elimination of the IFC was another instance where others were excluded. It illustrates that neither slavery nor the genocide of Native people were acknowledged as part of the national trauma at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan. Rather, while the victims of 9/11 were prioritized, those bearing witness to a series of difficult yet foundational pasts of the U.S. were marginalized.36 In such a manner, the WTC site was reconstructed as a place where a certain

34 “‘Pro-American’ History Textbooks Hurt Native Americans,” https://www.huffingtonpost.com/shannon-speed/proamerican-history-textb_b_6199070.html (accessed February 28th). 35 Ibid. 36 This kind of marginalization through the memory of 9/11 is a “collateral damage” entailing the remembrance of 9/11. For instance, the damage was done in terms of the date September 11th. This date is significant in American history not only because it was when the terrorist attacks happened in 2001 on American soil but also because it was when the U.S.-orchestrated coup d’état happened in Chile. On September 11th in 1973, then Chilean President Salvador Allende, who had been democratically elected by the people of Chile, was overthrown by the armed forces and national police covertly supported by the CIA as a part of American Cold War politics. Allende was targeted for his socialist intention to nationalize the copper industry in Chile in order to protect Chilean workers. Determined to prevent the implementation of his nationalization policy contrary to the U.S. national interests, the Nixon administration intervened and supported Allende’s opponents. In this sense, the U.S. made possible the coup against the Chile’s democratically elected socialist government, and the September 11th is a date signifying the U.S. aggression that caused trauma in the other country. Such an aggression is not an exception but, historically speaking, a part of the tradition of American foreign policy. In fact, the U.S. has overthrown foreign governments, many of which were democratically elected, to pursue its economic interests not only in the western hemisphere but also all over the world. Those overthrows are mostly attributable to the two brothers: John Foster Dulles and Allen Dulles. Respectively working as a secretary of state and a director of the CIA in the 1950s during the Cold War, they plotted covert operations against foreign governments for the sake of American business. The brothers succeeded in Guatemala and Iran, and their way of “diplomacy” has been repeated ever since to the Global War on Terror in the twenty-first century. For more detailed analysis of the brothers’ schemes, see Stephen Kinzer, The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War (New York: Times Books, 2013). The coup in

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historical discourse would be selectively narrated over others and as a result, an “official

American history” promoted.

Slavery and Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan

Considering the history of Manhattan, the IFC’s initial plan to include the exhibit about the enslaved was appropriate. This is because the neighborhood of the WTC site, or Manhattan itself, was once one of the epicenters of slavery in America during the time of the Atlantic slave trade. The present-day Wall Street area adjacent to this site was, for instance, where the first slave auction in what was called New Amsterdam at that time took place in 1655 and subsequently, the Municipal Slave Market operated from 1711 to 1762. 37 In fact,

“[s]laves…were among the workers that built the wall that Wall Street is named for.”38 They

“also cleared forest land for the construction of Broadway” and paved roads.39 As Leslie M.

Harris points out, Manhattan was a land of blacks: whether under the Dutch or British control,

Chile was one of the examples of the brothers’ legacy. As such, the U.S. has a long tradition of breaching democracy, and the date September 11th can be a signifier of this tradition. Such a signification of this date, however, has become hardly recognizable, at least in the U.S., since September 11th, in 2001. In American society, the date September 11th is no longer able to function as a mnemonic signifier of violence through which to evocatively and symptomatically represent the undemocratic, (neo)colonial, character of the U.S. that was exemplarily presented in Chile in 1973. Instead, what is being remembered by this date is only 9/11. As Elizabeth Jelin theorizes by the term “memory against memory,” the memory of the coup in Chile in 1973—one of the difficult pasts of the U.S.—is not simply forgotten but rather displaced by another memory, namely the memory of 9/11 [Elizabeth Jelin, State Repression and the Labors of Memory (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press), xviii]. In other words, only the latter is nationally evoked by the date September 11th, and, as a result, the former is silenced. 37 A quote from “New York’s Municipal Slave Market,” official plaque placed just a block from Water Street/Pearl Street where this market once stood. In 2015, the New York City Council approved this historical marker that would acknowledge the contributions of slaves to the foundation of early New York City and to the development of its economy. 38 Ibid. In addition, the first Trinity Church sitting right next to the WTC site is another product of slave labor. And yet, “the burial of people of African descent in Trinity’s churchyards” was forbidden at that time [“Unearthing Our Past,” https://www.trinitywallstreet.org/blogs/news/unearthing-our-past (accessed February 28th)]. 39 Ibid.

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“[a]s in the South, black slave labor was central to the day-to-day survival and the economic life of Europeans in the colonial North, and no part of the colonial North relied more heavily on slavery than Manhattan.”40

The forced sacrifice of the enslaved was essential for New York City’s development. In the early 1700s, almost half of the households had a handful of slaves primarily for domestic work.41 There were also ones who were forced to labor as skilled artisans and craftsmen for shipping, construction, and other trades “such as…tailoring, blacksmithing, shoemaking, baking, and butchering.”42 As the city grew, so did the number of the enslaved. By the mid 18th century, one-fifth the population of New York City consisted of slaves. Deeply indebted to human bondage, the city “had the largest number of enslaved Africans of any English colonial settlement except Charleston, South Carolina” as well as “the highest proportion of slaves to

Europeans of any northern settlement.”43

The American Revolution did little to change the situation of slavery in New York City.

Although manumissions proceeded in one way or another after the revolutionary war, many slaves in the city still remained unfree.44 Their subordinate status was maintained even when “An

40 Leslie M. Harris, In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), 11. The practice of human bondage was introduced in the New York City area by the Dutch West India Company in about 1626. The first 11 slaves—most likely from West Africa—were all men. Subsequently, this chartered company of Dutch merchants “promoted family life among its slaves” and thus “imported the first black female slaves, three women allegedly purchased for ‘the comfort of the company’s Negro men’” (21). Although the Dutch system of slavery was not mild by any means, after the English took over New Amsterdam in 1664, the condition of enslavement became much more severe;“[t]he variety of rights and privileges” such as “relatively good opportunities to form families, and access to courts and some forms of property” that had been “enjoyed by African slaves by New Amsterdam” were rescinded under the British rules of slavery (22). 41 “New York’s Municipal Slave Market.”[https://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/manahatta- park/highlights/19696 (accessed February 28th)]. 42 Harris, In the Shadow of Slavery, 30. 43 Spencer P.M. Harrington, “Bones & Bureaucrats: New York's Great Cemetery Imbroglio,” https://archive.archaeology.org/online/features/afrburial/ (accessed February 28th). 44 For instance, during the American Revolutionary War, Britain offered freedom to slaves in the rebellious American colonies including New York City, and called on them to flee and join the British

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Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery” was passed through the state legislature in 1799. By this act, the enslaved were only nominally liberated. For instance, while children born to slave mothers after July 4, 1799, were considered legally free, they nevertheless had to serve as indentured servants to their mothers’ masters until age 28 for men and 25 for women.45 Those children were, in other words, still treated as the property of those masters. What is worse, all the enslaved who were already in human bondage before July 4, 1799, were reclassified as indentured servants with no age limit. In effect, they remained slaves for life.”46

Material evidence of slavery in New York City still persists in the netherworld adjacent to Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan. In October, 1991, a part of the eighteenth-century

“Negroes Burial Ground” was discovered by the General Services Administration (GSA) in the underground area of Foley Square in Lower Manhattan. This occurred when a U.S. government agency conducted an archeological survey for the construction of a federal office building later known as the Ted Weiss Federal Building. While the intact remains of 419 men, women, and children of African descent—some free, many enslaved—were eventually excavated, it became clear that the physical extent of the site officially called the “African Burial Ground” extended

side. This was done in part to suppress the American Revolution by causing economic damage to the rebel Americans. 45 Harris, In the Shadow of Slavery, 70. As Jennifer Morgan argues in Laboring Women: Reproduction and Gender in New World Slavery (Philadelphia: University Pennsylvania Press, 2004), the issue of reproduction was central to the institution of slavery in the colonial landscape. Since slave mothers’ children were automatically—regardless of their fathers’ status—classified as the property of those mothers’ masters under the colonial law, slaveowners in the New World calculated and took advantage of the reproductive labor power of female black bodies for their economic success, or for the purpose of sustaining and increasing their property. This crude calculation persisted for some time even after the legislation of an Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery in 1780. 46 Therefore, under the Gradual Emancipation Law of 1799, one had to be born free. Otherwise, s/he could not help but being “dependent” on white masters in one way or another. Reducing blacks to “a special, lower class of citizens and workers who needed extra aid,” this law in effect “hindered (supposedly) freed blacks’ attempts to become equal members of the political economy of New York City (Harris, In the Shadow of Slavery, 71).

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well beyond this area. It was estimated that “over 20,000 Africans [had been] buried across the five-acre burial ground during the 17th and 18th centuries.”47

In 1992, it was decided to construct a memorial to mark this discovery.48 In the first place, the Ted Weiss Federal Building was redesigned to preserve the area of the archeological site of the African Burial Ground for the purpose of memorialization. Subsequently, GSA ran a design competition for what would become the African Burial Ground National Monument. As a result of this competition, which garnered 60 proposals, the one by Rodney Leon in partnership with Nicole Hollant-Denis, AARRIS Architects, was selected as the winning design. The proposal consisted of the following elements: a “Wall of Remembrance,” “Ancestral Re- internment Grove,” “Memorial Wall,” “The Ancestral Chamber,” “Circle of the Diaspora,”

“Spiral Processional Ramp,” and “Ancestral Libation Court.”49 These seven elements, Leon argued, would allow the memorial “to physically, spiritually, ritualistically and psychologically

47 “The African Burial Ground (ABG) in New York City,” https://coas.howard.edu/content/african-burial- ground-abg-new-york-city (accessed February 28th). As a part of “the single-most important, historic urban archaeological project undertaken in the United States,” the Howard University team conducted forensic studies of those 419 remains (Ibid.). After the completion of them, all the remains were reburied with honor in the Rites of Ancestral Return ceremony in 2003. What is important to note here is that while those 419 remains constitutes only a fraction of the Negroes Burial Ground, the rest buried there is left unattended. This makes a significant contrast with the identification process of the remains of the victims of 9/11; in the case of the terrorist attacks, the jurisdiction of the Office of Chief Medical Examiner of the City of New York pledges to continue DNA testings and required forensic studies until the last victim will be identified. 48 This decision was made after some commotions between the GSA and the African American community in the New York City: while the former was going to continue the construction of the Ted Weiss Federal Building, the latter protested and intervened, claiming that it was not sufficiently consulted and that proper respect was not given to those excavated and yet-to-be-excavated remains. Some protestors even did a 26-hour vigil at the site where the remains had been found. Because of the African- American community’s activism and lobbying effort to Congress, “President George H. W. Bush signed Public Law 103-393 ordering GSA to stop” its original construction plan and “approved the appropriation of up to $3 million to finance…the proper memorialization of the African Burial Ground” [“Ancestral Chamber,” https://www.nps.gov/afbg/learn/historyculture/ancestral-chamber.htm (accessed February 28th)]. 49 “Memorial Description,” https://www.nps.gov/afbg/learn/historyculture/upload/Rodney-Leon- Memorial.pdf (accessed February 28th).

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define the location where the historic re-interment of remains and artifacts of 419 Africans has taken place.”50 In 2007, the construction of the African Burial Ground National Monument was completed, and it was dedicated at Duane Street and Elk Street—later renamed the African

Burial Ground Way—in the Civic Center section of Lower Manhattan “to commemorate the financial and physical contributions of enslaved Africans in colonial New York (and in the U.S.,) and honor their memory.”51

In addition, in 2010, the African Burial Ground National Monument Visitor Center opened. Its exhibits examined topics including the archeology of the Negroes Burial Ground, the

Atlantic slave trade, colonial enslavement in New York City, and African American communities’ civic engagements at the site and beyond. With these exhibits, this center was expected to function as a place that intervenes in mainstream American history by reclaiming memories of the enslaved and excavating “things that [were] hidden from view, buried.”52

Two institutions, therefore, exist at/around Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, separated by their representations of American history. There has not been any collaborative work between the Ground Zero memorial complex and the African American Burial Ground, despite the

“proximity” between the WTC site and the Negroes Burial Ground. Geographically speaking, these two sites are only several blocks apart; it takes less than 15 minutes to walk from one place

50 Ibid. 51 “”History & Culture,” https://www.nps.gov/afbg/learn/historyculture/index.htm (accessed February 28th). 52 The caption in the African Burial Ground National Monument Visitor Center. At the African Burial Ground National Monument Visitor Center, for instance, the lack of attention to the enslaved in the history education in the U.S. is critically attended to. Through the exhibits about the Atlantic slave trade/the Middle Passage, about slave labor that built New York City and its wealth, and about repercussions of slavery in the present American society, the issue of enslavement is contextualized not as an exclusively southern institution but as a national and even transnational phenomenon. There are also exhibits displaying experiences of the enslaved and thus countering the whitewashing of slavery.

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to the other. It is also even possible that the latter reached further underground to the former.53

Moreover, for some critics, this proximity was apparent even on the day of 9/11. African

American Journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates, for instance, describes his reaction to the terrorist attacks in the following manner:

I suppose everyone who was in New York that day has a story. Here is mine: That

evening, I stood on the roof of an apartment building with your mother, your aunt

Chana, and her boyfriend, Jamal. So we were there on the roof, talking and taking

in the sight—great plumes of smoke covered Manhattan Island. Everyone knew

someone who knew someone who was missing. But looking out upon America,

my heart was cold. I had disasters all my own … I was out of sync with the city. I

kept thinking about how southern Manhattan had always been Ground Zero for

us. They auctioned our bodies down there, in that same devastated, and rightly

named, financial district. And there was once a burial ground for the auctioned

there … I had not formed any of this into a coherent theory. But I did know that

Bin Laden was not the first man to bring terror to that section of the city. 54

53 Since “[g]raves in the areas beyond” the site where the remains were found had been “destroyed by the construction of buildings” in Lower Manhattan, and since the extent of the Negroes Burial Ground was too large to be fully excavated,” its exact borders cannot be definitively determined (the caption in the African Burial Ground National Monument Visitor Center). More importantly, there must be Muslim slaves among those buried because a number of West African slaves in America were Muslims. According to Manning Marable, “As European states colonized the Americas and the Caribbean in the sixteenth century, they ultimately transported about fifteen million chattel slaves into their respective colonies. A significant minority were Muslims: of the approximately 650,000 involuntarily taken to what would become the United States, Muslims made up about 7 or 8 percent (Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention [New York: Penguin Books, 2011], 80). The following assumption, therefore, would not be too out of bounds: while Muslims have been excluded from Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and its neighboring area, the WTC site has been always already lying on some Muslim slaves’ remains. 54 Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me (New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2015), 86-7.

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It would not be, therefore, entirely inappropriate if the Ground Zero memorial complex initiates an invitation to visitors to take a detour to the African American Burial Ground and remember not only 9/11 but also slavery as a significant chapter in the U.S. national history in Lower

Manhattan. And yet, no effort to offer such an affiliated remembrance has been taken at the memorial complex. On the contrary, it has come into existence precisely through the denial of this kind of remembrance, as the elimination of the IFC confirms.55

Those Included in the Inside

The discussion so far illustrates that the vicinity of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and the WTC site itself have been reconstructed through the exclusion of certain others. Through this exclusion, the site has become a memorial complex where U.S. national history is sanitized. It is,

I argue, important to identify who are those others to do justice to their memories, or to rectify historical revisionism. The discussion of exclusion, however, does not end here; it would never fail to give rise to the following questions: who are then those physically and mnemonically included inside the Ground Zero memorial complex?; what kind of place does the inclusion of certain subjects create? In other words, the issue of inclusion needs to be attended to.

American Victims

55 In addition to the African Burial Ground National Monument Visitor Center, some attempts have been made in Lower Manhattan for reclaiming memories of the enslaved. The aforementioned plaque is one of them. The New-York Historical Society also held the exhibition titled “Slavery in New York” to showcase “the rediscovery of the collective and personal experiences of Africans and African-Americans in New York City,” from October 7, 2005 to March 26, 2006 [“Tour the Slavery in New York Galleries,” http://www.slaveryinnewyork.org/tour_galleries.htm (accessed February 28th)]. Its virtual exhibition is still open online [http://www.slaveryinnewyork.org/index.html (accessed February 28th)]. In other words, around the Ground Zero memorial complex, there are organizations eager to reveal the centrality of slavery in the development of the city and, by extension, the U.S. And yet, it seems that this memorial complex is unwilling to reach out to those organizations.

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Arguably, those who lost their lives on September 11th, 2001 are among the included ones. They are, for instance, “represented” by the National September 11 Memorial Reflecting

Absence. As will be illustrated in detail in Chapter Two, Michael Arad, an Israeli-American architect, designed the memorial as the two massive pools. On their rims, the names of the victims are engraved. In the National September 11 Museum, there is a permanent exhibition called In Memoriam where each victim’s portrait photograph is displayed.56 In addition, the site is literally a tomb for the victims of 9/11. The impact of the terrorist attacks was so severe that many of the victims’ bodies were pulverized beyond recognition. While an effort to “collect” them was made primarily by the city of New York, 40 percent of the victims have not been identified. Consequently, numerous unidentified body parts still remain to be genetically inspected. Under the custody of the New York City Office of Chief Medical Examiner, in 2014, those unidentified body parts were ceremoniously transferred from its office on 26th street to

Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan to be stored in one section of the National 9/11 Museum called

Remains Repository.57 The victims of 9/11 have been at the forefront of the commemorative attention at the WTC site.

This, however, does not necessarily mean that all the victims are equally receiving attention. On the contrary, there is a hierarchical structure at work. The hierarchy becomes apparent at the annual commemoration ceremony held at the memorial complex. Every year, starting from 8:46 a.m., the time when the first plane hit the North Tower, a commemorative ceremony is performed for the victims of 9/11 by some of their family members against the

56 For the further analysis of this exhibition, see Chapter 3. 57 “In ‘Ceremonial Transfer,’ Remains of 9/11 Victims Are Moved to Memorial,” https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/11/nyregion/remains-of-9-11-victims-are-transferred-to-trade-center- site.html (accessed February 28th). This repository is located between the museum’s permanent exhibitions. More discussion will follow in Chapter 3.

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background of the Ground Zero memorial complex and witnessed by people gathering at the site and viewers watching on TV or through online streaming video. The annual commemoration ceremony is one of the venues where those considered worthy of being included are brought forward into the public eye. On the surface, every one of the victims of 9/11 is commemorated there. The ceremony proceeds as family members of the victims of 9/11 call out the name of every victim. It is read aloud in alphabetical order by a pair of selected family members at the podium set in the middle of the Ground Zero memorial complex. Each family member respectively calls out around twenty names allotted to her/him in turn and gives a memorial tribute to her/his loved one.

From listening to and viewing the annual commemoration ceremony, it looks inclusive.

Those selected family members who take the podium are diverse in terms of age, gender, and race. There are kids, adults, and seniors, women and men, whites and people of color. On some points, however, this ceremony is not inclusive. One of them is nationality.58 It is primarily

American family members who give memorial tributes, despite the fact that non-Americans died in the event.59 In many cases, they often emphasize how the deceased were good American

58 Another point would be religion. As in the case of Cordoba House, the presence of Muslims is not appreciated at the Ground Zero memorial complex. The tribute by a family member who said that her uncle was “a proud Muslim American man” was almost disrupted by the holler from the audience. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35zF5cCZE38 (accessed February 28th), 1:30:46. 59 Since the National September 11 Memorial and Museum did not release to third parties the guidelines for the annual commemoration ceremony, I checked all the footages of the ceremonies in past years made available by the mayors’ offices of New York City. Many hours of investigation revealed that almost all of the family members had spoken in so-called American English. There are only a few exceptions. At the ceremony in 2011, for instance, a woman started her tribute in Spanish [“Mayor Bloomberg speaks at 9- 11 Ten Year Anniversary Commemoration Ceremony,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhIM1St4NMQ (accessed February 28th), 45:34]. In 2018, a pair of women speaking heavily accented English took the podium together. The former, however, quickly switched to American English. One of the latter wrapped herself up in the national flag of the U.S. and gave the following tribute: “God bless all the victims and God bless America. Always great America” [“2018 September 11th Commemoration Ceremony,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmAKp-QfxS0 (accessed February 28th), 2:41:31]. These two examples attest to Sara Ahmed’s cautionary insight that only “the differences that can be taken on and in by the nation, those that will not breach the ideal image

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mothers, fathers, daughters, sons, wives, and husbands, as exemplified in the following memorial tributes:

And my husband Gary Eugene Bird, a third generation made of, of Arizona who

loved the wide open spaces. A humble and caring humanitarian concerned daily

with the goodness of his community. A father always present to our two children

and many others drawn to his gentle yet tough love. A husband who brought out

in me the best version of myself every joyful day of our short 20 years together.

Rest in peace, my love.60

And my father Joseph John Hasson III. Although I was only three-month-old and

never really met you, Mom always tells how I’m exactly like you and that makes

me very proud to be your son. I will always follow in your footsteps. I know

you up there watching over me. We all love and miss you like crazy. God bless

you and God, God bless America.61

While the American victims are featured, non-U.S. citizens among the victims of 9/11 are not commemorated as foreign nationals. Although it was the “World” Trade Center that was targeted in New York City and thus there were foreign nationals who were killed at this site on

September 11th, 2001, the losses caused by the terrorist attacks are depluralized and defined as

“American” during the ceremony. In fact, its setting is nationally framed from the outset. The

of the nation” are permitted [Cultural Politics of Emotion (New York: Routledge, 2014), 138]. At the annual commemoration ceremony, the diversity among the family members is acknowledged as long as it is within the national framework. 60 “September 11th Commemoration Ceremony,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1y8ESzI0hg (accessed February 28th), 53:10. 61 “Mayor de Blasio Attends September 11th Commemoration Ceremony,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seIC-LXqw30 (accessed February 28th), 2:55:18.

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name-calling procedure is preceded by a sequence of national commemorative performances, including the “presentation of colors,” which commands respect for U.S. military personnel and the U.S. The annual commemoration ceremony begins with the march of men in uniform holding the U.S. national flag. Followed by a band of bagpipers, the flag bearers circled around

Reflecting Absence and proceed to the stage. Once they reach a designated spot on the stage, the bearers halt and present the flag. After this presentation, a chorus group starts to sing the national anthem. Within this national setting, the commemoration of American victims is prioritized over foreign victims.

American Service Members

The annual commemoration ceremony suggests that the Ground Zero memorial complex is a place for American citizens. What is important to note here is that some of the other

Americans who are not directly related to 9/11 are also included just because they are considered

“model American citizens.” As pointed out above, Debra Burlingame, for instance, celebrated the visitation of three wounded Marines to the site that she regarded as sacred. For Debra

Burlingame, who found it blasphemous to include those unrelated to 9/11 inside Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan and denounced the IFC, these Marines were worthy of being included. She welcomed them into the commemoration at the Ground Zero memorial complex where “others” were denied a place, whereas these Marines were most likely traumatized not by 9/11 but by the war fought in the Middle East and thus should be categorized as “others.”

As such, along with the American victims of 9/11, American service members are favorably received at the Ground Zero memorial complex.62 In fact, their inclusion has become

62 American veterans among the victims of 9/11 are also specifically commemorated: on Veterans Day, yellow roses are prepared for more than 250 victims who served in the U.S. military, and placed at their names engraved on Reflecting Absence

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the official policy at the site. As Joe Daniels, the then-president and CEO of the National

September 11 Memorial and Museum, publicly said, “The 9/11 Memorial welcomes many active and retired U.S. military service members…These men and women deserve our gratitude and a promise that they will always be honored and remembered at this sacred place.”63 This promise is stipulated in the institution’s code of conduct. While it prohibits visitors “to draw a crowd of on-lookers,” those “who are active members of the United States Armed Forces” and

“veterans”—as well as “first responders”—are allowed “to hold official ceremonies on the

(Memorial) Plaza.64”

In addition, around Veterans Day, the National September 11 Memorial and Museum organizes a series of programs and events called “Salute to Service.” Described as a “tribute honoring veterans, active-duty members of the military, and their families,” Salute to Service follows a particular procedure. According to an email sent out by the National September 11

Memorial & Museum to its mailing list, prior to Veterans Day:

Our Salute to Service began on Wednesday when United States Army

recruits from the Bronx, N.Y., participated in a swearing-in ceremony on the

Memorial, which included recognition of local organizations dedicated to

supporting veterans and their families.

Programming continued on Thursday, when members of the FDNY,

NYPD, and PAPD placed American flags on the Memorial at the names of first

responders killed on 9/11 who were also veterans.

63 “9/11 Memorial Welcomes Active, Retired U.S. Military Service Members,” https://www.911memorial.org/blog/911-memorial-welcomes-active-retired-us-military-service-members (accessed February 28th). 64 “Visitor Guidelines,” https://www.911memorial.org/visitor-rules-and-regulations (accessed February 28th). From time to time, for instance, commissioning (enlistment) and re-enlistment ceremonies are conducted there.

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On Friday, representatives from the United States Navy participated in a

ceremonial American flag folding and a drill team performance on the

Memorial.65

Through these programs and events, American service members are invited to take part in the memory work played out at the Ground Zero memorial complex. Their memories are, in other words, favored over others and made use of to evoke in the minds of visitors more than just grief for the victims of 9/11.

In particular, those American service members who have fought the Global War on

Terror for the U.S. are featured. The stories about them are often repeated at the Ground Zero memorial complex. Kathleen Santora’s is one of them. The official blog of the National

September 11 Memorial and Museum narrates her story: “enlisted in the US Army nearly one year after her brother, FDNY firefighter Christopher Santora, was killed in the line of duty on

9/11,” Kathleen Santora “wanted to do something in response to the attacks, and began her military service the day after the first anniversary” were written about on.66 Another story includes Pat Tillman. In the National September 11 Museum, an exhibit was curated about him as an American hero who “left his thriving career in the National Football League after 9/11 to serve in the U.S. Army.”67 Through a blog post and the display of his Army Ranger Jacket in the museum, “visitors are encouraged to view” this exhibit.68

65 See Appendix 2. 66 “Personal Stories Connect Military Community to 9/11,” https://www.911memorial.org/blog/personal- stories-connect-military-community-911 (accessed February 28th). 67 “Special Programming: 9/11 Memorial Museum Honors Military Members,” https://www.911memorial.org/blog/special-programming-911-memorial-museum-honors-military- members (accessed February 28th). This exhibit was a part of the museum’s special exhibition “Comeback Season: Sports After 9/11,” which ran through June 27, 2018 to summer 2019. 68 Ibid. The narrative that American citizens who decided to join the military as a response to 9/11 is one of the themes of the National September 11 Museum. For more detail, see Chapter 3.

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What is more, these service members have been juxtaposed with heroic American victims of 9/11 at the Ground Zero memorial complex. Around Veterans Day, for instance, a talk that focuses on “the place where WTC steel was buried to commemorate the first post-9/11 U.S. casualty in the War on Terror, Johnny Mike Spann, a CIA operative and former U.S. Marine” has been held at the National September 11 Museum.69 In this talk, a map that “lists the locations where WTC steel was buried in Afghanistan in late 2001 and 2002 by U.S. Special Forces” is introduced with “military insignia and NYPD, FDNY, and PAPD insignia as a way of linking

[service members’] efforts in Afghanistan to the first responder units who lost so many lives on

9/11.”70 As such, both American service members and heroic American victims of 9/11 are acknowledged to assert “the strong bond between this sacred place and those who chose to defend our nation” by engaging in the war in the Middle East.71

A War Memorial

The discussion about those included “inside” Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan suggests that it is not a place for only the victims of 9/11. As “the strong and truly meaningful connection between the National September 11 Memorial & Museum and the United States military” is yearly reconfirmed during the Veterans Day events, active and retired U.S. military service members are honored and remembered along with those Americans who died at the 9/11 sites.72

69 “Museum Talks Highlight WTC Steel Buried in Afghanistan,” https://www.911memorial.org/blog/museum-talks-highlight-wtc-steel-buried-afghanistan (accessed February 28th). 70 Ibid. 71 “US Veterans Honored Salute Service 5-Day Tribute,” https://www.911memorial.org/blog/us-veterans- honored-salute-service-5-day-tribute (accessed February 28th). The presence of those service members is integrated into the remembrance discourse of 9/11 in the National September 11 Museum as a group of “last responders,” a counterpart to the first responders. This point will be further examined in Chapter 3. 72 Appendix 2.

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In other words, although it is ordinary citizens who were killed by 9/11, the rebuilt WTC now functions as a war memorial that celebrates the nation’s military endeavor.73

In short, according to Benedict Anderson, war memorials exist for nations, or for

“ghostly national imaginings.”74 These national imaginings are, he argues, mediated in particular by the bodies of the Unknown soldiers buried in war memorials; their bodies give substance to imagined-communities/nation-states for which these soldiers fought.75 The Ground Zero memorial complex is an example of Anderson’s theorization on war memorials. As one of them, it contributes to the construction and promotion of favorable U.S. national images.

In this case, however, it is not only dead bodies but also living ones that matter. On the one hand, for instance, the aforementioned unidentified remains stored in the National September

11 Museum paints the U.S. as a nation with moral integrity to provide care even for the unidentified dead. Through those dead bodies, as Jay Aronson points out, the standing of the

U.S. is elevated as opposed to “the terrorists who so callously disregarded the value of life.”76 On

73 The desire to see the site as a war memorial was expressed by high officials early on in the reconstruction process. Even when the victims of 9/11 are commemorated, they are often grieved for as if they were fallen soldiers. Michael Bloomberg, for instance, once said, “139 years ago President Abraham Lincoln looked out at his wounded nation as he stood on a once beautiful field that had become its saddest and largest burial ground. Then it was Gettysburg. Today it is the World Trade Center, where we gather on native soil to share our common grief” [quoted in Jay Aronson Who Owns the Dead?: The Science and Politics of Death at Ground Zero (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2016), 12]. Juxtaposing these two burial grounds, he claimed that not unlike the soldiers who lost their lives for the “liberal” ideal of the North or the Southern Cause during the Civil War, the victims of 9/11 sacrificed themselves for the greater good. 74 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (New York: Verso, 2016), 50. 75 Ibid. 76 Jay Aronson, Who Owns the Dead?, 2. The exclusion and inclusion at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan may be intimately intertwined with dead bodies. It is possible that those unidentified body parts that were brought to the Remains Repository contain the body parts of the terrorists. Therefore, the site is, in actuality, messy, and the logic of exclusion/inclusion cannot be precisely executed or maintained. And yet, this problem is never acknowledged or even raised. Rather, as will be discussed later, the messiness of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan is solved by resorting to the simple binary of “us” and “them.”

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the other hand, the citizen-bodies of the family members of the American victims of 9/11 who gather together to grieve at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan for the annual commemoration ceremony allow the U.S. to be imagined as a nation: through the living bodies of all ages, gender, and races, an image of a multifaceted nation united beyond differences is projected to the viewers witnessing the ceremony.

Favorable U.S. national images are also structurally embedded in this war memorial, typified by the primary tower of the rebuilt WTC complex. Called the “Freedom Tower,” it was originally designed by Daniel Libeskind, the master plan architect for the reconstruction of the

WTC site. According to the conceptual plan that he titled Memory Foundations, Libeskind designed it as a 1,776-feet-high spire that would “[rise] above its predecessors, reasserting the pre-eminence of freedom and beauty, restoring the spiritual peak to the city, creating an icon that speaks of our vitality in the face of danger and our optimism in the aftermath of tragedy.”77 This tower with its height signifying the year of the declaration of American Independence was intended as a symbol of the U.S. itself. In this case, however, the objective of commemoration seemed to be deliberately open-ended. It was not only the American victims of 9/11 but also the

U.S. as a nation that were Libeskind’s central focus.78 In particular, he wanted to materially symbolize the national triumph that had been achieved through American independence in the form of the spire.

77 Memory Foundations. 78 In Memory Foundations, while acknowledging those who were lost as national heroes, Libeskind focuses on the national greatness. This conceptual plan begins with his feeling of awe toward the U.S. as a countryman addressing to fellow countryfolks: “I arrived by ship to New York as a teenager, an immigrant, and like millions of others before me, my first sight was the Statue of Liberty and the amazing skyline of Manhattan. I have never forgotten that sight or what it stands for. This is what this project is all about” (Ibid.). Memory Foundations gained popularity in part because of the first-person narrative technique. Positioning himself as one of the immigrants, Libeskind claimed that he was a typical American and empathically asked support from his fellow American citizens who would share his sense of awe toward the U.S.

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While many changes were made to this tower during its construction process, the architectural motif of “national triumph” remains. It is probably the only feature that was not abandoned among all the other features of Libeskind’s plan that were eliminated. For instance, the gardens that were proposed as “a constant affirmation of life” on the roof of Freedom Tower were removed to secure larger office space.79 In the meantime, Libeskind was replaced by the architect David Childs.80 Eventually, even the name was changed. The new primary tower is no longer called the “Freedom Tower” but “One World Trade Center.”81 Simply put, the latter was built as a tower completely different from the original design conceived by Libeskind except for one element: the height is 1,776 feet.

Through the new primary tower, the U.S. as a nation is celebrated at Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan. The allegorical height of One World Trade Center represents the U.S. as idealized at the time of its independence in 1776. This tower is, in other words, a material embodiment of the U.S. and helps define and reinforce the American self-image as the exceptional country where “all men are created equal” and “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”82 As

79 Ibid. The changes made to this tower will be identified in detail in Chapter 2. 80 In addition to Childs, several architects were brought in to rebuild the WTC site, and Libeskind was effectively removed from its reconstruction process. His design was significantly undermined over the years, though Libeskind is still credited as the masterplan architect. For instance, the Park of Heroes and the Wedge of Light that he proposed as two large public places where “[e]ach year on September 11th between the hours of 8:46 a.m., when the first airplane hit and 10:28 a.m., when the second tower collapsed, the sun [would] shine without shadow, in perpetual tribute to altruism and courage” were eventually eliminated (Memory Foundations). 81 The primary building of the new WTC complex was first named the Freedom Tower by the then New York Governor George Pataki. The name persisted because of its popularity. In 2009, however, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey announced that the tower would be officially called by its legal name of One World Trade Center. 82 “Declaration of Independence,” https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript (accessed February 28th). It is symptomatic that the Declaration of Independence was chosen and has remained as one of the most important allegorical signs to mark the reconstruction project of the WTC site located in Lower Manhattan, which was once a site of slavery. Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of this document, was deeply implicated in slavery. He was a major slaveholder. It is also historically

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such, the Ground Zero memorial complex came into existence as a war memorial promoting certain ideas about the nation and its values and priorities.

What is important to note here is that, as the elimination of the IFC illustrates, it is no longer everyone’s liberty/freedom that is upheld at this war memorial. The liberty/freedom symbolized at the site is the one for which the three wounded Marines and American service members sacrificed themselves in the Middle East. It can be argued, therefore, that the Ground

Zero memorial complex is a war memorial specifically contextualized by the Global War on

Terror. In fact, while American service members who fought the war for the nation are featured and even juxtaposed with the 9/11 first responders, Muslims have become identified as the enemy-others of the U.S. and targets of harassment and violence, as was seen in the case of the

Cordoba House. The memorial complex, as a war memorial, promotes the idea that a great nation is engaged in a battle between righteous and evil.

Conclusion

As discussed in this chapter, the WTC site was reconstructed through the exclusion of certain others. In particular, since 9/11, Muslims have been demonized as the enemy-others of the U.S. and essentially banned from Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and the surrounding area. The plan for a “mosque” proposed two blocks away from the WTC site was forced to be

speculated that Jefferson impregnated, at least, one of his slaves, Sally Hemings. Her clan were slaves at Monticello [see, for instance, Annette Gordon-Reed’s The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2009)]. In the sense that Jefferson was a practitioner of human bondage and the father of slaves on whose sacrifice the U.S. was founded, he is truly an American founding father. And yet, it is precisely this kind of “difficult past” that is in effect silenced through the allegorical figure of the new primary tower. While the U.S. is celebrated and its exceptional nature is presented to visitors, the memory of slavery is once again displaced at this site exactly where human bondage was practiced.

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abandoned. In its place, a luxury 43-story condominium building will be erected to fit into the urban geography of New York City.

The exclusion of “other others” has been repeatedly performed at the Ground Zero memorial complex. Bearing witness to the difficult pasts of the U.S. and hence inevitably evoking memories of violent acts inflicted by the U.S., those others have been denied a place inside the 9/11 site’s physical terrain or in the memory being remembered/produced at the site.

The elimination of the IFC was an example of such an exclusion. The plan for this cultural center was terminated by the then-governor Pataki pressured by family members of the victims of 9/11 because the IFC originally proposed including exhibits about slavery and the genocide of Native people in addition to the one about the terrorist attacks in 2001 on American soil. As this case illustrates, the reconstruction of the WTC site has proceeded through a series of exclusions.

Consequently, the WTC site has been reconstructed as a venue where mainstream

American history is materialized. This is most apparent in the case of the history of slavery in

New York City. At the rebuilt WTC site, there is no room for this memory.83 Despite the proximal relationship between Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and slavery in terms of geography and history, no mnemonic reference to the practice of human bondage to which the development of New York City/U.S. is indebted is ever provided to visitors.

While certain others have been excluded from the Ground Zero memorial complex and its vicinity, other subjects are included. Among those included alongside the victims of 9/11 are

83 Aside from 9/11, the 1993 World Trade Center bombing is also included in the remembrance performed at the Ground Zero memorial complex. The names of the victims of this bombing are engraved on Reflecting Absence. Plotted and carried out by two different terrorist groups, these terrorist attacks are two different incidents. And yet, the former is often acknowledged as a precursor, or even a part of the latter at the Ground Zero memorial complex. It is as if there is no qualitative difference between them— quantitatively, there is difference in terms of the number of victims. The (mis)remembering of the 1993 bombing will be discussed more in detail in Chapter 3.

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American service members. In particular, those who have sacrificed themselves and fought in

Global War on Terror for the U.S. are remembered at the rebuilt WTC complex. The site is, in other words, functioning as a war memorial.

It is, therefore, not too far-fetched to see the correlation between the Ground Zero memorial complex and the Global War on Terror. In fact, some critics have strongly suggested that this site should be reconstructed as a place that would not “bludgeon the free world”/the U.S. in the back when it was fighting against the unfree world/terrorists.84 These critics opposed the

IFC because they believed that the cultural center would undermine the moral high ground of the

U.S. engaging in the Global War on Terror by displaying the exhibits about such difficult pasts as slavery and the genocide of Native Americans. Instead, these critics demanded the new WTC complex that “would seek … to place the (terrorist) attack[s] in the context of the wider war that is being waged.”85 What is needed is not a cultural center that would disrupt the U.S. national image of an exceptional country of freedom, but an institution that would inspire support among visitors for the continuation of the war by “injecting some moral clarity … into the public discourse.”86 As such, the Ground Zero memorial complex has been imagined in relation to the

Global War on Terror, and it is this relationship that will be investigated in the next chapter.

84 “The International Freedom Center: Content and Governance Report” 85 Ibid. 86 Ibid.

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Chapter 2

The Cartography of Vulnerability: Wars and U.S. Geographies

They drew first blood, not me. —John Rambo, First Blood, 1982

But that’s why you built the towers, isn’t it? Weren’t the towers built as fantasies of wealth and power that would one day become fantasies of destruction? You build a thing like that so you can see it come down. The provocation is clear. What other reason would there be to go so high and then to double it, do it twice? It’s a fantasy, so why not do it twice? You are saying, Here it is, bring it down. —Don DeLillo, Falling Man, 20071

Introduction

In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, two projects started in the U.S.: the Global War on Terror and the reconstruction of the ruined WTC site. On the one hand, the then-President George W. Bush declared the war in an address to Congress only days after 9/11. As a response to 9/11, his administration initiated a series of international military campaigns with allied countries against organizations and regimes identified as enemy- others of the U.S. On the other hand, the plan for the new WTC complex began to be nationally discussed in the post-9/11 American society. Eventually, the ruined site was reconstructed into the Ground Zero memorial complex, including a new primary building, a memorial, and a museum.2

1 Don Delillo, Falling Man (New York: Scribner, 2007), 116. 2 The article “Filling the Void; To Rebuild or Not: Architects Respond” appeared in the magazine section of New York Times on September 23rd, 2001, by the prominent architect Richard Meier. Only 12 days after 9/11, Meier’s discussion of the reconstruction of the WTC site in a major, nationally distributed newspaper signaled the symbolic importance of the site and concerns for how it would or should be rebuilt. See Richard Meier, “Filling the Void; To Rebuild or Not: Architects Respond,” New York Times, September 23rd, 2001, https://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/23/magazine/filling-the-void-to-rebuild-or-not-

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This chapter will illustrate the simultaneous development of the Global War on Terror and the reconstruction project by examining them in relation to each other. It is, in a way, understandable that since the former was triggered as a response to the attacks on the WTC, the latter should turn into a site rationalizing the former. I do not, however, entirely agree with this logic. It is perhaps too simplistic. The links between the reconstruction of the WTC site and the ongoing Global War on Terror are complex and part of a historical phenomenon. In order to illustrate this point, this chapter will first attempt to define the American war by historicizing it within the context of U.S. military aggressions dating back to the Cold War, specifically focusing on the American War in Vietnam. By doing so, I will identify the logic behind U.S. warfare and reveal how this logic changed the geographies and landscapes in both Vietnam and

New York City.

In terms of methodology, following the juxtaposition between these two places, I will present a comparative approach throughout this chapter. Following the historicization of the

Global War on Terror in relation to the Cold War, this chapter will look at the reconstruction of the ruined WTC site to the Ground Zero memorial complex by temporally and geographically shifting the sites of investigation. In particular, in order to examine One World Trade Center and

Reflecting Absence as architectural signs, I will put them in conversation with the militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border and the memory work assigned to the USS Arizona Memorial in

Hawai‘i, both of which are not unrelated to 9/11: the former dramatically accelerated after 9/11; and the latter was built to commemorate the American sailors and other military servicemen killed by the attack on Pearl Harbor, the only external attack upon the U.S. prior to 9/11, and

architects-respond.html?mtrref=undefined&gwh=BF8414F1363AED987A546C4D850923A1&gwt=pay (accessed February 28th).

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which people often compare to 9/11.3 Through this comparative analysis ranging from New York

City to the edges of the territory of the U.S, I will argue that a particular kind of reality—a reality that is not unfamiliar in American history—is created and rationalized by the Ground Zero memorial complex, in the time of the Global War on Terror.

The Logic of the Global War on Terror

In President George W. Bush’s address to congress on September 20, 2001, he presented the ideological framework for the Global War on Terror. In his calling for other nations to act with the U.S., he famously divided the world into two sides: “[e]ither you are with us or you are with the terrorists.”4 Based on this binary opposition, Bush made it clear that “we [would] direct every resource at our command—every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence and every necessary weapon of war— to the disruption and to the defeat of the global terror network.”5 By pitting “them” (the enemy) against “us” (the U.S. and its allies), Bush declared the Global War on Terror not just as “one battle” against al-Qaeda but as a “lengthy campaign” to eliminate “them”: “Our war on terror begins with Al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.”6 According to him, “retaliation and isolated

3 For instance, on December 7th, 2001, Bush made this comparison on the USS Enterprise at the Norfolk Naval Station in Virginia. In his remarks on the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, he went back and forth between this attack and 9/11, and repeatedly equated them. See “President: We’re Fighting to Win—And Win We Will,” The White House, December 7th, 2001, https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/12/20011207.html (accessed February 28th). 4 “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People,” The White House, September 20th, 2001, https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010920-8.html (accessed February 28th). 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid.

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strikes” only against al-Qaeda were not enough for “us”/the U.S. because the enemy-others of the U.S./“them” were supposedly far larger in numbers and more dangerous/lethal than one specific terrorist group.7 He, therefore, cautioned his American audience and those listening to his address, whether allies or foes, to be ready for a permanent war that the U.S. would wage against its enemy-others.8

In this address, along with establishing the binary opposition between “us” and “them,”

Bush highlighted another rationale for the Global War on Terror: the vulnerability of the U.S. He said, “Our nation has been put on notice: We’re not immune from attack.”9 In this statement, the

U.S. is presented as a country always already in danger of being injured by terrorists who “kill not merely to end lives, but to disrupt and end a way of life.”10 They are, in other words, considered intrinsically antagonistic to the U.S.; they are the evil ones who “stand against us, because we stand in their way.”11 To maintain “our way of life,” Bush continued, terrorists have to be eliminated.12 His argument unfolded, using the following logic: since the U.S. was attacked and is likely to be attacked again by its inherently different and evil enemy-others, the Global

War on Terror must be initiated and continuously fought.

7 Ibid. 8 Various scholars have problematized the permanency of the Global War on Terror by either positively or negatively referring to Carl Schmitt’s political theories. On the one hand, for instance, Chantal Mouffe criticizes the war, based on Schmitt’s denunciation against war fought in the name of humanity. “[S]ince all means [are] justified once the enemy [is] presented as an outlaw of humanity,” she argues, this kind of war can be, by definition, indefinitely and limitlessly escalated (“Carl Schmitt’s Warning on the Dangers of a Unipolar World,” The International Thought of Carl Schmitt, 148). On the other hand, some other scholars see the Global War on Terror as a direct implementation of the Schmittian understanding of the political. In particular, Giorgio Agamben defines the war as what Schmitt calls the “state of exception” in which the U.S. suspends the law as a sovereign by declaring a state of emergency. What is problematic for Agamben is that in the post-9/11 world, the state of exception is imposed on the whole planet as the norm by the U.S. and consequently, the indefinite state of emergency has become the new real (“Der Gewahrsam-Ausnahmezustand als Weltordnung,” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, April 19, 2003, 33). 9 “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid.

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This logic was also repeated in the “National Security Strategy” issued by the Bush administration. This document suggests that whenever the “American people and American interests” receive or sense threats, actions “to anticipate and counter” the threat and/or feelings of fear, or to preemptively prevent damages against the nation, are initiated. Those actions are considered “the first duty of the United States Government” and “our inherent right of self- defense.”13 The perceived fear does not need to be empirically proven. When it is felt, military action should be taken, “even if uncertainty remains as to the time and place of the enemy’s attack.”14 On such terms, the Global War on Terror was declared and fought. The war is, in other words, predicated on the U.S. obsession with its vulnerability.

U.S. domestic and international policies regarding the Global War on Terror have been implemented to minimize the vulnerability of the U.S. Bush confirmed this point in his address by emphasizing the necessity to “oversee and coordinate a comprehensive national strategy to safeguard our country against terrorism and respond to any attacks that [might] come” as the rationale for the creation of the Office of Homeland Security.15 Subsequently, in November,

2002, the Department of Homeland Security was formed “to secure the nation from the many threats we face.”16 In addition, the Bush administration signed into law the “Uniting and

Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct

Terrorism Act” of 2001, also known as the Patriot Act, to strengthen security controls by the

U.S. It was apparent that this act would violate individual civil liberties by suspending

13 “V. Prevent Our Enemies from Threatening Us, Our Allies, and Our Friends with Weapons of Mass Destruction,” The White House, accessed October 10, 2018, https://georgewbush- whitehouse.archives.gov/nsc/nss/2006/print/sectionV.html (accessed February 28th). 14 Ibid. 15 “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 16 “About DHS,” U.S. Department of Homeland Security, accessed October 10, 2018, https://www.dhs.gov/about-dhs (accessed February 28th).

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constitutionally protected rights in the name of the national security.17 And yet, it was enacted for fear that the U.S. would be the target of another terrorist attack. The Patriot Act was, in other words, intended to lessen the vulnerability of the U.S. (perceived or otherwise) by any means necessary.

This sense of fear or vulnerability, was also used to justify the U.S. military invasions of

Afghanistan and Iraq after 9/11. In Bush’s address, the invasion of Afghanistan was rationalized based on the logic that “the only way to defeat terrorism as a threat to [the American] way of life is to stop it, eliminate it and destroy it where it grows.”18 He identified the Taliban regime of

Afghanistan as the threat “sponsoring and sheltering and supplying terrorists,” and called for the

U.S. military force to be ready to take military action against it.19 In fact, in October, 2001, the

U.S. went to war against the Taliban regime.

In the case of Iraq, the logic was repeated. In order to justify the invasion of Iraq, Bush explained that the U.S. would never be safe unless Saddam Hussein was militarily defeated:

“The people of the United States and our friends and allies will not live at the mercy of an outlaw regime that threatens the peace with weapons of mass murder. We will meet that threat now, with our Army, Air Force, Navy, Coast Guard and Marines, so that we do not have to meet it later with armies of fire fighters and police and doctors on the streets of our cities.”20 The Bush administration asserted that weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) were produced under the

17 The Patriot Act was criticized in particular because it extended the authority of law enforcement agencies/officers. This law allowed them to search a home or business without the owner’s or the occupant’s consent or knowledge and to obtain telephone, e-mail, and financial records without a court order. 18 “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 19 Ibid. 20 “President Bush Address the Nation,” The White House, March 19, 2003, https://georgewbush- whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030319-17.html (accessed February 28th).

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instruction of Saddam Hussein and that large stockpiles of WMDs were hidden by him.21

Although Iraq did not harbor or support the terrorists responsible for 9/11, it was still considered a threat to the U.S. Arguing that peaceful measures would not disarm Iraq of WMDs, Bush launched the second Gulf War in 2003, by using the same rhetoric that he used when declaring the Global War on Terror: to minimize the vulnerability of the U.S. In short, he framed the second Gulf War as a part of the Global War on Terror.

What is important to note here is that the Global War on Terror, which was arguably a war to overcome the sense of vulnerability, was framed as a war for “freedom.” The U.S. government claimed over the years that it was fighting against terrorists and repressive regimes antagonistic to “freedom.” It was “freedom” itself that was under attack and thus the U.S. had to stand up to save the world from the enemies of “freedom.”22 U.S. military aggressions have been consistently categorized as operations launched for the protection and perpetuation of “freedom” since 9/11.23 Those carried out in Afghanistan between 2001 to 2014 under the Bush and Obama administrations were designated as the “Operation Enduring Freedom” succeed by the

“Operation Freedom’s Sentinel,” which continues to this day.24 Likewise, the Iraq War is officially referred to as the “Operation Iraqi Freedom.”

21 See “V. Prevent Our Enemies from Threatening Us, Our Allies, and Our Friends with Weapons of Mass Destruction.” 22 In “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People,” for instance, Bush says, “we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom.” According to him, “[f]reedom and fear are at war” and “[t]he advance of human freedom—the great achievement of our time, and the great hope of every time—now depends on us.” 23 The elimination of the IFC is, therefore, much more ironical. While a war was fought for freedom by the U.S., the plan for a cultural center was eliminated precisely because it would complicate what freedom means in American history. 24 “Operation Enduring Freedom” is the official name of the Global War on Terror in Afghanistan. Subsequently, it has also become affiliated with counterterrorism operations in other countries including the Philippines and the Trans Sahara.

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These operations for “freedom” have been justified in part by the belief that the Global

War on Terror is a war to give “freedom” to “unfree” others.25 In fact, one of the goals of the

U.S. government is to liberate oppressed people from repressive regimes. Bush ended his announcement of the invasion of Iraq in the following manner: “My fellow citizens, the dangers to our country and the world will be overcome. We will pass through this time of peril and carry on the work of peace. We will defend our freedom. We will bring freedom to others and we will prevail.”26 Arguably, it is not necessarily the case that the goal of giving freedom to unfree others was considered important from a “humanitarian” perspective. Rather, it was pursued for strategic purposes. The Bush administration proposed to “unfree” oppressed Iraqi citizens “to build a new

Iraq that is prosperous and free” by ending Hussein’s dictatorship.27 This proposition was based

25 This is probably the reason why the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse became such a huge scandal in 2004. Photographs revealing a series of human rights violations against detainees in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq by personnel of the U.S. Army and the Central Intelligence Agency severely undermined the discourse of freedom framing the Global War on Terror and contradicted the U.S. self-image as the savior of the oppressed. 26 “President Bush Address the Nation.” In particular, Muslim women’s bodies have been appropriated as a rationale for the continuation of the U.S. military aggressions in the Middle East. Then-First Lady Laura Bush’s radio address to the nation on November 18th, 2001 exemplifies this appropriation. She said, “Afghan women know, through hard experience, what the rest of the world is discovering: The brutal oppression of women is a central goal of the terrorists. Long before the current war began, the Taliban and its terrorist allies were making the lives of children and women in Afghanistan miserable…Women have been denied access to doctors when they’re sick. Life under the Taliban is so hard and repressive, even small displays of joy are outlawed—children aren’t allowed to fly kites; their mothers face beatings for laughing out loud. Women cannot work outside the home, or even leave their homes by themselves…Because of our recent military gains in much of Afghanistan, women are no longer imprisoned in their homes. They can listen to music and teach their daughters without fear of punishment. Yet the terrorists who helped rule that country now plot and plan in many countries. And they must be stopped. The fight against terrorism is also a fight for the rights and dignity of women” [“Radio Address by Mrs. Bush, The White House, https://georgewbush- whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/11/20011117.html (accessed February 28th)]. As is illustrated by Laura Bush’s address, over the years, the U.S. has militarily performed a spectacle of “white men, seeking to save brown women from brown men,” which Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak defines as the imperialist exploitation of feminism (A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present, [Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999], 303). 27 “President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48 Hours,” The White House, March 17, 2003, https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030317-7.html (accessed February 28th).

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on the conviction that replacing a repressive regime with another regime sharing the same value of freedom as the U.S. would be beneficial to U.S. national security. A correlation between the

(un)free status of others and the vulnerability of the U.S., in other words, was established. By giving freedom to unfree others, the U.S. would become safer.

The Cold War and the Global War on Terror

The association of “vulnerability” and “freedom” is nothing new in American history. It can be traced back to the Cold War. As Mimi Nguyen argues, the association was a postwar product, and one of the guiding principles of this period.28 Harry Truman already hinted at the link between vulnerability and freedom in his presidential address delivered to Congress in 1947.

Since “the foreign policy and the national security of this country [were] involved” and at stake, he pledged to aid Greece and Turkey, or countries threatened by Soviet expansionism:

At the present moment in world history nearly every nation must choose between

alternative ways of life. The choice is too often not a free one.

One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free

institutions, representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual

liberty, freedom of speech and religion, and freedom from political oppression.

The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon

the majority. It relies upon terror and oppression, a controlled press and radio,

fixed elections and the suppression of personal freedoms.

28 Mimi Nguyen, Gift of Freedom: War, Debt, and Other Refugee Passages (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010), 36.

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I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples

who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside

pressures.29

Truman redefined the Cold War binary between “democracy” and “communism” as an opposition between two “ways of life” and condemned the communist side, which he believed was antithetical to a free way of life, or the American way of life. While acknowledging that

Cold War politics made it difficult or even impossible for one to freely choose between the two ways of life, he asserted that the U.S. as the leader of the “free” world was obliged to liberate people who were deprived of “freedom” from totalitarian communist regimes. This was also necessary because those regimes were a threat to national security: “totalitarian (communist) regimes…, by direct or indirect aggression, undermine the foundations of the international peace and hence the security of the United States.”30 Avowing the vulnerability of the U.S., Truman proposed to disseminate “freedom” to distant “unfree” others by monitoring their undemocratic regimes.31 As one of “the freedom-loving peoples of the world,” he “determined that their own self-interest and security were best served by distant others’ having the benefit of freedom.”32

29 Truman’s speech to Congress, “Address of the President of the United States Delivered Before a Joint Session of the Senate and the House of Representatives, Recommending Assistance to Greece and Turkey,” Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum,, March 12, 1947, https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/doctrine/large/documents/index.php?docum entdate=1947-03-12&documentid=5-9&pagenumber=1 (accessed February 28th). 30 Ibid. 31 In his canonical work Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy, Michael Hunt argues that “an active quest for national greatness closely coupled to the promotion of liberty” is the key to grasp the formation of the U.S. foreign policy. I would suggest that this coupling should be triangulated by the sense of vulnerability haunting the U.S. For more discussion about the importance of this sense of fear for the U.S. both in the Cold War and the Global War on Terror, see Joseph Masco, The Theater of Operations: National Security Affect from the Cold War to the War on Terror (Durham: Duke University Press, 2014). 32 Gift of Freedom, 36. In Imperial Affects: Sensational Melodrama and the Attractions of American Cinema, Jonna Eagle claims that imperialist sentiment in the U.S. has long been powered by the twin engines of vulnerability and violence, generating cultural, melodramatic fantasies of a national subject at once victimized and invincible. Truman was a protagonist in one of those fantasies. Being haunted by the

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In such a manner, the Cold War was conceived as a “liberal” project to safeguard U.S. national security. The irony of this project was that “freedom” was limited to an American way of life and the U.S. imposed its views upon others and “allies” as a liberal empire. Consequently, the world was being remapped as “Americans saw fit.”33 More specifically, the

“containment/integration” model explained by Christina Klein, became the basis for U.S. Cold

War logistics.34 On the one hand, those who failed to conform to the American way of life were to be contained within the Communist Bloc as enemy-others of the U.S. On the other hand,

“allies” would be integrated into the free world and encouraged to pursue the ideal of “freedom.”

The U.S. policy of containment was politically formulated to economically aid allies but also to militarily combat enemy-others, or communists in this instance. In the early stages of the

American War in Vietnam, for instance, through the Strategic Hamlet Program, the U.S. government attempted to spatially delineate and extend the Western Bloc in South Vietnam by physically isolating the rural population from contact with the National Liberation Front, more commonly known as the Việt Cộng. In 1962, in the policy document entitled “A Strategic

Concept for South Vietnam,” Roger Hilsman, the then director of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research, proposed to create new communities of heavily fortified hamlets in the most populated rural areas of South Vietnam. Each hamlet, according to him, was to be guarded by a self-defense group of 75 to 100 armed men who were responsible for “enforcing

sense of vulnerability, he believed that the U.S. had to militarily prevail, or was more than capable of doing so. 33 This phrase appeared in Henry Luce’s essay published in 1941: the U.S. must “accept wholeheartedly our duty and our opportunity as the most powerful and vital nation in the world and in consequence to exert upon the world the full impact of our influence, for such purpose as we see fit and by such means as we see fit” (“The American Century,” Life February, 17, 1941 [61-65], 63). His account exemplified the emergence of the sentiment of the U.S. as a liberal empire at that time. 34 Klein, Cold War Orientalism: Asia in the Middlebrow Imagination, 1945-1961 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), 32.

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curfews, checking identity cards, and ferreting out hard-core Communists.”35 Endorsed by John

F. Kennedy, this program was implemented to strengthen the defense line of the free world against enemy-others by resettling peasants behind “a ditch and a fence of barbed wire.”36

Consequently, areas outside those communities were designated as free fire zones where soldiers were authorized to shoot anyone “unidentified.”

Along with the implementation—and the eventual failure—of the Strategic Hamlet

Program, those free fire zones continued to expand. The problem was that the distinction between the Viet Congs antagonistic to the U.S. and the Southern Vietnamese remained indistinguishable to American eyes. Later, in the American War in Vietnam, Vietnamese civilians whose hearts and minds were to be won with the promise of a free world became the target of mass murders in South Vietnam. In the late 1960s, for instance, the order to “kill anything that moves” was passed down from the headquarters of the U.S. military to soldiers fighting on the ground. The Pentagon’s demand for quantifiable corpses, as American investigative journalist Nick Turse argues, incentivized American soldiers to kill Vietnamese people including noncombatants.37 Because of this directive, many soldiers became obsessed with producing casualties that they could claim as enemy kills. In addition, while mass murders were committed by individual soldiers, policies such as the indiscriminate use of artillery and air

35 Roger Hilsman, “A Strategic Concept for South Vietnam,” Roger Hilsman Personal Papers, Countries Files, 1961-1964. Vietnam: February 2nd, 1962. RHPP-003-006. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/Archives/RHPP-003-006.aspx (accessed February 28th). 36 Ibid. Kennedy himself saw the world divided between us and them over freedom in his inaugural address on January 20th, 1961: “Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” See “Inaugural Address,” John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/historic-speeches/inaugural-address (accessed February 28th). 37 Nick Turse, Kill Anything That Moves: the Real American War in Vietnam (New York: Picador, 2013), 190.

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power to remove and disrupt the population of Vietnam were implemented. The American War in Vietnam, which was supposedly fought to keep (at least South) Vietnamese civilians free from the repressive communist regime of North Vietnam led to an overwhelming number of deaths and casualties among the Vietnamese.

Similar contradictions have been repeated in the Global War on Terror.38 In the mainstream discourse, the war—although supposedly launched to safeguard U.S. national security—was continuously promoted and justified as a war to give freedom to unfree others. It is, however, those unfree others who have paid the price for American armed interventions. In

Afghanistan, many civilians were maimed and killed by U.S. bombing campaigns.39 According to Neta C. Crawford, a professor of Political Science at Boston University and Co-Director of the

Costs of War project, “[o]ver the past nearly 15 years, approximately 111,000 people have been killed” and “[o]f these, more than 31,000 of the dead are Afghan civilians.”40

38 This is not to say that the Cold War was not different from the Global War on Terror. There is a crucial difference between them in terms of geography. On the one hand, in the former, enemy-others were supposedly contained in the geographically circumscribed Communist Bloc. In the latter, threats of enemy-others are global and not constrained by geography. In fact, it was the national centers of economy, politics, and military inside the U.S. that were targeted and attacked on September 11th, 2001. In terms of the “liberation” of unfree others, however, some striking similarities can be found between the Cold War, in particular the American War in Vietnam, and the Global War on Terror. 39 In order to condemn civilian casualties, Afghan people who are in reality far from being saved by the U.S. have organized a series of protests against the U.S. government. In addition, then-Afghan President Hamid Karzai repeatedly pleaded with the American government to avoid killing Afghan civilians in military operations. In 2008, he sent a list of demands about the conduct of American troops, a part of which “was that they shouldn’t…bombard our villages [quoted in “Afghan Leader Sends Demands to US on Troop Conduct,” http://www.afghanemb-canada.net/public-affairs-afghanistan-embassy-canada- ottawa/daily-news-bulletin-afghanistan-embassy-canada- ottawa/2008/news_articles/december/12182008.html (accessed February 28th)]. Despite these efforts, the U.S.-led airstrikes did not stop but led to a great number of civilian deaths in Afghanistan. 40 Neta C. Crawford, “Update on the Human Costs of War for Afghanistan and Pakistan 2001 to mid- 2016,” Watson Institute, http://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/imce/papers/2016/War%20in%20Afghanistan%20and%20 Pakistan%20UPDATE_FINAL_corrected%20date.pdf (accessed February 28th).

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In Iraq, the Global War on Terror devastated the everyday lives of ordinary citizens by tearing apart the infrastructure of their society. In the blog Baghdad Burning, a 25-year-old Iraqi woman calling herself Riverbend offers eyewitness accounts of the dire situation that she and other fellow citizens face in Baghdad. After the invasion of Iraq in 2003, according to Riverbend,

“the luxuries—electricity, clean water from faucets, walkable streets, safe schools” could not be taken for granted there.41 “[I]t’s just not safe” to live in Baghdad.42 Arguably, those “unfree” others who were already vulnerable under repressive regimes became even more vulnerable by the U.S. military operations initiated and carried out for “freedom.”

And yet, just as the American War in Vietnam was justified by the U.S. government in the past, the Global War on Terror has been represented as a “just” and “justifiable” war in mainstream discourse. This is the logical outcome of a history of U.S. foreign policy where, as discussed above, the U.S. subject always assumed the status of being the “vulnerable” party. As

Judith Butler argues, “[i]f a particular subject considers her- or himself to be by definition injured or indeed persecuted, then whatever acts of violence such a subject commits cannot register as ‘doing injury,’ since the subject who does them is, by definition, precluded from anything but suffering injury.”43 In other words, “the production of the subject on the basis of its injured status then produces a permanent ground for legitimating (and disavowing) its own violent actions.”44 In fact, the Global War on Terror has been defined as an act of self-defense by the U.S. government since 9/11.45 After the terrorist attacks, the U.S. once again appeared as a

41 Riverbend, Baghdad Burning, https://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/ (accessed February 28th). 42 Ibid. 43 Judith Butler, Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable (New York: Verso, 2009), 179. 44 Ibid. 45 This is the case not only with the Bush administration but with the Obama administration. In a speech delivered in May 2013, Obama used the term “global War on Terror” in quotation marks, saying, “Beyond Afghanistan, we must define our effort not as a boundless “global War on Terror,” but rather as a series of persistent, targeted efforts to dismantle specific networks of violent extremists that threaten

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vulnerable subject who was injured in the past and could be always already injurable in the present and future. Because of this recurring sense of vulnerability, for the U.S., war is continuously justifiable. To avow one’s vulnerability, as Butler argues, “does not in any way guarantee a politics of non-violence.”46 Rather, in the history of U.S. foreign policy, the sense of vulnerability is what has justified American armed interventions in the name of freedom.47

A Cartography of Vulnerability

The realization that the U.S. is prone to feeling vulnerable helps us understand why it continuously justifies violent military actions against others. It also uses the same logic to initiate a process of making particular places “safe.” As discussed above, the creation of fortified hamlets in the rural area of South Vietnam was a result of the fear that the free world would be invaded by the Communist Bloc. In other words, a “cartography of vulnerability” was at work as the U.S. engaged in the Cold War. This cartography, or the practice of mapping sections of the world as unsafe and vulnerable, I argue, has also changed the American landscape in the case of the Global War on Terror. In order to illustrate this point, this chapter takes a detour here and focuses on the U.S.-Mexico border in the next section of my investigation. This detour to the

America” [“Remarks by the President at the National Defense University,” https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2013/05/23/remarks-president-national-defense- university (accessed February 28th)]. His administration attempted to limit this war and dropped the term from its National Security Strategy. Nevertheless, basic objectives of the Global War on Terror stipulated by the Bush administration remained in place. In the same speech, Obama even reiterated the vulnerable status of the U.S. subject: “We are at war with an organization that right now would kill as many Americans as they could if we did not stop them first. So this is a just war—a war waged proportionally, in last resort, and in self-defense” (Ibid.). 46 Ibid., 178. 47 This may well go back to the American Revolution in the 18th century. The U.S. has always claimed that it is defending itself, including when the U.S. is allegedly defending freedom abroad. In the case of the American Revolution, the U.S. claimed its vulnerability to another power—Britain—and the right to defend itself. In this sense, the notion of self-defense has been the basis for the existence of the U.S.

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geographic edge of the U.S. will better clarify the place-making process of a “cartography of vulnerability” within the context of 9/11.

The Southern Border

The U.S.-Mexico border has recently received much attention. It was one of the major

“troubled areas” identified by Donald Trump in his presidential campaign in 2015 and 2016.

Calling Mexicans criminals and rapists, he argued for the construction of “an impenetrable, physical, tall, powerful, beautiful, southern border wall” along the Mexican border to keep the

U.S. safe.48 Elected as president of the U.S. in 2016, Trump began plans to build a great wall, commonly known as the “Trump wall” which revealed his racial animosity toward Mexicans and other “brown” people from Central and South America. For the construction of the wall, he issued executive orders, introduced a law, shut down the federal government, and declared a national emergency.

Disturbing as Trump’s racist politics are, he is not alone in demanding a wall. While the

U.S.-Mexico border wall has been associated with Trump’s presidency, it was a national project that had already been in place before 9/11.49 Despite the fact that not a single terrorist responsible for the coordinated attacks against America by the hijacked passenger airliners on the morning of September 11, 2001 crossed the nation’s southern border, the construction of the border barrier was continually rationalized as an anti-terrorism strategy. Representative David

Dreier of California explained: “I hate the idea of our having to put up a fence. The fact of the matter is we have no choice. We have no choice because this week, as we marked the fifth

48 From Trump’s rally as the Republican presidential nominee in Phoenix, Arizona, on August 31, http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1609/01/cnr.05.html (accessed February 28th). 49 The fortification of the country’s southern border was already initiated in the late 1980s and the 1990s as part of the so-called war on drugs. However, it gained momentum after the U.S. was attacked on its own territory in 2001.

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anniversary of Sept. 11th, we are in the midst of a global war on terror. We face the threat of someone who would like to do us in coming across our border.’’50 He redirected the sense of vulnerability generated by 9/11 from the east coast to the U.S.-Mexico border. In so doing,

Dreier justified the policy to put up a fence by implying that, without it, another 9/11 would likely happen. This policy was legislated as the Secure Fence Act of 2006 during the Bush administration with bipartisan support in Congress. In the House of Representatives, the vote was 283 to 138, and, in the Senate, it was 80 to 19, with then-Senators Barack Obama and

Hillary Clinton voting yes. After the passage of this act, during both the Bush and Obama presidencies, around one third of the country’s southern border was fenced.51 Following this policy, Trump promised to build a wall in the remaining sections.

Calling the border barrier along the Mexican border just a “fence” is an understatement.

As Bush argues, it has been militarized “[b]y making wise use of physical barriers and deploying

21st century technology.”52 According to Reece Jones, a change has been brought to the border in the aftermath of 9/11 in terms of “the construction of substantial border infrastructure that expanded the enforcement area.”53 It “includes nine Predator drones…that patrol the

Southwestern border, high-tech surveillance systems known as ‘smart borders’ that use sensors and cameras to monitor for movement at the border, and ground-penetrating radar designed to detect subterranean tunnels.”54 At the U.S.-Mexico border, “[m]ilitary power, hardware, organization, operations, and technology” have been used “as…primary problem solving

50 U.S. Congressional Record 2006, H6583, https://www.congress.gov/congressional- record/2006/09/14/house-section/article/H6581-1? (accessed February 28th). 51 See Reece Jones, Border Barriers: Security and the War on Terror in the United States, India, and Israel (New York: Zed Books, 2012), 1. 52 “President Bush Signs Secure Fence Act,” https://georgewbush- whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2006/10/20061026.html (accessed February 28th). 53 Reece Jones, Violent Borders: Refugees and the Right to Move (New York: Verso, 2016), 36. 54 Ibid., 36-7.

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tools.”55 By definition, the territorial border exists on domestic territory and thus it is governed not by the military but by police officers. The clear limits on the internal use of the military is stipulated by the Posse Comitatus Act, which was passed after the Civil War: “It shall not be lawful to employ any part of the Army of the United States, as a posse comitatus, or otherwise, for the purpose of executing the laws, except in such employment of said force may be expressly authorized by the Constitution or by act of Congress.56” And yet, the distinction between the military and the police is blurred precisely because Congress has enacted a number of exemptions over the years.57 Hence, the country’s southern border is a place where the U.S. as a nation-state executes a policing role by exercising military power.58

The amalgamation of the military and the police has made the U.S-Mexico border deadlier for non-Americans who intend to cross it or even get close to it. Fifteen-year-old Sergio

Hernandez Guereca, for instance, was shot down by the Border Patrol despite the fact that he was on the Mexican side, and at least 20 to 30 meters away from the “fence” between Juárez, Mexico and El Paso, Texas. For whatever reason, Sergio and his three teenage friends reached the

“fence” at one point and were forced to retreat when Jesus Mesa Jr., a Border Patrol agent, rushed in with his gun drawn. Sergio and two other boys were able to run away to the Mexican

55 Ibid. 56 Posse Comitatus Act, 1878, 18 U.S.C. § 1385, 20 Stat. 152. 57 This blurring has also occurred in the Global War on Terror fought in the Middle East, but in the other way around: the U.S. military force has engaged in policing activities there. Those activities carried out by American soldiers “[include] checking documents, raiding houses, and searching for criminals and insurgents in a manner similar to the way SWAT teams conduct drug raids” (Violent Border, 40). 58 It is often said that globalization is undermining the authority of the nation-state because it is making the world borderless. Reasoning in this way, Wendy Brown argues that “[c]ounterintuitively, perhaps, it is the weakening of the state sovereignty, and more precisely, the detachment of sovereignty from the nation-state that is generating much of the frenzy of nation-state wall building today” (Walled States, Waning Sovereignty, 24). For her, the construction of border barriers including the one along the U.S.- Mexico border is a losing attempt for the dissolving nation-state to reassert its power. Contrary to Brown’s argument, in the case of the U.S., its authority is anything but declining. At the country’s southern border, the governing authority of the U.S. is being performed and reified by the deployment of its military/police power.

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side. The fourth boy was detained. In response, the others threw rocks at Agent Mesa, who fired back three times across the border into Mexico. Sergio was killed. Agent Mesa exercised deadly force beyond the border, which was by definition the territory of the military, even though he was a domestic law enforcement officer. The fact that Sergio’s life was in the hands of Agent

Mesa indicates that around the militarized barrier, the lives of those on the Mexican side have become increasingly vulnerable and at risk.

The presence of the militarized border barrier has also led to an increase in the number of deaths among migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border to the U.S. For instance, according to the International Organization for Migration, a related organization to the United Nations, “[t]he number of migrants who died crossing the United States-Mexico border in 2017 remained high, despite a forty-four per cent decrease in border apprehensions reported by the US Border Patrol between 2016 and 2017.”59 To avoid parts of the border where high-tech surveillance systems are deployed by heavily armed Border Patrol agents, migrants often choose to take “the arduous journey through the deserts of Arizona, which requires hiking for fifty or more kilometers through arid and desolate terrain.”60 This kind of rerouting is strategically intended by the U.S. government, as described in the first National Border Patrol Strategy: “The prediction is that with traditional entry and smuggling routes disrupted, illegal traffic will be deterred, or forced over more hostile terrain, less suited for crossing and more suited for enforcement.”61 The deaths of migrants are, therefore, attributable not just to direct violence by the Border Patrol, but also to

59 “Migrant Deaths Remain High despite Sharp Fall in US-Mexico Border Crossings in 2017,” https://www.iom.int/news/migrant-deaths-remain-high-despite-sharp-fall-us-mexico-border-crossings- 2017 (accessed February 28th). 60 Jones, Violent Borders, 45. 61 U.S. Customs and Border Protection, National Border Patrol Strategy (Washington, DC: U.S. Border Patrol), 2005.

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the structural violence created by the U.S. border policy which ensures more deaths among migrants when they are crossing borderlands far from the main entry points.

To sum up, this kind of border policy has become the norm since September 11, 2001. By responding to the fear of further terrorist attacks, the Bush administration started to construct and militarize the U.S.-Mexico border. From the beginning, the militarized border barrier was intended for migrants coming to the U.S. from Mexico, as no terrorists responsible for 9/11 crossed the U.S.-Mexico border.62 Taken from the original context of 9/11, the heightened sense of vulnerability justified the construction of the militarized border barrier. While the U.S. fought the Global War on Terror in the Middle East, this sense of fear changed the landscape of the country’s southern edge.

Feeling Vulnerable

The sense of vulnerability provoked by the terrorist attacks on September 11th, 2001, not only allowed the U.S. military to intervene in the Middle East but also to remap the U.S.-Mexico border. The national trauma of 9/11 is, in other words, affecting widely separated geographic places. Among them, Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, the epicenter of 9/11, is included. Not unlike the militarized border barrier where a “cartography of vulnerability” is practiced, the rebuilt WTC site is also a product of the sense of vulnerability. In order to clarify this point, let us turn to the reconstruction process of the site with a focus on the primary tower One World

Trade Center and the National September 11 Memorial Reflecting Absence, two architectural structures that spatially define the Ground Zero memorial complex.

62 Border barriers are “designed to detect and prevent the movement of the world’s poor,” not necessarily “terrorists” (Violent Borders, 46). By severely restricting the mobility of the poor, militarized border barriers function as an apparatus by which rich countries secure cheap labor on the “other side.” Militarized border barriers are one of the factors keeping and expanding the gap between the wealthy and the poor.

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If One World Trade Center were built in accordance with the original design by Daniel

Libeskind, the master plan architect for the overall reconstruction project at Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan, it would be an entirely different building and spatial complex. As an architect known for integrating allegorical elements into his works, Libeskind embedded symbolic meanings in his proposal for the primary building of the new WTC complex, the Freedom

Tower. He designed it to stand 1,776 feet high. The tower would rise “above its predecessors, reasserting the preeminence of freedom and beauty, restoring the spiritual peak to the city, creating an icon that speaks of our vitality in the face of our danger and optimism in the aftermath of tragedy.”63 The Freedom Tower’s specific height, as pointed out in the previous chapter, was intended to signify the year of the Declaration of Independence and the democratic ideals expressed in the founding document. The tower was also designed as an asymmetric spiraling structure resembling the Statue of Liberty. By designing this spire with its symbolically meaningful height for the tallest building in the world at that time, Libeskind attempted to architecturally represent the greatness of the U.S.

Although the Freedom Tower was well-received by New Yorkers to the extent that

Libeskind called himself the “people’s architect,” many of his original concepts were eventually eliminated from the tower’s final design.64 This was mainly because of disagreements between

Libeskind and Larry Silverstein, the real estate mogul who owned the lease to the WTC complex. To secure more office space and assure more rent, he directed his personal architect

David Childs to make revisions to Libeskind’s design, which originally prioritized symbolic elements over economic benefits.65 Silverstein’s pursuit of economic gains—namely, his “pursuit

63 Memory Foundations. 64 Greenspan, Battle for Ground Zero, 120. 65 Libeskind, for instance, opposed a request to place the primary building of the new WTC complex in a more rentable location. Instead, he proposed to integrate it in a way to line up the tower with the Statue of

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of happiness” as a capitalist—took precedence over any interest in addressing the national trauma of 9/11. Consequently, except for the height of 1,776 feet, Libeskind’s architectural allegories were eliminated. In One World Trade Center, therefore, there is almost no trace of the original vision of Freedom Tower, including its name.66

It was, however, not just Silverstein’s capitalistic motives that changed the course of the construction of the tower. The sense of vulnerability also affected its design. For instance, out of the fear that the rebuilt tower would be the target of another terrorist attack in the future, the New

York City Police Department demanded that the tower be adequately fortified.67 As a result, in part because of security concerns, the asymmetry of the spiraling structure of Libeskind’s

Freedom Tower was “straightened out” into a symmetrical form. In addition, in order to respond to the NYPD’s demand, a 187-foot concrete base was added to the design. Because of this addition, One World Trade Center, in particular its base structure, eventually ended up resembling a “bunker.” The tower is now a kind of fortress equipped with a number of security technologies. The architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP, which took over

Libeskind’s project, made sure that the NYPD’s demands were met. In the event of a major

Liberty across the ocean. From the beginnings, Freedom Tower was known for the significantly limited office space. It would only go up to the middle of the tower. The rest were allocated for greenery gardens called Vertical World Gardens [see “Slide 21,” http://www.renewnyc.com/plan_des_dev/wtc_site/new_design_plans/firm_d/slides/slide21.asp (accessed February 28th)] because, Libeskind argued, they were “a constant affirmation of life” (Memory Foundations). 66 Libeskind also designed two plazas, which were named “Park of Heroes” and “Wedge of Light” respectively. These plazas were deliberately designed and placed so that no surrounding building would cast a shadow on them from 8:46 a.m. (the time the first plane had hit) to 10:28 a.m. (the time the second tower had fallen) on every September 11th. They were also eliminated from One World Trade Center. 67 See Deborah Sontag, “The Hole in the City’s Heart,” The New York Times, September 11th, 2006, https://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/11/nyregion/nyregionspecial3/11groundzero.html (accessed February 28th) and Patrick D. Healy and William K. Rashbaum, “Security Concerns Force a Review of Plans for Ground Zero,” The New York Times, May 1st, 2005, https://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/01/nyregion/security-concerns-force-a-review-of-plans-for-ground- zero.html (accessed February 28th).

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terrorist attack, its “life-safety systems—stairs, communications, risers, sprinklers, elevators— are encased in a core wall that is three feet thick in most places.”68 It was also decided that

“biological and chemical filters in the air supply system” as well as “interconnected redundant exits” should be installed.69 In order to further satisfy NYPD’s demands, the tower’s “setback distance from West Street…has been increased from 25 feet to an average of 90 feet.”70 As such, the fear of another attack against the U.S.significantly changed the design of the primary building of the new WTC complex.

Via Pearl Harbor

Not only One World Trade Center but also Reflecting Absence, the National September

11 Memorial, the centerpiece of Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, was affected by the sense of vulnerability. The memorial was designed by an Israeli-American architect Michael Arad, and selected from 5,201 proposals submitted to the World Trade Center Site Memorial Competition held by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation in 2003. Asad’s original design had an underground component, and Arad had to modify it in part for security purposes. “[S]ecurity people” estimated that “[t]he memorial probably is as big a target as the [towers] were” and that the underground component would pose a security liability by making the memorial even more vulnerable to terrorist attacks.71 Because of this security concern, the underground component

68 “Freedom Tower Fact Sheet,” http://renewnyc.com/content/pdfs/freedom_tower_fact_sheet.pdf (accessed February 28th). 69 Ibid. 70 Ibid. 71 “Patt Morrison Asks: Memorial Man Peter Walker,” The Los Angels Times, September 10th, 2011, http://articles.latimes.com/2011/sep/10/opinion/la-oe-morrison-peter-walker-20110910 (accessed February 28th).

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was eventually eliminated.72 This suggests that the fear that the U.S. would be attacked again, more or less, dictated the design and construction of Reflecting Absence, or the overall reconstruction process of the WTC site.

This is, however, not the whole story of the cartography of vulnerability. Places produced through this cartography create certain realities. In fact, around fortified hamlets in South

Vietnam, the order to “kill anything that moves” was implemented and in the militarized border area between Juárez, Mexico and El Paso, Texas, Sergio was killed. Highly “secured” as a result of the sense of vulnerability, these areas nevertheless induced violence. Questions then arise: what about the Ground Zero memorial complex? How were important components of its plan motivated and shaped by this sense of fear? And perhaps, most significantly for this project, what kind of reality did and does the memorial complex create?

These questions will be addressed through another detour, but this time to Hawai‘i. This is because the archipelago in the Pacific is the only other place where the U.S. was attacked on its “territory” by a foreign entity, and the attack on Pearl Harbor has often emerged as a parallel reference point for Americans. Furthermore, the USS Arizona Memorial, is structurally similar to

Reflecting Absence in an important way. The USS Arizona Memorial was built over the sunken

72 The selection jury of the competition also demanded the elimination for a more “practical” reason. They believed that the vertical architectural structure would impede visitors’ accessibility. According to the selection jury, the proposed National 9/11 Memorial should “fit into the surrounding streets and sidewalks and into the larger context of Lower Manhattan” (David W. Dunlap and Glenn Collins, “How Greening of Design Swayed Memorial Jury,” The New York Times, January 8th, 2004, https://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/08/nyregion/how-greening-of-design-swayed-memorial-jury.html). In order to achieve this end, Arad was made to work with an American landscape architect Peter Walker. As a result, Reflecting Absence was redesigned. Its underground component was elevated to street level so that pedestrians could freely not only walk into the memorial area of the Ground Zero memorial complex but also look down on the memorial and walk out of this site. This redesign was intended to “[encourage] the use of this space by New Yorkers on a daily basis” (“About the Memorial,” https://www.911memorial.org/design-competition). This, however, does not mean that the WTC site, or, by extension, Lower Manhattan, was, in reality, reconstructed as an open place of remembrance. On the contrary, while the physical site welcomes pedestrian traffic, there is a limit on who can be remembered within and around the Ground Zero memorial complex, as discussed in Chapter 1.

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remains of the USS Arizona battleship to commemorate the sailors killed on December 7, 1941.

On that day, the Imperial Japanese Navy and its aircrafts bombed the U.S. naval base at Pearl

Harbor on the island of O‘ahu, causing enormous damage. A detour to Hawai‘i will illustrate the ways in which the memorial at Pearl Harbor functions similarly to the one at Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan.

The USS Arizona Memorial consists of two components separated by water. One of them is the 184-foot-long memorial structure floating above the sea surface. All the names of the deceased American soldiers are alphabetically engraved on one of the walls inside this memorial structure. The other component is the sunken battleship of the USS Arizona, which lies underneath the memorial structure. Underwater, the sunken battleship is decaying and spilling out oil. Visitors take a 145 passenger U.S. Navy boat to the memorial structure and, from there, can see the ruined state of the USS Arizona from above.73 The sunken battleship is literally a physical and symbolic “trace” of the attack against the U.S. The USS Arizona Memorial is thus structured to allow visitors to view the damage that the U.S. received on December 7th, 1941.

Art historian Rosalind Krauss explain that architectural structures that integrate a “trace” can be filled with “an extraordinary sense of time-past.”74 According to her, a trace “produced by a physical cause” is “[a vestige] of that cause which is itself no longer present.”75 When a trace is architecturally integrated into a building, a trace inevitably brings back the memory of the causal

73 The USS Arizona Memorial constitutes a part of the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center. At the center, a route is set for visitors to take. In order to see the sunken USS Arizona in person, visitors are required to join the free tour including a film “on the history of the politics, the people, and the attack on Oahu” [“USS Arizona Memorial,” http://www.pearlharborhistoricsites.org/pearl-harbor/arizona-memorial (accessed February 28th)]. After viewing the film, they board a boat to the memorial. While waiting for the timed entry tour to begin, visitors are encouraged to explore the grounds of the Visitor Center and, in particular, to walk through the museum area. As for the exhibition of the museum, see footnote 79 in this chapter. 74 Rosalind Krauss, The Originality of the Avant-garde and Other Modernist Myths (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1986), 217. 75 Ibid.

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events that constituted it “into the consciousness of the viewer.”76 Following Krauss, the USS

Arizona is a trace and thus, the USS Arizona Memorial continually evokes the moment of

December 7th, 1941, and its immediate aftermath for visitors, as a memorial integrating the sunken battleship/a trace of the attack against the U.S. The memorial is, in other words, possessed by the past event that produced the sunken ship as a trace, only to memorialize the tragic events associated with the Attack on the Pearl Harbor.

The current significance of the USS Arizona Memorial or its singular focus on one violent event in its past and not others becomes apparent when the site is put in conversation with the history of Hawai‘i. Pearl Harbor was originally called Ke Awalao o‘ Pu‘uloa, meaning

“the many waters of the long hill,” by Native Hawaiians. It was “the breadbasket of O‘ahu, a fertile estuary supporting as many as 36 fishponds,” which, according to Native Hawaiian activist Terri Keko‘olani, “made the land momona (fat) and brought a time of peace to O‘ahu.”77

In order to exclusively use Pu‘uloa/Pearl Harbor to expand the U.S. naval power across the

Pacific, the U.S. took this breadbasket away from the Kingdom of Hawai‘i with the threat of violence in the late nineteenth century and subsequently established a base on the site.78 Since then, the U.S. occupation of Pearl Harbor and the Hawaiian archipelago has continued into the

76 Ibid. 77 Tina Grandinetti, “In the Shadow of the Beast,” Flux, April 3rd, 2014, http://fluxhawaii.com/in-the- shadow-of-the-beast/. This account of Pu‘uloa/Pearl Harbor is based on her experience of joining the decolonizing O‘ahu tour called “DeTour” organized by local activists in Hawai‘i. 78 With the signing of the Reciprocity Treaty of 1875, the U.S. gained lands in the Pu‘uloa/Pearl Harbor area. In 1887, a league of anti-monarchists mainly consisting of white men of North American origin, joined by an armed militia, forced King David Kalākaua to sign what he called “The Bayonet Constitution” that was to renew the Reciprocity Treaty with the Pearl Harbor clause. Subsequently, the Kingdom of Hawai‘i itself was illegally overthrown. In 1893, with the help of the U.S. military force, American businessmen carried out a coup d’état. They prevailed upon the American minister John L. Stevens to call in the well-armed U.S. Marines and sailors under the pretext of protecting the safety and property of American residents in Honolulu. The coup left Queen Lili'uokalani imprisoned in her own home, ʻIolani Palace. Later, the Kingdom of Hawai‘i briefly became the Republic of Hawaii and was eventually annexed by the U.S. in 1898. Following the annexation, in 1899, the U.S. Navy established a base at Pearl Harbor.

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present day.79 In this case, the U.S. is clearly the aggressor. And yet, the USS Arizona Memorial inverts the direction of aggression.80 Through the confinement of the memorial’s reference to the

1941 bombing by the Japanese, visitors are invited to feel that it is not Native Hawaiians but the

U.S. who was injured and is injurable.81

79 In the scholarship of settler colonialism, occupation is defined as a historical practice “to benefit settlers economically and politically and to subjugate…indigenous peoples” and the Native land (Asian Settler Colonialism: From Local Governance to the Habits of Everyday Life in Hawai‘i, 10). Informed by this scholarship, I use the term “occupation” to designate a settler project, “the primary object of [which] is the land itself rather than the surplus value to be derived from mixing native labour with it” (Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology, 163). 80 This inversion is discursively reiterated in the museum area of the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center. The U.S. aggression in Hawai‘i, for instance, remains unacknowledged in the semi-gallery area called the “Oahu Court.” It is to supposedly display Hawaiian history with some photo panels and description boards. In this area, the story of the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawai‘i is narrated and yet, the narration remains superficial; who organized the overthrow for what purpose is never clarified. Even worse, the “Oahu Court” is not inside the building but an open area where a quasi-garden and benches are located. Not being designed as a proper museum exhibit, it invites visitors to sit, rest, and (probably) not think. Just as the history of slavery is marginalized at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, the history of the overthrow is displaced from the formal museum area of the visitor center. Inside the museum, the inversion of U.S. aggression continues; there are two exhibit galleries respectively called “The Road to War” and “The Attack.” They integrate so-called Japanese perspectives ranging from the wartime hardships of Japanese Americans, including their experiences of incarceration and internment during World War II to the devastation of the city of Hiroshima caused by the atomic bombing on August 6th, 1945. The displays and artifacts in these exhibit galleries are nevertheless arranged in a way to justify the war by repeating the simplified causal relationship that casts the U.S. military aggression as self-defense: the Japanese Empire initiated a surprise attack, and the U.S. rightly/righteously responded to it. By creating a narrative arc through the placement of the display on the “Attack” on Pearl Harbor at the beginning and the display on the atomic bombing in Hiroshima at the end, the exhibit galleries juxtapose these two violent yet completely different events and imply that Hiroshima was bombed because of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Inside (and outside) the museum, the vulnerable status of the U.S. (in Hawai‘i) is never questioned but rather consistently claimed. Placed at the end of a sequential tour that begins at the visitor center and ends at the USS Arizona Memorial, visitors are able to recognize the structure of the memorial as a trace or evidence of the attack against the U.S., thereby emotionally and materially experiencing the truth of the claim that America was indeed the victim. 81 Examining what visitors are meant to feel at the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center, Vernadette Gonzalez argues that the USS Arizona Memorial engages in cultural labor through which to “[recruit] sympathy for U.S. visions of security” [Securing Paradise: Tourism and Militarism in Hawai‘i and the Philippines (Durham: Duke University Press, 2013), 116]. To be more precise, by “roaming the grounds of the memorial,…riding on a boat to see the memorial, paying homage to the names of the dead displayed throughout the site,” visitors are encouraged to “justify, desire…the militarization of Hawai‘i” as a measure to be taken for the sake of the national security “while averting their gaze from the fact that Hawai‘i was, and is, contested territory” (Ibid.).

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Something similar, I argue, occurs at the Ground Zero memorial complex in terms of the visitors’ experiences. Not unlike the USS Arizona Memorial, Reflecting Absence is a memorial that is structured by the trace of the attacks against the U.S. and can be described as both a physical and conceptual “trace” or “traces.” The memorial consists of two pools made of black granite stones. The pools are massive in size and yet minimalistic in design. No ornamental elements adorn the pools. Each pool is 192 x 192 feet square and set 30 feet into the underground, with cascading waterfalls continuously pouring down its walls. The pools are located exactly where the twin towers stood; the former are built into the latter’s footprints.

Materially and symbolically representing the obliteration of the twin towers, the footprints are literal traces of 9/11, and these traces determine the structure of the National September 11

Memorial complex. They are, therefore, affective signs of an extraordinary time-past. The memorial invites visitors to recall September 11th, 2001 repeatedly, and to remember that the

U.S. was attacked on that date. No other past is allowed to co-exist on the site.82

This mnemonic effect of Reflecting Absence impressed the selection jury of the World

Trade Center Site Memorial Competition. In the first place, the competition’s guideline stipulated that applicants would have to “[m]ake visible the footprints of the original World

Trade Center Towers.”83 Arad’s memorial design was chosen in part because it addressed this

82 There is another kind of similarity between Pearl Harbor and Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan as well as the U.S.-Mexico border. It is not just Native Hawaiians who were and are deprived of their land. New York and the borderland around the country’s southern border was once and in certain cases still is illegally obtained Native land. As the U.S. has remapped the geographies and landscapes of these places with the excuse of its vulnerability haunting the U.S., Native claims to the land have been effectively suppressed. 83 There were five requirements in total. The other four are the followings: “[r]ecognize each individual who was a victim of the September 11, 2001 and February 26, 1993 attacks”; “[p]rovide an area for quiet visitation and contemplation”; “[p]rovide an area for the families and loved ones of victims”; “[p]rovide a separate accessible space to serve as the final resting-place for the unidentified remains from the World Trade Center Site.” http://wtcsitememorial.org/pdf/LMDC_Guidelines_english.pdf (accessed February 28th).

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requirement in an evocative manner. James Young, one of the jury members, explained why

Reflecting Absence was chosen: “[Arad] made the footprints themselves the memorial, in their geometric form, and that was very important. We saw that as the most authentic reference to the site, even more authentic than bringing remnants back. The downward flow of the water seemed suddenly to remind you of the towers’ implosion. It was all suggested in the design.”84 Revealing that the integration of the footprints was the winning factor, Young points out that the selection jury assumed that Arad’s memorial design would bring back the memory of 9/11 by architecturally reenacting the traumatic event.85 Structured by the twin towers’ footprints—the trace signifying the fact the U.S. was attacked on the morning of September 11th, 2001—

Reflecting Absence is itself a material signifier of U.S.’s vulnerability. Despite the fact that

Arad’s memorial design was modified for security purposes, when visitors see the memorial, they are invited to remember and feel the national insecurity resulting from the terrorist attacks.

This kind of remembrance is also facilitated by One World Trade Center. Although it has been fortified as previously mentioned, the primary building of the new WTC complex is still a source of fear. Larry Tomscha and five other General Services Administration employees, for instance, filed a lawsuit in Manhattan federal court to prevent their government offices from moving into the tower. They were afraid that “their new workplace, One World Trade Center,

[would] be the target of future terrorist attacks.”86 This “symbol of the United States [sic]

84 “Inside the Jury: An Interview with James Young,” Architectural Record https://archive.org/stream/architecturalrec192janewy/architecturalrec192janewy_djvu.txt (accessed February 28th). 85 One of the jury members was Maya Lin, the architect who designed Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington D.C. Her presence suggests that Reflecting Absence is a memorial following the tradition of the contemporary American memorial culture, which is greatly influenced by Lin’s memorial vocabularies: a minimalistic style, black granite stones, and flowing water. Arad’s memorial design is the sum of these components. 86 Tomscha et al v. The General Services Administration et al, https://cases.justia.com/federal/district- courts/new-york/nysdce/1:2015cv07326/447557/19/0.pdf?ts=1466598046 (accessed February 28th).

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economic interests” was perceived as vulnerable, and this perception was widely shared. The fact that One World Trade Center was underoccupied by tenants at the time of their suit, attested to this problem. And at the time of this research project in 2019, under occupancy still troubles the landlord. Remembering 9/11 and feeling the danger of another attack, many prospective tenants are reluctant to rent office space in the building.

That the vulnerability of the U.S. is evoked at the Ground Zero memorial complex further complicates the links between the reconstruction of the WTC site and the Global War on Terror.

As discussed above, it is the sense of vulnerability that the U.S. is not immune to external attacks that has justified the war. With Reflecting Absence and One World Trade Center, the memorial complex embodies and fuels fear and anxiety, and in turn perpetuates the Global War on

Terror.87 After all, being constantly reminded of (the possibility of) being attacked can easily lead to the justification for and continuation of counterattacks. Arguably, the Ground Zero memorial complex is an apparatus of memory intended to make visitors remember and feel the cause of (the continuation of) the war first initiated as a response to 9/11. As changes have been

87 Scholarly discussion of Reflecting Absence, however, tends to overlook this simultaneity. Erika Doss, for instance, defines the memorial’s minimalist aesthetics as “dispassionate” and argues that Reflecting Absence is “perfunctory in … the message it projects” [Erika Doss, “De Oppresso Liber and Reflecting Absence: Ground Zero Memorials and the War on Terror,” American Quarterly 65, no. 1 (March 2013): 211]. Analyzing Arad’s work as such, she compares the memorial with America’s Response Monument subtitled as De Oppresso Liber, a public statue dedicated in Liberty Park overlooking Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in 2011. The monument is “a sixteen-foot-tall, five-thousand-pound bronze statue of a Special Ops soldier riding an Afghan pony,” which is intended to “[commemorate] the ‘horse soldiers’ of Operation Enduring Freedom, covert combat troops” deployed in response to 9/11 in the initial stage of the Global War on Terror in Afghanistan. Doss examines De Oppresso Liber—“liberate the oppressed,” the motto of the U.S. Army Special Forces— and argues that “the stallion’s raised hoof, flared nostrils, alert ears, and agitated tail and mane suggest he is raring to go; the commando’s taut body, aggressive glare, and cache of weapons imply martial heroics and resolute purpose” (Ibid., 203). Doss criticizes the statue. According to her, it “reifies violent retribution and American imperialism” and affectively demands of visitors their consent to the Global War on Terror by filling the absence created by 9/11 with the jingoistic image (Ibid., 212s). In contrast, Doss defines Reflecting Absence as dispassionate and claims that the memorial takes no part in the war. It is, however, precisely through the so-called “dispassionate” aesthetics that Reflecting Absence is playing a role in the escalation of the Global War on Terror, and perhaps more effectively than the statue realistically reifying American imperialism.

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made to the reconstruction process of the WTC site to address feelings of fear, the memorial complex has come into existence as a fortress—physical and mnemonic—psychically providing a sense of urgency so that the U.S. must continually engage in the war in the Middle East, and eventually, in other parts of the world. In the end, the Global War on Terror is being fought not just outside the territory of the U.S., but also in Lower Manhattan.

Conclusion

In this chapter, in order to examine the simultaneous development of the Global War on

Terror and the reconstruction of the WTC site, the site of my investigation geographically and temporally shifted from New York City in 2001, to other spaces both in and outside the United

States. In the first place, I historicized the war by going back to the Cold War, and revealed that the sense of vulnerability that the U.S. is always already in danger of being injured has justified

American post-WWII oversea armed interventions. At the same time, I attended to the ways in which this sense of fear affected the “American” landscape by examining Vietnam, the U.S.-

Mexico border, Hawai‘i, and New York City. Through these temporal and geographic shifts in the “site of investigation,” the similarities among various policies and place-making processes are identified and connected across time and space. By doing so, I argue that the reconstruction of the WTC site must be understood in relationship to the Global War on Terror and how it plays an active role in acts of war in other parts of the U.S. and elsewhere in the world.

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Chapter 3

The Museum as a Battleground: Curating the Global War on Terror

The 9/11 Memorial Museum serves as the country’s principal institution concerned with exploring the implications of the events of 9/11, documenting the impact of those events and exploring 9/11’s continuing significance. —The National September 11 Memorial and Museum

The United States, the land of the free, is particularly rich in museums. That is appropriate, because museums are a means to freedom. —Wendy Beckett1

Introduction

Tom Hennes, the lead exhibition designer of the National September 11 Museum, once said that the museum’s role was to give visitors “expanded ways to encounter those aspects of

9/11 that they [had] already identif[ied] with—and those aspects that [had been] unfamiliar or contrary to their own experience” by “[m]aking a broad range of information and narratives available, while providing a stabilizing basis for the experience.”2 This statement was made to acknowledge both the function of the National September 11 Museum as a basis for the commemoration of the victims of 9/11 and the museum curators’ effort to diversify the ways in which visitors remember 9/11.

To borrow terms used by memorial scholar Edward Linenthal, Hennes’ intention was to create a “forum” and not a “temple.” He did not want the National September 11 Museum to be a temple offering only “a single committed perspective” or monolithic view.3 Instead, as if to echo

Linenthal’s notion, Hennes envisioned the museum as a forum that provides a safe place for

1 “About the Series,” https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/sisterwendy/about/index.html (accessed February 28th). 2 “The Heart of Memory: Voices from the 9/11 Memorial Museum Formation Experience,” Museum 93, no. 3 (2014): 32. 3 James Wertsch, Voices of Collective Remembering (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 42.

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critical inquiries into “complicated motives of actions and consequences often hardly considered at the moment of the event.”4

Hennes’ vision is what this chapter challenges. I am interested in how the victims of 9/11 are commemorated in the National September 11 Museum and whether or not the museum functions as a forum where a broad range of information and narratives regarding 9/11 are provided to visitors. For this purpose, I will recreate and identify the “route” that visitors are more-or-less expected to follow. This chapter is, in other words, written from the viewpoint of a putative docent who will expose a hidden or unacknowledged narrative arc of the museum.

In this chapter, a spatial and discursive sketch of the National September 11 Museum will be drawn. To achieve this end, I will focus on the following materials that guide visitors in one way or another: the museum map, the virtual audio tour available as a smartphone application, the museum brochure for suggested pathways, the virtual tour offered on the official website of the museum, and the official museum book No Day Shall Erase You: The Story of 9/11 Told at the National 9/11 Memorial Museum. At the same time, I will also examine the “museum exhibits” including various artifacts, films, news footage, audio recordings, and expository descriptions (written signage). Based on the analysis of these materials, this chapter will identify the museum’s spatial aesthetics as well as the museum’s rhetorical claims. The National

September 11 Museum is a significant component of the Ground Zero memorial complex. It is where visitors’ experiences are discursively shaped. Shifting the site of investigation to the museum in this chapter, I will analyze the spatial and rhetorical strategies promoted by this cultural institution to further clarify how the Ground Zero memorial complex functions as an

4 Edward Linenthal and Tom Engelhardt, Editors. History Wars: The Enola Gay and Other Battles for the American Past (New York: Henry Holt & Co, 1996), 9-10.

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apparatus of particular kinds of memories within the context of the Global War on Terror, or to show how many visitors are addressed at the site.

A Note on Visitors

Before proceeding, it is important to note is that the route recreated in this chapter is designed for primarily American visitors. This is because, as will be discussed later, they are the primary audience for the National September 11 Museum, and thus the presence of a foreign audience is of secondary concern. In fact, this museum effectively ignores those who do not fit an idealized version of an American citizen, by making certain curatorial decision, including presenting the stories in English, which is commonly used as the “national language” of the U.S.

Presumably, those visitors who are not proficient in the language would have a less meaningful experience. Although the museum offers the audio guide in multiple languages such as Spanish,

French, Chinese, German, Italian, Japanese, and Portuguese, the contents of these non-English audio guides are significantly reduced.5 Some visitors could easily get lost in the flood of expository descriptions in the museum, all of which are written only in English. The National

September 11 Museum attempts to universalize its message, as stated in the mission statement:

“Demonstrating the consequences of terrorism on individual lives and its impact on communities at the local, national and international levels, the Museum attests to the triumph of human dignity over human depravity and affirms an unwavering commitment to the fundamental value of human life.” And yet, the National September 11 museum is a place where that universal message is primarily meant for American citizens who can understand the language and identity

5 There are 37 entries in the audio guide in English, and 18 out of them are about the Historical Exhibition, which is one of the core exhibitions of the National September 11 Museum. All of these entries about Historical Exhibition are omitted in the audio guides in other languages.

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with the American values represented in the exhibition galleries. Keeping these constraints in mind, this chapter will describe the museum’s efforts to “expand” American visitors’ understanding of 9/11.

Remember Those Who Died

The National 9/11 Memorial & Museum is an enormous institution. It encloses 110,000 square feet of publicly accessible space within the foundations of the original World Trade

Center (WTC) with two exhibitions placed on the footprints of the Twin Tower. Its permanent collection includes “more than 11,000 artifacts, ... over 300 moving images, and more than

40,000 print and digital photographs.”6 With its main exhibition located seven stories below ground, the museum is designed to lead visitors down to the foundation level of the WTC on the

Ramp, the descending walkway symbolizing the “construction ramps used at this site, one to build the World Trade Center complex in the 1960s and another installed during the post-9/11 recovery period to haul debris out of the site and to provide access to victims’ family members and visiting dignitaries who came to pay their respects at Ground Zero.”7

6 “Collection,” https://www.911memorial.org/collection (accessed February 28th) 7 No Day Shall Erase You: The Story of 9/11 as Told at the National September 11 Memorial Museum, 41.

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Finch’s Mosaic

Memorial Hall

Center Passage Tribute Walk

Figure 3: Museum Map [Diagram: from Graphics, http://www.grahaphics.com/9-11-Memorial-

Museum.”]

At the end of Ramp, visitors reach Memorial Hall, a space situated between the footprints of the

Twin Towers, in which a large artwork “Trying to Remember the Color of the Sky on That

September Morning,” created by an American artist Spencer Finch is installed. The artwork covers a large wall which is also the facade of the Repository, and thus “provides a dignified and reverential setting for the remains to repose—temporarily or in perpetuity—as identifications continue to be made.”8

From there, visitors can choose where to go and what to see next. Because of its vast scale and open design scheme, visitors may follow different paths once inside the museum.

Therefore, some visitors may not see the same objects that other visitors view. They can walk on

8 “Remains Repository at the World Trade Center Site,” https://www.911memorial.org/remains-repository-world-trade-center-site (accessed February 28th).

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the Tribute Walk, which is “a dramatic venue for large-scale works of tribute art” and see “[a] diverse array of artworks...ranging from quilts to children’s paintings and including unique items such as a decorated tribute motorcycle and engraved Waterford crystal triangles that formed part of New Year’s Eve Ball dropped at Times Square on December 31, 2001.”9 Visitors can also go to In Memoriam, the memorial exhibition, “to honor and to learn more about each of the 2,983 people killed in the September 11, 2001 and February 26, 1993 attacks.”10 Located on the footprint of the South Tower, the exhibition is structured as a square within a square:

The outer square is lined with portrait photographs placed floor to ceiling on all

four walls, surrounding visitors with the faces and names of all who were killed in

the attacks…

The gallery’s inner chamber provides a more intimate space for remembrance, its

glass floor revealing a remnant of the original South Tower floor slab from the

lowest level of the World Trade Center to remind us of where we stand. Profiles

of every victim, each running about a minute in length, are projected onto the

walls of this room. Where family members, friends, former colleagues, and others

recorded remembrances of their loved ones, brief audio clips have been included

so that visitors can be introduced to victims by those who knew them best…11

Or, visitors can move on to the Center Passage where the physical remnants of the attacks are on display. In this area, “[s]ingular and enigmatic in appearance, not immediately recognizable, they are presented to visitors with minimal context: a section of the communications antenna from the

North Tower; a motor that powered one of the Twin Towers’ 198 elevators; the crushed truck of

9 No Day Shall Erase You, 68. 10 Museum Map, n.p. 11 No Day Shall Erase You, 65.

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FDNY Ladder Company 3; and steel twisted by the impact of hijacked Flight 11.”12 The Center

Passage allows visitors to proceed either to the Historical Exhibition located within the original footprint of the North Tower or to the Foundation Hall, “a place of reflection for a community of memory” housing the “Last Column” and a portion of the “Slurry Wall.”

Figure 4: “Last Column” [Photo: Tomoaki Morikawa]

12 Ibid., 83.

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Figure 5: “Slurry Wall” [Photo: Tomoaki Morikawa]

The latter forms one side of the museum’s inner wall, and together with the Last Column constitute the most iconic in-situ remnants in the museum. The Center Passage links the

Memorial Hall to the Historical Exhibition and Foundation Hall. There is also another option available: to go out of the museum from one of the early exits created for emotionally overwhelmed visitors. As such, there are many ways to walk through the National September 11

Museum. There is, however, one specific route spatially and discursively created by the museum’s structure and exhibits.

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Firstly, as pointed out earlier, the structure of the National September 11 Museum spatially determines the route that most visitors take. It consists of a straight path from the Ramp to the Memorial Hall. On this route, it appears that the impact of the terrorist attacks on a global level is implied by some exhibits in one way or another. In reality, however, the museum’s attention is predominantly fixated on the national framework. 9/11 is, in other words, narrativized within the framework of “America.” At the very beginning of the Ramp, a large map visually illustrates the routes taken by the four hijacked planes with expository descriptions informing visitors how the events unfolded on the morning of September 11th, 2001:

“Approximately two billion people, almost one third of the world’s population, are estimated to have witnessed these horrific events directly or via television, radio, and internet broadcasts that day.”13 Furthermore, visitors soon encounter a multi-media exhibit gallery “We Remember” created by Jake Barton, the head of the media design team for the National September 11

Memorial and Museum.

13 The caption in the museum.

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Figure 6: A Large Map and “We Remember” [Photo: Tomoaki Morikawa]

In this gallery, visitors encounter the global scale of the terrorist attacks. As visitors walk through “We Remember,” they are immersed within a montage of voices and images—voices simultaneously played in English and multiple other languages, with images of place-names from around the globe flashing on digital screens and eventually forming a map of the world.

However, this is the extent to which the museum narrates 9/11 within a global context. Although this introductory exhibit gallery reenacts the so-called “global response” to the terrorist attacks, this expansive context quickly narrows. “We Remember” is followed by the “Last Column” and a portion of the "Slurry Wall.” These two elements dramatically (re)frame the story of 9/11

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within a national narrative. In fact, visitors first view these two in-situ remnants by looking down on them from the Overlook in the middle of the Ramp soon after exiting “We Remember.”14

Both the “Last Column” and the “Slurry Wall” are saturated with symbolic meanings. On the one hand, the “Last Column,” the 58-ton, 36-foot-tall piece of welded plate steel, covered with messages to the dead, photographs, and memorial inscriptions and tributes affixed by firefighters, police, and rescue workers, and construction workers who were engaged in the recovery mission at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan for nine months after 9/11, has been regarded as a testament to American heroism and resilience. On the other hand, the “Slurry

Wall,” which was originally built to prevent the water of the Hudson River from seeping into the construction site of the WTC and flooding Lower Manhattan, has been considered the physical representation of American fortitude because, as is explained in the interpretive panel in the

Overlook area, “[d]espite fears that it might be breached on 9/11, thereby worsening the catastrophic impact of the attacks, the wall held.”15

The National September 11 Museum designers developed the physical approach to these two symbolically laden in-situ remnants to emphasize their enormous scale and importance. As mentioned above, they are first seen from the Overlook area through which every visitor passes.

Hence, all visitors cannot escape viewing the “Last Column” and a portion of the “Slurry Wall” from this dramatic perspective. In this way, the museum spatially frames their function and meaning within a tale of American heroism, resilience, and fortitude.

The National September 11 Museum’s national narrative (or interpretive framework) is also based on the subject of loss. It discursively frames the losses of 9/11 as exclusively

14 The other one is, as pointed out earlier, located at the end of the Ramp. From this overlook, visitors can have a good view of Finch’s mosaic 15 Ibid.

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American. Hence, while those who were killed by the terrorist attacks are commemorated in the museum, who they are is not explicitly discussed. To be more specific, the victims of 9/11 exist as an abstract numerical figure (i.e,. 3,000) and grouped together as American losses. For instance, the fact that more than 10% of the victims were foreign nationals is never highlighted, as this would disrupt the national narrativization of 9/11.16 Rather, the abstraction of the victims is furthermore intensified by the omnipresence of the American national flag throughout the museum. There are even artworks of the flag integrating the names of the victims or their faces, regardless of their nationality.17 Together, these representations suggest that “America” is the primary victim and the only frame of reference for understanding 9/11 and commemorating the human losses of the terrorist attacks.

Paying tribute to the victims by grouping them together, I would suggest, is one of the major functions of the National September 11 Museum. In fact, it is repeated again by the art installation “Trying to Remember the Color of the Sky on That September Morning” (2014) that every visitor encounters in Memorial Hall.

16 Except for the small interpretive panel stating that “[p]eople from more than 90 nations were killed in the 9/11 terrorist attacks” and the display of flags from each of those countries, the museum does not offer any additional information explicitly describing those foreign nationals. What is worse, even these minimal indicators are peripheralized: they are placed not in one of the exhibition areas but in the museum cafe. The flags, which are hung from the balcony of the cafe, look like decorative elements. They are so tightly exhibited together that one cannot easily identify which countries are represented. 17 For instance, the artwork “Flag of Remembrance,” which is a huge tapestry-like American flag hung in Tribute Walk, uses victims’ faces. For this piece, American artists Mindy Kombert and Sherry Kronenfeld “sketched an image of American flag over the numbered squares” and filled them with photos of victims (quoted from the audio guide). Another artwork of the American flag is “Flag of Heroes,” which contains the names of all those who perished in the WTC, the Pentagon, United flights 175 and 93, and American flights 11 and 77. Visitors can purchase this flag in the museum shop.

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Figure 7: Spencer Finch, “Trying to Remember the Color of the Sky on That September

Morning” (2014) [Photo: Tomoaki Morikawa]

An American artist Spencer Finch created the mosaic of color with 2,983 individual watercolor drawings. Every drawing is a unique shade of blue, symbolically indicating that every victim possessed a distinct personality and perspective. According to the interpretive panel found in the

Overlook area at the end of the Ramp where visitors have their first glimpse of Finch’s mosaic, this artwork “centers on the idea of memory.”18 The drawing panels are individually affixed to the wall of the Memorial Hall and surround the quotation from Book IX of The Aeneid by the

Roman poet Virgil: “No Day Shall Erase You from the Memory of the Time.” Together with the quotation, this artwork supposedly signifies that “[w]hat one person perceives as blue might not be the same as what another person sees; our memories, just like our perception of color share a

18 The caption in the museum.

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common reference.”19 Because no other interpretation is offered, Finch’s monumental artwork, composed of abstract mosaic tiles form a complementary relationship with the aforementioned artworks of the American national flag: together, they implicitly present or perform the notion that there is only one frame of reference through which to remember 9/11. These artworks eloquently support the museum’s “promise” to remember the victims, but by subsuming all who died as Americans.

Even the memorial exhibition In Memoriam allows for the co-optation or American nationalization of the victims of 9/11. The exhibition is intended to “[render] the number 2,983 an abstraction no longer” with the walls of faces “made up people, a true cross-section of humanity, aged two and a half to 85, from more than 90 nations, spanning the spectrum of ethnicities, economic classes, and faith traditions.”20 In the exhibition, as pointed out earlier, victims’ profiles and recorded tributes are included. These curatorial efforts to individualize the victims are powerful, but not effective enough to disrupt the museum’s larger strategy to circumscribe the losses of 9/11 as American losses. In In Memoriam, it is not clear whether or not the victims’ ages, nationalities, ethnicities, and religions are actually acknowledged as invaluable diverse attributes. Arguably, what visitors can perceive just by looking at the walls of faces with no specific information other than their names, and just by randomly listening to their

“familiar, loving, at times humorous” profiles is only that a mass of innocent people were indiscriminately killed by the terrorist attacks.21 In order to know who these victims are, one needs to spend time on interacting with the touch screens set in the memorial exhibition to obtain background information on each victim. Otherwise, as is expressed in the official museum

19 Ibid. 20 No Day Shall Erase You, 65. 21 Ibid.

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guidebook, these individual losses are subsumed under a generalizing narrative: “The memorial exhibition serves as a reminder that, given the arbitrary and indiscriminate nature of mass murder, any one of us might have been a victim…”22 In In Memoriam, and by extension in the museum itself, the specificities of the individual victims are continually overwritten by the rhetorical strategies in the museum. For most visitors, those who were killed will remain a mass of innocent people, or a mass of innocent, diverse yet American citizens; all the losses of 9/11 are commemorated as American losses at the National September 11 Museum.23

“Historical” Claims

After walking down the Ramp to the Memorial Hall, the various museum guides such as the audio tour, brochure, and an official museum book, direct visitors from In Memoriam and the

Center Passage to the Historical Exhibition. The National September 11 Museum, in other words, while exposing visitors to the immense damage that 9/11 caused through the display of the faces of the victims and the repetition of their names in the memorial exhibition, and through the enormous remnants left by the terrorist attacks, eventually leads visitors to the exhibition which “historicizes” the story of 9/11. The museum considers the Historical Exhibition a core experience and encourages visitors to allocate much of their time on exploring it.24 Almost half of the audio descriptions available through the smartphone application focus on the exhibits in the Historical Exhibition. In it, hundreds of artifacts “bear witness” to the terrorist attacks and offer an endless amount of information on the events of 9/11, the “historical” context, and the

22 Ibid. 23 It is, therefore, possible that the cross-section of humanity among the victims of 9/11 presented here only fosters the U.S. national image as a country of diversity, as in the case of the annual commemoration ceremony performed by diverse, yet “American” family members of the victims. 24 “Suggested Pathways,” https://www.911memorial.org/sites/default/files/SuggestedPathways.pdf (accessed February 28th).

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aftermath often in long expository descriptions. Undoubtedly, the Historical Exhibition is the focal point of the National September 11 Museum.

The narrative produced in the museum becomes more clearly defined in this core exhibition which consists of three sections: “Events of the Day,” “Before 9/11,” and “After

9/11.” “Beginning with the impact of the first hijacked airliner...and continuing to the end of the day on 9/11,” the first section “Events of the Day” is designed to encourage visitors to reexperience 9/11 by “[presenting] the escalation of events as witnessed that day, whether in

New York City or in the areas near the Pentagon and western Pennsylvania, or by watching the repeated television broadcasts worldwide.”25 In this section, the damages of the terrorist attacks are illustrated with artifacts, images, first-person testimony, and archival audio and video recordings. “Events of the Day,” focused on the losses of 9/11, is, in many ways, a continuation of In Memoriam and the Center Passage. The theme of the next section “ Before 9/11” is to

“[provide] historical context for what transpired on September 11, 2001.”26 By describing the roots and the rise of al-Qaeda dating back to the late 1970s, this section “tempers the emotional intensity of the first part with a more cognitive journey through the attack’s historical antecedents, toward an understanding of who did this, and why.”27 “After 9/11,” the final section of the Historical Exhibition displays objects showing “disparate though concurrent responses [by

American citizens] in the immediate days and weeks after the attacks” to the invasions of

Afghanistan and Iraq.28 Among the exhibit objects are posters of missing people and makeshift memorials which appeared in many parts of New York City, and the construction tools used during the recovery mission. This section ends with an exhibit which “explores issues being

25 No Day Shall Erase You, 92. 26 Ibid., 138. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid., 162.

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negotiated in the open-ended context of the post-9/11 world and poses ongoing questions arising out of 9/11.” These three sections are sequentially and spatially connected in this order. Through them, the Historical Exhibition produces a narrative that begins with the story of the “losses” of

9/11, to the “historicization” of events, and ends with “mourning” the losses of 9/11.

The Innocence of the United States

As pointed out earlier, the losses of 9/11 are essentially reenacted in “Events of the Day.”

In this section, the terrorist attacks are chronologically traced and retold with news footage and detailed expository descriptions. To complement this information, first-person accounts of survivors and victims, including real-time messages and calls to emergency services and family members from those trapped within the buildings and the planes, are continuously replayed.

These audio narrations are strategically integrated to emotionally move visitors.29 When numerous tragic stories of loss are effectively presented in this manner, the exhibition narrative circumscribes the losses of 9/11 as American losses. In particular, exhibits in “Events of the

Day” emphasize the words of first responders and present the stories of how they were killed and honorably died as American heroes. The museum, for instance, describes the actions of heroic firefighters and police officers who were killed during rescue operations, displaying their battered IDs and badges retrieved from the rubble, as well as parts of crushed fire engines and patrol cars. Included among the portraits of first responder heroes are the stories of several

American citizens. Welles Remy Crowther, an American equities trader working for Sandler

O’Neill and Partners located on the 104th floor of the South Tower, is one of them. His red bandanna is prominently featured to illustrate his courageous and sacrificial acts to rescue

29 Many early exits are, therefore, set up in “Events of the Day” for those who are emotionally overwhelmed while they reexperience 9/11 in this exhibit area.

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others.30 Together, the stories of American heroes form the core narrative of “Events of the Day” and show visitors that 9/11 is a story about American losses and bravery.

The next section “Before 9/11” takes the narrative one step further as it goes back in time. Through a series of exhibits, this section rhetorically claims that the U.S. itself was attacked. “Before 9/11” begins with a display of film posters, magazine covers, and photographs featuring the Twin Towers as well as a large architectural model of the WTC showing “the way the entire 16-acre complex would look upon completion back in 1971,” a display that emphasizes the iconic importance of WTC for Americans and in the U.S.31 In this gallery, the towers are defined “as emblematic of America itself—a place of possibilities and dreams that defie[s] limitation.”32 The identification of the WTC and America is also visually implied by a photograph capturing a meeting between U.S. President-elect George H. W. Bush, U.S. President

Ronald Reagan, and General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev of the Soviet Union during the Cold

War and against the backdrop of the Twin Towers. This was taken “during the Soviet leader’s trip to deliver a historic speech before the United Nations announcing unilateral arms cuts.”33 In the photograph, President Reagan and President-elect Bush, about the same height, look like twin brothers wearing coats similar in style and color.

30 “Wearing a red bandanna over his mouth and nose to guard against smoke, Crowther drew on his training as a volunteer firefighter to guide evacuees and help the injured” in the South Tower (No Day Shall Erase You, 109). The Red Bandanna: A life, A Choice, A Legacy (New York: Penguin Books, 2018), a biography written by Tom Rinaldi, is one of a few books which are sold in the museum shop. 31 No Day Shall Erase You, 138. 32 The caption in the museum. 33 No Day Shall Erase You, 140.

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Figure 8: “World Leaders, December 7, 1988” [Photo: No Day Shall Erase You, 140]

Furthermore, in terms of composition, the figures of the men parallel the towers in the background. Within the context of the exhibition, it appears that these two American leaders personify the Twin Towers. The first gallery, “Before 9/11,” is thus curated in ways to indicate that the towers were the embodiment of the U.S. itself. The curatorial strategy of presenting the symbolic status of the Twin Towers immediately after “Events of the Day” seems to emphasize that not only innocent American citizens, but also the towers themselves and what they represented were attacked out of the blue or without provocation. “Before 9/11” begins its narrative by portraying the U.S. as an innocent victim.

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Subsequent exhibits in this section portray the U.S. as an innocent actor in history as well as within the context of 9/11. The exhibit “Roots of Al-Qaeda,” for instance, “historically” accomplishes this by referring to the U.S. military involvement in the Middle East in the late

1970s and 80s, but with important details omitted. Despite the fact that the U.S. was actually the aggressor due to its own Cold War policies, the U.S. is portrayed as an innocent actor. An interpretive panel about the Soviet-Afghan War and Arab Afghans clearly illustrates this point.

By barely commenting on the Cold War, the text explains the reason why the U.S. became a target for al-Qaeda:

The Soviet-Afghan War (1979-1989)

The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in late December 1979. The Soviets aimed

to protect the Afghan communist government, threatened by an armed uprising of

Afghans of diverse political and ethnic backgrounds. These fighters were called

mujahideen, a term for warriors engaged in waging a jihad to defend Islam.

Ultimately, nearly a decade of war claimed the lives of approximately one million

Afghans and almost 15,000 Soviets. Having failed to defeat the Afghan rebels, the

Soviet superpower completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989.

The Arab Afghans

Islamic countries called for armed struggle against the Soviet occupation of

Afghanistan. Thousands of young Muslims from all over the world joined the

fight as mujahideen. Known as Arab Afghans, the foreign volunteers engaged in

occasional firefights, and their presence had a negligible effect on the outcome of

the war.

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Nevertheless, after the Soviet withdrawal, Arab Afghans proclaimed that together

with native Afghan rebels, they had defeated a superpower. The victory inspired a

fringe group of Arab Afghans led by Saudi-born Osama bin Laden to contemplate

other targets, including the world’s remaining superpower, the United States.34

Although the Cold War is implicitly referenced, it is never explicitly stated that the Soviet Union was fighting the U.S. in Afghanistan. The panel does not reveal that the Soviets had to continue the war because of the U.S. intervention. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzenzinski came up with a strategic report called “Reflections on Soviet

Intervention in Afghanistan” in which he says, “Our ultimate goal is the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. Even if this is not attainable, we should make Soviet involvement as costly as possible.”35 Carter embraced it, and so did Ronald Reagan, who took office after

Carter.36 Instead of historicizing the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan, the panel informs visitors that the war was fought only between the Soviets and mujahideen, and that a small sector of mujahideen led by bin Laden eventually targeted the U.S. for no reason other than that the U.S. became the last remaining superpower.

What is important to note here is that the panel carefully distinguishes native “Afghan rebels” from “Arab Afghans.” This distinction enables the National September 11 Museum to favorably portray the Cold War, as is done in another panel “U.S. President Ronald Reagan

Meets with Afghan Rebel Leaders in the White House, 1983” and in the film “The Rise of Al-

34 The caption in the museum. 35 Zbigniew Brzenzinski, “Memorandum for the Secretary of State” https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu//NSAEBB/NSAEBB396/docs/1980-01- 02%20Presidential%20Decisions%20on%20Pakistan%20-%20Afghanistan.pdf (accessed February 28th). 36 Stephen Kinzer Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq (New York: Times Books, 2007.), 267. As a result, the U.S. aid to the mujahideen “rose steadily from $30 million in 1981 to $200 million in 1984 (Ibid).

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Qaeda” on view in this area in “Before 9/11”: “The United States government also supported the

Afghan rebellion against its Cold War rival, the Soviet Union. The CIA funneled money and arms through Pakistan’s intelligence agency. This funding was directed to native Afghans. Arab fighters had their own resources.37” By distinguishing native Afghan rebels from Arab Afghans, the museum asserts that the U.S. did what was right and thus was on the right side of history.

This distinction is problematic. It is done at the expense of ignoring the fact that CIA funding was indirectly funneled through Pakistan and eventually distributed to Arab fighters, including bin-Laden.38 Consequently, visitors are unable to know that without the U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan, there would have been no bin-Laden, and without bin-Laden, there would have been no al-Qaeda, and without al-Qaeda, there would have been no 9/11.39 The

National September 11 Museum does not hold the U.S. accountable for its Cold War military aggression and the consequences of its activity to what occurred on September 11th, 2001. On the contrary, the museum effectively claims that the U.S. had nothing to do with how and why bin

Laden became influential, and instead helps establish the innocence of the U.S.

Evil Muslims

37 The caption in the museum. 38 According to Kinzer, “[n]early every cent of [the CIA funding], along with nearly every weapon and bullet, was delivered first to the [Inter-Services Intelligence Agency (ISI) of Pakistan] to its favored commanders” (267). This flow allowed the ISI to channel American aid to those who shared Pakistani General Zia al-Huq’s commitment to fundamentalist Islam. Among them, there was Gulbeddin Hekmatyar, a ruthlessly ambitious commander who made a fortune in the drug trade, dreamed of turning Afghanistan into a pure Islamic state, and liked to lead his followers in lusty chants of “Death to America!” (ibid.). In so doing, the ISI recruited militants from other Muslim countries. “At CIA- sponsored camps inside Pakistan,” Kinzer argues, “they were trained in modern techniques of sabotage, ambush, and assault, and in the use of weapons from sniper rifles to time-delayed bomb detonators (Ibid., 270). 39 The disruption of the historical trajectory is attributable to the museum’s decision to use Lawrence Wright’s The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (New York: Vintage, 2007) as a reference to historicizing 9/11 (see No Day Shall Erase You, 156). While offering insights into al-Qaeda, its founders, and its predecessors and affiliated organizations, and giving detailed accounts of the personalities of the members of these organizations, Wright remains silent on the role that the U.S. played in Afghanistan in relation to the Soviets.

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To put it plainly, the U.S. is never represented as the aggressor in the National September

11 Museum. This is apparent in the unreflexive use of the term “Ground Zero.” In the museum, it is given the following definition: “Within hours of the attacks, journalists began referring to the scene of mass destruction at the World Trade Center site as Ground Zero, a term for the epicenter of a blast or quake.”40 By introducing the term as a politically neutral and objective qualifier, the museum ignores the historical context out of which the term Ground Zero emerged. The term was originally used to designate the epicenters of the atomic and hydrogen bombings by the U.S. on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, as well as on Bikini atoll (in the central

Pacific) and Yucca Flats (in New Mexico) during the time of nuclear testing in the mid twentieth century. The museum discursively sanitizes the term Ground Zero by decontextualizing, dehistoriczing, and depoliticizing the term and not linking it to a history of U.S. aggressions, It thus rewrites history and depicts the U.S. not as an aggressor capable of atomic bombings, but as an innocent victim and the unfair target of aggressive actions by other nations and peoples.

In contrast, Muslims are negatively portrayed as the evil enemy-other of the U.S. in the

National September 11 Museum. The museum introduces the so-called Muslim issue with the exhibit “The 1993 World Trade Center Bombing” in “Before 9/11,” immediately before the exhibit “Roots of Al-Qaeda” or immediately after the aforementioned iconic images of the Twin

Towers and presidents Bush and Reagan. In the exhibit about the 1993 bombing, this terrorist attack is presented as a precursor of 9/11. Alongside the display of the wall fragment from the

WTC parking garage, the interpretive panels in this exhibit chronologically traces the bombing and describes the significant damage that it caused:

40 The caption in the museum.

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At 12:18 p.m. on Friday, February 26, 1993, terrorists detonated approximately

1,200 pounds of explosives in a rented van parked in the World Trade Center’s

underground parking garage. The bomb killed six people and injured more than

1,000. More than 1,000 emergency personnel arrived to aid in the evacuation and

treat the injured. Meanwhile, most of the 40,000 people who were in the Twin

Towers walked down smoke-filled stairways in the dark. The last survivors

escaped from the buildings more than 11 hours after the bomb blast.41

In the exhibit, the 1993 bombing is further explained in detail to visitors. Another interpretive panel describes how the terrorists plotted the bombing, carried it out, and how one of them was captured when he reported that the van, which they used for the bombing, was stolen. (He wanted to reclaim the deposit money back.) How their trials proceeded is carefully described to visitors, including the attack plot’s leader Ramzi Yousef’s statement: “Yes, I am a terrorist, and I am proud of it. And I support terrorism so long as it was against the United States government…42” It is, however, never clear who the terrorists are in this exhibit. Other than their names, their identities remain vague to the extent that they are grouped together with al-Qaeda:

“Though carried out by different groups of extremists, the attacks of 1993 and 2001 both occurred within the broader context of an emerging radical islamist ideology.43” The museum only nominally considers the “broader” context and thus fails to explain the different groups within it. Whether or not the groups may have different political and religious beliefs does not matter. What is emphasized is that the groups shared a radical Islamist ideology and consequently terrorized the U.S. Regardless of the differences that may have existed between

41 Ibid. 42 Ibid. 43 Ibid.

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them, the terrorists responsible for the 1993 bombing and al-Qaeda are generalized as “them,” or the enemy-other threatening an innocent U.S.

This kind of generalization is repeated when the Islamic religion is explained to visitors in “Before 9/11.” One can argue that the National September 11 Museum takes a precautionary step here. In an exhibit diagram, the museum states (and visually confirms the fact) that “Al-

Qaeda represents a tiny fraction of the global Muslim community.”44 (See Figure 5.)

Figure 9: “Al-Qaeda in the Context of Sunni Islam, circa 2000” [No Day Shall Erase You, 146]

This explanation, however, fails to help visitors understand anything other than the fact that al-

Qaeda is an Islamist or an Islamic group. Although the diagram visually illustrates that not all

44 Caption in the museum.

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Muslims belong to al-Qaeda, the image still suggests that the latter is a part of the former, and al-

Qaeda is inextricably associated with Muslims.

It is also possible that the museum’s precautionary warning is overwritten by other descriptions about Islam and Muslims, as can be inferred in the following example in the exhibits:

Islamism and the Roots of al-Qaeda

Islam is one of the world’s major religions. Adherents of Islam are known as

Muslims. Islamism is a political movement asserting that Muslims should be

governed strictly according to Islamic law, known as sharia. Islamists seek

political and religious control of Muslim countries. There are differing

perspectives among Islamists about when and if violence can be used to achieve

their aims.

Al-Qaeda in the Context of the Broader Muslim World

...Its goal has been to launch a global, violent jihad—struggle in defense of

Islam—that would rally large numbers of Muslims to its cause…

The objective of purifying Muslim societies is central to an Islamic movement

known as Salafism, which seeks to reform Muslim society by returning to what it

considers a more authentic practice of Islam. Most Salafis do not advocate

violence to achieve this end. Even when Salafism does not advocate violence, it

often preaches hostility toward non-Muslims as well as other Muslims who do not

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share its beliefs. Al-Qaeda is among a number of Salafi groups that did turn

toward an active strategy of violent jihad.45

In this particular interpretive panel, the text starts with a supposedly objective fact that Islam is one of the world’s major religions and ends with a description of violent extremist groups. The majority of Muslims whose existence is only vaguely implied receive no positive attention.

Instead, the text continues to focus on particular extremist groups, including al-Qaeda, when it

“explains” Islam. Here, it is pointed out that Islam does not entirely exclude violence as a means of achieving goals, and some followers of Islam wholeheartedly embrace it. In “Before 9/11,” the museum thus implies that Muslims are violent or hostile extremists.46 Muslims, in other words, are presented to visitors as “them” or the enemy-other of the U.S. with whom it is impossible to safely cohabit.47

Either with Us or with Them

45 Ibid. 46 The demonization of Muslims by the National September 11 Museum has not gone unnoticed. The aforementioned film “The Rise of Al-Qaeda” was, for instance, a subject of criticism. It was believed that by watching the film, “[u]nsophisticated visitors who do not understand the difference between Al Qaeda and Muslims may come away with a prejudiced view of Islam, leading to antagonism and even confrontation toward Muslim believers near the site” [Sharon Otterman, “Film at 9/11 Museum Sets Off Clash Over Reference to Islam,” The New York Times, April 24th, 2014 https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/24/nyregion/interfaith-panel-denounces-a-9-11-museum-exhibits- portrayal-of-islam.html?mcubz=0 (accessed February 28th)]. The film refers to the terrorists as Islamists who assume their mission is a jihad. It was feared that when exposed to the film, most visitors are “simply going to say Islamist means Muslims, jihadist means Muslims” (Ibid.). Furthermore, when the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum invited an interfaith group of clergy members to share their views, they expressed fear that the inflammatory tone of the film and its use of the words “jihad” and “Islamist” without sufficient explanation will very likely “[cast] aspersions on all Muslims,” and hence requested changes (Ibid.). The museum, however, declined to take the interfaith group’s advice. Without clarifying that extremists do not represent Muslims, the museum decided to screen the film. 47 Muslims are not allowed positive representation in the National September 11 Museum. The museum refused the interface group’s suggestion that the story of Mohammad Salman Hamdani, a New York City Police Department cadet and Emergency Medical Technician who was killed when he was engaged in a rescue operation, should be included (Otterman, “Obscuring a Muslim name, and an American’s Sacrifice,” The New York Times, January 2nd, 2012, https://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/02/nyregion/sept- 11-memorial-obscures-a-police-cadets-bravery.html). Despite the fact that there were many Muslims among the victims of 9/11, mourners, and recovery workers, Muslims are excluded from the museum.

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After walking through the exhibits representing Muslims as “them” through a sequence of interpretive panels and the film “The Rise of Al-Qaeda,” visitors enter “After 9/11,” the last section of the Historical Exhibition. Through this exhibit sequence, they are brought back from the “past” to the “present” and the “future,” or from the “history” of 9/11 to the aftermath of the terrorist attacks and beyond.

The last section highlights the Global War on Terror. This is the logical conclusion of the narrative arc. In the first place, the museum exhibits are curated in ways that repeat the war’s logic defined in Chapter Two: the U.S. was attacked and is likely to be attacked again by its evil enemy-others, and thus, military actions must be initiated, often preemptively, and continued against those enemy-others. By displaying the in-situ remnants and victims’ first-person testimony that bear witness to the damages inflicted upon American citizens and the U.S., the museum repeatedly reinforces a sense of vulnerability, that the U.S. is always already in danger of being injured. Consequently, in “After 9/11,” the necessity for the U.S. to fight back to minimize its vulnerability is underscored. In addition, the previous two sections “Events of the

Day” and “Before 9/11” set up a binary opposition between the innocent U.S. and evil Muslims, as the basis for fighting the Global War on Terror. What follows in “After 9/11” justifies the war to visitors.

The justification is explicitly made in the exhibit and signage. Exiting from “Before

9/11,” visitors are first led to an area where posters of missing people and makeshift memorials are displayed, along with the construction tools used during the recovery mission. Next, visitors enter an area where a group of American national flags are prominently displayed in one showcase to represent their ubiquitous presence in the post-9/11 American society. While the former gallery commemorates innocent (American) victims and celebrates acts of compassion,

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volunteerism, and public service shown by (American) laborers during the recovery and rebuilding efforts, the latter gallery reminds visitors of the Global War on Terror in a specific way:

The 2001 terrorist attacks were the deadliest foreign strike on American soil and

the first major attack by a foreign entity since the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor.

It awakened both a new sense of vulnerability and resurgent patriotism.

American flags appeared everywhere from lapel pins to automobile antennas.

Many feared additional attacks, including the use of chemical and biological

weapons. Anxiety about terrorism characterized the “new normal.”

The U.S. government initiated a Global War on Terror. Within the first month

after 9/11, the U.S. announced the formation of the Office of Homeland Security,

declared war on “a radical network of terrorists and every government that

supports them,” and launched a military operation in Afghanistan, thought to be

the hiding place of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. While there was not a

public consensus about military action, many Americans supported the nation’s

armed forces and affirmed patriotic resolve.48

Here, the Global War on Terror is presented as a “just” war. The interpretive panel claims that the war was justified; 9/11 was likened to the bombing of Pearl Harbor and, therefore, the U.S. needed to retaliate. Invading Afghanistan, which was believed to be a haven for terrorists, is also considered strategically sensible. At the same time, the anxiety shared by many Americans during the aftermath of the terrorist attacks is described. The panel, in other words, explains how

48 The caption in the museum.

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insecure American citizens felt under the “new normal” and thus regarded the Global War on

Terror as necessary by many, if not all, Americans (since there was no public consensus). By doing so, the National September 11 Museum suggests that the war was an appropriate step for the U.S. to undertake to combat the feelings of anxiety about terrorism felt by American citizens.

In addition, near the end of “After 9/11,” the “morality” of the Global War on Terror is hinted at in the gallery “Beyond the Recovery.” Through several interpretive panels, visitors are educated on how to understand 9/11 and its aftermath, as well as the after-effects. The museum even acknowledges the following: “It may not be possible to ever fully prevent terrorism or forestall heinous acts by individuals intent on doing evil, but we do have control over how we respond. As witnesses to events unfolding in our time, how we choose to respond—participating in a charity run, enlisting in the military to serve the nation, rebuilding communities devastated by a natural disaster, training caregivers to assist victims of mass violence—demonstrates the best of our human nature rather than the worst.49” Thus, in this interpretive panel, the museum implies that the U.S. will always be a potential target of terrorism. Terrorism is even listed alongside a natural disaster as if to indicate its inevitability and ever-looming presence. Visitors are also told that responding to terrorism is important. The panel counts serving in the military as a legitimate response along with other humanitarian actions. Joining the military to defeat supporters of terrorism is one among several options that can demonstrate the best of our human nature.50

49 The caption in the museum. 50 In another interpretive panel, militarily serving the nation is explained as one of the means that American citizens chose to deal with the trauma of 9/11: “[i]mmediately following the attacks and continuing long after, many people have channeled their grief and anger by volunteering, enlisting in the military, founding charities, contributing philanthropic causes, or otherwise helping people in need.” Among other humanitarian options, enlisting in the military to engage in the Global War on Terror is introduced to visitors as a form of mourning which can allow a person to overcome grief and anger. In

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What is important to note here is that many historical facts are distorted, over simplified, and omitted in the displays about the Global War on Terror in “After 9/11.” Although it is a section that concludes the Historical Exhibition, “After 9/11” is not necessarily engaged in historical inquiries. Some examples of these problems can be found in the interpretive panel

“How can America protect its citizens from terrorism,” in “Beyond the Recovery”:

To prevent further attacks, the U.S. government initiated a Global War on Terror,

sending troops to Afghanistan and later to Iraq. One of the objectives was to

undermine terrorism by enabling open, democratic elections in countries governed

by repressive regimes...

Since 9/11, al-Qaeda, other terrorist groups such as ISIS, and rogue individuals

have committed acts of terror around the world. Increased public awareness and

improved counterterrorism strategies have thwarted attempted attacks, but threats

of new attacks persist...

These claims, many of which were made by U.S. administrations at the time, are not historically accurate or well-supported. In the first place, for no apparent reason, Iraq is added to the list of

“them,” despite the fact that it has been historically acknowledged that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with al-Qaeda. The claim that the Global War on Terror was waged to prevent further terrorist attacks is also misleading. One could invert the logic here. It was the post-9/11

American regime that instigated operations in the Middle East that enabled the so-called terrorist groups to assume power. In particular, this was the case regarding ISIS. An American journalist

“After 9/11,” the war is represented as a solution not just for the U.S. facing terrorism but also for individual American citizens traumatized by 9/11.

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Joby Warrick argues that Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, the founding father of the organization that would become the Islamic State (IS, also known as ISIS or ISIL) did not appear out of nowhere but used the Iraq War in 2003 to empower himself. Possessing an “undeniable skill as an organizer and a strategist,” Zarqawi took advantage of the two disastrous moves made by the

U.S. government: dissolving the Iraqi Army and banning Ba’ath Party members from positions of authority.51 He organized an army by appealing to tens of thousands of Iraqis who were left out of work and on the streets because of U.S. policies. Furthermore, Zarqawi enlisted former members of Hussein’s military and acquired from them intelligence, funding, and weapons.

Consequently, IS came into existence as a militant group that would subsequently cause global security problems. As exemplified by this case, U.S. military interventions in the Middle East only created a political vacuum in the region, out of which the so-called “terrorists” emerged.

Visitors are, however, told none of these historical realities. Instead, the National September 11

Museum arbitrarily “historicizes” terrorism in a particular manner.

Contradictions associated with the Global War on Terror are also not discussed in “After

9/11.” The National 9/11 Museum remains silent on the ironic tragedy that in a war allegedly fought for freedom, many of those whom America supposedly wanted to save from repressive regimes were killed by U.S. bombings. As Afghan feminist Malalai Joya critically states, “the

U.S.-led, so called war of liberation caused the deaths of many civilians...”52 Neither are a series of America’s human rights violations against detainees in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq revealed. Because of this silence, the museum undermines its own stated mission to

51 Joby Warrick, Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS (New York: Anchor Books, 2016), 134. 52Malalai Joya, A Woman Among Warlords: The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice (New York: Scribner, 2011), 61. In particular, Joya denounces the U.S. government attempt to sell the invasion of Afghanistan as a humanitarian war to liberate Afghan women while it was “[raining] bombs on our villages in the name of liberating us” (Ibid., 8).

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“[demonstrate] the consequences of terrorism on individual lives and its impact on communities at the local, national and international levels,” as repeated at the end of “After 9/11.” In other words, because the Global War on Terror is contextualized solely at the national level from an

American perspective, how this global war and the consequences of 9/11 have impacted the lives of innocent people in international communities is neglected. Had the museum truly intended to live up to its mission, it would have examined how people in the Middle East have been devastated by the Global War on Terror. After all, these people are the ones who were most directly affected by the war. And yet, the National September 11 Museum chooses to remain silent. Hence, in an ahistorical manner, the museum justifies the Global War on Terror, and shows and tells visitors that the war needs to be continued and supported.

The Follow-Through

After viewing “After 9/11” and exiting from the Historical Exhibition, visitors are invited to explore Foundation Hall where they “will find remnants of the World Trade Center such as the slurry wall and the Last Column as well as interactive digital displays related to memorialization, rescue and recovery efforts, and the ongoing legacy of 9/11.”53 From here, visitors are able to freely walk around the museum. They can view the small exhibits area in which special temporary exhibition are periodically featured. Or, they can walk to the gallery

“Reflecting on 9/11” and “record their own stories, memories, and opinions in three adjacent recording booths.”54 If they want to leave the museum at this time, they can choose to do so. On the way to the exit they are welcome to purchase souvenirs at the museum shop. There is, in other words, no specific route suggested after exiting the Historical Exhibition. And yet, in the

53 “Suggested Pathways” 54 No Day Shall Erase You, 196.

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Foundation Hall, there is one showcase that is strategically placed for all visitors to see, as it is placed close to the exit of the Historical Exhibition.

This showcase is thematically connected to the Global War on Terror. After the war’s logic is repeated in the three sections in the museum’s core exhibition, this showcase explains the success of Operation Neptune Spear, “a global manhunt…for the ringleader of the al-Qaeda terrorist network.” It also reinforces the justification for the war by displaying the following objects: the uniform shirt worn by a U.S. Navy SEAL Six member during the raid on bin

Laden’s safe house in Pakistan; the coins created to commemorate the operation; and a brick chiseled out by journalist Dominic Di-Natale as a souvenir from the foundation of bin Laden’s house.55 Among these objects, an interpretive panel with an account of the Global War on Terror explains:

In a televised speech from the White House on May 1, 2011, U.S. President

Barack Obama delivered the news that Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader

responsible for the 9/11 attacks, had been killed in a targeted military strike

carried out by U.S. Navy SEALs. Assuring 9/11 victims’ families and the nation

that “justice has been done,” the President also asserted that the fight against al-

Qaeda would continue.

Throughout New York City and Washington, D.C., the streets filled with scenes

of people gathering to mark the successful raid. Many remained concerned about

what bin Laden’s death would mean for global security and world events. These

concerns remain current today, as al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks continue

55 The caption in the museum.

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to plot violent attacks and counterterrorism experts and civilians remain vigilant

to threats around the globe.56

Without questioning the legitimacy of the military operation, this interpretive panel presents the killing of bin Laden, the mastermind behind the events of 9/11, as a legitimate response to the terrorist attacks.57 It frames the killing of bin Laden as an act of justice executed by the U.S. government, and praised and celebrated by many American citizens. In addition, the National

September 11 Museum implies that the continuation of the fight against al-Qaeda is necessary by referring to President Obama’s statement and acknowledging a globally shared anxiety about terrorism around the world. Visitors are thus reminded that bin Laden’s death does not necessarily mean closure, and that terrorist threats are still everywhere and thus the Global War on Terror needs to be continually fought.58

The war on terrorism and its consequences are enacted and reenacted in the National

September 11 Museum (and the larger Ground Zero memorial complex). In commemorating the victims of 9/11 in this place, the terrorist attacks are narrativized to draw a line between “us” and

56 The caption in the museum. 57 Although the Operation Neptune Spear was initiated and carried out by the U.S. government, the U.S. is still not represented as the aggressor in this exhibit case. This is achieved by the consistent use of the passive voice in describing the killing of bin Laden. Instead of saying that the U.S. or American military personnel killed bin Laden, the museum chooses to use the expression that “bin Laden was killed” without clarifying “by whom.” 58 This is one of the major themes that the National September 11 Museum continually pursues. From November 2019 to May 2021, for instance, the special exhibition titled “Revealed: The Hunt for Bin Laden” is held. With newly declassified artifacts and “firsthand accounts from intelligence officers, government officials, law enforcement agents, military leaders, and special operations forces,” the following view is reiterated in this exhibition: “Worldwide, people are living with the daily threat of terrorism. Terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda and the Islamic State continue to plan attacks globally, with locations ranging from New York City and Paris, France, to Mogadishu, Somalia, and Surabaya, Indonesia. Additionally, lone actors, often motivated by online propaganda, enact their own plots.” See “Revealed: The Hunt for Bin Laden,” https://www.911memorial.org/visit/museum/exhibitions/revealed- hunt-bin-laden (accessed February 28th). Special exhibitions are often introduced to complicate the hegemonic narrative of permanent exhibits by modifying the museums’ messages. And yet, this special exhibition about Bin Laden further reinforces the National September 11 Museum’s approval of the Global War on Terror.

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“them,” to justify the Global War on Terror, and to argue for the continuation of this war. In the museum, the curators/designers developed a narrative arc for visitors to follow which, I argue, validates the Global War on Terror.

Audiovisual Components

The notion that the National September 11 Museum’s exhibits are curated to justify or lead to the Global War on Terror is evidenced not just by the route recreated in this chapter, but also by the official guided tours of the National September 9/11 Museum and Memorial, and the two films “Facing Crisis: America under Attack” and “Facing Crisis: A Changed World.” On the one hand, the guided tours, which are arguably the official stories presented to the public, illustrate how the museum officially interprets the events of 9/11 and discursively attempts to help visitors remember those events. On the other hand, the two films previously mentioned set the thematic tone of the National September 11 Museum for many visitors. Each of the films is

15-minute long and screens every 30 minutes in the auditorium located on a floor above the museum entrance. These films are often the first interpretive program that visitors encounter.

Both the guided tours and the two introductory films reveal how the museum directs its visitors’ to understand the content of exhibits and hence their understanding of 9/11.

The National 9/11 Memorial and Museum offers four official guided tours, including the one specifically exploring the memorial “Reflecting Absence” outside the museum: 1)

“Understanding 9/11” Museum Tour; 2) “Uncommon Courage: First Responders on 9/11”

Museum Tour; 3) “Early Access” Museum Tour; and 4) “Official 9/11 Memorial” Tour.

Participants on the first three tours can explore the museum exhibits for approximately 60 minutes. There is not much difference between the “Understanding 9/11” Museum Tour and the

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“Early Access” Museum Tour except that the latter allows participants to enter the museum before its official opening hour. The early access tour, in other words, enables participants to have the museum space to themselves with a small number of other tour participants rather than viewing the exhibits among large crowds of visitors during the day. The “Uncommon Courage:

First Responders on 9/11” Museum Tour differs from the aforementioned two tours in that it further highlights the courage of first responders, as can be inferred from its name. The

“Understanding 9/11” Museum Tour is the general tour offered all day. The other two museum tours are available only once a day.

All three museum tours follow the identical route from the Ramp to the Memorial Hall to the Center Passage, and to the Foundation Hall, with tour guides recounting an almost identical narrative. They emphasize the violence inflicted upon innocent Americans and through the terrorist attacks by directing visitors’ attention to the impact steel and other crushed objects in the Center Passage. During the tours, the “authenticity” of the National September 11 Museum is also highlighted. By viewing the in-situ remnants, participants are reminded that the museum itself is built on the ruins of the terrorist attacks. In addition, the courage of first responders is praised throughout the tours, along with the reference to American resilience and fortitude.

Participants on the tours are asked to pay close attention to the Last Column and the slurry wall, and their symbolic meanings. Tour guides emphasize the heroism that Americans showed in responding to 9/11. In particular, the fearless response of the passengers on United 93 prevented the intended attack on either Congress or the White House.

In the “Official 9/11 Memorial” Tour, which takes approximately 45 minutes, tour guides offer the basic information about the memorial Reflecting Absence—its size, its structure, and its architect—and lead tour groups around the sunken structure. Inviting participants to touch the

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memorial and the names of victims engraved on it, tour guides stop at places featuring distinguished names and explain how American heroes responded to 9/11. Welles Remy

Crowther, “the man in the red bandanna,” is mentioned, as he is correspondingly featured in the section “Events of the Day” in the Historical Exhibition. Todd Beamer, who was on board the

United 93, is also introduced to participants as an American hero, who started the resistance against the terrorists with the famous call, “Let’s roll!” Furthermore, at the end of the tour, guides identify Betty Ann Ong and Madeline Amy Sweeney, the flight attendants of the

American 11, as the very first responders of the day who transmitted crucial information about the hijackers to authorities.59

Although the term “the Global War on Terror” is not directly mentioned in any of these tours, the war is positively avowed in them. This is most apparent in the “Uncommon Courage:

First Responders on 9/11” Museum Tour. While this tour is identical with the other two museum tours in terms of its route and content, “Uncommon Courage: First Responders on 9/11”

Museum Tour differs in that its participants are encouraged to look at the showcase on the

Operation Neptune Spear when they reach Foundation Hall. Through this exhibit, as pointed out earlier, the National September 11 Museum explains that this military action was a legitimate response to the fight against terrorism. During the tour, the killing of bin Laden is described as the result of the actions of the “last responder(s).” Tour guides use the term “last responder(s)” to

59 As the presence of these flight attendants illustrates, the National September 11 Museum incorporates some female figures. This, however, does not mean that the site is a place where the issue of gender is seriously considered. The stories of female first responders are never used to challenge a masculine portrayal of heroism. In fact, these women are featured precisely because their actions can be likened to the courageous and decisive actions of their male counterparts. Moreover, their inclusion functions as a kind of performance through which the museum represents the diversity of respondents and its intention to be comprehensive (to represent all the facts). Like the annual commemoration ceremony of 9/11 at the Ground Zero memorial complex, the presence of women, people of color, and multigenerational participants, show not only the diversity of American society, but its putative benevolence.

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describe the CIA agent Maya, who spent years searching for bin Laden’s hiding place, and the

Navy SEAL Team Six members who were sent to Pakistan to assassinate him. By using these terms, the military personnel are presented as the counterparts to the heroic “first responders,” the fire fighters and police officers. Praising not only the first responders but also military personnel as American heroes, the tour guides present the Global War on Terror as a direct response to the events of 9/11, and thus as necessarily defensive and strategic.60

Regarding the war, the two films “Facing Crisis: America under Attack” and “Facing

Crisis: A Changed World” are more explicitly didactic and propagandistic, compared to the guided tours. In the former film, key 9/11 decision makers, including Secretary of State

Condoleezza Rice, New York Governor George Pataki, New York City Mayor Rudolph

Giuliani, and others, narrate the events of 9/11. The latter film shows world “leaders” such as

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, reflecting on the terrorist attacks. Both films also feature interviews with President George W. Bush. There is nothing offered to contextualize, much less criticize their accounts. Instead, the films follow these politicians as they emotionally recount their 9/11 experiences one after another.

Consequently, the terrorist attacks and the post-9/11world are sympathetically portrayed from these politicians’ viewpoints, and altogether they “sanctify” the Global War on Terror.

In two of the films, Bush’s famous declaration that “Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists,” when he publicly announced the start of the war, becomes a central theme

60 The tours reinforce the logic of “us” and “them,” the binary opposition supporting the Global War on Terror. When the tours reach the Memorial Hall, tour guides point at the Remains Repository located behind the mosaic artwork “Trying to Remember the Color of the Sky on That September Morning.” In front of the artwork tour guides explain that the museum is the resting place for many victims who are yet to be identified, They also inform visitors that the never-ending effort to identify every single one of the victims is still in process. As discussed in Chapter 1, this care for the dead underscores the contrast between “us” and “them”: “we” cherish the value of life, unlike “those terrorists” who killed ordinary citizens.

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and is echoed by other politicians.61 Musharraf, for instance, painstakingly distinguishes Pakistan from the Taliban, the regime (believed to be) providing a safe haven for al-Qaeda: “The first decision was about Taliban. Whether this was, an action to be taken against Taliban. So, is

Taliban and their talks on Islam, Talibanization, was that in favor of Pakistan. We’ll be for

Taliban and Talibanization? My answer was no, not at all.”62 He responds to Bush’s call and places Pakistan on the side of “us”/the U.S. in dealing with terrorism. Defining 9/11 as an act of war “meant to go after the centers of American power,” then Secretary of State Rice also supports Bush’s understanding of 9/11 and calls for resolute action.63 She explicitly frames it as a fight to offer the gift of freedom to people “deprived for too long of decency in their lives, or freedom in their lives, of the expectation that they somehow control their lives” in the Middle

East.64 Without this kind of resolute action, then British Prime Minister Blair argues, “us” will keep being threatened because “the terrorists had killed 3,000 people that day, but if they could’ve killed 30,000 and 300,000, they would’ve.”65 Both Rice and Blair emphasize Bush’s statement that “human conditions abroad matters to our national security at home.”66 Together with Bush, they support American policies to “end tyranny as we see it” under the pretext of

61 In the other film “Facing Crisis: America under Attack,” al-Qaeda/bin Laden is explicitly named as the enemy-other, while American political “leaders” narrate how they were shocked by yet promptly reacted to the “extraordinary” terrorist attacks. 62 “Facing Crisis: A Changed World.” 63 Ibid. 64 Ibid. Rice condemns 9/11 in the following manner: “After 9/11, we said, ‘there really is no justification for the taking of lives of the innocence in the name of any political religious, or social cause’” without problematizing what the U.S. has been up to.” She never mentions the fact that the U.S. military endeavor for freedom has been taking the lives of many innocent in the name of freedom. As such, the contradictory nature of the Global War on Terror is once again silenced. 65 Ibid. 66 Let us once again turn to Nguyen’s argument in Gift of Freedom. While examining the formation of the U.S. as a liberal empire, in Gift of Freedom, she points out that “[i]n the first half of the twentieth century, the freedom-loving peoples of the world determined that their own self-interest and security were best served by distant others’ having the benefit of freedom” (36). Quoted Bush’s saying clearly places him in the genealogy of those freedom-loving peoples.

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establishing “decent, responsible states that would be democratic, that would have the possibility to delivery for their people, and that could defend themselves.”67

As such, in both the guided tours and the films, the U.S. government’s rationale for the

Global War on Terror is continuously repeated and sanctioned. Through these tours and films, the museum presents the war as a just war fought for national security and freedom in a world divided between “us” and “them.” The guided tours and the films, in other words, reveal that the

National September 11 Museum accepts the necessity of the Global War on Terror and uses the war’s politics as the museum’s guiding interpretive framework.

Conclusion

The National September 11 Museum exhibits conclude with a remark by Joe Bradley, an operations engineer, uttered on the last day of the recovery mission at Ground Zero in 2002: “We came in as individuals. And we’ll walk out together.”68 Written on the wall at the foot of the escalator leading up to the ground level and to the museum’s exit, this quotation suggests that after walking through exhibits, visitors who come with their individual opinions on the terrorist attacks will also leave the museum as people bounded together in solidarity.

Arguably, one point of solidarity is support for the Global War on Terror. As has been discussed so far, in the National September 11 Museum visitors follow a narrative route that leads to war. Through the “commemoration” of the victims of 9/11 and the “historical” narrative of 9/11, the creation of a binary opposition between innocent American citizens (or the U.S.) and the evil enemy-other (or Muslims) is established, and the Global War on Terror is affirmed. In so

67 “Facing Crisis: A Changed World” 68 The caption in the museum.

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doing, the museum encourages visitors to subscribe to the logic of the war. Through guided tours, films, and exhibits, visitors are repeatedly shown and told that “we” were attacked by

“them” and “we” are still in danger of being attacked again by “them;” thus, we need to continuously take action, including military force, against “them.” As such, the National

September 11 Museum is meant to implicate visitors in the Global War on Terror by affecting the ways they remember 9/11.

The effect of the museum experience should not be underestimated. Attracting millions of visitors since its inception, the museum is, in multiple ways, interpellating them to become patriotic citizens or supporters of U.S. global wars.69 In other words, standing in the midst of

Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, the National September 11 Museum is fighting an interpretive war ostensibly for freedom in the name of the U.S., in the time of the Global War on Terror.

69 More than 40 million people have visited the museum since its opening in May, 2014. “2018 Annual Report,” http://2018.911memorial.org/.

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Chapter 4

Encoding, Decoding: Visitor Experiences at the Ground Zero Memorial Complex

No modern nation possesses a given ‘ethnic’ basis…The fundamental problem is therefore to produce the people. More exactly, it is to make the people produce itself continually as national community. Or again, it is to produce the effect of unity by virtue of which the people will appear, in everyone’s eyes, ‘as a people,’ that is, as the basis and origin of political power.1 —Étienne Balibar, Race, Nation, Class, 1991

Emotions provide a script, certainly: you become the ‘you’ if you accept the invitation to align yourself with the nation, and against those others who threaten to take the nation away2 —Sara Ahmed, Cultural Politics of Emotions, 2014

Introduction

Ernest Renan delivered a famous address later known as “What Is a Nation” when France was defeated in the Franco-Prussia War in 1871. Arguing that “suffering in common unites more than joy does” or that “grief is of more value than triumphs” in making people vigorously engage in warfare, Renan agitated his fellow French citizens to regain Alsace-Lorraine, the territorial right of which was lost to Germany because of the war.3 If Renan’s formulation of loss as social capital is correct, the annual commemoration ceremony of 9/11 performed against the background of the Ground Zero memorial complex is arguably a national event that helps to perpetuate the Global War on Terror. Through the tributes to the American victims made by the bodily presence of their family members, the following view is formulated and validated simultaneously: Americans, and by extension, the U.S., were injured and are injurable. Hence,

1 Étienne Balibar and Immanuel Wallerstein, Race, Nation, Class: Ambiguous Identities (Verso: New York, 1991), 93-4. 2 Ahmed, Cultural Politics of Emotions, 12. 3 Ernest Renan, What Is a Nation? and Other Political Writings (Trans. M.F.N. Giglioli, New York: Columbia University Press, 2018), 261.

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the American audience is potentially made to feel that “we” need to fight back, and the war is a series of legitimate “counterattacks” to minimize the vulnerability of the U.S. This ceremony, which is when and where the losses of the American victims of 9/11 are officially commemorated by American citizens, helps fuel the Global War on Terror.4

Reactions to the annual commemoration ceremony streamed online, however, vary from person to person. While many of the viewers express condolences, there are, for instance, those who make comments to critically—and sarcastically—reflect upon American history:

Kwum aix: Black 9/11 happening every fkig day in amerikkka for 400 yrs..miss

me with this BS.5

Huh: It was justified karma so get over it already. It wouldn’t have happened if

the country didn’t have a habit of creating it’s [sic] own enemies to begin with.6

4 In the context of 9/11, the experience of loss as social capital was—other than at the annual commemoration ceremony—also demonstrated in the following scene capturing the interactions between then-President George W. Bush and rescue workers at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in the immediate aftermath of 9/11: President Bush: Thank you all. I want you all to know—it [bullhorn] can’t go any louder—I want you all to know that America today, America today is on bended knee, in prayer for the people whose lives were lost here, for the workers who work here, for the families who mourn. The nation stands with the good people of New York City and New Jersey and Connecticut as we mourn the loss of thousands of our citizens. / Rescue Worker: I can’t hear you! / President Bush: I can hear you! I can hear you! The rest of the world hears you! And the people—and the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon! / Rescue Workers: [Chanting] U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! / President Bush: The nation, the nation sends its love and compassion— / Rescue Worker: God bless America! / President Bush: —to everybody who is here. Thank you for your hard work. Thank you for makin’ the nation proud, and may God bless America. / Rescue Workers: [Chanting] U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! [Bullhorn Address to Ground Zero Rescue Workers delivered 14 September 2001, NYC, New York, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=17&v=x7OCgMPX2mE&feature=emb_logo (accessed February 28th)]. By emphasizing that grief was uniting good American people with each other as a nation, Bush sought for a resolution through violence by declaring that “we” as a nation would come after the enemy-others of the U.S. had been eliminated. 5 “9/11 Memorial and Museum Ceremony 2019, Live Stream,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2nPT1J3wZQ (accessed February 28th). 6 “World Trade Center 9/11 Memorial Ceremony,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nz8McJ57n- k&t=4s (accessed February 28th).

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Tenzin Tsering: Americans are crying about 911 �. What about all the innocent

Muslim lives America took?7

Every September 11, I remember that day, I thought I lost my grandmother; and

my mother told me she was fine. The entire nation was gripped by fear, god bless

the families of the first-responders, who did lose family members. Our govt

deceived a fearful public, and used the anger to plunge our armed service men &

women into senseless wars we're still in today. We must reopen this case and

solve what hindsight makes more clear [sic].8

In contrast, and perhaps more expected, there are those who become agitated and even war- minded by this commemorative performance:

Diana Wolf Torres: I remember this as a moment that brought us all together as a

nation.9

Stream Dream: On that fateful morning, the whole world stopped and was

somehow united in horror or grief, because everyone knows exactly what they

were doing that day and with that bond created a wall of togetherness,

determination and unbreakable strength that no terrorist or bomb can break.10

7 Ibid. 8 “9/11 Memorial and Museum Ceremony 2019, Live Stream.” 9 “9/11 Memorial Ceremony in New York—September 11th, 2018,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYoSGv5WeW4 (accessed February 28th). 10 “18th Anniversary of the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks: USA Today,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDdEsnwxajc (accessed February 28th).

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The Ghost of Patrick Henry: Let it be known, that if any person or group of

persons so chooses [sic] to inflict death and destruction against the free people of

the United States of America we will not forget. We will hunt you until the end of

time, no matter how far you run, and bring you to Justice or send you to the

creator. God Bless America and all who have perished, our spirit remains

unbroken.11

DatBlueBoi: We have never given up after 9/11 because us Americans are strong

and we will always fight back until the end. May they Rest In [sic] Peace

.12

Vishal Srivastava: Just finish ISLAM... It’s curse and cancer for the world and

humanity ���.13

There are also many who believed that 9/11 was an “inside job” orchestrated by the U.S. government to fulfil its political purpose or a conspiracy concocted by Israel/Zionists or Saudi

Arabians:

Wayne Raisch: I believe that it was a set up, an inside job and used as a poor

excuse to go to war with another country that did not attack us. I believe that

Osama bin Laden knew too much and that is why he was silenced. there were

little dead Iraqi babies (non-combatants) /innocent civilians that were killed

11 “9/11 Commemoration Ceremony Live Stream from WTC Ground Zero in New York City,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWRU-sj_wbU&t=2426s (accessed February 28th). 12 Ibid. 13 “18th Anniversary of the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks: USA Today.”

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because some soldier wanted to feel all high and mighty with macho testosterone.

pathetic when you really look at it. I wonder why the wonderful American news

media did not show the real war footage. cowards. I saw dead babies on the back

of Iraqi trucks and heart broken Iraqi people that the cowards in the news media

did not show.14

Just in the Nick of time: Never forget (Zionist Israelis(and dual citizens), mossad

agents, netanyahu, the us intelligence branches, etc did) 911 [sic].15

Blanca J. Christ: Sounds all good but just one problem bozo…911 was a [sic]

inside job. Created by our military junta, zionists in Washington, Isreal [sic] n

deep state.16

BLUE MOXIE: Never forget the Lie, we were attacked by Saudi arabians, the

towers were rigged with explosives....9/11 was a stunt to start a war, a war I was

proud to fight until learned the truth…17

These comments indicate the range of interpellation. On the one hand, being emotionally moved by the annual commemoration ceremony, some viewers felt (the need for being) united and advocated for excessive “retaliation.” On the other hand, some other viewers reacted to this commemorative performance in more “nuanced” ways.

14 “9/11 Memorial Ceremony in New York—September 11th, 2018.” 15 “9/11 Commemoration Ceremony Live Stream from WTC Ground Zero in New York City.” 16 Ibid. 17 “9/11 Memorial and Museum Ceremony 2019, Live Stream.”

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The wide range of responses to the annual commemoration ceremony is the starting point of this chapter. With this breadth of interpellating effects in mind, this chapter further investigates the ways in which visitors experienced the Ground Zero memorial complex. The previous chapters revealed that the WTC site was reconstructed as the new memorial complex under the logic of the Global War on Terror and in the service of the U.S. fighting this war. What is important to note here, to borrow Stuart Hall’s terms, this “encoding” was not necessarily

“decoded” by visitors as it was intended, and the question of how complexly visitors are interpellated at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan needs to be analyzed.

In order to answer the problem of encoding/decoding, this chapter includes an ethnographic project. In so doing, I focus on the experiences of both American and non-

American visitors. As the previous chapters emphasize, this memorial complex is a place primarily meant for American citizens, and they are the ones who overwhelmingly participate in the memory work at the site. I investigate the validity of this assumption, however, by bringing in the perspective of foreign nationals and comparing them to the reactions of American visitors.18 Are foreign visitors immune to the interpellation strategies of the museum and complex?

Notes on Methodology

I started my ethnographic research by sending out a questionnaire to a large mailing list of an international academic institute. This is in part because the National September 11

18 It is possible that many of those who left “critical” feedback in the comment sections for the annual commemoration ceremony on YouTube are foreign nationals, and thus, were not successfully interpellated or moved by the commemorative performance supporting U.S. nationalism. This, however, cannot be conclusively proved. This chapter intends to explore this problem through an ethnographic study.

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Memorial and Museum does not allow third parties on its premises to distribute questionnaires or interview visitors. Only some credentialed members of press/news media with the authorization from the 9/11 Memorial & Museum’s Communications & Digital Media Department “can engage the public no closer than fifteen (15) feet away from the Memorial Pools, the Names

Parapets, and any entrance/exit to the Museum Pavilion.”19 Hence, I decided to use a substantial mailing list administered by the East-West Center (EWC) in Honolulu, a national educational institution established by the U.S. Congress in 1960 “to foster better relations and understanding among the peoples of the United States, Asia, and the Pacific islands through programs of cooperative study, training, and research.”20 Created for student participants and alumni of the educational programs of the EWC, this mailing list has more than 1,000 subscribers.

I chose the EWC mailing list because it would enable me to reach out not only to

American citizens, but also to foreign nationals. The EWC is, by definition, a “transnational” institution.21 Those associated with it are people from all over the world, and the educational programs of the EWC are geared toward both American and international students.22 Its mailing list is therefore diverse in terms of the nationalities of its subscribers.23

19 “Visitor Guidelines,” https://www.911memorial.org/visitor-rules-and-regulations (accessed February 28th). 20 “About East-West Center,” https://www.eastwestcenter.org/about-ewc/origins (accessed February 28th). 21 The EWC was originally established as an outpost agency of the CIA. From the outset, for the U.S. to have a strong foothold in the Asia-Pacific region, this institution invited more than 100 people from the said region for “cultural exchange.” 22 “Participant Statistics for FY 2016: A Supplement to the East-West Center Annual Report October 1, 2015 to September 30, 2016.” [https://www.eastwestcenter.org/sites/default/files/filemanager/pubs/pdfs/AnnualReport2016/annualreport 2016-supplement.pdf (accessed February 28th)]. 23 Since the EWC is a research institution, its members and affiliates are not diverse in terms of their educational experiences. There were none in my research study who did not have a college degree, and all the participants gathered through the EWC listserv had either a master’s or a higher degree. And yet, as will be illustrated later, their responses were diverse, or not necessarily determined by their academic education. At least, no pattern attributable to higher education was found among the responses.

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Starting from this mailing list, I found ways to extend the reach of my ethnographic project. In addition to sending out the questionnaire, I took a snowball approach and asked the research participants who answered my original query to introduce me to their acquaintances who had visited the Ground Zero memorial complex. This approach allowed me to reach out to people unassociated with an academic institution. I also expanded my ethnographic project by subsequently interviewing those who answered the questionnaire and agreed to have a conversation with me afterward. Using the semi-structured interview questions, I obtained more information about my research participants’ experiences at the memorial complex.24

Since the reconstruction of the WTC site was a long-term project, it was important to categorize and compare my research participants’ reactions, according to the year(s) when they visited the site. While Reflecting Absence and the National September 11 Museum were open to the public respectively in 2011 and 2014, the nine years from 2006 to 2014 were spent on the construction of One World Trade Center. Because of this time difference in the reconstruction process, what my research participants experienced at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan varied, dependent on the time of their visit(s). Some of them experienced a rebuilt memorial complex with the important components—namely, the memorial, the museum, and the primary tower— completed. Other participants visited Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in the early 2010s and found only the completed Reflecting Absence and the still-under-construction One World Trade

Center. In order to clarify what those visitors encountered, I asked my research participants to answer first the dates of their visit(s) to Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, along with a question about their nationality(ies). This allowed me to target the people who went there after September

12th, 2011, when the memorial opened to the public. These participants did not necessarily see all

24 For the semi-structured interview questions, see Appendix 4.

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of the memorial complex including the museum and the primary tower, but at least saw

Reflecting Absence, and thus experienced the site as a memorial complex, however incomplete.

The other questions on the questionnaire and the semi-structured interview were based on the issues described in the previous three chapters. Some of them were intended to invite my research participants to describe what they felt at the Ground Zero memorial complex. Some of my questions referred to the comments and statements made by those who were involved in the reconstruction project of the WTC site, or quotations provided by the National September 11

Memorial and Museum, and asked for responses. In other words, I posed these questions to explore how they were interpreted by my research participants.25

In addition to the questionnaires and interviews and to provide supplemental materials for my research, I used TripAdvisor, the world’s largest website that presents user-generated reviews of travel-related contents. More specifically, there is a review web page of the National

September 11 Memorial and Museum. This web page contains close to 90,000 reviews by those who have been to the site from all over the world, and the number of reviews keeps increasing. I chose this web-based archive because it would allow me to complicate my ethnographic project by including a large number of visitors’ reflections on the Ground Zero memorial complex.

The review web page on TripAdvisor is one of the few available resources regarding visitor experiences at the 9/11 memorial complex. There are, however, some existing “official” archives. For instance, inside the National September 11 Museum, close to the exit, there is an exhibit called “Reflecting on 9/11.” This is a part of the museum’s ongoing oral history project that collects visitors’ voices. Visitors are invited to enter one of the recoding booths and to answer some questions about the events of 9/11 in general, or the exhibits of the National September 11 Museum

25 For the other questions on the questionnaire, see the appendix 3.

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more specifically. Visitors’ answers are recorded, and some of them are played for other visitors. The problem is that the museum selectively chooses what to (not) play. The criteria for this screening process is not apparent, and the entire collection of the recordings is off-limits to third parties. Since the National September 11 Memorial and Museum does not release the visitors’ reviews that it possesses, I decided to utilize the TripAdvisor visitor studies, based on the aforementioned review web page.

The web-based archive allowed me to collect the stories of a variety of visitors. As pointed out above, TripAdvisor is a user-generated website and thus, reviewers receive no incentive of any sort and are not required to comment on any specific matter. In other words, the reviews of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum record visitors’ “fresh” perspectives. In this sense, the reviews can be considered the raw data, or the responses of visitors’ perceptions of the site.

The review web page on TripAdvisor enabled me to retrieve and categorize the reviews in different ways. In the first place, the reviews are listed in reverse-chronological order (from the present moment to the past) and can be easily reperiodized. This web page is also equipped with different retrieval functions. One can, for instance, search the reviews by “traveler rating,”

“traveler type,” “time of year,” and “languages.” There are even “tabs” by which one can thematically sort the reviews.

Along with these tabs, I used the “search-by-keywords” function. This function allowed me to systematically categorize the reviews by the following keywords: the (Global) War on

Terror; enemy; One World Trade Center; Reflecting Absence; the National September 11

Museum; museum tours; films; Americans; peace. By using these keywords, I grouped the reviews to analyze them, and when necessary, re-searched and re-grouped the reviews for further analysis with new keywords.

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Brief Profiles of Research Participants and Data

As mentioned above, I began my ethnographic project by sending out a questionnaire survey through the EWC listserv. 20 people in responded and agreed to fill out the questionnaire.

Ten out of the twenty agreed to a further interview. In terms of nationality, half of my research participants were American citizens. The other half were from all over the world, including

China, France, Indonesia, Japan, Latvia, Okinawa, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam. I subsequently interviewed three American citizens and seven foreign nationals—one from

France, two from Japan, one from Latvia, one from Okinawa, one from the Philippines, and one from Taiwan.

Not all of my research participants saw every component of the Ground Zero memorial complex. Eight of them went to the site before 2014, or before the opening of the National

September 11 Museum to the public. They saw Reflecting Absence, but not the museum. This means that only 12 of 20 participants visited the National September 11 Museum. Among them,

I was able to interview five participants—two American citizens and three non-American citizens from the Philippines, Taiwan, and Japan.

As for the respondents/reviewers on TripAdvisor, they were also international citizens.

Since I primarily looked through the reviews written in English, many of the reviewers whose comments I read were from Anglophone countries such as Australia, Britain, Canada, and New

Zealand, with the majority from the US. There were, however, people who were from non-

Anglophone countries and yet made comments in English. I also took advantage of my proficiency in Japanese and examined all the reviews in Japanese. They were most likely written by Japanese visitors.

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A Summary of the Ethnographic Project

Many of my research participants positively evaluated their experiences of Reflecting

Absence and the National September 11 Museum. In describing the former, for instance, the expression “beautifully designed” was often used. As evinced by the following comment made by one of my research participants (Participant #9), they mostly saw Reflecting Absence as a memorial appropriate for commemorating the victims of 9/11: “I felt a mixture of loneliness, guiltiness, sadness, and happiness—the happiness just from feeling that the memory of the victims had been honored in the design.”26 Another research participant (Participant #2) also appreciated Reflecting Absence.

Before seeing the completed memorial, I’ve heard some of the debates among

architects and seen some of the other proposals that had been discussed, and I was

very curious to see the actual memorial because it seemed to be such a fresh and

unexpected take. An “anti-monument,” I think I’ve heard it to be described like

this, and I think it perfectly fits the purpose. It’s a site of mourning, so it would

not make sense to have a heroic figural sculpture like, for example, we see in so

many war memorials…I noticed the engraved names and I thought that it is a very

subtle way of making sure that all victims are honored there. I believe it must be

very important for their surviving relatives and friends to see the name there. I

also thought it’s a good idea to put the names on the granite (I think?) railing

26 Quoted from Participant #9’s questionnaire.

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which is always visible and touchable, showing that it’s a monument for “the

people” not for an elite figure.27

Using the term “anti-monument,” she praised Reflecting Absence for its unexpected design, a people’s memorial inviting visitors to interact with it.

Likewise, the National September 11 Museum was favorably reviewed by many of my research participants. They found it powerful and sincere. While some of my research participants were overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information offered in the core exhibition

Historical Exhibition, they took its historical claims for granted. These research participants did not doubt the authenticity and veracity of the National September 11 Museum; they assumed that museums, including this particular museum, are “the places where we get to know about facts.”28

For instance, in response to the question about the films “Facing Crisis: America under Attack” and “Facing Crisis: A Changed World” screened in the auditorium of the National September 11

Museum, a research participant (Participant #8) answered that “they were very well made and helpful, and it [sic] made you relive the experience of the victims/survivors, and also all the things that happened on 9/11.” While these films are, as discussed in the previous chapter, filled with ideologically oriented commentaries made by the political leaders at the time of the terrorist attacks, this research participant regarded the films as truthful portrayals of the events of 9/11.

There were some research participants—albeit far from the majority—who were critical of the Ground Zero memorial complex. This attitude was exemplified by the following remark found on one of the questionnaires: “One note I would make is that I saw little American flags placed in holders next to some of the names (engraved on the rims of Reflecting Absence), and I

27 Quoted from Participant #2’s questionnaire. 28 Quoted from Participant #11’s interview.

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did not notice any international flags despite their being foreign victims as well, so that could have just been an oversight on my part or it could speak to the ways in which the memorial conjures up notions of ‘patriotism’ for Americans specifically.”29 This observation implies that while the site was supposedly reconstructed to include all the victims regardless of their nationalities, it is still a place where American patriotism is displayed and promoted.

Another research participant (Participant #1) severely criticized the Ground Zero memorial complex. Problematizing the omnipresence of American flags at the site, she pointed out the memorial complex’s complicity in the Global War on Terror. This sentiment was not expressed by most of my research participants: “I found it offensive that there were American flags planted in each of the engraved names, probably because it was July 4th but maybe they do this regularly. As a native New Yorker who lived through the attacks, I’ve seen how our tragedy has been used by American politicians to justify wars and American human rights abuses both at home and abroad.”30 Although this research participant did not identify who those “American politicians” were, she still sensed that the Ground Zero memorial complex was one of the ways politicians and the public could legitimize the post-9/11 American hegemonic policies including the Global War on Terror.

The Overview of the Reviews

The tendencies shown by the research participants of my ethnographic project were also found in the reviews on TripAdvisor. Namely, many of them favorably reviewed the Ground

Zero memorial complex. On average, it received 4.5 stars out of five. 79% of the reviewers and

29 Quoted from Participant #9’s questionnaire. 30 Quoted from Participant #20’s interview.

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16% of them respectively evaluated the site as excellent (five stars) and very good (four stars), while only one percent of the reviewers condemned it as terrible (one star). As such, the overall ratings of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum on TripAdvisor were very positive.

In particular, Reflecting Absence was highly appraised. Here again, the phrase

“beautifully designed” was often repeated as an adjective. There were more than 200 comments in which this phrase was used to describe the memorial, and some of them pointed out that

Reflecting Absence not only commemorated the victims of 9/11 but also reminded visitors of the terrorist attacks, as the following review illustrates:

Memorial Only

We visited the memorial - it’s beautifully designed and gives a feel for the

original footprint of the buildings anf [sic] what it was like watching the buildings

fall... Everyone who died is memorialised sensitively. A rose on each person’s

name on their birthday is a marvellous [sic] touch.

Do not forget.31

Even a reviewer who “criticizes” the National September 11 Museum for rushing to create the memorial acknowledges Reflecting Absence’s appropriateness as a memorial:

Too soon

…I could see the museum being more appropriate, relevant and overall interesting

if it was built say 30 years from now, when most of the people who experienced it

are older and even passed on. That’s what makes history so cool, is that we don't

have the firsthand stories from people, all we have left our [sic] documents, items

31 “Memory Only,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r640767863- The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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and other sources of what happened that day. But, we are all so familiar and

sensitized with 9/11, its [sic] kind of ingrained in us now. It was built too soon,

and so the result, in my opinion, is that its [sic] a money maker and is making a

business out of very recent tragedy. Don’t like that. If it helps others or is a

comfort to others, that is great. They should have just stopped at the reflection

pools.32

It is important to note here that this kind of review was not typical in terms of the assessment of the National September 11 Museum. This institution received favorable comments from visitors, just as Reflecting Absence did. In fact, it was often the case that the phrase

“beautifully designed” is used to praise the memorial and the museum together. The said review titled “Too soon” is not exceptional on this point despite its “critical” stance on the museum. The quote shown above is preceded by a poignant comment that “[t]he 9/11 Memorial and Museum, although beautifully designed and well-intended is just too heartbreaking to barely be called

‘entertainment’ or something ‘fun’ to do.”33

In addition, on TripAdvisor, there were many positive comments on the National

September 11 Museum. When they were filtered by the keyword “museum,” the ratio for the five-star reviews went up from 79% to nearly 90%. Praising the National September 11

Museum’s exhibitions as “tastefully done,” most of the reviewers regarded this institution as a place of “fitting tribute.”34

32 “Too Soon,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r318746143- The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 33 Ibid. 34 On the review web page on TripAdvisor for the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, there is a “fitting tribute” tab. This tab yields more than 1,000 comments describing the memorial complex under this expression.

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This, however, does not mean that all visitors highly appreciate the National September

11 Museum. As in the case of my ethnographic project, some reviewers on TripAdvisor were dissatisfied with it. Those dissatisfied reviewers, for instance, problematized the aforementioned films’ propagandistic stance and the museum’s display about Osama bin Laden:

Excellent but skip the 15 min movie

…

My criticism is that the first 15 minute movie that they invite you to watch first at

the auditorium is repugnant political propaganda. Starring George Bush Jr,

Rudolph Giuliani and others, in the film Bush justifies the Irak [sic] and

Afghanistan wars he dragged the US into. The US was attacked by an infamous

terrorist group, not Irak [sic] or Afghanistan. This political film is completely

unnecessary in a Memorial for victims. Best to skip it.

…35

A must if you visit New York

Do not recommend the 15 min. film on 1st floor auditorium with Bush, C. Rice

and the Blair commenting on event. I found it completely politically biased and

propaganda.36

Reflection

35 “Excellent but Skip the 15min Movie,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763- d1687489-r559906510-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 36 “A Must If You Visit New York,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r516083933-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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…

It all tells the story & evokes some strong feelings of what happened & those who

have been affected. Some of it was a bit hard to deal with & I felt the section

about al Kaeda [sic]) & Osama bin laden [sic] was somewhat “getting back at

them” & therefore was unnecessarily fuelling [sic] anger rather than promoting

peace & remembrance.

…37

Disappointing, but still a must see.

…

The bin Laden exhibits were totally out of place, in my opinion, this is not the

place to advertise who won the war.

….38

These comments were, however, rare. In English, negative reviews that received one or two stars constituted only 2% of the total. And among those reviews, there were hardly any comments that thematically criticized the Ground Zero memorial complex as a cultural institution.39

An Apparatus for the Global War on Terror

37 “Reflection,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r560651098- The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 38 “Disappointing, But Still a Must See,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763- d1687489-r315690693-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 39 Even if the “neutral”—three-star—reviews are included, the ratio for “dissatisfied” comments remain to be less than 5%, and many of them are not about the commemorative or museological representational practices at the site but about the bad customer services such as the inefficient ticketing process or about inconsiderate behaviors—including, but not limited to, taking selfies against the background of Reflecting Absence—shown by some “tourists.”

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The findings from my ethnographic project and the information from the reviews on

TripAdvisor indicated that the Ground Zero memorial complex functioned as an effective apparatus of memory in the time of the Global War on Terror. All in all, the memorial complex drew empathic reactions from visitors. Moreover, some reviewers on TripAdvisor explicitly endorsed the Global War on Terror. By filtering with the keyword “war on terror,” one could find comments in favor of the memorial/museum as a place of “solemn reflection dedicated to honoring and remembering the tragic events and the overwhelming loss of innocent life that occurred at this location and others on September 11, 2001 and February 26, 1993,” and in favor of the war itself.40 The following reviews present a few examples:

Mists and tears not shed

…

The global war on terror started here for me. It’s not over, and the immense pools

will never fill, as the spaces left in the hearts of the survivors will never be

filled…41

A must see for all Americans

You could hear a pin drop while touring the memorial and museum, except for the

occasional sobs especially from me. I will never forget that day as long as I live.

Seeing the people that lost their lives that day reminded me to always keep them

40 “Visitor Guidelines.” 41 “Mists and Tears Not Shed,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r694942293-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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in my prayers. Every American should come to this site to pay their respects and

to remind ourselves to be ever vigilant in the war on terror.42

This is an important place to visit

This museum far exceeded my expectations. It is a difficult place to visit

emotionally, but it is an important event to revisit. The exhibit includes the stories

of not just NYC, but also Washington DC and Pennsylvania. I was especially

reminded during this time in our countries [sic] history when the popular tide

seems to be turning against our public servants, that not too many years ago we

were especially grateful for those who chose that line of work. It strengthened my

own personal resolve that we must succeed in the war on terror, whatever form

that will take. Highly recommend.43

These comments often showed that going through the Ground Zero memorial complex made these reviewers realize who they were, or that they were Americans, and felt a kinship with other fellow Americans.44 With this sense of belonging, these reviewers renewed their resolution to keep fighting the Global War on Terror.

42 “A Must See for All Americans,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r411648993-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 43 “This Is an Important Place to Visit,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763- d1687489-r336455545-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 44 Some TripAdvisor reviewers imply that for them, the Ground Zero memorial complex is a place where Americans are reminded of how they should be, as illustrated by the following comment: “Be Prepared to Weep:…Our tour guide shared with us stories of bravery that occurred on 9/11. As an American I was inspired how our citizens bounced back after this horrific event…” [https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r712313402- The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th)]. The memorial complex is, in other words, a place where “Americans” come to be viewed as a “people” to be admired and emulated. As pointed out in Chapter 1, it is a place where the image of a “people” constituting the nation is projected; the Ground Zero memorial complex is thus an important national site.

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The search with the keyword “war on terror” did not yield many results. To be more specific, there were about 20 reviews that mentioned the war, and not always positively. Some of the comments even pointed out the National September 11 Museum’s “negligence” in that it did not fully discuss or explain the Global War on Terror:

Thoughtful and moving

…

My only quibble would be that the full after effects of the “war on terror” were

glossed over somewhat, but perhaps this is asking too much…45

A “Must See” when you visit New York City

…

There was also a section on Al Quaeda and its political aims, as well

as the hijackers. Possibly there could have been more discussion

around the decisions in the ensuring years about what to build by way of

replacement on the site, as well as the huge political fall-out and Bush’s

subsequent decision to launch the “war on terror”…46

Almost all of the reviewers do not comment on the war nor how it is represented at the Ground

Zero memorial complex.

This, however, does not mean that most of the visitors are free from the site’s interpellation about the Global War on Terror. By definition, the force of interpellation can be at

45 “Thoughtful and Moving,”https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r411289167-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 46 “A ‘Must See’ When You Visit New York City,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews- g60763-d1687489-r297054631-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum- New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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work unbeknownst to the subject. Judith Butler illustrates this aspect of interpellation by elaborating on the famous Althusserian “Hey, you there!” scene: “Imagine the quite plausible scene in which one is called by a name and one turns around only to protest the name: ‘That is not me, you must be mistaken.’ And then imagine that the name continues to force itself upon you, to delineate the space you occupy, to construct a social positionality. Indifferent to your protests, the force of interpellation continues to work.”47 According to her, although

“[i]nterpellation is an address that regularly misses its mark,” it is not the case that one can easily evade the power of the hail “Hey, you there!” at her/his discretion.48 More often than not, this address still constructs her/him as a subject, regardless of whether or not one rejects it. Not reacting to the hail does not guarantee one’s independence from the scene of subjection.

Therefore, even though many of the reviewers did not mention the Global War on Terror, nor object to the way the Ground Zero memorial complex favorably views it, this does not equate with the failure of the memorial complex to function effectively as an apparatus for the war. It is still possible for the memorial complex to shape American’s understanding of the war.

After all, the reviews on TripAdvisor show that the Ground Zero memorial complex is regarded by the majority of visitors as a serene place appropriate for commemorating the victims of 9/11. Hence, most reviewers do not problematize but rather uncritically accept the ideological nature of the memorial complex and its implicit promotion of American patriotism and the logic of the Global War on Terror.

This is most apparent in visitors’ attitude toward the historical narrative produced at the

National September 11 Museum. While its exhibits are curated in ways that follow and assert the

47 Judith Butler, Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative (New York: Routledge, 1997), 33. 48 Ibid.

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U.S.-centric “history” as revealed in the previous chapter, many of the visitors receive this version of “history” as the truth. The discussion above about my ethnographic project illustrates that some of my research participants take the museum’s “historical” claims at face value.49 In addition, the reviews on TripAdvisor denote the same tendency among the larger group of visitors. For instance, the query “historical exhibition” produces around 200 results commenting on this core exhibition, and not one of them finds fault with its contents. On the contrary, the

Historical Exhibition is highly recommended as a must-see “attraction,” as one reviewer says,

“The highlight, if there has to be one, is the Historical Exhibition… You can easily spend hours here. There is so much to see and watch.”50

Some other reviewers also suggest that one should join the official guided tours of the

National September 11 Museum. Those reviewers claim that the tours provide the historical details of 9/11. According to one reviewer, “[9/11] is our history, our present, and our future” and it is this history/present/future that was revealed to her/him through the guided tour.51

As such, a few reviewers explicitly acknowledge that the Ground Zero memorial complex helped them understand the events of 9/11:

49 This finding corresponds to the extant literature in the field of Museum Studies. People often find museums as one of the most trusted sources of information. See James Oliver Horton, “Slavery in American History: An Uncomfortable National Dialogue” in James Oliver Horton and Lois E. Horton, eds., Slavery and Public History: The Tough Stuff of American History (Chapel Hill, North Carolina: The University of North Carolina Press) 2006, Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen, The Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life (New York: Columbia University Press) 1998, Ngaire Blankenberg, “When Soft Powers Collide” in Gail Dexter Lord and Ngaire Blankenberg. eds., Cities, Museums and Soft Power (Washington, D.C.: AAM Press, 2015), and Stephanie Shapiro and Sarah Sutton, “We Are Still In: A look at How the Cultural Institutions Sector Has Responded to the US Withdrawal from the Paris Agreement.” Museum 97, No. 4 (July/August 2018). 50 An Emotional Must-See When Visiting NYC,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews- g60763-d1687489-r653105730-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum- New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 51 “Everyone Should Visit This Museum,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763- d1687489-r709898291-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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Well done exhibits

We visited this memorial and museum to better understand the events of 9/11—

and this was a wonderful way to do that. The museum exhibits are powerful and

well done. A place of understanding and reverence.52

A must see in NYC

After spending some time appreciating the Memorial Pools we decided to visit the

9/11 Memorial Museum. We weren’t at all sure what to expect but the whole

museum is excellently presented and allows visitors both young and old to fully

understand the events that took place that day and the aftermath…53

For these reviewers, the memorial complex is an educational site where they learn how to see the world. There, they are told how to remember 9/11, and, arguably, many visitors are, knowingly or unknowingly, convinced by what they are told about American patriotism, the Global War on

Terror, and its logical connection.

Findings

Contrary to my initial assumption that there would be marked discrepancies in visitors’ reactions to the Ground Zero memorial complex, especially between foreign and American visitors, the data proved otherwise. Both of these groups, in fact, had similar experiences of the site. In the first place, the research participants of my ethnographic project often stated that the

52 “Well Done Exhibits,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r713844888-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 53 “A Must See in NYC,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r712277364-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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target audience of the memorial complex was not necessarily limited to American citizens. To answer the question about who was the primary audience or target audience for the National

September 11 Museum, many of my research participants answered that the museum aims to appeal to both U.S. and international visitors. In addition, some of the questionnaires done by foreign national research participants reveal that they were so emotionally affected by the

Ground Zero memorial complex that they felt that 9/11 was their own story, as evinced by the following comment: “I had seen documentaries and read about 9-11 before I visited, but the memorial made it even more real. It made it more personal…[The National September 11

Museum] was a great reminder to me of what humans are capable of—from evil to good. It was a reminder of the heroes of the event like firemen and volunteers, and how blessed we are to have had such people. It was a reminder of how the world has changed after that event.”54

In terms of posting criticisms of the Ground Zero memorial complex, there is not much difference between foreign and American visitors either. In short, both groups rarely made negative comments about the institution, and, if any, their sporadic criticisms were qualitatively consistent, regardless of the commentators’ nationalities. The filtering of the reviews on

TripAdvisor with the keyword “propaganda” attests to this point. One can find around 20 comments mentioning the politically tendentious character of the memorial complex using this filtering. While four of them are written by American citizens, the rest are reviews left by foreign nationals from Australia, Canada, Spain, and United Kingdom. This ratio indicates that quantitively speaking, American visitors are less likely to be critical of the memorial complex, compared to non-American visitors. And yet, no discernible difference can be seen in the actual comments made by either American and non-American visitors in terms of the content. For

54 Quoted from Participant #6’s questionnaire.

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instance, along with the aforementioned films screened in the auditorium of the National

September 11 Museum, its exhibits and the institution itself are from time to time criticized as propaganda tools, regardless of visitors’ nationalities:

Tasteful and interesting

…

All great apart from the final 15 minutes where the exhibit turns slightly into

propaganda and pro-war…55 [It would be interesting to give the nationality here]

Somber yet packed and disorganized

…

There is an element of propaganda in some exhibits which seems a bit

politicized…56 [It would be interesting to identify the nationality here]

Touching reminder

…

The last part of the museum reads like propaganda for war in Afghanistan so

don’t expect anything revelatory…57 [identify nationality?]

55 “Tasteful and interesting,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r373802708-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 56 “Somber Yet Packed and Disorganized,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763- d1687489-r522650391-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 57 “Touching Reminder,” https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r371163524-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th).

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Nasty security people, underused museum space

…

The museum itself is strong on propaganda and less so on facts and genuine

education. I feel deeply for people who died there and their families and friends

who mourn them, but this museum feels like it capitalizes on their pain.58

As such, the interpellation at the Ground Zero memorial complex exerted some influences on visitors, not necessarily restricted by their nationalities. This disjunction between the memorial complex and visitors’ nationalities is also illustrated by the reactions of Japanese visitors. Although I originally suspected that the institution’s primary emotional appeal affected

American visitors because of my positionality as a Japanese national as pointed out in my

“Introduction,” this was not the case with other Japanese visitors.

Reading through the TripAdvisor reviews written in Japanese allowed me to realize that there was a kind of “national trait” among them. To be more specific, many Japanese visitors commented on “peace,” a theme that does not often come up in other peoples’ reflections on the

Ground Zero memorial complex.59 The search with the Japanese word “平和,” meaning

“peace,” yields around 50 results, which constitute nearly 10% of the entire Japanese reviews. In

58 “Nasty Security People, Underused Museum Space,”https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews- g60763-d1687489-r370421380-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum- New_York_City_New_York.html (accessed February 28th). 59 There is no reasonable rationale for non-Japanese people to comment on the Ground Zero memorial complex in Japanese. Therefore, although some of the reviews written in Japanese do not show where the reviewers are from, with regard to those reviews, I assumed that the language and the nationality overlap with one another.

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many of the comments, the phrase “平和を願う＝pray for peace” is repeated.60 Many of

Japanese visitors think of world peace when they visit Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan.61

This is not so surprising, considering that the Japanese tend to emphasize the importance of peace when they see war memorials. For instance, reviews about the Hiroshima Peace

Memorial Park on TripAdvisor are full of similar phrases about peace. As the park’s name indicates, peace is the major theme at the original ground zero in the city of Hiroshima. Many of the comments written in Japanese regard the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park as a place of contemplation to pray for world peace. Interestingly, Japanese visitors also reveal this national trait at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan.

It is, however, important to note here that in terms of the subject of war, Japanese visitors react differently at these two ground zeroes. On the one hand, antiwar slogans often come up in their reviews about the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. When praying for the world peace, many of Japanese visitors couple their prayer with the statements such as “戦争のない世界＝ the world without wars” and “二度と戦争を繰り返してはいけない＝never repeat the war.”

Among those Japanese visitors, there is a shared recognition that a war led to the atomic bombing in Hiroshima. On the other hand, the reviews written in Japanese about the Ground

Zero memorial complex rarely address the issue of war. While insisting on the importance of

60 As pointed out in Introduction, “peace” is the dominant point of reference in post-Pacific War Japan. This was also observed by an American schoolteacher who participated in the Pearl Harbor workshop organized in 2005 for schoolteachers from the U.S. and Japan, to deepen their mutual understanding of each other: “I was particularly struck by the genuine Japanese perspective of emphasizing peace, not war…I had wonderful discussions with some of the teachers from Japan, and learned that they do not have ships or planes sitting in harbors or airfields from WWII for visitors to view. They do not look back and go into great detail teaching about the war, but instead emphasize the need for peace through their Peace Education programs (quoted in White, Memorializing Pearl Harbor, 261). 61 In the reviews written in English, the word “peace” is rarely used in the context of praying for world peace. This word is often used in the phrase “rest in peace.”

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peace, Japanese visitors do not tie it to antiwar claims. They do not pay much attention to the war despite the fact that, as discussed in the previous chapters, the Cold War was the historical background of 9/11, and the Global War on Terror is endorsed at Ground Zero in Lower

Manhattan in many ways.

This indicates that the Ground Zero memorial complex may influence the ways in which visitors perceive 9/11, regardless of their nationalities. At least, for most of the Japanese visitors, the memorial complex is not a place where wars, including the Global War on Terror, are to be problematized. At the site, Japanese visitors are not encouraged to think that war is the cause of horrific events.

Instead, many Japanese visitors empathize with the victims of 9/11. Some of the

TripAdvisor reviews written in Japanese comment that the visual and audio materials displayed in the National September 11 Museum are emotionally powerful and moving, even though some parts of the exhibits are not fully comprehensible due to the language barrier between English and Japanese.62 Some other Japanese visitors apparently feel that 9/11 is not someone else’s

62 See, for instance, the following comment titled “I want as many people to see as possible (the museum) 一人でも多くの人に見てもらいたい”: “I deeply regret that I cannot fully understand English, but there are facts that one cannot know, unless s/he comes here. This is a place where one can feel through her/his own eyes, ears, and body that precious lives were violently taken and that there were people who desperately tried to save other people as many as possible. Or, this is a place where I want people to feel so. (英語を理解しきれはいのがとても残念ですが、当時の状況がどんなだったのか、ここ来な ければ知ることのない事実。 / 尊い多くの命が無残にも奪われたこと、一人でも多くの人を助 けようと必死だった方々、そんなことを自分の目で、耳で、身体で、何かを感じられる、感じ て欲しい場所です。, “一人でも多くの人に見てもらいたい,” https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r620606266- The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html). Not only this reviewer but also many other Japanese visitors were, regardless of their limited English proficiency, affected by the museum’s exhibits, in particular the ones displaying the photographs of the victims of 9/11 as in In Memorium, and in American victims’ last-moment testimonies played in the alcoves in the Historical Exhibition.

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problem but their own, especially after seeing Japanese victims’ names engraved on the rims of

Reflecting Absence:

That image is revived…

…When I was casually looking at the names, I encountered the one of a Japanese

national.

After I came back to Japan, I looked up it and found out that he had worded for

the Nishi-Nippon City Bank, Ltd.

I went to New York City from Fukuoka and came across a name of someone who

had worked for a company from the same region. It would be strange to say that

this encounter was a fate, but I wondered if he wanted to tell me something.

It is heart-wrenching to think that many of the victims are still buried there.

(あの映像がよみがえる…

…何気に名前を見ていると日本人の方の名前が。

帰国後調べると西日本銀行の方だとわかりました。

福岡から行った私がニューヨークで地元企業の方の名前を見つけました。

縁というと変な感じですが、何か伝えたかったのかなぁと思う出来事で

す。

今なお多数の遺体がこの地に眠っているのかと思うと胸が痛くなりま

す。)63

63 “あの映像がよみがえる…,”https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r414122045-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

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I cried when I found Japanese names

The memorial consists of two voids placed adjacent to each other. The names of

the victims are engraved on the memorial’s quadrangular rims.

When I saw many Japanese names, I felt for their family members and my heart

was wrenched…

(日本人の方のお名前を見つけて涙

隣同士に並んだ ２つの空洞になっている そのメモリアルの四角形に

は、お亡くなりになった方の名前が刻まれています。

日本人の名前を多数見かけたとき、ご家族の方の想いを重ねると胸がきゅ

っと苦しくなりました…)64

Some Japanese visitors—and other foreign nationals—were also awe-struck by the

American resilience demonstrated by the reconstruction of the WTC site itself. The review titled

“I cried when I found Japanese names,” for instance, ends with a message that “I was impressed with America’s power that made it possible to already build a new skyscraper, and I believe that this memorial area is a place that needs to be remembered for generations.”65 As such, from time to time, comments showing that reviewers take 9/11 personally and at the same time praise

America’s strength, appear even among foreign nationals’ reflections.

What is important to note here is that foreign visitors are also, more or less, interpellated at the Ground Zero memorial complex in the context of the Global War on Terror. They tend to primarily grieve for the losses of people who are similar to them. Others such as Afghanis and

64 “日本人の方のお名前を見つけて涙,” https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763- d1687489-r373798043-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html. 65 Ibid.

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Iraqis who were killed in the Middle East because of the Global War on Terror remain ungrievable for most of the foreign visitors. Much worse, in many TripAdvisor reviews, it is terrorists who are named as others—in particular, as enemy-others—without being specified who they are. In addition, as most typically (un)expressed by Japanese visitors, at the site, foreign nationals are not inclined to criticize the U.S. and the wars that it has fought. This does not necessarily mean that the Global War on Terror is explicitly endorsed by foreign visitors.66 And yet, by being moved by the American resilience and the losses caused by 9/11, foreign visitors, in effect, may become silent allies of the U.S. While explicitly or implicitly recognizing the post-

9/11 world order of us-versus-them initiated by the U.S. to perpetuate the Global War on Terror, they are not willing to problematize the war nor U.S. hegemonic foreign policy.

Limitations

66 Among the TripAdvisor reviews written in Japanese, there is one comment that decidedly supports the Global War on Terror. The reviewer of this comment titles it “The institution that allows you to empathize with the U.S. president (米大統領の気持ちがわかる施設).” This reviewer initially opposed the war: “although I was of course irate about 9/11 as an act of terror, at first, I thought that it was someone else’s problem. When the U.S. later invaded Afghanistan under the pretext of a just war or the U.S. as the liberator, I felt that the invasion was too reckless and that the U.S. president needed to be more composed as the leader of a country (勿論その時はテロ行為そのものには憤りの気持ちはあった が、どこか他人事のように思っていた。その後はアメリカは聖戦だ、自由軍だと言って、アフ ガンに攻め込んだ。なんと無謀なことをする、1 国の指導者はもっと冷静にあるべきだと感じ ていた).” However, this reviewer changed her/his view after visiting the National September 11 Museum, saying, “However, the reality of the terrorist attacks that I saw in the museum even horrified me. I felt that there was no means (other than the invasions) for the president who was responsible for the protection of his citizens to deal with the indiscriminate killings targeting innocent people. Such a tragic event is displayed in the museum (しかしこの博物館で見たテロの実態はそれは恐ろしいほどだ。 無実の人間の無差別殺人には自国民を守る義務のある大統領としてはやむ得なかったのではと 感じた。それほどまで悲惨な出来事が展示されている).” This reviewer was so stunned to see the devastation caused by 9/11 that s/he came to feel that the U.S. president’s decision to invade Afghanistan as a response to the terrorist attacks that had taken away the innocent lives was inevitable. See “米大統領 の気持ちがわかる施設,” https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489- r275904108-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

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Despite the richness of the responses that I was able to gather through my ethnographic project and the analysis of the reviews on TripAdvisor, they are limited in some ways. In the first place, the diversity of the “research participants” may not be large enough. On the one hand, since I primarily used the mailing list of an academic institution for my ethnographic project, my research participants who answered the questionnaire and agreed to do the interview with me are highly educated. All of them have studied in graduate schools and received or are pursuing postgraduate degrees. On the other hand, the profiles of the reviewers on TripAdvisor often indicate where they are from. However, I did not have access to other personal information such as age, class, gender, race, educational level, and so forth. It is, therefore, difficult to exactly identify who those reviewers are other than to know their nationalities.

In terms of languages, my study is also limited. Since I have a good command of English and Japanese, I was able to analyze the TripAdvisor reviews in both languages, but only in these languages. In other words, my inability to read other languages did not allow me to examine the comments in foreign languages such as Arabic, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and so forth. In order to analyze the differences and similarities in the ways in which American visitors and non-

American visitors experience the Ground Zero memorial complex, one would need to review the responses written in languages other than English and Japanese.

In addition, highlighting Japanese visitors’ reactions in comparison with American visitors’ may not be ideal. For the Japanese, the U.S. is its most important ally in the world. The

U.S. has consistently maintained a favorable public image among the Japanese over a long period of time. Data that has been annually collected by the Cabinet Office of Japan shows that

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the U.S. has been recognized as the protector of Japan by the Japanese for the past 30 years.67

When the Global War on Terror was initiated by the U.S., its popularity in Japan did not significantly drop. It went down only by 3%. In fact, the Japanese government decided to support the war for the sake of securing the Japan-U.S. alliance. Considering the long-term amicable relationship between the U.S. and Japan and the realpolitik between the two, it is understandable that Japanese visitors were not necessarily critical of the U.S. and its hegemonic foreign policies.

Ideally, in the future it would be important to survey foreign visitors whose countries are not necessarily “pro-American” to measure the effects of the Ground Zero memorial complex in shaping their attitudes toward the post-9/11 world order that the U.S. ushered in.

There is also another limitation in terms of periodization. The visitation period that I identified may not be appropriately long enough. As stated earlier, I targeted the people who visited Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan after September 12th, 2011, the opening date of

Reflecting Absence to the public. My research, therefore, effectively excluded those who had visited before the said date and experienced the WTC site as still-under-construction ruins. I neither asked for responses from those who had witnessed the ruined WTC site, nor did I ask them to use this experience to evaluate how it affected their views of the Global War on Terror.

In order to further identify the function of the Ground Zero memorial complex as an ideological and material apparatus in the time of war, it might be more helpful and constructive to comparatively investigate the ways in which visitors reacted to Ground Zero in Lower

Manhattan, not only as a rebuilt memorial complex, but also as a wounded site under recovery.

The following questions concerning the influences that a place may have hence remain

67 “Gaikō ni Kansuru Seron Chōsa 世論調査,” https://survey.gov-online.go.jp/index-gai.html (accessed February 28th).

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unanswered: what did the ruined WTC site reminds visitors of?; how did (not) the Ground Zero memorial complex as a cultural institution change the nature of visitors’ remembrance at the site?

Conclusion

The previous three chapters illustrate that many stakeholders were involved in the reconstruction of the WTC site. Family members of the victims of 9/11, architects, business people, the city of New York, and the NYPD made various claims and competed against one another. It was through the affiliations and conflicts among those stakeholders that Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan was turned into a memorial complex.

To be more specific, by tracing the changes made to the original reconstruction plan, this dissertation reveals that the Ground Zero memorial complex is a product of the time of the

Global War on Terror. While—or precisely because—it was rebuilt as a result of the conflicts among many stakeholders, the memorial complex reflects the Zeitgeist of the era characterized by the war. The Ground Zero memorial complex is, to borrow Raymond Williams’s term, a structure of feeling in the sense that the memorial complex is a “collectively” constructed built form through which to articulate a common set of perceptions and values prevailing in the post-

9/11 American society.

What is important to note here is that the Ground Zero memorial complex is not just a structure of feeling limited to Americans. The memorial complex is, in other words, designed and built to elicit feels from many visitors, whether s/he is an American citizen or not. The findings of this chapter suggest that the Ground Zero memorial complex is emotionally moving to many visitors, regardless of their nationalities, and is seemingly successful in encouraging

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these visitors, including foreign nationals, to stand on the same side of the U.S. in a world where the Global War on Terror is being fought. While binding together Americans as a national community, the memorial complex simultaneously addresses non-American subjects who empathize with the U.S. Is this a testament to the success of the aesthetic and rhetorical strategies wielded at the rebuilt WTC site? Surely, this should not be something to unthinkingly celebrate.

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Conclusion

…there exists, all around us, an apparatus urging us to accept American innocence at face value and not to inquire too much.1 —Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me, 2015

[I]f war is to be opposed, we have to understand how popular assent to war is cultivated and maintained, in other words, how war waging acts upon the senses so that war is thought to be an inevitability, something good, or even a source of moral satisfaction.2 —Judith Butler, Frames of War, 2009

American Sniper is a blockbuster film released in 2014. Loosely based on the memoir of the same title about United States Navy Seal Chris Kyle, the deadliest marksman in U.S. military history with 255 kills from four tours in the Iraq War, the film depicts him as a tragic American hero who suffers from killing women and children during his service. The film closes with the episode that while Kyle is recovering from his trauma and reconciling with his life and his family, he is killed by another fellow traumatized veteran.

In one of the scenes in American Sniper, the actual news footage of the collapsing WTC is inserted. In this scene, Kyle (Bradley Cooper) and his wife (Sienna Miller) gasp at the televised horror of the terrorist attacks. The film switches to a dark/blank screen, and is quickly followed by a scene of Kyle in Iraq, fighting against al-Qaeda. It is as if Kyle, a stunned and righteously inspired American, was dragged into the Global War on Terror in Iraq because of the events of 9/11.

As illustrated in Chapter 3, historically speaking, the process was quite the opposite.

Until the U.S. invaded Iraq and devastated its social infrastructure by bombing, Iraq was not a recruitment breeding ground for terrorists. And yet, American Sniper never problematizes the

1 Coates, Between the World and Me, 8. 2 Butler, Frames of War, ix.

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failed WMD search, Abu Ghraib, and the myriad other U.S. atrocities in the Middle East. The film, in other words, remains silent on the specious rationale for the Global War on Terror and the damages the war caused many non-American others, while it attends to Kyle’s trauma at the center of the film narrative. Audiences are not invited to critically inquire into the Iraq War but to fight alongside with Kyle.3

Many other cultural products justifying the Global War on Terror and fueling patriotic sentiments for the continuation of the war are rampant in American society. One of the main arguments of this dissertation is that the Ground Zero memorial complex is one such cultural product. It would be too naive to assume that the role of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum is limited to the apolitical commemoration of the victims of 9/11. Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan is a highly contentious place in the American landscape, and thus, the memorial complex standing there cannot be anything but political and politically charged.

I initially reached this insight because of my positionality as a Japanese national. As a citizen of a country where an anti-war discourse is emphasized in the aftermath of the bombing of Hiroshima, (and whether or not it lacks its own ability to be critically reflective), I found the pro-war narratives disseminated at the Ground Zero memorial complex to be inappropriate. The site seemed politically and excessively charged to me.

3 A writer of the magazine Rolling Stone reports that even audiences who were usually critical about politically hawkish propaganda, like the one rationalizing Kyle’s story, were enthralled by the film. He underscores the dangerous influence that the film may have on American audiences in his review: “When hunky Bradley Cooper’s Kyle character subsequently takes out Mustafa with Skywalkerian long-distance panache—‘Aim small, hit small,’ he whispers, prior to executing an impossible mile-plus shot – even the audiences in the liberal-ass Jersey City theater where I watched the movie stood up and cheered. I can only imagine the response this scene scored in Soldier of Fortune country.” See Matt Taibbi, “‘American Sniper’ Is Almost Too Dumb to Criticize. Almost,” Rolling Stone, January 21st, 2015 https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-news/american-sniper-is-almost-too-dumb-to-criticize- 240955/ (accessed February 28th).

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Informed by my specific positionality and response, this dissertation exposes the complexity of the Ground Zero memorial complex. Hence, although this is a site-specific study focused on Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, I shift the sites of my investigation in time and space. In order to reveal the historic significance of the memorial complex in American history and politics, this dissertation travels from the contemporary era of the Global War on Terror to the time of slavery, from New York City to the Japanese city of Hiroshima, to Vietnam, to the

U.S.-Mexico border, and to Hawai‘i.

In moving from one point to another, and by tracing the processes of exclusions and inclusions at the site, I demonstrate that the WTC site was reconstructed as a war memorial in the time of the Global War on Terror, and despite the fact that it was ordinary citizens who were killed by 9/11, and not only or primarily military personnel. On the one hand, Muslims and other others who bear witness to the difficult pasts that contradict the foundational ideals about inclusivity in the U.S. are excluded from occupying the physical terrain of Ground Zero in

Lower Manhattan, and from being remembered at the site. On the other hand, the American service members who sacrificed themselves in the wars fought in the Middle East in the post-

9/11 world are allowed to be officially commemorated along with the victims of 9/11. They help validate the U.S. as an exceptional country of freedom and democracy to national and international audiences.

Most importantly, this dissertation reveals the mutual dependence of the WTC site and the Global War on Terror. This means that the latter was initiated because of, or as a response to, the demise of the Twin Towers on September 11th, 2001. At the same time, it is also the case that the physical reconstruction of the WTC site was not free from the war. The sense of vulnerability, which has been the driving logic of the Global War on Terror, dictated the

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reconstruction project itself—the design and location of its structures. Many changes were made to the original design out of security concerns. The Ground Zero memorial complex is, as a result, a product of the fear that the U.S. will be attacked again.

What is more, this commemorative institution continuously evokes a sense of vulnerability. The memorial Reflecting Absence and the primary tower One World Trade Center, both of which were redesigned for security purposes, thus reminding viewers that the U.S. was once attacked and is likely to be the recipient of further violence in the future. With these architectural works, the memorial complex perpetuates the ongoing necessity of the Global War on Terror. Inciting fear can lead to the justification for and continuation of “counterattacks,” as was the case in Vietnam, the U.S.-Mexico border, and Hawai‘i.

In a way, the WTC site is another battleground of the Global War on Terror. While its landscape was shaped by the logic of the war, the Ground Zero memorial complex is playing an active role in initiating and perpetuating acts of war. Hence, the Global War on Terror and the reconstruction of the WTC site is in a vice-versal relationship, and the war is being fought not only in the Middle East but also at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan.

This becomes more apparent in the National September 11 Museum. While the victims of

9/11 are commemorated inside this cultural institution, its exhibits are curated in accordance with the logic of the Global War on Terror. The binary opposition between “us” and “them” is drawn and redrawn through the museum’s “historical” captions, and the vulnerability of the U.S. is continuously emphasized. The National September 11 Museum shows and tells visitors how to remember 9/11. The museum is, in other words, where an interpretive war is being waged in the name and time of the Global War on Terror, but disguised as a site of commemoration.

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These observations about the Ground Zero memorial complex suggests that the WTC site was rebuilt primarily for American citizens. The memorial complex is, to revisit White’s discussion on the sites of national traumas, a place where national subjects are produced. Just as the memory work at Pearl Harbor is performed in ways to invite American citizens to consent to

U.S. military aggression, the Ground Zero memorial complex is designed to intensify visitors’ patriotism through the layers of “commemorative” activities and exhibits.

This insight dovetails with the dissertation’s initial assumption that the memorial complex was a place for American visitors. In fact, the place is filled with national symbols and references. For instance, surrounded by American flags, the primary tower reaches 1,776 feet, the symbolic height signifying the year of American Independence. However, the ethnographic study that I conducted reveals that the Ground Zero memorial complex is far more influential.

My ethnographic project allowed me to track the wide range of responses to the site’s interpellation. In short, it was not just American visitors who were affected by the

“commemorative” signs and practices performed at the memorial complex. Some foreign visitors emotionally empathized with the U.S. for the losses caused by 9/11, and viewed themselves as allies of the U.S. or empathetic supporters, unwilling to problematize the Global War on Terror and U.S. hegemonic foreign policies.

This is significant, considering the fact that from time to time, the U.S. incurs strong antipathy in the world, even from allied countries. When the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, many people across the globe objected to its unilateral decision. Nowadays, U.S. bombings in Syria and Trump’s support of Israel endangers the international reputation of the U.S. and may exacerbate its increasing diplomatic isolation. Under such a political climate, the importance of cultural institutions increases. They are the fortresses, based on the ideological wars being fought

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to reposition the U.S. in global politics.4 And, as this dissertation illustrates by using the close reading of the (rebuilt) WTC site, and the ethnographic study as methodological guides, the

Ground Zero memorial complex is a crucial battleground. At this very site, while national sentiments are heightened, empathy toward the U.S. is continuously solicited from foreign visitors and a kind of international ideological alliance is being forged for the Global War on

Terror and beyond, despite further U.S. aggressions.

Hence, “we,” including American and non-American citizens, need to heed Ta-Nehisi

Coates’s warning in the epigraph to this chapter. What would it mean to question all that that surrounds us? In this case, the Ground Zero complex as an apparatus urging visitors to accept

American innocence at face value without question, thus allowing it to become more aggressive.

Although the memorial complex may appear apolitical and neutral to some visitors, it is incumbent on those of us who study the meanings of cultural institutions, and in this case an

4 For the Syrian issue, some museums have already embarked on damage control. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, for instance, held a special exhibition titled “Syria: Please Don’t Forget Us” from December 2017 to February 2020. Although this was a very small exhibition, “Syria: Please Don’t Forget Us” was nevertheless significant. This exhibition began with a video in which Mansour Omari, a Syrian survivor who exposed Bashar Hafez al-Assad’s violence. Omari was made to “disappear” for nearly a year in a Syrian secret prison and when released, smuggled out his 82 cellmates’ names written on “five scraps of fabric in an ink made of rust and their own blood” [See the exhibition’s information on “Syria: Please Don’t Forget Us,” https://www.ushmm.org/information/exhibitions/museum-exhibitions/syria-please-dont-forget-us (accessed February 28th)]. In addition, some pictures of Syrian detainees killed in custody were displayed to show how brutally and randomly violence was inflicted upon civilians in Syria. Through these exhibits, on the one hand, “Syria: Please Don’t Forget Us” claims that “[since] 2011, the Syrian government has been committing crimes against humanity by systematically killing, bombing, and torturing its own citizens, leading to the greatest humanitarian crisis since World War II” (quoted from the caption in the museum). On the other hand, the exhibition does not elaborate on the relationship between Assad regime and the U.S., or how they sought to cooperate with each other under the pretext of the Global War on Terror. “Syria: Please Don’t Forget Us” remains silent on the fact that it is also the U.S.-led “war of annihilation” that have killed and injured many civilians and destroyed Syrian cities.

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important American memorial museum, to show that it can be a deathly and lethal apparatus waging/stoking a global war while seemingly fixed on consoling and healing a nation.5

5 This is where this dissertation has taken me in terms of the investigation of the Ground Zero memorial complex. At the same time, this dissertation is pushing me further, to consider the issues I was unable to adequately address here. Most importantly I want to consider Ta-Nehisi Coates. His lived experience as a black American allowed him to make the dire warning in the epigraph that begins this chapter. His knowledge of the history of African Americans as well as his own experiences led him to state that “southern Manhattan had always been Ground Zero for [them].” For me, it was my position as a Japanese national that gave me a “distance” from the Ground Zero memorial complex, a conceptual and emotional distance that enabled me to critically look at the site. Writing this dissertation unexpectedly revealed how deeply I am embedded in the world as a Japanese national subject. Having been surrounded for most of my life by an apparatus that urged me to accept certain national narratives about Japan, I have probably, unquestioningly incorporated them to the extent that those narratives structured my epistemological framework on an affective level. I remember feeling an inexplicable anger when I saw some American- looking people taking selfies in front of the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima. While making it possible for me to conceptually and historically analyze the complexity of the Ground Zero memorial complex, my ideological standpoint as a Japanese citizen may prevent me from seeing some things about myself, while enabling me to see things about others. This dissertation, therefore, eventually returned to me—to my positionality and to my experiences at both the 9/11 museum and at the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima . It has forced me to reflect on my identity as a Japanese national engaging in American Studies. “What would it mean for me to question the U.S. with all that that surrounds me?”

174 Appendix A

2019/4/30 University of Hawaii Mail - Honoring those who serve

Tomoaki Morikawa

Honoring those who serve 1 message

Alice M. Greenwald ­ 9/11 Memorial & Museum Sat, Nov 11, 2017 at 5:44 AM Reply­To: [email protected] To: Tomoaki Morikawa

Dear Tomoaki,

On this day devoted to honoring our nation's veterans, I want to recognize the strong and truly meaningful connection between the National September 11 Memorial & Museum and the United States military.

In the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, many men and women answered the call to serve our nation and protect the freedoms we enjoy each and every day. In the more than 16 years since the attacks, the dedication to community and country shown by members of the armed forces remains a stellar example of courage and selfless devotion. Today, as part of our Salute to Service, we honor their commitment and sacrifice.

This morning at the 9/11 Memorial, members from Team Red, White & Blue continued a tradition of placing yellow roses at the names of the more than 250 individuals killed on 9/11 who served in the United States armed forces.

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/1?ik=9ebe985ff4&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1583784979961246969&simpl=msg-f%3A1583784979961246969 1/3

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2019/4/30 University of Hawaii Mail - Honoring those who serve

This gesture is part of a special five­day tribute honoring veterans, active­ duty members of the military, and their families. It is a distinct honor to express our gratitude to those who serve through a series of programs and events at the 9/11 Memorial & Museum.

Our Salute to Service began on Wednesday when United States Army recruits from the Bronx, N.Y., participated in a swearing­in ceremony on the Memorial, which included recognition of local organizations dedicated to supporting veterans and their families.

Programming continued on Thursday, when members of the FDNY, NYPD, and PAPD placed American flags on the Memorial at the names of first responders killed on 9/11 who were also veterans.

On Friday, representatives from the United States Navy participated in a ceremonial American flag folding and a drill team performance on the Memorial. We also hosted a public program in the Museum's auditorium, https://mail.google.com/mail/u/1?ik=9ebe985ff4&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1583784979961246969&simpl=msg-f%3A1583784979961246969 2/3

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2019/4/30 University of Hawaii Mail - Honoring those who serve exploring some of the earliest and most significant post­9/11 missions fought by U.S. Special Forces.

The men and women of the military have sacrificed much in service to our country, Tomoaki. I ask that you take a moment today to join us in expressing appreciation for their selfless dedication and exemplary patriotism.

With warm regards,

Alice M. Greenwald CEO & President

The National September 11 Memorial & Museum is only possible because of your support.

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National September 11 Memorial & Museum | [email protected] 200 Liberty Street 16th Floor | New York, NY 10281

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177 Appendix B

2019/4/30 University of Hawaii Mail - To those who serve

Tomoaki Morikawa

To those who serve 1 message

Alice M. Greenwald, 9/11 Memorial & Museum Sun, Nov 11, 2018 at 2:13 AM Reply­To: [email protected] To: Tomoaki Morikawa

Dear Tomoaki,

This Veterans Day, we honor the dedication and sacrifice of those who serve.

The 9/11 Memorial & Museum recognizes the profound connection between this sacred place and those who have sacrificed so much for our country. In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, thousands of brave men and women joined the United States Military, stepping up to defend the nation and protect our freedoms.

Today, we recognize all who have heeded the call of service. Early this morning at the 9/11 Memorial, as a part of our annual Salute to Service, members from Team Red, White & Blue placed yellow roses at the names of the more than 250 individuals killed on 9/11, who served in the United States Armed Forces.

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/1?ik=9ebe985ff4&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1616839642175449396&simpl=msg-f%3A1616839642175449396 1/3

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2019/4/30 University of Hawaii Mail - To those who serve

This year's Salute to Service began five days ago, and concludes today, on Veterans Day. Throughout this period of tribute, we honor the commitment of veterans, active­duty members of the military, and their families. Over the past several days, the Memorial has proudly welcomed hundreds of veterans and military personnel, including Medal of Honor Recipient and Veterans Day Parade Grand Marshal Florent Groberg, and Sunny, a yellow Labrador Retriever and future service dog training with the veterans' assistance organization America's VetDogs.

Today also marks the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I. In recognition of this centenary, the 9/11 Memorial Museum is privileged to offer our visitors a preview of the central sculptural feature of our nation's next major national memorial, the new National World War I Memorial planned for Washington, D.C.'s Pershing Park. A 10­foot­long model of the memorial's centerpiece, titled "A Soldier's Journey," will remain on view throughout the month of November.

Tomoaki, I ask that you take a moment today to join us in expressing your appreciation to the men and women who have dedicated their lives to serving our nation and protecting the freedoms we enjoy each and every day.

Learn more about the 9/11 Memorial & Museum's Salute to Service.

Sincerely,

Alice M. Greenwald President & CEO https://mail.google.com/mail/u/1?ik=9ebe985ff4&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1616839642175449396&simpl=msg-f%3A1616839642175449396 2/3

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2019/4/30 University of Hawaii Mail - To those who serve

The National September 11 Memorial & Museum is only possible because of your support.

DONATE

National September 11 Memorial & Museum | [email protected] 200 Liberty Street 16th Floor | New York, NY 10281

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180 Appendix C

Questionnaire

Please answer as many of the following questions as possible. Thank you.

1. Are you a U.S. citizen? If not, what is your nationality?

2. How many times have you been to Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan? Please specify the years of your visit(s) and the approximate length of time of each visit.

3. Did you visit Reflecting Absence, the National September 11 Memorial designed by Michael Arad? (https://www.911memorial.org/memorial)

Please describe any of your experiences and responses to Arad’s memorial (e.g., its architectural design, size, waterfall features, engraved names of the victims, emotional feeling, etc.)

4. Did you visit the National September 11 Museum (opened to the public on May 21st, 2014)? Which exhibits/objects impressed you the most, and why did they impress you?

5. Did you join any of the museum tours? If yes, what did you learn from them?

6. Did you watch any of the films screened in the auditorium of the museum? Did you find them helpful? Please describe your response(s) to the film(s).

7. Based on your experience, who do you think was the primary audience or target audience for the museum? 1) U.S. Visitors 2) International Visitors 3) Both

Please explain your answer.

8. Did the experience of visiting Reflecting Absence and/or the museum enhance or change your initial understanding of the events of 9/11? Please explain.

9. Did you see or visit One World Trade Center, the new primary tower? (https://oneworldobservatory.com/en-US)

What was your initial impression? Please describe any of your responses to the building (architectural design, size, emotional feeling, etc.)

181 Appendix D

Semi-structured Interview Questions

1. Can you talk about how you make sense of 9/11?

2. Can you tell me about your reasons for visiting the rebuilt WTC?

3. How would you want to transform the World Trade Center site into what kind of place?

4. Talk about your experience working at Ground Zero. Can you tell me about challenges you have been facing?

5. In the National September 11 Museum, the Marines who killed Osama bin Laden are called “last responders” as a counterpart to rescue workers known as “first responders.” What do you think about this term and does it make sense to you?

6. How are you looking at the Global War on Terror that has been fought by the United States in response to 9/11? What is it like to visit Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan in the age of the war?

7. The International Freedom Center (IFC) was a proposed museum on the Ground Zero memorial complex. (It was never built.) It was designed to tell the stories of not only 9/11, but of other historic events of genocide and crimes against humanity in the U.S. and throughout the world. This plan was not realized because of protests from some family members of the victims of 9/11. They felt that it would be inappropriate, and one person described it as “creating a Museum of Tolerance over the sunken graves of the USS Arizona.” Do you agree with or sympathize with concerns and protests by family members?

Would you want to see the events of 9/11 linked to other events such as the genocide of Native Americans and the slave trade in the United States, the Third Reich’s Final Solution, and the Soviet gulags? Why do you think would it be important for some people to link these events with 9/11?

8. What kind of place do you think the rebuilt WTC should be?

9. Have you ever talked about your experiences at the rebuilt WTC to any other person?

182 Appendix E

Profiles of Partiicipants

Participant's Saw Saw Went to Agreed to Affiliated with Nationality One World Trade Center Reflecting Absence Museum Interview EWC

Participant #1 U.S. Participant #2 Latvia Participant #3 U.S. Participant #4 Japan Participant #5 Japan (Okinawa) Participant #6 Vietnam Participant #7 U.S. Participant #8 Philippines Participant #9 U.S. Participant #10 U.S. Participant #11 Taiwan Participant #12 Indonesia Participant #13 France Participant #14 Japan Participant #15 U.S. Participant #16 U.S. Participant #17 U.S. Participant #18 U.S. Participant #19 China Participant #20 U.S.

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institution that allows you to empathize with the U.S. president).” Accessed February

28th, 2020. https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-

r275904108-The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“An Emotional Must-See When Visiting NYC.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r653105730-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

201

“Ano Eizō ga Yomigaeru… あの映像がよみがえる… (That Image Is Revived).” Accessed

February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r414122045-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Be Prepared to Weep.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r712313402-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Disappointing, But Still a Must See.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r315690693-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Everyone Should Visit This Museum.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r709898291-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Excellent but Skip the 15min Movie.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r559906510-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Hitoridemo Ōku no Hito ni Mite Moraitai 一人でも多くの人に見てもらいたい [I want as

many people to see as possible (the museum)].” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r620606266-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Memory Only.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r640767863-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

202

“Mists and Tears Not Shed.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r694942293-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Nasty Security People, Underused Museum Space.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r370421380-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Nihonjin no Onamae wo Mitsukete Namida 日本人の方のお名前を見つけて涙 (I cried when

I found Japanese names).” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.jp/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r373798043-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Reflection.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r560651098-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Somber Yet packed and Disorganized.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r522650391-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Tasteful and Interesting.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r373802708-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“This Is an Important Place to Visit.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r336455545-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

203

“Thoughtful and Moving.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r411289167-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Too Soon.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r318746143-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Touching Reminder.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r371163524-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

“Well Done Exhibits.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1687489-r713844888-

The_National_9_11_Memorial_Museum-New_York_City_New_York.html.

Videos

“18th Anniversary of the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks: USA Today.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDdEsnwxajc.

“2018 September 11th Commemoration Ceremony.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmAKp-QfxS0.

“2019 September 11th Commemoration Ceremony.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35zF5cCZE38.

“9/11 Commemoration Ceremony Live Stream from WTC Ground Zero in New York City.”

Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWRU-sj_wbU&t=2426s.

204

“9/11 Memorial and Museum Ceremony 2019, Live Stream.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2nPT1J3wZQ.

“9/11 Memorial Ceremony in New York—September 11th, 2018.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYoSGv5WeW4.

Bush, George W. “Bullhorn Address to Ground Zero Rescue Workers.” Accessed February 28th,

2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=17&v=x7OCgMPX2mE&feature=emb_

logo.

Kennedy, John F. “Inaugural Address.” John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum.

Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/historic-speeches/inaugural-address.

“Mayor Bloomberg speaks at 9-11 Ten Year Anniversary Commemoration Ceremony.”

February 28th, 2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhIM1St4NMQ.

“Mayor de Blasio Attends September 11th Commemoration Ceremony.” February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seIC-LXqw30

“September 11th Commemoration Ceremony.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1y8ESzI0hg.

“World Trade Center 9/11 Memorial Ceremony.” Accessed February 28th, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nz8McJ57n-k&t=4s.

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