How memories of Japanese American imprisonment during WWII guided the US response to 9/11
As soon as Islamic extremists were identified as having carried out four deadly, coordinated attacks on U.S. soil in the early morning of Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta started hearing calls from the public to ban Arab Americans and Muslims from all flights – and even to round them up and detain them.
In the chaotic hours and days following the attacks, Mineta did not yet know that his childhood incarceration by the federal government in the aftermath of Japan’s Pearl Harbor bombing nearly 60 years earlier would be a crucial element in decisions about how the George W. Bush administration responded to 9/11.
Enduring the wartime hardships
Earlier that spring, President Bush had invited Mineta and his wife, Deni, to spend time at Camp David, the presidential retreat. One night after dinner, the president asked Mineta about his imprisonment during World War II.