The Persian Gulf Conflict and the Vanishing Hostages

After the Gulf War of 1991, no one bothered to formally announce the public disappearance of the American hostages held in Iraq and Kuwait. A courageous group, they had numbered more than 3,000. Many of pictures had appeared in national news magazines. While held, yellow ribbons had temporarily sprouted for them on trees, mailboxes, In store fronts, on light posts. Their stories were often told,(1) especially when they could relate a story of terrified hiding and resourceful escape.(2) They all returned by the Christmas season of 1990 and have thereafter remained invisible.(3) Americans cared about them while they were in danger, thrilled at the occasional story of escape, experienced relief at their safe return during Christmas season of 1990--then seemed to quickly forget them. Saddam Hussein had apparently intended to use them as human shields for a few weeks during critical stages of preparation for battle, then responded to worldwide pressure for their release.Even those who had been mere children just a decade earlier could remember the Iran Hostage Crisis of 1979-81, when daily expressions of outrage constantly interrupted network television programming. Adults would remember the 52 returning embassy personnel who were welcomed and housed at West Point, displayed at a massive White House reception, interviewed on talk shows, paraded through their home towns and invited to give inspirational speeches or to write books.Not this time. The yellow ribbon loyalties had moved on by the time the Gulf hostages came home. The successful military support group Operation Yellow Ribbon had already begin to use the symbol to show emotional support for the armed services and to rally contributions for a national 800 hotline.(4) When Franklin Mint fired its numbered, 24-karat gold Home Coming Limited Edition Collector Plate, with its long Yellow ribbon and American flag, it was strictly a "tribute to the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces."(5) People magazine's Commemorative Issue, festooned with a yellow ribbon, featured "Heroes of the War: The Fifteen Most Intriguing People." Not a hostage among them.Following more than ten years of civilian service, one of our most distinctive and unifying patriotic symbols had thus been recalled for military duty as quickly as the war front itself had appeared. The hostages received, so to speak, an honorable discharge from the duties performed by the hostages who had come back from Iran, from TWA Flight 847 (1985), from the Achille Lauro cruise ship (1985), and from Lebanon at various times during the 1980s. The latest captives from the Gulf were loved, welcomed locally, well thought of, but they were no longer national heroes. Culturally speaking, they were dead.If they felt confused about their evaporated fame, the rest of us can also admit disorientation. Hostages had become such familiar part of our public space. How could they so quickly disappear from their dominance in our journalism, in our hearts, and in out civic rituals? The puzzle intensified when the returning hostages of Lebanon--Alann Steen, Terry Anderson, Thomas Sutherland--were all invited to a White House Christmas tree ceremony in December of 1991. They continue to be cast in 1992 as parade marshalls and other roles that make them ceremonial centerpieces.To explain this anomaly, and to account for the fading of the Gulf hostage, I present a brief chronology of some important events that have defined the status of the civilian hostage in recent American ritual life. I end with a description of how the military, at the moment of their danger and victory, overshadowed the hostages. Yet the nation's way of representing and responding to the military experience borrowed liberally from the hostage tradition of the 1980s.1. CAPTIVITY AS AMERICAN NATIONAL STORYCaptivity has always been a gripping story for us. Our national literature began with the narratives of Mary Rowlandson and John Williams, who described their experiences of being held among Native Americans. …