[ technical difficulties ] >> just why i'm down here today, we lost innocent lives that day, that brought us all down here. >> you mentioned you were going with the firefighters and police

and you were discovering some pretty gruesome scenes. >> definitely. every time you heard the bell that they found a human remain, we all stopped. even today if i hear a bell, i get sweaty palms. >> reporter: there has been a lot of debate regarding the first responders. where is that debate now? >> i have worked on this for the past nine years. today senator gillibrand, we have managed to put a band aid on a surgical wound. if you are exposed to high levels of toxicity, you need continued medical help. >> reporter: and that discussion will continue and a lot of

painful memories and a lot of pain right now from the people who are still suffering, and of course it's a debate that continues in congress. dell. >> david shuster thank you very much. we're going to take you live now to shanksville, pennsylvania. [ bell ringing ] >> this is the world trade center. this is the moment of silence there. and now shanksville, pennsylvania. it is a moment of silence being observed first at the world trade center at 9:59 is when the first tower fell, and then at 10:03, just 30 seconds ago, you are seeing the moment of silence in shanksville, pennsylvania, and here is the bell.

[ bell ringing ] >> announcer: john tagnani. >> that is the time that marks the time that united airlines flight 93 fell to the ground in shanksville, pennsylvania. john you were there, it is a very somber moment even though this was the day, and this was the site where those on board that flight decided to fight back. >> reporter: dell, made more so by the fact the weather is almost identical to how he was in 2001. what you are looking at is the members of the families of flight 93 and their supporters. we have heard the national anthem, we have heard the reading of the names, and now the tolling of the bell, and one of the bell tollers, i might tell you is captain thomas dearborn and his crew from the

uss somerset, which has been named in honor of flight 93. and they take part in lots of represents involving the flight 93 families. we're going to hear remarks from various dignitaries, including the new president of the families of flight 93. his name was gordon felt. he was until yesterday in charge of the federal advisory commission, but he stood aside from that, as has everybody on that commission, to take up a new role. and now that the money is in to build the memorial and the learning center and the visitor's center, it is the families who will take over the role of raising money to maintain this site. so we'll dip in now, and hear a few remarks being made here.

>> dr. brent glass. following dr. glass will be in gordon felt who is also a commissioner and the president of the families of flight 93. dr. glass. >> good morning. secretary jewel, superintendent ryanbald, gorrdy felt, friends, colleagues, it is an honor to participate in today's ceremony -- >> reporter: what happened on flight 9312 years ago today. flight 93 is the aircraft that did not go to the terrorist plan. it took off 40 minutes late because of routine delays. and the hijackers did not take over the aircraft for a full 46 minutes. that's much later than the hijackers on the other aircraft.

by the time they did take over the aircraft, the passengers were able to use the telephones in the seat backs and later when they were flying lower to use their cell phones to call their loved ones. and tell them what was going on, and they knew that this was no ordinary, if there is such a thing, hijacking of a flight. this was a suicide mission. so lead by todd beamer, and the other members of the passengers working with the crew, they decided to try to take over the flight, and according to most reports they did so, getting as far as the cockpit. it's not clear they got into the cockpit, but certainly that's what the families think they managed to achieve. the attempt to wrestle control of the aircraft, away from the hijackers was clearly unsuccessful because it crashed here, upside down, doing more than 500 miles an hour at 10:03,

12 years ago today. but the reason the people aboard the flight are considered to be national heros is because that plane was on its way to the nation's capitol, washington, d.c., and we don't know for certain what the target was, it might have been the capitol building or the white house. by taking over that flight and even though it ended in disaster here in this field, there this beautiful part of rural pennsylvania, the heros aboard flight 93 managed to save a lot more lives in the washington, d.c. area. >> john is joining us live from shanksville, pennsylvania. thank you very much for the perspective. you are watching our special continuing coverage of the 12th

anniversary of the september 11th attacks. and as we watch the names being read, and see the observances, and we hear the bell being rung, this is a day that happened in real time. at exactly 8:46 that morning, the first flight striking the north tower and then another plane striking the south tower, then a plane crash going the pentagon, at this point millions not only around the united states but around the world watching and wondering what is unfolding, and then the plane coming from the skies in shanksville, pennsylvania effecting the lives of those people you see there, who are reading the names of their loved ones, and changes the u.s. and the world forever. these are the people that remember that day. >> to me honestly, it's a very sorry day. you remember a lot of wonderful people who have left us, and you internalize it, and you

remember. it's just -- it's a remembrance day. >> i will always remember what i was doing when i first heard about it. the country came together during that time. just brings back some bad memories, but some good ones also. >> it was a tragedy. it affected us back home. we mourn on that day, and we rejoice that we can overcome. ♪

>> we return to our special coverage of america looking back then and now on september 11th, 2001, and now 2013, some 12 years later.

you are looking live at the picture -- that is the south side of the pentagon, where american airlines flight 77 struck. on that day, america changed forever, not just in new york, but in the defense infrastructure in washington that up to that point in time believed that it could not be attacked and would not be attacked and was proven wrong. and then they decided that had to fix that. ali velshi reports companies and contractors focused on the security sector, have seen a big boom in business. >> 12 years after that faithful day in september, america's security sector is booming. the government spends nearly six times what it did in 2001 in the fight against terrorism, fuelling the nation's growing security apparatus. >> since september 11th, there

has been a steady growth, and it really has changed the landscape in terms of what you can do with a technical degree and a security clearance. >> reporter: u.s. intelligence spending has doubled. but the private sector adds more than $280 billion to the market, bolstering firms that specialize in things like cyber security, and new hardware, that has transformed bedroom communities in major security hubs. for those like kevin that spells opportunity. two years ago he started his own video analysis company in arlington, virginia. >> we take video and turn it into data. >> reporter: his firm uses complex algorithms to analyze thousands of videos every day. >> you are looking at syria, you

are looking at 10,000 videos a day, and you are seeing the presence of this particular weapon is 3% throughout the month of july, and in july, we see a jump to 7%. you could watch those videos all day and you would never see that jump. >> reporter: the market has more than doubled in the past two decades, and it's not just overseas. they can identify faces and root out potential threats and raise questions about what level of privacy we can come to expect. >> american companies have been compelled to work with the intelligence community to provide potential intelligence for the nsa even at the risk of their own interests. >> joining me now to discuss the lasting security implications of

the 9/11 attacks is benjamin friedman, and david leventhal. i'll begin with you mr. friedman, the defense industry seems to have grown exponentially. is this a good thing or a bad thing and are we any safer? >> the size of the defense roughly doubled since september 11th, that's adjusting for inflation, and then it has fallen off a bit from that in this past year, where we had roughly an 8 or 9% drop. my own view is we spend far too much on defense. it enables us to get in trouble around the world instead of making us safer. it goes to big-ticket items designed mostly for fighting other countries, not really going after terrorists.

>> is it a misnomer to look at the defense budget to say it has grown or not grown that much, when if you go up the -- [ technical difficulties ] -- that have now lined up to get their piece of the national security pie, it is not much larger than it was 12 years ago. >> i think doubling is much larger, but all of those defense contractors are feeding off of the defense budget. we're talking roughly $50 billion. the intelligence budget has doubled, but that's mostly within the defense budget. so if you look at national security spending in a broadway, maybe it approaches a trillion dollars. >> mr. leventhal your thoughts. >> what you have is a lot of these contractors, and names you

would recognize, bowing, raytheon, who is not only receiving a heck of a lot more money than they used to, but also spending more than they used to when it comes to trying to influence government. some of them get 80, 90% of their income from the federal government, so it benefits them to invest in lobbying the government. so there's definitely a give and a take here, and a very close relationship that is a financial one through and through. >> as we look at those numbers and the names of those defense contractors, and you did rattle off the top ten, is it fair to an american public that wants an equal voice and seat at the table to compete against grumin,

where say in syria, the american public is saying they don't want to get involved, and yet there are those who spend a lot of money each and every day lobbying those same members of congress. >> there is a built-in inherent advantage that defense contracts have when it comes to lobbying the federal government. you have a lot of these defense contractors, and companies in general, but specific defense contractors that have armies of lobbyists if you will, and many of those are not just people who went to college to get a government relations degree or what not, but these are former government officials who have the no how and a great deal of expertise and experience, and many times will lobby the very people who they used to sit next

to. so this is really the way of washington when it comes to building those relationships when defense contractors can do what that do, and that is makes money, and that gives them a gre great advantage to do so. >> we are joined by our studio guest who is also a security expert. do you agree with their assessments on whether or not we are safer now? and whether or not the billions that are spent on the security structure since 9/11 have been a good or bad thing. >> i agree in certain areas. we probably overspend in some areas. >> what areas? >> we have seen a 12-fold increase in the amount of cyber attacks on the united states. we see a ramping up in that area. do i think probably in certain areas we overspend? yes, and i think more of those

resources could go to intelligence and diplomatic budget at the state department. and it is not just about yielding military power overseas, there are soft power elements that come into play as well. we probably overspend generally thinking, but i think there are reasons to have increases in certain areas of the government. >> mr. friedman we have spent billions of dollars on bombs, and whenever we go into a airport, we are almost stripped naked. have we spent more money on the infrastructure of defense and not enough money on educating our enemies? >> i'm not sure how much good it does to educate our enemies -- >> why not? >> well, i'll explain if you let me. liberalism sells itself generally speaking, and really the way that we avoid terrorism

here is not participating in political conflicts in the parts of the world where terrorism is produced. what we want to convince them to do is not hate us so much that they sign up to kill americans or help those who do, and i think that's really sort of a hands off project. i'm all for trying to improve the image of the united states, but i'm not sure that's a sort of panacea. i don't think we would vilify defense contractors. i don't know of any defense contractors lobbying for war. they want to spend a lot on defense, but don't necessarily want to have wars. they put jobs in districts of congress members, not because they lobby. they lobby sort of as a side project, but really they are influential in a way that congress is complicit in, which is we have all of these bases around the country, and it's the american voters who elect those

congressmen to fight for those facilities that set that up. >> do you agree? >> blame or no blame, it's really not the issue. what you do have is a lot of members of congress who have factories and operations in their districts and nothing will get a congressman more riled up when you talk about potentially cutting jobs or reducing the defense budget in a way that would affect their budget. you see people from the defense firms having very close relationships with those members of congress who do have facilities in their districts and what not, but budgetary matters are a very big concern. we talked about a drone that is very unpopular. saying they don't need it, and government says it doesn't need

it, members of congress disagree, in part because they could lose jobs if this program were to go away. >> mr. friedman, i will ask you the question this way rhetorically. they say the toys of boys are bombs. are you saying with regards to the situation in syria and involving conflicts, that there aren't members of the defense industry who somewhat salivate at the fact that a bomb that does not explode cannot be rebuilt, and there another check in the bottom line? >> i don't know. they depend on a bunch of broader decisions about how ready we want to be or how much we want to spend. i think we want to spend a lot less money. i want to hurt their bottom line, but i don't think they are out there necessarily promoting

wars. i think that is a little bit unfair -- >> no, i don't think it was characterized as promoting war. but it was saying there are those that have profited from war ever since eisenhower. >> people have profited from war since we have been having wars. there has always been an amount of private participation in wars, going back even to the revolutionary wars, and a lot of those people we view as heros now, i think rightfully so. so it depends on the circumstances in the war, but just because you are making money helping the government do something doesn't mean you are a crook. >> tara which of these two gentlemen are right? >> i agree with ben on that.

i think there are obviously other political decisions, based on a lot of other factors. i do think another interesting point though -- is that because of a lot of the threats that we are seeing could also be home grown or small cells it does beg the question on is the spends go to help protect us from those kinds of threats. >> let me phrase the question this way, because i don't think it's right to villainize the people in the defense industry. i think it could be asked at a time when they are talking about cutting the budget in washington there has been an awful lot of money spent on defense since september 11th, and is now a good time to look back at the

billion dollars being spent, and say was that money well spent and are we any safer? >> i think all three of us agree that there's no overwhelming push on capitol hill from defense contractors to try to have a military action in syria to the broader question, ultimately defense contractors, most of them get the majority of their money from the u.s. government. so if the u.s. government is spending less money on military action and less money on the devices to have readiness, then this is something that is going to effect all of them, so of course as the federal government is in the straights that it is in right now financially, as we are still under a situation of sequestration, this is something that the united states is always going to have to look at, because we're not talking about chump change, we're talking about serious dollars, and that

can be real money as you try to pencil out the federal budget from year to year. >> dave benjamin, and tara, i thank you all for being with us. it is now 10:27, we are going to go back to the world trade center site, because in 60 seconds the bell will ring again. this will mark the moment in time that the second tower fell. if you are just joining us, we continue to follow the observances of the 12th anniversary of the september 11th terrorist attacks. we watched president obama place a wreath at the pentagon, that gesture barely coming 12 hours

after he spoke to the nation trying to persuade americans about his plan to attack the assad government for its use of chemical weapons. let's listen. >> we love you and we miss you. you'll never be forgotten. [ bell ringing ] >> again, it is a different day, as we observe this the 12th anniversary of the september 11th attacks. it is a day we look back and reflect on what is changed over the last decade plus. and it is a day we debate whether or not america will become involved in yet another situation in the middle east. this time assad in syria. this is what the president said just 12 hours ago on the eve of this day, talking about whether

or not the united states should become involved in the situation in syria. he said that it is time to give diplomacy a chance, saying that this time the russian proposal does need further examination by the international community. david shuster you are standing by live at the september 11th memorial site here in lower marg margin -- manhattan. is this different than that day 12 years ago when there seemed to be so much of a rush to do something? >> obviously on the day of 9/11, 12 years ago, the rush was trying to find out what happened to people's loved ones, it was a scramble and complete chaos. i think what you saw, though,

dell, that night after president bush hopscotched around the country on air force one, and then the president delivered a speech to the nation saying we were going to come after the terrorists, it was pretty clear that the united states was a nation at war, even if it was only going to be a matter of time. then came something of a delay in that the bush administration which was under tremendous pressure to have an immediate response to al qaeda, and the taliban, and afghanistan, they waited seven weeks, and only then did they open up the attack in afghanistan. so it was a fascinating time, and yes, there was tremendous pressure for the united states to respond immediately, but the immediate concern, of course was trying to find people that might have been buried alive, and console the victims and have some sort of understanding of

what happened that day, and then the bush administration preparing the nation for the war that was going to come. >> david shuster, thank you very much. >> we have john terret standing buy. john, you have been listening to the ceremonies, the comments, your thoughts? >> my thoughts are that this is the 12th anniversary of 9/11. it's not a particularly big one in the nation's sides, that was the 5th and the 10th. but it is very big for the families of flight 93, because here they are in this field in beautiful rural pennsylvania with the sun shining, remembering their loved ones, who died at 10:03 on this day 12 years ago, and to a certain extent i think they feel a

little bit left out because they are all out here in pennsylvania, and everyone talks about planes going into the world trade center, and the pentagon. and the families are determined to not let this be forgotten. salary jewel who is the secretary of the interior is here as the only official representative, and they are just having a wreath-laying ceremony at the moment. we're getting towards the end of the service here in shanksville. what happens at the end, the families will move through a gate, away from the memorial plaza, which is where most of them are seated at the moment, and they'll take a walk through some beautifully landscaped gardens down to the point of impact where flight 93 came in, it came in upside down doing

almost 600 miles an hour, and today what marks the point of impact is a very large rock. it is a symbolic rock that they moved in when they were doing the memorial. so the families will go down there in peace. so the whole area is known as the field of honor, and is called the field of honor, because the point at which the memorial actually starts is the point at which they stop finding human remains. so all across that field and into the woods behind, the families assume that is the burial site of their loved ones. yesterday, tuesday, was a particularly difficult day for the families. they experienced the closing of

flight 93 federal advisory commissions. it has been going on ten years, and met on more than 40 occasions. it is a very, very emotional event, and we witnessed that. they also took part in a ground-breaking ceremony, where there will be in two years time, hopefully, if all goes well, the brand new visitor's center and learning center to welcome people from all over the world here to find out what happened on flight 93 and the aftermath and ask the question can it be avoided in the future. we take a look now at the day before the national remembrance of 9/11. >> reporter: 12 years gone. that's a lot of time, isn't it? >> it is. but there are times when you look back and the pain and the

anguish of the events seem like it was just yesterday. >> reporter: gordon lost his brother here when the 757 crashed upside down doing more than 500 miles an hour. >> yeah, i miss my brother, and i -- i -- i miss the fact that his children have grown up without a dad, and i hope that -- that this memorial can serve to educate people about the human lost. >> reporter: there already exists a memorial plaza, wall of names, memorial groves, and field of honor. the new visitor center will be located on that hill overlooking the crash site. the flight 93 federal advisory commission is being wound up. the friends of flight 93 will raise funds from here on in.

the last meeting in summer set was very emotional. >> ten years does nothing at all to develop the site that we have that had serious environmental problems. it took the family members a year to even come together and start talking about ideas for this memorial. >> reporter: and this is the moment the families have been waiting for, a ground-breaking ceremony. everyone joined in lead by the interior secretary, salary jewel. for gordon all of this is just the beginning. now the friends of flight 93 will oversee things. >> we'll continue to raise funds to support the park. >> so far 190,000 visitors have come, 2 million since september 2001. the friends of flight 93 hope the new construction will envies

visitor numbers significantly, as the extraordinary story of flight 93 goes on being hold. ♪ >> reporter: let's just remind ourselves of what that extroer neir story was. the passengers and crews of flight 93 had their aircraft taken over by the hijackers. 46 minutes into their flight from new york airport, because the hijackers had left to take over the aircraft quite later than the other hijackers, it meant that the passenger's were able to make telephone calls to loved ones, and they found out that planes had gone into the world trade center and the pentagon, and they realized they were not on any ordinary, if you can put it like that, hijacked

aircraft, so they decided to fight back. the families think their loved ones got into the cockpit and tried to overtake the aircraft. and the heroics of that day ended in what could have been a much worse tragedy. it is thought that they saved hundreds of lives in bringing the aircraft down here in the field in pennsylvania. as we leave you, this is one of the most emotional moments of the ceremony here in shanksville. you are looking at members of the families going down to the rock, that marks where the plane came in. there were three coffins that were placed there in 2010, and the families will spend as much time as they want there, being in the same location as where

their loved ones parished. dell? >> john thank you. we bring our correspondent from syria. you have spent years covering the middle east in that post 9/11 world. where were you on september 11th? >> dell, i was a graduating student at the american university in cairo. i remember being in a taxi in downtown cairo when the news first broke, and like many egyptians there was this very strong sense of shock and immediate sense of uncertainty. it wasn't clear to us at the moment what just hand, whether this was a one-off attack or a

pattern of attacks, but it was very clear to us, that it this very ordinary group of young men really shook the entire world by taking on the world's most powerful country. something that not only scared americans, but scared a lot of us in our part of the world. i remember personally wondering whether i was ever going to graduate, the auc was a primary american target, just like the u.s. embassy. it too had to shut down for three weeks. going back to campus after three weeks, and witnessing those intense conversations, a lot of the members of the international body students leaving, a lot of professors, of course, choosing to stay behind and start this intense process of conversations between the international student body, so a very interesting time indeed to have been a college student in that part of the world. dell?

>> what was the feeling towards the u.s. then, and how has that changed if it has changed at all based on your reporting? >> we talk a lot, dell, about how 9/11 affected america, but we also have to member just the very strong impact it has left on the psyche of arabs. once again as i mentioned it sparked a lot of soul searching in this part of the world. many questions were being asked as to how exactly this hand and why it happened. we saw the influx of foreign reporters at the time coming to the region, exploring that question, but more importantly also in this part of the world, dell, for the very first time we saw this kind of debate, soul sear searching, questions, how could did arabs come -- [ technical difficulties ] -- that it could appear at the time that this was a moment to

spark a dialogue of bridging the divide between the east and the west, but unfortunately many people feel that this was a missed opportunity, there was obviously concerns about the impending sense of collective punishment that was to become something that was very evident to this part of the world a few years later when we saw the iraq war and several other wars that targeted this part of the world, certainly that concern did list through. >> that brings us then to syria. what does the united states do next as far as the arab world is concerned with regard to syria based on your reporting from the region? >> well, of course the issue of foreign military intervention, dell, was at the heart of why 9/11 happened. remember those people who carried out the 9/11 attacks

were citing an intervention in the '90s, be it by the soviet union or the united states which maintained basis in saudi arabia after the gulf war. so the issue of foreign intervention really at the heart of why 9/11 happened. so when we saw the iraq war hand, this was a very big concern that this would only end up enbolding these groups. i can tell you from my reporting that there are a lot of concern of the presence of these foreign fighters in syria, whether the united states should intervene to take them out or not, what the fighters from the moderate groups, the none self-described islamist groups are talking about, is that they should worry

about arming the moderate groups, that way they would avoid direct intervention into the conflict, something that could once again raise the specter of empowering those radical groups, dell? >> thank you very much for your perspective. and joining us now in studio, is an al jazeera contributor and the codirector at the liberty and security center at nyu. as you listen to this day unfolding, your thoughts on whether or not we are seeing history repeat itself with regards to syria? >> i'm not sure i would go that far at this point in time what president obama has proposed is a limited strike. he has made it very clear he does not intend to have boots on the ground. so he is making a concerted effort not to repeat the

mistakes of iraq and afghanistan. there is also the risk that once the united states starts taking military action in syria, that it would be drawn into a broader conflict. and there is no appetite for that either in congress or amongst the american people or president obama himself. >> and yet in washington they have the term blowback which is if an event happens, that event leads to another event happening down the road. is there a concern that one day we're looking at another september 11th where somebody says they are angry about what the united states does? >> i think that is always a risk whenever the united states intervenes in any foreign country? >> so should it? >> i think there's two sides to this argument, one is -- it is in the united states security interests to make sure the weapons of mass destruction do not proliferate and that they are not used around the world. that is a long-term security

interest. it's not something that gets achieved over a day or a year, and that's why the united states has worked pretty hard to put in place arms control regimes in order to make sure that certain types of weapons are not used. it actually makes war in some sense more humane. so i see that this is a long-term interest of the united states. now, you know, putting a long-term interest in front of a wa war-wary public is challenging. >> the argument over who is to blame in syria continues at this hour. in world war ii, and world war i chemical weapons were used, and that's when the world said never again. and here we are again at the brink of trying to determine whether they will ever be used

again. is there room in the world as the world cop? >> i don't know anyone would accept the united states as the world's policeman, and i think that was an issue that president obama seems to be quite aware of, and he has raised it quite directly in his speech last night, and i think there is however, a line to be drawn at some point, which is, if for example, we have here now an allegation that chemical weapons were used by assad and killed 1400 people, and we're still waiting for the un inspectors to come back with their report. they were the ones on the ground who took the samples and analyzed them under international supervision, that's a very big step that we need to wait for, and then of course we have this russian proposal now to find a way to get assad to give up his chemical weapons so they come under some sort of international supervision, and i think nobody

wants to go to war and get involved, really in this conflict. >> the voices of the 1400 crying out for justice. is justice delayed justice good in this case or is it justice too late? >> i think justice has to take place at some point in time, and what we have seen is it's very difficult for justice to take place in the course of a conflict. take a look at, for example, yugoslavia, you had this ongoing civil war for years on end, and it was only after they were able to establish a political agreement that they could move on to the next step of holding people accountable for killing massive amounts of civilians. so it was very difficult to see justice taking place in the midst of an ongoing conflict. >> thank you very much. different on this day as we look

back we also wrestle with the issue of syria, and the use of chemical weapons and 1400 people dead this time oversees in another country, and what the united states should do, as we go to break, we're taking a look now at the reading of the names, 125 pairs, 250 couples, or 250 people in all reading the names, until all of the names who died on that day have been read aloud so they are never forgotten. as we go to break, we listen to those who can never forget. >> all of us who lived through it and were glued to our television sets that day were so profoundly moved by what was happening and felt so vulnerable, and victimized at the end of it, and i think that that's what we'll never forget. >> i remember coming in the office, and all i remember is

how lucky i was to be alive. that could have been me, so it just felt like the reaper. >> hopefully people won't forget. and it still kind of keeps us together, the glue together as a country and one nation, you know? ♪

>> we're coming to you from our studios in new york where we continue to observe the 12th anniversary of the september 11th terrorist attacks. we go to david shuster who is

observing the observances on what was considered ground zero. david your reflections as we are now into our third hour. >> we're here at st. paul's chapel , which was something of a staging area on 9/11. people coming down here, who are not family members, but just tourists who are curious what was this site? and how has it been rebuilt. the world trade center towers, they were symbols of american strength and power. so when they collapsed 12 years ago today, there was also the beginning of dialogue about what should new york do, should the towering be rebuilt? there were many architects

through the years who hated the world trade center towers, and there were some who felt like okay this is an opportunity to do something different, to do something architecturally marvellous, so they began this very long path of rebilling. rebuilding a set of tower, and also the memorial and ways to try to remember the victims. here we are 12 years later, and one of the reasons the family members say they still grieve is because the process here has not been finished. >> reporter: 12 years after 9/11, much of the site known as ground zero remains under congress. but progress is being made. there are waterfalls with the names of the 2,753 victims

etched in the granite. nearby workers are still building the 9/11 museum. the space will be filled with pictures and personal stories. and the centerpiece building here, one world trade center is nearly complete. with the placement of the 400-foot radio tower, it marks the year of american independence by design. but inside work continues. it has been a long 12 years and controversy has marked ground zero ever since officials have begun trying to rebuild. officials have refused to consider rebuilding the twin pow towers in any fashion. instead the special development corporation in charge decided to hold a contest to come up with a new design. officials selected a design by an architect who never built

anything taller than four stories. his freedom tower featured an off-center sky scraper with turbines near the center. but it was determined that the plan was unsafe. and larry silversteen complained about the official potentials. in 2005 childs unveiled a new freedom tower plan. the first steel beam was installed in 2006, and by 2008, the concrete core began to rise and construction reached street level. in 2009 officials changed the name from freedom tower to one world trade center, three years

ago by 2010 the tower reached the halfway point. one world trade center as signed leases with a chinese company, the federal government's general services administration and offices belonging to new york state, but that still leaves about half of the total office space in the building unrented. still to come an adjacent 72-story sky scraper is set up open, another is under construction and then there is two world trade center waiting to be build when the business market in lower margin -- manhattan improves. the rent in this particular

building is going to be 15% higher than average. when all is said and done the cost will be almost $4 billion, billion, with a b, it will be the most expensive building the world has ever constructed, and one of the reasons, again, is because of all of the security concerns, so some extraordinary measures have been taken to try to make sure there is never a repeat of 9/11. dell? >> david i'm security as i watch the scenes around you, is there a sense from the site that there is just another day in new york, or do the people coming down there realize what today is? >> reporter: everybody realizes. even people going to work have paid their respects and stopped and looked at the camera crews,

police and officials who are here. but it's important to remember that new yorkers pride themselves on their resilience, and one of the ways that you hear from people about how new york bounces back is to say we're not going to let 9/11 dictate our lives. so yes, there are hundreds of families who are here, paying their respects, but there are thousands of people that have been streaming by to their their -- offices, and many heading off to their jobs, doing their work, and for them, it's about moving on. >> well put mr. shuster. we turn now to washington, where you see the members of congress coming out. randolph pinkston is there.

randall describe what we're looking at. >> reporter: we're looking at the east steps of the capitol, dell. a crowd has been waiting for them for sometime now. not a large crowd. many staffers. some members of congress, we expect. this will be moderated by house speaker john boehner, and comments by house minority leader, nancy pelosi, and harry reid, and mitch mcconnell. this is the non-partisan day of remembrance of 9/11. as we all know not only was there an attack in new york there was also one washington at the pentagon. and there were thoughts that the plane that crashed in

pennsylvania may have been headed for the capitol, others believe it was the white house. but in any event, no one was taking any chances. [ technical difficulties ] >> our audience that is joining us, it is now 11 eastern time. you are looking at a scene on the eastern steps of the capitol building. >> we begin with the singing of the national anthem. ♪ oh, say can you see, by the dawn's early light, what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming ♪ ♪ whose brood stripes and t bright