I literally never once heard the word "homeland" in a US nationalism context until a week after 9/11

Not too harp on this too hard but: Slavery? Trail of tears? Manifest destiny? It's been dogshit since the beginning. Who cares if the term "homeland" sounds dystopian. The vocabulary doesn't really matter. The attitude behind it has always been there. Like getting hung up on the word "homeland" is a Peggy Noonan ass point to make:

In a June 2002 column, Republican consultant and speechwriter Peggy Noonan expressed the hope that the Bush administration would change the name of the department, writing that, "The name Homeland Security grates on a lot of people, understandably. Homeland isn't really an American word, it's not something we used to say or say now"

She wasn't annoyed at the department itself, but how it was presented to the public.

And as others said already, of course America was torturing people before 9/11.