There is little, if any, disagreement over the absolute necessity of this first requirement. As the Hart-Rudman Commission put it. "Guaranteeing that homeland security is achieved within a framework of law that protects the civil liberties and privacy of United States citizens is essential. The United States Government must improve national security without compromising established constitutional principles."^[7] Security measures, if carried too far, pose risks that may equal or even exceed those of terrorists and ill-intentioned foreign governments. Extreme restrictions on personal liberties would instill resentments against government and ultimately weaken the government's ability to protect the populace, In fact, such overreactions have sometimes been the result desired by terrorists. Similarly, badly designed border controls could endanger international trade and the American economy.

　

　There is one specific topic that must be addressed before moving on: posse comitatus. Some have suggested, erroneously, that the posse comitatus doctrine and law^[8] preclude the use of military forces and personnel to perform homeland security functions. To the contrary, the posse comitatus doctrine has always allowed the use of military forces to support domestic law enforcement. However, that use has always been subject to constraints, including civilian control of the military. Further, there is the very significant question of whether such use is in the best interests of the nation. Too active or too aggressive a military role carries with it the risk that resentments against the military and/or government will result. More likely, and therefore of even greater concern, is that the use of combat forces to perform domestic security functions will degrade their ability to fight and win any future war.

　

　A truly comprehensive homeland security program would include actions ranging from nuclear counterproliferation efforts overseas to consequence management operations here in the event of a successful attack. Given the range of actions required and the need to work both at home and in foreign venues, it will be necessary to use all four levers of power, Further, with many responsibilities being fulfilled by state and/or local authorities and with many potential targets being owned by the private sector, a truly national program will necessarily extend well beyond the federal government. Figure 3 depicts the full scope of organizational involvement while showing the split between military roles (homeland defense against military threats and military support to civil authorities) and civil functions at the federal, state, and local government levels and among private-sector owners or operators of critical infrastructure.

　

　

　Risk is a function of probability and consequence. Effectively managing risk requires actions to address both these determinants of risk. Prevention is aimed at reducing the probability of an adverse event's occurring; consequence management and response capabilities must be available should prevention prove inadequate. Neither prevention nor consequence management is sufficient by itself. A comprehensive national strategy to meet the homeland security challenge requires both.

　

　Table 1 presents a broad spectrum of potential prevention measures and consequence management and response capabilities that could be applied to the homeland security problem. As shown, prevention starts with "over there" diplomatic and military measures and extends into "execution disruption" measures here at home. Consequence management and response pick up with "execution disruption" (such as hostage rescue) and run through the full range of recovery and reconstitution measures that would be required following a terrorist attack. Finding the right mix of prevention measures and consequence management and crisis response capabilities is the key to successfully meeting the homeland security challenge.

　

　

　The risk-management approach described here provides the right conceptual framework for developing the comprehensive capability called for by Hart-Rudman and others. However, significant analysis and program development work would be required before this conceptual approach could be turned into concrete measures ready for implementation. The first step would be to develop detailed threat assessments addressing known and potential capabilities of our adversaries, our own vulnerabilities, and the logistics requirements and likely critical paths in executing attacks of various types. Understanding these aspects of threat in detail will allow us to target the weakest links to break event chains before harm comes to the nation. From this we can select specific prevention measures, based on probability of success rather than self-serving bureaucratic agendas, and determine the resources required for execution. Another essential analytic task would be to describe, in detail, the likely consequences of various forms of attack should they occur. This will allow us to determine the capabilities needed to conduct consequence management operations. Rigorous analysis of the sort described would allow us to identify the capabilities, operational competencies, and resources, including those not yet in existence, required for successful execution across the prevention and consequence management and response spectrum.

　

　Having identified what needs to be done, the next step would be to determine which agencies and levels of government are most appropriate to carry out specific functions. The key to ensuring that we get the best value for our money, always an essential requirement for good government, is to build on existing agency legal authorities, missions. capabilities, and competencies to the maximum extent possible. Where new legal authorities and/or operational capability is required, give them to the agencies best suited to the task by virtue of their existing tasking, and avoid duplication wherever feasible.

　

　Finally, identified agencies must be given clear homeland security tasking, together with unambiguous direction on their new priorities and adequate resources for tasks assigned. There are those, including the Hart-Rudman Commission, who also believe that restructuring is a prerequisite to effecting the necessary cross-functional coordination and to changing priorities at agencies that have historically paid little attention to existing or potential homeland security responsibilities. The counter to that argument is simple: agencies respond to the policies and priorities of the administration and Congress, as reflected in appropriated budgets. If agencies have not given sufficient priority to homeland security issues in the past, it is because they have not been tasked or funded to do so. In the past, such attention wasn't needed to the degree that it is now. A more moderate approach would be to acknowledge the necessity of clear tasking and adequate resources while admitting that restructuring may be required for more effective cross-functional coordination and to clearly indicate that priorities have shifted dramatically. In short, restructuring may be needed, but clear tasking, well-defined priorities, and adequate resources are absolutely essential.

　

　

　Building on existing law enforcement authority and blending in proven risk-management practices and a range of traditional and nontraditional national security and economic information, the Maritime Domain Awareness concept developed by the Coast Guard serves as an excellent example of commonsense application of the principles discussed above. Maritime Domain Awareness involves fusing ship, cargo, passenger, and crew databases from multiple sources to give the various security and enforcement agencies a far more complete advance picture of who and what is coming their way. Compared to the incomplete information available within agency stovepipes today, this cross-agency integration and correlation of data elements will yield a quantum-step improvement in government's ability to protect the homeland from threats arriving by sea.

　

　As noted previously, international trade is both a source of animosity in some quarters and a means of access to our shores. Well over 95 percent of our foreign trade that is not under the North American Free Trade Agreement is carried by ship, which illustrates that America is connected to the global economy, not primarily by aviation and the Internet, but by maritime commerce. ^[9] Every year, thousands of foreign ships, carrying multinational crews and cargoes from around the globe, enter U.S. ports. Unfortunately, in a time when access to WMD may be growing, the resources and methods available to our border control agencies are not adequate to protect the homeland from the myriad threats that could arrive by sea. As a result, asymmetrical "military" and terrorist threats have a natural gateway to America's shores via the marine transportation system. Given the importance of international goods and materials to the U.S. economy, closing our borders is out of the question. Further, with our growing reliance on just-in-time deliveries of foreign goods, even slowing the flow long enough for more complete random inspections may be economically intolerable. The challenge facing the Coast Guard, the Customs Service, and the other border control agencies is to develop ways to better protect the nation without sacrificing economic vitality in the process and without breaking the federal budget. ^[10]

　

　Information is the key. Databases from agencies and services, each with a partial view, must be fused so that the total picture emerges and effective intelligence is produced. With sufficient advance information about inbound ships, cargoes, and crews, the border control agencies will have a significantly enhanced ability to separate the good from the bad. Thus armed, they will be better able to intercept the bad before it becomes a problem for the country. This idea―exploiting available information to separate the good from the bad, and to then stop the bad―is at the heart of Maritime Domain Awareness. The potential of this idea is so powerful that it has received National Security Council support, and a multiagency Memorandum of Agreement aimed at Maritime Domain Awareness implementation has been executed.

　

　Much of the information required for Maritime Domain Awareness must already be submitted to various agencies, although not always in a timely manner to satisfy homeland security intelligence requirements. While earlier submissions may incur a cost, that cost should be minor. To carry the concept a step further, a properly conceived system could be designed so that it actually expedites properly documented cargoes originating in countries whose customs and security authorities have entered reciprocal arrangements with the United States, thus facilitating legitimate commerce rather than impeding it.

　

　

　America is entering a new era filled with dangers we have either never faced or have not seriously confronted for a long time. Clear are the calls for action to deal with these emerging threats. Less clear has been what to do in response to these calls to action.

　

　Dr. Kevin O'Prey, a defense analyst with Defense Forecasts International, has observed that the homeland security issue is extremely difficult to deal with due to its inherent nature. He describes the homeland security threat as involving low-probability, high-consequence events that are impossible to absolutely prevent and impossible to politically ignore. Further, while acknowledging that specific threat scenarios may involve individually low probabilities, Dr. O'Prey quotes former Secretary of Defense William Cohen that "the question is 'When?'- not 'If?'"^[11]

　

　This perspective reveals parallels between homeland security and commercial aviation that lend support to the principles and basic approach outlined earlier. The traveling public knows that dangers do exist in flying, but the benefits of flying are too strong to resist. The public's response to the risks inherent in flying has been the demand for rigorous safety programs (prevention) coupled with emergency preparedness and effective accident investigation (response) and availability of insurance (consequence management). The benefits of America's political, military, and economic place in the world are, like those of commercial air travel, too attractive to forgo. However, unlike with aviation, our recognition of the threats facing us is so new that we have yet to develop a comprehensive national suite of prevention programs and consequence management and response capabilities to deal with the homeland security problem.

　

　Certainly, many good ideas have been put forward outlining how this nation could deal with specific aspects of the overall problem. What has been lacking has been a more encompassing, holistic view of the homeland security issue and a set of principles and a methodology to guide our future actions. While much remains to be done, we have attempted to provide a framework with which the United States can build the comprehensive national response the nation needs.

　

　While adhering to constitutional principles and the rule of law, the President and Congress can use risk-management concepts to select, from among the many options available, those measures and capabilities that provide the best value in safety and security. The key is to understand the true nature of the threats and use all four national security levers of power appropriately. The American people deserve no less.

　

　

[1] Richard A. Falkenrath, Robert D. Newman, and Bradley A. Thayer, America's Achilles' Heel (Cambridge, MA: MIT press, 1999), p. 213.

　

[2] Michael E. O'Hanlon, "Beyond Missile Defense: Countering Terrorism and Weapons of Mass Destruction." Policy Brief #86. Brookings Institution, August 2001.

　

[3] Roadmap for National Security: Imperative for Change, U.S Commission on National Security/21st Century Phase III Report, 15 February 2001, pp. 2, 10.

　

[4] Ibid., p. 10.

　

[5] Ibid., p. 11, Recommendation 1.

　

[6] New World Coming: American Security in the 21st Century, U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century Phase I Report, "Supporting Research and Analysis," 15 September 1999, p. 130.

　

[7] "Roadmap for National Security," Phase III Report, "Addendum on Implementation," 15 April 2001, p 3-B.

　

[8] The posse comitatus law (18 USC 1385), adopted in response to Reconstruction-era abuses, precludes the use of military forces for general law enforcement. The law applies only to the Army and the Air Force. The posse comitatus doctrine has been extended to the Navy and Marine Corps by Defense Department policy. The Coast Guard, while a branch of the armed forces of the United States at all times (14 USC 1 and 10 USC 101(a)(4)), has specifically been granted broad federal maritime law enforcement authority by statute (14 USC 2 and 89). The Coast Guard is unique in being both a military service and a civil authority/law enforcement agency. For additional commentary on the status of the posse comitatus doctrine, see "The Myth of Posse Comitatus," by Major Craig T. Trebilcock, U.S. Army Reserve, Journal of Homeland Security, 27 October 2000.

　

[9] "An Assessment of the Marine Transportation System: A Report to Congress," U.S. Department of Transportation, September 1999, p. 2

　

[10] Stephen E. Flynn. "Beyond Border Control," Foreign Affairs, Nov.-Dec. 2000, and Stephen E. Flynn, "A Transportation Security Agenda for the 21st Century," Transportation Research News, Nov.-Dec. 2000, No. 211, pp. 3-7.

　

[11] Kevin P. O'Prey, Executive Vice President, Defense Forecasts International, comments at the Quadrennial Defense Review 2001 seminar, National Defense University, 9 November 2000.

　

　

　Thomas L. Friedman, The Lexis and the Olive Tree (Vintage Anchor Publishing, 2000).

　

　Reports of the Hart-Rudman Commission (the Commission on National Security/21st Century)

　

　Report of the Seaport Crime and Security Commission (sometimes referred to as the Graham commission). This report describes the security vulnerabilities arising from the United States' relatively ineffective port security and control measures for contraband entering via otherwise legitimate international marine commerce.

　

　Reports of the Gilmore Commission (the Advisory Panel to Assess Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving WMD). The commission's reports describe the United States' current low state of preparedness to deal with a range of mass-consequence events such as a nuclear attack or the release of a lethal contagious disease such as anthrax or smallpox. The Gilmore Commission appears to be moving beyond mere "response" and toward a more comprehensive view of prevention.

　

　The Center for Strategic and International Studies has produced reports dealing with homeland defense (a subset of homeland security) and with preparedness for attacks with biological weapons).

　

　The Cato Institute has prepared a limited number of reports dealing with homeland security. Cato Policy Analysis No. 306, "Protecting the Homeland: The Best Defense Is to Give No Offense," is recommended only for its description of the potential threats.

　

　At the Council on Foreign Relations, Dr. Steve Flynn, an active-duty Coast Guard officer. is working on a project to examine "Border Control in an Era of Global Economic Integration." He has also published two shorter articles on his work: "Beyond Border Control" (Foreign Affairs, Nov.-Dec. 2000) and "A Transportation Security Strategy for the 21st Century" (Transportation Research News, Nov.-Dec, 2000). Additional information can be obtained through the ANSER Institute for Homeland Security.