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75–970 PDF 2001

COMBATING TERRORISM: IN SEARCH OF A

NATIONAL STRATEGY

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY,

VETERANS AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

MARCH 27, 2001

Serial No. 107–18

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEPHEN HORN, California

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

BOB BARR, Georgia

DAN MILLER, Florida

DOUG OSE, California

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

DAVE WELDON, Florida

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

——— ———

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JIM TURNER, Texas

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

——— ———

——— ———

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

KEVIN BINGER, Staff Director

DANIEL R. MOLL, Deputy Staff Director

JAMES C. WILSON, Chief Counsel

ROBERT A. BRIGGS, Chief Clerk

PHIL SCHILIRO, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut, Chairman

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

DAVE WELDON, Florida

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

TOM LANTOS, California

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

——— ———

——— ———

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

LAWRENCE J. HALLORAN, Staff Director and Counsel

R. NICHOLAS PALARINO, Senior Policy Advisor

JASON CHUNG, Clerk

DAVID RAPALLO, Minority Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on March 27, 2001 ............................................................................ 1

Statement of:

Hoffman, Bruce, director, Washington Office, RAND Corp.; James Clapper, Jr., Lieutenant General, USAF (Ret.), vice chairman, Advisory

Panel to Assess the Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction, accompanied by Michael

Wermuth, project director; and Frank Cilluffo, chairman, Report on

Combating Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Terrorism,

Center for Strategic and International Studies .......................................... 88

Rudman, Hon. Warren B., Co-Chair, U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century; and Charles G. Boyd, General, USAF (Ret.), executive director, U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century ......... 19

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Cilluffo, Frank, chairman, Report on Combating Chemical, Biological,

Radiological, and Nuclear Terrorism, Center for Strategic and International Studies, prepared statement of ..................................................... 127

Clapper, James, Jr., Lieutenant General, USAF (Ret.), vice chairman,

Advisory Panel to Assess the Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction, prepared statement

of ..................................................................................................................... 104

General Accounting Office, prepared statement of ........................................ 11

Hoffman, Bruce, director, Washington Office, RAND Corp., prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 92

Kucinich, Hon. Dennis J., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Ohio, prepared statement of .................................................................... 6

Rudman, Hon. Warren B., Co-Chair, U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century, prepared statement of ................................................... 25

Shays, Hon. Christopher, a Representative in Congress from the State

of Connecticut:

Article by Sydney Freedberg, Jr., entitled, ‘‘Beyond the Blue Canaries’’ .......................................................................................................... 77

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 3

(1)

COMBATING TERRORISM: IN SEARCH OF A

NATIONAL STRATEGY

TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2001

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS

AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM, Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room

2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Shays

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Shays, Putnam, Lewis of Kentucky, Gilman, Kucinich, and Tierney.

Staff present: Lawrence J. Halloran, staff director and counsel;

R. Nicholas Palarino, senior policy advisor; Thomas Costa, professional staff member; Jason Chung, clerk; Alex Moore, fellow; David

Rapallo, minority counsel; Earley Green, minority assistant clerk;

and Teresa Coufal, minority staff assistant.

Mr. SHAYS. A quorum being present, the Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations’ hearing entitled, ‘‘Combating Terrorism: In Search of a National Strategy,’’ is called to order.

Last week we learned the stalled investigation of the Khobar

Towers bombing that killed 19 Americans has been beset by a longsimmering power struggle between the FBI Director and the U.S.

Attorney assigned to bring terrorism perpetrators to justice. Transfer of the case to another prosecutor may breathe new life into the

5-year-old inquiry, but the change is also a symptom of a suffocating problem plaguing the Federal effort to combat terrorism—in a

word, ‘‘turf.’’ In 1995, the President designated the Federal Emergency Management Agency as the lead Federal agency for consequence management—the measures needed to protect life, restore essential

services, and provide emergency relief after a terrorism event involving conventional, biological, chemical, or radiological weapons

of mass destruction.

The FBI, part of the Department of Justice, was directed to lead

crisis management—the measures needed to prevent or punish acts

of terrorism.

Today, more than 40 Federal departments and agencies operate

programs to deter, detect, prepare for, and respond to terrorist attacks. We put their names out to demonstrate how difficult it

would be to get them all in one room, much less get them all to

speak with one voice.

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While some interagency cooperation and information sharing has

begun, substantial barriers, including legislative mandates, still

prevent a fully coordinated counterterrorism effort. As the organizational charts get more complex, the effort inevitably becomes less

cohesive.

In our previous hearings, we found duplicative research programs and overlapping preparedness training. Despite expenditure

of more than $9 billion last year, many local first responders still

lack basic training and equipment.

According to our witnesses this morning, the fight against terrorism remains fragmented and unfocused, primarily because no overarching national strategy guides planning, directs spending, or disciplines bureaucratic balkanization. They will discuss recommendations for reform of counterterrorism programs that the new administration would be wise, very wise, to consider.

When pressed for a national strategy, the previous administration pointed to a pastiche of event-driven Presidential decision directives and an agency-specific 5-year plan. Reactive in vision and

scope, that strategy changed only as we lurched from crisis to crisis, from Khobar to the U.S.S. Cole, from Oklahoma City to Dar es

Salaam.

In January, the subcommittee wrote to Dr. Condoleeza Rice, the

President’s national security advisor, regarding the need for a clear

national strategy to combat terrorism. The administration has

begun a thorough review of current programs and policies. In deference to that review, the subcommittee will not receive testimony

from executive agencies’ witnesses today. They will appear at a future hearing. That hearing will be in the very near future.

Terrorists willing to die for their cause will not wait while we rearrange bureaucratic boxes on the organizational chart. Their

strategy is clear. Their focus is keen. Their resources efficiently deployed. Our national security demands greater strategic clarity,

sharper focus, and unprecedented coordination to confront the

threat of terrorism today.

We look forward to the testimony of our very distinguished witnesses as we continue our oversight of these critical issues.

At this time I would like to recognize Dennis Kucinich, the ranking member of the committee.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Christopher Shays follows:]

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Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for calling

this hearing.

I want to welcome the witnesses.

I have a prepared statement. I would like to insert it in the

record and just note that I am hopeful that, as we review this

counterterrorism program, that we would also have the opportunity

to explore causal relationships in terrorism so that we may learn

why our Nation feels it needs such a sweeping counterterrorism

presence.

I thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Dennis J. Kucinich follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. At this time I recognize the vice chairman, Adam

Putnam.

Mr. PUTNAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also have a statement

to submit for the record, but I appreciate your calling this hearing.

Clearly, as the charts around us indicate, the national strategy

against terrorism is that there is not one national strategy against

terrorism.

Recent events—Khobar, Oklahoma City, a number of other

places around the world—have clearly indicated the need for us to

further refine our efforts and our preparations for these types of

acts of violence against American citizens and our interests, and I

look forward to the testimony from the witnesses.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

I recognize Ron Lewis from Kentucky.

Mr. LEWIS OF KENTUCKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would just like to welcome our witnesses. I’m looking forward

to their testimony. This certainly is a complex problem, but we certainly need to be doing everything we can to solve this as soon as

possible.

Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Before calling our witnesses and swearing them in, I just want

to get rid of some housekeeping here and ask unanimous consent

to insert into the hearing record a statement from the General Accounting Office discussing the fragmentation and lack of strategic

focus in current Federal counterterrorism programs. Based on

many of the studies and audits conducted for this subcommittee,

GAO recommends greater use of Results Act principles to measure

progress toward a truly national strategy.

Without objection, so ordered.

[The prepared statement of the General Accounting Office follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. And I ask unanimous consent that all members of

the subcommittee be permitted to place an opening statement in

the record, and that the record remain open for 3 days for that purpose.

Without objection, so ordered.

I ask further unanimous consent that all witnesses be permitted

to include their written statement in the record. Without objection,

so ordered.

At this time, I would welcome our primary witness, the Honorable Warren B. Rudman, who is co-chair, and Charles G. Boyd,

General, executive director. Mr. Rudman is co-chair on the U.S.

Commission on National Security/21st Century.

As you know, Mr. Rudman, we swear in all our witnesses, and

I would welcome both our witnesses to stand.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. Note for the record both of our witnesses

responded in the affirmative.

Senator Rudman, what we do is we do the 5 minute, but we turn

it over because we do want you to make your statement and we do

want it part of the record, and then we’ll ask you some questions.

Thank you.

STATEMENTS OF HON. WARREN B. RUDMAN, CO-CHAIR, U.S.

COMMISSION ON NATIONAL SECURITY/21ST CENTURY; AND

CHARLES G. BOYD, GENERAL, USAF (RET.), EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, U.S. COMMISSION ON NATIONAL SECURITY/21ST

CENTURY

Senator RUDMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I don’t think I have

more than 5 minutes, and I expect General Boyd has a few minutes, and we are here for as long as you need us.

Mr. Chairman, I’m honored to be here today on behalf of the U.S.

Commission on National Security/21st Century. I co-chair this with

former Senator Gary Hart. Senator Hart is in London and unable

to be here, and I am delighted that General Boyd is able to accompany me.

For those of you that are not familiar with the background of the

membership of this Commission, it was very unique. It was the

brain child of former Speaker Newt Gingrich, who looked at the

fragmentation that was called to his attention in this area of terrorism against our homeland, approached President Clinton, and

together they put together legislation which created this Commission. It was then turned over, for administrative purposes, to the

Department of Defense. The funding came out of the Department

of Defense.

We have been at this for more than 2 years. This has not been

a staff-run activity. This has been an activity run very much by the

commissioners, themselves, who spent a great deal of time over

this period of 2 years, including a number of weekends at various

retreats going over and fighting out these issues. When you read

the report, you’ll find that it is not like many reports which try to

recommend that which is possible; this report recommends what

we think you ought to do.

Now, politically that’s your problem and not ours, but we didn’t

think we ought to give you our political judgment. We thought we

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ought to give you our best judgment, and we have given you a road

map of how to do these things.

For those of you who unfamiliar with the Commission, let me tell

you alphabetically who served, and it was totally bipartisan: Ann

Armstrong, former chairman of the PIFIAD and also Ambassador

to the Court of St. James; John Dancy, some of you know, international correspondence for many years for NBC News; Les Geld,

president of the Council on Foreign Relations; Lee Hamilton, familiar to all of you here in the House; Donald Rice, former Secretary

of the Air Force, former head of RAND Corp.; Harry Train, former

commander in chief, Atlantic, a four-star admiral; Norm Augustine,

well known to many of you for his work in Government, but, of

course, best known probably as being chairman of Lockheed Martin; Jack Galvin, former head of NATO; Newt Gingrich; Lionel

Almer, Under Secretary of Commerce at one time in the Reagan

administration for international trade; Jim Schlesinger, who held,

I believe, four or five Cabinet posts in various administrations; and

Andrew Young, a former commissioner—former Ambassador to the

United Nations and former mayor of Atlanta.

I want to get directly to the question that your letter of invitation posed to us, and you asked: why is there no comprehensive national strategy to combat terrorism?

I would start my answer by pointing out that dealing with terrorism is an enormously complex problem. As we all understand, terrorism is varying and varyingly motivated. Sometimes it emanates

from States, sometimes from groups, or even from individuals.

Sometimes it comes from combinations of state sponsorship and

non-State actors, or either one. The source of these groups are

wide, coming from no one region of the world. And, as we have had

the misfortune to learn, it can include domestic elements, as well.

Terrorism also takes several tactical forms—assassinations,

bombing, biological or chemical attack, cyber terror, and potentially

terrorism perpetrated by the use of weapons of mass destruction.

Terrorists may also choose a wide array of targets, a complexity

that has generated considerable confusion. While some scholars define ‘‘terrorism’’ in its basic form as essentially unconventional attacks on civilians for any of several purposes, others include attacks on uniformed military personnel operating abroad as forms

of terrorism, such as Khobar Towers, such as the U.S.S. Cole incident. Others disagree. They consider such attacks to be another

method of waging conventional warfare. The distinction is not just

definitional or theoretical. Unfortunately, it influences how the

U.S. Government approaches policy solutions to these problems.

Clearly, given this diversity of motives, sources, tactics, and definitions, the responsibility of dealing with terrorism within the U.S.

Government ranges over a wide array of executive branch departments and agencies, as well as several Senate and House committees on the legislative branch side. Developing any effective comprehensive strategy for dealing with terrorism would be difficult in

any event, but under these circumstances even more so.

And I must say, Mr. Chairman, I’m a great believer in graphics.

Whether these have just been placed here for future witnesses or

whether they are here to illustrate the problem, there it is in front

of you. You could not have a more clear, definitive definition of

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what we’re talking about than looking at the names, all of them

great organizations, well motivated, trying to do the right thing,

but look at the number of them. Whoever on your staff came up

with that idea deserves an Oak Leaf Cluster. [Laughter.]

Mr. SHAYS. Why do you make an assumption, sir, that it was

staff that thought of that? [Laughter.]

Senator RUDMAN. Maybe that’s because I served in the Senate.

The U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century concluded that, however difficult the problem with terrorism may be,

we simply must do a better job of dealing with it. There is no national security problem of greater urgency.

The Commission phase one report on the national security environment of the next 25 years concluded unequivocally, based on unbelievably lengthy, complex, and detailed testimony from many in

this Government, concluded that the prospect of mass casualty terrorism on American soil is growing sharply. We believe that over

the next quarter of a century the danger will not only be one of the

most challenging we face, but the one we are least prepared to address.

The Commission’s phase two report on strategy focused directly

on this challenge, arguing that the United States needed to integrate the challenge of homeland security fully within its national

security strategy.

The Commission’s phase three report, released on January 31st

and delivered to the President on that day, devotes an entire first

section, one of five, to the problem of organizing the U.S. Government to deal effectively with homeland security.

We have argued that to integrate this issue properly into an

overall strategy framework there must be a significant reform of

the structures and processes of the current national security apparatus.

As you know, Mr. Chairman, the phase three report recommends

the creation of a National Homeland Security Agency. Before I discuss this proposal, I wish to stress what the Commission intends

and does not intend to achieve with its recommendations, because

some of it I believe has been misunderstood—probably by people

who didn’t read it very carefully, but it has, nevertheless, been misunderstood.

The United States needs to inculcate strategic thinking and behavior throughout the entire national security structure of Government. In the Commission’s view, and notwithstanding the early exertions of the new administration, we have a long way to go in this

regard. We have not had in recent years a process of integrated

strategy formulation, a top-down approach led by the President and

the senior members of his national security team, where priorities

were determined and maintained and where resources were systematically matched to priorities.

There has been almost no effort to undertake functional budgeting analysis for problems that have spread over the responsibilities

of many executive branch departments and agencies, the result

being that it is extremely difficult for the Congress, in its oversight

role, to have a sense of what any administration is doing with respect to major national security objectives.

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Finally, there has been no systematic effort from the NSC level

to direct the priorities of the intelligence community to align them

with the priorities of national strategy.

I might say to you in another hat that I’ve worn for the last 8

years as chairman and vice chairman of PIFIAD, I can tell you that

statement is absolutely sound and something that needs to be addressed.

It needs to be clear, before we discuss the proposal for National

Homeland Security Agency, we conceived of the National Homeland

Security Agency as a part of, not a substitute for, a strategic approach to the problem of homeland security. Clearly, even with the

creation of that agency, the National Security Council will have a

critical role in coordinating the various Government departments

and agencies involved in homeland security.

The Commission’s proposed strategy for homeland security is

threefold: to prevent, to protect, and to respond to the problem of

terrorism and other threats to the United States.

The Department of State has a critical role in prevention, as does

the intelligence community and others. The Department of Defense

has a critical role in protection, as do other departments and agencies. Many agencies of Government, including, for example the

Centers for Disease Control in the Department of HHS, have a critical role in response. Clearly, we are proposing to include sections

of the intelligence community, the State Department, the Defense

Department, and the Department of Health and Human Services

in this new agency. As with any other complex functional area of

Government responsibility, no single agency will ever be adequate

for the task.

That said, the United States stands in need of a stronger organizational mechanism for homeland security. It needs to clarify accountability, responsibility, and authority among the departments

and agencies with a role to play in this increasingly critical area.

It needs to realign the diffused responsibilities that sprawl across

outdated concepts of boundaries. It also needs to recapitalize several critical components of U.S. Government. We need a Cabinetlevel agency for this purpose. The job has become too big, requires

too much operational activity to be housed at the NSC level. It is

too important to a properly integrated national strategy to be handed off to a czar. We seem to have czaritis in this Government for

the last 10 years. It didn’t work in Russia, and I don’t think it has

worked very well here. It requires an organizational focus of sufficient heft to deal with the Departments of State, Defense, and Justice in an efficient and an effective way.

Mr. Chairman, the Commission’s proposal for a National Homelands Security Agency is detailed with great care and precision in

the phase three report. With your kind permission, I would like to

include that section of the report in the record here, for I see no

need to repeat here word-for-word what the report has already said

and is available to all.

Mr. SHAYS. Without objection, we will be happy to do that.

Senator RUDMAN. So I will give that to you.

However, I would like to describe the proposal’s essence for the

subcommittee. I will not mince words. We propose a Cabinet-level

agency for homeland security whose civilian director will be a statVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Nov 27, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00026 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75970.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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utory advisor to the National Security Council, the same status as

that of the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency or the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The director will be appointed by

the President and confirmed by the Senate.

The basis of this agency will be the present Federal Emergency

Management Agency. Added to FEMA will be the Coast Guard

from the Department of Transportation; the Border Patrol from the

Department of Justice under INS; the Customs Service, the law enforcement part of Customs Service, from the Department of Treasury; the National Domestic Preparedness Office [NDPO], currently

houses the FBI; and an array of cyber security programs now

housed varyingly in the FBI, the Commerce Department and elsewhere.

Together, the National Homeland Security Agency will have

three directives—prevention, critical infrastructure, protection, and

emergency preparedness and response—and a national crisis action

center to focus Federal action in the event of a national emergency.

The agency will build on FEMA’s regional organization and will not

be focused in D.C. It will remain focused on augmenting and aiding

State and local resources.

The purpose of this realignment of assets is to get more than the

sum of the parts from our effort in this area. Right now, unfortunately, we are getting much less than the sum of the parts. We are

not proposing vast new undertakings. We are not proposing a highly centralized bureaucratic behemoth. We are not proposing to

spend vastly more money than we are spending now. We are proposing a realignment and a rationalization of what we already do

so we can do it right. In this regard, we intend for the union of

FEMA, Coast Guard, Border Patrol, Customs, and other organizational elements to produce a new institutional culture, new

synergies, and a higher morale. We are proposing to match authority, responsibility, and accountability. We are proposing the solve

the ‘‘who’s in charge’’ problem.

Perhaps the most important of all, we are proposing to do all this

in such a way as to guarantee the civil liberties that we all hold

so dear. Since it is very likely the Defense Department assets

would have to come into play in response to a mass casualty attack

on U.S. soil, the best way ensure that we violate the U.S. Constitution is to not plan and train ahead for such contingencies.

The director of the National Homeland Security Agency, I repeat,

is a civilian. If no such person is designated, responsible ahead of

time to plan, train, and coordinate for the sort of national emergency of which we are speaking, I leave it to your imagination and

to your mastery of American history to predict what a condition of

national panic might be produced in this regard.

Mr. Chairman, one final point, if I may. All 14 of us on this Commission are united in our belief that this proposal is the best way

for the U.S. Government to see this as a common defense. All 14

of us, without dissent, agreed to put this subject first and foremost

in our final report. All 14 of us—7 democrats and 7 Republicans—

are determined to do what we can to promote this recommendation

on a fully bipartisan basis.

But we are not naive. We know that we are asking for big

changes. I know, as a former member of the legislative branch, that

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what we are proposing requires complex and difficult congressional

action. This proposal stretches over jurisdictions of at least seven

committees, plus they are appropriations committees counterparts

of the House and the Senate. This is why, Mr. Chairman, the work

of this committee and the Committee on Government Reform is so

critical to the eventual success of this effort, and that is why I

again want to express my gratitude for the opportunity to be here

today.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, before General Boyd testifies, I just want

to tell you a little bit about General Boyd which would not be

known. General Boyd was asked by Speaker Gingrich at the time,

who he knew personally, to head up this effort. General Boyd spent

61⁄2 years in a Hanoi prison. He is the only POW who reached fourstar rank, and following that held enormously responsible positions

throughout our Government until his retirement. We were very fortunate to have General Boyd lead our effort. I always told him I

thought it was a little bit beneath his pay grade, but he was willing

to take this on as executive director.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Senator.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Warren B. Rudman and the report referred to follow:]

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Mr. SHAYS. It may have been beneath his pay grade, but I think

he realizes the important work of the Commission and, therefore,

was happy to serve.

It is wonderful, Senator, to have you here. You are such a distinguished witness, and the Commission has done such an outstanding job.

Obviously, General, it is a tremendous honor to have you testify

before the committee, for your service to our country.

I’m just going to acknowledge the presence of Mr. Gilman, Ben

Gilman, who is the former chairman of the International Relations

Committee. We will be calling on him shortly.

General Boyd, we are happy to have you make your statement.

General BOYD. There’s not much I can add to that statement.

Mr. SHAYS. Is that because you wrote it? [Laughter.]

General BOYD. That is his statement, sir. That is his statement.

I might add one piece of evidence or emphasis or amplification.

I believe at the outset of this enterprise if you would have queried

the 14 commissioners and asked them if they were going to end up

at the end making their most important recommendation, their

highest priority recommendation, the forming of a National Homeland Security Agency I think they would have scoffed at the idea.

But as time went on—and I watched their thinking develop, and

they watched and saw the evidence from the intelligence community, as they traveled about—and they traveled throughout the

world to over two dozen countries—there was a gradual coming together of their thinking along the lines as follows.

One, that the resentment focused toward the United States

throughout much of the world I think came as a surprise. As a

symbol of the globalizing vectors that we are on and the exclusion

of so many people and nations from that process, and the emphasis

of the United States being the symbol of that vector has produced

a degree of resentment that, as I say, I think came as a surprise

to many.

It was crystallized one night as we were in Egypt talking with

a group of scholars, and one of them, a distinguished gentleman,

looked at us and said, ‘‘The problem for you over the next quarter

of a century is managing resentment throughout the world against

your country.’’ At some level I think that was a message we got everywhere.

When we coupled that with all of the intelligence that we have

access to and saw that the proliferation of these capabilities, these

weapons of mass destruction, weapons of mass disruption into the

hands of State and non-state actors who never before in history

had that kind of power that they could wield against a great State,

and coupled with what they might consider reason to be resentful

of us, we had the formula for a security problem that, as the Senator said, we feared we just weren’t addressing in any sophisticated

or complete way.

I think that’s what drove these commissioners to the set of conclusions that they reached at the end. Stacking this as the most

important, the highest priority national security objective that our

Nation should adopt.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much, General.

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It is, candidly, a very stunning recommendation, and one that I

was surprised by, but, given the work that our committee has done,

we, I think, can fully understand why it was made.

I would make the point to you that Mac Thornberry has introduced legislation that incorporates your recommendations. It was

sent to this committee, and it will—excuse me, sent to the full committee, I think probably sent to this committee, but not sure. But,

at any rate, I believe it will be seriously considered by the committee.

Senator RUDMAN. Mr. Chairman, I believe that Congressman

Skelton also is introducing or has introduced or about to a major

piece of legislation, not precisely like Congressman Thornberry’s,

but dealing with this issue based on our program.

Mr. SHAYS. That’s great to know. We will be following that, as

well.

At this time I would call on Adam Putnam, the vice chairman

of the committee, to start the questioning.

Mr. PUTNAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I thank the panel for their very intriguing and unnerving testimony, but certainly you fulfilled your role in thinking outside the

box and bringing us a very innovative approach.

You make great reference to managing this resentment. How

much of this resentment is of our own doing that could be addressed through consistency policy or redirection of policies, and

how much of it is, as you alluded to, an overall vexing discomfort

that we see even in our own country over the uncontrollable forces

of globalization?

Senator RUDMAN. Well, I’ll answer briefly and let General Boyd

comment.

There were some things that will change only if and when American foreign policy changes in some areas—and I’m not suggesting

it should be changed, I’m just trying to answer your question. Certainly in the Middle East it is our foreign policy in the middle east

that drives this resentment. I’ve had that kind of—some up-close

and personal experience with that recently, and there is no question that there was deep resentment, and the Osama Ben Laden

activities are driven by our policy. I have always thought our policy

was the correct policy, but obviously people out there don’t.

In other parts of the world it is not so much our policy as our

projected strength. You know, nobody likes the big guy. Sometimes

we haven’t been over the years too circumspect in how we dealt

with our bigness, so there’s that kind of resentment. And that, of

course, plays right into the last part of your question, Congressman

Putnam, and that was the fact that undoubtedly globalization

tends to put all of us under a magnifying glass. And you put it all

together and you find this resentment at an extraordinary level,

which I think surprised even some of us who had major foreign

travel, had served on major committees that dealt with these

issues, but the resentment was substantial.

Chuck, do you want to add to that at all?

General BOYD. Just this—that if you develop a strategy, a national security strategy, for dealing with this problem, it seems to

me that the—and along the lines that we have suggested, the

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framework of which would be a protection—prevention, protection,

and response.

The prevention piece deals at the heart of this problem. The Diplomatic Corps would be at the forefront of dealing with this problem over the rest of the planet.

I think that the kind of self-absorption that we often project, or

maybe even arrogance, is all a part of that, and that can be worked

in a solid approach, a diplomatic approach to this problem.

But in the end, as the Senator says, we’re going to be the symbol

of power and wealth and influence, and there’s going to be resentment, no matter how effective our diplomatic approach is, so this

is something we just simply have to deal with, have to live with,

and prepare for, it seems to me.

Mr. SHAYS. Has our hierarchy of threats that all of these establishments have identified, has it evolved too match this changed

philosophy, this newfound globalized resentment that has developed at the close of the cold war? Are we prepared for the proper

threats, both at home and abroad?

Senator RUDMAN. Well, I think the answer is clearly no. Let me

give you an anecdote of something that got all of our attention

about 6 months ago. I really commend to you an article in ‘‘Foreign

Relations Magazine’’ about a young Coast Guard commander who

was doing a fellowship up there in New York who decided to look

at the threat of weapons of mass destruction to the United States.

I mean, it’s stunning, and let me just give you in a paragraph what

essentially the findings were.

There are 55,000 containers that come off ships into the United

States every day—55,000. A small fraction of them are opened at

the port. Most of them go to their destination, be it St. Louis or

Chicago, Dallas, Boston, whatever, on the West Cost, into the

southwest or along the West Coast. Some of them aren’t opened for

a matter of months, I believe—am I correct, Chuck?

General BOYD. Could be a month or two. Yes.

Senator RUDMAN. Month or two. It doesn’t take much imagination, with the technology available to so many people who ought

not to have it, that the acquisition of a small amount of fissionable

material put in the right kind of a design and placed on one of

those carriers—I mean, the thought is horrendous, but it is real.

It also goes to biological and chemical.

So, although I am not here to comment on the proposal that is

being debated about missile shield defense, if I wanted to set off

a weapon of mass destruction in New York I think I probably

wouldn’t do it with something that had a return address on it.

We had testimony from the intelligence community and from people looking at this problem, and we need more intelligence, but,

most of all, we don’t only need more prevention, but we have to understand how to respond.

You may remember that former Secretary of Defense Bill Cohen,

about a year-and-a-half ago—I believe it was before you came to

Congress, Mr. Putnam, but it is worth getting a look at, in response to your question. Secretary Cohen wrote an article that essentially said, ‘‘It’s not a question of if, it is a question of when.’’

I’m sure the Members of Congress here remember reading that. It

was a very stunning article—it appeared in the ‘‘Washington Post’’

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op-ed page—in which the Secretary of Defense said, ‘‘We’re going

to have a horrible incident in this country over the next 10 to 15

years, sooner or later. We don’t know. It’s going to happen, and

we’re not prepared to deal with it.’’ You know, I was thinking, as we were developing this report, of

the horrible events of Oklahoma City. Mr. Chairman and members

of the committee, that was a horrible event. That was infinitesimal

compared to what we’re talking about, and it has to be addressed.

It is a moral responsibility for this Congress to address this issue.

You don’t have to come up with our solution, but you have to come

up with a solution.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Mr. Kucinich, and then we’ll go to Mr. Gilman.

Mr. KUCINICH. Senator, again, welcome.

Senator RUDMAN. Thank you.

Mr. KUCINICH. In your testimony you said, ‘‘Perhaps most important, we are proposing to do all this in such a way as to guarantee

the civil liberties we all hold dear.’’ I had a chance to review the

phase three report, and I may have missed the section, or maybe

it wasn’t included, but I didn’t see any comprehensive statement in

here of how civil liberties would be guaranteed in such a framework.

Senator RUDMAN. On page 11, top paragraph, let me read you

that paragraph so you don’t have to look it up. ‘‘Congress is

perched, as well, for guaranteeing that homeland security is

achieved within a framework of law that protects the civil liberties

and privacy of American citizens. We are confident that the Government can enhance national security without compromising Constitutional principles. In order to guarantee this, we must plan

ahead. In a major attack involving——’’

Mr. KUCINICH. Senator, with all due respect, I did see that.

Senator RUDMAN. All right. Fine.

Mr. KUCINICH. With all due respect, I did see that.

Senator RUDMAN. What is your question? How do we do it?

Mr. KUCINICH. I’ll go over it again.

Senator RUDMAN. All right.

Mr. KUCINICH. You said that we’re proposing to do this in such

a way as to guarantee the civil liberties.

Senator RUDMAN. Correct.

Mr. KUCINICH. How do you establish a national security apparatus in the United States, in effect implement a national security

state, and simultaneously protect civil liberties? I think we’d all be

interested to know——

Senator RUDMAN. I’d be happy to answer the question.

Mr. KUCINICH [continuing]. How you would do that.

Senator RUDMAN. You see, Congressman, that’s a great question.

The problem we were all concerned with was, without this kind of

planning, if something happens in Cleveland it is going to be the

military that is going to be there instantly, and you may have to

even declare marshal law if there are enough casualties and

enough destruction. You’ve not planned for it. You don’t have interfaces between Federal and State government and city government

which are already planned and in place with civilians in charge.

That’s what will happen today. That’s what happens in the event

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of massive tornadoes or massive hurricanes along the Southeast

Coast back about 10, 12 years ago and more recently.

What we say is, if you have a civilian in charge of this agency

and you are planning and training in prevention is involved with

setting up scenario planning with city and State governments

across this country, then if something does happen you are in a position to have civilian control with the military assisting them.

Now, the military has so-called ‘‘posse comitatus’’ restrictions, as

well it should, but in times of marshal law, you know, those essentially aren’t observed.

Mr. KUCINICH. So you are envisioning marshal law?

Senator RUDMAN. I’m envisioning that there would be marshal

law unless you had this agency in place. That’s what we’re—absolutely.

Mr. KUCINICH. So a Governor doesn’t have the ability to, in effect, declare an emergency? A mayor doesn’t have that ability to declare an emergency?

Senator RUDMAN. They certainly do, but they do not have the authority to declare marshal law on a national basis, I can assure you

that.

Mr. KUCINICH. Local police departments don’t have the ability to

enforce law within a community?

Senator RUDMAN. Congressman, as good as local police forces

are—and I’m a former State Attorney General and I have a high

regard for them—they could not possibly cope with the kind of

thing we’re talking about. They don’t have enough resources,

enough people. And, by the way, they may be the victims, themselves.

Mr. KUCINICH. And when we speak of homeland security, we’re

implying that we are not protected right now.

Senator RUDMAN. We are not.

Mr. KUCINICH. There’s $300 billion a year the American taxpayers pay for a Department of Defense, and billions more for

State patrol and billions more for protection of their local police departments, and you’re saying that, despite spending billions and

billions and billions of dollars, we’re still not protected. And so I

would ask you, Senator, just as coming from Cleveland, OH, as you

so kindly recognized, how could I convince my constituents that, in

an environment where hundreds of billions of dollars are being

spent and that’s not enough, that they should spend more, particularly when their schools are not up to par, when people don’t have

decent health care, when they have roads and bridges falling apart.

Please enlighten me, Senator.

Senator RUDMAN. Sure. I’d be happy to.

No. 1, we’re not saying you have to spend more. These agencies

spend quite a bit of money now, themselves, but we think that

we’re not getting the right bang for the buck.

No. 2, with all due respect to your comments about national security, almost all of our expenditures for national security, up to

now, at least, are for conventional warfare in a two major theater

war scenario, which I expect will soon be done with, but that is the

current plan. All the aircraft carriers, all the Army and Marine divisions, the entire Air Force, none of that is directed toward homeland security.

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The only thing that we know is that if something bad happens

today the only organization in the United States, the only organization in the event of a weapon of mass destruction going off or being

put in the water supply or what, the only people who could respond

would be U.S. military. There is no one else. They have the transportation the communication, the medical supplies, they have it all.

Unfortunately, it has not been coordinated in the way that it has

to be, and we believe this agency, in its prevention and response

missions, would do just that.

Mr. KUCINICH. I’d like to go back to something, Senator, and that

is: how do we guarantee civil liberties in a national security state?

I mean, we’re really talking about a profound change in the way

we view ourselves as a Nation. We’re talking about a fortress

America here. How do we guarantee people’s basic Constitutional

rights to privacy, to being able to freely associate with who they

want, to be able to freely speak in the way that they want? How

do we guarantee that within the framework of a bill that, frankly,

its linguistic construction raises some chilling possibilities of something that is anti-democratic.

Senator RUDMAN. You know, we debated that and we don’t think

it does. We had people on our Commission such as former NBC correspondent Bud Dancy that was very concerned about that very

issue, and we don’t think our recommendation amounts to that at

all.

As a matter of fact, Congressman, I can almost guarantee you

that the people of Cleveland, OH, wouldn’t even know this agency

existed except for those people who are police, fire, medical, who

would be getting training from this agency and recommendations.

No one would even know it existed because it has no interface with

the community until something happens.

Now, when something happens I would say to you, quite frankly,

that if it was bad enough I suppose there could be some period of

time where the Governor, the mayor, or the President might decide

that they would have to suspend things—for instance, if a nuclear

weapon went off in a major American city. But we’re not talking

about any deprivation of civil liberty in normal circumstances.

In almost all circumstances, including hurricanes and floods in

this country, including in your own State, there have been occasions where the National Guard had to be called out to keep order

and to suspend certain liberties until the situation could be simmered down to protect law-abiding citizens, and that is not part of

our recommendation, that’s just what happens.

Mr. KUCINICH. I think, Senator, it would be enlightening for this

committee to be able to have some kind of proceedings of those debates that took place within your Commission over the issues and

concerns about civil liberties.

Senator RUDMAN. We would be happy to respond.

Mr. KUCINICH. I mean, I would be happy to take the Senator’s

word for it, but we could also perhaps learn on this committee

about some of the concerns that were expressed, because I think

that an appropriate forum would be this committee and the Congress to have a wide and open discussion with which perhaps our

constituents could be involved in what the implications would be

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for the democracy of having such a structure in place, particularly

since it would be, by your statement, invisible.

Senator RUDMAN. Well, I would hope it would be, as FEMA is invisible to most of the residents of all of our States until something

bad happens. When something bad happens they suddenly realize

that something called ‘‘FEMA’’ they have heard of. And I must say

I think that under former Director Witt they did a first-rate job.

Mr. KUCINICH. I think you would concur, though, that the broad

scope of this homeland—the Homeland Security Act goes far beyond anything that encompasses the purpose of FEMA.

Senator RUDMAN. Absolutely. It expands it, it gives coordination

to it. It is heavy on prevention. It is heavy on intelligence gathering

abroad, obviously, and to some extent domestically by the FBI. But

all the people that do what they are supposed to do would continue

to do the same thing, but there would be a lot more coordination

and planning. Right now there have been a number of exercises

around the country conducted by various organizations directing it

toward a mass destruction weapon being imposed on a State or a

city, but hardly enough.

Mr. KUCINICH. Senator, thank you.

Senator RUDMAN. We will get to you, Congressman—— Mr. KUCINICH. What do you mean by that?

Senator RUDMAN [continuing]. A summary—[laughter.]

Senator RUDMAN. We will get—well, if you’d like to put an exclamation point after the first six words, that is your privilege. We

will get to you, Congressman, a position paper that will summarize

the debate and how we concluded what we concluded on the very

issue of civil liberties that you are rightfully concerned about.

Mr. KUCINICH. I appreciate that, Senator.

Senator RUDMAN. We’ll get that.

Mr. KUCINICH. I certainly also appreciate your service to this

country, as well as General Boyd’s.

General Boyd stated several times about this concept of managing resentment. Would you like to elaborate on that, General.

I guess we’re out of time right now. I’m sorry.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Gilman, it is a privilege to have you here, and

thank you for your patience.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to welcome Senator Rudman and General Boyd.

I commend you, too, Mr. Chairman, for focusing your attention

on this very critical problem, and I want to comment Senator Rudman and General Boyd for the report that they’ve issued focusing

our country’s attention on what has to be done. Apparently, there

is no central entity at the moment and the fragmentation is abundant throughout the Government and nobody is truly prepared to

take the preparations for avoiding terrorism in the first place and

then have it properly addressed.

In our International Relations Committee we focused a great

deal of attention on the usual targets—our embassies abroad. You

know, I was present when Admiral Lindman came before us many

years ago. You were there, Senator Rudman.

Senator RUDMAN. I served on that commission, Chairman Gilman.

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Mr. GILMAN. And there you are. And he tried to focus attention

on what we should be doing, and we reacted very belatedly, and

still have yet to prepare the proper security of those posts abroad.

Then Admiral Crowe, Ambassador Crowe, came forward reiterating

it.

Last year we tried to put some real money into the budget to try

to move back the Embassy posts abroad—move them back from

streets, move them back from danger areas. They say that every

10 feet means another floor you could save in the long run. Yet,

we have been very reluctant to do these kind of things.

So I hope that your Commission will continue to remind our Nation of what we should be doing to protect those agencies that we

have abroad, and particularly our Embassies, which are a target

that have often been addressed.

I note that in your report you talk in part of prevention, as well

as prosecution. We need better human intelligence, and that seems

to have been a big problem over the years.

CIA had a restriction on who they recruit for these kind of activities, and I hope that will be changed in the future so that we can

have proper intelligence. That’s three-quarters of the battle, if we

have some advance information about what’s happening in these

terrorist organizations. And we have to find a way to breach those

organizations to become involved with them.

And then, too, you talk about the better coordination and that we

have no coordination at the moment. It is a band-aid approach, a

reaction approach, as we’ve had in so many other disasters, and I

think that having your Home Security Agency is a sound method

of bringing people together.

Let me ask you what has been the attitude of the administration,

the present administration, with regard to your proposal?

Senator RUDMAN. Well, you know, they are in their first 100 days

and they’ve got a lot of things to do. Of course, there are five or

six major chapters of this report with recommendations for DOD.

We’ve had a major meeting with Secretary Rumsfeld, who has

asked us on that aspect of it to work with them. They liked a number of our recommendations.

For your personal interest, we had an excellent meeting with

Secretary Powell, and, as a matter of fact, we were asked by the

House Budget Committee to testify following General Powell 2

weeks ago on the State Department, which I think you would find

that part of our report—knowing some of your public statements,

I think you’d agree with virtually all of it. General Powell likes a

good deal in that report, and they’re moving toward it.

As far as the President and the National Security Council, it is

kind of interesting that our recommendation on the NSC—and I’m

sure it’s not because we’ve said it, but, coincidentally, they have

embodied our recommendation to make the NSC more of a coordinator and certainly not operational or a second State Department

within the White House, which has been, I know, a concern of

many people for a long time.

So I would say the administration has responded well. We

haven’t got a specific response to this, but I know they’re looking

at it.

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Mr. GILMAN. Is there specific legislation that you’ve proposed for

the National Homeland Security Agency?

Senator RUDMAN. We have 50 recommendations, and from those

recommendations we thought the Congress ought to draft the legislation. We thought it would be presumptuous of us to draw a bill,

as a Presidential commission.

Mr. GILMAN. And has anyone undertaken that, Senator, to

incorporate——

Senator RUDMAN. Mac Thornberry and Ike Skelton. Thornberry’s

bill tracks our recommendations very closely on homeland security,

and Mr. Skelton also embodies much of it, but it is a bit different.

As I said before you arrived here, Chairman Gilman, we are not

saying that this is the only way to do it, but we are saying, ‘‘Here

is the problem. There’s got to be a way. Here is our suggestion,’’

and let the Congress work its will and do something to improve the

current situation.

Congressman Kucinich was talking about money, a very important subject. We are not talking about particularly expanding

money, but when you look at these signs up here, the future speakers from all the departments they come from—I don’t know if they

are on both sides. I don’t know whether you can see them from

your side or not, but there are about 40 or 42 of them. They spend

a huge amount of money right now. We say it can be spent a lot

better.

Mr. GILMAN. Let me ask you what’s the response by the Intelligence Agency? Have you discussed this with Mr. Tevin?

Senator RUDMAN. Absolutely, because I’ve had an ongoing relationship, because I still chair the President’s Foreign Intelligence

Advisory Board. They are very aware, as is the FBI.

I might say—and I can’t get into detail in this kind of a session,

but I think that the intelligence community and the FBI has been

doing a first-rate job on prevention—not enough, not good enough—

very hard, though, to figure out what some guy in a tent in Afghanistan is thinking about doing to somebody who is living in

New York unless you really have human intelligence, terrific signals intelligence, and all of these things.

But I must say that it is a high priority of both the agency and

the Bureau.

Mr. GILMAN. I’m pleased the Federal Bureau is now planning to

create a police academy training unit in UAE, just as they’ve done

successfully in Budapest, in South Africa. I think these can be extremely helpful.

Senator RUDMAN. Our liaison relationships with these countries

is probably the most valuable thing that we have in terms of understanding terrorism that has its origins overseas.

Mr. GILMAN. Well, thank you, Senator Rudman and General

Boyd for being here today.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Lewis.

Mr. LEWIS OF KENTUCKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator Rudman and General Boyd, how did the Commission

deal with the question of preparing for so-called ‘‘low-probability,

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high-consequence’’ threats like mass casualties for biological weapons, chemical weapons?

Senator RUDMAN. Under our proposal in the response section of

that we believe that the model should be what has already been

done in exercises carried out by DOD with local Guard units in

local cities and counties and States in which you have scenario

planning based on if this were to happen, which you refer to as

low-probability but high-damage, high-impact events, that the medical services, the police services, the municipal services, the Office

of the Mayor, the Governor, that everybody understands what you

try to do, knowing that communications will be disrupted, key people will be disabled, but you put together a plan, and that is one

of the major roles in the response side of the new agency.

However, in order to be able to do that you need the prevention

and the training, and you have to do it across a broad spectrum

of these agencies, which is, unfortunately, done but rarely.

Do you want to add to that, Chuck?

General BOYD. I think the essence of—there are two things that

I’d like to come back to, because I think they are absolutely critical.

One is the notion of a national strategy. If this is not integrated

in a national strategy, if it is a separate entity—an entity that is

dealt with independently—it doesn’t work the whole issue.

And the second thing is, we need somebody in charge. There’s an

old saying that nothing concentrates the mind like the prospect of

hanging. As a military guy, a lifetime military guy, I can tell you

nothing concentrates your sense of responsibility like taking command, being placed in command—somebody who is put in charge

with authority, responsibility, accountability, and some capability

to do his mission, and that’s what we really call for—putting somebody in command at a sufficient level that he or she can deal with

other counterparts in the executive branch on an equal footing.

Senator RUDMAN. I would add one thing. The problem with the

czar approach is that you’ve got all of these agencies that have very

powerful heads, and now you’ve got somebody who is supposed to

direct them. Well, they have no budget authority and no command

authority, and that’s why most of them had failed.

General BOYD. If you do that and someone defines then someone

to define the requirements, to refine the training, to be held accountable here in Congress, to come and report what they’re doing

or what they’re not doing, I think that all of these loose ends that

don’t now get coordinated will be coordinated.

With respect to the issue of civil liberties, let me just go back to

that for a moment. I think Congressman Thornberry’s proposed

legislation calls for an IG function on this, to deal with this issue,

and with reports back to the Congress on how we are doing with

civil liberty. These are mechanisms that almost ensure that responsible person has to address such things as civil liberties or such

things as medical preparedness. All of these things he or she will

be accountable for.

I think there is no other mechanism that I know of, other than

putting somebody in charge and holding them accountable, to ensure success.

Mr. LEWIS OF KENTUCKY. Is there any preparation at all being

done at the local, State level today, or——

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General BOYD. Some.

Mr. LEWIS OF KENTUCKY. Some?

General BOYD. There has been some, but it has been sporadic,

fragmented. But people certainly are trying, and these agencies are

trying. Nothing that we say here this morning should be indicated

as being critical of them. We are not.

General BOYD. There is an important issue, an article in, I believe, the most issue of the National Journal, entitled, ‘‘Beyond the

Blue Canaries,’’ which deals with—and the Blue Canaries are the

policemen. They are the first one in the chemical environment that

are—you’re going to find that know that there’s a chemical attack

going on. The allusion is to the canaries in the mine shafts of old.

In that article, there is a description of the varying capabilities

throughout the country, and it is a mixed bag. There are some communities in some States that are doing better than others with respect to this kind of preparation.

What we are suggesting is that, with a central focus in a National Homeland Security Agency of this kind, with setting some

standards and setting some priorities and a coherent avenue of resource provision to the States and assistance, that unevenness can

even out across the Nation.

Mr. LEWIS OF KENTUCKY. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Lewis.

One of the challenges I think we have, Senator—‘‘we,‘‘ you and

this committee—is what do you say that you know to be the truth

without frightening the hell out of people. But the fact is that we’ve

had the Secretary of Defense say what needed to be said—it is not

a matter of if there will be an attack, it’s a matter of when. I really

believe that. And that attack can be chemical, it can be biological,

or it could be nuclear. So we know that to be the case, or believe

it to be the case.

In your report—I reacted a little differently than my colleague,

the ranking member, and I loved the synergy of the tough questions that were asked of you, but I basically read it from the standpoint of if we don’t do something you will end up taking away more

of American’s privileges.

When Abraham Lincoln had to basically sneak his way into D.C.

because he didn’t know who was friend or foe—was Maryland going

to be on what side, or was Virginia going to be on what side, who

was friend, who was foe—and there were tremendous suspensions

to our liberties. That’s not something we, as Americans, want to

see happen, but they had to happen. But they happened because

of the disaster.

It’s interesting. If we could have prepared for it differently,

would we have been able to not have seen those suspensions take

place of our civil liberties.

What I’d love to know to start with is: where do you draw the

line of telling people what you believe to be the truth without overdramatizing what you think may happen.

Senator RUDMAN. Well, that’s probably the toughest question of

all, and I will answer it the best I can, because I have been asked

to speak about this report at various places around the country,

and I have, and I have to be careful because you don’t want, you

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know, people running out of the auditorium, Congressman Shays,

for the bomb shelters.

Essentially I say this: that the U.S. Government spends a great

deal of money every year planning for a series of eventualities of

foreign threats to our national security. Anyone who serves on the

International Relations Committee or what we call in the Senate

the Armed Services Committee or the Intelligence Committee is

well aware in detail of all of the plans that we have for a whole

line of contingencies that could happen in the Middle East, Asia,

Taiwan. The military has catalogs of these, and that was one of

Chuck Boyd’s assignments many years ago in that planning function with the Joint Chiefs.

The one thing we haven’t done, I tell people, is to do the same

kind of scenario planning for our own defense.

In a fairly mild way, I try to tell people there are a lot of folks

out there who don’t like us. The people in Oklahoma City happened

to be Americans, but they didn’t like us or themselves, evidently.

But we have what happened in New York, which could have been

a terrible disaster, even more so than it was, with the Twin Towers

in New York if other types of weapons had been used. We’ve had

other threats coming across our border, as you’ll recall the first of

the year a year ago up in the Pacific northwest.

All of these people have a desire to inflict punishment on us as

citizens, and all we’re asking, I tell people, is that we put the same

level of planning behind that threat as we do to a threat that

might happen in southeast Asia or in the Middle East or who

knows where. And I think that is probably the best way to explain

it to people. People understand that.

And, by the way, Congressman Shays, Mr. Chairman, people do

understand this threat. People have thought about it.

Mr. SHAYS. I make the assumption—yes, General Boyd?

General BOYD. Could I just add one thing, sir? One of the things

that we’ve said in relation to dealing with resentment—but I think

it applies really to your question, too—is tone matters. The President is the one, above all others, who must articulate what the

threat is to the United States with respect to the homeland, but

the tone that he uses is going to be critical.

You can panic the people or you can be honest with them and

forthright with them and, at the same time, be calm and dispassionate about the nature of it, and a call for taking those prudent kind of consolidating moves that we are calling for.

This is not—we don’t call for a huge new expenditure of funds.

We call for a rationalization of capabilities we already have. We

don’t create new agencies. We don’t create any new big bureaucracies. We simply rearrange the furniture in such a way that it has

coherency and makes sense. It is FEMA on steroids.

Mr. SHAYS. I want to ask both of you this question: do you think

that—I want to ask it very bluntly—do you believe that this country will face a terrorist attack?

Senator RUDMAN. Frankly, I think that it would be miraculous

if in the next 10 years it didn’t happen.

Mr. SHAYS. All right, sir. General Boyd.

General BOYD. I believe that it is a very high threat.

Mr. SHAYS. All right.

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General BOYD. Yes, sir, I believe that.

Mr. SHAYS. Now, I found myself embarrassed that I laughed at

your comment, because I’ve tried to find a way to express it, and

that was—when you were talking about missile defense, which I

think we need to move forward on for all the reasons that have

been documented on a system that works, but I fear more the possibility of a terrorist threat from nuclear weapon put in a shipment

that is in this United States.

And, by the way, they are usually opened within 2 months, but

if this is a shipment that someone is looking to protect and send

a particular place, they may find a way to have it not opened for

years. It is just stockpiled, ready to use when someone wants to

use it and detonate it, and it could be a nuclear device.

But I found myself laughing and being uncomfortable when you

made the comment ‘‘something without a return address.’’ That’s

really the reason I fear it.

Senator RUDMAN. Well, that’s right.

Mr. SHAYS. Yes.

Senator RUDMAN. That is exactly right, and if you will take the

time to read this article, which is fairly short, it is a wonderful article, wonderfully researched by a brilliant young Coast Guard commander who writes about this very threat. And there are a lot of

ways to do it. Libya could have a ship come to the 10-mile limit

and then just cruise into New York Harbor. I mean, there are all

sorts of things that can happen, and that is why intelligence, as

somebody in the panel talked about earlier, is so vital to know

what’s going on and to be able to trace it. But, you know, unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, you know, in this business almost perfect

isn’t good enough.

Mr. SHAYS. This gets me to this issue of why—so one reason is

that it doesn’t have a return address. Another is that certain countries may not have the capability to respond except by a terrorist

attack.

Senator RUDMAN. Correct.

Mr. SHAYS. And in the process of our doing work both at home

and abroad on this issue—and it is our key concern of this committee, the terrorist threat—in meeting with the general in France

who is in charge of their chemical, nuclear, and biological response,

he said, ‘‘You Americans don’t seem to understand—’’ in so many

words he said this—‘‘that you are such a world power that the only

way a force can get to you is through a terrorism attack.’’ And he

used the word ‘‘resentment.’’ He said, ‘‘You are resented throughout

the world, and this is the way they’re going to get you.’’

So now it does raise another question, maybe a little beyond

what you’ve recommended, but I’d like to know your response. It

does seem to suggest that, as important as our Defense Department is, that our State Department is extraordinarily important

and may be helping us minimize the resentment and then isolating

it to certain areas.

I’m interested to know, did you get into this? How do you

manage——

Senator RUDMAN. We sure did.

Mr. SHAYS [continuing]. The resentment?

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Senator RUDMAN. If you will read whatever chapter it is in the

report on the State Department, we make that very point. I referred to it in my comments here this morning about the statement. There are two things the State Department does which people don’t always appreciate outside of Government. I’m sure you do

here. No. 1, of course, in terms of advising the President on American foreign policy and its result in a variety of ways, including resentment it may cause; but, two, and equally important in my

view, is that the State Department has a very important intelligence role to play. Intelligence is not gathered necessarily with

people wearing long rain coats and dark fedoras meeting on street

corners in Budapest. It is quite often collected by Ambassadors,

charges, other people from the mission meeting counterparts from

various countries at a lot of events who hear things, and when you

put them all into a matrix they suddenly tell a story.

The State Department’s INR unit has done very good work in the

intelligence area, and that’s one of the reasons we recommend that

there be reorganization as well as more funding for the department.

Mr. SHAYS. That would raise the question—and then I’m going

to call on Mr. Kucinich—but that would raise the question that we

are potentially put at a disadvantage when we don’t have relations

with, say, Iran, or even with Iraq, frankly. We don’t have people

there. We begin to lose the language, we begin to lose contacts. It

does make that kind of suggestion.

Obviously, there’s value in having people in all parts of the

world.

Senator RUDMAN. There is no question that is a judgment that

Presidents have to make. If you don’t have people in a particular

country, the amount of intelligence you gather in a variety of ways

falls off very sharply.

Mr. SHAYS. I’d like to come back for a second round, but, Mr.

Kucinich, you have the floor.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, Senator

Rudman, and General Boyd.

As I’m listening to this discussion here, it really appears that the

discussion of a Homeland Security Act is not only about our homeland, but it is really about America’s mission in the world, as well,

about how we see ourselves as a Nation and how we conduct our

foreign policy.

I would hope that any discussions that take place about a Homeland Security Act would be within the context of those essential pillars of principle.

For example, this discussion, whether we like it or not, is undeniably drenched in fear.

Senator RUDMAN. Is what?

Mr. KUCINICH. Undeniably drenched in fear. I remember a President who once told the American people, ‘‘We have nothing to fear

but fear, itself.’’ I also know that we have some steps, positive and

constructive steps, apart from a Homeland Security Act which

could be taken to lessen tensions in the world. As a matter of fact,

the Congress has spent many years working on such steps long before I got here, and they include—and I know the Senator has

probably been involved in many of these—a nonproliferation treaty,

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an anti-ballistic missile treaty, a comprehensive test ban treaty,

STAR-II, STAR-III, and the entire panoply of arms control initiatives which have, at their kernel, a belief that people can back

away from the abyss, can learn to cooperate, and can learn to live

together.

At this very moment there are proposals to build down the Russian nuclear stockpile. Russia has asked for help in getting rid of

fissionable material. Russia has asked for help in doing something

about their nuclear scientists who are out of work. Russia has

asked for help in disposing of 40,000 tons of chemical weapons, all

of which represent a challenge for the security not only of their Nation but for potential security problems abroad.

The chairman pointed out in his discussion perhaps an opportune

moment exists to review our policies with Iraq, Iran. The administration recently announced its intention to move forward with the

sale of missiles to Taiwan, which puts us in a particularly difficult

position with China.

I think that when we talk about homeland security, which encompasses a fortress America or national security state, it is helpful to broaden our vision and to say, ‘‘What is our role in the world

that we are creating circumstances that could cause resentment?’’

Because I think that if we do not inspect cause and effect, we’re

missing out on an opportunity to go beyond the analytical framework which you have spent a good deal of time working on, and

I think we are all grateful for your doing that because it helps us

focus on exactly where are we at at this moment with respect to

our condition of a Nation which is said to be the object of resentment in the world.

I think another question that might be asked that would be appropriate is: if we are so resented as a Nation, as the testimony has

said, then are there other steps that America could take other than

becoming a fortress that would help to lessen its vulnerability and

this portrait of vulnerability which is being drawn here.

General Boyd.

Senator RUDMAN. Well, let me see if I can address two or three

of the things in that question.

First, it was not our mission——

Mr. SHAYS. General, may I ask you a question? You are a fourstar? They told me Congressmen have four stars, so what do you

do when both are four stars?

General BOYD. He has got five.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. [Laughter.]

Mr. KUCINICH. I directed the question to General Boyd, though.

If I have five stars, then I want General Boyd——

Senator RUDMAN. Oh, I didn’t know you directed it to General

Boyd. You go right ahead and answer it, General Boyd, and I’ll

comment after you answer.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you.

General BOYD. A couple of points maybe I think that might be

useful.

First of all, I think it is really important to recognize we’ve never

suggested for a moment that we ought to develop a fortress America or a national security state. What we have suggested is that we

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rearrange some of the capabilities we have in a coherent way to address a problem that seems not to be well addressed.

But I think the Commission goes in exactly the direction that

you are suggesting, with respect to the first order of dealing with

this problem, to deal with it in a diplomatic way.

You’ll notice on page 12, right at the top, under the first pillar

of a national security strategy, prevention, we say that, most

broadly, the first instrument is U.S. diplomacy. We go into addressing grievances in the world on the diplomatic front, to begin with.

Protecting us at home is a global mission, and all of the elements

that you’ve talked about in preventing the proliferations of weapons of mass destruction, arms control measures, diplomatic measures, conflict prevention, etc., all are elements of a strategy that

would deal with homeland security at the end of the day.

I think we are in complete agreement with what you are saying,

and I think it is all right here in our text.

Senator RUDMAN. I want to——

Mr. KUCINICH. Yes, Senator, please, if I may add, we are in complete agreement that a structure exists currently apart from this

proposal. I agree with you on that.

Senator.

Senator RUDMAN. You have to understand our charter from the

Congress. Our charter from the Congress was, ‘‘Take a look at U.S.

national security in its broadest sense in the 21st century. Don’t

recommend, you know, new foreign policy for us. Don’t tell us what

weapon systems we ought to buy. But give us a broad brush of

some of the things you think are wrong and how to correct them.

Now, I want to just make one point, Congressman, because I

think it is a very important point. And you’re right, I was involved

in all of these things that you spoke about—the SALT treaties, the

ABM treaties, the anti-proliferation treaties, and many more. But

those were all dealing essentially with the Soviet Union. We were

concerned about conventional warfare. We had a policy for years

which I never like the name of, but I guess it worked—we’re all

here. It was called ‘‘mutual assured destruction,’’ and it went on

the basis that the Soviets weren’t about to launch at us because

they knew the result would be a launch at them. We’d all be gone,

but that wouldn’t be very good unless you’re dealing with madmen.

So all of these are directed at what we assume would be rational

governments that were identifiable. What we’re talking about are

irrational governments and individuals and organizations that cannot be identified. That’s where terrorism comes from, unless you

can pin it to a particular country like Libya and a particular incident.

So I agree with General Boyd’s response to your comments. I

agree with those. But I want to point out that all of these treaties

are good in terms of preventing the American people from having

inflicted upon them conventional nuclear or chemical warfare. They

are not good for a wit, to use an old New Hampshire term, when

it comes to dealing with the Osama Ben Ladens of this world. He

doesn’t care about the bomb proliferation treaty. If he could buy

some Ukrainian-enriched uranium and get a Russian scientist to

bolt it all together, believe me, he would do it.

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Mr. KUCINICH. I also remember a New Hampshire term, I think

it is ‘‘Live Free or Die.’’ Senator RUDMAN. That’s correct.

Mr. KUCINICH. And I just wonder if, in making this transition

from a world of mutually assured destruction, which we’ve—— Senator RUDMAN. It’s still there.

Mr. KUCINICH [continuing]. Had a whole system of arms agreements to back us away from that nuclear abyss, that we don’t get

to a condition where we effectively chip away at basic civil liberties

and go from MAD to SAD, self-assured destruction.

Senator RUDMAN. Right.

Mr. KUCINICH. And so, I mean, that, again, I know, Senator,

coming from New Hampshire—and it is good that you are on that

committee, because I know that’s something you are sensitive to.

I’m from Ohio and I’m just as sensitive to it.

I have a question which kind of fits this into a budget framework, and perhaps Senator could help me with this. Would the director of the new Homeland Security Agency have budgetary authority over other agencies? In other words, could the director tell

Secretary Powell or Secretary Rumsfeld to change their budget priorities?

Senator RUDMAN. Absolutely not.

Mr. KUCINICH. Well, the—— Senator RUDMAN. The only place where that exists now in any

way is between the CIA and the Defense Department. That is more

advisory than mandatory.

Mr. KUCINICH. Right. Well—— Senator RUDMAN. That would not work.

Mr. KUCINICH. That’s what I assumed. So the next question is:

if that’s the case, what else remains here but a domestic national

security apparatus?

Senator RUDMAN. Well, that’s exactly what exists; however, the

job of the President and the national security advisor is to coordinate these agencies, both domestic and overseas.

All of these little blocks out here on this table have some little

piece of this. Now, obviously, we’re not talking about dissolving any

of these agencies—the FBI, the CIA, FEMA, Justice, State. What

we are saying is that those that have roles like Justice and State

will keep them, but all these other agencies that only have a piece

of the action will be in a central unit that will be run by a civilian

director who will have to coordinate, obviously, with the CIA, the

DOD, the State Department, but will be a far easier job of coordination because it will be down from 45 to probably around 5.

Mr. KUCINICH. I just want to add this, Senator. I know we are

moving on. Again, I want to thank Senator Rudman and General

Boyd for appearing today. This is an important subject and it requires extensive discussion and questions, and I appreciate your

participation in this.

One final note. As somebody who has served as a local official— as a councilman and as a mayor of a city—I have a lot of confidence that perhaps there might be a way of strengthening security through using local authorities. I think our local police are well

trained and they have the ability to respond to crises that come up,

and I think, in democratic theory, the idea of municipal police orgaVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Nov 27, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00078 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75970.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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nizations may, in the long run, be able to sustain any concerns

about threats to civil liberties. I want to make sure we aren’t in

a situation where we are being told that we’re gaining our liberties

by parting with some of them.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator RUDMAN. Mr. Chairman, could I just say one brief thing

to the Congressman?

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Senator RUDMAN. You know, your concerns are properly held. We

have spent a lot of time on them, and one of the things we recommend is one of the things that isn’t happening that will happen

is the using of local resources, but they can’t be used if they are

not trained and coordinated and equipped. In many cases they

don’t have the funding—as a mayor you would know—for the kind

of equipment they need.

And let me point out that one of our recommendations that has

been vastly misunderstood is we talk about forward deployment of

U.S. forces. The U.S. National Guard is forward deployed in this

country, and, in the event of the kind of a holocaust we’re talking

about, they are the best people to aid local authorities in their

States, as they do now. Some of them have thought that we were

recommending—who didn’t read the report—that be their primary

mission. We say it should be a secondary mission. Their primary

mission is the one to support the regular forces in time of national

emergency, particularly in times of war.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Senator.

You have the floor for 10 minutes.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Just one brief question of Senator Rudman and General Boyd.

The Conference Committee report of 1998 in the Appropriations

Act for the Departments of Commerce, Justice, State, Judiciary,

and related agency required the Department of Justice to issue a

report, a 5-year plan that was mandated at that time by the Congress, how to deal with terrorism.

Congress intended the plan to serve as a baseline for the coordination of a national strategy and operational capabilities to combat

terrorism.

Now, did you examine that report, either Senator Rudman or

General Boyd?

Senator RUDMAN. Well, we looked at a lot of reports. I’m not sure

that one has been published yet. That was authorized in, what,

1998?

Mr. GILMAN. It was authorized in 1998, and in December 1998

the Department issued the Attorney General’s 5-year plan.

Senator RUDMAN. We’ve seen that, but I think there’s something

else that was supposed to be produced, as well, and I’m not sure

that—I’m confused about that. I have seen that.

Mr. GILMAN. It is a classified plan.

Senator RUDMAN. I have seen that.

Mr. GILMAN. And what are your thoughts about that?

Senator RUDMAN. It takes a narrow—it takes the approach you

would expect them to approach, considering who they are, Justice.

It is their counter-intelligence plan and it is their view of coordination of local agencies.

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I did not see that here. I saw that in another hat that I wear.

I’m well aware of it. But it does not have the breadth of the report

that we have submitted. It wasn’t supposed to.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you very much. And thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank you, Mr. Chairman.

We made reference to a particular article by Sydney Freedberg,

Jr., entitled, ‘‘Beyond the Blue Canaries.’’ I’m going to put it on the

record, without objection, and I’m just going to read the first paragraph and a half.

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. It starts out,

When you walk into clouds of poisonous gas for a living, it helps to have a sense

of humor, even a morbid one. That’s why fire department hazardous materials specialists often call their police colleagues ‘‘blue canaries.’’ It is a reference to the songbirds that old-time miners took with them underground as living or dying indicators

of bad air in the shafts. The joke goes like this, ‘‘There’s a policeman down there.

He doesn’t look like he’s doing too well. I guess that’s not a safe area,’’ explained

John Eversole, chief of special functions for the Chicago Fire Department.

In their oxygen masks and all-enclosing plastic suits, ‘‘hazmat’’ specialists such

as Eversole can approach industrial spills with confidence—and they do, dozens of

times a day, all across the country. Fortunately, so far, they have not had to don

those suits in response to some terrorist group that has doused an American city,

subway, or airport with lethal chemical weapons.

What we did in our District is we invited a response team to

come to the District and act out a scenario where an Amtrak train

had encountered a derailment, and the police went in, and they

were the first responders, and they didn’t come out alive because

of the chemicals.

We had about 40 agencies—some Federal, but we had the local

police, we had the State police, we had the National Guard, who

were the response team, and it was a fascinating experience to see

how everybody would coordinate their activity.

I mention that because we focus primarily on the national response, but we have three levels of government, and they could put

up charts, not maybe as complex as this but somewhat as complex.

So I envision your recommendation is that this homeland office

would—and I don’t ever see it as a fortress America, but this homeland office would also work, what, to coordinate this and the response? Maybe you could explain, Senator.

Senator RUDMAN. Yes, it would. One of its primary functions is

to work with localities, municipalities, counties, States, so if something went wrong then there would be a plan, people would know

who did what and when and where in terms of what if the local

hospital becomes disabled. What if the local police department is

disabled? What if the local fire department is disabled? What if the

communications network goes down? What do you do? And that’s

what we ought to be talking about.

Mr. SHAYS. Would it also get involved—I’m looking at one of the

charts that you can’t see because it is closest to me, but it says, ‘‘Department of Agriculture.’’ I’m just thinking, ‘‘Now, what would

the Department of Agriculture do,’’ and then you have a real, live

example of the civil liberties of farmers in Great Britain who are

seeing their personal property destroyed against their wishes, in

some cases, because of foot-in-mouth disease.

Now, a terrorism could simply do what, General Boyd, as it relates to that?

General BOYD. The proliferation of disease, with biological warfare in animals as well as human beings. I mean, there is almost

every aspect of Government has some piece of this where potentially it has involvement. But, again, the point that you made and

the point that certainly we’ve made in our report is the coordination of all of that in an effective, coherent way just doesn’t get accomplished.

Mr. SHAYS. We’re going to shortly get on to the next panel, but

let me ask this question. We obviously have a deterrent. We want

to prevent and we want to protect the public from a terrorism atVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Nov 27, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00089 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75970.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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tack. That is obviously our first interest. But obviously we then

have a response to an attack. It can be basically disarming a nuclear weapon. Obviously, that is something that we are prepared

to do very quickly. But take any of the three areas of mass destruction, you have communications problems, you have health problems, you have the property, the fire, the police, and so on. You

have the hospitals. But you also want to solve the crime, because

we want to hold people accountable for what they may have done.

It relates to this issue here. My biggest interest, obviously, is to

prevent, and yours, as well, and to protect.

In the process of your doing your research, only the intelligence

allows us to sift through hosts of vulnerabilities to distinguished

the real threats. What was the Commission’s view of the currency

and reliability of U.S. threat assessment? And how could it be better?

Senator RUDMAN. Well, I’ll be happy to answer that, as I answered, I believe, before to Chairman Gilman. I think that there

has been a vast improvement in the human intelligence aspects of

the work of the CIA overseas and the FBI here within this country

in terms of identifying threats, not only against cities and citizens

but against individuals, such as the President. Having said that, it

is the most difficult, because unless you are 100 percent you lose.

So I would add to your comment, Mr. Chairman, that the response be planned meticulously so every place in this country

knows how it would respond, and a good place to look—and your

staff can get it for you very easily—is get all of the Japanese Government’s reports and all the publicly available information on the

attacks of deadly gas in the Tokyo subway system by a terrorist

group several years ago. We’ve looked at all that and the U.S. intelligence community has all that. It’s all available.

Here was a city with a fire department pretty well organized

dealing with a mass of people in such a small area, and look at the

confusion that resulted and the problems that existed. And we’re

talking about a fairly minor attack in terms of the number of people affected and the number of stations that were affected. We’ve

got to look at that. It will help to answer your question about response.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. But your bottom-line point is that you

have a good amount of confidence in our capabilities?

Senator RUDMAN. I do. Unfortunately, I want to stress you can’t

have 100 percent confidence. You would be a fool to. And, unfortunately, in this business just one slips through—and my greatest

concern, incidentally—personal opinion, not in the report, but

based on a lot of work that I have done—I am more concerned

about chemical and biological right now than I am about nuclear.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Senator RUDMAN. I think it is a serious threat, easily deployed,

and hard to deal with.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me conclude this just asking if either of you

would like to ask yourself a question that you were prepared to answer.

Senator RUDMAN. I think you’ve asked them all.

General BOYD. You’ve asked the best ones.

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Mr. SHAYS. OK. Is there any final comment that either of you

would like to make?

Senator RUDMAN. My only comment would be that, to the extent

that Members of the House and Senate recognize the seriousness

of this problem and recognize that we’re dealing with, you know,

missile defense and we’re dealing with a lot of other issues which

we should be dealing with, this should be dealt with. This is a

major threat to the American people. I’m not saying it is imminent.

We have no such intelligence. But it is a major threat.

If you look at what happened to those wonderful, young American soldiers on the U.S.S. Cole, to the Air Force men and women

in Saudi, and you just amplify that a bit, you’ll understand what

we’re talking about.

Mr. SHAYS. I’d like to thank both of you and also thank our panel

to come for their patience, but this has been very interesting, very

helpful, and we’ll look forward to continued contact with both of

you.

Senator RUDMAN. We’ll cooperate with you in every way we can.

And, Congressman Kucinich, we will get an answer to you on the

specific question you asked and how we address that issue.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you.

Senator RUDMAN. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, gentlemen.

At this time we will call our second and last panel, Dr. Bruce

Hoffman, director, Washington Office, RAND Corp.; General James

Clapper, vice chairman, Advisory Panel to Assess the Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction; accompanied by Michael Wermuth, project director; and

Mr. Frank Cilluffo, chairman, Report on Combating Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Terrorism, Center for Strategic

and International Studies.

Do we have anyone else that may be joining us, as well? Is that

it? Is there anyone else any of the four of you might ask to respond? We’ll ask them to stand as we swear them in.

I would invite the four of you to stand, and we’ll swear you in.

Raise your right hands, please.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much. We’ll note for the record all

four have responded in the affirmative.

It is possible, gentlemen, that I might be out of here before 12

for just a few minutes because I need to testify before the Appropriations Committee and they adjourn at 12. I will come back, and

it’s possible I’ll still be here. We’ll see. But don’t take offense if I

all of the sudden take off here.

If you could go in the order I called you, we’ll go first with—well,

I guess we’ll just go right down the line here, OK?

Mr. Wermuth, my understanding is you will not have a statement but respond to questions; is that correct?

Mr. WERMUTH. That’s correct, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. So, Dr. Hoffman, thank you for being here. We’ll

take the clock 5 minutes. We’ll roll it over and hope that you can

be concluded before we get to the 10; 5 minutes, and then we’ll roll

it over.

We have sworn in everyone.

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OK. Thank you.

Dr. Hoffman.

STATEMENTS OF BRUCE HOFFMAN, DIRECTOR, WASHINGTON

OFFICE, RAND CORP.; JAMES CLAPPER, JR., LIEUTENANT

GENERAL, USAF (RET), VICE CHAIRMAN, ADVISORY PANEL

TO ASSESS THE DOMESTIC RESPONSE CAPABILITIES FOR

TERRORISM INVOLVING WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION,

ACCOMPANIED BY MICHAEL WERMUTH, PROJECT DIRECTOR; AND FRANK CILLUFFO, CHAIRMAN, REPORT ON COMBATING CHEMICAL, BIOLOGICAL, RADIOLOGICAL, AND NUCLEAR TERRORISM, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

Mr. HOFFMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the subcommittee, for this opportunity to testify.

Clearly, much has been done in recent years to ensure that

America is prepared to counter the threat of terrorism; yet, despite

the many new legislative and programmatic initiatives, significant

budgetary increases, and the intense Governmental concern that

these activities evince, America’s capabilities to defend against terrorism and to preempt and to respond to terrorist attacks arguably

still remain inchoate and unfocused.

As last November’s tragic attack on the U.S.S. Cole demonstrated, America remains vulnerable to terrorism overseas. Indeed, within the United States it is by no means certain 6 years

later that we are capable of responding to an Oklahoma City type

incident.

Today, however, the question is no longer one of more attention,

bigger budgets, and increased personnel, but rather of greater

focus, of better appreciation of the problem, a firmer understanding

of the threat, and the development of a comprehensive national

strategy. My testimony this morning will discuss how the absence

of such a strategy has hindered American counterterrorism efforts

by focusing on the critical importance of threat assessments in the

development of a national strategy.

The title of this hearing, ‘‘Combating Terrorism: In Search of a

National Strategy,’’ is particularly apt. Notwithstanding many accomplishments that we’ve had in building a counterterrorism policy, it is still conspicuous that the United States lacks an overarching strategy to address this problem. This is something that on

numerous occasions, including before this subcommittee, the Gilmore Commission and its representative, its vice chairman, General Clapper, has called attention to.

What I would ask is that the articulation and development of a

comprehensive strategy is not merely an intellectual exercise; rather, it is the foundation of any effective counterterrorism policy.

Indeed, the failure to develop such a strategy has undermined

and forwarded the counterterrorist efforts of many other democratic countries throughout the years, producing ephemeral if not

nugatory effects that in some instances have proven counterproductive in the long run. Indeed, this was one of the key findings

of a 1992 RAND study, which I’d like to enter the executive sumVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Nov 27, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00092 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75970.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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mary of four pages into the record but leave a copy of the report

for the subcommittee staff to consult at their leisure.

Using select historical case studies of close U.S. allies, such as

the United Kingdom, West Germany, and Italy, this was precisely

the conclusion that we had reached.

Accordingly, the continued absence of such a strategy threatens

to negate the progress we have achieved thus far in countering the

threat of terrorism.

A critical prerequisite in framing such a strategy is the tasking

of a comprehensive net assessment of the terrorist threat, both foreign and domestic. Indeed, this is something, as well, that numerous witnesses before this subcommittee from the General Accounting Office, John Parkin from the Monterey Institute have previously called attention to. They have cited that there has been no

net assessment for at least the last 6 years, and also that no means

exists to conduct such an assessment of the terrorist threat within

the United States, itself.

Equally as problematic, it is now nearly a decade since the last

NIE—national intelligence estimate—on terrorism, a prospective,

forward-looking effort to predict and participate future trends in

terrorism that was undertaken by the intelligence community. Admittedly, a new NIE on terrorism is currently being prepared as

part of a larger process viewing all threats against the United

States.

But let us ask, given the profound changes we have seen in the

character, nature, identity, and motivations of the perpetrators of

terrorism within the past years, one would argue that such an estimate is long overdue.

Certainly, the Global Trends 2015 effort undertaken by the National Intelligence Council last year was a positive step forward in

this direction; however, at the same time, at least in the published,

unclassified version of that report, little attention was paid to terrorism.

The danger of not undertaking such assessments and constantly

revisiting previous assessments is that we risk remaining locked in

a mindset that has become antiquated, if not anachronistic. Indeed,

right now we very much view terrorism through a prism locked in

the 1995–95 mindset, when some of the key or pivotal terrorist incidents of that particular period—some that were discussed by Senator Rudman and General Boyd this morning, the 1995 attack on

the Tokyo subway and the bombing a month later of the Oklahoma

City bombing—have framed our perceptions of understanding of

the terrorist problems.

Now, those perceptions and that understanding may still be accurate, may still be correct, but, without constantly going back and

asking and applying them to current developments in terrorism, we

don’t know that. Let me give you one example.

At the time and in my written testimony I refer to several statements made by directors of Central Intelligence that said in the

mid 1990’s we faced a worsening terrorist problem. The number of

terrorist incidents was increasing. Terrorism was becoming more

lethal. Therefore, this argument was used to present a framework

that terrorism involving weapons of mass destruction had not just

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become possible, probable, or even likely, but that it was inevitable,

imminent, and even certain.

This may well be the case, but at the same time, though, by not

taking advantage of the long or unfolding of trends, we may miss

the point.

For example, lethality in terrorism, in fact, at least as targeted

against Americans, declined rather than increased throughout the

1990’s. For example, overseas six times as many Americans were

killed by terrorists in the 1980’s as in the 1990’s. On average,

international acts of terrorism that targeted Americans in the

1980’s killed, again, on average, 16 Americans per attack; in the

1990’s, that average was 3.

The situation is not all that different domestically, either. Nearly

eight times more terrorist incidents, according to FBI statistics,

were recorded in the 1980’s as compared to the 1990’s. Admittedly,

the death rate in the United States was greater—176 persons were

killed by terrorists in America during the 1990’s, compared to 26

in the 1980’s. But, at the same time, viewed from a slightly different perspective, 95 percent of that total come from one single incident—the tragic, heinous bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City.

My point, though, is that, of the 29 terrorist incidents reported

in the United States by the FBI in the 1990’s, only 4 resulted in

fatalities.

So yes, Oklahoma is something we have to pay attention to, we

have to prepare to, but Oklahoma City, at the same time, is not

emblematic of the trend of terrorism in the United States.

Now, this isn’t by any stretch of the imagination to suggest that

the United States should become complacent about the threat of

terrorism or that we should in any way relax our vigilance. Rather,

what these statistics, I think, highlight is the asymmetry between

perception and reality that a comprehensive terrorism threat assessment would go some way to addressing.

Without such assessments, we risk adopting policies and making

hard security choices based on misperception and miscalculation,

rather than on hard analysis built on empirical evidence of the actual dimensions of the threat.

Without ongoing, comprehensive reassessments, we cannot be

confident that the range of policies, countermeasures, and defenses

required to combat terrorism are the most relevant and appropriate

ones for the United States.

Regular systematic net assessments would also bring needed

unity to the often excellent but, nonetheless, separate, fragmented,

and individual assessments that the intelligence community carries

out on a regular basis.

This would enable us to present the big picture of the terrorist

threat, which would facilitate both strategic analysis and the framing of an overall strategy. It would also profitably contribute to

bridging the gap that lamentably has begun to exist between the

criminal justice law enforcement approach to countering terrorism

and that of the intelligence and national security approach.

This dichotomy, which has characterized the United States’ approach to terrorism during the 1990’s, is not only myopic but may

also prove dangerous.

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In conclusion, only through a sober and empirical understanding

of the terrorist threat we will be able to focus our formidable resources where and when they can be most effective.

The development of a comprehensive national strategy to combat

terrorism would appreciably sustain the progress we’ve achieved in

recent years in addressing the threat posed by terrorists to Americans and American interests, both in this country and abroad.

Thank you very much.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Dr. Hoffman.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hoffman follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. General Clapper.

General CLAPPER. Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the

subcommittee, I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak on

behalf of the Advisory Panel to Assess Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction, lessawkwardly known as the Gilmore panel, after its chairman, Governor Jim Gilmore of Virginia.

I might mention that I guess the epiphany experience for me

with respect to terrorism was my participation as a senior intelligence investigator in the aftermath of the Khobar Towers attack

in June 1996 in Saudi Arabia.

In the brief time I have for these remarks, I will cut to the chase

on the two specific findings and recommendations in our last report

that you asked that we address—one, lack of a national strategy,

which has already been spoken to at some depth this morning, for

combating terrorism, and that the administration should develop

one; and the other major point was the reorganization of the Federal Government’s programs and at the present should establish a

national office for combating terrorism in the Executive Office of

the President and seek a statutory basis for it.

So our suggested solution organizationally and structurally is different than what you heard this morning from Senator Rudman

and General Boyd.

On strategy, it is our view, after 2 years of looking at this, that

the Nation now has many well-intended but often disconnected programs that aim individually to achieve certain preparedness objectives. Some of the sorted several policy and planning documents,

such as the Presidential Decision Directives [PDDs] 39 and 62; the

Attorney General’s 1999 5-year plan, which Mr. Gilman mentioned;

and the most recent annual report to Congress on combating terrorism, taken as a whole, constitute a national strategy.

In our view, the view of the panel, these documents describe

plans, various programs underway, and some objectives, but they

do not, either individually or collectively, constitute a national

strategy.

We recommended in our report published in mid-December that

the new administration develop an over-arching national strategy

by articulating national goals for combating terrorism, focusing on

results rather than the process.

We made three key assumptions about forging such a strategy,

and I think these are reflective of the composition of our panel,

which was heavily numbered with State and local officials representing emergency planners, fire chiefs, police chiefs, and emergency medical people, public health people, and State emergency

planners. So our perspective, I think, was a little bit different perhaps than the Hart-Rudman Commission because of the composition of our group, which was heavily influenced, heavily populated

by State and local people.

So the first assumption that we kept in mind in suggesting a national strategy was that local response entities will always be the

first and conceivably only response. In the case of a major—God

forbid—cataclysmic attack, however you want to define it, no single

jurisdiction is likely going to be capable of responding without outside assistance.

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What we have in mind here is a multiple jurisdiction, perhaps

a multiple State event, rather than one that is localized to a single

locale or a single State.

Maybe most important, we have a lot of capabilities that we have

developed over many years for response to natural disasters, disease outbreaks, and accidents, so these capabilities can and should

be used as the foundation for our capability to respond to a terrorist attack.

I’d like to briefly highlight some of what our panel sees as the

major attributes of such a strategy.

It should be geographically and functionally comprehensive and

should address both international and domestic terrorism in all its

forms—chemical, biological, nuclear, conventional explosives, and

cyber. It must encompass local, State, and Federal, in that order.

It must include all of the functional constituencies—fire departments, emergency medical, police, public health, agriculture, etc.

To be functionally comprehensive, the strategy, we believe,

should address the full spectrum of the effort, from crisis management, as well as consequence management, and it must have objective measures in order to set priorities, allocate funds, measure

progress, and establish accountability.

The main point I would leave you with, with respect to a national strategy for combating terrorism, is that it must be truly national, not just Federal. It should be from the bottom up, not the

other way around.

Our other major recommendation, that we need somebody in

charge—a theme you have already heard—is directly tied to devising a strategy. The display boards behind you are from our first report that we published at the end of 1999. It was our attempt to

depict objectively the complexity of the Federal apparatus, all the

organizations and agencies and offices that, in one degree or another, have some responsibility for various phases of combating terrorism.

We found that the perception of many State and local people is

that the structures and processes at the Federal level for combating terrorism are complex and confusing. Attempts that have been

made to create a Federal focal point for coordination with State

and local officials such as the NDPO have, at best, been only partially successful. Many State and local officials believe that Federal

programs are often created and implemented without including

them. We don’t think the current coordination mechanisms provide

for the authority, coordination, discipline, and accountability that

is needed.

So for all these reasons we recommended a senior authoritative

entity in the Executive Office of the President which we called the

‘‘National Office for Combating Terrorism,’’ obviously a different

construct than the Hart-Rudman Commission suggested.

This would have the responsibility for developing a strategy and

coordinating the programs and budget to carry out that strategy.

We feel strongly that this office must be empowered to carry out

several responsibilities which are outlined in our full report. I will

highlight three here by way of example.

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First and foremost, of course, is to develop and update the strategy, which would, of course, be presented and approved by the

President.

The office should have a programming and budgeting responsibility in which it can oversee and, through the process of certifying

or decertifying, ensure that our programs and budgets among all

the plethora of departments and agencies are synchronized and coherent.

An area that is of particular interest and near and dear to my

heart is the area of intelligence, which Bruce has already spoken

to. This office would also be responsible for coordinating intelligence matters, to foster the national assessments that Dr. Hoffman spoke to, to analyze both foreign and domestic intelligence in

a unitary way, rather than as two separate, disparate pursuits, and

to devise policy for dissemination to appropriate officials at the

State and local levels.

We believe this office should have certain characteristics or attributes that we think are important. The person who heads the office should be politically accountable—that is, nominated by the

President, confirmed by the Senate—and enjoy Cabinet-level status.

The office must have complete oversight over all the Federal programs and funding to influence resource allocation. It should be

empowered to certify what each department, agency, or office is

spending in the interest of following a strategy, sticking with priorities, and minimizing duplication.

Finally, the office should not have operational control over execution. Indeed, we don’t want to see the various Federal stakeholders

abrogate their responsibilities. What we do want to see is to have

them carried out in a coherent, synchronized, coordinated way.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee,

the Gilmore panel members are convinced that these two recommendations are crucial for strengthening the national effort to

combat terrorism. We need a true national strategy and we need

somebody clearly in charge. This is not a partisan political issue.

We have members on our panel who identify with each of the parties, virtually all the functional constituencies, and all governmental levels—Federal, State, and local. This is simply something

we all agreed that the country needs.

Contemplating the specter of terrorism, as you are doing this

morning, in this country is a sobering but critically necessary responsibility of Government officials at all levels and in all

branches. It is truly a national issue that requires synchronization

of our efforts—vertically, among the Federal, State, and local levels, and horizontally among the functional constituent stakeholders.

The individual capabilities of all critical elements must be

brought to bear in a much more coherent way than is now the case.

That fundamental tenet underlies our work over the last 2 years.

Our most imposing challenge centers on policy and whether we

have the collective fortitude to forge change, both in organization

and process.

I would respectfully observe that we have studied the topic to

death, and what we need now is action.

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Mr. Chairman, this concludes my brief statement. I would be

pleased to address your questions.

Mr. SHAYS [assuming Chair]. Thank you, General Clapper. We

will reserve the opportunity of questioning you at the conclusion of

our panel’s testimony.

[The prepared statement of General Clapper follows:]

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Mr. GILMAN. I now call on Frank Cilluffo, chairman, Committee

on Combatting Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Terrorism of the Homeland Defense Initiative Center for Strategic and

International Studies.

Please proceed.

Mr. CILLUFFO. See, even think tanks have an alphabet soup of

acronyms following them.

Mr. GILMAN. That’s quite a lengthy one.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Mr. Chairman, distinguished Members, I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today on a matter of

critical importance to our Nation’s security. I want to echo the previous panelists and commend you for your foresight in seizing the

occasion to identify gaps and shortfalls in our current policies,

practices, procedures, and programs to combat terrorism.

In considering how to best proceed, we should not be afraid to

wipe the slate clean and review the matter anew to thoroughly examine the myriad of Presidential decision directives and policies

with a view toward assessing what has worked to date, what has

not, and what has not been addressed at all. This, in turn, lays the

groundwork to proceed to the next step of crafting an effective national counterterrorism strategy, a theme we’ve obviously heard a

lot of today.

My contribution to this hearing will focus predominantly on terrorism involving chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear

weapons, or CBRN terrorism, and the threat to the homeland, but,

by and large, I think the comments will be relevant—at least I

hope—to counterterrorism more generally.

During our deliberations we concluded that, although Federal,

State, and local governments have made impressive strides to prepare for terrorism—specifically, terrorism using CBRN weapons— the whole remains far less than the sum of the parts. Let me briefly explain.

The United States is now at a crossroads. While credit must be

given where credit is due, the time has come for cold-eyed assessment and evaluation and the recognition that we presently do not

have but are in need of a comprehensive strategy for countering

the threat of terrorism, and, I might add, the larger dimensions of

homeland defense.

As things presently stand, however, there is neither assurance

that we have a clear capital investment strategy nor a clearly defined end state, let alone a sense of the requisite objectives to reach

this goal.

Short of a crystal ball—and I do think it is fair to say that, since

the end of the cold war, political forecasting has made astrology

look respectable—but, short of a crystal ball, there is no way to

predict with any certainty the threat to the homeland in the short

term or the long term, though it is widely accepted that unmatched

U.S. cultural, diplomatic, economic, and military power will likely

cause America’s adversaries to favor asymmetric attacks in order

to offset out strengths and exploit our weaknesses.

Against this background, military superiority, in itself, is no

longer sufficient to ensure our Nation’s safety. Instead, we need to

further, by broadening our concept of national security so as to encompass CBRN counterterrorism.

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Make no mistakes, though. The dimension of the challenge is

enormous. The threat of CBRN terrorism by States and non-State

actors presents unprecedented challenges to American government

and society, as a whole. Notably, no single Federal agency owns the

strategic mission completely, nor do I think that’s even a possibility. For the moment, however, many agencies are acting independently in what needs to be part of a whole.

Importantly, a coherent response is not merely a goal that is out

of reach. To the contrary, we now possess the experience and the

knowledge for ascertaining at least the contours of a comprehensive

strategy, a comprehensive response, and a future year program and

budget to implement that strategy.

It bears mentioning that strategy must be a precursor to budget.

Now there’s a concept, huh? Of course, none of this is to say that

we have all the answers. Quite the contrary. Indeed, our recommendations represent just one possible course of action among

many—and you’ve heard some others today—and it is for you, Congress, and the executive branch to decide precisely which of these

avenues or combination thereof should be pursued.

In any case, my vision of a comprehensive counterterrorism

strategy would incorporate a full spectrum of activities, from prevention and deterrence to retribution and prosecution to domestic

response preparedness. All too often, these elements of strategy are

treated in isolation.

Such a strategy must also incorporate the marshaling of domestic

resources and the engagement of international allies and assets,

and it requires monitoring and measuring the effectiveness or

benchmarking of the many programs that implement the strategy

so as to lead to common standards, practices, and procedures.

In our report on CBRN terrorism, we set out a roadmap of nearterm and long-term priorities for senior Federal Government officials to marshal Federal, State, local, private sector, and NGO resources to better counter the threat.

With your patience, I will elaborate upon the highlights of our

blueprint, beginning with a clear outline of the structure of our

suggested strategy.

In our review, a complete CGRN counterterrorism strategy involves both preventing an attack from occurring—our first priority

should always be to get there before the bomb goes off—which includes deterrents, nonproliferation, counterproliferation and preemption, and, second, preparing Federal, State, and local capabilities to respond to an actual attack.

In short, our counterterrorism capabilities and organizations

must be strengthened, streamlined, and then synergized so that effective prevention will enhance domestic response preparedness

and vice versa.

On the prevention side, a multi-faceted strategy is in order. The

common thread underpinning all of these, as we’ve heard earlier

today, is the need for a first-rate intelligence capability. More specifically, the breadth, depth, and uncertainty of the terrorist threat

demands significant investment, coordination, and retooling of the

intelligence process across the board for the pre-attack, the warning, trans-attack, possible preemption, and post-attack—‘‘who done

it’’ phases.

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In the time that remains, I want to focus on issues of organization and domestic response preparedness. In my view, effective organization is the concept that not only lies at the heart of a comprehensive strategy but also underpins it, from start, from prevention, to finish—consequence management response.

We must ask ourselves whether we are properly organized to

meet the CBRN terrorism challenge. This requires tackling very

fundamental assumptions on national security. Are our existing

structures, policies, and institutions adequate? CBRN terrorism is

inherently a cross-cutting issue, but to date the Government has

organized long vertical lines within their respective stovepipes.

Our report treats the wide-ranging question of organization by

breaking it down into three different sub-themes, and you saw

some of the comparison and contrast between the NSSG and the

Gilmore report here. Ours is actually a mishmash of both.

Effective organization at the Federal level, top down; effective organization at the State and local levels and the Federal interface,

the bottom up; and effective organization of the medical and public

health communities, as you alluded to earlier, Mr. Chairman.

I thought I’d make some very brief remarks on each of these, in

turn.

As a starting point, we’ve heard to death that there is a need for

better coordination of the 40-some Federal organizations that have

a CT—counterterrorism—role. To ensure that departmental an

agency programs, when amalgamated, constitute an integrated and

coherent plan, we need a high level official to serve as what we

refer to as a ‘‘belly button’’ for our overall efforts, and that position

needs to marry up three criteria, and we keep hearing the same

criteria description is same, some of our prescriptions are different,

but authority, accountability, and resources.

One way to achieve this end and the course that we have suggested is to establish a Senate-confirmed position of assistant to

the President or Vice President for combating terrorism. The assistant for combating terrorism would be responsible for issuing an

annual national counterterrorism strategy and plan. This strategy

would serve as the basis to recommend the overall level of

counterterrorism spending and how that money should be allocated

among the various departments and agencies of the Federal Government with CT responsibilities.

Remember the golden rule—he or she with the gold rules.

To work, the assistant must have some sway over departmental

and agency spending. After all, policy without resources is rhetoric.

Accordingly, we recommend the assistant be granted limited direction over department and agency budgets in the form of certification and pass-back authority. That’s not to get it mixed up with

a czar. Obviously, a czar needs Cossacks, and I don’t know too

many of those around. We have too many little czars. But we do

see the need to pull that away from the National Security Council,

keep it in obviously the Executive Office of the President or Vice

President, and not get it confused with operations. It should have

no operational responsibility, period.

Let me make two very brief points on lead Federal agency. First,

we need FEMA to assume the lead role in domestic response preparedness. We must capitalize FEMA with the personnel, as well

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as administrative and logistical support and assign FEMA the

training mission for consequence management. It makes little

sense to ‘‘hive off’’ training for consequence management from the

very organization that would handle consequence management.

Now that rests at Department of Justice. Moreover, FEMA is already well-integrated into State and local activity in the context of

natural disasters.

While FEMA has been revitalized and has distinguished itself

when responding to a series of natural disasters recently, the same

cannot be said of its national security missions. Put bluntly, it has

become the ATM machine for chasing hurricanes.

An additional point I wish to make concerns the role of Department of Defense. Obviously, this is a subject of much debate. Realistically, though, only Department of Defense even comes close to

having the manpower and resources necessary for high-consequence yet low-likelihood events such as catastrophic CBRN terrorism on the U.S. homeland. But even the mere specter of suggestion of a lead military role raises vocal and widespread opposition

on the basis of civil liberties.

That being said, however, it is wholly appropriate for DOD to

maintain a major role in support of civilian authorities, though we

must grant the department the resources necessary to assume this

responsibility.

Perhaps it is just me, but I find it difficult to believe that, in a

time of genuine crisis, the American people would take issue with

what color uniform the men and women who are saving lives happen to be wearing.

Even more starkly, the President should never be in a position

of having to step up to the podium and say to the American people,

look them in the eye, ‘‘We could have, should have, would have, but

didn’t because of.’’ Explaining to the American people the insidethe-beltway debates just will not stand up in such a crisis.

Moving now very briefly to State and local, obviously we need an

effort——

Mr. SHAYS [resuming Chair]. I’m going to ask, could you finish

up in a minute?

Mr. CILLUFFO. Sure.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Mr. CILLUFFO. On the State and local side, we see the need for

more resources to make their way to State and local for implementation and execution. Obviously, the threat is perceived to be low

and the cost exceedingly high that we need to be able to work toward nationwide baselines. And we need to be able to dictate that

we have an optimal transition from an ordinary event—responding

to a heart attack—to an extraordinary event.

I think that the value of to be and exercising must not be underestimated. Hopefully, it will be the closest we get to the real thing,

and, if not, it allows us to make some of the big mistakes on the

practice fields and not on the battlefield, which in this context

could be Main Street, U.S.A.

I’ll skip the public health section, but I want to close very briefly

on a personal note. Last year, on April 19th, I had the privilege to

attend the dedication of the Oklahoma City National Memorial on

the 5-year anniversary of the attack on the Alfred P. Murrah

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Building. Just last week I was again in Oklahoma City and had the

opportunity to visit the Memorial Center’s Interactive Museum. I

highly recommend visiting the museum. It was profoundly moving.

I was reminded that America is not immune from terrorism and

that if such an attack can occur in America’s heartland, it can

occur anywhere. I was reminded that the consequences of such acts

of violence are very real. In this case 168 innocent lives were lost

and many, many more affected.

I was reminded that those first on the scene of such a tragedy

are ordinary citizens, followed up by local emergency responders

such as fire fighters, medics, and police officers, all of whom were

overwhelmed except for the desire to save lives.

I was touched by the experience, of course, but, most of all, I left

proud—proud of Oklahoma’s elected officials; proud of the survivors; proud of the many thousands of men, women, and children

who lost family members, friends, and neighbors; and, perhaps

most importantly, I left proud to be an American, for what I saw

was the community strength and resilience. I believe this indomitable spirit, the will of the people to return, to rebuild, to heal, and

to prosper best represents America’s attitude toward terrorism, and

I’m confident that, with these hearings and all of our reports, that

the powers that be in the executive branch and Congress will develop, implement, and sustain such a strategy.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Cilluffo.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Cilluffo follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I’m going to recognize my colleague from New York,

but first let me put in the record, Dr. Hoffman requested the executive summary of the RAND Report, Strategy Framework for Countering Terrorism and Insurgency, be placed in the record, and without objection we will be happy to do that.

Mr. Gilman.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, since I arrived late, I’d like to introduce into the

record at this point in the record or the appropriate place my opening statement.

Mr. SHAYS. That will be done without objection.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I’d like to address the entire panel with one question. You all

had focused on the need for better coordination, avoid the fragmentation, put someone in charge, the need for a sound, effective,

coordinated program. What has prevented us from doing that? We

go back to the Gilmore Commission, the Attorney General’s report

on the 5-year interagency terrorism, technology crime plan. All of

these have focused on the same conclusions—that we need to have

a central agency, we need to have coordination, we need to get rid

of the fragmentation. What has prevented us from doing that over

these years? I address that to all of the panelists.

General CLAPPER. I think, sir, that it has been somewhat of a

function of perhaps inertia, unwillingness, reluctance to step up to

the recognition of at least a potential threat here to reposture.

There is the issue, I suppose, of giving up—the concern about

giving up turf, jurisdiction, and to make do with sort of the interagency coordination processes which basically diffuse responsibility

and accountability.

There has been, I think, a reluctance to step up to the notion of

perhaps having to give up some authority or turf in the interest of

having someone who is clearly in charge and who is accountable.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, General Clapper.

Dr. Hoffman, do you have some comment?

Mr. HOFFMAN. It is something of a chicken and the egg question,

but I think it is the absence of a strategy that has deprived us of

a focus that would enable us to marshal our efforts and to focus

on how to address the threat through organization. I think the

trouble is it is much too fragmented and piecemeal, and it represents too many different things to too many different agencies.

Mr. GILMAN. Dr. Hoffman, we have these reports—the U.S. Commission on National Security, Gilmore Commission, Attorney General Report—all said we need a national strategy. What I’m asking

is what has prevented us from adopting it? What can we do to

overcome that inertia that General Clapper is referring to?

Mr. HOFFMAN. I think it is a national will to bring together this

comprehensive net assessment, that it has to start for that position

and it has to come from the Executive.

Mr. GILMAN. What do you recommend? How do we bring that

about?

Mr. HOFFMAN. I think that there has to be, first, the process of

net assessments has to begin, where we take the disparate pieces

that have been used to define a threat and bring it together and

have a coherent definition of what we need to plan against. I think

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that would better identify what the requirements are than to approach it in the direction we do now without—— Mr. GILMAN. But I think the experts have all identified the problem. What I’m asking is how do we implement now the recommendations from the problem that you’ve assessed?

General CLAPPER. Well, there’s probably two ways that can happen, sir. Either the Executive can step up to the task and champion a strategy and assume a position of leadership, or that direction can come from this institution.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Mr. Gilman, if I can also expand on that briefly,

I agree that the executive branch plays a key role here. While we

have seen a lot of talk for the past 8 years, it could be summed

up—and perhaps unfairly—long on nouns, short on verbs. There

was a lot of focus, but very little action and implementation.

I think that you clearly have to get someone who is above the

specific agency roles and missions, so I can only see that coming

from the leadership, and that has to be someone—because you have

different roles and missions. For example, law enforcement wants

to string them up, the intelligence community wants to string them

along. It’s not that they don’t necessarily fight, but they’ve got very

different missions in terms of their perceptions of the world.

I think that there are only two times in our rich yet, relatively

speaking, young history where we really needed to ask these very

fundamental questions, and those were the founding fathers, the

very issue of the federalism debates, and then again right after

World War II, where we created the National Security Act of 1947,

where we saw the need to turn OSS into the Central Intelligence

Agency.

So I think this is unprecedented in terms of timing in terms of

asking the very basic national security needs and architectures we

need to have in place, but I think that, with the new administration in place and some of the principal cabinet members, this will

happen.

Mr. WERMUTH. Mr. Gilman.

Mr. GILMAN. Yes, Mr. Wermuth?

Mr. WERMUTH. To further answer, it really is a leadership issue,

but it is more than that, too. If you look at these charts, all of these

agencies have very clear statutory responsibilities, and all of the

ones that are sitting there on the table will have pieces of this,

depending—— Mr. GILMAN. It is obvious we’ve got too much fragmentation.

Mr. WERMUTH. We do, but let me suggest that part of the process, in terms of accountability and responsibility, is following the

money. One of the specific recommendations that the Gilmore Commission makes, in terms of its structure, is giving a senior person

in the White House some budget responsibility—certification and

decertification—requiring all of these agencies to bring their budgets to a table to eliminate duplication, to match their budgets

against the priorities established in the national strategy, so it has

to be a focus that is centralized, with all respect to the proposal

from Hart Rudman. If this isn’t done in the White House at a very

senior level with someone who is sitting very close to the President

and has the President’s authority to do it all, we came to the conclusion that an agency, a single agency, would never be able to pull

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all of this together. I think, to a certain extent, that view is reflected in the CSAS recommendation that it needs to be in the

White House, that there needs to be some senior oversight over

this entire mishmash of organizations.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Mr. Gilman, could I build on that—— Mr. GILMAN. Yes, please.

Mr. CILLUFFO [continuing]. Very briefly. And, if I could be so

bold, I sort of feel like a fisherman being asked his views on hoofand-mouth. Obviously, it is a problem, and I’m here to tell you it

is worse. But I think that Congress also needs to look at how it

is organized to deal with this challenge.

Right now you’ve got a series of both committees with authorization oversight, and everyone claims—— Mr. GILMAN. Well, that’s what this committee is all about.

Mr. CILLUFFO. And that’s why I think this committee—— Mr. GILMAN. We’re doing the oversight. We’re trying to focus on

that problem. But, more important, if I might interrupt you, more

important, Mr. Wermuth said we need someone close to the White

House. Several years ago there was a national coordinator appointed within the Security Council to take the responsibility.

What I’m asking our panelists—and you’re all experts now—how

best can we implement the recommendations that are obvious to all

of us—to have a national strategy, to get rid of the fragmentation,

to make it an effective, coordinated policy? How best can this Congress act to accomplish that? Any recommendations by our panelists?

General CLAPPER. Well, sir, I tried to suggest that if the executive branch, the new administration, takes this on and devises a

strategy and appoints a leadership with sufficient staff, wherewithal, and the authority, to include program and resources, I

would hope that such a move would be endorsed by the Congress.

In the absence of that, then I guess I would suggest that, to the

extent that people think that this is an important issue, that these

things need to be fixed, that the Congress would legislate, as they

have in the past, to mandate the creation of such a national strategy and the appointment of a leader.

Mr. SHAYS. Well, General Clapper, I welcome your recommendation. What do you think about the report by Senator Rudman today

bringing about a commission in securing the national homeland.

General CLAPPER. Sir, if you are referring to the——

Mr. GILMAN. The Rudman Commission.

General CLAPPER [continuing]. Their proposal for a Homeland

Security Agency——

Mr. GILMAN. Yes.

General CLAPPER [continuing]. An embellished FEMA. Sir, we

spent in our commission, our panel, a lot of time looking at various

models of what might be the best construct for a lead element in

the Government, and so we went through a lead element, a lead

agency, picking one of the current departments of the Government,

whether it is Defense or Justice or Health and Human Services,

and basically we for lots of reasons rejected that. We looked at the

notion of an embellished, strengthened FEMA, and we’re concerned

there about the mixture of law enforcement and consequence management kinds of responsibilities. Of course, one of the major law

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enforcement elements, the FBI, itself, would, of course, not be in

this construct.

The other difficulty we saw was an agency, subcabinet agency,

somehow directing the coordination across Cabinet-level agencies.

So we just decided that FEMA, which has been very, very successful, particularly under its recent leadership, is very well

thought of, I have learned through my interactions with State and

local people, by State and local officials, and that we shouldn’t jeopardize the very important mission that it performs, perhaps embellish that and give them more resources, but not jeopardize what it

does now by adding on these other agencies.

So our conclusion—and, again, I would mention that I think the

nature of our recommendations is heavily influenced by the composition of our panel, which was heavily populated by State and

local people—was an entity in the Executive Office of the President, politically accountable, appointed by the President, confirmed

by the Senate, which would have this oversight and authority over

the entire range of all these agencies and their programs, all individually well intended but not necessarily coordinated, and that

would be the entity to do that.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, General.

Do any of the panelists disagree with General Clapper’s conclusion?

Mr. CILLUFFO. Well, I wouldn’t say disagree, but different areas

of emphasis.

I do not think the breakdown is where the rubber meets the road

and it is at the agency level, so I’m not sure if we really do need

an agency, nor do I think we should ever have a super-agency, because it gets to some of the very fundamental presumptions of

American ethos.

But I think the real problem is at the policy level, and a lot of

that stems from policy without resources are rhetoric. You need

someone who can marry up authority, accountability, with resources. The budgetary role which I think both of our reports alluded to, accentuated in different ways, is where the real problem,

where the real breakdown is.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you. I want to thank the panelists. Thank

you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Mr. Kucinich.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much.

I thank the witnesses for being here today.

General Clapper, I looked at your testimony here about the

major elements of a national strategy. Do you think preliminary to

the execution of such a strategy there would have to be a comprehensive risk assessment nationally.

General CLAPPER. Yes, sir. And that topic was addressed quite

substantially in our first report we published in 1999, which Dr.

Hoffman had a great deal to do with, since he was working with

us then. So we treated that subject—the whole issue of threat and

the need for threat assessments, much along the lines of what Dr.

Hoffman testified to in our first report.

So the short answer to your question is yes.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you, General.

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Now, I looked at your testimony, and you say the national—you

speak to a national strategy should be geographically and functionally comprehensive, should address both international and domestic terrorism. Then you go on to say that the distinction between

terrorism outside the borders of the United States and terrorist

threats domestically is eroding. What do you mean by that?

General CLAPPER. Well, I think in many—we’ve had a proclivity,

I think, has been historically to sort of separate domestic threats

as one set and those emanating from foreign sources as another.

Of course, as we’ve seen the World Trade Center being, I think, an

example that those nice, neat boundaries probably are not going to

apply. I think this is particularly true in the case of the cyber

threat and the potential terrorist threat posed in the cyber world

or cyber arena, where the long arm of terrorism can reach out from

anywhere else in the world and be reflected as an apparent domestic attack.

I think the mechanisms and the apparatus, the jurisdictional distinctions that we have in this country are going to be put to the

test because of that erosion between heretofore distinct foreign

threats and domestic.

Mr. KUCINICH. Would you agree that the FBI and the CIA have

distinct and quite different missions in this Government?

General CLAPPER. They do, although I think they have done a lot

toward working together in recognition of the fact that terrorists

don’t necessarily recognize political boundaries.

Mr. KUCINICH. So would you see then more of a role for the Central Intelligence Agency in domestic intelligence-gathering?

General CLAPPER. No, sir, I don’t. What I see is what they’re

doing, and what I hope continues to occur, which is a close working

relationship so that when the baton is handed off, so to speak, that

it’s not dropped between when there is evidence that a foreign-emanated threat is reaching into the United States, that baton is handed off, so to speak, between the CIA, which has a clear foreign intelligence charter, and the FBI, which has a domestic intelligence

charter.

Mr. KUCINICH. Your sense is that right now we don’t have a national intelligence-gathering apparatus? Is that what you’re saying?

General CLAPPER. No, I didn’t say that at all, sir. We do.

Mr. KUCINICH. Well, you say—— General CLAPPER. One of the elements of the entity that we are

suggesting, the National Office for Combating Terrorism, would be

a robust intelligence effort under the national coordinator, who

would serve to bridge both the foreign intelligence overseen by the

Director of Central Intelligence and the domestic intelligence, and

we would see that as a major coordinating role——

Mr. KUCINICH. So it would be——

General CLAPPER [continuing]. As a part of that national office.

Mr. KUCINICH. General, would we be hiring new people then to

do the national intelligence gathering?

General CLAPPER. I don’t think so, sir. I think a few, perhaps,

but I think what this really represents is somewhat the same thing

that Senator Rudman was speaking of and General Boyd, which is

a re-arraying, perhaps, in a more-efficient, coherent manner to deal

with what this threat represents.

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Mr. KUCINICH. In your testimony you say that to be functionally

comprehensive the national strategy should address the full spectrum of the Nation’s efforts against terrorism, and No. 1 you put

intelligence. So what role does intelligence have then in your

Homeland Security Act?

General CLAPPER. Well, I think intelligence is a key, as Dr. Hoffman testified, a key element of this. It should underpin our national strategy. I think there is a lot that can be done to disseminate intelligence, regardless of where it comes from, whether it is

foreign or domestic, to selected appropriate State and local officials.

We have many intelligence-sharing relationships with foreign

countries, so we certainly ought to be able to figure out mechanisms whereby we can share intelligence, for example, with State

Governors or senior emergency planners in the States and selected

local officials. Right now there is not a real good mechanism for

doing that.

I would think—and our report describes—that this is a role that

the National Office for Combating Terrorism could perform, and

specifically the intelligence staff that we would envision that would

be a part of it.

Mr. KUCINICH. I’m looking at these dozens of agencies and departments here which have various intelligence functions. I’d like

to focus on the Federal Bureau of Investigation for a moment.

Would it be your opinion that the FBI is not doing an adequate job

in handling matters and challenges relating to intelligence gathering for the purposes of protecting the United States against domestic terrorism?

General CLAPPER. No, sir, I would not say that. And, on the contrary, I would emphasize something that I said earlier—that I

think a lot of progress has been made because of what we’ve experienced in terms of a closer working relationship between the CIA

and the FBI, so, as a lifelong professional intelligence officer, I

wouldn’t—I’m certainly not suggesting that they’re not doing their

job. They could certainly do it better if they had more resources.

Mr. KUCINICH. We’ve had testimony in front of this committee,

Mr. Chairman, that would imply that we have a profound national

security challenge, and if we do it would seem to me that the FBI

would be the appropriate agency to deal with it and not to create

an entirely new Governmental agency.

I share with you the opinion that the Federal Bureau of Investigation does an excellent job in handling a variety of challenges of

a law enforcement nature. It seems to me that the Federal Bureau

of Investigation has the specific charge to handle a number of the

elements of a national strategy that you have already spoken

to——

General CLAPPER. Yes, sir, in a domestic——

Mr. KUCINICH. May I—I’m not finished, General, if I may. Speaking of intelligence, deterrence, prevention, investigation, prosecution, preemption, crisis management, consequence management—

that almost defines what the Federal Bureau of Investigation is

about, at least the Bureau that I am familiar with, and it seems

to me that in offering an entirely new structure here we may be

wading into waters of duplicating existing Federal functions.

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General CLAPPER. No, sir. On the contrary—and, first of all, I’m

not suggesting—we weren’t in our report a profound new agency.

What we are suggesting is a comparatively small staff effort appended to the Office of the President to ensure it has the focus and

the responsibility and the authority, and what we’re really talking

about, I believe, is simply marshaling the totality and focusing on

the totality of our intelligence effort by ensuring coordination between the foreign and the domestic.

The CIA, in a foreign intelligence context, has potentially a role

to play in all those dimensions that you enumerated. In virtually

every case, I believe, the CIA potentially would have a role to play,

as well, in working in partnership with the FBI.

Mr. KUCINICH. If that’s the case, then, the CIA would inevitably

become involved in matters relating to handling of domestic law

enforcement challenges.

General CLAPPER. No, sir. I don’t think so. I think this would be

in every case, as it is done now, if it turns into a domestic scenario—and we’re hypothesizing here—the CIA I think would be in

support, if it turns into a domestic situation, in support of the FBI.

I don’t—— Mr. KUCINICH. But they would be sharing—— General CLAPPER. I do not—— Mr. KUCINICH. They would being intelligence.

General CLAPPER. I’m sorry, sir?

Mr. KUCINICH. They would being intelligence.

General CLAPPER. Yes, sir.

Mr. KUCINICH. And they do that now?

General CLAPPER. Yes, sir.

Mr. KUCINICH. And what do they do with the intelligence there

if it is a domestic matter? The CIA would give it to the FBI and

the FBI would handle it.

General CLAPPER. Well, I’m not sure I understand your question.

Mr. KUCINICH. Well, I’m just going back to the point I’m making,

and that is that we talk about a Homeland Security Act, and I’m

just wondering what’s—there’s implied here a criticism of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s abilities to respond.

General CLAPPER. No, sir. I don’t think that’s implied at all.

Mr. KUCINICH. Well, I would think that if we’re talking about

creating a reorganization here of some sort and with new oversight

structure with budgetary authority, as Mr. Cilluffo had talked

about, we’re certainly talking about something new, and you cannot countenance such a discussion without it reflecting on the service of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to this country.

And one final comment, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate your indulgence. I agree with all of the panelists about the role of Presidential policymaking, because that really helps to set the tone as

to what a Homeland Security Act would—what milieu it would operate in terms of policy. And I see two paradigms, Mr. Chairman,

and I’ll just be completed here.

If we look at a paradigm or a model of cooperation with other nations in solving security challenges, then this Homeland Security

Act could be beneficent in its scope.

On the other hand, if a President, any President, began to ramp

up the rhetoric and become involved in a cold war type atmosphere,

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if we go into a new cold war theater with implied threats, confrontation with other nations, a Homeland Security Act in its scope

would necessarily have a totally different meaning.

This is not, as you state, this is not neutral with respect to the

policy that comes from the Executive, so it has to be, I think—always we have to think in terms of the context of the operation of

the act and the international and national policy of an administration.

So if we enter into a cold war type scenario again, this particular

proposal would have implications that some may feel would be

quite challenging for the maintenance of civil liberties in our society.

I thank the chairman for his indulgence.

Mr. SHAYS. We’re going to have opportunity to have dialog back

and forth. This is the last panel, and we only have four Members.

At this time I’d recognize Mr. Tierney. And we’ll go for a second

round. I still have my first to do.

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you. I’ll try not to cover any of the other

ground. I apologize, I was at another committee meeting.

General Clapper, you, I believe, talked a little bit about a comprehensive terrorism policy. In that, are you also factoring in nuclear issues, threats of nuclear issues? And, if so, how do you go

about prioritizing which is the more serious concern for us at any

given time—threat from a nuclear problem or threat from terrorism?

General CLAPPER. Well, from a process standpoint, I would reinforce what Dr. Hoffman spoke to, which is the necessity for having

the nationally sanctioned, nationally recognized threat assessment

which would deal with specifically those issues.

Now, those are not static. They’re not set in concrete. That could

change.

My personal opinion, I’m inclined to agree with Senator Rudman.

I think our current main focus perhaps ought to be in the chemical

and biological arena, although I would comment that the weapon

of choice continues to be for terrorists a vehicle-borne conventional

explosive.

Mr. TIERNEY. Mr. Cilluffo, you talked about having or you alluded to a substantial amount of good news that deserves to be

told. Will you tell us, you know, being aware of some of the critical

challenges we face, what have been the accomplishments, in your

view, in the last decade or so?

Mr. CILLUFFO. Sure. I do think there are some pockets of very

good news, ranging from State and local exercises, which never

seem to make its way, though—what goes on in Portsmouth, NH,

or what goes on in Denver, CO, as we saw in a major exercise

called ‘‘Top Off,’’ often stays in those cities. So, while there have

been some specific exercises, there have been some programs that

are highly successful, State departments foreign—FEST team and

the role linking in CDC and USAMARID within the Department of

Defense into those programs are highly successful.

But, again, the whole remains far less than the sums of the

pieces, and until you start looking at ways to work toward common

standards, baselines, and the like, you are going to continue to

have some areas of excellence but other areas that are neglected.

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Mr. TIERNEY. Let me ask the other witnesses what they see have

been the biggest improvements over the last 8 or 10 years.

Mr. HOFFMAN. I’m perhaps too much down in the weeds, but I

would have to say, at least in the intelligence realm, it was the creation of the Counterterrorist Center at the Central Intelligence

Agency that, on the one hand, knits together both the operational

and intelligence sides of that agency, but also is an all-community

entity that involves the FBI and all other agencies involved in anticipating foreign terrorist threats.

I think the proof, frankly, in a sense I think has been demonstrated that it has had a very good record in deflecting and

thwarting terrorist acts in recent years.

Mr. TIERNEY. General.

General CLAPPER. Sir, I have been very impressed with the commitment and the concern at the State and local level. As a Federal

servant whole professional career, this is not an area I was very

familiar with, and through my engagement with the Gilmore panel

and the SECDEF’s Threat Reduction Advisory Committee and

some other boards and panels I have been on, I have really been

impressed by what is going on at the State and local level. In fact,

I have been so impressed with it, and I think that’s really where

the focus needs to be.

I think there is a tendency on the part of us beltway denizens

to sort of look from the top down, and there’s a lot of good work,

a lot of sophistication, I might add, at the State and local level

about what is involved and what is needed, and there’s a great

commitment out there.

What the Federal level needs to do, I think, is to get its act together and complement and support and buttress what is going on

at the State and local level.

Mr. TIERNEY. Would you do that with research and resources?

General CLAPPER. Actually, as indicated in our second report,

there are a range of activities where the Federal level can facilitate

and support—exercises and training, equipment standards, a medical plan where the Federal Government—that’s a function that,

from a national perspective, I think that leadership has to come

from the Federal Government.

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you.

Mr. WERMUTH. And if I could just expand on that a bit—and this

is a view that is slightly different than the one that Senator Rudman and General Boyd espoused earlier—some of the really good

news has been in the actual activities and programs undertaken at

the State and local level.

There is a lot going on out there. In fact, my personal view is

that most State governments, and even some larger municipal

areas, are much better organized, much further along in their

thinking about how to approach this problem than the Federal

Government is.

There is a process called ‘‘emergency management assistance

compacts.’’ It is agreements between States to help each other in

the event of an emergency like this or a natural disaster, and those

are now in place in 42 States, and that continues to grow every day

until we’re going to—we’ll probably be at 50 before the end of this

year.

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There are some great stories to be told in terms of multi-jurisdictional compacts and agreements within States. The Los Angeles

area in California now has a consortium of some 72 jurisdictions

that are focused on terrorists. They have a terrorism early warning

group, a working group where all these jurisdictions get together

and plan how they would respond. So those are great stories out

there in the heartland, and General Clapper mentioned supporting

those efforts, supporting their plans to create incident command

systems, unified command so that they can approach this, the possibility of an attack, cohesively when the attack occurs, and that

would mean then integrating the support, as well, from the Federal

level that might have to be brought to bear if the incident were

large enough.

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman.

I’d first like to ask each of all four of you what was said by the

previous panel that you would disagree with.

General CLAPPER. Sir, I think the only thing we disagree on is

the instrumentality or the entity to put someone in charge. Our

construct in the Gilmore Commission was an office tethered to the

Office of the President, as opposed to embellishing FEMA.

Other than that, I think we are in pretty much uniform agreement, certainly on the need, on the threat, on the need for a strategy, and on the need for firm, assertive leadership. I think the

issue is implementation.

And, as Senator Rudman said, there’s probably a number of ways

that this can be accomplished. The important thing is the recognition of the need, the threat, and to have a national strategy.

Mr. SHAYS. Dr. Hoffman.

Mr. HOFFMAN. I think my expertise is more in the area of terrorist organizations and motivations than in the U.S. bureaucracy, so

I have a different perspective. I would focus on their depiction of

the threat.

I think that fundamentally the—I don’t disagree completely, but

I think the United States has to be capable of responding along the

entire spectrum of terrorist threats, not just the high end ones.

I think that is important because there’s the difference between

WMD terrorism and terrorist use of chemical, biological, or radiological weapon that could not be at all motivated to kill lots of people but could be motivated to have profound psychological repercussions, and I think the terrorists realize that, and that has to be as

much a factor. We’ve responded, I think, very much to the physical

consequences and to emergency management. I think we also have

to focus equal attention on the psychological repercussions.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Mr. Wermuth.

Mr. WERMUTH. The Hart-Rudman proposal on structure envisions, at least in our reading of their proposal, a super Federal

agency that somehow is in charge. We have suggested—the Gilmore panel has suggested that the likelihood of the entity being in

charge is most probably going to be the local—either the mayor or

perhaps the Governor, and more so inside the State.

Our proposal suggests that you don’t need someone at the Federal level being in operational control, a single entity because all

147

these agencies have part of that. You need to coordinate that piece

in advance so that everyone clearly understands the role of all of

these agencies, and then provide the support mechanism to whichever lead Federal agency might be selected, depending on the type

of the incident, and particularly to support the State and local entity that probably is going to be really in charge of handling the

overall response.

It is different in approach. Hart-Rudman, in the short definition,

is top-down. The Gilmore Commission approach is bottom-up, recognizing that State and local entities are likely going to be the entities clearly first responding and really in charge of the situation,

and the Federal piece is going to be a support mechanism.

Mr. SHAYS. So bottom line, though, again, with the General, it’s

the issue of how you structure the response?

General CLAPPER. Yes, sir. That’s correct.

Mr. Cilluffo.

Mr. CILLUFFO. We, too, in terms of description, are very much

singing off the same sheet of music. It’s where the

prescriptions—— Mr. SHAYS. With the general—— Mr. CILLUFFO. Actually, with both Hart and Rudman and with

the Gilmore panel.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Mr. CILLUFFO. We don’t see it as a top-down or a bottom-up; we

see it as the convergence of both. And we placed more emphasis on

the public health communities, but we didn’t get to discuss the bioterrorism challenge in great depth and the threats to agriculture

and the threats to livestock.

But the big issue is we all see the same need. We see the need

for a whole slough of gaps, and they are all pretty much on the

same topic. We see the need to marry up the same three criteria— authority, accountability, and resources. We, too, did see the need

to enhance and capitalize FEMA; we just didn’t see the need to balloon it as large as it may have been and incorporating other agencies and missions that have other very important missions at hand.

So, in reality, it is sort of a mix and match of all of the above

here.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. I think we would all agree that the attack in

Oklahoma was done by a terrorist; is that true?

Mr. CILLUFFO. Correct.

Mr. SHAYS. But more or less siding with you, Dr. Hoffman, on

this issue, it wasn’t a weapon of mass destruction. But let me ask,

as it relates to weapons of mass destruction, the world—the cold

war is over. I view the world as a more threatening environment

that it’s a more dangerous place. I happen to believe the cold war

is over and the world is a more dangerous place.

Dr. Hoffman, do you believe that it is not a question of if there

will be a terrorist attack using weapons of mass destruction but a

question of when? I’m going to ask the same question of you, General, and you, Mr. Wermuth, and you, Mr. Cilluffo.

Mr. HOFFMAN. If you phrase it in terms of mass destruction, I

would disagree with that.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. General Clapper.

General CLAPPER. The question, sir, is when?

148

Mr. SHAYS. Yes, not if, in the next 10 to 20 years.

General CLAPPER. Well, guess I would be more concerned, again,

about—I mean, we have to be concerned with the full spectrum of

threats. We can’t just pick one and disregard the other. But I think

the more likely threats will remain, at least as far as I can see, the

conventional, perhaps large-scale—— Mr. SHAYS. You know, that’s not really the question I asked. Dr.

Hoffman, you’ve been clear. You believe there will be no attack by

a terrorist in the next 10 to 20 years using a weapons of mass destruction. That’s what you believe.

Mr. HOFFMAN. Against the United States, yes, but I would qualify that by saying a chemical or biological or radiological weapon,

that I do believe.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me—— Mr. HOFFMAN. From a mass destruction—— Mr. SHAYS. Yes. I view chemical, biological, and nuclear—they

are defined as weapons of mass destruction, aren’t they? I mean,

am I misusing the term?

Mr. HOFFMAN. I think incorrectly. I think they are three different

weapons that have very different—— Mr. SHAYS. OK. Let’s break it down. And I do want to be very

clear on this. You all have been involved in this issue a lot longer

than I have, but I ended up asking to chair this committee with

the proviso that we would have jurisdiction of terrorism at home

and abroad. I happen to think, what I have been reading, frankly,

for the last 10 to 20 years makes me very fearful, so I have my

own bias about this.

But let me just ask you, as it relates to each of the three—we’ll

separate nuclear as a weapons of mass destruction, I’ll put chemical and biological together—and ask each of you if you think that

the United States will face an attack by a terrorist using these

weapons. First nuclear, Dr. Hoffman.

Mr. HOFFMAN. I would put nuclear on the low end of the spectrum, but phrased chemical/biological/radiological, yes, I do.

Mr. SHAYS. So it is a question of when, not if, on those two?

Mr. HOFFMAN. Yes.

Mr. SHAYS. General Clapper.

General CLAPPER. I agree with that.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. Mr. Wermuth.

Mr. WERMUTH. I’m going to answer your question a little bit differently by saying that it is easy to say it is a question of—it’s not

a question of if, but when, but that really goes to the heart of what

we’re talking about.

I believe that terrorists will attempt to use chemical and biological weapons. Those I would kind of put in the same category. Radiological and nuclear, I would say that the chances of that are no.

But I don’t even think you can say for chemical and biological that

it is not a question of if but when unless you’re doing what we’re

all saying here, unless you’re collecting good intelligence, unless

you’re analyzing that good intelligence. I’m unwilling to say that

there will be a mass destructive attack in the next 20 years because I don’t think anybody has that crystal ball. We don’t have

any intelligence right now that indicates that anyone has that capability, but we’d have to keep watching it.

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Mr. SHAYS. Wait. You misspoke. You clearly have intelligence

that people have the capability.

Mr. WERMUTH. We have intelligence that nation states have capability; we don’t have any intelligence that any terrorist group or

individual currently possesses the capability to deliver a chemical,

biological, radiological, or nuclear attack against the United States

presently that would result in casualties in the thousands or tens

of thousands.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. With all due respect, I would accept that on nuclear, but could I just—and we’ll get to you, Mr. Cilluffo—I am

really unclear as to how you can make a statement that there is

not the technology for an individual cell of people, I mean a group,

a small number of people to mount a terrorist attack using a chemical agent that would have devastating injury and death.

Mr. WERMUTH. I tried to be very careful with my choice of world.

Mr. SHAYS. I know. I don’t want you to be so careful.

Mr. WERMUTH. I said no current intelligence that indicates that

anyone currently possesses the capability. Is the technology there?

Could they try to acquire the capability? Could they culture and

perhaps transport and deliver an attack? Yes, that’s in the realm

of possibility, but there is nothing to indicate that any entity currently possesses that capability where they could deliver the attack.

Mr. SHAYS. Now, in Japan they didn’t pull it off? Didn’t they

have the capability?

Mr. WERMUTH. Dr. Hoffman is more of an expert on this than I

am, but I would argue that they didn’t have the capability because

they didn’t have the effective means of delivering what it was they

wanted to deliver so that the result was mass fatalities. That’s

clearly their intention.

Mr. SHAYS. And I would argue—but I’m probably foolish to do it,

given Dr. Hoffman and you all are such experts—but I would argue

that they didn’t pull off what they had the capability of doing.

Mr. WERMUTH. They punctured plastic garbage bags with umbrellas as a means of dissemination. They did not have a capability

effectively to disseminate the agent that they had in their possession.

Mr. SHAYS. That was in part because they didn’t want to hurt

themselves in the process. The issue of, you know, we have the mutual assured destruction seemed to matter to nations. It doesn’t

seem to matter to terrorists when they are willing to blow themselves up in the process.

So if they had been willing to release them and do it manually,

they might have succeeded, and they had the technology. They just

had to do it in person.

Mr. Cilluff.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Yes, Mr. Chairman, nor can you bomb an actor

without an address, so deterrence needs to be rethought.

Mr. SHAYS. Say that again.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Nor can you bomb an actor without an address,

so deterrence and compellence in terms of a national strategy

needs to be re-thought-out in terms of foreign deployment and projection of power. It’s a little different. This requires personalizing,

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knowing some very specific information on what could be a very

small cell or organization or group.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Mr. CILLUFFO. In terms of likelihood—— Mr. SHAYS. Not a matter of if, but when, on first nuclear—— Mr. CILLUFFO. Yes.

Mr. SHAYS [continuing]. And then—— Mr. CILLUFFO. I agree on the bio, on the chem side with the caveat it depends on consequences. You may have small-scale biological or limited-scale chemical attacks that could be, in some cases,

even major, major events, worse than in Oklahoma City, but that

doesn’t mean necessarily an attack that will damage the fabric of

American society.

But with that in mind, yes, I do think. The capabilities, as you

referenced, exist. The intentions exist. There’s no shortage of actors

with views inimical to the United States out there in the world; it’s

when you see the marriage of the real bad guys wanting to exploit

the real good things. Luckily, we have not seen that yet, but I do

think we will.

Mr. SHAYS. See, my feeling about terrorists is they just don’t

have as good an imagination as I have, which—I mean, seriously.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Let’s keep it that way.

Mr. SHAYS. And it’s not a challenge to them, but most don’t—one,

two, and three are probably almost as far away from me as they

are from Congressman Tierney. What would prevent terrorists

from coming in and exploding that plan up and, in a sense, not

causing maybe the deaths in the thousands and thousands, but certainly it would make all of lower eastern Connecticut uninhabitable

for the next 10,000 years? What would prevent that? I mean, do

you have to have some great weapons to do that?

Dr. Hoffman, tell me first about Tokyo and then respond to the

question I just asked.

Mr. HOFFMAN. In Tokyo I would say what’s interesting in the

case is that something on the order of 50 scientists working fulltime precisely on the means to develop and deploy chemical, and

probably fewer than 20 scientists biological weapons. They attempted, through more sophisticated techniques than puncturing

trash bags, to use biological weapons nine times through aerosol

sprayers and the like, and it failed. That’s why they moved on to

chemical. They thought it was easier.

I think the lesson is not that some other terrorist group may not

succeed but may not, indeed, learn from their mistakes, because

one thing we do know that I think all terrorist experts will agree

on is that terrorists learn from their mistakes much better than

governments, the governments they raid against.

But I think what the Me case shows is that this is far more difficult to develop an effective chemical or biological weapon and

then to achieve the dispersal.

On two other occasions Ome did use chemical weapons and used

more-sophisticated aerosol spraying devices, and it also didn’t

work.

I think this is part of the issue, too, is that—and that goes to

your question why wouldn’t terrorists use some of these more-heinous types of weapons, and I think, on the one hand, it is because

151

terrorists know that they have problematical effectiveness. Let’s

look at the last conventional conflict where chemical weapons were

used, and were used promiscuously by Iraq against the Iranians

during the Iran/Iraq War. Chemical weapons accounted for fewer

than 5 percent of—sorry, I want to make sure I’m right about that,

sorry—fewer than 1 percent. Of the 600,000 fatalities in that war,

5,000 were killed with chemical weapons. And I have to say, in

World War I, although the first use of chemical weapons shocked

many people, fewer than 12 percent of the casualties were with

gas.

So these I think psychologically are very powerful weapons,

which the terrorists realize, and they realize that using them in a

very discreet way will have profound psychological repercussions

that I would argue we are not as prepared to deal with as perhaps

the physical repercussions of them.

Tokyo is a perfect example to figure over 5,000 persons injured

in that attack is widely cited, but in the issue of the ‘‘Journal of

the American Medical Association’’ last year confirmed that approximately 75 percent of all those ‘‘injuries’’ were, in fact, psychosomatic, psychological effects of people checking into hospitals because they were so panicked, because there was an effect of not

only could the fire department not respond to the physical consequences, there was not a very effective governmental communications strategy in place, so therefore exactly what the terrorists

want, to sell panic, to create fear and intimidation.

Mr. SHAYS. I wonder, though, if when Great Britain had hearings

and they had experts come and talk about the threat that Hitler

presented in the 1930’s, they would have had a lot of people give

you 100 reasons why Hitler wasn’t a threat, and then 1 day it

dawned on people that he was one heck of a threat, and I wonder

if it is the same kind of scenario here—that we are kind of coasting

along, and you all are the experts. If you, Dr. Hoffman, don’t feel

the technology exists, then I have to concede that it doesn’t exist

because you are the expert. But it just flies in the face of so much

of what this committee has uncovered.

General CLAPPER. Sir, if I could——

Mr. HOFFMAN. If I could just say one thing—it’s not that the

technology doesn’t exist and it’s not that I don’t think we should

prepare for it. I don’t think we should focus on that exclusively.

If you’re asking me as a terrorism expert what is the preeminent

terrorist threat that the United States faces today, I would say a

series of simultaneous car and truck bombings throughout the

country, which would cause panic, which would demonstrate that

terrorists coerced the building, which would be easier for them to

do.

Mr. SHAYS. I mean, it wasn’t very difficult, except they were

caught, to bring—a few years ago I went down to Colombia because

the DAS operation of Colombia, their FBI, lost their building. It

was exploded. There was a chemical weapon that basically caused

700 injuries and 70 people killed in Colombia.

The question that I had there was it was agricultural chemicals.

They took a big bus, they loaded it with agricultural weapons, and

they blew up the building.

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When you went into one of the tunnels—the Holland Tunnel, I

think it may have been, but it was one of the tunnels in New

York—they were simply going to take a truck with a chemical explosives, a car in front, and they would stop the truck catercornered, they would hop into their car, and drive off, and the

bomb would detonate, you know, a minute or two later, and you’d

have flames coming out like they were coming out of the barrel of

a gun on both ends. I doubt people would take comfort and use the

tunnels much. I mean, that can happen.

But let me ask you this: what is to prevent them from blowing

up a nuclear site, a nuclear generating plant? I mean, do you have

to have the technology to have radiation go then? What would be

the technology? Dr. Cilluffo, what would it be?

Mr. CILLUFFO. Just the Mr. I’m not a doctor.

To be honest, what you are bringing out is what hopefully the

terrorists don’t think, and that’s better-placed bombs—conventional

terrorism on new targets which could cause mass casualties. A

well-placed bomb at a LNG—liquified natural gas—facility or a nuclear facility or something lobbed into something else, yes, security

and safeguards at our nuclear facilities do need to take these sorts

of threats into consideration. Absolutely.

And you’re right, it is partially imagination here, and hopefully

they don’t become too imaginative. And that, again, is not to

say——

Mr. SHAYS. You know, that’s really kind of—you know, ‘‘hopefully’’ isn’t good enough.

Mr. CILLUFFO. I agree with you wholeheartedly.

Mr. SHAYS. And we know that’s not the case. I mean, you know,

they aren’t unimaginative people. I mean, we can joke about it and

we can say it, but they aren’t.

Mr. CILLUFFO. I was actually referring to your comment. And I

also agree that bits, bytes, bugs, and gas will never replace bullets

and bombs, as Bruce referred to, either. But one of these could be

a transforming event, where, as tragic as a major conventional terrorist attack can be, that’s not going to shake the country’s confidence to the very core.

So I agree, it is somewhat like looking into Hitler during World

War II. It’s finding the unexpected, not looking for the expected

and trying to look for it within that noise level. It’s looking for the

thing that you’re not looking for, and that is a concern, and I think

that by all means one of these events, if successful, could transform

society.

Mr. SHAYS. Yes. And my point in asking these questions is then

to ask the reasons why we are here for the hearing. But, I mean,

I don’t like to have experts come—and I don’t want to say it is

going to be worse than it is going to be. I think, Dr. Hoffman, what

you’re doing is you’re saying, you know, you need to know the

threat as it exists and as it might exist so you can respond in an

intelligent way. I mean, I value that tremendously. But I’m concerned that in the end that we will talk about this problem after

there is an event, because I do think there will be an event. I don’t

think it will probably be nuclear, although, you know, if you speak

to someone like my colleague, Curt Weldon from Pennsylvania, he’s

concerned that the nuclear backpacks in Russia aren’t all acVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Nov 27, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00156 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75970.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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counted for and the Russians say they are. But, you know, I happen to think that Curt Weldon, who has made so many visits to

the Soviet Union, has a point that we should be concerned with.

I have more questions, but I am happy to—— Mr. TIERNEY. My only thought, just the one question on that, is

that we are so reliant on a lot of things that work through satellite

technology these days. What’s our exposure of vulnerability if

someone decided to go after satellites?

Mr. CILLUFFO. That is a topic that broadens the scope of the discussion today, and I do think vulnerabilities to our space assets is

a critical issue that the United States needs to look at and needs

to take steps to harden those targets.

And you could make the case, a very good case, that yes, that is

part of homeland defense in the larger context. We are more dependent than anyone else on these forms of space satellites.

Mr. TIERNEY. When you look at how much we do depend on

them, entire systems.

Mr. CILLUFFO. And you are absolutely right. From a dependency

standpoint, whether it is our national security information or

whether it is telecommunications, surveillance, radar—— Mr. TIERNEY. Well, a number of different things.

Mr. CILLUFFO. You’re absolutely right, and that is something I

do hope. And, looking at Secretary Rumsfeld’s thoughts on this in

the past, I do think that this is something we’re going to see an

awful lot of effort brought to bear, at least within OSD. You may

even have—there’s some discussion about a new Under Secretary

for Space and Command and Control Communications, C4ISR, intelligence and surveillance, so I think that, with Secretary Rumsfeld in charge, those sorts of concerns will be addressed and first

priorities. But I agree with you.

General CLAPPER. If I might add a comment, no one can say with

certainty—none of us, and certainly no one in the intelligence community can say that there isn’t another Omshon Rico somewhere

out there that we don’t know about who may be going to school on

what—on the Japanese cult. This is an issue that the intelligence

community is often critiqued for. In other words, the dilemma is do

you only go on what is evidentiarily based, or do you go or plan

on what is theoretically possible. That is kind of the dilemma we

are in here with respect to potential terrorist attacks.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Let me be clear on this. You all have basically said—first off, you

have responded by saying that it is not a question of when as it

relates to nuclear. I mean, I think you all have made it—agreed

that chemical, biological may be a question of when, but you particularly, Dr. Hoffman—and others reinforced it—are saying, you

know, let’s not lose track of what terrorists can do without having

to use weapons of mass destruction. They can do a heck of a lot

of damage.

But you all are saying to us—and if you’re not, tell me this—that

we do not have a strategy, a national strategy, to combat terrorism.

Is that true, Dr. Hoffman?

Mr. HOFFMAN. Yes, sir.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

General CLAPPER. Yes.

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Mr. WERMUTH. Yes.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Correct.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. And tell me—and each of you have done it well,

but I’d like you to attempt it, in as succinctly as possible, why do

you think we do not have a national strategy? I’ll start with you,

Dr. Hoffman.

Mr. HOFFMAN. It goes back to our assessment of the threat. I

think we have disparate parts that we don’t completely understand; that it has led us—and this is a very personal view—it has

led us to focus perhaps exclusively or, if I can say that more kindly,

perhaps too much on the high-end threats and to ignore the entire

spectrum.

My concern is, again, how we would respond to and address an

Oklahoma City type threat. I think certainly we’ve made tremendous strides in addressing the potentiality of biological and chemical threats, but at least—and perhaps my experience is too narrow,

but when I was meeting with first responders in Oklahoma, Idaho,

and Florida, the complaints from three very different States were

very similar—that they felt there were tremendous opportunities to

get chemical and biological kits to respond to that end of the

threats, but things that they needed, such as concrete cutters, thermal imaging devices that would respond equally as well in—— Mr. SHAYS. You’re just telling me a little bit more than I need

to know right now.

Mr. HOFFMAN. OK.

Mr. SHAYS. So the bottom line is that—why?

Mr. HOFFMAN. I think we need a strategy—— Mr. SHAYS. I want to know why.

Mr. HOFFMAN [continuing]. And a threat assessment to plan

against, and we don’t have a clear one now.

Mr. SHAYS. And the reason? I’m just asking why? I want you— you said it once, but I just didn’t want to lose track of it.

Mr. HOFFMAN. There is not a net assessment or a process to

gather together the differing strands from different agencies.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

General.

General CLAPPER. Inertia.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. Thank you. You did it very succinctly, even more

than I wanted. Can you expand?

General CLAPPER. Let me suggest, if I may, sir, maybe another

way to think about this——

Mr. SHAYS. Yes.

General CLAPPER [continuing]. Is that if you think of the terrorist

threat in a military context—if I can put my former hat on—as a

major contingency for this country, and the issue is whether we are

basically—and I’m speaking broadly here—still working with the

legacy of the cold war and the structure we had to confront the cold

war and the bipolar contest with the former Soviet Union, now we

are confronted with a very different threat, not necessarily a nation

but nation state based, yet fundamentally the Government is still

structured as it was, so that’s another attempt on my part to answer your question.

Mr. SHAYS. Well, I think it is a very helpful one, frankly. I mean,

our institutions are prepared to deal with something quite different

155

than a terrorist threat, and there are lots of implications, aren’t

there? There are implications that the military might have to say,

‘‘As important as this, this, and this is, this may be a more serious

threat,’’ and to acknowledge that may put some people, frankly, out

of business or devalue in some ways their importance to someone

who may have a more-important role to play in this new day and

age.

I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but that’s what it triggered to me.

Mr. Wermuth.

Mr. WERMUTH. In my opinion, Mr. Chairman, the answer is leadership; specifically, leadership from the other end of Pennsylvania

Avenue. The executive branch has the responsibility for developing

national strategies of any kind. Congress can’t do that. Congress

can direct the strategy, but Congress doesn’t have experience in developing national strategies.

Part of the problem I think, not to be too critical of efforts, wellintentioned efforts that have taken place, particularly in the years

since Oklahoma City, but it is a lack of recognition on the part of

the executive branch about the nationality of this issue. It can’t be

fixed with a couple of Presidential decision directives directed at a

couple of Federal agencies. It can’t be fixed by the Justice Department’s view exclusively on how to handle this problem. It is a national issue. As General Clapper said, it is not just a Federal issue.

It has got to be part and parcel of a national approach to addressing the issue.

From my own perspective, that has not been well recognized by

the executive branch to this point.

Mr. CILLUFFO. As I did bring up earlier, I also agree executive

leadership is absolutely critical and is probably the single-most-important element and ingredient to actually seeing action on what

we are discussing today.

I also think that the different agencies that now need a seat at

the national security planning table has changed. Public Health

Service, Department of Agriculture were never really seen as agencies that needed a front-row seat at the national security community.

And I also agree with Mike Wermuth’s comments that there’s a

tendency to look at the world through your own lens, through your

own organizational chart, to look at the world’s problems through

your own organizational chart, when at reality you can’t look at it

through an individual lens but rather a prism that reflects all

these different views. But then, again, that requires that belly button, that individual who can marry up authority, accountability,

and resources.

And I do get back to resources. The Golden Rule: he or she with

the gold rules. If you don’t have anyone who has some——

Mr. SHAYS. No, that’s the Gold Rule. That’s not the Golden Rule.

Mr. CILLUFFO. The Gold Rule. Forgive me.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Mr. CILLUFFO. But it is——

Mr. SHAYS. I don’t even have the courage to ask you the analogy

of the belly button. That’s a show stopper for me.

Do you have the courage to ask him?

156

Mr. TIERNEY. No.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Mr. CILLUFFO. One point.

Mr. SHAYS. One point?

Mr. CILLUFFO. A focal point.

Mr. SHAYS. A focal point. OK. That’s good enough.

So you basically establish the problem exists, you basically agree

that there isn’t a national plan. You’ve explained to me why, and

all of you have had slightly different responses, but they all, I

think, are helpful to me to understand because that can then enable us to see how we work around that. So I get to this last point

of each of you have kind of focused on the solutions of how we

should approach dealing with this problem, and I’d like you succinctly to tell me, is it important whether we get in debate—it is

important—I’ll tell you what I’ve heard: that the position that Mr.

Clark has within the White House needs to be brought more out

into the open. I mean, we haven’t really been able to get him to

testify before our committee, for instance, and have a meaningful

dialog because he is, you know, not under our jurisdiction. So at

least should be someone that Congress has the right to review and

look at and question and all that.

And then the question is: does that person end up becoming a

czar? Does he end up becoming something a little more different,

like was suggested by Senator Rudman? What is that? You’ve said

it, but tell me what—is it important that the debate be about

whether he is a czar or not a czar or so on? What is the important

part?

General CLAPPER. Well, as far as the Gilmore Commission is concerned, we developed a great aversion for the term ‘‘czar’’ and

steadfastly avoided using that term. That implies—I think it has

sort of a negative connotation.

What I think I would characterize it as is an authoritative coordinator who is accountable and responsible and has the ear of the

President.

Mr. SHAYS. With significant powers?

General CLAPPER. I think—well, significant powers——

Mr. SHAYS. A budget?

General CLAPPER. Well, has to have oversight and visibility over

all the agency budgets that are—that we’ve got lined up here who

have some role to play in this.

We were very concerned that the departments and agencies we

do have who are lined up on the wall here do not abrogate their

obligations and responsibilities that they are now charged with.

We’re not suggesting that, or that those should be all-subsumed,

gathered up under one central organizational umbrella. That was

not our intent at all.

What we were suggesting is that there needs to be an orchestrator, a quarterback, or whatever metaphor you want to use, who

does have oversight and influence over the allocation of resources

and funds and can account for and address duplication, overlap, or

omissions where there is something that no one is doing that this

entity—and it has to be something more than a very capable staffer

on the National Security Council to do it.

157

Mr. SHAYS. So it is someone that is answerable, in the executive

branch, answerable to the White House and Congress.

General CLAPPER. Absolutely. It should be someone appointed by

the President and confirmed by the Senate, so that personage is politically accountable.

Mr. SHAYS. Dr. Hoffman.

Mr. HOFFMAN. Congressman, my expertise is very narrow. I can

tell you how to organize a terrorist group, but much less so——

Mr. SHAYS. You look smart to me, though.

Mr. HOFFMAN [continuing]. But much less so how to tackle the

U.S. Governmental structure. I defer to my colleagues on that one.

Mr. SHAYS. Sure?

Mr. HOFFMAN. Absolutely.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Mr. Wermuth.

Mr. WERMUTH. I would simply concur with what General Clapper said, with the addition that it is not just a matter of taking the

national coordinator’s position in the NSC and elevating it to Presidential appointment with Senate Confirmation. If you look at all

the agencies on this table, it is more than just national security

issues. When you consider the CDC and the other HHS functions,

when you consider the Department of Agriculture and the possibility of agro terrorism, when you consider some of the other aspects,

it is not just an NSC function as we know the National Security

Council. It is much broader than that, which is why we suggested

that this new director or this new entity should have oversight over

all of these. Even though there is still an important National Security Council input and focus here, it is significantly broader and

takes, of course, into consideration State and local functions, as

well.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Cilluffo.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Well, to be blunt, Dick Clark has done some very

good work as a national coordinator. I think that perhaps he has

had too much on his plate. He’s the coordinator for all things that

go boom in the middle of the night, from cyber to CBRN to transnational crime—drugs, thugs, and bugs, I guess you could call it in

the vernacular.

The difference that I see is the need to—is the ability to have

some sway over budget, and this means certification and pass-back

authority, in our recommendation, and, additionally, that would require congressional oversight.

You do want to be able to fire someone, too. Let’s be honest here

and get down to—I mean, when it comes to accountability, you

want to point a finger to see why we should be doing things, why

aren’t we doing things, and why didn’t we do something.

So I do think that it needs to remain within the executive

branch, but within the EOP, in the Office of the President or Vice

President. And, while it is a coordinator, that coordinator would define the yearly strategy, the annual strategy, and budget should be

dovetailing through that strategy, and then they can even decrement a certain amount of an agency’s counterterrorism-related

budget if that particular agency isn’t adhering to that.

Mr. SHAYS. You all have been very interesting, very helpful.

158

Is there a question that we should have asked that you would

have liked to have responded to? Or is there a question that came

up that you think you need to respond to before we close the

record?

General CLAPPER. Sir, there is one issue I would like to bring up,

since it came up in the Hart—in the earlier discussion with Senator Rudman and General Boyd, and that had to do with the issue

of lead Federal agency and the implications there with respect to

civil liberties.

I will tell you that this was probably the most intensely debated

issue that has come up in the Gilmore panel in its thus far 2 years

of existence. It is an issue the Governor, himself, feels very strongly about, and it is why we specifically recommended in our panel

a discourse that in every case, no matter how cataclysmic an attack, that the lead Federal agency should always be civilian and

never the Department of Defense. That’s one issue that we weren’t

asked that I would like to address, and particularly on behalf of

Governor Gilmore because I know that he does feel very strongly

about it.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Can I just add to that very briefly?

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Mr. CILLUFFO. The debate is normally cast as an either/or, as if

security and freedom are mutually exclusive. I don’t share that. In

fact, I see them as enabling one another.

Obviously, we should never infringe upon liberties in order to

preserve them, but, at the same time, the American Government

at the Federal, State, and local level have a responsibility to protect American citizens and their livelihood. Look at how much

we’ve spent on projecting and protecting abroad. I don’t see why

protecting us at the homeland, given the potential threat, should

be seen as anything else but truly the very core of what our national security community in the end is all about.

Mr. SHAYS. Would you agree, though, that it should be a civilian?

Mr. CILLUFFO. Yes. We did make—I did make reference in my

testimony to the role of Department of Defense, but yes, I think it

has to be civilian. But I also, at the same time, don’t want the

President to have to turn to that cupboard and then find it bare.

So I would also say that many people think that DOD capabilities

are arguably more robust than they are because of the civil liberty

discussion. The truth is, there’s not a whole lot there, either. We

need to capitalize that capability so the President, who has the decision, could then decide who is taking charge, has those assets and

capabilities at hand if and when, God forbid, needed.

Mr. SHAYS. Any other comment, any of you?

Mr. HOFFMAN. If I could have one final word?

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Mr. HOFFMAN. I think we should—and this is a much bigger picture, a comment. I think we need to resist the temptation to reflexively write off terrorists as fundamentally irrational or fanatical, as

often has been the temptation in recent years.

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Mr. HOFFMAN. I agree entirely with Senator Rudman and General Boyd about the resentment against the United States. I was

in Kashmir last month and certainly first-hand witnessed it from

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relatively educated people, actually, and not even the fanatics necessarily, this anti-Americanism. But at the same time I think if we

lose sight of the fact that terrorism, even for groups like Ome, who

we don’t understand, still remains instrumental and a logical

weapon, and if we misread and misunderstand terrorists, I think

we risk not preparing for the threats we really face.

I agree with you entirely about Hitler. My only difference is how

Hitler would have attacked, not whether he would attack.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

All of you have provided some tremendous insights, and I appreciate your patience in waiting to respond and your patience with

our questions. We’re learning about this every day, and you’ve

added a lot to our knowledge. Thank you very much.

Mr. HOFFMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

General CLAPPER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. WERMUTH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CILLUFFO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. With that, we’ll adjourn this hearing.

[Whereupon, at 1:12 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned, to

reconvene at the call of the Chair.]

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