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VIEWPOINTS ON HOMELAND SECURITY: 

PART I AND II 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

APRIL 21, 2010 and MAY 19, 2010 

Serial No. 111–63 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

APRIL 21, 2010 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi, Chairman 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

JANE HARMAN, California 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

HENRY CUELLAR, Texas 

CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania 

YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York 

LAURA RICHARDSON, California 

ANN KIRKPATRICK, Arizona 

BEN RAY LUJA ́ N, New Mexico 

WILLIAM L. OWENS, New York 

BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey 

EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri 

AL GREEN, Texas 

JAMES A. HIMES, Connecticut 

MARY JO KILROY, Ohio 

DINA TITUS, Nevada 

VACANCY

PETER T. KING, New York 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan 

PETE OLSON, Texas 

ANH ‘‘JOSEPH’’ CAO, Louisiana 

STEVE AUSTRIA, Ohio 

I. LANIER AVANT, Staff Director 

ROSALINE COHEN, Chief Counsel 

MICHAEL TWINCHEK, Chief Clerk 

ROBERT O’CONNOR, Minority Staff Director 
(III) 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

MAY 19, 2010 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi, Chairman 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

JANE HARMAN, California 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

HENRY CUELLAR, Texas 

CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania 

YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York 

LAURA RICHARDSON, California 

ANN KIRKPATRICK, Arizona 

BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey 

EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri 

AL GREEN, Texas 

JAMES A. HIMES, Connecticut 

MARY JO KILROY, Ohio 

DINA TITUS, Nevada 

WILLIAM L. OWENS, New York 

VACANCY

VACANCY

PETER T. KING, New York 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan 

PETE OLSON, Texas 

ANH ‘‘JOSEPH’’ CAO, Louisiana 

STEVE AUSTRIA, Ohio 

I. LANIER AVANT, Staff Director 

ROSALINE COHEN, Chief Counsel 

MICHAEL TWINCHEK, Chief Clerk 

ROBERT O’CONNOR, Minority Staff Director 

(V) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 21, 2010 

STATEMENTS

The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress From 

the State of Mississippi, and Chairman, Committee on Homeland Security .. 1 

The Honorable Peter T. King, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of New York, and Ranking Member, Committee on Homeland Security ........ 3 

The Honorable Laura Richardson, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California: 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 5 

The Honorable Emanuel Cleaver, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Missouri: 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 6 

WITNESSES

Mr. Bob Graham, Former Commission Chairman, Commission for the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 7 

Joint Prepared Statement ................................................................................... 10 

Mr. Jim Talent, Former Commission Vice-Chairman, Commission for the 

Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 16 

Joint Prepared Statement ................................................................................... 10 

FOR THE RECORD

The Honorable Peter T. King, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of New York, and Ranking Member, Committee on Homeland Security: 

Department of Homeland Security Jurisdictional Chart .................................. 4 

APPENDIX

Questions From Chairman Bennie G. Thompson of Mississippi for Bob Graham and Jim Talent ............................................................................................ 53 

Questions From Honorable Christopher P. Carney of Pennsylvania for Bob 

Graham and Jim Talent ...................................................................................... 56 

Questions From Honorable Yvette D. Clarke of New York for Bob Graham 

and Jim Talent ..................................................................................................... 57 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 19, 2010 

STATEMENTS

The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress From 

the State of Mississippi, and Chairman, Committee on Homeland Security: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 61 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 62 

The Honorable Peter T. King, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of New York, and Ranking Member, Committee on Homeland Security ........ 62 

The Honorable Laura Richardson, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California: 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 64 
Page

VI 

WITNESSES

Mr. Lee Hamilton, Former Commission Vice-Chairman, The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 65 

Joint Prepared Statement ................................................................................... 70 

Mr. Thomas Kean, Former Commission Chairman, The National Commission 

on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 68 

Joint Prepared Statement ................................................................................... 70 

APPENDIX

Question From Ranking Member Peter T. King of New York for Lee Hamilton 

and Thomas Kean ................................................................................................ 105 

Questions From Honorable William L. Owens of New York for Lee Hamilton 

and Thomas Kean ................................................................................................ 105 

Question From Honorable Gus M. Bilirakis of Florida for Lee Hamilton and 

Thomas Kean ........................................................................................................ 105 
(1) 

VIEWPOINTS ON HOMELAND SECURITY: 

PART I 

A DISCUSSION WITH THE WMD 

COMMISSIONERS 

Wednesday, April 21, 2010 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:08 a.m., in Room 311, 

Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Bennie G. Thompson [Chairman of the committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Thompson, Harman, DeFazio, Jackson 

Lee, Cuellar, Clarke, Richardson, Pascrell, Cleaver, Green, Himes, 

Kilroy, Titus, King, Lungren, Rogers, McCaul, Dent, Miller, Olson, 

Cao, and Austria. 

Chairman THOMPSON [presiding]. The committee will come to 

order. Good morning. 

Today we are privileged to be joined by Senator Bob Graham and 

Senator Jim Talent, the chair and vice-chair of the Commission on 

the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and 

Terrorism. It is disturbing to think that as we meet today America’s adversaries are seeking weapons of mass destruction that 

could kill large numbers of our citizens and inflict great harm to 

our Nation, but that is reality. 

In 2008, the ‘‘World at Risk’’ report, issued by the WMD Commission, brought into focus the seriousness of the threat and the need 

to confront it with purpose and speed. As the author of H.R. 1, the 

‘‘Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act,’’ I 

am proud to have played a part in establishing the Commission. 

Specifically, Title 18 of that comprehensive homeland security 

law authorized the establishment of a bipartisan commission to 

study the threat that the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction posed to our country. Notably, the law directs the commission 

to give particular attention to Federal efforts to secure nuclear materials around the world from terrorists and states of concern. 

In the ‘‘World at Risk’’ report the commissioners did not mince 

words about the WMD threat. Specifically, the commission stated 

that it believes that unless the world community acts decisively 

and with great urgency it is more likely than not that a WMD will 

be used in a terrorist attack somewhere in the world by the end 

of 2013. The commission concluded that since a biological weapon 

can more easily be obtained and used by a terrorist than a nuclear 

weapon, the Government needs to move more aggressively to limit 
2 

the proliferation of biological weapons and reduce the prospect of 

bioterror attack. 

In January 2010, Senators Graham and Talent issued a report 

card that assessed the Government’s progress toward implementing 

their 13 recommendations. They gave an ‘‘F’’ to the Federal Government for failure to enhance the Nation’s capabilities for rapid 

response to prevent biological attacks from inflicting mass casualties. Another ‘‘F’’ was for a lack of progress on reforming Congressional oversight to better address intelligence, homeland security, 

and crosscutting 21st Century National security missions. 

Given your extensive credentials, Senators, your insight on what 

we need to do to fix Congressional oversight are particularly welcome. As you know, we are currently working on bipartisan legislation to improve domestic capabilities to prevent, deter, detect, attribute, respond to, and recover from WMD attacks in general, and 

based on your recommendations, biological attacks in particular. 

The gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Pascrell, together with 

Ranking Member Mr. King are collaborating on this legislation, 

which should be introduced in the next few weeks. I know it is a 

New York and New Jersey thing, but we wish them all success. 

This hearing and the testimony we will receive from Senators 

Graham and Talent are critical to this effort. Again, I would like 

to thank the commissioners for their leadership and continued commitment to educating us about the WMD threat. 

I would also like to recognize your staff, led by Randy Larsen 

and Gigi Gronvall, for working closely with the committee as we 

develop counter-WMD legislation. 

Before I yield back I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Pascrell. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to thank Senator Graham, Senator Talent, for the service 

that they gave to this Nation when they served on this side of the 

building and on the other side of the Capitol, and the service you 

have rendered this Nation since leaving the House. You have 

done—both of you—a terrific job; I am very, very proud of what you 

have done. 

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for yielding time as well as 

your leadership in offering H.R. 1, the ‘‘Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act,’’ which created the 

WMD Commission whose commissioners are before our committee 

today to talk about what I consider to be a very critical issue. 

The 9/11 Commission did a very thorough job of describing the 

circumstances of the attack on September 11 and providing recommendation designed to guard against future attacks. However, 

one area they did not address was how to respond to the threat of 

unconventional weapons, including nuclear and biological. 

The WMD Commission before us today has issued 13 recommendations, and in its report card released this January gave 

very mixed grades, to be kind, of the actions we have taken to date. 

But they have made one thing very clear, that more than 8.5 years 

after 9/11 we still do not have a comprehensive National strategy 

to counter the grave threat that WMD poses to our Nation. 

This is exactly why I am working with my good friend and counterpart, Ranking Member King, to craft bipartisan legislation, the 
3 

‘‘Weapons of Mass Destruction Prevention and Preparedness Act of 

2010,’’ which we plan to introduce very shortly. We have worked 

closely with the Commission—with the Commission staff—in order 

to write a bill that has a truly comprehensive approach, a logical 

approach to securing the Nation against weapons of mass destruction by looking at all the angles, from prevention and deterrence, 

preparedness, detection, attribution, response, and finally, to recovery. 

It is especially important to note that our legislation concerns all 

WMD threats, but we will give special focus to the emerging threat 

of biological weapons, and with good reason, in which the WMD 

Commission gave us a very poor grade for failing to do enough to 

prevent a biological attack on our mainland, or to be able to respond efficiently and effectively enough in the event of a biological 

attack. The Commission highlighted the urgency of this threat 

when it wrote that ‘‘terrorists are more likely to be able to obtain 

and use a biological weapon than a nuclear weapon.’’ 

Mr. Chairman, I look forward to hearing the testimony from the 

commissioners, Senator Graham, Senator Talent, on the threat we 

face as well as the preliminary thoughts about this legislation, and 

I yield back and I thank you for yielding to me. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman appreciates the Ranking Member’s agreement to 

recognize the gentleman from New Jersey. Now—— 

Mr. KING. I was not given a chance to object. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairman THOMPSON. The Chairman now recognizes the Ranking Member of the committee, gentleman from New York, Mr. 

King, for an opening statement. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me again thank Senator Graham and Senator Talent for all 

their service to the Nation, especially on this vital, vital issue, and 

it is great to see Jim Talent here. We got elected in the same year. 

Jim has gone on and made something of himself, and I am sitting 

here with Bill Pascrell, but what are you going to do? 

Seriously, Jim, I want to thank you for all your efforts. 

Mr. Chairman, this is a vitally important issue. This is an issue 

which, as you and Chairman Talent and Chairman Graham and 

Congressman Pascrell pointed out, is an issue which is vital to the 

security of our Nation but in many ways nowhere near enough has 

been done since September 11. 

I appreciate the hearing today. I will just for the record point out 

that we have been asking for this hearing since last September and 

I think the fact that we are having it today, that Bill Pascrell is 

going forward in his legislation—and I am proud to work with him 

on it—shows a bipartisan commitment on this issue. 

Obviously the administration is—has been given charges as to 

what they should do, but also there is an obligation on Congress. 

If I may, there is a chart we prepared showing how Congress is 

still—there is such a disunity in the Congress. Let me just show 

the display. You know, in the—Commissioners, in your report and 

also in the 9/11 Commission report it was pointed out how oversight just is spread out so much among Congress. 
4 

Just the other day I received a letter from Secretary Napolitano 

saying that the Department of Homeland Security has to report to 

108 different committees and subcommittees; they have testified at 

166 different hearings. To me, this, again, this lack of cohesion 

really reflects poorly on the Congress and prevents us from getting 

our job done. 

So I think no matter what happens in November, Mr. Chairman, 

I think we have to recommit ourselves to making sure that we 

work to consolidate jurisdiction within this committee and certainly 

to narrow the jurisdiction, because now it is just all over the place 

and really almost makes no sense at all. 

There is the chart there. It just gives some example of how bifurcated this is and how, again, what a puzzle palace we have become. 

[The information follows:] 

Mr. KING. Now, I would just, from my own perspective in the 

New York-New Jersey area, we have particular threats when it 

comes to weapons of mass destruction. Obviously radiation, dirty 

bombs, nuclear bombs are a real threat to our subway system, to 

the cities, whether it is New York, or Patterson, Newark, any of 

them in that area are prime targets. 

Also, the whole issue of biological warfare is something which we 

have to do much more about. Certainly Bill Pascrell and I, that is 

a main element of what we are trying to do. Congresswoman 

Clarke and I are working as far as the radiological attacks. 

But I would hope that this hearing—it is really the first we have 

had in the Congress, certainly in the House side, on this issue— 

will give us the impetus to go forward. I don’t know how many 
5 

markups we are going to have between now and the end of the session, or before the summer, but, Mr. Chairman, I would hope that 

we can, once Bill Pascrell and I—once the legislation is ready that 

we can move on it quickly in this committee and try to then start 

it, because it will probably have to go to a number of other committees, as to get this process on the way. 

Hopefully we can get legislation passed; at the very least we will 

send a strong signal to the administration, send a strong signal to 

the entire Federal bureaucracy, and also start a real debate in the 

Congress. The debate was started at the National level by Senator 

Talent and Senator Graham, but I don’t think we in the Congress 

have taken this seriously enough. 

It is not the issue that is debated that often; it is not the issue 

that is in the forefront. With everything else we talk about, whether it is health care, whether it is taxes, whether it is jobs, whatever, all of that will be forgotten overnight if there is a biological 

attack anywhere in our country. The impact it will have on our 

economy, the impact it will have on the lives of everyday people, 

the devastation it will cause will be unprecedented. 

So thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing. I think 

the spirit on both sides sort of working toward a bipartisan solution, bipartisan answers, but we can’t just debate it forever, we 

can’t just talk about each other in a nice way, we have to get the 

job done. 

We can’t allow details to stand in the way. If there are one or 

two disagreements that I have or Bill Pascrell has, the Chairman 

has, let’s resolve them. Let’s not try to stand on ceremony. 

I am not saying any of you are, I am just saying all of us in Congress have a tendency to rely on one or two things we don’t agree 

with and use that as an excuse not to go forward. We have to go 

forward on this, otherwise the work that is done by Senator Graham and Senator Talent will not be taken advantage of and we will 

have squandered and missed an opportunity which could have very 

dire and tragic consequences. 

With that I yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. The Chairman, for 

the Ranking Member’s information, plans to move forward after 

this hearing and subject to you and Mr. Pascrell finally agreeing 

on something—we will go forward. 

Other Members of the subcommittee and committee are reminded that under committee rules opening statements may be 

submitted for the record. 

[The statements of Hon. Richardson and Hon Cleaver follow:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HONORABLE LAURA RICHARDSON

APRIL 21, 2010 

Mr. Chairman, thank you for convening this hearing today on the findings and 

recommendations of the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) Proliferation and Terrorism. I appreciate your commitment to this 

issue, and I would also like to recognize our distinguished witnesses, Senator Graham and Senator Talent, for their services to our country. Thank you both for taking the time to appear before the committee today. 

As a proud representative of the 37th district of California, I am especially concerned about this topic. My district is home to many high-value terrorist targets: 

the Port of Long Beach, two airports, major freight rail lines, and 40 percent of the 
6 

Nation’s goods moving along our rails and four major interstate highways. Each of 

these represents a prime opportunity for a nuclear or biological attack, and as these 

gentlemen can tell us, the threat is very real. 

The Commission has concluded, as is highlighted in the testimony today, that it 

is more than likely that a weapon of mass destruction (WMD) will be used in a terrorist attack somewhere in the world by the end of 2013, a date that is rapidly approaching. In addition, the Commission found that the U.S. Government needs to 

move more aggressively to limit the proliferation of biological weapons to reduce the 

prospect of a bio-terror attack. However, the report card released by the Commission 

in January 2010 makes it clear that the Government is not moving fast enough to 

mitigate this risk of attack. 

For example, the Commission graded the work done to ‘‘enhance the Nation’s capabilities for rapid response to prevent biological attacks from inflicting mass casualties’’ with an ‘‘F.’’ As Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Emergency Communications, Preparedness, and Response, I anticipate working with my colleagues to 

address some of this shortfall. I also look forward to reviewing the bill about to be 

introduced by my distinguished colleagues to enhance homeland security by improving efforts to counter a WMD attack from every stage of the threat, from the preevent prevention and deterrence through post-event recovery. 

I am pleased that this hearing is providing a chance for committee members to 

delve into the issues facing our Government and homeland security with regard to 

WMD. Clearly, the Federal Government still has work to do in terms of preparation 

and coordination. I look forward to sharing this information with the stakeholders 

in my district, as well as hearing from our distinguished panel of witnesses on this 

subject with regard to public outreach, possible legislative ideas, and foreign policy. 

Thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for convening this hearing. I yield back my time. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HONORABLE EMANUEL CLEAVER

APRIL 21, 2010 

Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member King, it has been 3 years since the bipartisan Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation 

and Terrorism was authorized. In this time, the Commission has issued both a report, as well as a report card on the country’s progress in working to limit the 

threat of biological and nuclear weapons. While much has been done, we are still 

a long way away from having a strong system of deterrence, prevention, and recovery from WMDs. 

The report issued by the Commission has boldly asserted that ‘‘it is more than 

likely than not that a WMD will be used in a terrorist attack somewhere in the 

world by the end of 2013.’’ With this very real threat looming over our heads, it is 

extremely troubling that the Commission has found that the country has failed to 

properly address certain recommendations. For instance, the Commission gave the 

country a failing grade when it came to working to ‘‘enhance capabilities for a rapid 

response to prevent biological attacks from inflicting mass casualties.’’ 

Given the uncertain times that we live in, we must do all within our power to 

eliminate the threat of biological and nuclear weapons. To that end, I am eager for 

the chance to speak with our witnesses today and gauge their views on the new legislation that will soon be introduced by my colleagues on the committee. From increasing intelligence capabilities, to risk analysis and protection biological agents, 

this bill aims to put many of the Commission’s recommendations into law. Our witnesses have a vast wealth of experience in working to deter WMD threats, and their 

additional recommendations are essential in our progress forward. 

Chairman THOMPSON. I welcome our distinguished witnesses, 

Senator Bob Graham, who obviously had to come a long way to get 

here—we really appreciate it, Senator Graham—and Senator Talent, the chair and vice-chair of the Congressionally-created Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism. 

Senator Graham is a former two-term Governor of Florida and 

served for 18 years in the United States Senate. This is combined 

with 12 years in the Florida legislature for a total of 38 years of 

public service. He is recognized for his leadership on issues ranging 

from health care to intelligence. 
7 

He served a decade on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, including 18 months as Chair in 2001 and 2002. In addition to his responsibilities associated with WMD Commission work 

Senator Graham serves as the chair of the board of overseers of the 

Graham Center for Public Service. 

Thank you, Senator Graham, for being here today and for your 

service to the country. 

Senator Jim Talent was elected to the Missouri House of Representatives in 1984 at the age of 28, where he served 8 years. At 

the age of 32 he was unanimously chosen as Minority Leader. He 

served in that capacity until 1992, when he was elected to Congress to represent Missouri’s second district. 

Senator Talent served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 

1993 to 2001. During his time in the House Senator Talent distinguished himself as a thoughtful leader on the House Armed Services Committee where he served for 8 years. 

From 2002 to 2007 he represented the people of Missouri in the 

United States Senate. While in the Senate, he distinguished himself as a leader on a number of major committees, including the 

Senate Armed Services Committee, where he served as Chairman 

of the Seapower Subcommittee. Today, in addition to his on-going 

WMD Commission work, Senator Talent serves as a distinguished 

follow at the Heritage Foundation. 

Thank you, Senator Talent, for being here today and for your 

service to our country. 

Without objection, the witnesses’ full statement will be inserted 

in the record. 

Senators, the floor is yours. 

Can you turn your mic on for us? 

STATEMENT OF HON. BOB GRAHAM, FORMER COMMISSION 

CHAIRMAN, COMMISSION FOR THE PREVENTION OF WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION PROLIFERATION AND TERRORISM 

Comm. GRAHAM. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and we 

are deeply appreciative of your and Congressman King holding this 

hearing as a critical part of the steps necessary to move us towards 

a safer America. It has been an honor to have served for the last 

2-plus years with my good friend, Senator Jim Talent. 

I would say if there is an example of bipartisanship on an important issue it is what we have tried to exhibit, and I am pleased on 

our final report in a commission that was composed of Republicans 

and Democrats was unanimous report reflecting a unity of view as 

to the seriousness of the threat and the steps that should be taken 

to reduce it. 

Mr. Chairman, as you said, in December 2008 our commission 

issued its report, called ‘‘World at Risk.’’ The word ‘‘world’’ was selected to recognize the fact that this is not a problem that any one 

country can deal with alone, that it is truly a global threat requiring a global response. I will talk about that a little bit later. 

Then, in January of this year we issued our first report card on 

what has transpired in the year that passed since the report. It 

was a mixed report card. The most negative aspects related to the 
8 

topic that Senator Talent and I will particularly focus on this 

morning, and that is the potential of a biological attack. 

As the Chairman said, it is our conclusion that it is more likely 

than not that there will be, under current circumstances, a weapon 

of mass destruction used someplace on earth by a terrorist group 

before the end of the year 2013 and that it is more likely that that 

weapon will be biological rather than nuclear. So that has been the 

particular focus of our post-report activities. 

My comments today are going to focus on the issue of urgency. 

We have used the term in the commission report and in our subsequent statements that the clock is ticking. I am going to suggest 

this morning that we need to come up with a new metaphor. The 

impetus for change has got to be stronger than an analog clock 

slowly moving around the dial. We are dealing with a digital clock 

where the numbers are now spinning. 

It has been over 500 days since ‘‘World at Risk’’ was issued. 

There has been some response by the administration and we saw 

some of that recently in the nuclear summit. But this is going to 

require action at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, and I am 

pleased that today this hearing is taking place, and I hope that it 

will jumpstart aggressive Congressional response to this issue. 

There are four areas in which I think urgency is the word of the 

day and the spinning digital clock. First, we must construct an effective response to a biological attack. Unlike a nuclear attack 

where there is very little you can do in the aftermath, it is what 

you can do in the aftermath of a biological that may both serve as 

a deterrent and a sufficient reduction of the consequences to take 

it out of the category of mass destruction. 

We say it is a deterrent based on analysis done by our intelligence community as well as foreign intelligence services that the 

likely possessor of a biological weapon will have to make a choice 

where to use that weapon. That choice is likely to be determined 

by where it thinks it can do the most damage, have the highest kill 

rate. 

So if your community is relatively well prepared you will be less 

likely to be the target of attack in the first place; if you appear to 

be highly vulnerable and a source of high loss of life you become 

an attractive target. So the degree to which you are prepared to respond is a key element in whether you will be attacked. 

If you are attacked your ability to respond can reduce the death 

toll. It would be horrendous if 1,000 people were killed, but it 

would be an international disaster if 500,000 people were killed, 

which is within the range of estimates of what would happen with 

a biological attack in a major American city. 

So we have a strong interest in being as prepared as possible. 

Frankly, in our report of January we gave the Nation—not just the 

Federal Government, but the Nation—an ‘‘F’’ in our level of preparedness to respond. This is my first call for urgency, that this 

committee has the responsibility to start an aggressive series of actions that will lead us to a grade—to deserve a grade substantially 

better than an ‘‘F’’ in our capacity to respond. 

The second area of urgency is showing leadership to the world. 

One of our recommendations is that the United States, because of 

this global nature of biological attack, needs to be a leader in bring-
9 

ing other nations to a high level of response and security of things 

like Schedule 1 biological agents. That next world conference is 

going to take place in 2011. 

We think it is important for the United States to have taken affirmative action before that conference so we will be able to show 

to the world that we are committed and therefore that they can follow our gold standard of what should be done. If we have not taken 

any action by that conference I think our position to influence other 

nations will be substantially diluted. 

The third area of urgency—the Chairman alluded to the fact that 

I have had some travel difficulties. I have been in the Middle East 

and Asia much of the last month. I think the two most dangerous 

areas in the world where there is the greatest potential of a transfer from a nation state to a terrorist group of a weapon of mass 

destruction are the Indian-Pakistan border and that arc that runs 

from Iran through Syria to Israel and into Palestine. Those, in my 

opinion, are the two places in the world that are the most likely 

to be the first point of attack. 

Both of those are driven by longstanding enmities that go back 

to just after World War II—Kashmir, in the case of India and Pakistan; the dispute between Israel and the Palestinians in the Middle 

East. These issues, which we have allowed to linger now for 6 decades, are a major threat to the security of the entire world and 

need to get strongest attention from the United States and the 

international community for their resolution. 

There has been no substantial progress on either of those fronts 

since 1979, 31 years ago, when the Camp David Accord was entered into between Egypt and Israel. That is the last major successful effort to deal with those animosities. 

Finally, the sense of urgency over the issue that the Chairman 

and the Ranking Member have discussed, and that is this issue of 

the Congress itself. Congress is not well organized—and that is a 

very passive and understatement—to do what it needs to do on 

these issues. This has been recognized now for almost a decade, before 9/11. 

Commissions who were looking at issues of National security 

came to the conclusion that the Congress was not properly organized. The 9/11 Commission said it again. We said it in our ‘‘World 

at Risk’’ document. I would urge that the Nation can be a safer 

place if this body would take the steps to place accountability and 

responsibility for these issues clearly in one jurisdiction so that the 

Nation will know where to look to for leadership. 

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Ranking Member, I, again, appreciate the opportunity to be here. My colleague, Senator Talent, is going to focus 

on some of the more specific aspects of our report, and we would 

both then look forward to receiving your questions. 

I would like to also introduce at this time Dr. Gigi Gronvall, who 

has been a major part of the development of our efforts over the 

last year. Thank you very much. 

[The joint statement of Mr. Graham and Mr. Talent follows:] 
10 

JOINT PREPARED STATEMENT OF BOB GRAHAM AND JIM TALENT

APRIL 21, 2010 

Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members, thank you for the opportunity to 

speak to you today on behalf of the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of 

Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism. Congress created our Commission 

early in 2008, based on the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission, assigning us 

the task of assessing the risk of WMD terrorism and recommending steps that could 

be taken to prevent a successful attack on the United States. Our Commission interviewed hundreds of experts and reviewed thousands of pages of information. We 

want to thank those Commissioners—Graham Allison, Robin Cleveland, Stephen 

Rademaker, Timothy Roemer, Wendy Sherman, Henry Sokolski, and Rich Verma— 

who worked tirelessly to produce our Report, World at Risk, in December, 2008. 

In 2009, the Commission was authorized for an additional year of work, to assist 

Congress and the administration to improve understanding of its findings and turn 

its concrete recommendations into actions. In accordance with that authorization, 

and based upon close consultation with Commissioners, we submitted a report card 

assessing the U.S. Government’s progress in protecting the United States from 

weapons of mass destruction proliferation and terrorism. This report card provided 

an assessment of the progress that the U.S. Government has made in implementing 

the recommendations of the Commission. 

While progress had been made in many areas, the overall assessment for biological threats was not good. We submit a copy of that report card for the record. While 

certainly not every assessment was poor, we found that the Government simply had 

not paid consistent and urgent attention to the means of responding quickly and effectively so that bioweapons no longer constitute a threat of mass destruction. The 

failures did not begin with the current group of leaders. Each of the last three administrations has been slow to recognize and respond to the biothreat. The difference is that the danger has grown to the point that we no longer have the luxury 

of a slow learning curve. The clock is ticking, and time is running out. 

The Commission has concluded its work as a Congressionally mandated organization, as of February 26, 2010. We are committed to continuing this bipartisan work, 

however, and will continue to monitor progress on the Commission’s recommendations in our newly formed WMD Center, a bipartisan, not-for-profit research and 

education organization. It is our hope that by identifying areas of progress, as well 

as those in need of further attention, appropriate action will be taken to mitigate 

the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction to the United States. 

THE COMMISSION’S FINDINGS

The Commission’s Report assessed both nuclear and biological threats, and provided 13 recommendations and 49 action items. The Commissioners unanimously 

concluded that unless we act urgently and decisively, it was more likely than not 

that terrorists would attack a major city somewhere in the world with a weapon of 

mass destruction by 2013. Furthermore, we determined that terrorists are more 

likely to obtain and use a biological weapon than a nuclear weapon. Shortly thereafter, this conclusion was publicly affirmed by then Director of National Intelligence 

(DNI) Mike McConnell. 

There are several reasons for our conclusion that a bioattack is actually more likely than a nuclear attack. Many pathogens suitable for use in a biological attack are 

found in the natural environment, all over the globe. The lethality of an effectively 

dispersed biological weapon could rival or exceed that of an improvised nuclear device. The equipment required to produce a large quantity from a small seed stock, 

and then ‘‘weaponize’’ the material—that is, to make it into a form that could be 

effectively dispersed—is of a dual-use nature and readily available on the internet. 

The most effective delivery methods are well known in the pharmaceutical, agricultural, and insect-control industries. It is much more straightforward to stockpile 

weaponized pathogens than nuclear material, raising the terrible specter that terrorists could attack an American city using a bioweapon, then quickly ‘‘reload’’ and 

attack again within a matter of days or weeks. 

So, while it is certainly possible for terrorist groups to get a nuclear weapon, it 

is less difficult for them to develop and disperse a bio-weapon. There may be even 

fewer barriers for terrorist groups with close ties to those nation states which are 

accumulating both the materials and scientific capability for weaponization. All of 

the ingredients are in place for a biological weapon to be in the hands of a terrorist 

organization, which is subject to none of the international law constraints and retaliatory consequences which might impede a nation state from its use. 
11 

None of this is speculation. Al-Qaeda was well down the road to producing such 

weapons prior to 9/11. Due to the ease in creating a clandestine production capability, our intelligence community had no knowledge of two such facilities in Afghanistan prior to their capture by U.S. troops and a separate, but parallel bioweapons 

development program al-Qaeda ran in Malaysia. Facilities with more sophisticated 

equipment than those found could be in operation today without our knowledge. 

When would we find out about such a facility? It is possible, even likely, that we 

would not know until after an attack took place. Consider this scenario: A team of 

engineers sympathetic to al-Qaeda bring a seed culture of anthrax spores to the 

United States from an overseas laboratory. They purchase and modify a truck so 

that it sprays anthrax spores into the air. The load up the truck with its deadly 

cargo, and slowly drive it through the downtown traffic of a mid-sized city during 

rush hour, at the end of the day. No one notices the truck, or finds it at all unusual 

that the truck is emitting fumes. No BioWatch sensors go off. Days later, however, 

desperately ill people start flooding emergency rooms. In the following weeks, 13,000 

people die. The city may need to be cleaned up so that people can safely enter the 

downtown area, at a cost of billions of dollars. As tragic as this event could be, the 

terrorists remain at large, free to commit the same murder twice. Antibiotics would 

likely arrive quickly, but there would be National demands for a vaccine—but there 

is not nearly enough anthrax vaccine to satisfy the demands from even one small 

city. Unfortunately, this scenario is not considered ‘‘worst-case’’ or unrealistic, but 

it is in fact the National Planning Scenario for a biological attack. It was released 

5 years ago this month. Five years—the clock is ticking, and we are not prepared. 

The Obama administration appears to agree with our concern regarding the 

threat of 21st century bioterrorism. The following is a quote from National Strategy 

for Countering Biological Threats signed by President Obama on November 23, 

2009. 

‘‘The effective dissemination of a lethal biological agent within an unprotected population could place at risk the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. The unmitigated consequences of such an event could overwhelm our public health capabilities, 

potentially causing an untold number of deaths. The economic cost could exceed one 

trillion dollars for each such incident. In addition, there could be significant societal 

and political consequences that would derive from the incident’s direct impact on 

our way of life and the public’s trust in government.’’ 

WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION PREVENTION AND PREPAREDNESS ACT OF 2010

First, Mr. Chairman, we want to thank you and your committee for the extraordinary leadership you have shown by holding this hearing about the WMD Prevention and Preparedness Act of 2010. We realize that the WMD issue spreads across 

many committee jurisdictions and will required unprecedented leadership, coordination, and cooperation. The biggest internal enemy we face in dealing with this 

threat is the natural inertia of Government. The only way to overcome this inertia 

is for our top political leaders to take bold actions. 

As of the time we prepared this statement, we had not seen actual bill language, 

but we appreciate the summary of the bill provided by your staff, and are happy 

to provide comments based on that summary. 

INTELLIGENCE

As we understand it, the bill, if enacted, would require the DNI, in coordination 

with the Secretary of Homeland Security and other appropriate Federal Agencies to 

develop and maintain a National Intelligence Strategy for Countering WMDs. It also 

calls for improving National capabilities to collect, analyze, and disseminate intelligence related to WMDs. We understand the DNI is already working on the 2010 

National Intelligence Strategy for Countering Biological Threats. 

Based on a recently completed tour of nations in two of the most vulnerable regions, there are significant gaps in our intelligence relating the nation state-terrorist links. Recognizing the inherent difficulty of collecting intelligence in these 

venues, doing so should be the highest priority of American intelligence. 

We commend these provisions. Increased attention in this area is of vital importance and, we understand, would underscore the DNI’s own initiatives. We hope 

that the drive to produce this report would spur the intelligence community to acquire and retain additional expertise in the nuclear and biological fields; prioritize 

pre-service and in-service training and retention of people with critical scientific, 

language, and foreign area skills; and ensure that the threat posed by biological 

weapons remains among the highest National intelligence priorities for collection 

and analysis. Indeed, recommendation 11 in our report, World at Risk, was that the 

United States must build a National security workforce for the 21st century. 
12 

* The information has been retained in committee files. 

One important issued not addressed in the intelligence section is the problem of 

not including public health personnel in many of the fusion centers. Only a handful 

of these centers currently include public health officials. We all need to understand, 

in the 21st century, public health is a critical element of National and homeland 

security. Public health resources need to be fully integrated with law enforcement 

and traditional first responders. 

We also recommend that the bill include a provision directing the Secretary of Defense to provide a classified report to the committees with primary oversight of the 

Department of Defense, intelligence community, and Department of Homeland Security on the efficacy of the biological weapons tests conducted by the United States 

during the 1950s and 1960s. Some commentators assert that bioweapons are not of 

concern, primarily because they have not been used on a widespread basis. We are 

entirely confident that the report we call for, if properly done, would dispel any 

doubts about the threat that bioweapons pose to the safety and security of our society and our allies. 

PREPAREDNESS: GETTING FIRST RESPONDERS READY, AND ENGAGING THE PUBLIC

We strongly believe that a well-informed, organized, and mobilized citizenry has 

long been one of the United States’ greatest resources. An engaged citizenry is, in 

fact, the foundation for National resilience in the event of a natural disaster or a 

WMD attack. 

Consistent with the Commission’s Report, we must create a culture of preparedness and resilience across our Nation. There are vast arrays of capabilities found 

across our society that can and must be organized and, when needed, mobilized in 

the event of a natural disaster or WMD attack. These capabilities are primarily the 

combined assets of State and local governments, our diverse business communities, 

nongovernmental organizations, professional and service organizations, and all citizens. The Federal Government cannot hope by itself to possess the capabilities needed in the event of a major disaster—but it can lend vital support if local and regional actors have organized beforehand. We submit for the record the WMD Commission’s final product, a brochure for community preparedness. We All Have A 

Role: Working with Your Community to Prepare for Natural and Man-Made Disasters.* 

We have found that the Federal Government can do more to make sure that 

State, local, and Tribal governments can respond in a crisis, and so we support this 

legislation’s call for sharing security information with State, local, and Tribal governments (Title 1, section 111). State and local governments, as well as health departments, need more comprehensive threat information in order to prepare for 

emergencies, as well as gain support from leadership and staff in preparedness activities. 

We support the bill’s provisions for the Department of Homeland Security to put 

forward threat bulletins and guidance to local governments (Title 2, section 202), 

and crafting important messages ahead of a crisis (Title 204). We recommend that 

the public be involved in the creation and approval of threat information and alerts. 

This will help to ensure that these alerts effectively reach and motivate their target 

audience. 

SECURE, PRODUCTIVE U.S. LABORATORIES AT THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE

Certain principles animated the section of our Report dealing with laboratory security. We were concerned about: (1) The proliferation of high-containment labs, 

which were not only unregulated but often unknown to the Government, (2) the 

fragmentation of Government oversight among several agencies, (3) the need for a 

thorough review and update of the Select Agent Program, and (4) the importance 

of regulating labs in a way that enhanced security but did not discourage robust 

scientific research in the United States. 

Enhanced biosecurity measures should improve security, streamline oversight, 

and focus our resources on the greatest risks. By correctly applying risk management principles, the United States can increase security without impeding science 

or critical U.S. industries. Without robust scientific research, we will not have the 

drugs, vaccines, and diagnostic tests needed to protect the American people in the 

event of a biological attack. The work of developing medicines is difficult, takes a 

long time, and is fraught with challenges. We still do not, for example, have drugs 

or vaccines for many of the biological agents weaponized by the Soviet Union. Therefore, it is in our National security interest to make sure that our laboratories continue to develop medical countermeasures, while still operating safely and securely. 
13 

We believe that this legislation highlights many of the provisions of our Report, 

and in certain respects improves on our recommendations. For example, the bill introduces into the Select Agent Program the idea of stratifying risks, which we think 

is a real advance in achieving the right regulatory balance. Stratification of risks 

into tiers allows for more realistic assessments of risk, and will benefit public health 

investigations. The bill calls for the designation of ‘‘Tier I’’ agents to be the most 

dangerous subset of the pathogens that have clear potential for use as biological 

weapons. Multiple studies were conducted as a result of our Report. Virtually all 

of them, from both the public and private sectors, have called or will call for the 

stratification of agents. The overwhelming recommendation from the scientific community is that any legislation employs a tiered approach. 

We therefore commend the committee for introducing the stratification approach 

into this bill and recommend that the Tier I list be developed by the Secretary of 

DHS in consultation with the Secretary of HHS. Today, 82 Select Agents receive the 

highest level of security focus and regulation. We believe the correct number of toptier agents is closer to 8 than 80. 

Stratifying the Select Agent list should allow us to focus increased security on the 

highest risks and allow public health-related research involving non-Tier I agents 

to proceed without excessive regulation. We suggest that care be taken to avoid duplicating the unintended negative consequences of the current Select Agent program. Security restrictions must not preclude international cooperation, which is 

necessary for public health and infectious disease surveillance, as well as our National security. For example, we should not repeat what happened at the beginning 

of the H1N1 pandemic, when flu samples from sick patients in Mexico were not 

shipped to U.S. laboratory scientists to analyze, but to Canada—because U.S. import 

and shipping regulations were so restrictive. We also do not want to ‘‘close our windows,’’ so to speak, into the activities of other nations’ laboratories. Scientists from 

the United States should be able to collaborate on Rift Valley Fever or Venezuelan 

equine encephalitis research with scientists where those diseases are endemic. If we 

don’t, other countries’ scientists will. For these reasons, the Select Agent program 

status quo needs to be changed, and we recommend calling for adjustments to ease 

restrictions on non-Tier I agents. 

Our recommendation to stratify biological agents for security purposes is distinct 

from the measures that scientists need to take for safety. Many pathogens, including those that cause tuberculosis, HIV, and herpes B, require special safety precautions, though most experts do not consider them to be feasible for use as bioweapons. We encourage the further refinement of safety systems and procedures for 

all types of biological research, so that research can be conducted with the highest 

level of safety. 

FRAGMENTATION OF OVERSIGHT SHOULD BE ELIMINATED IN PATHOGEN SECURITY

In our Report, we concluded that the fragmentation of Government oversight of 

laboratories was a National security problem. We determined that there should be 

one set of requirements concerning pathogens for the scientific community to follow, 

instead of having separate regulatory programs from multiple departments. The authority to oversee and enforce these requirements must be vested in one lead agency 

so that the regulated community has a single coherent, consolidated, and streamlined set of regulations to follow. 

Currently, under the Select Agent Rule, as defined by 42 CFR 73, 7 CFR 331 and 

9 CFR 121, HHS and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) regulate select agents. 

Human pathogens are regulated by HHS; plant and animal pathogens are regulated 

by USDA, and facilities that house pathogens that are a concern for humans and 

livestock are inspected jointly. Accounts of this process suggest that HHS and USDA 

cooperate well in meeting their regulatory responsibilities. Given the distinct expertise on these pathogens in USDA and HHS, it is appropriate that USDA’s expertise 

be brought to bear on livestock and crops, and that of HHS for human pathogens. 

However, it is our belief that in constructing a regulatory system for pathogens that 

can infect humans, one cabinet secretary should be in charge. As Commissioner 

Robin Cleveland stated last December, we ‘‘have too many agencies, too many turf 

fights, and unclear oversight entities.’’ That must end. 

We recognize that the bill would require the Secretary of the Department of 

Homeland Security to develop enhanced biosecurity measures, and would require 

them to inspect all Tier I laboratories. In our Report, we recommended that HHS 

‘‘lead an interagency review.’’ This recommendation was implemented by Executive 

Order in January. The review called for will soon be completed. The Report also 

called for HHS ‘‘to lead an interagency effort to tighten Government oversight on 

high-containment laboratories.’’ Based on what we have learned from several recent 
14 

studies, numerous meetings with representatives from the Executive and Legislative 

branches, and the scientific community, we continue to recommend that overall 

oversight authority and responsibility for lab security be assigned to the Secretary 

of Health and Human Services, with recommendations on scientific matters from 

USDA and security matters from DHS. The Secretary should solicit, possibly 

through the creation of an advisory council, the recommendations from the scientific 

and security communities with a view towards constantly improving the regulatory 

model given all the concerns of the communities involved. To sum up, we recommend that HHS take the lead. We continue to take that position, and believe 

that it will lead to the improved regulatory process that we all seek. We also do 

not have the luxury of time to bring another agency up to speed. HHS has been 

doing a positive service in this area, and we do not want to change ships in midstream. 

BUILDING A RESPONSE AND RECOVERY PLAN THAT ACTS AS A DETERRENT

The bill requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services, in coordination 

with the Secretary of Homeland Security and other appropriate Federal agencies, 

to develop and implement a National Medical Countermeasure Dispensing Strategy. 

A National strategy is sorely needed to establish effective and timely distribution 

of emergency medical countermeasures (MCMs). Countermeasures could serve to 

blunt the impact of an attack, save lives, and thwart the terrorists’ objectives—but 

only if they are delivered when and where they are needed. We commend the 

Obama administration for issuing an Executive Order in December, 2009, to establish Federal capabilities for the timely provision of medical countermeasures following a biological attack, and we commend this committee for taking up this important, as well as complicated, effort. But, dispersal of medical countermeasures is 

but one link in the chain of actions that are needed to respond to a bio attack. Rapid 

detection and diagnosis capabilities are the first links, followed by providing actionable information to Federal, State, and local leaders and the general public; having 

adequate supplies of appropriate medical countermeasures; quickly distributing 

those countermeasures; treating and isolating the sick in medical facilities; protecting the well through vaccines and prophylactic medications; and in certain cases, 

such as anthrax, environmental clean-up. All parts of the chain need considerable 

attention. 

Public health agencies at the Federal, State, and local levels have made great 

strides since 2001 to prepare the Nation for biological attacks and other disasters. 

This is in spite of the challenges of preparing for such events, especially in light 

of limited and decreasing budgets. However, much more can be done to support public health, and also traditional first responders, so that the Nation can effectively 

respond to a biological attack. 

One way that the burden on public health may be eased is if the public is more 

prepared. We commend this committee for including provisions for the public and 

especially first responders, to access the vaccines and antibiotics they might need 

in an attack, before such an event occurs. (Title 1, section 105) For example, anthrax vaccine could and should be available to first responders, and we agree with 

the committee that the Government should seriously review the issue of whether 

and under what conditions home MedKits should be available for concerned citizens 

who wish to prepare themselves and their families. In considering the policies for 

vaccination and antimicrobial distribution in light of known biological threats to the 

United States, however, we recommend that public health responders also be given 

priority, and that vaccination be done on a voluntary, not a mandatory, basis. 

We also feel obligated to comment on a key issue regarding medical countermeasures not addressed in this bill. Yes, we must have a system capable of rapidly 

dispensing MCMs during a crisis, but we must first have the required items to dispense. A world-class delivery system that does not have the appropriate products 

is of no value. Several months ago the administration attempted to raid the BioShield Reserve Fund to pay for H1N1 flu preparedness—certainly an important program, but one that needed funding on its own merits. Thankfully, this raid was not 

successful because leaders in Congress, who understand the importance of BioShield 

to our biodefense program, prevented it. Unfortunately, the story on funding for the 

Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Act (BARDA) does not have a 

similar good ending—at least not yet. There is, however, still time to correct this 

funding shortfall. The current funding request for fiscal year 2011 is $476 million. 

The Center for Biosecurity at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center recently 

estimated that $3.39 billion per year in medical countermeasure development support would be required to achieve a 90 percent probability of developing one FDAlicensed countermeasure for each of those requirements. The cost estimates of devel-
15 

* The information has been retained in committee files. 

oping these pharmaceuticals were based on in-depth surveys of historical vaccine 

and drug development data, and reflect the high failure rate of biopharmaceutical 

development. It now falls to the U.S. Government to fund the development of medical countermeasures based upon the level of risk that is deemed tolerable. An 

amount of $1.7 billion per year would meet roughly half the estimated need to provide a significant and necessary down-payment on the Nation’s preparedness. Given 

the threat, $1.7 billion per year for prevention and consequence management is a 

reasonable and comparatively sound investment. 

America must develop the capability to produce vaccines and therapeutics rapidly 

and inexpensively. Both the BioShield Reserve Fund and BARDA will be key elements in reaching this goal, but only if they receive proper support and funding. 

Developing this capability over the long-term will lead us to a security environment 

where biological weapons can be removed from the category of WMD. That must be 

the long-term biodefense strategy for America, but it will be unattainable if we do 

not properly fund these key programs. We submit for the record an article we coauthored on this subject in the summer of 2009 for the Journal of Biodefense and 

Biosecurity.* 

DECONTAMINATION—RESOLVING LONG-STANDING QUESTIONS SO WE ARE PREPARED

We commend the committee for including the provision that DHS issue guidelines 

in coordination with the Environmental Protection Agency for cleaning and restoring indoor and outdoor areas affected by the release of a biological agent. These 

guidelines should also address methods of decontamination following a large-scale 

event, and should address some of the remaining questions of a technical and scientific nature that make decontamination of a large area difficult. Currently, U.S. 

environmental laboratory capacity is insufficient for the challenge of sampling and 

testing following a large biological release. Federal leadership roles should also be 

clarified—many Federal agencies currently have roles in decontamination, but it is 

still unclear which agency would lead. Likewise, it is unclear who will cover the 

costs of decontamination, as well as the temporary relocation of building occupants. 

Private building owners would rightly question what their role is, at this time—if 

private industry is to be responsible for decontamination of their own property, 

there should be guidance for decontamination practices and qualified decontamination contractors available to industry in the event that they are needed. 

The WMD Commission sponsored a small study to review current bio-decontamination capabilities and responsibilities. The conclusions were not encouraging. 

We submit the recently-published article for the record.* 

THE BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS CONVENTION—AN OPPORTUNITY TO LEAD

Section 112 of the legislation intends to require the Secretary of State to promote 

confidence in the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) implementation and compliance by its States Parties. It also calls for promoting universal membership in 

the Convention. One of the WMD Commission recommendations in World At Risk 

was that the United States should propose a new action plan for achieving universal 

adherence to the BWC (recommendation 2–4). We are supportive of the goal, as well 

as moving forward to address the other important gaps in our preparedness. In 

order to provide leadership at the 2011 BWC Conference and take advantage of this 

once-every-5-years opportunity, we should be doing more to lead by example. 

THE CLOCK IS TICKING

We cannot overstate the urgency of this crisis, and the need for action, now. The 

international situation is fragile, with Israel and its neighbors, on the India-Pakistan border, and this fragility substantially increases the risk of terrorism with a 

WMD. While there are issues at stake that have gone unresolved for over 60 years, 

we may have only 3 more years of procrastination before the consequences reveal 

not a World at Risk, but a world immobilized by crisis. 

One of our recommendations was for Congress to reform Congressional oversight 

to better address intelligence, homeland security, and cross-cutting 21st Century 

National security missions. The fact that we are having this hearing on April 21, 

2010—more than 16 months after World at Risk was issued—is evidence of the difficulty that Congress has in organizing itself to protect the people of America, and 

the world, from this ultimate catastrophe. 
16 

CONCLUSION

We commend the committee for taking up this important issue. We look forward 

to participating in a robust discussion on Capitol Hill and with the administration 

and stakeholders as the WMD Prevention and Preparedness Act of 2010 is introduced, and makes its way through the legislative process, and stand ready to help 

where we can, to promote important strides for our National security. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chair has previously recognized the good work of Dr. 

Gronvall, and it is obvious she has both of your gentlemen’s backs. 

Senator Talent, for as long as you need to explain. 

STATEMENT OF JIM TALENT, FORMER COMMISSION VICECHAIRMAN, COMMISSION FOR THE PREVENTION OF WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION PROLIFERATION AND TERRORISM 

Comm. TALENT. Appreciate that, Mr. Chairman. Yes, Dr. 

Gronvall will slip us notes when you ask the hard questions. We 

may just actually refer them to her. 

It is great to be here and to recognize your great work on this, 

Mr. Chairman, and the Ranking Member, to see old friends, because this is a hearing room I know very well, to see my friend 

from Missouri, Mr. Cleaver, here, and to congratulate him on his 

work on this. I am really pleased to hear about the efforts between 

Mr. Pascrell and Mr. King, and knowing those two personalities 

and all kidding aside, I think that something is going to end up 

being done. So that is very important. 

Yes, I am going to make some observations, Mr. Chairman, and 

then let you all ask the questions and we can have a dialogue, and 

I think it is important to do that. This hearing is really important 

and I am glad you are holding it. 

It has been my observation over the last 2 years studying this 

whole area that while most of the problems are Executive in nature—we have seen this now through two administrations, just the 

difficulty of getting this big, fragmented set of agencies to work together to do things, much less given the Federal issues—and that 

it is important to have top-level Executive leadership hold people 

accountable, that when Congress gets active and people in the 

agencies seeing Congress getting active it makes a big difference. 

Even if the legislation that you are passing is just basically affirming what the Executive is doing in certain areas it shows a level 

of seriousness and unity and commitment, particularly when it is 

done on a bipartisan basis, that people through the Executive 

branch take seriously. 

I think the model for this is probably the Intelligence Reform 

Act. When Congress went through everything it had to go through 

to pass that it made a big difference within the intelligence community. It is not that everything is perfect within that community at 

all, but there is no question that at least some cultural change resulted as—occurred as a result of that. So I think it is important 

that you are doing it. 

Mr. Chairman, you ask about and the Ranking Member asked for 

suggestions we might have about how to remedy the difficult problems we have in the Congress regarding oversight, so I will give 

you a practical response. As a person who served in this body for 
17 

8 years in the Minority, in the Majority, in the leadership, on the 

back bench, as a committee chairman, in a lot of different capacities, I think the initiative ought to come from you all because, let’s 

face it, you are probably going to be the gaining committee—ought 

to be, in my judgment. 

Mr. Chairman, if you and the Ranking Member would talk—get 

the Speaker’s blessing; you are obviously going to have to have 

that—and then talk with the Majority and the Minority leaders, 

maybe get a staff person designated, and do all this low-visibility. 

I mean, in the initial stages I would not want surfacing and on the 

Hill or anything like that if you could avoid it, in the magazines. 

Talk to the Executive branch people and let them know that they 

can let their hair down and try and identify the four or five areas 

where the current fragmented system is causing the biggest problem, and maybe begin focusing on those areas. Then when you 

have got an agenda together and maybe three or four ideas for 

what you could do about them—and between the two of you you 

know the House well enough to know going in, probably, what is 

possible and what isn’t possible. 

Then maybe in the Leader’s office, with the Minority Leader’s 

person present there, get together the Chairmen, the Ranking 

Members, and the key staff people and just begin asking what can 

be done. Is there any low-hanging fruit in this? I mean, what steps 

can be taken so you can begin making some progress? Don’t make 

the best the enemy of the good. I don’t know that you need some 

kind of global solution, but just start taking some steps and emphasizing to people the seriousness of this threat. 

I mean, if they have not had—if these committees of jurisdiction 

and oversight have not had the briefing on this they need to get 

the briefing on this. This is something that was impressed upon me 

through our initial deliberations. I am not an intel guy the way Ms. 

Harman is, but when I saw what I saw, and when I saw people 

like Bob Graham, and Graham Allison, and Wendy Sherman, and 

Robin Cleveland, taking as seriously as they took this threat, that 

impresses you. 

This is a major threat and if we are going to make it a priority 

to deal with it, I mean, that means—if something is a priority it 

means you are willing to sacrifice other things for it. I think if you 

can get the people in that room going in to accept that—do this 

low-key, and then get the process moving that way. It is going to 

take a major effort, Mr. Chairman, and I know how busy you all 

are. But I think it is worth doing because not only is fragmented 

oversight can it be negative in the sense that it impedes the Executive, but it is the opportunity cost, because good oversight can 

make a huge difference, as those of you on the Intelligence Committee know. 

So I would describe, and we did in the report, Congress’ efforts 

in this to this point have on balance, I think, been a negative not 

because the Members haven’t wanted to do it but because this system is so screwed up, and it could be a big positive. So that is just 

my practical advice and you can take it for what it is worth. 

I do want to say, because our report card was not good in the 

area of bio-preparation, that we have—the two of us, I think—been 

pleased personally at the administration’s response, and in par-
18 

ticular the President’s response, personally. You know, our understanding is that he has taken a personal interest in this, he is 

meeting with teams of people particularly in the area of countermeasure development, and that is all to the good. But we can’t— 

I mean, having the President pay personal attention to something, 

you know, when you are talking about trying to unify a structural 

sort of response is not the long-term answer because he is just too 

busy. But it is still good that they are responding in that fashion. 

I also want to make a comment—Chairman Graham talks a lot 

about the links in the chain of preparedness, and that all the links 

have to be strong if we are going to be prepared for a bioattack. 

Preparation for a bioattack is the key to deterring it because if we 

are prepared well enough then—and if the attack is likely not to 

be a major success, then they are likely not to launch it. In contrast to a nuclear attack, this is an area where preparation can actually be prevention. 

If you look at the—if you think of the four links in terms of 

stockpiling the countermeasures, distributing the countermeasures, 

detecting, having good surveillance, and then clean-up, I think we 

are showing some signs of life on the stockpiling issue. Secretary 

Sebelius is conducting a review; I think they are serious about it. 

The follow-up has to be there. You know, and I am hopeful that 

they will come out with a strategic plan. The problem there was 

fragmentation among the different agencies—typical story: FDA, 

CDC, HHS, all that—and then a lack of funding. 

The distribution side of this, as much maligned as it has been 

of the countermeasures, is the area where I think we are the furthest—not where we need to be, but we are the furthest. We have 

a model in place, you know, the CRI initiatives, with points of dispensing that are more or less locally-controlled; we are in 72 cities. 

Then they are overlaying a Federal response through the Postal 

Service, which has been tested in St. Louis, as a matter of fact, and 

seemed to work. 

So at least we have a model in place of the local dispensing sortof settings with a Federal overlay. We have gone some distance in 

getting it actually in place and in testing it. So, I mean, that link— 

I think there is a long way we need to go, but I think at least we 

have some idea of what we are doing. 

The two where I think we are failing the most right now is in 

detection or surveillance and then clean-up. On the surveillance 

side of it we have BioWatch. We have that in a number of cities, 

and that is a good idea. We funded a lot of different sort of studies 

and surveillance systems, so they keep track of over-the-counter 

sales of drugs and that sort of thing, but they are not linked together. There is no general strategy or sense of priorities with regard to that. 

We don’t have good enough detection sort of tests so we can tell 

whether somebody is sick. I mean, you have got a—the pregnancy 

test has developed to the point you can tell whether you are pregnant in a matter of minutes, right, but we can’t test for even—for 

swine flu that quickly, much less for some of these other kinds of 

pathogens. So we need those detection tests. I mean, it is a bad 

thing when, if the President asks, you know, the head of CDC at 

any given time, ‘‘How many people were sick with the H1N1?’’ they 
19 

couldn’t have told him. They can’t tell you today with certainty how 

many people died from that, because they would just guess. 

You all probably had this experience or know people who had 

this experience: You call a doctor up and they say, ‘‘Well, it sounds 

like it, but it is, you know, it is not worth—you are not in a highpriority enough group to bring you in and test you to make certain 

whether you had it.’’ That was a—that was a pandemic we had 6 

months’ notice for. So we have got problems with surveillance. 

Then clean-up, we have recently—the Commission recently funded a study on this. We have total fragmentation on this, and environmental clean-up is important because we need to clean up 

quickly and get people back into an affected area. It is a hugely important response. 

Think about this from the standpoint of, let’s just take New 

York, and I—that is the city most people use. You get an attack, 

you are going to have your initial impact with people getting sick 

and dying and then the problem is, you just can’t have half of New 

York that people can’t go back into for 6 months because you are 

trying to clean it up. 

I just think we are nowhere on that. Again, the typical fragmentation—HHS, EPA, USDA has a piece of this. We have not 

funded the research adequately, and there is a lack of training and 

guidance for the first responders. They don’t know what to do and 

how to clean up. This would seem to be an area where we could 

build a Federal reservoir of understanding and expertise that we 

could be very flexible with. 

So we have a long way to go. One other observation: There is a 

mentality that I think that you all as leaders need to adopt as you 

approach these issues. One of them is the urgency of it. 

It is relatively easy to grasp, but intellectually it is hard to make 

it a working reality in your day-to-day operations and decisions. It 

is just hard, because it is hard to conceptualize something like this. 

Some of you have, like, lived on the Intelligence Committee for 

years—seen Ms. Harman up there, more adjusted your point of 

view to this, but it is hard to do. Keep communicating the urgency 

of the threat. 

Then in terms of structuring solutions, I believe a partnership 

rather than adversarial model with all the different agencies and 

Federal—and State and local organizations is the right one. So you 

include rather than exclude, in terms of groups of people—so share 

the intel with the public health people, unless you really can’t; empower rather than regulate, like with the labs—and I think you all 

have that approach in this bill; and support rather than punish. 

We want people to take the initiative. We want people to make 

decisions. You know, we want people to go out and do things in response to this. If they know that you are going to back them up 

rather than be looking to play gotcha with them I think it will have 

a big impact. 

But thank you again, Mr. Chairman. I think it is great that you 

are having this hearing. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

Obviously we appreciate both of your gentlemen’s testimony, and 

obviously it is revealing, but nonetheless very troubling, that we 
20 

are still only where we are and not where we need to be. I thank 

you for your testimony. 

I now recognize myself for 5 minutes. 

You both talked somewhat about the looming biological threat. 

I guess we will ask Senator Graham this question as it relates 

to the 2013 prediction: If you would, tell us a little bit about how 

you arrived at that number and—well, it is obvious we are not prepared—what we need to do to get prepared if that becomes a reality. 

Comm. GRAHAM. That number is a statistical estimate. We interviewed over 150 experts in the United States and elsewhere on this 

issue. We studied the literature. Our commission itself has some 

people who have spent a lifetime, such as Graham Allison, on this 

matter. So we present it as our best judgment based on all of the 

above as to the time frame within which we are operating. 

I mentioned that I have recently returned from a trip to Asia and 

the Middle East, and nothing that I learned in that trip caused me 

to feel that we were overly or excessively concerned with the date 

2013. My concern would be that the percentage of likelihood that 

that date will be the date by which a weapon of mass destruction 

will be used by a terrorist—the likelihood of that is higher than we 

thought it was in December 2008. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you. 

Senator Talent. 

Comm. TALENT. Could I just add a quick comment on that? I 

think we obviously didn’t have intel saying, ‘‘Well, there is a plan 

underway that is going to come to fruition in 2013,’’ but we do 

want to emphasize, this is a short-term threat. This is not something where we can say, ‘‘Oh, it is terrible but it is a generation 

from now.’’ It is not. 

We know they are trying to get this stuff. It fits their strategy. 

It is proliferating all over the world, so it is getting easier and easier for them to get it. 

If they get it and they hit a major city with it—not necessarily 

in the United States—from their perspective, you know, they win. 

So everything we saw emphasizes the short-term nature of it. So 

that is why 2013. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you. 

With respect to that short-term nature, the legislation that we 

are kind of working through right now to address so many of the 

things you have identified, my charge to Mr. Pascrell is to make 

sure that, regardless of how controversial or cross-jurisdictional it 

might appear, it is the right thing to do. So therefore, understanding that it is the right thing to do, those are the marching orders that I have suggested to him. 

Your testimony today further highlights the fact that we need to 

put aside some of the jurisdictional challenges that have prevented 

things from going forward and do it, because it is in the best interest of not just this country but the world that we become that leader in this arena. To that extent about the world leadership, it is 

your belief that if we took that step we make a better argument 

with not only our friends and enemies around the world that it is 

the right thing to do, but it is difficult to make that argument without feeling the predicate at home. 
21 

Comm. GRAHAM. Yes, I think the fact that Congress would take 

what anyone in politics recognizes as a difficult step, because it is 

changing jurisdictions and areas of power and influence in a critical legislative body, that would symbolically send a very powerful 

signal that America was taking this matter with the urgency that 

it deserves. But I think it would be the actual product that would 

come as a result of that reorganization that would be even more 

influential. 

If the United States could go to that conference in 2011 having 

passed legislation that provided some new standards for security of 

high-risk pathogens—and you have very good provisions in your 

preliminary draft of the legislation to that effect—that would allow 

us to say to Malaysia and to Brazil, these other countries that have 

significant capability to develop and weaponize biological weapons—I am not picking on those two countries as being likely candidates—but if we could say to them, ‘‘Look, this is what we have 

done to secure our laboratories so they will be less susceptible to 

being invaded by the bad people who would like to get access to 

these material,’’ I think our case would be stronger. 

Conversely, if the facts are that we have known about this now 

for a decade or more, it has been considered an urgent matter for 

a couple of years and we have done zero, then what is our moral 

authority to try to get anybody else to strengthen their domestic 

situation? 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you. 

Senator Talent. 

Comm. TALENT. I would agree with that, and particularly given 

the fact that this is something that—you know, other governments 

don’t want this kind of an attack to happen. This is not a situation 

where there really are different ultimate agendas that are being 

concealed here. I mean, I think there are a lot of potential partners 

out there. So I think setting an example is important. 

We should say, there is a lot of good activity going on. The Executive branch is doing a lot all the time. You all have done and 

funded and authorized a lot. 

The problem is, and Graham Allison puts it this way—he is really correct—we are running towards our goal, but they are running 

faster than we are. So even though we are making progress, their 

lead is growing. 

A lot of that is just because the nature of this kind of conflict in 

weaponry favors them. I mean, it is easier—they are able to attack 

very vulnerable areas that are hard for us to defend and that we 

depend on a lot more than they do. That is the nature of asymmetric weapons, and this is the ultimate asymmetric weapon. 

So the short answer is yes, I think it is a very important model 

to empower the President with when he as the summit on this in 

about a year now. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman now yields to the gentleman from New York, the 

Ranking Member. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, I regret that I had to step out of the room. Ironically 

enough, it was Secretary Napolitano calling to make sure that I 

had gotten a copy of her letter talking about the multitude of com-
22 

mittees that she has to testify before each year. So I told here I 

did, and I told her we raised it and we are going to continue to 

raise it. 

Let me focus, if I could, on biological weapons. I think if you 

went to the average Member of Congress and you spoke about 

WMD they would think of an abbreviation, we think of dirty 

bombs—the average American, certainly. It is hard to get people focused on the issue of a biological weapon. 

Having been here on September 11, I remember afterwards we 

were asking ourselves, ‘‘What did we know? What didn’t we know? 

What should we have known? What did we do? What didn’t we do? 

What we should have done?’’ So, assuming the absolute worst here, 

I just want to make sure that we are at least—you know, leaving 

Congress aside; we have our own issues we have to deal with—but 

just generally, for instance, in your dealings with the intelligence 

community do you feel that they are sufficiently alert to this and 

sufficiently concerned? 

Comm. GRAHAM. I think the answer is, they have certainly given 

this a high priority. In the prepared testimony, however, I inserted 

a statement to the effect that this potential of a nation state developing weapon of mass destruction capability, specifically biological, 

and then sharing it with a linked terrorist organization—such as 

Iran and Syria have had a long-time relationship with Hezbollah; 

Pakistan for many years has had a close relationship with the 

Taliban—that represents the ultimate threat because the nation 

state gets to have some degree of deniable involvement in the matter, points its finger at its surrogate that is actually carrying out 

the operation. 

I think that this situation is accelerating and that our intelligence agencies need to give it an even higher priority than that 

which they have given it in the past. 

Mr. KING. Senator Talent. 

Comm. TALENT. Yes, I would say yes and no. Yes in the sense 

that they recognize and I think believe that a WMD attack from 

a terrorist organization is the greatest threat that we confront that 

they have to deal with. 

The problem is cultural, and it goes beyond just the intel community. When people think of WMD they usually think of other 

things. We have had whole establishments of people for generations who have grown up understanding that nuclear material can 

be put to bad use, but the idea that genetic material or pathogens 

could be put to bad use is much newer. 

So they all tend to respond a little bit slower. They don’t have 

the same high level of cultural awareness, as a community, of these 

issues. So you get things like the fusion centers—and we mentioned this in our testimony—where, you know, the local fusion 

centers where everybody’s supposed to come together and share 

intel and all the rest of it. The public health—except in a few cities 

that have really pushed hard, like yours—the public health community hasn’t got the clearance so they can participate. 

I don’t think the—from what we have seen, the intel agencies 

don’t keep good enough track of just open-source foreign public 

health information that could be really important. There are dots 

they ought to have there to connect. 
23 

There are issues with workforce—they may not have enough people in the workforce who really understand bio issues. Plenty of 

people understand nuclear issues. 

I don’t want to point the finger and say, ‘‘That person doesn’t 

care or isn’t doing their job,’’ because they all really do care. It is 

a cultural issue, and culture takes a little time to change. 

Mr. KING. My time is running down, so I will ask two questions 

in one and then if you could answer the—both of them. 

If you could give the same—answer the same question regarding 

State—Federal-State law enforcement—FBI, State police, local police—how attuned they are, how concerned they are about this? 

Also, even though we were on the committee, I didn’t realize until 

I read your report, or your report card, that the budget for the Department of Homeland Security only requested about one-tenth of 

what would be needed for medical countermeasures in the event of 

a biological attack. I am sure this is true in the previous administration, so I am not trying to make this a partisan issue. 

The fact is, of all the issues we debate with the homeland security budget, I doubt if this would even come up if you hadn’t 

brought it to our attention. Obviously we are talking about—you 

mentioned a half a million lives could be lost. So on those two 

issues, the intensity with law enforcement, and also with the Department of Homeland Security itself, why only one-tenth is put in 

for the medical countermeasures? 

Comm. GRAHAM. Well, I think that is a perfect example of what 

happens when you don’t have clarity of responsibility in terms of 

Congressional jurisdiction. There should be a place in each of the 

two houses of Congress which wakes up every morning asking the 

question: ‘‘What can we do today to make our response to a biological attack stronger?’’ both in terms of substantive legislation and 

advocacy before the Appropriations Committee. 

That number is the number which—the University of Pittsburgh 

has a major center located in Baltimore that is probably the Nation’s premier medical entity on bioterrorism, and it has calculated 

that in order to have an adequate supply of the eight—for the eight 

pathogens that the Department of Homeland Security has identified as the most likely to be used in a weaponized form and to have 

that adequate supply within 5 years, which is outside the window 

of the 2013 prediction of course, that it would take approximately 

$3.4 billion each year for the next 5 years to get there. 

The budget that Congress approved last year was approximate 

10 percent, or roughly $300 million. $300 million is a lot of money, 

but it means that we either are determining that we are only going 

to prepare for one-tenth of the amount of therapeutics that will be 

required or we are going to take 50 years to get there, neither of 

which, I think, is an acceptable response to the American people. 

It is important that someplace in Congress knows this issue and 

is the virulent advocate for its remediation. 

Comm. TALENT. I certainly would agree with that, and again, I 

think that Bob’s point about oversight is important here. Like 

when the stimulus bill went through, this would have been a great 

opportunity to fund this program. It is not like somebody brought 

this up with Mr. Obey and he said, ‘‘Oh, I don’t want to fund coun-
24 

termeasures,’’ right? Clearly, I know how this system works; Bob 

knows. 

For some reason this wasn’t on the table, because you all would 

have funded it. Or you would have looked at it—maybe staff would 

have looked at it and said, ‘‘Well, we have thought about it and we 

don’t want to fund it because we don’t think the structure is right 

and we need to’’—I mean, you would have had an intelligent response. There was nobody there at that point who was raising this, 

and that is—that is the absence, you see? 

Not only does the fragmented oversight impede the Executive, 

but the absence of that means you are not making the contribution 

that all of you as Members want to make. I mean, if somebody had 

set up—if we had attacked you, which we didn’t do, for not funding 

this, you would have gone to your staff and said, what in the heck 

happened? Why didn’t we fund this, right? 

Now, I will say this: You all need to watch OMB on this, because 

they are on, like, autopilot, wanting to defund these programs to 

fund other things. Somebody over at OMB has decided that that is 

a good way to fund some other stuff, so watch that. 

In terms of local sharing, Bob or Ms. Harman have a better view 

than I would. I think we said in the report we think the FBI is 

doing a lot better job than it used to in sharing with local groups, 

but there is a long way to go. Again, this is an area where we have 

to look at whether they are including public health officials. If they 

look at it and decide for some reason not to, okay, but let’s not just 

exclude them categorically because we don’t think that they are 

part of the solution. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman will now recognize the other Members for questions they may wish to ask the witnesses. In accordance with our 

committee rules and practice, I will recognize Members who were 

present at the time of the hearing based on seniority on the committee, alternating between Majority and Minority. Those Members 

coming in later will be recognized in the order of their arrival. 

The Chairman now recognizes for 5 minutes the gentlelady from 

California, Ms. Harman. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me welcome our witnesses. I believe that Jim Talent and I 

were elected to the House in the same year. He has obviously 

had—— 

Comm. TALENT. I may say, Ms. Harman, the years have treated 

you much more kindly than they have treated me, so—— 

Ms. HARMAN. Well, I notice your gray hair, my friend. Hadn’t 

seen that before. 

Bob Graham, I want to commend you not only for your friendship 

and enormous contributions, but for your mentorship of me as I 

served on our Intelligence Committee when you chaired the Senate 

Intelligence Committee, and for your superb handling of the joint 

inquiry on 9/11, which was a bicameral, bipartisan exercise by the 

Congress. Imagine—that seems like a, you know, some kind of an 

old, ancient idea, given these partisan times. But I thought we 

were very effective and I thought your leadership was exemplary. 

Let me also mention that when your excellent report came out 

I made some comments about my view, which is that we should 
25 

prepare and not scare the American public. I think those comments 

were construed to mean I was critical of your report. I am not critical of your report; I applaud your report. 

But I do believe that it is—that preparation, as Mr. Talent said, 

is a key to prevention, and so I am glad that you both see it that 

way. 

Let me focus on just a couple issues that concern me enormously, 

or that may offer some keys, and just to see if you have thought 

about them. One is forensics and attribution. This has been mentioned in the nuclear case, but I also think it would apply in the 

biological case. If we can find out who produced the stuff that was 

used, or if the bad guys know that we will find out and the country 

transferring stuff to bad guys knows that we will find out, I think 

that is a huge deterrent. I just want to ask you whether you do, 

and what it is, exactly, that you think we should do. 

My understanding is that there is a Nuclear Forensics and Attribution Act, which was signed fairly recently, but it wasn’t funded 

by this administration. I would suggest that this is something we 

should fund and that this could be a very major prevention strategy. I just want to know what you think. 

Comm. GRAHAM. I completely agree that if you are going to deter 

your adversary it is critical that the adversary knows that after the 

boom you are going to be able to determine from whom that was 

dispatched. In our report we talk about the importance of a forensic 

aspect to this issue and have urged heightened funding of the Nation’s efforts, both on the nuclear as well as the biological side. 

That would be another example of an issue that this committee 

might give some special attention to see if, in fact, we are moving 

towards the capability to be able to identify with sufficient clarity 

that we could then justify a response. 

On 9/11 we knew immediately who was responsible, and in October 2001 started to send a massive military response to Afghanistan. If we had not been able to have made such a quick and internationally-accepted determination of who the perpetrator was we 

would have been unable to have credibly launched that response. 

Ms. HARMAN. I agree. 

Comm. TALENT. This is an area—I just checked to make certain—we gave the administration an ‘‘A’’ in this area because they 

do have a—we had recommended that they develop a strategy; they 

have developed one that more than met the requirements that we 

had laid out in the report. But of course, implementation is the 

key. 

Ms. HARMAN. Funding is the key. 

Comm. TALENT. Funding. Absolutely. It would be a good subject 

for this committee to interest itself in to make certain that they do 

implement. But I completely agree with you. You are absolutely 

right from the standpoint of, it is a key deterrent if they know we 

can identify who did it, particularly where a nation state is behind 

it. 

Ms. HARMAN. Well, I think it needs more attention by Congress. 

Time is short, but let me just commend you again for your ‘‘F’’ for 

our efforts to reorganize the Congress. Sadly, it is true. The committee, I believe, has way too little jurisdiction for the responsibility vested in us, and I have been through painful meetings 
26 

where our Chairman has courageously tried to augment our jurisdiction, and then he gets jumped by the Chairmen of other committees who don’t want to give anything up. 

Most of us are ready to criticize the Senate these days for stopping all of our valuable legislation, but the one place where the 

Senate has it right is that it has a committee, chaired by Joe Lieberman, where Susan Collins is Ranking Member, that has a lot 

more jurisdiction than ours and is capable of doing a lot more than 

we can because of its larger turf. Would you agree with that? 

Comm. GRAHAM. I would agree with that, but if I could be so presumptive as to ask you and other Members this question: When the 

Chairman or the Ranking Member or other Members of this committee go to the leadership of the House with this request, the reality is there is a degree of perception of self-interest—you are trying to expand your power by taking it from somebody else. 

What has got to be at the table is the National interest. My question is, who—what entities—do you think are capable of presenting 

that National interest to the leadership of the Congress, in this 

case specifically the House of Representatives, that would give 

them the impetus to take the action which we think is so critical 

for the Nation’s safety? 

Ms. HARMAN. Well, my time is expired, Mr. Chairman, and I 

think it is probably a question to you both. But I would just say, 

Bob, that your report and your calls for action and the reports by 

Lee Hamilton and Tom Kean for action, this is an unfinished item 

on the 9/11 agenda, and hopefully at some near point a popular uprising, which is pretty effective around here, might cause us to see 

this more clearly. 

My time is up. I yield back. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Gentleman from New York. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I would say that Secretary Napolitano has been very aggressive 

on this, and if we could have the administration work with us, they 

really have no axe to grind one way or the other other than to try 

to work it through. 

So I would say if we could meet with people from the administration to show, again, as Senator Talent said, hit the low-hanging 

fruit first, then find areas where we look as if we are acting responsibly but the right thing is being done. But I think the administration can play a role, and obviously both parties have to sit 

down on this—— 

Comm. TALENT. It is going to have to be bipartisan. 

I mean, you could explore, going so far—I don’t think it is something the President would want to mention in a State of the Union 

address, but if on behalf of the Executive branch agencies who have 

to live with this, you know, he made a personal request at some 

point, I think that that might be helpful. He is just representing 

the National interest. I know, you know, he wants to show comity 

to how we operate on this end of Pennsylvania Avenue. 

I have got to believe the leadership wants to do this. This isn’t 

a leadership issue. I mean, the leadership is looking at this and 

saying: A, it is probably impossible; B, we have 1,000 other things 

to do; C, we don’t want to go out there and tilt at windmills and 

end up offending everybody and we get nothing anyway. I mean, 
27 

if you talk with the Speaker and the leaders of both parties that 

is probably what they will tell you. 

So, as I said, some good work sort of beneath the surface to try 

and figure out what can be done and give them some hope might 

motivate them. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Well, I appreciate everyone’s comments, 

and the one good part about the discussion is, up to this point that 

has been a theme people on the right and left—— 

Comm. TALENT. Absolutely. 

Chairman THOMPSON [continuing]. Have displayed, that this 

needs to happen. So in that respect there is no—— 

Comm. TALENT. Mr. Chairman, I know it is easy for Senator 

Graham and I to think of new things for you to do, because largely—this is water you are largely going to have to carry, but—— 

Chairman THOMPSON. Well, I mean it is, as I said earlier, it is 

the right thing to do. So it makes it easier from our perspective. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr. 

McCaul, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. MCCAUL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Senators, for being here, and your work products, 

your sense of urgency in terms of fixing the Congressional oversight issue. I think over 100 committees and subcommittees have 

jurisdiction currently, and I don’t—I think it is paralyzing. 

Mr. Chairman, I hope we can work together in a bipartisan way 

to fix this issue. 

I think with your help and your credibility on the outside helping 

us I think we can hopefully get there. 

I have two quick questions with the limited time I have. One is 

on the nuclear issue; one is biological. 

In your report you describe Pakistan as the intersection of nuclear weapons and terrorism. I agree with that assessment. It has 

been an issue since the A.Q. Khan network. 

Very concerned about the security of the nuclear stockpile in 

Pakistan, very concerned with Iran close by, by some reports 

maybe a year out from developing a nuclear weapon, very concerned about their alliance with Venezuela, with Hugo Chavez in 

this hemisphere, and with the potential of nuclear material being 

smuggled and, you know, potentially being brought across the border, which we know has some defects, I should say. It is easy to 

cross, and I think it is still very easy to get this type of material 

into the United States. 

If you wouldn’t—and I know, Senator Graham, you commented 

on that area of the world being the most dangerous part of the 

world, and I agree with that—what are your comments on how we 

can better protect the Nation? 

Comm. GRAHAM. One, as I mentioned, we need to start dealing 

with some of these long-simmering issues that have become the 

flashpoint where this might actually occur. If, for instance, something broke out in Kashmir that we ignited the vitriol between 

India and Pakistan, that could be an incident that could cause 

someone to make the decision, ‘‘We don’t want to use these weapons, but we are going to let our surrogate, Taliban, have access to 

these weapons and they will do our dirty work.’’ 
28 

You may have read the story within the last week that there are 

now suspicions that Syria has transferred Scud missiles to 

Hezbollah in Lebanon. That could be a precursor of letting your 

surrogate do the dirty work for you. So I think one of the things 

that is very important is that we—that after 60 years we give the 

urgency necessary to try to bleed off these long-simmering disputes. 

Second, I think also on a longer-range view, the United States 

needs to work with our allies to try to better understand the Muslim world. The Judeo-Christian world represents about 1.2 billion 

people; the Muslim world represents about 1.2 billion people. If we 

leave to our children and grandchildren animosity between these 

two groups, which together are roughly half of the population of 

the world, we have left them a very incendiary legacy. 

On the more immediate, I think one of our recommendations was 

to work with India and Pakistan to develop some failsafe procedures. Unlike the United States and the Soviet Union during the 

Cold War where, although we were strong adversaries and had the 

capability of destroying each other, we understood that we didn’t 

want to allow a misstep or an accidental event to become the ignition for such a war, so we set up the red phone in the Oval Office 

and a whole protocol. None of that exists between India and Pakistan. 

I have felt that this may be an area in which the United States 

and Russia together, since we developed these protocols for our 

own benefit and the world’s benefit, might work together with 

India and Pakistan to try to get them to develop. I was encouraged 

that within the last month India and China have started to develop 

some of those failsafe procedures, but there is almost nothing has 

been done in a similar vein between the real adversaries, which are 

India and Pakistan. 

Mr. MCCAUL. I agree. With the limited time I have left, again, 

the issue of Iran and their alliance with Venezuela, putting that in 

our own hemisphere, what do you perceive as the threat level of 

smuggling that type of material across our border into the United 

States? 

Senator Talent. 

Comm. TALENT. We didn’t address in the report border security 

as such. I am also very concerned about it, and I think we do have, 

you know, as a political establishment, be able to separate out the 

National security aspects of that from the immigration aspects of 

it and reach an agreement on the National security side of it. I 

mean, I think that is a concern. There are a lot of ways they could 

try and get it in the country and that is certainly one of them, and 

we are very concerned about Iran. The report reflects that. 

Pakistan is just incredibly difficult. Bob mentioned some of the 

reasons. I would just say a couple of discrete things: We are still 

not where we need to be in terms of—on workforce issues within 

the intelligence community. This is something that Senator Graham just hammers on, and correctly. We don’t have enough people 

who understand those issues. We haven’t recruited effectively 

enough. It just takes so long to hire people in the intel community. 

We can work particularly with India and Pakistan on security of 

pathogens—this is in the bio area. Then one other point that I 
29 

made a lot and got into the report, because I am coming from my— 

the DOD side—if you look at the speeches of Secretary Gates he 

talks all the time about the importance of developing the civilian 

elements of National power, what you call ‘‘smart power’’ or ‘‘soft 

power,’’ the ability to communicate effectively about American intentions and to help build local grassroots economic and political 

institutions that are a bulwark against this kind of instability. 

I personally believe the State Department is going to have to— 

and Secretary Clinton, I think, wants to do this—going to have to 

undergo the kind of cultural angst and reform in development that 

DOD did with Goldwater-Nichols that the intel community has 

done so that the President has an option. You know, you all in your 

campaigns, if you have got a part of your district where you are 

not running as well as you like, you know, you can instruct your 

consultants to build up your numbers and they will have a plan. 

Well, we should have the ability to say, you know, there is this 

province of Pakistan or people where our goals, you know, they are 

misinformed and they are angry at us, and the President ought to 

have the option to say, ‘‘Let’s go out and build up America’s brand 

there.’’ We don’t have that organic capability. So Presidents are, 

you know, reduced to options none of which are very palatable. 

Mr. PASCRELL [presiding]. Thank you, Mr. McCaul. 

Mr. MCCAUL. I see my time is expired. Thank you. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman recognizes for 5 minutes the gentleman from 

Pennsylvania, Mr. Carney. 

Mr. CARNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

Thank you both, Senators, for being here today. I have got to tell 

you, I think this is probably one of the most important hearings 

that we have held this year, maybe this entire cycle. Juxtapose 

that when, you know—to me, we should have all the major networks here listening to you two tell us what we really need to pay 

attention to. You know, certainly when the Salahis were here talking to us, you know, every damn network in the world was here, 

and the well was full of photographers, you know. 

I suspect that we are stuck somewhere between Chicken Little 

and an ostrich in looking at this issue. You brought up Pakistan. 

You know, the Pew Organization did public opinion polls of the 

United States and Pakistan just recently; we are at 18 percent approval. Worse than Congress, actually, in Pakistan. But we had to 

do battle with that, so—— 

Comm. TALENT. President Obama gets that report and he would 

like to do something about it, and who does he detail to do something? We have no capability within the Government. We have better capability as political actors to change our numbers than we do 

to change our numbers, and why? We don’t have that organic capability within any of the civilian agencies. 

Mr. CARNEY. There are organizations that can do that, I 

think—— 

Comm. TALENT. Right, from the margin, but—— 

Mr. CARNEY. Sure. 

Comm. TALENT. We haven’t thought about how to develop. I am 

sorry to interrupt. 
30 

Mr. CARNEY. No, you are right. I mean, I would like to have the 

dialogue here. But one thing that I was struck by, so it is about a $17 billion number you are looking at—$3.5 billion over 5 years—— 

Comm. TALENT. Right. 

Mr. CARNEY [continuing]. Or whatever, something like that, over 

5 years. Does that include things like a surge capacity for hospitals? Now, I represent a district, for example, that is in the eastern part of Pennsylvania—the northeast part of Pennsylvania. We 

have a lot of hospital capability there. 

Assuming that, you know, based on the premise that we are 

going to have an attack in an urban area where it will do the most 

damage, you know, we are talking about Mr. Pascrell’s and Mr. 

King’s area probably. Well, do we have that surge capacity, from 

your opinion on this, or—— 

Comm. GRAHAM. Well, let me first—the number that I gave, 

which was $3.4 billion for 5 years, that is for the BioShield program. That is what it is going to cost to do the research to determine the most appropriate therapeutic against these pathogens 

that are most likely to be weaponized, and then to produce enough 

of the material that 90 percent of Americans could be treated in 

the event of a mass attack. It does not include the cost of some of 

the other aspects of building this response, such as surge capacity. 

Yes, I think that is an important issue. I served for 18 years on 

the Veterans Committee during a period of time in which we were 

dismantling a number of major VA hospitals as the number of veterans was declining. Many of these were in urban areas—big cities 

like New York and Chicago—which are the places that are probably most likely to be called upon to have some surge capacity. 

I advocated that we should step back and think about, do we 

really want to dismantle all this capability in the event that we 

might wish that we had it available? I think that the Congress 

needs to give some thought to how are we going to be able to respond if suddenly there are thousands—hundreds of thousands of 

people who are requiring immediate medical attention. It is not 

going to be very satisfying, I think, to the American people to say 

that we will just throw up our hands, do nothing, and accept that 

as a cost of living in this era of terror. 

Comm. TALENT. I think it ought to include—you want to be careful because they need the money to develop the actual medical 

countermeasures—but a decision-making process that was working 

well might very well go through the following logic. It might say, 

look, a lot of these pathogens attack, let’s say, people’s respiratory 

systems. So if we have—if we are certain that we have adequate 

capacity to get them on respirators and we can lengthen their lives 

that way that gives us greater time, then, for drugs to be dispensed 

and take effect. So it ought to be thought of as seamlessly as possible. 

I think you hit a really good insight. The surge capacity is related to the medical countermeasure question. The on-going challenge—none of us have complete answers to it—is how to deal with 

this fragmented, you know, bureaucracy so that people are cooperating enough that we get this seamless decision-making, that we 

don’t have—and in this case you have got FDA, you have got NIH, 
31 

you have got BARDA, you have got BioShield. Now, Secretary 

Sebelius is looking at this and we are going to be looking very carefully at what she comes up with, and we think you should, also. 

Mr. CARNEY. I agree, absolutely. You know, I want to echo all my 

colleagues here on the sort of ridiculous requirements that DHS 

has to go through in terms of committee reporting and things like 

that. We should be the bellybutton in Congress for all of this, to 

be quite honest. 

I hope if you haven’t had the opportunity that you share that 

with the President also. You know, he needs to hear it from a couple of credible people who are beyond the political process now, not 

those of us still in the midst of it. 

Comm. TALENT. Well, I mean, he served—he knows—— 

Mr. CARNEY. Yes. 

Comm. TALENT [continuing]. What the jurisdiction is like. I 

agree, by the way, with what Ms. Harman said, that it is better— 

this is one of the few areas where it is better in the Senate than 

it is here. They have more jurisdiction in their committee there. 

Mr. CARNEY. I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Pascrell. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Carney. 

The Chairman recognizes for 5 minutes the gentleman from 

Pennsylvania, Mr. Dent. 

Mr. DENT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senators, I thank you for being with us here today and talking 

about this WMD issue, particularly the concerns about biological 

attack. I assume that you believe that a biological attack would be 

more likely than, say, a nuclear attack because it is probably easier 

to develop or engineer a biological pathogen even though it may be 

easier to contain it and it is easier to prevent, obviously, a nuclear 

attack by controlling fissile material, and the President has been 

a leader on that issue, as have others. 

I read Graham Allison’s book, ‘‘Nuclear Terrorism,’’ and how it 

is easier to prevent that—of course, harder to contain the nuclear 

attacks. So I assume that that is the reasoning behind why you feel 

that biological attack is more likely. 

Comm. GRAHAM. That is certainly a part of the reason. The difficulty of developing a nuclear weapon is being demonstrated by 

Iran. Iran has had some 5,000 centrifuges working for several 

years trying to develop enough highly-enriched uranium to produce 

one bomb. 

Mr. DENT. It was always my understanding, if I read Allison’s 

book correctly, that if one had fissile material, was able to obtain 

it, steal it, buy it, that—and they had the know-how—they could 

develop a crude device—nuclear device—usually within a year, assuming they could get the fissile material. Is that your understanding, too? 

Comm. GRAHAM. Well, if you had gotten the Sears Roebuck catalog from A.Q. Khan—— 

Mr. DENT. Right. 

Comm. GRAHAM [continuing]. And ordered the actual physical 

vessel in which that highly-enriched uranium was going to be introduced it wouldn’t be a matter of months or weeks, it could be 

a matter of days before you could have a weapon that was ready 

to be used. But with biological, so many of those most likely to be 
32 

weaponized items are from nature itself. They don’t require much 

human intervention. Anthrax is a naturally-developing product 

from dead cows. In fact, the word ‘‘anthrax’’ is a Russian word that 

means ‘‘Siberian boil’’ because the first place it was seen was in Siberia in dead cattle. 

Other synthetic pathogens are readily developed in high-containment laboratories. The ability to then take that weaponized product and distribute it effectively, which has been a major impediment for biological weapons, witness the failed attempt to use it in 

the subway in Tokyo, the Department of Homeland Security feels 

that those distribution problems have now largely been solved, and 

that in the hands of competent technicians that there will be the 

ability to distribute it in a way that will be largely unnoticed until 

sufficient number of people have been impacted to have a weapon 

of mass destruction. 

Mr. DENT. Can I also ask you quickly about the dirty bomb’s radiological impact? I mean, I often don’t refer to that as a weapon 

of mass destruction, but a weapon of mass disruption—— 

Comm. TALENT. Right. 

Mr. DENT [continuing]. Because it will probably not—it may not 

kill as many people but it will certainly be a terrible disruption in 

the midst of this country and this economy, and contamination 

issues are very great. What are you predicting, or what do you see 

in the future as it relates to the likelihood of a dirty bomb attack 

somewhere in this country? 

Comm. TALENT. Well, when we started the Commission off the 

chairman and I had to make a decision about what we were going 

to get into and not get into. The problem is how to say something 

without trying to say everything. 

Mr. DENT. Right. 

Comm. TALENT. Actually, models developed within the intel community about how to—when something becomes a weapon of mass 

destruction. There was, like, grids, you know, impact, disruption, 

death, et cetera. We made an executive decision not to go heavily 

into chem or radiological weapons, and so I just don’t know that 

we are the best ones to answer that. 

Mr. DENT. Okay. That is fine. So you see it more as a weapon 

of mass disruption as—— 

Comm. TALENT. Yes. I mean, I agree totally with what you are 

saying, and—— 

Mr. DENT [continuing]. Destruction. Okay—— 

Comm. TALENT [continuing]. And there is a tremendous danger 

of it. I just don’t know that we are the—Bob might, out of his general knowledge of intel, be able to give you an answer whether 

the—to the extent that that is a specialized issue. We do know 

that, from the intel, that they are emphasizing bio as well as nuclear, and for all the reasons you indicate: Easier to get, easier to 

weaponize, easier to stockpile. The only advantage of bio over nuclear is that we can prepare for it a lot better. 

Mr. DENT. We can contain it a little better than nuclear. 

Comm. TALENT. You are right. You have got the whole—you 

know, you have got the concepts down right and you are reading 

a great author on this subject. 

Mr. DENT. I yield back. My time is up. 
33 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you very much, Mr. Dent. 

Now the Chairman recognizes for 5 minutes the gentleman from 

Oregon, Mr. DeFazio. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you two for your work. 

Just a couple of quick questions about our capabilities in terms 

of responding on biological attacks. I had brought to my attention 

by some folks from Corvallis, Oregon who are working with DOD 

that they have developed a capability, as have some of their competitors, to very quickly take an agent and develop, you know, an 

effective countermeasure vaccine, and they have demonstrated this 

capability. They have been working closely with DOD. 

I mean, I guess my question is, are we, in some places, making 

progress but we are not recognizing them over here because we are 

so fragmented? Because apparently there is a program called 

Transformational Medical Technologies Initiative at DOD—— 

Comm. GRAHAM. Right. 

Mr. DEFAZIO [continuing]. Which has been working with private 

sector folks who have come a long way in terms of being able to 

quickly respond to a diverse range of threats, but I am not sure 

that Homeland Security is aware of it or has any capability of digesting this or working with them. Are you—— 

Comm. GRAHAM. Sorry. Well, the answer is, I hope so, because 

we—one of the strengths of America is our entrepreneurship and 

our innovation. One of the things, however, we learned with the 

H1N1 is it is one thing to know what you need to have in order 

to have an effective therapeutic; it is another thing to scale it up 

quickly to be able to respond to the attack. We had 6 months’ notice with H1N1 and we still had a period where—— 

Mr. DEFAZIO. We are still using eggs. 

Comm. GRAHAM. Yes. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. I mean, that is the problem. But this is a breakthrough technology that these folks have worked with which would 

not require extensive large factories and those sorts of things and 

can be rapidly replicated. 

Comm. TALENT. I think you put your finger on a real strength 

that we are not taking advantage of. You know, our diverse country, our Federal system is a disadvantage in the sense that it is 

fragmented; it is an advantage in the sense that we have all these 

really great people out there thinking about things and doing 

things in Oregon, or in the public health system, whatever, but we 

don’t—you know, the others don’t know about it. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Right. 

Comm. TALENT. It is the need for integration within the system 

of decision-making. This is where, you know, you all who know the 

Government and just—you have years and years, Mr. DeFazio, I 

know you do—in thinking about how this Government operates, 

could maybe think outside the box about practical solutions for 

solving that problem. 

Now, one of the things Bob and I have talked about, and we have 

never put it in an official report, and the reason we haven’t is because we get people coming to us, just as you do, just as you have 

home district people who say we have this tremendous solution and 

you saw them, right? 
34 

Pick the right agency and to set up maybe a group of people— 

and this could even be experts from the outside who are sitting in 

on this—and just inviting those around the country who have solutions—you would have to screen it a little bit because you know 

you will get people who have developed something—but who have 

solutions to some aspect of this preparedness problem that is working in some context. Maybe their local fire protection districts 

picked it up or whatever—to bring it to this group which is then 

connected to all the other parts of the system, Federal and State, 

and can say, ‘‘Hey, this is really a great device for decontamination.’’ I think I have just seen decontamination technology out 

there that could probably solve this problem if we knew the right 

agency to get it to and—whether it is EPA or whatever. 

I think you have put your finger on a very important empowerment tool here. It would be a good thing for you—I am giving you 

more work, now, to do—to think in terms of how to do this, and 

maybe as this bill moves to put it in there. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Right. It is an on-going frustration, and I am sure 

you had it when, you know, when you were in the Senate and representing folks with good ideas, is how do you connect them with 

the decision-maker, because the decision-makers are out there putting out an RFP somewhere to other people who haven’t had this 

breakthrough, and, you know, we are floundering around, it just 

seems to me, spending a lot of money and we are not getting to the 

effective—— 

Comm. TALENT. There are a lot of technologies resident in DOD 

that are not being used in the rest of the system, and we shouldn’t 

blame DOD. I am sitting on another panel that Bob was able to 

escape—it is the independent panel reviewing the Quadrennial Defense Review—and we just heard a report from the assistant secretary who does homeland for them. She is really great, and she 

was talking about, they have these resident capabilities, but then 

chain-of-command issues because the Governors want—in the 

event of it, the Governors want to run the show, and how do they 

do all this stuff? It is just this constant problem you run into of 

fragmentation within the Executive branch, and as between the 

Executive and the State and local. 

This body here and this committee is an institutional integrator, 

because everybody respects you, believe it or not, and people have 

to listen to you on a certain level. But what you do with that is 

the challenge. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Yes. Thank you. 

One other quick question. This is just sort of a personal crusade. 

There is a chemical that is produced in the United States. It is no 

longer allowed for new production or broadcast use. It is called 

Compound 1080, and it is an odorless, colorless, antidoteless, highly-concentrated poison that is used for wildlife—you know, for killing wildlife and predators. It has been identified, you know, by 

both the FBI and DOD as a particularly high threat. 

I have been trying to get, you know, the production of this stuff 

stopped. They found some of it, if you remember, in containers in 

Iraq, you know, Saddam was apparently playing around with it, 

trying to figure out what to do with it maybe. You know, I think 

producing something like that here in the United States—and it is 
35 

still out there in the United States—it has been stockpiled in different places—is a real problem. 

Have you come across this, or has it been brought to your attention—okay. All right. Because I have had a bill—— 

Comm. TALENT. We have now. I mean—— 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Yes. Okay. 

The facility that produces it has virtually no security. It does 

have sort of a dilapidated barbed-wire fence around it, but anyway, 

I would just raise that hopefully to get someone’s attention or support for my proposal to ban the production of it. 

Comm. GRAHAM. If you are looking for a homework assignment 

there are people—significant numbers of people—who start with 

the premise that biological weapons aren’t capable of being utilized 

in a way that would constitute a weapon of mass destruction. What 

we encountered was, up until President Nixon, who terminated the 

U.S. development of an offensive biological weapons program, we 

probably had the best biological weapons program in the world in 

the 1960s, and it was enormously effective. 

If you want to get some sense of what was capable of being done 

50 years ago you might ask for a briefing on what our own program 

was and then speculate what 50 years of further scientific engagement with the worst biological materials might have brought us to. 

That will keep you up at night. 

Comm. TALENT. As another suggestion, if—because you all have 

to deal with this issue—learn a scenario that is relevant to your 

districts, and when you talk about it run through the scenario, because people get it then. I mean, the one I use is, St. Louis we 

gather on the Fourth of July at the riverfront, you know, to celebrate the holiday. Isolate anthrax, turn it into a slurry or a powder, 

get a pickup truck, put a shell in the back of it, punch a hole in 

the top of it and drive up and down Memorial Drive with a paint 

sprayer blowing it up in the air. Let the winds take it. 

I mean, Mr. King, we have seen, and Mr. Chairman, we have 

seen the modeling for New York. You know, in the summer you expose several million people in New York; you kill, depending on 

how effective it is, a tenth to, like, a third of that. 

Mr. PASCRELL. It brings it home. 

Comm. TALENT. It absolutely does. 

Mr. PASCRELL. It brings it home. 

Comm. TALENT. Think how many times people are gathered in 

New York over the summer for one reason or another. It is—— 

Mr. PASCRELL. Mr. DeFazio, thank you for your questioning. On 

target, as usual. 

I would like to turn now—the Chairman recognizes for 5 minutes 

the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Olson. 

Mr. OLSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you much to our witnesses for coming today. I want to 

thank you for your service as elected officials. Thank you for your 

expertise and thank you for your commitment to protect not only 

Americans but the citizens of the world. 

My question: I kind of want to follow up on some of the discussion we have had about the threat of India-Pakistan, and on a 

daily basis we are learning more about the threats that are posed 

by terrorist groups not in the places that are covered on the news, 
36 

you know, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, but other places, like 

Yemen, where al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, and Somalia, 

with the Al-Shabaab movement. They are no longer a regional 

threat. Their stated goal, as you all know, is to strike the United 

States and our allies. 

Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has already shown some 

signs that attest—on Christmas day with the bomb on the aircraft, 

and possibly having some connections with the shootings in my 

home State of Texas at Fort Hood. My question to you all is, what 

is the likelihood that the next WMD attack will be from one of 

these groups, that it will be forthcoming from them and not where 

kind of our focus is? I appreciate your comments on that issue. 

Comm. GRAHAM. I can’t give you a statistical probability of that 

occurring, but I think it is certainly within the realm of reality. To 

me, one of the most frightening things about what happened on 

Christmas day is that it broke what we had assumed to be a relationship. 

There are about 60 of these regional or sub-regional groups that 

have an affiliation with al-Qaeda—big al-Qaeda in the caves of 

Pakistan. In the past the assumption had been that those affiliate 

groups were disciplined by big al-Qaeda and they would not take 

a major operation without approval. This situation in December 

seemed to be a break from that tradition, that these regional 

groups are starting to be self-initiating in their operations. 

If that is, in fact, the case, the level of risk has just gone up significantly, because now we don’t have a small group of people making decisions; we have got a large group of people, frequently with 

a diverse set of motivations behind their actions. So whether they 

end up being the one who delivers the WMD or whether it is their 

older parent, it won’t make much difference to the people who are 

affected by it. 

Comm. TALENT. I can’t say it better than the Chairman said it. 

Mr. OLSON. Okay. Well, thank you very much. 

Just another question: You know, a lot of our focus here in preventing terrorist attacks is on aircraft, because that is how we have 

been attacked in the past. I represent a district that is within the 

greater Houston area, and unfortunately, I would argue—I could 

argue that we are the best target for terrorists to attack. I mean, 

we are a major city, the Nation’s third-largest city. 

We have a port that you could, you know, drive a tanker very 

close to the downtown area, close to the urban areas. It is for our 

commerce; it is the second-largest port in our country. We have got 

a huge medical center there which serves the entire region, and if 

you were to have a biological attack and take out its capabilities 

you could have a very, very serious situation there. 

I guess my question is, in some of your studies are you seeing 

any evidence that the terrorists out there who—again, with the 

folks on aircraft right now as their mechanism to attack us—are 

going to get wise and realize, you know, we can get a tanker, you 

know, a tanker on a ship in the Port of Houston, or we can just 

get something across our borders. Our State has the largest border 

with Mexico, and, you know, we can achieve our goals not by folks 

on aircraft but by folks on these very—I think very easy ways, unfortunately, to hurt our country. 
37 

In your studies do you see any evidence that the terrorists are 

actually thinking about that way of coming at us instead of on aircraft? 

Comm. GRAHAM. Well, I will give you another homework assignment. I spent 3 weeks last summer in Great Britain in large part 

talking to their intelligence, law enforcement, political groups as to 

terrorism in United Kingdom. They have been dealing with terrorism much longer than we have. 

One of the things they do is they engage citizens to a much higher level than has been our practice. They told me a story about a 

citizen who came to an appropriate law enforcement agency and 

said, ‘‘I think I know how a terrorist would deliver a weapon of 

mass destruction in London, or Manchester, or Birmingham,’’ and 

the answer was they would do it with an ambulance. Why an ambulance? Because that is a vehicle that people tend to defer to, allowing it to get close to the target before detonation. 

Well, this led Scotland Yard to ask the question, ‘‘Do we know 

where our ambulances are in the United Kingdom?’’ They did a 

survey and were stunned to find out how many were unaccounted 

for. 

I would suggest you might take as a question in your own community, is somebody responsible for knowing the whereabouts of all 

emergency vehicles which might provide the platform for a relatively safe and unimpeded vehicle of mass destruction? So yes, I 

think we have tended to solve yesterday’s problem. 

If a fellow named Reed gets on an airplane from London to 

Miami and has something bad in his shoes the next thing we are 

doing is having everybody take their shoes off at the airport. If 

somebody, as the man did in December, has it in his underwear, 

we are now going to take pictures of everybody’s underwear. 

We have got to get out of this chasing the past and take a more 

futuristic approach asking, what are the most likely ways, not the 

ways that have already been shown to be used, but that a thoughtful, considerate, smart adversary would likely choose? 

Comm. TALENT. Just a couple of quick comments. Senator Graham said some things that triggered some thinking. 

First of all, it is really important that we get a lot of this thinking and intensity level coming from the grassroots and local communities upward in the system. You all in Houston know, if you 

think about it and you are motivated to think about it, where these 

threats might come from better than the FBI is going to know sitting there in Washington. 

So this is one of the reasons we do repeat the urgency of the 

threat, keeping in mind what Ms. Harman said. This is not an attempt to get people to panic at all. It is so people will recognize a 

threat, get past the sense of panic or despair, and then just adopt 

it as sort of a working reality in their lives so that people, as they 

have done in Britain, as they have done in Houston, as they have 

done to some degree in New York, which is a leader in this, just 

people recognize this is part of the world that we have to live in. 

So somebody in Houston has got to be thinking about, how could 

this—how could they hit us here differently than they have done 

it before? 
38 

The other point I want to mention that is related to this, because 

it is—it has to do with community action and preparedness: I really 

want to applaud the draft bill, as we understand it, because you 

raised the subject of making sure first responders and their families have the med kits. 

You mentioned the big hospital you have got there. Well, if those 

people are working in that hospital, if there is some kind of bioattack and they are worried about their families, then that is what 

they are going to pay attention to, and who can blame them? So 

we need to make certain that this group of people has the medical 

countermeasures, that they have it for their families at minimum. 

Then you also raised, I think, a very important issue—it is gutsy 

of you to raise it—the question of giving med kits out just to the 

general population. Under what circumstances is that an appropriate thing to do? I think you ought to—we ought to be studying 

that. Just particularly in certain high-risk cities, you know, Houston, New York, whatever, to what extent do we just say to people, 

‘‘You can empower yourself and your family by having these med 

kits.’’ 

Now, there are plusses and minuses to that, but we have got to 

be thinking outside the box and your legislation pushes the Secretary in the direction of studying that, and I think that is good. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Olson. Good questions. 

The Chairman recognizes for 5 minutes the gentlewoman from 

Texas, Ms.—I am sorry—Ms. Jackson Lee. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very 

much for your recognition and for this hearing. 

Let me thank the two co-chairs and probe Senator Graham on 

a point that you have made, and then pursue the line of questioning that my colleague just engaged in with respect to Yemen 

and other African nations. I think we have had this discussion before, even as the Homeland Security Committee was being crafted, 

and that is, what is the jurisdiction and how do we find a home 

for National security and antiterrorism efforts on behalf of this Nation and allow one entity to be in power? 

Senator Graham, in your testimony you mentioned the jurisdictional complexity that we are in, and I note that in grading us with 

a grade that most students don’t want to receive—an ‘‘F’’—you 

have reform Congressional oversight to better address the intelligence. If you would respond to that along with the question of 

what I think is crucial, is training the next generation of National 

security experts—I am going to add another question in and then 

I will listen. 

I, too, I have just come back from Yemen and looked at it in two 

different directions. One, of course, the government’s commitment, 

if at all, to nonproliferation, and I would like your assessment of 

that; but also, the social issues of large numbers of unemployed 

youth who are obviously ready targets for al-Qaeda recruitment. 

What role do we have to play in that aspect to quash the ripeness of those who are there to be engaged in terrorism, and what 

role is Saudi Arabia playing, if you are familiar with them completely closing the border and not, themselves, dealing with their 

neighbor in a number of ways—of course, the nonproliferation and 

al-Qaeda getting their hands on nuclear materials, but also, is 
39 

there another way Saudi can be more involved in what potentially 

might be happening in Yemen? I thank you both for your presence 

here. 

Senator Talent, you may join in on some of those questions that 

I have asked. Thank you, again. 

Comm. GRAHAM. Well, let me take the prerogative of picking one 

of your questions, and I will answer it, and then if Senator Talent 

would like to pick another one, and that is this issue of preparing 

the next generation of National security officers. I think this is a 

very significant issue. 

Our inquiry into 9/11—the joint House-Senate—in my opinion, 

our most important single conclusion was that the fundamental 

lapses that led to—led the intelligence community to be blind before 9/11 were found in the quality of people who were involved in 

their responsibilities. 

The Congress, I hope, after more than 5 years of procrastination, 

is about to pass legislation to establish what has been referred to 

as the intelligence equivalent of the Reserve Officer Training Corps 

for the military, where we will have a regularized process for the 

recruitment, preparation, particularly in areas of science and languages, of the next generation of our intelligence community leadership, and then a smooth process for their integration into the 

community. I think that is of extremely high importance and I am 

pleased that it looks as if it is about to happen. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Do you think we are moving fast enough? 

Comm. GRAHAM. Well, I think we should have done it 5 years 

ago, but better late than never. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Senator Talent, would you take the jurisdictional question about whether or not we have a strong enough jurisdictional oversight, one place, one unified place on this issue, 

and how do we move to that? You know that is a challenge here 

in the United States Congress—— 

Comm. TALENT. Yes, it is. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE [continuing]. House and Senate. 

Comm. TALENT. While Senator Graham and I know the practical 

obstacles, and I have made this point in a number of contexts, I 

think you are exactly right to be concerned about it, and it takes 

what ought to be a real positive Congressional oversight—I am a 

believer in Congressional oversight because the agencies pay attention when Congress gets involved—but it takes what should be a 

positive and turns it into what I think we all have to admit is a 

negative. 

I mean, there is a reason Secretary Napolitano has contacted the 

Chairman, and Mr. Pascrell, and Mr. King to say, ‘‘Could you be 

certain to raise this issue?’’ It is not because she—I mean, because 

she is hearing from her under secretaries and assistant secretaries 

that they are having to spend too much time in too many committees that they ought to be spending doing all of this other stuff we 

are talking about, and that is the practical matter. 

Now, you all know the Cabinet Secretary is the last thing in the 

world they want to have to do, is get involved with telling Congress 

how to change its internal procedures. So if she is doing that that 

means this is a big problem over there. 
40 

I think a combination of making certain that the key committee 

staff people and Chairmen and Members on the committees here 

have got these threat briefings so they know this is the security of 

the country at stake, this is not a fight over a typical oversight 

issue, and then if we can make the problem their problem—in dealing with the Congress, once you get the other person to accept the 

fact, this is a problem I have to participate in solving, I can’t just 

be an obstacle to solutions. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So you think one department should be 

strengthened with—such as Homeland Security? 

Comm. TALENT. Within the Executive branch, yes. Then here in 

the Congress I think a committee should be—and it is easy for us 

to say here because it ought to be this committee. I mean, we are 

not testifying now before Judiciary or something where we would 

have to tell them, you probably need to give something up. 

I agree completely with what you and Senator Graham were saying about, within—experts within intel. 

Let me add one comment, because it is relevant to your other 

point, ma’am. In order to get the kind of workforce that we need, 

they are going to have to be empowered to move more quickly in 

setting up this reserve and hiring people. That means they are 

going to have to cut down on some of this review, you know, so that 

they—think about this: You get a great person graduating from, 

you know, you pick it, some great school, and they have studies in 

this area and they know it, and the CIA wants to hire them. 

Now they have got to get—go through clearances and this stuff, 

it takes a year. Well, what top-notch person is going to sit around 

for a year waiting to see whether an offer can be made? So we are 

going to have to shorten that procedure of time. That means there 

is a possibility some mistakes could get made if you are hiring hundreds of people. 

I think it is important, Mr. Chairman, that this committee and 

the Intelligence Committee, if a mistake occurs that way, unless 

somebody clearly was negligent, that you not play gotcha with 

them. Don’t have a hearing and then hammer on them. You see 

what I am saying? Then back them up, because we are going to 

have some mistakes of commission rather than omission. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you. Thank you very much. 

Thank you, Ms. Jackson Lee, for your questions. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I thank you. I just want to conclude to you, 

Mr. Chairman, and say that I think Yemen is an important issue 

for this committee. Several Members have been and I hope the 

committee will—I didn’t hear their answer on that, but I hope the 

committee will also have input on that as we go—the Commission, 

rather, as we go forward. 

Thank you. I yield back. 

Mr. PASCRELL. The Chairman now recognizes for 5 minutes the 

gentleman from the great State of Alabama, Mr. Rogers. 

Mr. ROGERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you both for being here. This has been a really good hearing, and I agree with Mr. Carney, it is unfortunate that we don’t 

have the same media attention for what you have had to say that 

we had for the Salahis, which was just a joke. 
41 

But I want to talk, obviously, first about something that you 

said, Senator Graham, earlier to Ms. Harman about how we get 

this jurisdiction issue resolved. I think it is going to take people 

like you, who don’t have a dog in the fight, to help push this issue 

with the administration. Secretary Napolitano has talked with us, 

and she is just—it is a real problem, as you just said, Secretary— 

Senator Talent. 

But I was pleased after the Christmas day bombing when Lee 

Hamilton was interviewed the next day, and this is one of the 

things he mentioned. He said it is time for the Congress to have 

the political will to implement that last 9/11 Commission recommendation on jurisdiction, because we have this diluted focus 

right now in the House as a result of this jurisdictional problem. 

So I hope that Lee Hamilton and Tom Kean will do what I am asking you to do, and that is communicate to the President and to the 

Speaker, this is an issue that does not need to be left undealt with. 

But having said all that, I want to talk about rural preparedness 

and mass evacuation. I have the Center for Domestic Preparedness 

in my district. It is the only facility in the country that trains first 

responders as to how to deal with an attack of mass destruction, 

and it is a great facility. 

One of my concerns, as being a Member who represents a rural 

Congressional district, is that we don’t push that training out into 

rural America, because I am of the opinion that when there is an 

attack in a major urban area—and I don’t think it is just going to 

be New York, New Jersey; could be St. Louis, or it could be Birmingham, Alabama, or Charlotte, North Carolina, or financial hubs 

of the region, these people are going to be evacuated out into rural 

America to get them out of there. 

While we are doing some work in this area and training first responders, I don’t think we are pushing that training out into rural 

America. 

I have been an advocate to try to get the Center for Domestic 

Preparedness funded to take that training to rural America, because a general rule in rural America, as you know in Florida, and 

I know you know in Missouri, it is volunteers that are working in 

these fire and rescue departments, and they can’t leave and take 

2 weeks to go to the Center for this free training because they can’t 

leave their jobs. They are not a professional firefighter. So anything 

that you could do to help let the Department know that you think 

this is an area unattended to I think would be beneficial. 

I am pleased that at the Center they also have the Noble training facility—Noble Hospital—which trains, as you talked about a 

few minutes ago, these hospital workers, if there is an attack, they 

could be thinking about their loved ones. We are trying to deal 

with that and trying to bring hospital administrators as well as 

caregivers in and train them as to what it is going to be like, what 

the environment is going to be like. 

It is very state-of-the-art, but we need more messaging to get 

that information out there. We need more hospitals to recognize 

that it could be them that has this problem and they need to be 

prepared to deal with it. 
42 

But having said that, do you think that there is enough being 

done in the way of preparedness in rural America for the mass 

evacuations out of an urban center after an attack? 

Comm. GRAHAM. I guess I am not aware of any comprehensive 

planning for that eventuality. So that would lead me to say that 

no, we have not assessed where these urban populations are likely 

to go in the aftermath of such an attack. 

States like yours and mine, which have had some experience 

with evacuations for hurricanes, know what those circumstances 

are, and they would be much more difficult if the reason for the 

evacuation was a man-made nuclear or biological attack rather 

than nature giving us a hurricane. I think you put your finger on 

an important issue, and one that I think would be worthy of some 

further exploration by this committee, to heighten the sensitivity of 

the appropriate Federal agencies to this likelihood. 

Mr. ROGERS. Well, I was pleased in your earlier answers to questions to see you all both recognize that we have a real problem, and 

you talked about the funding with Ms. Harman—the inadequate 

funding for health care providers in the—to prepare them for training. 

I don’t know if you all were aware, but I talked with Mr. Carney 

and Ms. Richardson, who both chair subcommittees in this full 

committee, there has been an effort internally within the Department to basically dismantle the Office of Health Affairs, which we 

spent 5 years configuring to deal exactly with what you are talking 

about. Fortunately, in the last couple of weeks Secretary Napolitano came in and stopped that effort. But it is important that we 

remember that that is a critical element of being prepared to respond to a weapon of mass destruction attack. 

Comm. TALENT. I think ‘‘we don’t know’’ is the question. I mean, 

you say, ‘‘Are we prepared enough?’’ I would answer, ‘‘No,’’ but then 

I would also answer, ‘‘We don’t know.’’ 

You know, I was approached by some people locally in Missouri 

who explained to me that our technology, in terms of organizational 

directories—just very simple of these various first responder 

groups—is so unsophisticated and so poorly linked together that 

they don’t know what capabilities their fellows—their brothers and 

sisters in the same service have. 

So the fire protection districts in suburban St. Louis don’t know, 

if there is a disaster, what fire trucks, or hazmat outfits, or diving 

outfits are available around the State of Missouri, and there is no 

easy way to find out except pick up the phone and call the chiefs. 

So we don’t know, and if you don’t know how can you structure 

a plan where you are engaging? Because an intelligent plan would 

probably say, ‘‘Well, we don’t need to train everybody in every rural 

fire protection outfit about everything, but we ought to have some 

of them trained in some things so that they can contribute and 

help in the event of a disaster in Birmingham, or whatever.’’ 

We don’t know, and that is the lack of integration and fragmentation that is such a huge issue. So, you know, failing that, 

yes, you have got to keep these organizations alive so you can keep 

these folks in the game. I mean, I would agree with you. 

On the jurisdictional, let me just—I am sitting here thinking 

about the ideas we have had. Maybe this is not the place to air a 
43 

plan, maybe I should be more secret about it. But if you all had 

a hearing where you encouraged Secretary Napolitano to testify as 

to the practical consequences—and maybe you have already done 

this—and the President just privately let her know that even 

though she would take some flack from some other people for it, 

that he would support her in it, and then you guys came up with 

a resolution for both the caucus—the Democratic Caucus and the 

Republican Conference at the beginning of the next—where you got 

up and offered a resolution instructing the leadership, and maybe 

they knew about it beforehand and privately supported you, to 

come up with a solution and put it to the Members in both parties—— 

Mr. ROGERS. That is a good idea. 

Comm. TALENT [continuing]. And just let them, you know, let 

them vote on it, you know, in the context of some publicity and, 

you know, do you want a solution to this or not? At a certain point 

the people are blocking this, and I understand that. I mean, I was 

a committee Chairman; I was there for the—you know, I know all 

that, but at a certain point they are going to say, ‘‘You know what? 

The reasons to do this are beginning to outweigh the reasons not 

to do it.’’ 

Mr. ROGERS. Thank you very much. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Rogers. I think encouraging 

points you brought up, and the response from the panel is very, 

very, very important. 

We have to bite the bullet on turf. We are so frightened to go 

near that issue. Thank you for your encouragement. 

Comm. TALENT. It is easy for me. I don’t have to stand—— 

Mr. PASCRELL. Leader King and myself have been talking about 

this for many, many moons, but now we have a Secretary finally 

coming forth and saying she really wants to work with us, so—— 

The Chairman now recognizes for 5 minutes the gentlewoman 

from Nevada, Ms. Titus. 

Ms. TITUS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Senators, for taking time to come and talk to us 

about this important topic of keeping Americans safe, and our allies and people around the world. I represent southern Nevada, 

and—— 

Comm. GRAHAM. I gathered that. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. TITUS. We have 450,000 hotel rooms in some of the largest 

hotels in the world, and they are like small communities unto 

themselves. I know that your report you stress the need for increased involvement from individuals communities, and I think we 

are moving towards that, and I am very pleased that we are going 

to be working on this legislation. 

But something that I see that is missing that I would ask your 

advice on is how do we involve the private sector as we move forward? I know that is not on your score card, but could you give us 

some advice that we might take into account as we draw up this 

legislation, and also tell us how you think we are doing on that 

measure, if we are doing anything at all? 
44 

Comm. GRAHAM. There is an organization—it is called BENS, 

that is the Business Executives for National Security—which has 

as its mission to bring the private sector into these issues of homeland and National security, and our assessment was they had done 

a very excellent job where they had been employed to do this, and 

I use the word—not that they were hired, but that they were engaged. 

I would suggest that might be a place for you to start to have 

a conversation between the business community of southern Nevada and this BENS organization to see how they might be able 

to work together. They bring a lot of expertise to the table. 

Comm. TALENT. I was going to say, Congresswoman, that I think 

a key to this is that private actors need to know that the partnership model is going to be followed, rather than the adversarial 

model. So, for—and your legislation reflects that, for example, in 

the lab regulation. 

People who are running these high-containment labs, yes, it is a 

potential security problem, which we recognize in our report; it is 

also the answer to the problem, because they are the ones developing the research, the life-saving countermeasures, and they need 

to know that their regulators are not going to treat them like the 

enemy, okay, that they are going to partner with them, unless they 

have some reason. 

Now, obviously if you discover some security risk or something, 

and I would say this the same thing with the businesses that import and export pathogens, et cetera, they all—all the people leading this that we run into want to be part of the solution. So if they 

are treated as partners, if you have negotiated rulemaking, if you 

include them in on this—this would include the travel and tourism 

community. 

You know, you don’t want the Government to hand down from 

on high, ‘‘This is what you now have to do.’’ You know, you want 

to include them in as partners rather than as adversaries. I think 

that is a very important model and an important signal for you all 

to send to the Executive branch. 

Ms. TITUS. Well, I say that it is especially important in the hospitality industry. Nobody has better security than we have in Las 

Vegas, so we should be taking advantage of some of that expertise. 

On the other hand, when you are on holiday you are away from 

home and so you have less awareness of what resources are available, what road to take to get out of town, where you can access 

evacuation points, all of that, so having the hospitality industry involved—and I will look at the BENS group, too—I think would be 

very important and useful to us. 

Thank you. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Ms. Titus. 

Before I ask a question, Peter King has a question. 

Mr. KING. I am going to have to leave in a second, so I appreciate 

the Chairman giving me this. 

I would just ask Chairman Graham and Chairman Talent if you 

can get back to us on this: In the Lieberman-Collins bill in the Senate they seem to focus more on the international aspect than we 

are so far in our legislation. Is that going to be very costly? You 

mentioned the OMB before. 
45 

But if you could just get back to us, take a look at their bill, with 

how significant you think it is that maybe we should expand more 

of an international component, or should we try and get what we 

can by focusing domestically? So if you would just take a look at 

that for us I would appreciate your input. Thank you. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Peter King. 

It has always been my belief that if our State and local officials 

are not an integral part of our homeland security strategy—both 

pointed this out many, many times—then we have no such thing 

as homeland security. All we have then are some fancy bureaucratic plans, because the great majority of our first responders, the 

people who actually help prevent and respond to emergencies, are 

at the State and local levels. They are there first, before the Federal Government is involved, before anybody is involved; they will 

be the first to be moving. 

That is exactly why Mr. King and I made State and local coordination an integral part of weapons of mass destruction legislation, 

both at the preparedness and response levels. I would like you both 

to comment on your thoughts on this issue, especially in regards 

to the need for this coordination both before and after a possible 

weapons of mass destruction attack, be it nuclear, biological, radiological, chemical, whatever. 

Senator Graham. 

Comm. GRAHAM. Yes. I could not agree with you more. It is particularly true on the biological aspect because the public health 

service, which is in most areas a combination of State and local responsibility, will play such an absolutely central role that is illustrative of the broader issue of coordination of State and local with 

the Federal partnership. 

When we gave an ‘‘F’’ to our response capability we were giving 

an ‘‘F’’ to the Nation, not to one level of government, because we 

think that fundamental failure has been the failure to develop a 

means by which all of the critical elements that are actually going 

to be out there and will make a difference on the ground, life or 

death, for people who have been impacted—how effectively they 

will understand their mission, be able to execute their mission and 

not stumble over each other or leave gaps of unprotected people. 

Comm. TALENT. I would agree, and I think this is an area, Mr. 

Chairman, where we could do a lot informally as between leaders. 

If, for example, Secretary Napolitano, or the DNI, or somebody presented at a National Government’s Association meeting, and to emphasize the nature of this threat, so to say to the Governors, ‘‘Look, 

you are an integral part of this. We are going to recognize that, but 

we need you to make certain that your offices don’t treat this as 

a business-as-usual thing. This is not an excuse for you to cut your 

public health spending and hope that you can get Federal dollars 

to replace it.’’ 

So once you get to the top—the Governors themselves and say, 

‘‘This is going to be a National effort; you are an important part 

of it,’’ you need to recognize personally and make sure your key 

people recognize that this has to be reflected in State priorities as 

well as Federal. I think that is own for their seat at the table, but 

that is informal. It is not something you legislate, it is just something that—as between leaders ought to occur. 
46 

Mr. PASCRELL. You pointed out earlier, and we have been there 

several times, that how they approach these particular sensitive, 

urgent issues in England is very different than we approach it 

here. It would seem to me—I have come to this conclusion; I don’t 

know if my good friend, Mr. Lungren, would agree with me—that 

there is a bottom-up approach, that you are looking at the folks 

who are on duty in the local level to foster ideas so that they really 

focus, and this is really homeland security. 

I have got one other quick area, and then we will ask Mr. Lungren if he has any questions. 

We have neglected, I think, looking at how our vaccination policy 

plays in our deterrence for the effects of a possible biological attack. You and I both agree—I think we do—that the next attack 

will be biological. We expect it to be between now and 2013. 

Our legislation, that Peter—Mr. King and I have been working 

on diligently, with your staff and everybody else’s staff, calls for the 

Secretary of Health and Human Services to review the adequacy of 

vaccination and antimicrobial distribution policies, guidance and 

information provided to the public in light of known biological 

threats to the United States. 

Realizing we can’t vaccinate everybody against every possible 

disease, I think we should at least let the first responder community volunteer to get immunized against those biological agents we 

have been told pose material threats to the United States. Do you 

agree with that? In addition to HHS, who else do you think should 

be involved in reviewing our vaccine policy? 

Comm. GRAHAM. Mr. Chairman, could I ask your indulgence? I 

am afraid I have a commitment this afternoon in New York and 

I have got to catch a plane, which is going to leave without me unless I leave fairly soon. So if I could conclude by expressing my appreciation for the opportunity that you afforded this, and Senator 

Talent has indicated that he can stay—— 

Comm. TALENT. Decidedly the ‘‘B Team,’’ but willing to stay for 

you or Mr. Lungren if you like. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Great. I would appreciate that very much. 

I really want to thank you, Senator Graham. Your contributions 

before and now to this Nation—your service has been impeccable, 

and we want you to catch that plane, but we are going to be talking as we go along and finishing this bill. Thank you. 

Comm. GRAHAM. We look forward to that very much, and thank 

you for your leadership. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, sir. 

Comm. TALENT. Yes, you have put your finger on a real problem, 

Mr. Chairman, and we have talked a lot about this. I mean, we are 

still making vaccines using chicken eggs. I don’t know if your staff 

has informed you, we actually—Senator Graham actually did a 

video on it, which was quite an experience. 

You know, we had 6 months’ notice with H1N1, and we didn’t 

have enough vaccine, which is like, just, it is incredible. Now, I 

think it is very important that we do what you talked about, that 

we make certain the first responder community has whatever medical countermeasures we can come up with to protect them so they 

feel secure and, you know, can then do their job of protecting the 

rest of us in the even of an attack. 
47 

You do raise an issue here, which is—I think you are raising this 

issue, if I understand your question correctly—should we expedite 

procedures, for example, with FDA approval to get them these vaccines quicker? 

Mr. PASCRELL. Right. 

Comm. TALENT. You know, that is a controversial subject. We did 

that with anthrax and there have been some issues involved with 

it. 

I think we need a decision-making structure where that is an 

open possibility to be decided on a case-by-case basis. You know, 

I think it depends on how crucial it is, how high-risk this population is, how much—how far along FDA is. I think it depends on 

a series of things. 

But we need a decision-making structure so that somebody is capable of saying, ‘‘Yes, we need to let this go and do this in this instance with regard to this drug.’’ We don’t really have that. 

Now, we are putting some pretty high hopes in the review that 

is going on now in the Executive branch. We think they are energized, and I am certain you and the staff on the committee are 

watching it, so let’s see what they come up with, is what I would 

say to you, which should be completed pretty quickly, shouldn’t it? 

So let’s see what happens, but it is a crucial issue. You are right, 

we have to have this first responder community protected or they 

are not going to be able to protect us. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman recognizes for 5 minutes the gentleman from California, Mr. Lungren. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am sorry 

I missed a good deal of the proceedings, but I was handling the 

suspension bill that was honoring the 10th year of Father Coughlin 

as our chaplain, and there were a lot of people speaking, including 

the Speaker, so it took me more time than I thought. So I thank 

you. 

If I had a lot of time I could address each question with a different manner of referring to Mr. Vice President Talent, there. I 

could call him Senator, I could call him Congressman, I could call 

him Leader, I could call him Chairman, but I know we don’t have 

enough time so I will just call him—— 

Comm. TALENT. Jim is fine. 

Mr. LUNGREN [continuing]. Jim. 

You mentioned early on about the failure of the Congress where 

we got a big ‘‘F’’ on reorganizing ourselves, and you briefly mentioned opportunity costs lost. Could you just tell us what you mean 

by that? 

Comm. TALENT. Sure. The negative of it is that people in the Executive branch have to spend too much time before too many committees and subcommittees, so that is the area where damage is 

positively done to what they are trying to do—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. It is not just testifying; it is all the preparation 

of testimony, going over it and getting other staff to do it, and so 

forth. 

Comm. TALENT. So you would become an obstructive force, let’s 

just be—not you, but the institution. Then the positive does not 

happen because you don’t have clear channels of oversight. 
48 

Nobody from this authorizing committee was there when the 

stimulus bill, which, again, forget about what you think of it as 

economic policy, this was an opportunity to fund a lot of this stuff 

and there wasn’t anybody there to go to Mr. Obey and his people, 

and Jerry Lewis and his people and say, ‘‘Look, you have got to 

make certain this money is in there,’’ because nobody had the clear 

responsibility; whereas, had it been a DOD priority you would have 

had Mr. Skelton there, and the Ranking Member there, and somebody would have done it. 

We all know how this place operates. If everybody has responsibility over something nobody has responsibility, and so it doesn’t 

get done. You were right to point it out. 

We are not just saying it because Congress is an easy target for 

commissions like us. I will say one other thing to you, Mr. Lungren. Within this community of bipartisan commissions, and I am 

sort of operating in this world now, there is an increasing sense of 

resolution that they are going to keep hitting this institution with 

this issue. I mean, the political cost to you all of continuing not to 

do anything is going to go up. 

I am on other commissions, because everybody is saying it is 

time for you guys to get with it. Again, I don’t mean you personally, I mean as an institution—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. Well, you should mean us personally, because the 

institution is made up of Members and we have found the enemy. 

We found the enemy and he is us. 

Comm. TALENT. Yes. 

Mr. LUNGREN. That is not because the Democrats are in control; 

it happened when the Republicans were in control. Whatever happens in November, I hope we are going to have an absolute dedication to the proposition that we ought to fix it and fix it right, because in response to the threat that you talk about, to have Congress with institutional prerogatives, and protections, and parochialism makes no sense whatsoever. 

Let me ask you this other thing: Senator Graham mentioned that 

a biological attack could render 500,000 Americans dead. 

Comm. TALENT. Yes. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Is that an exaggeration or is that an—— 

Comm. TALENT. No. Again, if you have not had it I would encourage you, and maybe as a committee—Mr. Pascrell, you and Mr. 

King could arrange this easily—get the briefing, the DHS modeling 

an anthrax attack on New York, and that is—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. So we are talking about a half a million people, 

potentially, which I consider to be a huge attack—— 

Comm. TALENT. Oh, it would be—— 

Mr. LUNGREN [continuing]. Which would be more devastating 

than any single attack that has ever been made on American soil. 

Comm. TALENT. Mr. Lungren, you have got to understand from 

their point of view, they have a strategy to win this thing. They— 

I know it is hard to define them. But to use asymmetric weapons 

to hit us at vulnerable points and basically force us to stop resisting whatever it is they want, you know, they don’t really know. 

So you hit New York with that, let’s say, and I don’t like to pick 

New York. It could be St. Louis; it could be Houston. You hit them 

with it and—— 
49 

Mr. LUNGREN. Could even be in the West. We are sometimes forgotten here, but, you know, there is something west of the Mississippi. 

Comm. TALENT. One of the things they have told us is that the 

further west you go the less conscious the local leadership is of 

this, unfortunately. You might want to check in Los Angeles, and 

San Francisco, and places. Yes, it could be Los Angeles. 

So you hit a California city with it and then a month later you 

hit it again. You kill an American city. Now, how long do we continue the struggle against them? I mean, the last time a weapon 

of mass destruction was actually used in a war the country it was 

used against surrendered within a week. 

Now, this is their thinking, okay? We may not think of it in these 

terms, but they think of it in these terms. 

Mr. LUNGREN. That could come from both a transnational terrorist organization or a rogue nation that has utilized terror as its 

purpose and its—— 

Comm. TALENT. It is used us as the stumbling block, or is upset 

with how—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. Okay, well then I would just ask you this: In anywhere in your report did you suggest it would be good National policy for us to say that we would unilaterally decide not to use a nuclear response is someone used chemical or biological attack on us? 

Comm. TALENT. Did we address declaratory policy in the report, 

do you know? No, you don’t know, or no, we didn’t? 

I don’t think we addressed declaratory policy. Bob and I are careful not to go outside the four corners of the report, even though he 

and I, obviously, as individuals have opinions about all this. 

Mr. LUNGREN. But it is just interesting that we talk about deterrence and we talk about all prevention and deterrence, which 

means that you prevent the other side from attacking or you deter 

them from attacking, and for 50 or 60 years we have had a nuclear 

deterrence even though I think most of us would agree that we can 

bring down our stockpile. That deterrence has worked fairly well 

nuclear-to-nuclear, and when you tell me of the devastating impact 

of a single biological or chemical attack on the United States, in 

my view that is equivalent to the threat of using a nuclear weapon. 

It is a different weapon but it is equivalent, and I just question 

whether we ought to then say we will refrain from using a retaliatory weapon that we have had, as much as no one knows what the 

scenario would be. So that is why I was just trying to figure out 

what you think the dimensions are, and I just wanted to make sure 

we are not exaggerating when we talk about a half a million people 

that could be lost with a single attack. 

Comm. TALENT. We are not exaggerating. Look, I will take my 

hat off as the vice chairman and just put on the Jim Talent hat. 

I don’t think we should leave any doubt in our declaratory policy 

that that is an option that is on the table. Now, whether the 

changes leave that doubt or not, you know, I leave up to you all 

to decide. That is my own opinion. 

One of the things that, in communicating about this in the district, that is so important, I think, to get across to community leaders and just average Americans or voters is that deterrence in the 

traditional concept doesn’t work against a terrorist because they 
50 

don’t have a national base that you can respond against. I mean, 

now, you are right—if we can assign a national actor, if we can use 

the forensics and figure out, then we can deter them. 

But it may not come that way. It may just be al-Qaeda on their 

own, and what do you do? I mean, what are you going to blow up? 

Mr. LUNGREN. It is also difficult when an enemy says that if you 

kill them you have given them the greatest path to immortality 

that they can have. I mean, deterrence usually works well with 

someone who doesn’t want to die. 

Comm. TALENT. Right. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Although I have noticed that most of the leaders 

of al-Qaeda themselves don’t want to die, they want all their followers to die. 

Comm. TALENT. It works when you have a clear, I mean, enemy 

or other party that you are dealing with, when it is bilateral rather 

than multilateral—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. Right. 

Comm. TALENT [continuing]. When you have secure lines of communication so the policy is clear. In short, when there are a lot of 

things present that are not present here, which is why our ability 

to deter this is much weakened regardless of what declaratory policy says to end. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I thank you for your testimony. I thank—— 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Lungren. Thank you for your 

questions. 

We do have to get a list, and the DHS—Department of Homeland 

Security—does submit a list of priorities at budget time. This was 

not a priority. 

So we get our, you know, priorities out of whack here, we have 

got major problems. We are more concerned about—and I am not 

saying this is not important, but choices had to be made—we spent 

more money ‘‘fixing the border.’’ 

Secondly, your point is very well taken about, this is not nationto-nation when we are talking about terror. It doesn’t necessarily 

have to be and it hasn’t been. But homegrown terror is just as onerous, and we need to take a look at that a lot more closely because 

that is an issue that we are afraid to talk about, literally speaking. 

I want to thank you for your testimony today, Senator Talent. 

Having worked with you in the past when you were here I know 

that you are dedicated to the protection of America—the United 

States of America. I know that you and Senator Graham really 

worked, put a lot of time in the last couple years along with your 

staff members. 

We are trying to work in the spirit with which you provided us, 

and that is why we do not live in a cocoon, but rather, we are trying to talk to everybody—the Homeland Security staff, your staff, 

the 9/11 Commission staff, professionals in the field, in order to 

come up with legislation that is going to be meaningful and logical 

so that we do approach this with the six major categories that you 

laid out. I think that is important and I think that is significant. 

A lot of food for thought today for every one of the Members. I 

know some had to come in—well, you know how it works. 

Comm. TALENT. Right. 

Mr. PASCRELL. We have a lot more Members in the beginning. 
51 

But we hope that within the next couple of weeks the bill will 

be completed, and we hope it meets with your approval. So, there 

being no additional witnesses I am going to ask—we might have 

some questions that the Members didn’t ask, you know, we will 

provide to you and we hope that you would respond expeditiously. 

Hearing no further business, the committee stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:32 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

(53) 

A P P E N D I X 

QUESTIONS FROM CHAIRMAN BENNIE G. THOMPSON OF MISSISSIPPI FOR BOB GRAHAM

AND JIM TALENT

Question 1. In your view, does the intelligence community have adequate resources and capabilities to identify and thwart a biological attack? 

Answer. Regarding the identification aspect of your question, both the intelligence 

community and the Departments of Homeland Security and Defense have clearly 

‘‘identified’’ the threat of bioterrorism, however, thwarting (preventing) an attack is 

a low probability event, no matter how much we spend on intelligence efforts. 

With a large percentage of our intelligence resources focused on the Soviet Union 

during the 1970s and 1980s, we failed to adequately detect a massive offensive bioweapons program in the Soviet Union that included 50,000 scientists and technicians working in scores of facilities spread across 12 time zones. The intelligence 

community failed to properly identify both the intent and capability of the Soviet’s 

BW program. Furthermore, we now know that al-Qaeda began their bioweapons 

program in the late 1990s with two labs in Afghanistan and one in Malaysia. Once 

again, the intelligence community failed to identify both intent and capability prior 

to DoD’s discovery of the two labs in Afghanistan after 9/11. 

While it is important that bioterrorism remain a high priority for the intelligence 

community, we must also realize that we will most likely have only strategic warning of an attack, not tactical warning. We can achieve higher quality of strategic 

warning, and perhaps tactical warning, by ensuring that the intelligence community 

has the top-quality scientific staff required to properly analyze the emerging threat 

of hi-tech bioweapons through better use of human and open source intelligence. 

Tactical warning, however, is highly unlikely. This was demonstrated in 1999 by 

a Defense Threat Reduction Agency program called Biotechnology Activity Characterization by Unconventional Signatures (BACUS). Nuclear programs and largescale chemical programs produce large intelligence signatures. BACUS demonstrated that there would be virtually no intelligence signature for a bioweapons 

program—a program capable of producing enough weaponized pathogens to attack 

a dozen American cities. 

Al-Qaeda’s stated intent to kill large numbers of Americans, combined with the 

facts that virtually all likely bioterrorism pathogens are available in nature and 

that the biotechnical revolution now gives non-state actors the technical capability 

required to produce and deliver sophisticated bioweapons, led the WMD Commission 

to the conclusion that America’s primary defense against bioterrorism is robust response capability. Major improvements in response capabilities not only limits the 

effect of an attack, it also serves as a deterrent. 

Bottom line: The best way to improve America’s intelligence capabilities against 

the bioterrorism threat is to provide the IC with an increase in highly-qualified personnel dedicated to this mission. As we stated in World At Risk (recommendation 

10), ‘‘highly-qualified’’ includes people with appropriate language/cultural knowledge 

and scientific/technical skills. 

Note: We suggest all Members of this committee receive a briefing on the Population Threat Assessment from the Department of Homeland Security Office of 

Science and Technology. We also suggest all Members receive a briefing on the 

former U.S. offensive bioweapons program to better understand the capabilities of 

bioweapons. 

Question 2. As of today, do you believe that the intelligence community has 

enough baseline information about terrorist actors, their claims, and plans to conduct WMD attacks against the Nation? 

If not, what should the intelligence community be doing differently? 

Answer. We cannot fully answer this question in an unclassified format, however, 

our answer to question No. 1 addresses much of this issue. 
54 

Question 3. The Department of Homeland Security conducts a number of risk assessments, including the BioTerrorism Risk Assessment (BTRA). The National 

Academy of Science has identified a number of fundamental concerns with the 

BTRA, ranging from mathematical and statistical mistakes that have corrupted results to more basic questions about how terrorist behavior should be modeled. Do 

you share the National Academy’s concerns? What do you think can be done to overcome these problems? 

Answer. The best thinking needs to be brought to bear in assessing the bioterrorism threat, as well as determining the best use of resources for countering it. 

Therefore, we believe that the BTRA should be subject to rigorous peer review and 

objective analysis, as occurred in the 2006 NAS report. 

Our understanding is that many of the NAS concerns have been addressed, or are 

in the process of being addressed. DHS is investing in adversary behavior modeling 

and, most importantly, peer review has been institutionalized in the BTRA. The 

2010 BTRA underwent an extensive, refereed 10-week review process which included external professional reviewers. In general, we believe that transparency 

should continue to be encouraged so that DHS has ready access to the scientific talent outside of the agency to ensure that the modeling methods employed are cutting 

edge and useful. For example, some of the DHS findings were briefed at the Los 

Alamos National Laboratories Risk Analysis for National Security Applications 

Meeting in April and the Society for Risk Analysis meeting in December. These 

types of activities should be strongly encouraged in the future. 

Question 4a. First responders have been asking for specific guidance regarding 

what to do when responding to WMD attacks for some time. For instance, in response to a dirty bomb attack, questions have been asked as to whether law enforcement should ‘‘scoop and run out’’ with injured people or whether EMS should be 

called in to ‘‘treat in place’’. Do you believe that is the responsibility of the Department of Homeland Security to develop and distribute this guidance? 

Answer. Absolutely. One of the most valuable things DHS can provide first responders is knowledge, particularly knowledge of issues involved with low probability, high consequence events such as WMDs. Much of this information comes 

from our National laboratories. DHS can take this highly technical, scientific information and put it in a format useful to those working on the front lines of homeland 

security. 

DHS will soon release version 2 of Planning Guidance for Response to a Nuclear 

Detonation. Version 1 of this document provides valuable information to first responders regarding response to an improvised nuclear device (IND). This document 

was produced by an interagency team and backed up with hard science from years 

of work at our National labs. The real value of this document was the practical advice that was included. For instance, first responders will want to rescue people following an IND, but there will be great concern about how close they can get to 

ground zero without causing severe risks to themselves. This document provided 

clear guidelines, such as: If more than half of the windows have been blown out of 

a concrete building, it is likely to be ‘‘too hot’’ (radiological risk) to enter that area. 

The document also provided valuable information on what equipment would be most 

needed in the first hours after an IND explosion—snow plows. Not really intuitive, 

but critical equipment to clear the rubble out of streets. 

This sort of document should be produced for all DHS planning scenarios. Most 

notably, it does not exist for biological attacks—part of the reason the WMD Commission gave an ‘‘F’’ for bio-response capability. 

Question 4b. Do you agree that the Department should develop such guidance in 

coordination with first responders? 

Answer. Yes, without question. The National Response Framework was a major 

improvement over the National Response Plan because DHS solicited input from 

first responders, and incorporated their inputs into the final document. 

Question 5a. Together with the authorization for your Commission, we authorized 

the DHS National Biosurveillance Integration Center (NBIC) in the 9/11 Act. Our 

vision was for this Center to receive and integrate input from 13 different Federal 

Departments and agencies (including DHS) to provide a common biosurveillance picture. Unfortunately, over the past 3 years, participation by other agencies has been 

minimal and the products paltry. Given your extensive political experience and 

knowledge of workings of the Federal bureaucracy, would you agree that it is time 

for us to mandate the participation of these Federal Departments and agencies in 

the NBIC? 

Question 5b. How do you believe the NBIC could be made efficient, productive, 

and valuable? 

Answer. In order to accurately detect and manage biological threats, multiple data 

sources need to be integrated and analyzed at the National level. A prime dem-
55 

onstration of why this is important occurred during a 2008 outbreak of salmonella 

in the United States that sickened nearly 1,500 people. The true cause of the outbreak—jalapen ̃ os—was determined only when shipping manifests became available 

to public health authorities. Before that private sector information was available, 

public health authorities believed tomatoes were the culprit. That misdiagnosis resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses to the tomato industry. This incident also demonstrates that the private sector should have a clear interest in sharing as much information as possible with public health authorities to avoid harmful 

mistakes. 

What is most important about NBIC is that it is a place where information from 

agencies can be integrated. Unfortunately, it does not appear that Federal agencies 

see the ‘‘value added’’ in providing data and analysts to NBIC. While participation 

could be mandated, that is not likely to sustain collaboration, and it may result in 

agencies sending junior staff there without giving NBIC the attention it deserves. 

For NBIC to be successful, it should provide added value to the agencies, such as 

providing access to data or analytical capabilities, which would facilitate the work 

of individual agencies, or NBIC could provide tools to support multi-agency investigations, such as outbreaks of zoonotic diseases or food contamination events. 

Many successful Federal biosurveillance systems rely on voluntary data sharing. 

The National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance system is a Federated system that 

conducts surveillance for a wide range of important diseases, including novel influenza strains, anthrax, and food-borne illnesses. States participate voluntarily because they value access to the CDC’s aggregated data and analysis. NBIC should 

heed this example. 

Question 6. In your testimony, you said that the funding level for the Biomedical 

Advanced Research and Development Act (BARDA) is not sufficient. Can you please 

comment on the current funding level for BARDA and why you believe it is important that the funding be increased? Specifically, where should we be dedicating new 

resources? 

Answer. BARDA is one of our Nation’s first lines of defense against chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear public health threats, supporting the development 

of new drugs, vaccines, and other medical countermeasures. It was created by Congress in 2006 with unanimous consent in both chambers. As these medical products 

have no commercial market—the Government is the sole customer—finding private 

investors willing to fully support development of medical countermeasures is nearly 

impossible. For this reason, a public investment in BARDA is necessary if these 

needed countermeasures are to be developed. 

BARDA has already hired top talent, and has been working effectively with the 

private sector. However, they have received little funding. It’s time to correct that. 

This is a National security issue—and it is just as important as the capability to 

produce world-class military hardware and technology. 

BARDA funding is wholly inadequate to their mission. The Center for Biosecurity 

of UPMC recently estimated that $3.39 billion per year in medical countermeasure 

development support would be required to achieve a 90 percent chance of developing 

a countermeasure for each of the eight biodefense requirements laid out in HHS’s 

Public Health Emergency Medical Countermeasures Enterprise (PHEMCE) Strategy 

for Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Threats. While this amount may 

be a large sum in the context of health budgets, it is quite small when considered 

in the context of National security expenditures. In spite of limited funding to date, 

BARDA has developed the infrastructure, workforce, and expertise to manage the 

necessary portfolio of new MCMs. All that remains now is for the program to be 

funded. Fully funding the program will not give us the countermeasures to protect 

us from all bioweapons, but it is a necessary downpayment for our security. 

Recently, even the funds intended for purchasing medical countermeasures for 

National security were under threat—the administration considered significantly depleting the Project BioShield Special Reserve Fund (SRF) to fund the development 

and/or procurement of H1N1 influenza vaccine. We continue to urge that BioShields 

funds be used only for their intended purpose: The procurement of medical countermeasures against chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) threats to 

National security. Depleting the SRF will severely diminish U.S. efforts to improve 

preparedness for CBRN events, thereby undermining the President’s commitment to 

a strong National biodefense program. 

Without a significant increase in BARDA funding, and security for BioShield 

funds, the status quo will persist: A serious and potentially catastrophic vulnerability to CBRN agents. Furthermore, funding BARDA would have an immediate 

and significant stimulative impact on the biodefense industry, as well as the broader 

economy. The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis estimates that each new biotech 

job results in the creation of 5.8 additional jobs in other industries. Furthermore, 
56 

for every dollar of labor earnings or output in the biotech sector, another $2.90 or 

$1.70, respectively, are produced in other parts of the economy. 

Preparedness for catastrophic health events requires stable, continuous funding, 

planning, and oversight to build the capacity to prevent and mitigate the effects of 

an attack with a bioweapon. If you do not act to fully fund BARDA, the organization 

will wither, the private sector will turn away from biodefense, and the American 

people could ultimately pay a horrible price in the wake of a terrorist attack with 

a biological weapon. 

Question 7. Considering the Commission’s findings regarding the need for developing and distributing medical countermeasures, what do you think of making medications, including vaccines, available to the public for use on a voluntary basis? 

Answer. America would be far better prepared to respond to a bioattack if a large 

percentage of our civilian first responders (medical, public health, and law enforcement personnel) were also vaccinated against the two bio-threats included in the 

Department of Homeland Security’s planning scenarios—anthrax and smallpox 

(both of which have FDA-approved vaccines). The Department of Defense has vaccinated a large percentage of its active duty, National Guard, and reserve forces 

against anthrax and smallpox. Why should we not do the same for our civilian responders? They will provide the majority of the response force to a bioattack on our 

homeland, not the military. 

Obviously, we cannot order civilians to take these vaccines, but they can be offered to all volunteers. The cost would be minimal since the most likely source of 

vaccines would be from the National stockpile. Instead of destroying vaccines once 

they reach their expiration date, we should use them prior to expiration. 

This action would significantly enhance preparedness at minimal cost. 

Based on lessons learned from exercises and natural disasters, we should also 

consider offering these vaccines to the families of these first responders. During a 

major crisis, we want first responders focused on the needs of their communities. 

Protecting the families of first responders is a key component for success. 

QUESTIONS FROM HONORABLE CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY OF PENNSYLVANIA FOR BOB

GRAHAM AND JIM TALENT

Question 1. If we are going to ask laboratories that possess Tier I Material Threat 

Agents to meet higher standards for biosecurity, it seems fair and necessary to see 

to it that they have access to more funds to make this happen. Since this is a homeland security issue, I think grants should come through DHS. What do you think 

of the need for grants to increase laboratory biosecurity, and having those grants 

go through DHS? 

Answer. This bill advances sound risk management principles for pathogen security by introducing the idea of stratifying biosecurity risks. The bill calls for the designation of ‘‘Tier I’’ agents to be the most dangerous subset of the pathogens that 

have clear potential for use as biological weapons. Today, 82 biological select agents 

and toxins receive the highest level of security focus and regulation. We believe the 

correct number of top-tier agents is closer to 8 than 80. Multiple studies were conducted as a result of our Report, and in virtually all of them, from both the public 

and private sectors, there have been calls for the stratification of agents. 

Stratification of biological agents into tiers should allow for more realistic assessments of risk, it will benefit public health investigations, and it should also encourage security monies to be concentrated on the highest risks. Therefore, it may not 

be necessary to increase funding for security improvements, as this approach could 

lead to a more judicious allocation of existent security funding. 

Question 2. Has the commission examined the extent to which our Nation has 

adequate laboratory capacity to respond to a large-scale act of bioterrorism? What 

are your suggestions for increasing laboratory surge capacity? 

Answer. See answer to Question No. 4. 

Question 3. In our efforts to prepare for and combat acts of bioterrorism, do you 

believe that our Nation has invested enough in the physical laboratory infrastructure needed to develop new countermeasures to biological agents? Can we do more 

to coordinate the laboratory resources we currently have available across agency 

lines? 

Answer. See answer to Question No. 4. 

Question 4. I have been a strong proponent of the Regional Biocontainment Laboratory program that was established by the National Institutes of Health to conduct research on biological pathogens. I believe we should bring these 13 universitybased labs into our National response system and invest in their ability to provide 

diagnostic support during a National emergency. Do you believe these labs can play 

a more active and useful role beyond their core research role? 
57 

Answer. The Commission did not explicitly examine the extent to which our Nation has adequate laboratory capacity to respond to a large-scale act of bioterrorism. 

We also did not specifically examine whether the Nation has invested enough in the 

physical laboratory infrastructure to develop new countermeasures, or whether 

there is sufficient capacity of the type that is needed. For example, there may be 

enough laboratory capacity for basic research into pathogens of bioweapons concern, 

but not enough capacity for animal testing of diagnostic tests and countermeasures. 

From a small study that the Commission sponsored, it appears that there is not 

enough laboratory capacity for testing environmental samples. Given the lack of 

clarity on this topic, it would be an excellent idea for there to be an investigation 

to determine whether the Nation has enough laboratory capacity, as well as what 

the appropriate amount of capacity and physical infrastructure would be. 

On a strategic level, it appears entirely appropriate that these university-based 

laboratories play a role in National response and provide support during a National 

emergency. The legislation that you introduced, the Laboratory Surge Capacity Preparedness Act, (H.R. 1150) is one step that should move forward to address this 

need. As we understand it, the Laboratory Surge Capacity Preparedness Act directs 

the Secretary of Homeland Security to award grants to regional biocontainment laboratories for maintaining surge capacity that can be used to respond to acts of bioterrorism or outbreaks of infectious diseases. If these laboratories can share materials and protocols so that they are useful additions to the normal laboratory capacity in an emergency, it would be a step forward for preparedness. 

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD FROM HONORABLE YVETTE D. CLARKE OF NEW YORK

FOR BOB GRAHAM AND JIM TALENT

Question 1. There have been several white powder incidents in New York City and 

across the country over the past few years. The ETCS&T subcommittee, which I 

chair, has looked into a number of white powder incidents over the past few years. 

In December 2008, before the most recent incidents at some of the foreign consulates, Congressional offices, and the Wall Street Journal in New York City, my 

subcommittee looked at how the U.S. Government was investigating the white powder letters and packages that were being sent to various Governmental offices here 

in the United States and to U.S. embassies and consulates overseas. As far as we 

know, the perpetrator(s) of those events has not yet been identified. Since the anthrax events of 2001—and despite the white powder letters and packages that continue to be sent throughout the United States and the world—guidance is not yet 

available regarding remediation after a biological attack or incident. Almost 10 

years later, we clearly need to require DHS, EPA, OSHA, and NIOSH to undertake 

a concerted effort to develop and issue guidelines for cleaning and restoring indoor 

and outdoor areas that have been affected by the release of a biological agent. Do 

you agree? 

Answer. It is certainly true that guidelines for cleaning and restoring indoor and 

outdoor areas are needed. As we said in our testimony, we commend the Homeland 

Security committee for including the provision that DHS issue guidelines in coordination with the Environmental Protection Agency for cleaning and restoring indoor 

and outdoor areas affected by the release of a biological agent. These guidelines 

should also address methods of decontamination following a large-scale event, and 

should address some of the remaining questions of a technical and scientific nature 

that make decontamination of a large area difficult. Currently, U.S. environmental 

laboratory capacity is insufficient for the challenge of sampling and testing following 

a large biological release. Federal leadership roles should also be clarified—many 

Federal agencies currently have roles in decontamination, but it is still unclear 

which agency would lead. Likewise, it is unclear who will cover the costs of decontamination, as well as the temporary relocation of building occupants. Private building owners would rightly question what their role is, at this time—if private industry is to be responsible for decontamination of their own property, there should be 

guidance for decontamination practices and qualified decontamination contractors 

available to industry in the event that they are needed. The WMD Commission 

sponsored a small study to review current bio-decontamination capabilities and responsibilities. The conclusions were not encouraging. 

Question 2a. During your tenure in Congress, I expect that much of your situational awareness about the WMD threat was based on classified information. In the 

case of the biological threat, do you believe that it is possible for the United States 

to develop accurate biological situational awareness without combining classified 

and unclassified information? 
58 

Question 2b. At the other end of the spectrum, do you believe that there should 

be more unclassified analytic materials distributed to non-Federal partners, most 

especially in the public health community, to enhance their situational awareness? 

Answer. We have both held Top Secret/SCI security clearances for decades, and 

during the 2 years of our Commission, received a number of classified briefings. 

However, the information available in unclassified documents clearly identify the serious threat posed by bioterrorism. The following quote is from page 1 of the National Strategy for Countering Biological Threats, November, 2009: 

‘‘The effective dissemination of a lethal biological agent within an unprotected population could place at risk the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. The unmitigated consequences of such an event could overwhelm our public health capabilities, 

potentially causing an untold number of deaths. The economic cost could exceed $1 

trillion for each such incident. In addition, there could be significant societal and 

political consequences that would derive from the incident’s direct impact on our 

way of life and the public’s trust in Government.’’ 

Classified information can sometimes give specific details about a particular organization or groups of individuals, but the threat we face today can be more than 

adequately presented in an unclassified document or presentation. 

Here is a specific example. Colonel Randall Larsen, USAF (Ret), the former executive director of the WMD Commission has provided briefings on bioterrorism to the 

Joint Staff Anti-Terrorism/Force Protection Executive Course for the past decade. 

The course is taught three times a year for 125 senior officers who all possess TS/ 

SCI clearances. However, the briefing is given at the unclassified level. This allows 

the senior officers to freely discuss all information when they return to their units 

around the world, without requiring them to remember which part is classified and 

which part is not. 

Classified information is not required to understand the serious threat of bioterrorism. 

Question 3. Given the challenges inherent in enforcing export control measures, 

I believe there is value in the Federal Government reaching out to manufacturers 

and exporters of materials sought by terrorists, the terrorist-sponsoring governments, and any other countries that seek to proliferate WMD. At the Department 

of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement currently conducts 

this sort of outreach regarding materials, technology, and WMD of all types. Do you 

agree that this is a valuable activity? 

Answer. Reaching out to the private sector is a very important part of a part of 

a layered defense against the proliferation of WMD technology. One of the most effective means of countering proliferation is to ensure that it does not get into the 

wrong hands in the first place and the Federal Government should leverage its existing relationships to partner with manufacturers and exporters on this important 

mission. There are a number of existing efforts underway, including at the Department of Commerce, that should be strengthened. 

Question 4a. There are many companies that now legally provide strains of organisms, some of which could potentially be used to create biological weapons. Considering your experience with the Export Council, what role, if any, do you think the 

criminal justice community should have with respect to the sale, distribution, and 

potential misuse of such strains? 

Question 4b. Do we need to review and update the relevant criminal statutes? 

Answer. At this time, it does not appear to be necessary to review and update 

the relevant criminal statutes. In the United States, access to those pathogens that 

are considered to be most likely to be used in bioterrorism (‘‘select agents’’) is already regulated. 

Within the United States, select agents are regulated by the Department of 

Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA), and 

the possession and transfer of the toxin is restricted to those people who have received a Security Risk Assessment (SRA), which entails a background check performed by the Department of Justice (DOJ), and are working in a facility that is 

cleared for select agents, and has been inspected by either HHS or USDA. According 

to the USA PATRIOT Act (2001) aliens from countries determined by the State Department to have been provided support for international terrorism are considered 

to be restricted persons and are prohibited from possession of select agents. 

For export of select agents, the regulatory regime is likewise extensive: 

• According to the Treasury’s Department of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), U.S. 

persons generally may not enter into any transactions, including exports of 

goods or services, to Cuba, Iran, and Sudan or to foreign nationals from those 

countries. 
59 

• Articles of military significance are subject to export controls that are part of 

the State Department’s International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). 

ITAR-controlled items and services may not be exported from the United States 

without a license from the State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade 

Controls. 

• U.S. companies may not engage in export transactions involving persons whose 

export privileges have been revoked or suspended, or with entities known to 

have ties to embargoed countries, terrorist organizations, or international narcotics traffickers. There are lists maintained by Treasury and State for this determination. 

• Export control regulations prohibit exports of any items when the exporter 

knows that the items will be used in connection with the proliferation of nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons. Of course, for select agents, there are 

limitations to what laws and export controls can accomplish: they apply only to 

the United States; all but two of the regulated pathogens (smallpox and 1918 

influenza) can be found in nature, sick people and animals, laboratories and 

hospitals, all over the world; new technologies circumvent the need to acquire 

many pathogens, as they can be made from scratch; and the select agent list 

will never be able to include all deadly pathogens. However, these limitations 

are not likely to be addressed by additional criminal penalties. 

Question 5. I know that the Export Council works to assist businesses in exporting to foreign countries. Do you believe that companies that sell strains of organisms that could be weaponized are capable of effectively differentiating between legitimate customers and potential terrorists? 

Answer. This is not an issue we examined at the Commission. This question 

should be directed to the State Department. 

Question 6. Senators, I represent the 37th District of California, home to one of 

the largest ports in United States, the Port of Long Beach. The 9/11 Act mandated 

that all U.S.-bound cargo be scanned for nuclear materials by 2010. Since 2007, 

there is scant evidence that DHS intends to meet the mandate. Given the nature 

of the nuclear threat, do you support the deployment of additional nuclear detectors 

in ports throughout the world—either for use by U.S. operators or by host countries? 

Answer. The best way to prevent a mushroom cloud over an American city (or 

port) is to locate, lockdown, and eliminate loose nuclear material. 

There is very good reason why DHS has not aggressively pursued 100 percent 

screening of cargo containers. Highly-enriched uranium (HEU) is the most likely 

material terrorist would use in an improvise nuclear device (IND). HEU is a very 

low emitter of radiation. One millimeter of lead, or even something as common as 

aluminum foil would prevent our current state-of-the-art detector from discovering 

a Hiroshima-style IND in a shipping container. Furthermore, we think it highly unlikely that a terrorist would put something as valuable as a nuclear weapon in a 

container, put a good padlock on it, and ship it to the United States. They would 

not likely take their hands off of the device. (To see the most likely way terrorists 

would attempt to smuggle an IND into the United States, we recommend you see 

the video, Last Best Chance, produced by the Nuclear Threat Initiative and available at www.nti.org.) 

We suggest you talk to Beth Ann Rooney, chief of security at the Port of New 

York and New Jersey regarding her opinion of 100 percent screening. She will ask 

you why Congress wants to screen every container entering her port, but none of 

the 700,000 cars that come off of RO/RO ships each year. An IND will fit in the 

trunks of these cars, but Congress has no plans to have them screened. Furthermore, Dr. Peter Zimmerman, a science advisor to the WMD Commission (and currently a consultant at DHS’s Homeland Security Institute) will advise you that 

there is no technology to detect a nuclear weapon inside bulk containers such as 

grain ships and oil tankers. 

Bottom line: the best way to prevent nuclear terrorism in the United States is 

through programs such as Global Threat Reduction. If funds are to be spent on detection, it should be on research and development programs to improve capabilities, 

but we should not be spending large sums of money deploying current technology 

that has a very low probability of detecting nuclear material. 

Question 7. Do you believe this action would help to prevent or deter the nuclear 

threat in any significant way? 

Answer. Spending more resources on scanning in ports with current technologies 

makes us less secure. This money will be better invested in locating, locking down, 

and eliminating loose nuclear materials. 

(61) 

VIEWPOINTS ON HOMELAND SECURITY: 

PART II 

A DISCUSSION WITH THE 9/11 

COMMISSIONERS 

Wednesday, May 19, 2010 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in Room 311, 

Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Bennie G. Thompson [Chairman of the committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Thompson, Harman, Norton, Jackson 

Lee, Carney, Richardson, Kirkpatrick, Pascrell, Cleaver, Green, 

Himes, King, Smith, Lungren, McCaul, Dent, Bilirakis, and Austria. 

Chairman THOMPSON. The committee will come to order. The 

committee is meeting today to receive testimony on ‘‘Viewpoints on 

Homeland Security: A Discussion With the 9/11 Commission.’’ 

A lot has changed in this country since the attacks of September 

11, 2001. In every facet of American life, there is greater awareness 

of the risk of terrorism. From the alert citizens in Times Square, 

to the fast-acting passenger on Flight 253, to other ordinary Americans who said something to the appropriate authorities when they 

saw something that was concerning, a culture of vigilance is taking 

hold in America. 

At the same time, at all levels of government, there are some 

major changes in the way we view the risk of terrorism and collaborate to address it. From the establishment of the Department 

of Homeland Security, to intelligence reform, to the creation of a 

consolidated, integrated terrorist watch list system, the way that 

Government organizes itself to make the homeland more secure 

has changed in significant ways. 

The Christmas day terrorist plot brought to mind observations 

made in your report. You determined that the attacks reveal four 

kinds of failures—failures of policy, failures of capability, failures 

of management, and failures of imagination. Had Umar Farouk 

Abdulmutallab successfully brought down Flight 253 last December 

with a bomb in his underwear, we would have certainly concluded 

that despite years of significant investment and reform, it was a 

failure of policy, capability, management, and imagination. 

I look forward to receiving your testimony today about what we 

still need to do to effectively identify and thwart plots well before 

they are launched. I also am interested in hearing your thoughts 
62 

about the degree to which the intelligence community and DHS are 

mindful of emerging threats. For instance, last month, we received 

troubling testimony from the former WMD commissioners about 

the threat of a biological attack. Another novel threat for this country, but a common scenario in other countries, is an attack on a 

busy rail system. 

Finally, you have been great champions for reform of Congressional oversight over the Department of Homeland Security. You 

acknowledge that consolidation of jurisdiction is one of the most 

difficult challenges in Washington, yet it is critically important. As 

Chairman of this committee, I have a special appreciation of the 

extent to which the lack of centralized legislative jurisdiction has 

damaged the Department. As the prime advocate for needed jurisdictional reform, I am particularly interested in hearing testimony 

from you on this issue. 

Thank you again for being here. 

[The statement of Chairman Thompson follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN BENNIE G. THOMPSON

A lot has changed in this country since the attacks of September 11, 2001. In 

every facet of American life, there is greater awareness of the risk of terrorism. 

From the alert citizens in Times Square to the fast-acting passenger on Flight 253 

to other ordinary Americans who ‘‘said something’’ to the appropriate authorities 

when they ‘‘saw something’’ that was concerning—a ‘‘culture of vigilance’’ is taking 

hold in America. 

At the same time, at all levels of government, there are some major changes in 

the way we view the risk of terrorism and collaborate to address it. 

From the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security to intelligence 

reform to the creation of a consolidated, integrated terrorist watch list system—the 

way that the Government organizes itself to make the homeland more secure has 

changes in significant ways. 

The Christmas day terrorist plot brought to mind observations made in your report. You determined that the attacks revealed four kinds of failures—failures of 

policy, capability, management, and imagination. 

Had Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab successfully brought down Flight 253 last December, with a bomb in his underwear, we would have certainly concluded that, despite years of significant investment and reform, it was a failure of policy, capability, management, and imagination. 

I look forward to receiving today’s testimony from the Commissioners about what 

we still need to do to effectively identify and thwart plots well before they are 

launched. 

I also am interested in hearing your thoughts about the degree to which the intelligence community and DHS are mindful of emerging threats. For instance, last 

month, we received troubling testimony from the former-WMD Commissioners about 

the threat of a biological attack. 

Another novel threat for this country, but a common scenario in other countries, 

is an attack on a busy rail system. 

Finally, you have been great champions for reform of Congressional oversight over 

the Department of Homeland Security. You acknowledge that consolidation of jurisdiction is one of the most difficult challenges in Washington; yet, it is critically important. 

As Chairman of this committee, I have a special appreciation of the extent to 

which the lack of centralized legislative jurisdiction has damaged the Department. 

As the prime advocate for needed jurisdictional reform, I am particularly interested 

in hearing testimony from you on this issue. 

Chairman THOMPSON. I now recognize the Ranking Member of 

the full committee, the gentleman from New York, Mr. King, for an 

opening statement. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me, at the outset, commend Governor Kean and Chairman 

Hamilton for the terrific job that they have done, not just in their 
63 

years of public service prior to September 11, but certainly with the 

9/11 Commission recommendations and the way you have stayed 

on this ever since. As each year goes by, the recommendations you 

made in the 9/11 report seem to be more and more on target and 

absolutely necessary. 

Let me, at the beginning, fully agree with the Chairman. It is 

now almost 6 years since your report came out, and the consolidation in Congress has barely improved at all; in some situations it 

has even gotten worse. It is now 108 committees and subcommittees that the Department of Homeland Security has to report to, 

and it makes absolutely no sense. This isn’t any territorial grab by 

us at all, but if there is going to be consolidation—in fact, I would 

just refer the Commissioners, that is, right now, the spider web of 

committees and subcommittees that the Department has to report 

to. 

It is impossible, I think, for the job to be done. The Department 

gets mixed messages, they have to spend an inordinate amount of 

time preparing for this testimony, and it just gets involved in parochial issues and to me it is so diffuse that it makes absolutely no 

sense whatsoever. So whatever you can do to, again, in the public 

eye, encourage consolidation would be very helpful. No matter what 

happens in November, the Chairman and I are going to be working 

with our leadership in both parties to again try to consolidate 

much, much more than we have right now. 

Also, on the question of Homeland Security grants, we still have 

the issue where so much money is sent to, I believe, areas that do 

not need as much as others. We had a recent situation in New 

York last week—and I am not trying to make this a New York-centric meeting, but I think that was a microcosm of the debate we 

are having Nation-wide in that just 2 weeks after the Times 

Square bombing, there were dramatic reductions made in mass 

transit security aids in New York, and also port security aid. 

As the debate went back and forth as to who was responsible, I pointed out that there was a $38 million grant made several years 

ago to harden the path tunnel from New Jersey to New York which 

was being held up because of an historic review that was going on 

because the tunnel was more than 50 years old—which is why it 

had to be hardened in the first place—and it was sitting there. 

Finally, after I brought this out on Friday, last night the money 

was finally released. But it is that type of bureaucracy—and last 

July, the GAO issued a report, I believe, talking about more than 

$400 million that was being held in the pipeline. So that also, I 

think, is important, No. 1, to make better use of the Homeland Security funding, but also to eliminate some of the red tape and bureaucracy which prevents the money from being distributed. 

I think we can say that both administrations have been successful in keeping foreign terrorists from the country. I think al-Qaeda 

central has been weakened, it is harder for them to send over a 

team like they did on September 11. The other side of that, though, 

is that they are now recruiting people from within the country; for 

instance, Zazi last September, obviously Major Hasan in Fort Hood, 

and now Shahzad 2 weeks ago or 3 weeks ago in Times Square, 

which means that we are dealing with people living legally in the 

country, people who are not on the radar screen, people who do not 
64 

have terrorist connections, and it is harder for us to have any advance notice of them, to know where they are coming from or what 

is going to be happening. 

So when we do capture someone, it is important to get as much 

intelligence as possible, which is why I welcome that Attorney General Holder said last week about beginning to look into what we 

are going to do with Miranda warnings and how we are going to 

treat these people who are legally in the country, in many cases, 

American citizens, when they are captured, because this may be 

the only way we can get intelligence from them. FISA would not 

be of much help, our allies would not be of much help, but when 

we actually get someone, we can get—as we see now from Shahzad, 

we are getting a lot of information. But if he had availed himself 

of the right to remain silent, we wouldn’t have gotten that. 

So I think it is important that we ensure that reforms do go forward and that at the very least, the Attorney General consult with 

everyone in the intelligence community before any Miranda warning is given so we ensure that whatever information we believe is 

essential to head off upcoming plots to find out who else are co-conspirators in the country, who he was trading with overseas, and all 

of that, would be at least delved into before any Miranda warning 

is given. 

How we are going to address this new type of terrorist in a way 

which is going to be, I think—the battlefront, I think, has shifted 

to the United States in many ways, and we have to find ways to 

cope with that. 

So with all of that, I thank you for your service, I look forward 

to your testimony today, and I also want to thank you for those report cards you have given out over the years, which I think have 

been a good way of prompting Congress to move along. Just because we haven’t been attacked doesn’t mean that we are doing everything right. So I just want to thank you again and I look forward to your testimony. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

Other Members of the committee are reminded that under committee rules opening statements may be submitted for the record. 

[The statement of Hon. Richardson follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HONORABLE LAURA RICHARDSON

MAY 19, 2010 

Mr. Chairman, thank you for convening this hearing today on the state of homeland security and intelligence and the status of efforts to address the recommendations set forth in the Report of the 9/11 Commission. 

It is a privilege to be joined by our distinguished witnesses: Former Representative Lee Hamilton and former New Jersey Governor Thomas Kean. America owes 

you a debt of gratitude for your skillful leadership of the 9/11 Commission. Thanks 

to the work of the Commission you led, ‘‘America is ‘safer but still not safe,’ ’’ to 

quote your famous words in the 9/11 Report. Thank you both for being here. 

Since the 9/11 Commission’s report was released, Congress has taken a number 

of actions to implement the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations. However, it is crucial to hear from the 9/11 Commissioners to identify both our successes and areas 

where work remains. In particular, in the discussion of strategies for aviation and 

transportation security, the 9/11 Commission Report highlights the need for a ‘‘Layered Security System’’ that includes security measures to address the wide array of 

threats, including the use of insiders, suicide terrorism, and standoff attack. 

The Commission Report states that ‘‘the U.S. border security system should be integrated into a larger network of screening points that includes our transportation 
65 

system and access to vital facilities, such as nuclear reactors.’’ As a proud representative of the 37th district of California, I am especially concerned about this topic. 

My district is home to the Port of Long Beach/Los Angeles, which receives 40 percent of the Nation’s cargo. The 9/11 Act set forth a goal of working towards 100 percent cargo screening, and I am sorry to say that almost 10 years later, we are not 

closer to reaching it. 

In addition, as Chair of the Subcommittee on Emergency Communications, Preparedness, and Response, I look forward to hearing the Commissioner’s reflections 

on the Commission’s recommendations on emergency preparedness and response. 

Citizen preparedness and private sector preparedness is an important component of 

our homeland security strategy. However, according to Citizen Corps National surveys, in 2007 only 42 percent of survey respondents reported having a household 

emergency plan. Again, this is another area where we have not yet reached the 

goals of the Commission recommendations. 

I am pleased that this hearing is providing a chance for committee Members to 

delve into the issues facing our Government and homeland security with regard to 

progress on the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. Clearly, the Federal Government still has work to do. I look forward to sharing this information with the 

stakeholders in my district, home to a target-rich environment, including the airports, water treatment facilities, and ports. 

Thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for convening this hearing. I yield back my time. 

Chairman THOMPSON. I also would want to again welcome our 

distinguished witnesses, Governor Thomas Kean and Representative Lee Hamilton, the chair and vice-chair of the Congressionallycreated National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the 

United States. 

In addition to his service as chairman of the 9/11 Commission, 

Thomas Kean served as Governor of New Jersey from 1982 to 

1990, and Speaker of the New Jersey Assembly. He also served as 

president of Drew University from 1990 to 2005. Today, Mr. Kean 

serves on the boards of a number of prominent National organizations, including the Robert Wood Foundation. 

Also, I would like to, in his absence, recognize Mr. Pascrell from 

New Jersey, who never lets us forget about New Jersey on this 

committee. 

Lee Hamilton represented the citizens of Indiana’s Ninth District 

for 34 years in this body. During his tenure, he served as Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee and the Intelligence Committee. Today, Representative Hamilton serves as the president 

and director of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars at the Indiana University Center. Without objection, the witnesses’ full statement will be inserted in the record. 

I now ask the witnesses to summarize their statement for somewhere about 5 minutes, or the best you can do. 

The Chairman recognizes the gentleman from Indiana. 

STATEMENT OF LEE HAMILTON, FORMER COMMISSION VICECHAIRMAN, THE NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES 

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Chairman, I think I will speak first and then 

the Governor will follow me, if that is all right with the Chairman. 

Tom and I are very happy to be with you this morning. We are 

very appreciative of the leadership that has come from this Committee on Homeland Security ever since its creation. 

We are here as co-chairmen of the Bipartisan Policy Center’s National Security Preparedness Group, which is a successor to the 

9/11 Commission, and our principal hope and thrust in that group 

will be to try to play a constructive role in supporting you and 
66 

other people in the Executive branch who work very hard on homeland security. 

Tom and I will be talking about two separate topics; one is the 

nature of the threat that we confront, and then secondly on intelligence and some of our observations as a result of a conference we 

held on that just a few weeks ago. 

I think as Mr. King said in his statement, we believe that alQaeda has been seriously weakened, but I am not at all sure that 

we have a firm grasp on how seriously. There are disparate elements to the radicalism across the globe, and it is just extremely 

difficult to keep track of all of it. Overall, then, we think perhaps 

the threat has been reduced, but it certainly has not been eliminated, and the struggle goes on. 

A few quick observations about the threat in general. Pakistan 

is the new hub and center of the terrorist threat; more plots 

against the United States emanate from Pakistan or have a strong 

connection with Pakistan than anywhere else. As Mr. King also 

said, we are witnessing the emergence of a new generation of terrorists, American citizens, lone actors trained abroad, and I think 

we can expect more from persons with limited resources and perhaps limited training. So in some ways, the threat is as much internal as it is external. 

We have often said, and you have heard others say, that we are 

safer today, but not safe enough. Many of the statements coming 

from our leaders today about the progress that has been made in 

homeland security are correct. We have already referred to the setbacks for al-Qaeda; we talk a lot about the success of the Predator 

Drone attacks. We were advised the other day that we should all 

feel pretty good about the accomplishments. The problem, of 

course, is that the attacks keep coming, over Detroit, in Times 

Square, at Fort Hood. The problem may be that we do not fully appreciate the diversity of the possible attacks. We focus more now 

on home attacks originating here, but we must not rule out the 

possibility of attacks coming from abroad. We certainly have to understand the evolving nature of the threat that we face. 

One of our colleagues on the National Security Preparedness 

Group wrote the other day in one of our leading magazines, ‘‘We 

seem able to focus only on one enemy at a time in one place. We 

do not understand the networked, transnational, multifaceted nature of the attack.’’ So the defining trait of today’s terrorist threat 

is its diversity. The Attorney General has stated the Times Square 

attempted attack was directed by the Pakistani Taliban. The attempted attack in December was the work of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. In both of these cases, al-Qaeda affiliates thought 

previously as regional or local threats demonstrated their ability to 

reach the United States. Of course, we are all aware of the threats 

coming from the tribal regions of Pakistan. 

As we have come to recognize the evolving nature of the threat, 

we as a country need to consider what policy recommendations 

should follow this assessment, and our group, and I am sure others 

in this town are beginning to work on that. We will be working 

during the summer to complete the work and draw conclusions and 

recommendations that you and others in the Congress and the administration may want to utilize. 
67 

Just a word before I turn it over to Tom Kean on the state of 

intelligence reform. I believe, and I think most people believe, that 

a lot of progress has been made on intelligence reform. Specifically, 

data is more widely shared than it was a few years back. We still 

have a long way to go. The analysts, rather than the collectors, 

have begun to drive data collection; that is a significant change 

that is now occurring in the intelligence community. 

The technology has improved. The transformation is underway 

from a confederation of bureaucracies in effect in the intelligence 

community—some 16 of them—to a network of collection and analysts. The establishment of the Mission Managers is, I think, a 

positive development. The increasing focus on cybersecurity is a 

positive development. Reform has been made on speeding up security clearances. I think the establishment of a joint duty program, 

likewise, is part of the progress. All of that needs to be emphasized 

and recognized as a positive step. My point of view, of course—perhaps yours—is that we cannot achieve perfection, but we can continue to reduce the likelihood of human error to an acceptable 

level, and that is what we have to do. 

Now, there are a lot of challenges before the intelligence community today. I will mention in a moment the ambiguity with regard 

to the role of the DNI, a critically important problem. The President has stated oftentimes that he is not satisfied with the Presidential daily brief. I don’t know that I can remember a President 

who has been satisfied with the Presidential daily brief, but Tom 

and I have seen a good many of them dating a few years back— 

I don’t think they are available to Members of Congress so far as 

I know—and I think Tom and I would very much agree that there 

is a long way to go in improving the daily brief. That is an enormously important step in the intelligence dissemination. 

There certainly has to be the development of leadership towards 

a more integrated intelligence community; that is happening, but 

not nearly fast enough. You all are familiar with the problems the 

intelligence community has with the Congress. I think there has 

been some improvement—at least that is my impression, I don’t 

know how you feel about it—in that under Mr. Panetta’s leadership 

in the CIA, but you would know that probably better than I. 

We certainly need more sophisticated analyses—signals, human, 

technical have to be integrated much better than they are. The relationship of the intelligence community generally to the general 

public I think needs a lot of work. Tom will talk a little bit about 

the necessity of civil liberties and privacy. 

But on the challenges, what impresses me more than anything 

else is that we get this massive amount of data—it just comes in 

by the truckload per minute—and it overwhelms the ability of the 

intelligence community to analyze it. We have simply got to do that 

better through a lot of different means than we have been able to 

do it. So the greatest challenge in a sense to the intelligence community is the management of the data that comes in. 

Now, the final point I want to make with regard to intelligence 

is that I think because of the ambiguity of the law where the authorities of the Director of National Intelligence with regard to 

budget, with regard to personnel simply are not as clear as you 

would like them to be. The ambiguity creates a lot of problems 
68 

within the intelligence community. You would know better than I, 

but my observation is that law is not going to be changed soon. It 

took a long time to get that law on the books, and I don’t see any 

great effort at the moment to correct it. 

So what does that mean? It means that the role of the DNI is 

not clear. Is he a strong leader of the intelligence community empowered to lead the intelligence community, or is he a coordinator, 

a convening authority charged with helping to facilitate inter-intelligence agency? Now, that is a huge difference, and it makes all the 

difference in the world as to how the intelligence community is 

shaped. My view—and I think Tom’s—is that we favor the former 

point of view, that is to say the DNI should be a strong leader in 

the intelligence community with sufficient power to carry out his 

responsibilities. 

The burden is on the President now to clarify who is in charge 

of the intelligence community, where the final authority lies on 

budget, personnel, and other matters. As long as you leave it to the 

interagency process without clear direction from the President, you 

are not going to have an integrated intelligence product. So we put 

a lot of responsibility, of course in almost every subject, on the 

President. But here the President’s leadership is crucial and it 

must be enduring, not just an intervention. He has got to stay on 

top of this in order to make it work. 

Tom will handle other points of interest on the intelligence community. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. We were very generous with the time, but obviously we appreciate the clarity of your 

comments. 

Governor. 

STATEMENT OF THOMAS KEAN, FORMER COMMISSION CHAIRMAN, THE NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS 

UPON THE UNITED STATES 

Mr. KEAN. Thank you. I, likewise, also appreciate very much 

your work and the chance to appear before you today. I will talk 

just a minute about another lesson that we think we can learn, and 

that is the nature of the domestic intelligence mission and how it 

demands really greater clarity. The intelligence community must 

become more competent in obtaining and using appropriate information on people who cross the borders and may have a nefarious 

intent, that is including Americans. The failed attack of 12/25, 

cross-border drug violence, and other events last year highlighted 

the challenges we face in our porous borders and the rapid mobility 

of modern society. In addition, we have seen that some of our practices, such as No-Fly Lists, must be more dynamic, responsive, capable of triggering quick action, including warnings sometimes that 

are based on incomplete information. Our procedures for collecting 

and using U.S. personal data must adapt to these new challenges. 

Last, the Attorney General’s guidelines for intelligence agencies operating domestically needs to be updated and harmonized so that 

the intelligence community can perform its mission successfully. 

We don’t really believe that domestic intelligence has received 

enough attention, especially, and as we have all said, the evolving 

nature of the terrorist threat. In the Commission, we place great 
69 

emphasis on the need for the FBI to reform itself and build an organization that places more emphasis on preventing attacks. To 

refocus attention on these issues, we are going to host a conference 

in the fall with top Government officials and other experts to ensure that we are still taking the right steps so that the agency is 

reformed to meet the modern needs of the terrorist threat as we 

know it today. 

Another fact, as evidenced by the reviews following the failed attempt of the Christmas day bomber, the DNI needs to be a leader 

in managing and improving analyses in the intelligence community. As Lee said, we are awash with data coming in from every 

direction all the time. We are collecting more information than ever 

before, but we have got to understand it, we have got to manage 

it, we have got to integrate it. The good news is that we have got 

the technology. We need to continue to push forward, however, on 

policy innovations to ensure that we manage the data properly and 

that the right people are getting the information they need, always 

having in mind that when we do this, we also have to protect civil 

liberties. 

We are cosponsoring a serious of events with the Markle Foundation to continue to push for innovative policies, including making 

information discoverable and building interfaces that allow for sufficient exchange while at the same time protecting civil liberties. 

Making progress in these issues is critical for mounting an effective 

fight against terrorists that are going to be increasingly sophisticated. 

I just want to mention briefly two other items that are left over 

perhaps from a 9/11 report. Civil liberties, of course, has been mentioned already, and Congressional oversight. We always have to 

worry about the balance between civil liberties and our security. It 

will always be part of the struggle with terrorism. America must 

never sacrifice one for the other. Following the 9/11 Commission 

recommendations, this Congress created the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board to advise the Executive branch and to oversee over efforts to defend civil liberties. The board was staffed and 

it became operational in 2006. After some little activity in 2007, 

the board has been dormant since that time. We have, in other 

words, no members and therefore no board protecting civil liberties. 

Now we have got massive capacity now to develop data on individuals, and we need somebody to ensure that the collection capabilities do not violate our privacy and the liberties we care about. 

Mr. Chairman, we support the sentiment expressed in your letter 

to President Obama, supported by many Members of this committee, that he should quickly appoint members of the board. We 

continue to believe this board is a critical function, and we urge the 

President a swift reconstitution. 

Now, you have said as well as I could the problem with Congressional oversight. As you know, this is one of our main recommendations in our report. It is fractured and overlapping on both sides 

of the Hill. It is in an unsatisfactory state. We note, as Congressman King said, the number of over 100 committees now that DHS 

officials report to. It has led to conflicting mandates for the division 

of Homeland Security. As you have said, without taking serious action, we think this confusing system is going to make this country 
70 

less safe. We want to continue to work with the Congress to help 

improving oversight of our homeland security, and will do everything we can to cooperate with you in this regard. 

Thank you very much for having both of us, and we would be 

glad to answer your questions. 

[The statement of Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Kean follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF LEE HAMILTON AND THOMAS KEAN

MAY 19, 2010 

I. INTRODUCTION

We are very happy to be before this committee this morning. We are grateful to 

Chairman Thompson and Congressman King for the invitation to discuss the challenges the serious and evolving terrorist threat poses to our Nation. 

Today, we are appearing in our capacity as co-chairmen of the Bipartisan Policy 

Center’s National Security Preparedness Group (NSPG), a successor to the 9/11 

Commission. Drawing on a strong roster of National security professionals, the 

NSPG works as an independent, bipartisan group to monitor the implementation of 

the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations and address other emerging National security issues. 

NSPG includes the following membership: 

• Mr. Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst and Author, Schwartz Senior 

Fellow at the New America Foundation • Dr. Bruce Hoffman, Georgetown University terrorism specialist • The Honorable Dave McCurdy, Former Congressman from Oklahoma and 

Chairman of the U.S. House Intelligence Committee, president of the Alliance 

of Automobile Manufacturers • The Honorable Edwin Meese III, Former U.S. Attorney General, Ronald Reagan 

Distinguished Fellow in Public Policy and Chairman of the Center for Legal and 

Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation • The Honorable Tom Ridge, Former Governor of Pennsylvania and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security, Senior Advisor at Deloitte Global LLP, Ridge 

Global 

• The Honorable Frances Townsend, Former Homeland Security Advisor and 

former Deputy National Security Advisor for Combating Terrorism 

• Dr. Stephen Flynn, president, Center for National Policy 

• Dr. John Gannon, BAE Systems, former CIA Deputy Director for Intelligence, 

Chairman of the National Intelligence Council, and U.S. House Homeland Security Staff Director 

• The Honorable Richard L. Thornburgh, former U.S. Attorney General, Of Counsel at K&L Gates 

• The Honorable Jim Turner, Former Congressman from Texas and Ranking 

Member of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, Arnold and Porter, 

LLP 

• Mr. Lawrence Wright, New Yorker Columnist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 

• The Honorable E. Spencer Abraham, Former U.S. Secretary of Energy and U.S. 

Senator from Michigan, The Abraham Group. 

Over the course of 2009 and 2010, our group met with Obama administration officials and former senior officials from the Bush Administration, including: 

• Director of National Intelligence, Admiral Dennis Blair (July 2009) 

• CIA Director Leon Panetta (July 2009) 

• Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano (July 2009) 

• FBI Director Bob Mueller (September 2009) 

• Former CIA Director Mike Hayden (September 2009) 

• Former DNI Mike McConnell (September 2009) 

• John Brennan, Deputy National Security Adviser (January 2010) 

• Mike Leiter, Director of the NCTC (April 2010). 

We believe the strength of our group will allow us to be a voice on National security issues and a resource to you and the Executive branch. First and foremost, we 

are here to help play a constructive role in support of your work. 

Recent events have reminded us, especially the failed attempts on 12/25 and in 

Times Square, that the country needs to continue to improve its defenses and 

strengthen Governmental institutions designed to fight international terrorism and 

other threats to the United States. At the Bipartisan Policy Center, our National 
71 

Security Preparedness Group has been studying the implementation of the 9/11 

Commission’s recommendations, especially those regarding intelligence reform, and 

new threats to our National security. 

We look forward to working with you, and benefiting from the work of this committee, as our study continues. 

Today we would like to discuss with you two on-going projects that have a direct 

bearing on the important work of this committee. 

First, as we testified in January, the threat from al-Qaeda, remains serious. What 

we and other experts are studying is how the threat of terrorism is evolving. The 

conventional wisdom for years has been that al-Qaeda’s preferred method was a 

spectacular attack like 9/11. But the defining characteristic of today’s threat seems 

to be its diversity. 

Second, the 5-year anniversary of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act recently passed. Our group marked this anniversary by hosting a conference on the State of Intelligence Reform. The Director of National Intelligence 

and host of other former intelligence officials participated in the conference and I 

will share with you today some of the conclusions from the discussion. 

THE TERRORIST THREAT

The defining trait of today’s terrorist threat is its diversity. As you well know, the 

Attorney General has stated that the Times Square attempted attack was directed 

by the Pakistani Taliban. The attempted attack in December was the work of alQaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. In both of these cases, al-Qaeda affiliates thought 

previously as regional or local threats demonstrated their ability to reach the United 

States. We’re well aware of the threat emanating from the tribal regions of Pakistan. We’ve also come to appreciate the increasing threat of homegrown terrorism 

as some Americans have become radicalized. 

As we have come to recognize the evolving nature of the threat, we as a country 

need to consider what policy recommendations should follow this new assessment. 

Our National Security Preparedness Group is studying this issue. Professor Bruce 

Hoffman from Georgetown and Peter Bergen of the New America Foundation are 

leading a series of interviews and meetings with terrorism experts to take a fresh 

look at the nature of the threat in light of the increased activity. We will work over 

the summer to complete this work and draw conclusions and recommendations that 

Congress and the administration can utilize. We have already arranged for Bergen 

and Hoffman to testify on this assessment in September, along with homeland security experts Fran Townsend and Steven Flynn. We look forward to working with you 

on this study and the opportunity to return in the fall to your committee. 

STATE OF INTELLIGENCE REFORM

The determination of terrorists to attack the homeland remains unabated, reminding us of the need for viable and agile Governmental institutions to counter 

the threat. To us, these episodes further suggest the importance of creating a Director of National Intelligence and a National Counter Terrorism Center in the first 

place. At their core, the problems evident on September 11, 2001, reflected failures 

of information sharing among the Federal partners charged with protecting the 

country. No one in the Federal Government was charged with fusing intelligence derived from multiple foreign and domestic sources. The DNI has been charged with 

breaking down bureaucratic, cultural, technological, and policy barriers to the sharing of information among Federal agencies and the NCTC has been successful in 

thwarting a number of potential terrorist attacks. 

There has been good work done since September 11, 2001, but we need to continue down the path toward further integration and insist on a greater level of effectiveness within the intelligence community. To further these goals, we hosted a conference on the State of Intelligence Reform in April with Director Blair, General 

Hayden, Admiral McConnell, Fran Townsend, Jane Harman, John McLaughlin, and 

Steve Cambone. The conference was a success in highlighting the importance of the 

issues this committee is dedicated to, including information-sharing and improved 

counter-terrorism policy within our borders. 

Today, we are releasing a brief summary of the proceedings, and we would like 

to offer you several key observations. 

First, the President needs to be very active in defining roles and responsibilities 

within the intelligence community. We think the conference showed that the DNI 

has achieved a meaningful measure of success in its first years—that has made it 

worth the inevitable turmoil—but that the successes relied too heavily on key personalities within the Executive branch. We want to continue to look closely at the 

authorities of the DNI to make sure he has the authority to do his work, but it is 
72 

our sense that the success of the DNI in the short term is not dependent on additional statutory adjustments to IRTPA. 

Nonetheless, there are still ambiguities that can contribute to mission confusion 

and lack of clarity about lanes in the road. This is perhaps the greatest challenge 

facing the DNI. Is the DNI a strong leader of the intelligence community empowered 

to lead the IC as an enterprise? Or is the DNI a mere coordinator, a convening authority charged with helping facilitate common inter-intelligence agency agreement? 

The lack of clarity in its mission invites a host of other criticisms, including that 

the ODNI is too large, too intrusive, and too operational. 

The burden is on the President to clarify who is in charge of the intelligence community and where final authority lies on budget, personnel, and other matters. In 

our estimation, we need a strong DNI who is a leader of the intelligence community. 

The DNI must be the person who drives inter-agency coordination and integration. 

At the same time, the DNI’s authorities must be exercised with discretion and consideration of the priorities and sensitivities of other intelligence agencies. But the 

President’s leadership is crucial and must be enduring or we run the risk of mission 

confusion and decrease the prospect of achieving long and lasting reform that was 

recommended after September 11, 2001. The DNI’s ability to lead the intelligence 

community depends on the President defining his role and giving him the power and 

authority to act. 

Second, the nature of the domestic intelligence mission demands greater clarity. 

The intelligence community must become more competent in obtaining and using 

appropriate information on people who cross borders and may have nefarious intent, 

including Americans. The failed attack of 12/25, cross-border drug violence, and 

other events last year highlighted the challenges we face due to our porous borders 

and the rapid mobility of modern society. In addition, we have seen that some of 

our practices, such as No-Fly Lists, must be more dynamic and responsive, capable 

of triggering quick action, including warnings based on incomplete information. Our 

procedures for collecting and using U.S. person data must adapt to these new challenges. Lastly, the Attorney General’s guidelines for intelligence agencies operating 

domestically needs to be updated and harmonized so that the IC can perform its 

mission successfully. 

It was clear in the conference that in many ways, ‘‘domestic intelligence’’ has not 

received enough attention especially in light of the evolving nature of the terrorist 

threat. The 9/11 Commission placed great emphasis on the need for the FBI to reform itself and build an organization that placed more emphasis on preventing attacks. To refocus attention on these issues, we will host a conference in the fall with 

top Government officials and other experts to ensure we are taking the right steps 

along the path of reform. 

Third, as evidenced by the reviews following the failed attempt on 12/25, the DNI 

needs to be a leader in managing and improving analysis in an intelligence community awash with data. In an age when we are collecting more information than ever 

before, a major challenge is understanding, managing, and integrating a huge 

amount of information. The DNI needs to develop ways of dealing with intelligence 

information overload. The good news is that the technology to do the job exists. We 

need to continue to push forward on policy innovations to ensure that we manage 

the data properly and that the right people get the information they need, while 

protecting civil liberties. We’re cosponsoring a series of events with the Markle 

Foundation to continue to push for innovative policies, including making information discoverable and building interfaces that allow for its efficient exchange while 

at the same time protecting civil liberties. Making progress on these issues is critical to mounting an effective fight against increasingly sophisticated terrorists. 

PRIVACY AND CIVIL LIBERTIES

The balance between security and liberty will always be a part of the struggle 

against terrorism. America must not sacrifice one for the other. Following the 9/11 

Commission recommendations, the Bush administration created a Privacy and Civil 

Liberties Oversight Board to advise the Executive branch and oversee Government 

efforts to defend civil liberties. The board was staffed and became operational in 

2006. In 2007, Congress restructured the Board as an independent agency outside 

the White House. Despite early criticisms of undue delay and inadequate funding, 

the Board held numerous sessions with National security and homeland security advisers, the attorney general, and the FBI Director, among others, on terrorist surveillance and other issues arising from intelligence collection. 

However, the Board has been dormant since that time. With massive capacity to 

develop data on individuals, the Board should fight to ensure that collection capabilities do not violate privacy and civil liberties. Mr. Chairman, we support the sen-
73 

timent expressed in your letter to President Obama, supported by many Members 

of this committee, that he should quickly appoint members to the Board. We continue to believe that the Board provides critical functions and we urge President 

Obama its swift reconstitution. 

CONGRESSIONAL OVERSIGHT

Third, the DNI and IC must provide greater transparency, foster greater trust 

with the American people, and avoid over-reaction during troubled times. While 

much intelligence must remain classified and out of public view, the intelligence 

community still needs support from the media, Congress, users of intelligence, and 

foreign partners, among others, to successfully pursue our National goals. The DNI 

should work to promote a robust relationship/partnership with Congress, which 

serves as the proxy for the public in overseeing the IC and affirming its direction. 

The 9/11 Commission also placed great emphasis on rigorous Congressional oversight. This recommendation helped precipitate the creation of a House Homeland 

Security Committee and a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs 

Committee. However, enduring fractured and overlapping committee jurisdictions on 

both sides of the Hill have left Congressional oversight in an unsatisfactory state. 

DHS entities still report to dozens of separate committees hundreds of times per 

year, which constitutes a serious drain of time and resources for senior DHS officials. Furthermore, the jurisdictional melee among the scores of Congressional committees has led to conflicting and contradictory tasks and mandates for DHS. Without taking serious action, we fear this unworkable system could make the country 

less safe. 

The 9/11 Commission also called Congressional oversight over intelligence dysfunctional. We made recommendations to strengthen the oversight committees 

which were not accepted by the Congress, though some progress has been made. 

Today we want to emphasize the enormous importance we attach to rigorous oversight of the intelligence community. 

Congress is the only source of independent advice to the President on intelligence 

matters. Such oversight requires changes in the structure of Congressional committees, specifically the creation of powerful oversight committees in both the House 

and Senate. Today, the appropriations committees’ monopoly on the provision of 

funding weakens the ability of the intelligence authorization committees to perform 

oversight and wastes much of their expertise. 

Congressional oversight can help ensure the intelligence community is operating 

effectively and help resolve disputes about conflicting roles and missions. We urge 

the Congress to take action to strengthen the oversight capabilities of the intelligence committees. 

Chairman THOMPSON. I thank both of you for the very enlightening testimony given today before this committee. 

I would like to remind each Member that he or she will have 5 

minutes to question the panel. I now recognize myself for 5 minutes. 

As both of you noted, it is hard to break down the stovepipes 

when there are so many stoves. While information-sharing has improved since 9/11, many—myself included—are troubled that despite undergoing significant reforms, the intelligence community 

did not uncover and prevent the Christmas day plot. It now seems 

that while the intelligence community is doing a better job of collecting and sharing the information, it does not have the analytical 

capability, human and technical, to connect the dots. Now, both of 

you addressed this issue in your testimony, and I want to give you 

a little time to elaborate on it because we have this humongous 

data collection effort underway, but the question is: What and how 

are we doing with it after we collect it, and is that our next challenge? 

Governor. 

Mr. KEAN. I think you have put your finger on it, it is our next 

challenge. We haven’t always treated analysts with the same respect we treat other people in the intelligence community. We 
74 

know now that it is no good collecting all this data if we don’t have 

the means and the personnel who can seriously analyze it, condense it, and turn it over to the policy people who are going to act. 

We don’t think we are there yet by any means. This requires, in 

my mind, giving the analysts the kind of status, the kind of pay, 

the kind of promotions that are available to other people in the intelligence agency and that we recognize them for the very important function they hold. This is going to be a continuing challenge. 

We are going to get more information, not less. Unless we analyze 

it and put it quickly into people’s hands so that action can be 

taken, we are not going to do the job to protect the American people. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Mr. Hamilton. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Chairman, I believe, as you have suggested, 

information sharing remains the core problem in intelligence. You 

referred to the stovepipes of the 16 intelligence agencies correctly. 

I do believe there is a lot better sharing, there is a lot better connection of the dots than several years back, so we have made a 

good bit of progress, but it is not seamless, and it is still a very 

formidable challenge for the intelligence community. 

I connect this problem to the authority of the DNI. What you 

have in the intelligence community today are 16 very able, very patriotic, very professional groups with a lot of very talented people. 

They have operated traditionally very much within their own stovepipe, within their own agency. They have felt that it is not necessary to share, the heavy emphasis has been on need to know 

rather than need to share. They are very protective of their jurisdiction and their bailiwick. I do not believe you are going to get the 

sharing that you need without somebody forcing it, and that somebody has to be the DNI. I don’t know where else it comes from. If 

he does not have the authority to do that, you are not going to get 

it. That is my view, basically. So the authority of the DNI is absolutely critical to resolving the question of better information sharing. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Well, I guess the question is: Do we need 

a legislative fix, or can a fix be done administratively? Or is it a 

matter of having the will to do it? 

Mr. HAMILTON. It should be a legislative fix eventually, but to be 

blunt about it, you are not going to get around to it quickly and 

the problem is right now. So the only solution can come from the 

President now, and he has to make it clear, in my view, who has 

the authority and who doesn’t. He has this ambiguous law out 

there, which is less ambiguous because of work in the Bush administration than it was, but it is still ambiguous, and as long as you 

have that ambiguity, you are going to have these agencies fighting 

for jurisdiction and power. 

That is what you are really talking about, the distribution of 

power here. So I think the immediate action has to be Executive, 

the longer-term action has to be Congressional and Executive. That 

law has to be clarified. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. One last question. 

A number of us, Governor, as you indicated, sent a letter to the 

President about the Privacy and Civil Liberties Board not being 

constituted. We received a reply, but to date no action has been 
75 

taken to fill the vacant positions. We will renew that request after 

this hearing, given your testimony and your standing within this 

whole homeland security arena. 

So you may receive some calls prompted by our letter, but a substantial number of the Members of this committee felt that this 

board had an integral part in this whole process and that to leave 

it vacant was not in the best interests of that data collection effort. 

So we will pursue it. 

We now recognize the Ranking Member from New York for 5 

minutes for questions. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have to continue to call 

Congressman Hamilton ‘‘Mr. Chairman’’ because I served with him 

on the International Relations Committee and the Foreign Affairs 

Committee, and he was an outstanding Chairman. 

Chairman Hamilton, you were talking about the DNI. If I can 

follow up on that. I am on the Homeland Security and the Intelligence Committee. My perspective is that the DNI has very little 

real power in this administration. More and more I find that intelligence policy is being driven by the Homeland Security Advisor to 

the White House, John Brennan. We saw that after the Christmas 

day bombing. He was the one who was convening the public conferences, speaking to people in the community. I believe he has an 

inordinate amount of power in the intelligence community, as opposed to Admiral Blair, for instance, or even Director Panetta, and 

he is beyond Congressional oversight because of Executive privilege 

being in the White House. That, to me, adds a real problem, that 

we are finding more and more policy being driven from the White 

House on these intelligence issues. 

In addition to that, as we are finding more and more domestic 

cases, the Department of Justice obviously is involved early on; and 

as a result of that, it is declared a law enforcement or criminal justice matter, and Congress is not being briefed. I can speak for myself—and I believe there can be some degree of bipartisan agreement on this—we get very little information, I would say less information now than before for two reasons; one I think because the 

White House is controlling intelligence more, but secondly, because 

we are going to have an increased number of domestic cases, which 

become criminal justice cases, and they tell us information can’t be 

given out because a law enforcement investigation is going forward. 

So in many ways we are going backwards, and we have to find 

a way to address that because I do believe we are going to find 

more and more of these domestic cases, and that is going to be, in 

many ways, the center of terrorism, and yet we are not going to 

get the information we need. So if you have any thoughts on that, 

or just take it back and consider it. Again, from my discussions, 

this is a bipartisan concern to one degree or another. 

Mr. KEAN. I lead off by saying that I think we agree that it is 

absolutely essential that Members of Congress have the information that you need because you are unique in the intelligence area. 

I mean, if those of us who are citizens are interested in transportation, we can go listen to the Transportation Committee or the Environment, the environmental committees, or so on. But a lot of intelligence is secret, and so you have got to have that information 

in order to do your job, which is oversight. If you are not doing the 
76 

oversight, then nobody is, the public and the press isn’t allowed the 

information to do it properly. So I believe that your committees are 

more important in this area than any other committees in the Congress because you have that unique responsibility. 

I might say, as far as the DNI goes, it concerns me a bit because 

the DNI, both Lee and I believe, has got to be the strong leader 

of the intelligence community. If somebody else is taking even the 

public lead on some of these questions, the DNI is not where it is 

supposed to be in the public perception, which is part of the problem. 

Mr. KING. As far as the public perception, I don’t know we heard 

from Admiral Blair on Fort Hood, very little on the Christmas day 

bombing, and nothing, to date, that I am aware of on Times 

Square. So the public perception, and also the perception of the 

community, is that the DNI does not have the gravitas or the 

power or the clout that is needed to really get the job done. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think we have been quite clear as to how we 

think it ought to be; the DNI ought to have the power. 

Your observations about Mr. Brennan were of great interest to 

me. You are certainly right, I think, when you say he has had the 

public role in a number of these cases, but I don’t think the intelligence community is going to function in all of its parts unless the 

DNI has the authority. 

The second question you raised has been a difficult one. I come, 

of course, from the Congress, and I believe very strongly in the 

right of the Congress to get information. I know how vitally important that is to a Congressional committee. I conducted a number 

of investigations, four or five of them probably, where we had a 

conflict between the Congress on the one hand wanting to get information and the prosecutors, in effect, saying if Congress gets the 

information, they are going to screw up the prosecution. That is not 

an easy question to resolve. I don’t know any blanket rules that applies, there may be one but I don’t know it. 

What it takes, I think, on an ad hoc basis, is for the principals 

to sit down and try to work it out so that the Congress gets the 

information in a timely way and the prosecutor’s case is not disrupted too greatly. So I don’t have any words of advice for you on 

this. It is an inherent problem that comes up again and again. 

There is a problem of it right now with the Senate committee—I 

guess that is the Homeland Security Committee—seeking information and the Department of Justice holding it back. So that is the 

only observation I have on that. 

Mr. KING. Mr. Chairman, if I could just make one further point. 

In this regard, I believe that the Department of Homeland Security, since you are going to be faced more and more, literally, with 

homeland threat, actually threats emanating from the homeland, I 

think it is more essential than ever that the Department of Homeland Security be able to establish itself in that world, in that community. I don’t believe the Department has been aggressive enough 

on that. 

Again, and this is not being critical of Secretary Napolitano, but 

again, when you look as these cases evolve, the Secretary of Homeland Security is not a major player in them as far as the public is 

concerned. I know in the Times Square case it was many, many 
77 

days before we got any information from the Department of Homeland Security. I felt they were, at best, ancillary to what was happening, even though that was clearly a homeland security issue. So 

I am concerned that the Department is losing status, losing ground 

in that community. There is a lot of turf fighting in there. If the 

Department does not establish itself and get itself firmly implanted 

in that world, I think that also is going to weaken the Department 

as we go forward. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentlelady from California for 

5 minutes, Ms. Harman. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

As most people know, 9/11 and the recommendations of the 9/11 

Commission have been central to my activities in Congress. I am 

passionate about fixing this problem, and I am enormously respectful of what our witnesses bring to this. I appreciate the fact that 

you have hung in for all these years and that you are continuing, 

on a bipartisan basis, on a beautiful bipartisan basis to work at 

this. I also want to applaud the Bipartisan Policy Center’s National 

Security Preparedness Group and your staff leader, Michael 

Allen—an old friend of ours—for sponsoring the kinds of conferences that you have. 

I participated in your recent conference on intelligence reform, 

and as one of the four principal coauthors of the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004, which was based on your bipartisan recommendation, I think the subject is fascinating. Let me just offer my view, 

which I offered there. I don’t think the law is perfect. It was very 

difficult to get anything passed. But I think now we are down to 

50 percent law and 50 percent leadership. The law is adequate for 

the right leader, supported by the President, to be the joint commander that we envisioned. That is the role. It is not just coordinator—and I know wouldn’t even call it leader, I would call it commander, as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is, over 16 intelligence agencies to leverage their strength and pull them together 

and use both the knowledge building and budget executing authorities that he or she has to make the concept work. So that is my 

two cents. 

On Peter King’s point about the lack of Congressional reform, I 

strongly agree. It is an embarrassment that we have not acted in 

this Congress to reform our committee structure to have a sharper 

focus on the homeland security threat, which is the primary threat 

to our security in the world. This committee is jurisdictionally challenged. The Chairman knows I have spoken out everywhere I can 

about the need for us to get more jurisdiction and to be the focal 

committee here, as the homeland committee is in the Senate, of 

more legislation and more effort, both to provide oversight and to 

legislate where necessary. So that is a disappointment. 

I want to focus on a couple of things that were mentioned in the 

testimony and one that wasn’t. First of all, the Privacy and Civil 

Liberties Board needs to be formed yesterday. My understanding is 

that the White House is currently vetting nominees. That is an improvement, but they are a year and a half late. This committee 

should have been actively participating over the last year and a 
78 

half as we have tried to navigate an ever-evolving and very dangerous threat. So I hope that they will nominate people soon. I 

hope that their list is impressive. I think that once we have this 

committee at work, we will be doing what is essential, which is 

pointing out, as Tom, you said, that security and liberty are not a 

zero sum game, we really have to have both—more of both I would 

argue. 

If we don’t live our values, I think the bad guys win. That is 

why, by the way, Mr. King—I don’t see a need to reform Miranda, 

I see a need to use the public safety exception well and to have the 

best interrogation teams on the case. I think we will get farther 

that way and build more trust with the communities we need to 

come forward to tell us that there are family members or neighbors 

who are acting strangely. I also think that is the way we will win 

the argument with the next generation that is deciding whether to 

be suicide bombers or good citizens around the world. 

My time is running out, so let me just ask you about something 

you didn’t touch, but it was one of your recommendations, and that 

is the need for a National interoperable communications network. 

I have only got about 40 seconds, but I continue to believe that that 

is as serious a gap as the connecting the dots problem. I think we 

are doing much better with connecting the dots, I think we are not 

doing better with this interoperable capability problem. 

What is your view? 

Mr. KEAN. Well, I would agree. Whenever there is an attack on 

the United States, it becomes immediately important that the first 

responders and others are able to communicate with each other immediately, on site, using the same wavelengths. There is no question. We were not there on 9/11, we were not there with Katrina, 

and we are not there yet. So I couldn’t agree with you more. It is 

something we have got to concentrate on. It could have saved a lot 

of lives and it will save a lot of lives when we get this right. It is 

better, we are getting there, but too slowly given the threat. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I don’t know of anything that has frustrated us 

more than not solving the problem of the ability of first responders 

to talk to one another. It is an absolute no-brainer that the help, 

the police, the safety people, the fire people have to be able to talk 

with one another, and we are not there yet. It is amazing that 6 

years after our report—or whatever it is—we haven’t been able to 

accomplish that. What that means is that lives are at risk because 

of the inability to communicate. Some municipalities have made 

considerable progress, many have not. But we have got to keep 

pushing, and I thank you for bringing it up. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentleman from Texas for 5 

minutes, Mr. Smith. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Kean, thank you all for being here. The 

Ranking Member just left, but I join him in welcoming back Mr. 

Hamilton, who when he was in Congress, was absolutely one of the 

most respected Members with whom I have served. So I appreciate 

your both being here. 
79 

My first question goes to the 9/11 Commission’s recommendation 

for a biometric entry-exit system. It so happens in a 1996 bill that 

I introduced that became law we had an entry-exit system. That 

has not been fully implemented; both Republican and Democratic 

administrations have not fulfilled their responsibility to obey the 

law. I wanted to ask how important you think it is that this administration implement that entry-exit system that you all recommended and that in fact is required law today? I don’t know who 

wants to answer first, but I look forward to hearing from both of 

you all. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, I commend your initiative. I think you are 

right on the mark. That was a unanimous recommendation; you 

had to have some means of identifying people coming in and going 

out of the country, and so we suggested the biometric system. I am 

delighted that you are still pushing it. I agree with you that it 

ought to be of the highest order. 

We have done better on the entry side than the exit side. We 

haven’t done anything on the exit side, there has just been too 

much opposition to it. But we have got to override that opposition. 

You have got to keep track of these people coming in, you have got 

to keep track of them while they are here, you have got to keep 

track of them when they leave. We are not able to do that. I don’t 

know how you do that without some kind of an identification system if you don’t have it. So your initiative is, I think, very worthy. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Kean, anything to add? 

Mr. KEAN. I would just echo, I think the initiative is praiseworthy. I don’t know of any other way we are going to make our 

borders safe. 

Mr. SMITH. Another recommendation of the 9/11 Commission was 

to set standards for the issuance of sources of identification, such 

as driver’s licenses. You all know that in 2005, we passed the 

REAL ID Act, it is now on the way to being implemented by a majority of States. Yet, frankly, this administration wants to change 

it and wants to eliminate the requirement that the States check 

the identification documents that are being used when applicants 

try to obtain a driver’s license. Do you feel that that is somehow 

weakening our homeland security defenses? It seems to me we 

want to leave REAL ID as it is, require that the identification be 

confirmed. Do you feel that we should do just that, or do you feel 

that we should repeal the REAL ID Act as this administration 

seems to feel? 

Mr. Kean, Mr. Hamilton. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I am not sure I can get into the details of that 

because I haven’t followed it closely, but I will tell you how radical 

I am on it. I believe we ought to have an identification card. I know 

there are objections to that on the left and on the right. Someday 

we will get there, other countries have it. We are going to have to 

have it for purposes of—a lot of purposes, but certainly in controlling our borders. That may go a lot farther than you or others may 

support, but we have to have confidence in the identification or the 

system just doesn’t work. 

Mr. SMITH. The administration on the REAL ID Act actually 

wants to, as I say, eliminate the requirement that States verify the 
80 

validity of identity documents that are used when applicants apply 

for driver’s licenses. So I assume you would be opposed to any 

elimination of that. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think I would, Mr. Smith, although let me emphasize that I haven’t looked at that very hard. 

Mr. SMITH. If anything, it sounds like you want to strengthen it. 

Mr. HAMILTON. That is exactly right. The necessity of having an 

accurate identification is key to homeland security, I believe. I 

want to emphasize the 9/11 Commission did not approve the idea 

of an identity card, I was kind of out here in the wilderness on that 

one. So we kind of compromised on it. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you. The last quick question is, what recommendation of the 9/11 Commission that has not been implemented do you think is the most important? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, I think the one we just talked about with 

Representative Harman is No. 1, and No. 2—— 

Mr. SMITH. You are welcome to use either of the two examples 

I just gave, by the way. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, they are very important observations. I 

would add another one, I think you have to have somebody in command at the site, and we haven’t solved that problem either. That 

is another no-brainer. Somebody has to be in charge. Somebody has 

to make literally hundreds of decisions very quickly when a disaster strikes. You are going to make some of those decisions wrong, 

but you have got to make them because there are all kinds of problems that pop up, food, water, safety, sanitation, security. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Hamilton. My time is up, but I want 

to give Mr. Kean an opportunity to briefly respond as well if he 

wants. 

Mr. KEAN. I would agree with Lee, as we usually do. The ones 

that have only been partially followed, such as the sharing of information, that is key, that we have got to keep on pressing and 

pressing—and I hope this committee will keep on pressing on that 

one. Then some of the others seem easy because they are so logical, 

but they haven’t been done yet, like the interoperability of communications networks on the site. They are obviously not easy because 

they haven’t been done, like the creation of civil liberties or obviously Congressional reform. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Kean. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri for 

5 minutes, Mr. Cleaver. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank both of you for 

being here. 

I have a rather well-known blood relative who was the subject 

of a lot of controversy due to his best seller, ‘‘Soul On Ice.’’ As a 

result of the fact that we have the same last name, I ended up on 

the watch list as a Member of Congress. It took a lot of work and 

help from American Airlines and my staff to get that changed. 

Based on what happened, both with regard to the attempted 

Christmas day bombing and the recent Times Square failed attempt, do you believe that there is something awry with the watch 

list system? I mean, if we have to take somebody off an airplane, 

it has already failed. Then when I look at my own personal experi-
81 

ence, something is wrong, and something needs to be done, I think. 

I would like to get your opinions, and perhaps even to make some 

suggestions on what needs to be done. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think the fact is that we don’t have one watch 

list, we have dozens of watch lists. It seems to me we ought to have 

a single watch list and be very careful about the names that go on 

it, obviously, and it has to be managed and screened very carefully. 

My impression is that various departments have different watch 

lists, and that we have a conglomeration of them. I think our idea 

on the 9/11 Commission was that we have a single watch list, 

which would be an integrated watch list from all of the departments of Government that have some responsibility in homeland 

security. But the need to refine that and make it more accurate is 

hugely important. 

My impression there is that we have not done a very good job 

of integrating the watch list or sharing its accuracy, and we just 

keep adding thousands and thousands of additional names to it. So 

I think the watch list needs a lot of work. 

Mr. KEAN. I don’t know if this is still true, but for a long time, 

the very worst actors or people we worried about, most weren’t on 

the watch list. Somehow it violated to let the airlines have those 

names, somehow they thought it was going to jeopardize National 

security, so they weren’t on it. That is obviously, to me, another nobrainer; of course, they should be on it. 

I think the Christmas day bomber and perhaps the Times Square 

bomber did us a huge favor because it got us to look again at the 

watch list and the problems with it. It got us to look at the problem 

of information sharing again and the problems with it. It focused 

our attention at a time when our attention had quite naturally 

wandered, it was being diverted by all sorts of other important 

problems facing this country. What they did, we can’t always count 

on people being incompetent or using faulty technology. We found 

out some of the things that we did wrong and we are not going to 

repeat those mistakes, like the problem with the watch list being 

one of them. 

But we can’t count on our luck. We can’t make those mistakes 

again and we’ve got to get in front of the problem and anticipate 

some of these problems and try to correct them ahead of time. The 

watch list is certainly one of them. You are right. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We have got multiple watch lists. We have got 

a Selectee list; we have got a No-Fly List. I frankly get confused 

with it all. It seems to me we ought to have a system where the 

fellow at the airline counter can hit the button and he can tell 

whether this guy is a dangerous person getting on an airplane or 

not. Now, that is, I guess, overly simplistic, but that is what you 

have got to have, and you have got that information available instantly. You can’t take a day to find out about it. I think the technology is that we can achieve that. But we are not there. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you. I thank both of you. 

Chairman THOMPSON. Thank you very much. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentleman from California for 

5 minutes, Mr. Lungren. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to 

thank both of our guests here today because of the great work they 
82 

have done, Governor and Lee. They talked about your being former 

Chairman, but I know you also were someone who played Hoosier 

basketball before they had the movie ‘‘Hoosiers,’’ and I don’t want 

to forget that. 

One of the things that has been so frustrating for me since I 

came back in 2005 and it appears to me frustrating for the two of 

you is what I call the lack of urgency to deal with this problem. 

Governor Kean, you just mentioned that maybe we should be 

thankful for the failed attacks because it caused us to be concerned 

again, but we can’t depend on failed attacks to keep that level of 

urgency that’s necessary. This hearing is reflective of that, where 

the multiple TV cameras discussing one of the most important 

issues facing this Nation. It almost appears that we in the Congress are still reactive rather than proactive. 

We had the Christmas attempted bombing, and then we were 

concerned about it and it was an issue of high import here for 3 

weeks. Then we had the failed attempt in Times Square and that’s 

been on people’s minds for about 21⁄2 weeks, although I see that 

ebbing away as well. So I want to thank you for your continued effort to try to provide that sense of urgency. I note the words that 

you used about the failure of us to respond to one of, I believe, the 

important recommendations of the Commission, that is, the consolidation and direction of Congress on this issue where you used 

words, without taking serious action, we feel this unworkable system could make the country less safe. 

I hope you stand by that statement because oftentimes, people’s 

normal reaction is that it is just about process here. So what we 

have 100 and some committees and subcommittees? So what that 

there’s jurisdictional wrangling? How could that impact us in the 

way you have just stated? But you have stated—our failure to deal 

with this jurisdictional milieu can make the country less safe. 

Could you sort of elaborate on that? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Lungren, I thank you for mentioning the lack 

of urgency. I guess if there has been a common theme to what Tom 

and I have talked about since the Commission disbanded, it was 

just that point. We have an enormous problem in the country of 

course in establishing priorities. We all are very much aware of 

that. But we don’t think there is any higher priority than the protection of the—and the security of the American citizen. 

We have said over and over again that a lot of good work is being 

done, a lot of good people working on it, but when you visit these 

various places and you talk to the officials involved, you come away 

with a feeling that they do not have a real sense of how urgent the 

problem is. There are people out there still and a lot of them who 

want to kill us, and we have got to be very much attuned to that 

and do everything we can to protect ourselves against it. I like your 

point about the jurisdiction in the process. I know that gets to be 

a highly technical matter and an enormously controversial matter 

in this Congress. 

I don’t know of any tougher problem—I served on every Congressional reform committee that came along during the 34 years I was 

in the Congress and I have dealt an awful lot with the question of 

jurisdiction, and I know how difficult and sticky it is and what passions it arouses in Members of Congress, but they have to keep 
83 

their perspective, their eye on the ball here, and that means the 

security of the American people. 

When you are fighting about jurisdiction and you are splitting jurisdiction among 108 committees on homeland security, all of that 

energy, all of that effort is not going towards what it ought to be 

going towards, which is the security of the American people. It is 

an enormous diversion from what the Congress ought to be focusing on. So we were very critical of the Congress on this question. 

We remain very critical of the Congress on it, and you have to get 

your house in order. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I appreciate that. To point out a number of things 

that the two of you have contributed in the testimony today, the 

DNI needs to be a real position with real leadership and either legislatively or administratively that has to be done; otherwise it just 

gets in the way, adding another layer that we didn’t have before 

we made the changes. 

Second, you have told us here in the Congress we need to get our 

act together so that we can concentrate on these things because as 

you say, if we don’t, the consequence is it could make the country 

less safe. 

Just the third thing I would just mention, and we don’t have 

time to get into this, but I do fear we have a continued problem 

with understanding the nature of the threat against us and understanding that as we utilize the criminal justice system and the 

counterterrorist system or concept, there are challenges there that 

we need to deal with first and foremost. I am sorry my friend from 

California left because on Judiciary, we have been trying to deal 

with this question of the Mirandizing issue. It is not as simple as 

just extending the public safety exception because the public safety 

exception deals with an imminent danger such as a loaded gun 

being within the reach of a suspect as you are questioning him, not 

the extended kind of danger we have from a terrorist situation. We 

are going to have to deal with that up front and not just kind of 

pass it by. So I thank you for your testimony. 

Mr. CARNEY [presiding]. I thank the gentleman. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentlewoman from Arizona, 

Ms. Kirkpatrick. 

Ms. KIRKPATRICK. Gentlemen, thank you so much for being here 

today and thank you for your great work. I am very impressed with 

your clear concise recommendations, and I will continue to press 

for their implementation as quickly as possible. 

Representative Hamilton, I wanted to follow up on Mr. Smith’s 

question about the Biometric Exit Program. You know, it is clear 

to me we need to do that. I am just wondering what are the obstacles that have prevented that implementation? 

Mr. HAMILTON. It is my understanding that the airlines have 

strongly objected to exit checks because they think it would slow 

the process of boarding passengers and the like and so far as I 

know, that is the principal objection, but there may be others as 

well. 

Ms. KIRKPATRICK. Do you know if there are any objections at the 

ports of entry, the land crossings? 

Mr. HAMILTON. I do not know about that. 
84 

Mr. KEAN. I think there was some actually because some of the 

border States there are people who cross the borders back and 

forth sometimes seven or eight, nine times, ten times a day because 

of the kinds of jobs they have in some of those border States. So 

some of the Governors and some of the States, as I understand it, 

put up an objection to anything that would impede that process or 

slow it down. 

Ms. KIRKPATRICK. I represent a border State, Arizona, and recently toured the border. Both the citizen traffic—and I also went 

to the port of entry and it is really clear that the agents have a 

very difficult time identifying folks who are coming and going, and 

I think that should be a top priority of the administration. 

But I am also concerned about funding. In Arizona, we have hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash going across the border, and 

it occurs to me that it is very important for us to attack the financing of these terrorist groups. So, Governor, would you address what 

we are doing to cut off financing? Do you think we are doing 

enough? What more should we be doing? 

Mr. KEAN. Actually, when we graded the various Government 

agencies, I think we gave Treasury one of our highest grades, as 

I remember, for the tracking of money. We thought they were doing 

a very good job at that time. I have not personally reexamined that 

issue, but there were a number of—some of which have become 

public in what used to be private, but there are a number of tools 

that they have been using in cooperation with other governments 

to track dollars to terrorist organizations, and my impression was 

that they were doing a pretty good job in that area. 

Ms. KIRKPATRICK. Do you have any information about the use of 

these prepaid cash cards going toward funding of terrorist organizations? 

Mr. KEAN. I don’t. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I don’t think anyone believes that you can stop 

terrorist activity just by going after their finances. But I also believe that almost everybody believes that going after their finances 

is an absolutely essential tool and it takes a good bit of sophistication as to how the financial world works. I think we have learned 

a lot on that, and my impression is—I may not be up to date—is 

that we have improved our tools at identifying financial transactions involving terrorists. So it is an element of our anti-terrorism activity that has to be always strengthened wherever we 

can. It is an important part of it, but we will not in the end by that 

tool alone cut off terrorism, but it is an important part of it. 

Ms. KIRKPATRICK. I have about a minute left. I have one other 

question and this is about stopping terrorist travel. You have made 

a number of recommendations for tightening border controls and 

fostering international information sharing to impede the ability of 

individuals with terrorist aspirations to enter the United States 

but with the high-profile arrests of Faisal Shahzad and Colleen 

Rose known as Jihad Jane, have we entered a new phase of terrorist activity in America where we now see American citizens carrying out terrorism on behalf of foreign terrorists? 

Mr. KEAN. This is the strategy now. I mean, this seems to be the 

way that terrorists have decided to attack us. We strengthened 

after 9/11 ways in which we stopped terrorists of certain nationali-
85 

ties coming from various countries. So the gold standard for a terrorist now is to try to get an American citizen, and if it is an American citizen who looks different than somebody might conceive of a 

terrorist looking that’s even better. 

So their emphasis of them trying to track these kinds of people— 

and it is very dangerous for us because these people can travel 

freely in and out of the country because they are American citizens. 

We also know that Mr. Alawi who we actually first identified in the 

9/11 Report, has become extraordinarily dangerous because he understands how to talk to vulnerable Americans and he understands 

how to recruit in a way that people have not been able to recruit 

before for al-Qaeda. So this is the new—this is the new threat. This 

is what we have to get ahead of. This is not what we are used to. 

This is not 9/11. This is a new threat. American citizens who have 

been lured by somebody like Alawi because of whatever problems 

occur in their own lives and it is a much more difficult problem. 

It is a problem we have got to get ahold of and get ahead of. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We mentioned in our testimony that there are 

certain trends that are taking place in the terrorist threat. One of 

them, for example, the decentralization of al-Qaeda, but another 

one certainly is the increasing emphasis they are putting on recruitment of people who are homegrown, who speak English, who 

have a Western passport, probably have American citizenship. As 

Tom has mentioned that has become the focal point of a lot of our 

National security conversations now. This is not an easy problem. 

We have about 200,000 Americans a year who travel from here to 

Pakistan. As I said earlier, Pakistan is often at the core of these 

attacks in one way or the other. 

Keeping track of 200,000 people is no easy task, but we are trying to do it and we have become much better at it than we were. 

But obviously 99.9 percent of them are good people doing legitimate 

things, and it is a problem picking out the bad guy. Two hundred 

thousand just in the one country. Add Somalia, add Yemen, add 

another a number of other countries, Afghanistan, Iraq, and so 

forth, and you can see the problem that confronts us. 

Ms. KIRKPATRICK. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you, Chairman, 

for allowing me a little additional time. 

Mr. CARNEY. Of course. 

The Chairman now recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania, 

Mr. Dent. 

Mr. DENT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Good morning, gentlemen. I think one area that we really 

haven’t fully explored about Faisal Shahzad is the process by which 

he became a naturalized citizen. He reportedly entered the country 

more than 10 years ago on a student visa; then he obtained a work 

visa before marrying a citizen and then becoming naturalized himself. Given that he tried to blow up Times Square a little more 

than a year after becoming a citizen, questions are now surfacing 

regarding the security check requirements for naturalization. 

Do you think there are limitations on the ability of Federal immigration officials to conduct robust security screening on those seeking to become citizens or legal permanent residents? 

Mr. KEAN. That is a good question. I am not as familiar with 

that as I perhaps should be. He, of course, had gone and gotten an 
86 

advanced degree as well which would indicate to somebody he was 

well on the way to being a productive citizen of this country and 

so he was a tough one I think to figure out. Something obviously— 

we don’t know what it is yet—something went terribly wrong in his 

life or somebody got to him or something, but it is important we 

follow procedures and get these people ahead of time. But he would 

have been a difficult one to catch, I think, because he seemed to 

be in the right path to becoming a good American citizen. 

Mr. DENT. Right. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Dent, it is a good question. I must say I just 

haven’t examined it. When we did the 9/11 Commission Report, I 

don’t think the question ever arose as far as I can remember. We 

want to welcome people into this country. We want to be a welcoming country so far as new citizens are concerned. But I think 

the events that you have identified clearly put us on the alert that 

we have got to be a lot more careful before we make a person a 

naturalized citizen. 

Mr. DENT. Thanks, and I appreciate your honesty there. Perhaps 

maybe going forward no one will ask any question about it, but we 

need to better integrate our naturalization process with our National security apparatus and I am not sure that any of us have 

that answer here today how we should do that, but it is something 

that we as a committee and as a Congress may want to look a 

great deal more at, naturalization and National security interests. 

My next issue revolves around the Secure Flight Program, which 

I know that you were—both of you. I thank you again for your 

leadership on the 9/11 Commission, but I know that one of your big 

recommendations was for TSA to assume the responsibility for airline passenger prescreening against a terrorist watch list, and I 

think that was on page 393 of the 9/11 Commission Report. As you 

know, in 2004 Congress passed the Intelligence and Terrorism Reform Act, which included the Commission’s recommendations that 

advanced airline passenger prescreening be conducted by TSA. 

TSA, as you know, after many fits and starts, created the Secure 

Flight Program to carry out this important function. The passage 

of the Intelligence Reform Act was nearly 51⁄2 years ago and Secure 

Flight is not yet fully implemented, although we are told it will 

soon be. 

Had Secure Flight been fully implemented, the Times Square 

bomber would have not been permitted to board a flight to Dubai 

because TSA would have caught the recent addition of Shahzad’s 

name to the No-Fly List. TSA tells us that Secure Flight will, in 

fact, be fully implemented for domestic air carriers by the end of 

June and for foreign carriers by the end of this year. 

As you know, there have been many factors that have delayed 

the implementation of Secure Flight, including pressures from privacy and civil liberties groups and criticisms from the GAO. 

Are you concerned that nearly 9 years after 9/11 and nearly 51⁄2

years after Congress mandated the passage of prescreening against 

the terror watch list be done by the Government, we still have terrorists boarding commercial flights? 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think, Mr. Dent, the ability of screening the 

checkpoints and screening the passengers, the inability to detect 

explosives is a point of high frustration for us. We have—here we 
87 

are—this was a problem well before 9/11. Here we are, we do not 

yet have a detection device that can spot all the explosives that a 

terrorist may bring on. We do not have a device, as I understand 

it, today that could have stopped the underwear bomber. You might 

have gotten him with one of these—— 

Mr. DENT. Whole body scans might have—— 

Mr. HAMILTON. Body scans, but not necessarily. 

Mr. DENT. Correct. 

Mr. HAMILTON. We have put a lot of money into this in trying 

to develop detection equipment. I am kind of frustrated by it. I 

don’t understand the science of it, of course. But we have to come 

up with devices that can detect all of the explosives the terrorists 

can think about. You know the kinds of metal detectors we now 

have when you stop to think about it, the terrorists have moved beyond that and they have outfoxed us and they now have new ways 

of exploding things. It is a catch-up game all of the time, it seems 

to me. But I do not understand why we cannot detect these things. 

I am all for the money being spent to try to find out the right 

device, but when you consider all of the superb scientific talent we 

have around this country, it seems to me we ought to be able to 

figure out a device that will detect explosives. 

Mr. KEAN. I think also—I am frustrated obviously by the length 

of time that has gone by, but I noticed—I came in this morning 

through the airports, and the public is willing to accept anything 

in the name of security, and they have accepted all sorts of inconvenience. Yet if it is going to make them safer, they will accept it. 

So unlike other things, that is not our problem. I mean, the public 

is with us. So we need, what we need is the technological and the 

Governmental will to get these things done and get them done yesterday. 

Mr. DENT. Thank you. I see my time has expired. 

Mr. CARNEY. Thank you, Mr. Dent. According to the sheet, here, 

it is my turn. 

I, first of all, thank you both for being here. This is an honor I 

think for everybody in the committee to have men of your background and intelligence and clarity and wisdom speaking to us. I 

only have really a couple of questions. One is kind of operational 

and one is perhaps existential. The first one: Do we have the correct mix of ints employed in this challenge? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Mix of what? 

Mr. CARNEY. Intelligence capabilities employed in this mix, the 

mix we have, employed in this challenge of the global war on terror 

or whatever it is called now? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, the heavy emphasis on intelligence has 

been collection. We are superb at it. We can really produce the 

data. We have had a great deal of difficulty in developing the analytical capability, and if you go downtown and talk to these Executive branches like the FBI and the CIA and DHS and all the others, DOD, they will tell you that one of their greatest needs is developing the analyst. 

You don’t develop a good analyst in a year or 2. It takes several 

years. As I indicated early in my testimony, the analyst now drives 

intelligence. You can’t—you simply cannot operate in the intelligence world today unless you have effective analysts. So your 
88 

question about the capabilities are—I would put much less emphasis on collection and much, much more emphasis on analytical capability. That is what will drive your intelligence as a preventer of 

terrorism. 

Mr. KEAN. Another—this has always been true, it seems to me, 

ever since I have been in this field. We still don’t have enough 

what is called human intelligence. We don’t have the language 

skills. We don’t have the people employed. We are technologically 

terrific, but we just simply haven’t been able to bring in the trained 

people into the human intelligence area that we need to if we are 

going to be successful in this area. 

Mr. HAMILTON. When I chaired the Intelligence Committee decades ago, we were worried about the inadequacy of human intelligence. We have been worried about the inadequacy of human intelligence ever since I can remember, and that goes back 40 years. 

The conventional wisdom in this town has always been we have got 

to have better human intelligence. When Mr. Tenet came before us 

to testify—Tom, you will remember—he said we are going to put 

more emphasis on this and it will take us 5 years, and we were 

astounded because it was going to take so long. It has taken longer 

than that and we are still not there. 

Mr. CARNEY. Why don’t we have it? 

Mr. HAMILTON. Look, the problem is this: There are a lot of problems, but you are asking a person to put their life on the line for 

years. You are going to pay them—I don’t know—$100,000 a year. 

You cannot take a guy from the Midwest like me and expect he is 

going to penetrate Osama bin Laden’s cell. You have got to have 

a person with a specific background and so forth and makeup, ethnicity. 

Mr. CARNEY. We had a high school kid from California do exactly 

that. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Okay. You bet. So you have to pick these people 

out. You have to train them. How many people do you know, Members of Congress, who would be willing to go 4, 5, 6 years living 

under the harshest conditions in Iraq or Afghanistan or Pakistan, 

you pay them $100,000 a year, and their life is on the line every 

single day? They can’t come back home for vacation. That is the 

tough problem and that is why the human intelligence is such a 

formidable task for us. 

Mr. CARNEY. My final question, my second question: We are directing our resources to prevent them from gaining victory. But 

what in their minds, our enemies’ minds, constitutes victory? 

Mr. KEAN. Well, if you take the statements of Osama bin Laden, 

it is to have the United States totally outside of their the Arabian 

peninsula, in some cases to have the State of Israel destroyed and 

the Palestinians regiven their land. Those are about the two biggest objectives that Osama bin Laden has—— 

Mr. CARNEY. What about the caliphate from Indonesia across—— 

Mr. KEAN. Well, that is out there. I don’t think he has been explicit in that one but certainly it is out there, yes. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think we have to be very cognizant of their tactics. They want to exhaust us on many fronts. They want to cause 

us turmoil. They are—Tom, what did we figure it cost 9/11, 

five—— 
89 

Mr. KEAN. Not much. 

Mr. HAMILTON. A few hundred dollars. 

Mr. KEAN. It was not expensive. 

Mr. HAMILTON. The reason they look upon 9/11 as such a huge 

victory is not just because of the 3,000 people they killed but because they spent a few hundred dollars and we spent multiple billions of dollars in homeland security, defense, fighting two wars 

and all of the rest. If you look at it from their perspective, that is 

a big victory. So they want to exhaust us. They want to cause turmoil. They want to bankrupt us. They want to drive divisions 

among our allies and our friends. They want to destabilize things. 

They want to put fear into our hearts. All of these things are tactics that they employ. The ultimate is what you suggested probably, but that they recognize is very, very far off, establishing a caliphate. 

Mr. CARNEY. So the sense of a strategic victory by tactics is what 

we are struggling with here in this question. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think that may be a good way to put it. But 

they really are focused, I think, much more on tactics at the moment than trying to achieve their ultimate goal. 

Mr. KEAN. It is interesting by the way, they considered the Underwear Bomber a victory because it disrupted us. Even though it 

was unsuccessful, all of a sudden everybody was running around 

saying what did we do wrong and Congressional hearings and 

newspaper headlines and all of that. They considered that a victory. 

Mr. CARNEY. Okay. Thank you. My time is way up there. 

Mr. Austria, please, for 5 minutes or so. 

Mr. AUSTRIA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to thank 

both of you, Mr. Chairman and Governor, for being here today and 

providing the committee Members with testimony as far as updating us as far as the 9/11 report and the progress we have made. 

I think it is very important. My line of questioning was going to 

go down to traveling, but we have had three questions in that area 

particularly with flight safety and I appreciate your responses as 

far as technology that is being used and investments being made, 

as far as the multiple watch lists out there, having a single watch 

list, and having that information brought together and integrated 

together and the fact that you brought up we need one person or 

a single point or a principal point of oversight to review the homeland security. 

One of the areas I wanted to go into to talk a little bit about was 

emergency communications at the local, State, and National level, 

because I know when the initial report came out, you noted the 

tragic consequences of the inability of first responders to be able to 

communicate with each other effectively because of all the multiple 

agencies and the different jurisdictions. I guess my question would 

be how would you assess that today? 

Have we made progress on that? Where are we compared to what 

those recommendations were, where we should be? Do you believe 

if there was another large-scale terrorist attack today in the United 

States, with the multiple agencies, would they be able to be respond with all the multiple jurisdictions out there to be able to ef-
90 

fectively communicate with each other, in particular, our first responders? 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think it might depend a lot on where it occurred. But in most cases, I don’t think we have the ability to get 

effective, reliable communications at the point of the disaster because we haven’t got that worked out yet. Have we made a little 

progress on it? Yes, maybe 25, 35 percent there, but we are not 

there yet. Now, this gets into complicated questions of the radio 

spectrum. The radio spectrum, of course, is a very valuable piece 

of property, and yet our view is that a sufficient amount of that 

radio spectrum should be set aside for the public interest in being 

able to respond and some progress has been made in that direction, 

I think, but not nearly enough. So I think it remains a huge problem, and if we were to have another disaster again, we would lose 

lives because we have not resolved it. 

Mr. KEAN. Let me give you another example because one person 

in charge is so important at the time—one agency at least. In New 

York City, which I know best, Mayor Bloomberg has made a lot of 

progress because he finally solved the controversy between the police and fire department. Now in an emergency, he said the police 

are going to be in charge, as they weren’t—when the 9/11 attack 

came, we didn’t know who was in charge; so now it is the police. 

But what happens if happens in the subway? It is the transit authority. Who appoints them? The Governor. What if it is in the tunnels or bridges? It is the Port Authority. Who do they report to? 

The Governors of two States. So there still isn’t the command authority, even in New York City, which may be prepared as well as 

anybody now, that I think we need. Every city, every State, every 

area ought to have a command authority in charge. So any emergency that happens, there’s one agency to report to. That is absolutely vital and we are not there yet. 

Mr. AUSTRIA. Do you have any recommendations as far as how 

can we move forward and make progress? Because a big concern 

of mine is—and when you are dealing with all of these different jurisdictions at local level, State, Federal, who has jurisdiction over 

what, who would be the entity to take a lead on this in moving this 

forward? 

Mr. KEAN. Maybe it is my background, but I think the Governor. 

I think that is the logical, logical person in every State. If it is an 

entity as large as New York City, then I think the mayor. The 

mayor has got to make those determinations. For instance, in my 

example, I think the mayor should be asking if he hasn’t already 

the Governors of New York State and the State of New Jersey if 

necessary to give him the authority in case of an emergency so that 

there is one agency in charge. 

In the case of New York, that would be the police. In the case 

of New Jersey, I know it is the State police that are put in charge 

during an emergency. But every State under the Governor, I think, 

ought to have that responsibility and have it clear. 

Mr. HAMILTON. It is an easy problem to State and we have done 

a reasonably good job of stating it. It is a very difficult problem to 

resolve. 

Mr. AUSTRIA. One last question I have, Mr. Chairman—— 
91 

Mr. HAMILTON. If you have a disaster taking place in one State, 

the Governor probably ought to be in charge, but even in that case, 

you have got to think of resources. For example, when Katrina hit, 

the Governor of Louisiana, as I recall, made a statement saying 

that she had at her command a handful of helicopters. She needed 

150. Where are you going to get 150 helicopters? There is only one 

place: the DOD. So in so many of these areas where you have massive problems as a result of an attack, the Federal Government is 

certainly going to have to come in at some point. 

Now, the reason this problem has been so difficult to solve is because it is a tough political problem. The mayor likes to think he 

is going to be in charge, or she. The Governor thinks that he or 

she ought to be in charge. They don’t have the resources often to 

do it. The Federal Government is going to be involved heavily one 

way or the other. Working that problem out in advance is very 

hard to do, but I think we have to work hard to try to figure out 

who is in charge at the scene of a disaster. 

Mr. AUSTRIA. I know my time has expired. So thank you, Mr. 

Chairman, and thank both of you for your hard work on the 9/11 

Commission report. I appreciate it very much. 

Mr. CARNEY. Mr. Green, 5 minutes. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the witnesses. 

I have just so much respect for your clarity of thought. It is very 

obvious, in fact, intuitively obvious to a casual observer that you 

have given a lot of thought to these questions and it is important 

that we receive the benefit of your thinking and I cannot tell you 

how important this hearing has been and thank you and I trust 

that we will continue to benefit from your clarity of thought in the 

years to come. I am one of those persons who had the misfortune 

of being involved in the stock market at one time and I had a great 

analyst. He could always tell me the day after why I lost money 

the previous day. He could never quite get it right before. I would 

always marvel at his ability to do this. 

It seems to me that some of what we have is a benefit of great 

hindsight that allows us to connect dots because we see how important the dots are. But before with the foresight is sometimes difficult. I am mentioning this only because I just want to say a kind 

word in defense of the people who have to connect these dots. 

When you are inundated with just an inordinate amount of material and intelligence, and it just seems that so much of it is important, it really is sometimes difficult with trying to use the benefit 

of foresight to connect these dots. 

After an event, it becomes so obvious to you: Well, why didn’t— 

we should have, sure, there, it was right there before our eyes, 

somebody should have, why didn’t you call, why didn’t you send the 

information to—it is easy after the fact. These people have some 

of the toughest assignments in the world, and when I hear us criticizing them for getting a break, it hurts my heart because we got 

a break and it so happens that that break helped us to solve a mystery as it were. But that happens in this business. You need a 

break to solve some of these problems because there is just so 

much information. I want to compliment them, all of them. I just 

don’t know how I can ever be grateful enough, but I want to say 

thank you to them for the work that they do. 
92 

Something that you said I want to reemphasize. You talked 

about how we compensate them and what we expect from them. I 

am taking that to heart. I am not sure how we can resolve the 

question of giving them adequate compensation. Whatever we pay 

them it won’t be enough, but we ought to try to pay them such that 

they become a part of a class of professionals that we can respect 

and people will want to do this because if you want compensation 

as a reward, then you will get that reward. But I also think that 

appreciation is a great part of the compensation that is needed to 

attract and retain people in this area of endeavor because human 

intelligence is just absolutely a necessity. 

Now, with 1 minute and 16 seconds left, I have to go to one other 

place and that is first responders are an absolute necessity, but as 

we learned from Times Square, it is not only the officer on the beat 

but also the vendor on the street that makes a difference too. I 

think that while we get a lot of intelligence we have to continue 

to encourage the public to play a role in this because the public has 

a vital role in seeing that. I think it originated in New York—‘‘See 

something, say something.’’ It is important for the public to be involved in this process and helping us to acquire the intelligence so 

that the analysts can give us a proper assessment of what the intelligence reveals. 

I wish I had a great question for you, but I have heard my colleagues and they have all gone into areas that were of interest to 

me; so I just conclude with a word of thank you for the outstanding 

contribution that you have made to the safety of our country. We 

throw these words around calling people patriots. Sometimes they 

deserve it, sometimes they don’t. But I think it is fair to say that 

you are both great patriots and we owe you a debt of gratitude. 

Thank you very much. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time. 

Ms. RICHARDSON [presiding]. Mr. McCaul is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. MCCAUL. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Mr. GREEN. I apologize, Madam Chairwoman. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. No problem. 

Mr. MCCAUL. Let me, like everybody else, thank you for your 

great work not only on the 9/11 Commission, but Mr. Hamilton on 

the Iraq Study Group as well. I think that report help turned that 

war around in a profound way and I want to thank you for that 

as well. 

I know my colleague from Texas talked about, it is true, hindsight is 20/20. It is easy to find where the dots weren’t connected 

after the fact. But one of the main recommendations coming out of 

the Commission was information sharing. I am the Ranking Member on the Intelligence Subcommittee. We had a recent hearing 

with the Director of Intelligence and Analysis on this issue. We 

have had some intelligence successes but we had to be right every 

time. They only have to be right once. 

But I want to just highlight two failures in terms of lessons 

learned and how we can improve. One is in the case of the Fort 

Hood shooter Hasan. We know that the Joint Terrorism Task Force 

had information that Mr. Hasan was communicating with a cleric 

in Yemen, Mr. Awlaki, one of the biggest threats we have today, 
93 

and yet—with the DOD representative on that task force, and yet 

that information was not shared with the commanding officer, General Cohen, at Fort Hood, which is right next to my district in 

Texas. 

He was very concerned about that, I understand, in terms of sensitivities of investigations. But at a very minimum they could have 

said, you know, you have a major on your base who has been talking to one of the top al-Qaeda recruiters and you may want to keep 

an eye on him, and just maybe that would have prevented that horrible disaster from happening. 

The second is the Christmas bomber. We know that the father 

came into the embassy and warned about his own son being with 

extremists in Yemen. We know that the NCTC had threat information streaming in as well and yet that—he was allowed to still have 

his visa and his passport and he got on an airplane. The Senate 

Intelligence Committee found 14 intelligence failures leading up to 

the Christmas day attack aboard that flight. As we had the hearing 

with I&A, the issue of a National Fusion Center came up, and they 

have been tasked by the administration to be the lead—DHS as the 

lead agency in charge of this National Fusion Center. 

Now, ideally, you would want to include the joint terrorism task 

forces, the HIDA, the DOD certainly in that Infusion Center. This 

is more horizontal intelligence sharing that I am referring to more 

than just vertical. 

So the question came up—this is a monumental challenge in my 

estimate, how they can possibly pull this off and whether they have 

the requisite authority or authorities given to them by Congress to 

go to the Joint Terrorism Task Force or to go to the Department 

of Defense and say you need to be a partner and you need to be 

sharing this kind of information. I personally don’t think they have 

those authorities today. I think that is something that Congress 

needs to be taking a look at in terms of providing them with the 

requisite authorities to carry out that mission. With that, I would 

love to get your comments on that. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I want to be clear. Who does not have the authority under your view? 

Mr. MCCAUL. Well, I don’t think—DHS has been tasked with 

this monumental challenge of putting together a National Fusion 

Center, and again ideally you want the partners to be the intelligence community, the military, Joint Terrorism Task Forces. I 

think it may be difficult for them to go to these agencies and get 

the buy-in necessary with the current lack of authority. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I think I would be in accord with your view. I 

think there is a huge amount of ambiguity with regard to the authorities in DHS and this has made it more difficult for them to 

carry out the responsibilities they have. As you were talking about 

the Fort Hood case and the Christmas bomber case, and the comment you also made with regard to hindsight, it occurred to me 

that it is important that we go, as you obviously have, through a 

very careful analysis of what happened in these events. 

The Senate committee report yesterday, which I have only seen 

a press release on, is an example of that. We have to examine these 

things so that we learn as much as we possibly can from one of 

these incidents occurring and we take steps to correct it. Quite 
94 

frankly, one of the problems is—and this is part of the system, but 

we often go through an awful lot of political gamesmanship here. 

You are responsible, you are responsible, the Republicans are responsible, the Democrats did it, and so forth. 

I am not so naive as to think that doesn’t and won’t happen. 

That is part of the discussion. But I like—I think in terms of how 

we investigate an airline crash in this country, it is done very, very 

professionally, and I don’t recall people popping up on television 

saying it was the Republicans’ fault or the Democrats caused this 

airline to crash. We send in experts, they identify the cause, and 

then they try to correct it. All of that takes weeks and even 

months. 

Now, I may be a little naive here, but I think that is the way 

we have to respond to these incidents that occur. You are going to 

have the political charges for sure, but I really think you have to 

go into it in very great depth for the purpose of trying to find out 

how to correct it. We have kind of gone through that process painfully, but by and large, our system does that although it takes a 

little more time than we would like it to. I am not sure this is responsive at all, but the Fort Hood case is so frustrating, and of 

course, the Christmas bomber case too. It is hard to understand 

how a man like that could be operating as a psychiatrist and it not 

become known to his colleagues ahead of time. So we have got to 

analyze that very carefully and try to find out how to avoid it. 

Mr. MCCAUL. I agree. Thank you very much. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Ms. Jackson Lee from Texas is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you so much. 

Governor, chairman, let me thank you over and over again for 

the vision of the 9/11 Commission. It strikes me as an enormous 

task to have taken up the cause and the challenge right after or 

in the midst of the smoke rising at the 9/11 site and project into 

the future what has been a valuable roadmap, and all we can say 

to you is thank you as we have now morphed into something that 

is enormously challenging for Americans. We relish our freedom. 

We grow up learning about our freedom. As those of us who have 

been blessed to be in this institution, have traveled internationally 

and seen the different forms of governance even if they happen to 

be a democracy—many people don’t realize that London in Great 

Britain have community cameras that watch every step almost of 

their citizenry. I wonder what we would say about that. 

So I ask these questions in the context of our culture and the 

concept that I have written an op ed a couple of weeks ago after 

the horrific tragedy of Fort Hood. It was so intrusive, so unexpected because those of us from Texas know that Fort Hood is an 

enclave of family and it is secured but unsecured, and I said 

human intelligence has to be the new focus, that terrorism is franchised, it is the individual—we use this term lone operator, but it 

is not even that. It is who wakes up in morning and through whatever reasons decides to strike. So I want to pose these questions 

if I might collectively. 

One, the genius of this committee and the Chairman, I might 

say, we organize the Transportation Security and Infrastructure 

Protection Committee, and of course, there is an assistant sec-
95 

retary. I don’t think we do enough protecting the infrastructure of 

America. I think Times Square is an infrastructure and certainly 

in the querying of the Times Square alleged bomber, they gave another list of sites. 

So my question is where are we in the infrastructure scheme and 

what should be the urgent next step? Focus, then, if you would 

more clearly on the Secure Flight to determine whether or not we 

have gotten it right—maybe you can see that. Are we where we 

need to be on surface transportation? We are all focused on mass 

transit and aviation, and lo and behold a car, a bus—everybody 

knows, those of us went to college, the Greyhound bus, Trailways— 

maybe they don’t exist anymore. Then we have a new assistant secretary. 

Is there a hot item, TSA, that that assistant secretary should immediately look at? I am going to close on this. I just want to say 

that I am a convert. This is the jurisdiction of homeland security 

in America. This is a Lego set or something else. I was hoping 

somebody could see this. I know you can just see sort of a page, 

but you can see it is so thick you can’t even see it. I think that had 

something to do with the translation of information to TSA, which 

gets blamed for everything. You are a genius to have organized 

that. It is the right organization to be in place. But the newspapers 

reported that when the call came out of the National Counterterrorism Center, they said to TSA look at five airlines, limiting their 

direct action. 

Who is at fault with that? Just by the grace of God, I will say 

it, we got the person but they were on an international flight. 

So I yield to you. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, let me pick up first on your comment about 

infrastructure protection because I think it is a classic homeland 

security problem. The problem is we are unwilling to establish priorities. In every community you go into, there are certain facilities 

that everybody knows would be the target of the terrorist. We are 

engaged in this unending process of talking about priorities without establishing them. The fact of the matter is you cannot protect 

everything. You can protect some things and you can’t protect others. You simply don’t have the resources to protect everything. So 

you have to make judgments that you are going to protect this, 

that, and the other. You would like to protect it all, but you can’t. 

Many of those infrastructures that you mentioned are not public. 

They are privately owned. So the private sector here has an important role to play as well. 

In short, I think the problem of infrastructure is a question of 

establishing priorities in a community, in a State, and in the Nation, and although we talk about it constantly in homeland security, we don’t do it very well. So I think priorities have to be established on infrastructure. 

Mr. KEAN. I think also Lee is absolutely right, as he usually is. 

You can’t protect everything. But the role of the citizen here becomes absolutely essential because the citizen—it was a citizen 

who identified that problem in Times Square and brought it to 

somebody’s attention. So we have got to have people who are alert 

and also a system so that the citizen, if they see something wrong 

like they did in Times Square, is confident in calling over the local 
96 

law enforcement person, and the local law enforcement person can 

recognize what the problem is and can go up the chain and have 

confidence to go up the chain so that the local law enforcement is 

respected by Federal authorities and State authorities. 

That works because my view is that much more often we depend 

totally on the good people in the FBI and so many other agencies. 

That is not going to be the first alarm on a piece of infrastructure. 

It is going to be somebody who sees something is wrong and somebody who has the confidence to go to somebody in law enforcement 

and point it out and that line of response that goes from there. So 

I think we have got to train citizens and we have got to make sure 

the links between local law enforcement and the Federal authorities are clear and there is respect on both sides. 

Mr. HAMILTON. One of the fundamental concepts of homeland security is a layered defense. You have many different layers of defense. The first layer is the citizen that Tom has been talking 

about. Other layers are obvious. But I think we have fallen short 

as a Nation in terms of educating the American people on their responsibility on homeland defense. There is a tendency to look to 

Washington, to look to the DHS, to look to the intelligence agencies 

to defend us on homeland security. They all have important roles 

to play, but so does every American citizen and if the American citizen doesn’t do the job, then you are—they are going to get 

through, the terrorists. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Surface transportation too? 

Ms. RICHARDSON. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. Mr. Pascrell is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you. I have more respect for each of you 

than for any public official in this country, and I just want you 

both to know that because of your forthrightness and directness. I 

never have to ask: What was he talking about? So I commend you, 

Tom and Lee, for the great work that you have done not just a few 

years ago and it took us a little time to respond but again this is 

Congress. We expect more and there isn’t a sense of urgency. 

I came here today to ask you questions about legislation that 

Peter King and I are putting in and we will probably drop it this 

week or next week, and we have been working on it for a long time 

in a bipartisan nature on weapons of mass destruction, which you 

just about touched on. I know this wasn’t really your main objective, but now we have a WMD Commission and the WMD Commission has made some recommendations as you guys, a few moons 

ago, made recommendations, but it took us a little while to catch 

up. 

Their recommendations were very specific, and Peter and I have 

tried to respond to the great hazards of the biological attacks. The 

Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission very specifically stated 

that they expect a biological attack in this country within the next 

2 or 3 years; you can’t get any more specific than that. 

But something that you both touched upon and something that 

Congressman Lungren pursued strikes me as a little bit more timely right now. So if I may, Governor Kean, you described in New 

York City situations that depended upon where the location of the 

attack was; whether it was in the tunnel connecting the States or 
97 

whether it was someplace in the city itself. The question is: Who 

is in command and who is in charge? 

The thing that was disturbing to a lot of American people after 

the December 25 incident was nobody was in charge, I am convinced of that. 

Something that you talked about, Lee, strikes me as making this 

even more urgent, and that is on the subject of DNI, the Director 

of National Intelligence. I think that this position, as it stands 

right now, needs to be reviewed and inspected very carefully. There 

are close to 3,000 people that work under the Director of National 

Intelligence. That same Director of National Intelligence, as Mr. 

Lungren pointed out, has very little authority, but his job is to talk 

about gathering intel, which is the only privy of the Homeland Security Committee. 

The Homeland Security Department only collects intelligence, 

there is no analysis whatsoever. So this brings about even more interesting situations. I would contend, and I would like to know 

your opinion of this, that we need to take a very close look at the 

DNI because we have created a dinosaur; neither of you envisioned 

it, neither of you asked for it, because you are not dinosaur people: 

If you can’t get it done, get out of the way. 

Well, we chose to create an erector set of a dinosaur that George 

Tenet has frequently said of yesteryear, but very, very significant 

now, once in a while, the tail of the dinosaur needs to be whacked. 

It is almost a description of democracy, I guess. So we are at that 

point. 

Nowhere is there more obvious danger to this country than in 

the intelligence apparatus. I don’t believe that the intelligence apparatus understands the mission—I know the Members of Congress don’t—so maybe there is not a clearly defined mission, generally speaking. Then in each of the agencies that have to gather— 

and some analyze this information, and very few analysts, very few 

people in the field—this used to be the width and breadth of intelligence, having folks out into the field, gathering—who are not 

afraid to stay there 3 or 4 years. You two spelled it out very specifically. 

I personally believe that the DNI has to be somebody other 

than—we are not talking personalities now—that the DNI is something of an albatross in that one of the leading intel gatherers and 

analysts should be in the position and therefore be responsible 

when something happens. 

Let me give you my suggestion. I think that to avoid the confusion on gathering the information, in the analysis of the information, that I would like to see the head of the CIA in that position. 

I would like to see the Director of the CIA. Remember of past year 

the DNI was no longer there. The Director of the CIA has his feet 

on the ground, has access to all the other agencies. That agency 

has been given a very specific responsibility. I would rather see the 

Director of CIA report to the President of the United States because his feet are on the ground, whomever that person would be. 

I know the role of the CIA, I know the role of the Director of the 

CIA; I am not sure what the role is of the DNI, since he has no 

authority. 

Ms. RICHARDSON [presiding]. Please summarize. 
98 

Mr. PASCRELL. So I am very concerned, with urgency, that we 

take a very close look—and I would really respect not only your 

opinions about the WMD legislation, which I mentioned before as 

a commercial, but as I am asking you now about who should be directing the intelligence of the United States of America, and how 

do we not only gather it, but analyze it and put it to good use to 

defend the America that we know? I think it is a critical question 

right now. Too many problems have occurred down the line, and 

who pushed Jake? We never know who is responsible. That is what 

you do when you build a bureaucracy; you build a bureaucracy so 

you don’t know who is responsible, so nobody is held accountable. 

If you may, Madam Chairwoman, may they please quickly respond? I mean, am I on Mars, or do we have possibilities here? 

Mr. HAMILTON. The important thing is that the person who is the 

head of the intelligence community—that is 16 agencies—have the 

authority to be in charge. Now, your suggestion that it be the CIA 

Director makes sense so long as he has the power. For a long time, 

the Director of Central Intelligence had two jobs: One was running 

the CIA, and the other was he was in charge of the intelligence 

community. The problem was that he had no authority to run the 

intelligence community because all of the budget was in the DOD. 

So one director after the other focused on the CIA, trying to make 

that a good organization, and simply did not pay any attention to 

the rest of the intelligence community. 

Okay. We have come along now and we have established the 

DNI. Our whole plea here is that you have authority in a person 

with budget and personnel authority to manage the intelligence 

agencies. If you want to put it in the CIA, that is okay; but if you 

do it, give them the authority to act beyond the CIA to the other 

15 agencies of the intelligence community. So what we are really 

arguing for is unity of command, if you would, within the intelligence community. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Can Mr. Kean respond? 

Ms. RICHARDSON. Very briefly, because we are going to call for 

votes. 

Mr. KEAN. Very briefly, we wonder whether the Director of the 

CIA isn’t a full-time job and whether they can take on the whole 

thing as well. In addition, we knew when the legislation was 

passed that the role of the DNI was not made definitive. Lee and 

I talked about that. Lee said the only way to cure that is the President; the President can give the authority, even if it isn’t in the 

legislation. 

So I think we come here today to say, unless you are going to 

pass legislation—which I don’t think you are going to do too fast— 

the President has got to give the person in charge of intelligence 

the responsibility and the encouragement and the power to do the 

job. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you. 

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. The Chairwoman is going to defer to Ms. 

Holmes Norton, and then I will wrap up. 

Ms. Holmes Norton is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Ms. NORTON. I thank the Chairwoman very kindly. 
99 

I really have two questions; let’s see if I can get them out and 

get answers in in the time allotted to me. 

You are both heroes of the Congress as well as the American people. That is a dual heroism that you both deserve. Substantial portions of your recommendations are already law. 

I would like your guidance, first, on an issue that I found too seldom discussed, and that is weighing risk with the cost of securing 

ourselves. We are all pretty much amateurs; 9/11 people who were 

cops all of a sudden became security officers. One of the ways in 

which I have noted this is in what we protect and how much we 

think we are protecting. 

I will give you a good example. To get into the Capitol on weekends—and since I represent the Nation’s Capital, I am sometimes 

here. There is one entrance open. No one stands there. No Capitol 

Police at the other entrance. Those are in the Senate as well as the 

House. That is a good thing, because you know there has been a 

risk and cost analysis, and somebody figured out that having a 

Capitol policeman at all four entrances on Saturday and Sunday on 

weekends, in light of what we know about risk and threat, didn’t 

make sense. 

Let me give you another example. I sit as Chair of a subcommittee that has to do with building and leasing, and we found 

a real disparity between GSA, which leases for employees who— 

forgive the expression—push papers, and DOD, which leases for 

employees that push papers. DOD has a setback and requirements 

for shatterproof glass and all the rest of it that aren’t heard of for 

civilian employees anywhere else. 

Now, notice I am not talking about people who deal with security. In fact, some people who have just moved out of BRAC as contractors because of BRAC ended up further down into Virginia. 

DOD has problems with these people being replaced with Federal 

employees who would now be doing the same kind of work, because 

the setback isn’t there and the shatterproof glass. 

Now, if we are going to spend our money on shatterproof glass 

and setbacks, the first thing we are going to do is run out of money 

for real risks, I think—I am giving you my opinion. I want yours. 

But in the midst of a recession, we also must note that these kinds 

of setback requirements and shatterproof, et cetera, requirements, 

would mean that large parts of urban and suburban America would 

be off limits for many Federal employees. 

I wonder what you think about the notion of weighing risk and 

cost to come to some kind of balanced and expert decisions about 

how to in fact spend our money now, 10 years or so after 9/11. 

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, I am quite receptive to the idea. What is 

interesting to me is that you bring it up, because in all of the other 

hearings we have had on homeland security, I don’t think it has 

ever been brought up. But I do believe that the whole idea of costs 

associated with homeland security, with protection, has not been 

adequately considered and that we have not weighed in very many 

instances the costs and the risks, the cost-benefit ratio as we try 

to do in other things. So I think as we move along, we will do more 

of that kind of analysis because we can’t protect everything and we 

do have to make judgments. 
100 

When I was talking a moment ago about priorities, I was really 

talking about the same thing that you are bringing up, Ms. 

Holmes, and that is, you cannot do everything you want to do in 

homeland security. We have lived through a period since 9/11 when 

the security people win almost every argument—maybe not all of 

them, but almost all of them—and we have paid for that. The 

Homeland Security budget—I don’t know what it is today, but 

around $40 billion I think, whatever it is—has gone up and up and 

up. So I think the whole idea of cost-benefit ratios, assessment of 

risks, has to become a much more important part of the discussion 

of homeland security. 

Ms. NORTON. Thank you. I don’t want to abuse my time, but Governor Kean. 

Mr. KEAN. As unusual, I agree with Congressman Hamilton. He 

is absolutely right. Priorities, risk assessment. 

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton, now as the acting 

Chairwoman, I will be able to ask a few questions. 

Let me first of all say to both of you gentlemen, it is a pleasure 

to meet you in person. As all the Members have said, we are in 

great gratitude for all of your work; not only with what you did 

with the 9/11 Commission report, but what you continue to do. 

Every time I see your comments in the press, everyone has to acknowledge the tremendous work that you have done, I think the 

selflessness in terms of the recommendations that continue to come 

forward. I just want to encourage you to continue to do so. 

I have two simple questions that I would like to focus on. One, 

our former Secretary of Homeland Security and our current Homeland Security Secretary, neither have been able to move forward in 

terms of us achieving the goal that is in the report of 100 percent 

cargo inspection. My district is the home of the ports of both Los 

Angeles and Long Beach, which is 45 percent of the entire Nation’s 

cargo, and a bridge alone carries 15 percent of the entire Nation’s 

cargo. 

My question is, you obviously spent much time to make that recommendation. What would you recommend that we could do to get 

us moving on this point? It seems like the Secretaries have moved 

more into screening, which is a paper situation, versus inspection. 

I really wanted to get your thoughts on that. 

Mr. KEAN. Well, it is absolutely, as you know, a matter of homeland security essential. I am on the other end of the country at a 

great port, and it is frustrating that after all this time we still 

haven’t got what you refer to. It should have been done, it should 

be done. Every time I ask questions about it they say, well, we are 

almost there. We are not almost there. We haven’t done it yet. 

I know we are doing a lot more of screening things before they 

get to our ports, and that is enormously helpful, but the goal has 

still got to be as you enumerate. The goal has got to be there, and 

we have to keep the pressure on to make sure that is done. We talk 

about setting priorities, that has got to be a priority. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. Well, I would respectfully ask if you would consider in your work, continuing to look at this issue. I had an opportunity to go to the Port of Barcelona and I asked the question: 

Other than the containers that are pulled out, screened, asking for 
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you to inspect, how many others do you look at? The answer was 

none. 

It is, I believe, going to be our biggest mistake, our continued 

failure to address the issue. So any efforts you can make to help 

us with that. 

The second question I would like to ask, and I have just a couple 

minutes left. Yesterday I had an opportunity to view the National 

exercise program. It has been dramatically scaled back, and this 

committee has some concerns with that, in that the scaled-back 

version really includes the agencies walking through, paper-wise, 

what they would do; but the whole normal exercise of 6,000 people 

really seeing a disaster and having to move from point A to point 

B has been minimized. I wanted to get your thoughts of whether 

you view this committee should recommend the scaled-back version 

or really push for the real exercise. 

Mr. KEAN. I would just like to push for the real exercise. There 

is nothing like it. Do it. Even when I was Governor of New Jersey, 

we used to have those exercises. State police were in charge. I 

would go as the commander to the building. We would simulate a 

disaster, whether it was a terrorist kind of disaster—more often we 

were always worried about a hurricane, or what have you. But we 

would spend most of the day there going through a real-time exercise, so when it happened, everybody knew what their job was, and 

coordination was there and lives could be saved. 

It disturbs me. I didn’t know they were scaling that back. I think 

it is very important that they go through a real-time exercise. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I agree. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. In defense of the Department, the agencies operated as they would, but unfortunately the site that was to be considered, which was Indianapolis, they did not do a real live exercise. So it was more agencies talking, but not the real people moving. But thank you for your comment. 

Mr. Chairman, did you want to add anything? 

Chairman THOMPSON. Yes. Thank you very much. 

Governor, as you can see, your former constituent is still here, 

Mr. Pascrell. I told you he is a great American. 

I want to thank both of you gentlemen for your very timely and 

important testimony. Part of what we are trying to do is to get it 

right. As I shared with you before the hearing started, it is all 

about keeping Americans safe. It has nothing to do with party, it 

has nothing to do with anything other than keeping Americans 

safe. To the extent that the two of you have helped set the roadmap for us to make that happen, it is incumbent upon Congress 

to get it right and make sure it happens. 

I have committed myself to a couple of issues that we will address. I want to ask that if at any time you think there is something this committee can be helpful with, please call on us. We are 

here, we want to do it. We have, I think, one of the most bipartisan 

committees on the Hill. We understand the critical mission that we 

are charged with. 

Jurisdiction is an issue we absolutely need to fix. Of course, jurisdiction is a sacred, holy grail in this institution; but nonetheless, 

we have to call it like we see it, and we are in the process of helping make that record. What you have said here today helps us cre-
102 

ate the legislative record that is necessary to move it forward, and 

I thank you for it. 

Apart from that, Madam Chairwoman, I yield back to you. 

Ms. RICHARDSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Pascrell, votes have been called and we have 9 minutes. We 

will allow 1 minute to wrap up because it is my understanding the 

witnesses have another engagement. 

Mr. PASCRELL. I will be very brief, if that is possible. 

I want to get back to the WMD legislation that is coming aboard. 

In this legislation, which we consulted with the staff of the WMD 

Commission, we are looking at this from all angles—prevention, deterrence, preparedness, detection, attribution, response, and, finally, to recovery. 

I wanted to ask both of you: Do you believe the threat of bioterrorism is as dire as anything we face in our homeland security 

strategy? 

Mr. KEAN. It is a dire threat, and so are other weapons of mass 

destruction. I mean, the one that, frankly, bin Laden has mentioned over and over again is a nuclear operation. He would love 

to get a nuclear bomb detonated on American soil. You can imagine 

what that would do. No, all these weapons of mass destruction. 

I commend you for the legislation. We need to be aware of it, it 

has got to be up-front. We have got to do everything in our power 

to prevent what could be catastrophic in this country. 

Mr. HAMILTON. I agree. The emphasis you are putting in your 

legislative proposal for weapons of mass destruction is terribly important because it has been much neglected, we just haven’t 

thought of it in those terms. The problem is, of course, as you recognize, that the potential consequences of a WMD attack, including 

bioterrorism, are just horrendous. We lost 3,000 people on 9/11, 

and all of us can think of what the impact of that was on the country and indeed on our personal lives. 

Just think what would happen if you had a massive bioterrorism 

attack or a nuclear weapon going off. We estimated, what, 500,000 

people dead if a nuclear weapon went off in Manhattan; not casualties, dead. 

So the consequences are just horrendous and may even approach 

a threat to the existence of our country. That is how serious a 

WMD attack could be. 

If I may add something else in there, we have to pay a lot more 

attention to cybersecurity because we are such an interconnected 

country—our water systems, our electrical grid, our communications systems, on and on and on are dependent upon computers. A 

skillful enemy, adversary, could cause enormous disruption in this 

country with a cybersecurity attack on the country. So I hope, Bill, 

as you proceed with that worthy effort, you will think about cybersecurity as well. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Well, thank you both for all of your testimony 

today. We are counting on both of you. I know that you don’t see 

your job as over, and we certainly don’t see it. Please steer us away 

from this bureaucratic nightmare we have constructed into a much 

more sane approach. Thank you. 

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 
103 

Ms. RICHARDSON. I thank the witnesses, Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton, for your valuable testimony, but as has been said, even more 

so for your service as well. 

I thank the Members for the questions. Before concluding, I 

would remind the witnesses that the Members of the committee 

may have additional questions for you, and we will ask for you to 

respond in a timely fashion in writing to those questions. 

Hearing no further business, the committee stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:23 p.m., the committee was adjourned, and 

the hearings were concluded.] 

(105) 

A P P E N D I X 

QUESTION FROM RANKING MEMBER PETER T. KING OF NEW YORK FOR LEE

HAMILTON AND THOMAS KEAN

Question 1a. One of your most important recommendations in the 9/11 Commission report was the need for Congress to ‘‘create a single, principal point of oversight 

and review for homeland security.’’ The 9/11 Commission noted that, at the time, 

there were 86 committees and subcommittees exercising oversight of the Department of Homeland Security. Now, nearly 6 years later, there are up to 108 such 

oversight panels. In your written testimony, you state that ‘‘without taking serious 

action, we fear this unworkable system could make the country less safe.’’ 

How do you believe that this failure to consolidate jurisdiction has or will make 

our country less safe? 

Question 1b. How would you recommend building support for consolidating homeland security jurisdiction within Congress? 

Question 1c. How could individuals or organizations outside Congress help facilitate a solution to this problem? 

Question 1d. Do you believe a hearing by the Committee on Homeland Security 

to examine the detrimental impact this jurisdictional web has on the Department 

would provide useful information that could help achieve progress on this issue? 

Question 1e. Could you please submit what you believe would be the ideal jurisdiction for this committee? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

QUESTIONS FROM HONORABLE WILLIAM L. OWENS OF NEW YORK FOR LEE HAMILTON

AND THOMAS KEAN

Question 1. I recently read an article about DHS telling a dairy farmer living 

along a port of entry in Vermont border that if he refuses to sell his land for 

$39,500, the Government intends to seize it by eminent domain so that they can 

upgrade a port of entry. This port saw under 15,000 vehicles cross it in 2009. Do 

you believe DHS takes into consideration the small business and economic impacts 

of their border policies? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 2. I have a land port of entry in my District that was denied much-needed funding in the President’s fiscal year 2011 budget. While I understand the need 

for fiscal restraint during this economic downturn, I understand that a private 

group offered to provide the upgrades to the facility and lease it back to the Federal 

Government but their proposal was denied by the Feds because DHS believes that 

land ports are an inherently Governmental function. Do you concur with this opinion? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

QUESTION FROM HONORABLE GUS M. BILIRAKIS OF FLORIDA FOR LEE HAMILTON AND

THOMAS KEAN

Question. Governor Kean and Congressman Hamilton, you’ve noted your concerns 

about the detrimental effects of Congressional committees fighting for jurisdiction 

and not working together, and as you know this is an issue on which we agree. 

I am also interested in your thoughts on whether we’ve made sufficient progress 

on interagency security efforts. For instance, I have long been concerned about the 

security of our visa issuance process. Congress authorized the Visa Security Program in the Homeland Security Act of 2002. Yet, nearly 8 years after the Act’s passage, we have less than 20 Visa Security Units in high-risk countries. 

I don’t think there is a sense of urgency in establishing these units, which provide 

enhanced security screening of those seeking temporary visas to enter the United 

States. In fact, the State Department has denied DHS requests to place these spe-
106 

cially trained ICE agents in consular posts because they were concerned about space 

issues. Unfortunately, DHS has taken no for an answer when such objections are 

raised. 

There are too many examples of terrorists exploiting our visa issuance system. 

After all we’ve learned, how can this still be a problem nearly 9 years after September 11? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Æ