[House Hearing, 108 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST
ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
AUGUST 17, 2004
__________
Serial No. 108-55
__________
Printed for the use of the Select Committee on Homeland Security
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/
index.html
__________
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SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
Christopher Cox, California, Chairman
Jennifer Dunn, Washington Jim Turner, Texas, Ranking Member
C.W. Bill Young, Florida Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Don Young, Alaska Loretta Sanchez, California
F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts
Wisconsin Norman D. Dicks, Washington
David Dreier, California Barney Frank, Massachusetts
Duncan Hunter, California Jane Harman, California
Harold Rogers, Kentucky Benjamin L. Cardin, Maryland
Sherwood Boehlert, New York Louise McIntosh Slaughter, New
Joe Barton, Texas York
Lamar S. Smith, Texas Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Nita M. Lowey, New York
Christopher Shays, Connecticut Robert E. Andrews, New Jersey
Porter J. Goss, Florida Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Dave Camp, Michigan Columbia
Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Florida Zoe Lofgren, California
Bob Goodlatte, Virginia Karen McCarthy, Missouri
Ernest J. Istook, Jr., Oklahoma Sheila Jackson-Lee, Texas
Peter T. King, New York Bill Pascrell, Jr., New Jersey
John Linder, Georgia Donna M. Christensen, U.S. Virgin
John B. Shadegg, Arizona Islands
Mark E. Souder, Indiana Bob Etheridge, North Carolina
Mac Thornberry, Texas Ken Lucas, Kentucky
Jim Gibbons, Nevada James R. Langevin, Rhode Island
Kay Granger, Texas Kendrick B. Meek, Florida
Pete Sessions, Texas Ben Chandler, Kentucky
John E. Sweeney, New York
John Gannon, Chief of Staff
Stephen DeVine, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel
Thomas Dilenge, Chief Counsel and Policy Director
David H. Schanzer, Democrat Staff Director
Mark T. Magee, Democrat Deputy Staff Director
Michael S. Twinchek, Chief Clerk
(II)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
STATEMENTS
The Honorable Christopher Cox, a Representative in Congress From
the State of California, and Chairman, Select Committee on
Homeland Security.............................................. 1
The Honorable Jim Turner, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Texas, Ranking Member, Select Committee on Homeland
Security....................................................... 3
The Honorable Robert E. Andrews, a Representative in Congress
From the State of New Jersey................................... 64
The Honorable Dave Camp, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Michigan.............................................. 39
The Honorable Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Florida...................................... 85
The Honorable Benjamin L. Cardin, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Maryland..................................... 50
The Honorable Donna M. Christensen, a Delegate in Congress From
the U.S. Virgin Islands: Prepared Statement.................... 7
The Honorable Peter A. DeFazio, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Oregon............................................ 36
The Honorable Norman D. Dicks, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Washington........................................ 37
The Honorable Jennifer Dunn, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Washington........................................ 6
The Honorable Bob Etheridge, a Representative in Congress From
the State of North Carolina.................................... 100
The Honorable Barney Frank, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Massachusetts......................................... 40
The Honorable Jim Gibbons, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Nevada................................................ 62
The Honorable Bob Goodlatte, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Virginia.......................................... 45
The Honorable Jane Harman, a Representative in Congress From the
State of California............................................ 47
The Honorable Ernest J. Istook, Jr., a Representative in Congress
From the State of Oklahoma..................................... 93
The Honorable Peter T. King, a Representative in Congress From
the State of New York.......................................... 49
The Honorable James R. Langevin, a Representative in Congress
From the States of Rhode Island................................ 105
The Honorable Sheila Jackson-Lee, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Texas........................................ 66
The Honorable John Linder, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Georgia............................................... 52
The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress From the
State of California............................................ 86
The Honorable Nita M. Lowey, a Representative in Congress From
the State of New York
Oral Statement................................................. 60
Prepared Statement............................................. 8
The Honorable Karen McCarthy, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Missouri: Prepared Statement...................... 9
The Honorable Kendrick Meek, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Florida........................................... 108
The Honorable Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Delegate in Congress From
the of District of Columbia.................................... 136
The Honorable Bill Pascrell, Jr., a Representative in Congress
From the State of New Jersey................................... 33
The Honorable Loretta Sanchez, a Representative in Congress From
the State of California........................................ 119
The Honorable John B. Shadegg, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Arizona........................................... 55
The Honorable Christopher Shays, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Connecticut.................................. 35
The Honorable Louise McIntosh Slaughter, a Representative in
Congress From the State of New York:
Oral Statement................................................. 53
Prepared Statement............................................. 10
The Honorable Lamar S. Smith, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Texas............................................. 31
The Honorable Mark Souder, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Indiana............................................... 58
The Honorable John E. Sweeney, a Representative From the State of
New York....................................................... 87
The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Mississippi.................................. 30
WITNESSES
Panel I
The Honorable Lee H. Hamilton, Vice Chair, National Commission on
Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States:
Oral Statement................................................. 15
Prepared Statement............................................. 19
The Honorable Thomas H. Kean, Chair, National Commission on
Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States:
Oral Statement................................................. 11
Prepared Statement............................................. 19
Panel II
The Honorable J. Cofer Black, Coordinator, Office of the
Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Department of State:
Oral Statement................................................. 67
Prepared Statement............................................. 68
Ms. Maureen Baginski, Executive Assistant Director for
Intelligence, Federal Bureau of Investigation:
Oral Statement................................................. 77
Prepared Statement............................................. 79
Mr. John Brennan, Director, Terrorist Threat Integration Center:
Oral Statement................................................. 74
Prepared Statement............................................. 75
General Patrick Hughes, Assistant Secretary for Information
Analysis, Department of Homeland Security:
Oral Statement................................................. 70
Prepared Statement............................................. 70
For the Record
Responses from Ms. Maureen Baginski:
Quesitons submitted by the Honorable Edward J. Markey.......... 139
Questions submitted by the Honorable John Sweeney.............. 139
NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES
----------
Tuesday, August 17, 2004
House of Representatives,
Select Committee on Homeland Security,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:40 a.m., in room
345, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Cox
[chairman of the committee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Cox, Dunn, Smith, Shays, Camp,
Diaz-Balart, Goodlatte, Istook, King, Linder, Shadegg, Souder,
Gibbons, Granger, Sessions, Sweeney, Turner, Thompson, Sanchez,
Markey, Dicks, Frank, Harman, Cardin, Slaughter, DeFazio,
Lowey, Andrews, Norton, Lofgren, McCarthy, Jackson-Lee,
Pascrell, Christensen, Etheridge, Langevin, Meek, and Chandler.
Chairman Cox. Good morning. The Select Committee on
Homeland Security will come to order.
The prior business of the committee will stand adjourned,
and the committee will proceed to hear testimony pursuant to
notice on the 9/11 Commission recommendations concerning
homeland security information sharing. Let me welcome the
distinguished chairman and vice chairman of the Commission, Tom
Kean and Lee Hamilton.
We appreciate your appearance before us today. This
committee, Republicans and Democrats alike, commend you for
your work and for your significant contribution to our national
effort to apply the lessons learned from the tragedies of
September 11th.
This committee and the 9/11 Commission both have a common
origin. We were formed because of and in the wake of the
catastrophic terrorist attacks against America. Both Congress
and the President swiftly recognized that neither the executive
nor the legislative branch of our government was organized to
deal with this terrorist assault. This committee, as you know,
represents the only structural change thus far in Congress,
since September 11th, which was undertaken specifically to deal
with the threat of international terrorism to the United
States. As such, you can understand why we are here to conduct
this hearing into your findings and your recommendations.
As chairman, I can report that this committee has
consistently pursued a legislative and policy agenda to focus
congressional attention on preventing and preparing for acts of
terrorism targeting the United States. This has been a
bipartisan effort owing in part to the strong and able
leadership of our ranking member, Jim Turner, and also to the
recognition by all our members that the security of the
American people must transcend politics, even in an election
year. Partisanship will surely cause us to fail.
The theme of today's hearing is information sharing, which
was a primary focus of the Commission, as it has been of
numerous hearings of our committee. In the fight against
international terrorism there can be no higher priority.
Nor do we treat this subject narrowly. It encompasses
fundamental issues of structure, systems, policy, and
leadership. It is about getting vital information to those who
need it in time to prevent harm to Americans.
The 9/11 Commission has done a superb job in investigating
and recounting for the American people the details of the Al-
Qa'ida attacks on our Nation nearly 3 years ago. In 77 minutes
on that fateful day, terrorism on U.S. soil took over 3,000
innocent American lives.
The report shows in graphic detail how the terrorists
exploited systemic weaknesses to defeat one U.S. Government
agency after another. These were agencies that we reasonably
could have expected to stop the terrorists--the Intelligence
Community, law enforcement, the Federal Aviation
Administration, the State Department, and the Department of
Defense.
Nor does the report spare the Congress. The Commission
concludes that the Congress had failed to organize itself to
deal effectively with post-Cold War national security threats
in general and international terrorism in particular.
Your indictment, therefore, is not just of our Intelligence
Community, but of the way the entire U.S. Government was
organized with respect to counterterrorism.
The Intelligence Community does not exist in a vacuum. Its
priorities and performances are clearly influenced both by
executive branch structures and by the authorization and
appropriations committees in the Congress.
Reforms will not succeed, the report concludes, unless the
priorities of the President, the Federal Government, and the
Congress are brought into alignment for the future. And this
means each branch must be properly organized to do this, which
is still not the case today.
President Bush has gotten ahead of this issue by accepting
two principal recommendations from the Commission. First, with
regard to establishing the National Counterterrorism Center,
and second, by proposing a National Intelligence Director.
These swift and bold decisions are consistent with his repeated
statements that whatever we have achieved over the past 3
years, we have much more work to do to protect the American
people. The President clearly sees the 9/11 Commission report
as helping toward this end, and so should we here.
I know the Commission will stay engaged with us as we
grapple with these active issues in the months ahead. You have
not just delivered a carefully prepared historical analysis,
but you have also significantly advanced the long-term
prospects for fundamental reform.
Finally, let me turn to the Commission's look at the
performance of Congress over the past several years. The report
found Congress wanting in several key areas. Congress, the
report says, is too much oriented toward domestic rather than
foreign affairs. Congress has resisted reorganizing itself to
deal with the post-Cold War threat environment, including
international terrorism. Congress has focused on selective
investigations over comprehensive and thorough oversight. And
Congress has allowed rigid and unchanging committee
jurisdiction to skew priorities, often against heightened
security concerns in a changing world.
That is an unflinching diagnosis. All of us, Republicans
and Democrats alike, would have preferred a different one. But
we do hear you, and we must now do something about it.
The Commission follows this provocative analysis with a
recommendation that permanent standing committees on homeland
security be established in both the Senate and the House. These
far-reaching recommendations I know will be delved into even
more deeply this morning.
Let me thank you both once again for coming before our
committee this morning. I am eager to hear your testimony and
to remain engaged with you in the challenging year ahead.
Let me now turn to our distinguished ranking member, Jim
Turner, for his opening remarks.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for calling
this very important hearing.
I want to acknowledge the presence of all of our colleagues
here today to deal with this very critical issue. And I have
been a part of several other hearings where many of the family
members of the families of the 9/11 victims have been with us.
I want to acknowledge their steadfastness in following this
issue and working together with the 9/11 Commission to bring us
to the point where we can make America safe.
Governor Kean and Congressman Hamilton, we are very pleased
to have you before us. I know you have had a rigorous schedule
of testifying. I know, Governor, you are probably tired of
hearing all of Lee Hamilton's former colleagues brag on him,
but we want to do that once again here today. I was listening
to Congressman Hamilton's successor, Baron Hill; in talking
about him the other day in the Armed Services Committee, he
pointed out that following Lee Hamilton in office was kind of
like following Abraham Lincoln in office. Lee Hamilton did such
an outstanding job for many years leading us, particularly in
the area of foreign policy.
So we are very honored by your presence and we thank you
for being with us. Most importantly, thank you for your
leadership of a bipartisan commission. Your unanimous report
creates, I think, the political conditions that are necessary
to advance meaningful reform. You have invited all to embrace
your report and its recommendations. And in the partisan world
of Washington, D.C., you have produced a truly bipartisan
product. We commend you in that effort. You have not dealt with
the blame game, wisely recognizing that prior to 9/11 failing
to take Al-Qa'ida seriously was a pervasive fault.
Now, here we are almost 3 years after 9/11, and frankly we
have no excuse. We have heard repeatedly from numerous
scholarly reports, recommendations for action. Today, we are
confronted with the clear threat of another major attack on our
country. The reality of these continued threats should be a
stark reminder to us that we have much more to do to make
America safe.
You have been very clear in your recommendations that just
moving a few positions around on the organizational chart as
the proposed National Director of Intelligence will not get the
job done. You have said we need a grand strategy, a
comprehensive, long-term approach to address a new enemy,
militant Islamic jihadism.
Defeating this enemy, you say, requires a three-pronged
approach: one, attacking the terrorists more aggressively; two,
securing our homeland better; and three, pursuing policies and
initiatives to prevent the rise of future terrorists.
Only one of your recommendations, I note, deals with the
role of the military; 21 of your recommendations deal with
strengthening homeland security, 10 of your recommendations
deal with preventing the rise of future terrorists. Clearly we
must transform the military to defeat this new enemy.
Condoleezza Rice testified to your commission that in June
of 2001 when she was tasked with drawing up plans to attack Al-
Qa'ida and the Taliban, in her words, quote, ``The military
didn't particularly want this mission.'' We are trained and
equipped to fight nations and armies, but the new enemy
requires new training, new capabilities, and new missions.
We defeated communism in the last century by maintaining
superior military capabilities and by projecting our values and
our ideals as a nation to the rest of the world. When the
Berlin Wall fell, not one shot was fired. Radical Islamic
fundamentalism must be defeated by the same force of our ideals
and our values. Secretary Rumsfeld, in his now famous memo,
asked this: He said, ``Are we capturing, killing or deterring
and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrasas and
the radical clerics are recruiting, training, and deploying
against us? The United States is putting relatively little
effort into a long-range plan, but we are putting a great deal
of effort into trying to stop terrorists.'' That is from the
Secretary of Defense.
The 9/11 Commission gives us a long-range plan to stem the
rise of future terrorists, and it begins with supporting the
voices of moderation in the Islamic world. The Commission
recommends investment in education and economic partnership in
the Muslim and Arab world with America offering, in your words,
an example of moral leadership in the world committed to treat
people humanely, abiding by the rule of law and being generous
and caring to our neighbors.
This clearly will require American leadership in building
strong alliances and coalitions around the world. If our
government continues to ignore the 10 recommendations of the
Commission to prevent the rise of future terrorists, we have no
strategy for victory over terrorism. We will be left to decades
of fighting the terrorists both abroad and here at home. And
until we achieve this ultimate victory over terrorism, we have
no option but to implement vigorously the 21 recommendations of
your report dealing with securing the homeland.
I am pleased that we can report to you that our committee
has already taken action on your recommendation to distribute
homeland security funds based solely on the assessment of
threats and vulnerabilities. We acted on this in a unanimous
and bipartisan way last February. Now this legislation should
be set for debate on the House floor.
For over 2 years we have called on the administration to
close the security gaps facing America as outlined in many of
your recommendations. The 9/11 Commission has stated that
unscreened air cargo is a threat to our security. Congressman
Markey and Congressman Shays have called for action on this for
over 2 years, yet little has been done to close that security
gap, and the vulnerability remains.
The 9/11 Commission has stated that we need a biometric
interoperable border screening security system. Members of
Congress on both sides of the aisle have been advocating for
such a system for many years. Yet the 9/11 Commission has
concluded that the US VISIT system, initiated by the Department
of Homeland Security, is built on, and I quote, ``antiquated
computer environment.'' That will have to be replaced.
Almost 3 years after 9/11 we still do not have an
interoperable border security system. We still have not
achieved integrated information sharing among intelligence
agencies.
The 9/11 Commission has noted that even after the deadly
rail attacks in Madrid, the Department of Homeland Security has
failed to develop an integrated strategic plan for the
transportation sector. My colleague, Congresswoman Holmes
Norton, called for this action months ago in our legislation to
better secure our rail and public transportation sector, but
there has been no action. The list could go on.
The 9/11 Commission report is a wake-up call for our
government. We need to regain the sense of urgency that we all
had after September 11th. With 21 recommendations on homeland
security, we should, Mr. Chairman, schedule hearings on each of
these recommendations jointly with other committees when
appropriate to be ready to act on comprehensive legislation
that addresses each of the Commission's 41 recommendations.
We also should be proceeding with the suspended markup of
our Homeland Security Authorization Act. Many of the amendments
that my colleagues and I would offer to that bill relate
directly to the recommendations of the Commission.
Democrats met last week with Governor Kean and Lee Hamilton
to talk about the report and to let it be known that we are
ready to get to work. I hope that this committee can provide
and will provide the leadership necessary over the next few
weeks to move forward on this important task.
Governor Kean, Mr. Hamilton, thank you again for your
leadership in helping make America safe. America is grateful
for what you and your colleagues have done, and for your
dedication and your commitment we will be eternally grateful.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. I thank the gentleman.
I would advise members of the outset that both Chairman
Kean and Vice Chairman Hamilton have been generous with their
time today. They are available to be with us all morning, and
they have requested that they be dismissed at 12:15. In order
to provide sufficient time for questioning by all members, I
would ask members to consider waiving or limiting the durations
of opening statements. If members have written statements, they
may as always be included in the hearing record.
The vice chairman of the full committee, the gentlelady
from Washington State, Ms. Dunn, is recognized for her opening
statement.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I too thank the
witnesses for coming yet another time to testify before our
committee--a very important committee, though, I believe, of
people who are representative of districts all over the Nation.
And we have flown in today to make sure that we hear from you
firsthand. It is a credit to you that you have got so many
members here today, because we believe that you have done a
very thoughtful job and have brought sensitivity and attention
to an issue that we have been dealing with now for almost 2
years. So thank you for being here.
The terrorist attacks on September 11th forced all of us to
think differently about life in America. We realize we faced a
new enemy, one that is not easily contained or eliminated. That
day we shifted our focus and our resources. The terrorists
didn't make us fearful as they had hoped they would do. They
strengthened our resolve. They have not made us cower. We have
confronted them with international might. Most of all, the
terrorists have reminded us of what is great about America:
freedom, democracy, justice, values that we will always fight
for.
These radical groups are creative and enduring in their
effort to bring down the values of the Western civilization. We
must be just as unwavering and innovative in our effort to
prevent them from doing so. The 9/11 Commission's report has
provided an insightful road map for our continuing effort to
reform systems and processes that were not designed to confront
the present enemy.
Today, we will hear firsthand from Commission leaders as
well as Federal officials of counterterrorism responsibilities.
House and Senate leadership are committed to swift action on
the Commission's report. In the following weeks, the American
people will see a careful and thoughtful process that takes
into account the progress that already has been made by the
administration and the Congress as well as the equally
thoughtful calls for action in the Commission's report.
We have a lot of work to do. The President has already
proposed creating a National Intelligence Director as well as a
National Counterterrorism Center, two changes suggested in your
report. It is also important to note that of the 19
recommendations for intelligence reform issued by the joint
Senate-House inquiry last year, which are consistent with the
9/11 Commission's recommendations, Congress and the
administration already have implemented or addressed all but
three of those.
As we take action on the 9/11 Commission's ideas, we will
also consider the Commission's recommendation to focus
congressional oversight. Successful reform of Federal
Government agencies will absolutely depend on effective
oversight. And the current system which requires Homeland
Security Secretary Tom Ridge and his chief deputies to report
to an estimated 88 committees and subcommittees reinforces the
status quo and is unacceptable. We will continue to seize this
opportunity for reform. And during our consideration of bold
proposals, we will not discount the reform that has already
taken place--the consolidation of 22 Federal agencies within
the Department of Homeland Security; the establishment of the
Terrorist Threat Integration Center, centralizing information
and manpower from several intelligence agencies; the passage of
Project BioShield--all bold steps that have made us safer than
we were on 9/11.
In a Presidential election year, it is especially tempting
to focus on what has been done wrong and not what has been done
right.
As we focus on the Commission's recommendations, I am
confident that all of us will put politics aside. It would be a
mistake and a disservice to our constituents to ignore the
progress we have made since 9/11. Today we welcome ideas for
continued process.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. I thank the gentlelady. Does the gentleman
from Mississippi, Mr. Thompson, have an opening statement?
Mr. Thompson. Mr. Chairman, in the interest of getting to
the substance of why we are here, I will reserve the time
allotted to me.
Mr. Frank. Mr. Chairman, as greatly as I respect my
colleagues, I would not have interrupted my vacation to come
listen to us all make speeches. I ask unanimous consent that we
waive opening statements and get right to the witnesses.
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Donna M. Christensen
Thank you Mr. Chairman. I want to, at the outset, commend you Mr.
Chairman for scheduling a hearing before this committee on the
recommendations of the September 11th Commission.
Mr. Chairman, I welcome the opportunity to discuss the Commission's
findings and recommendations with the Commission's distinguished
Chairman and Vice-Chairman. They are to be commend for the remarkable
job they have done, not only in spearheading the drafting of the report
but also for the generous way that they have given of their time in
appearing before a number of other committees to press for the
enactment of their recommendations in their entirety. I also appreciate
that we will hear from the Mr. Brennan of the TTIC again, as well as a
comprehensive list of witnesses who will allow us to fully explore the
need for a better homeland security information sharing system between
agencies and state and local governments.
Coming close to the end of the committee listing, I am sure that
most of the broader questions will have been asked. My interest then is
in border security, the treatment of the territories and Indian
reservations, funding and preparedness of first responders, and how we
regain our position of moral leadership in the world.
Over the past two weeks, in response to the 9/11 commission report
and in preparation for this hearing, I convened Town Meetings across my
Congressional District to gage my constituent's reaction to the
commission's recommendations. These meetings were hugely successful in
demonstrating the importance the people of the Virgin Islands place on
the protection of the community and the United States as a whole.
Overall we endorse the findings and recommendations of the
Commission, but stress the need for a planned approach developed on the
basis of study and research. To the extent we are still not as well
prepared as we should be and limited in our capacity to adequately
respond, I believe it is because all along we have ``reacted'' instead
of ``responded.''
I daresay, if lack of imagination was a fault before 9/11, it
continues to be so today, closely followed by being entrenched in the
old ways things were always done. This and the other legislative body
bear much of the responsibility for the latter, and I see little signs
of willingness to change.
Change was and is needed to meet new threats and new methods of
attack that are only limited by the imagination, will and ingenuity of
those who would do us harm.
If we fail to imagine and change, our constituents will always
remain at great risk.
Political posturing which is dominating much of our reaction has no
place. To eliminate it requires presidential leadership of a kind we
have not seen in the life of this Committee.
More specifically, where you address the need for a comprehensive
border strategy, the 175 miles of unsecured border in the U.S. Virgin
Islands, my district--a cross over point for illegal entrants from
distant places remains unsecured. We fully support that all borders
must be secured.
We support an all hazard approach that protects our communities'
safety at all times, for we cannot know where the terrorists will next
strike or how. This includes a fully prepared and intact public and
private health system with emphasis on poor and minority communities
where it is weakest--including Indian reservations, with clear lines of
authority and accountability.
One area not specifically iterated in the report, but very relevant
to improved intelligence, is the need to diversify our intelligence
workforce if we are ever to penetrate the enemy cells.
Realizing that this is a report on 9/11, I would nevertheless add
that the focus of our terrorist identification and eradication cannot
be focused on Islamic believers only. Continuing to do so leaves every
other flank open.
Lastly, and this is my greatest concern--as you have so accurately
said, we have done nothing to reduce the growth of the numbers of those
dedicated to doing harm to our citizens and our country.
We have failed to look within, to go beyond getting back to
``normal''. It--normal--was and remains not a nice place to be for many
of us, and the world can see that. Our failure to deal fairly with
those who are ``different'' right here in the US portends the
impossible for our dealings with those in foreign lands.
To gain respect we not only have to reach out with educational,
political and economic opportunity elsewhere, we must begin that
process here at home. We have yet failed to do so, and any outreach
across the seas will be seen for the empty, false gesture that it is.
So we have a lot of work to do. We are grateful for your service,
and the blueprint you have so ably provided.
It remains for the president and us to respond appropriately. The
only hope I hold out that we will do so is your promise to follow
through on the recommendations to the end, and the commitment of the
families of those who were so brutally assassinated on September 11,
2004, whose efforts made the commission possible.
Thank you once again Mr. Chairman for the opportunity to give these
brief opening remarks. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses.
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Nita M. Lowey
I want to welcome Commission Chairman Kean and Vice Chairman
Hamilton to the Committee. I commend you for the thorough and dedicated
way in which you have carried out your work on behalf of our country.
It is clear that this Committee, and this Congress, has a great deal of
work to do.
I share your commitment to act expeditiously to implement the
recommended reforms, some of which can be put in place without major
structural changes and without enacting legislation. It is on these
recommendations I would like to focus today.
This Committee has an awesome responsibility as the first oversight
panel of the Department of Homeland Security. But despite the best
intentions of many of my colleagues, the Select Committee has not
become the perfect solution to the question of how to oversee this new
Department. Instead, this arrangement has turned out to be the perfect
storm.
We have been hamstrung by jurisdictional disputes that the
leadership has been unwilling to resolve. We passed a First Responder
bill out of Committee five months ago that would have ensured that our
formula for disbursing homeland security dollars was based on threat,
population, and vulnerability, just as the Commission has recommended.
But it has been stalled on its way to the floor by Members who disagree
with the Commission's recommendation that ``Congress should not use
this money as a pork barrel.'' We could act on this recommendation
right now, but we have not.
Since the summer of 2003, the Department of Homeland Security has
cited consistent intelligence reports that terrorists remain interested
in using aircraft as weapons against the United States. A GAO report
released in June concluded our airports and aircraft are still
vulnerable--passengers are not checked adequately for explosives, and
more than 1 million airport workers, many of whom have antiquated
background checks, enter secured areas each day without being
physically screened. The Commission recommended that we give priority
attention to improving screening of passengers and more closely oversee
screener performance. We could act on this recommendation right now,
but we have not.
Our communication systems failed our first responders on September
11th, leading to many deaths that could have been prevented. In May, I
introduced the CONNECT First Responders Act, a bill that would fund the
creation of a nationwide interoperable communications infrastructure.
The Commission recommended that Congress support efforts to improve
communications connectivity. We could act on this recommendation right
now, but we have not.
The Commission has also made recommendations that are more long-
term, recognizing that homeland security is not only a matter of
practice; it's a matter of policy. I appreciate the Commission's focus
on the importance of providing a quality education in the Muslim world
that teaches tolerance, the dignity and value of each individual, and a
respect for different beliefs. As Ranking Member of the House
Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign Operations, I have worked to
quadruple U.S. spending on basic education abroad, from $98 million in
FY 2000 to a total of $400 million for FY 2005. I have always
maintained that support for this objective is a matter of national
security--not just a nice thing to do--and I am pleased to have the
unanimous support of the Commission in this endeavor.
The Commission's report has provided Congress with a road map. The
speed and resolve with which we follow this road map will have serious
consequences for the security of the American people. I urge this
Committee and this Congress to listen carefully to our witnesses today,
and to act quickly to make our country more safe.
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Karen McCarthy
Thank you Chairman Cox and Ranking Member Turner for convening this
important hearing.
On September 11, 2001 the world watched in horror as terrorists
attacked our country. They were able to invade our country and commit
these terrible acts of violence.
The release of the bipartisan 9/11 Commission Report has told us
what went wrong but most importantly provides us a roadmap to prevent
this from happening in the future. Their recommendations are the
actions that we in Congress must take to prepare and prevent another
attack.
The Commission found that lack of intelligence information sharing
between the CIA, FBI and other government agencies was the greatest
weakness leading to the 9/11 attacks. They found that even when
intelligence was shared there still was an inability to make sense of
this information and take immediate action. I strongly agree with the
Commission's recommendation that the President should lead a government
wide effort to help fix these critical problems within our intelligence
gathering organizations. If this had happened before the 9/11 attacks
many lives may have been saved. These institutions must be able to
collect, analyze and share intelligence expeditiously and have the
means to pass on and collect intelligence to and from our state and
local officials who serve on the front lines.
The Commission recommends the establishment of a National
Counterterrorism Center, built upon the foundation of the existing
Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC). They also recommend the
consolidation of budgetary and operational oversight of all fifteen
intelligence agencies and the naming of a new National Intelligence
Director to unify the intelligence community. As the Ranking Member on
the Intelligence and Counterterrorism Subcommittee of the Select
Committee on Homeland Security, I whole heartedly support these
recommendations.
The international collection and sharing of information is
extremely important to stopping terrorists. The Commission recommends a
global strategy for the United States to ``. . .reach out, listen to,
and work with other countries. . .'' Congress must embrace this
strategy. During the first part of August, I joined with my Homeland
Security Committee colleagues on an intelligence gathering trip to the
UK and Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. We learned about
the existence of foreign terrorist cells from their intelligence
agencies and had a very frank exchange about how we can help each other
in the fight against terrorism. I was very pleased to see that the 9/11
Commission Report recommends that United States ``. . .should reach
out, listen to, and work with other countries. . .'' as a means of
gathering intelligence.
Now that the 9/11 Commission has done its job, we need to do ours.
Today's hearing puts us a step closer to preventing another terrorist
attack. I urge the leadership of Congress to follow the lead of this
Committee.
I want thank the 9/11 Commissioners and the staff for their hard
work and dedication. This report should become our bible in winning the
war on terrorism.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today on how we can
quickly move forward to create a new National Counterterrorism Center,
name a National Intelligence Director, develop a global strategy for
working with our allies and implement all of the Commission's
recommendations. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Louise M. Slaughter
Thank you, Chairman Cox and Ranking Member Turner for holding this
timely and important hearing, and thank you Governor Kean and
Representative Hamilton for joining us.
I would like to start by giving special recognition to the two fine
men before us today for their yeoman's work.
The fortitude and great character that Governor Kean and
Representative Hamilton exhibited at every point in the process is
truly remarkable. From the very beginning, we could see that these two
men took their responsibilities to the 9-11 families and the American
people very seriously.
As we are all aware, the process for investigating the attacks was
not always smooth. In some corners, there were those who tried to
denigrate the effort to secure key testimony and access to records.
There were even some who chose to characterize the effort to secure
this information as partisan. Those critics were blind to what was
really behind this effort.
On 9/11, I stood on the steps of the Capitol building, arm-in-arm
with my colleagues in Congress to sing God Bless America. On that day,
there was no such thing as Democrat or Republican. We were all just
Americans. It is that sense of unity and patriotic spirit that guided
this Commission's work.
Governor Kean, the other Commissioners, and the Commission staff
were executing their solemn oath to the 9/11 families and the nation.
They did not execute their responsibilities to serve the interests
of any one political party. No, they were on a mission to get to the
truth to make America safer.
The 9/11 Commission was not focused on pointing fingers or laying
blame. Rather, it was focused on providing the truth about what
happened on that terrible, terrible day to the families of those lost
in the September 11th attacks and all Americans.
The 9/11 Commission was also focused on providing us with a plan to
ensure that our country is never as vulnerable as it was on September
11, 2001.
They could not have provided a higher service to this country.
I am pleased that the reaction to the 9/11 Commission report
recommendations has been overwhelmingly positive. However, the
Commissioners are right to be concerned that this report, like so many
well-regarded reports before it, will be relegated to sitting on a
shelf in all our offices, and see no action.
We cannot not--we must not--let that happen.
My constituents, the 9/11 families, and all Americans expect more
than cosmetic changes from our government.
We must act on all 41 recommendations outlined by the 9/11
Commission--not merely the provisions that the President supports.
The focus of today's hearing is on information sharing--an area
that has received significant attention by this panel since the
Committee's inception in January 2003. The 9/11 Commission's findings
seem to support what I have come to believe.
Despite the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in
March 2003, our information sharing system is weak and the problems of
interagency coordination that existed on September 11th persist.
The people I represent in Western New York are the kind of people
who ``call it like they see it''. When it comes to current state of
homeland security, they don't know what to think.
In the wake of the September 11th attacks, they stood ready to
sacrifice; many going down to Ground Zero to help in the search and
recovery. They still stand ready to withstand delay and discomfort, if
it means our country will be safer.
But today, nearly three years later, they ask me how duct tape will
make their families safer. They ask me why there are chronic delays at
the U.S.-Canadian border, even when we're not at a heightened Orange
Alert. They ask me how confiscating a key-chain pocketknife from an
elderly man at the airport will make them safer.
As the Ranking Member of this panel's Rules Subcommittee, I am
keenly interested in the Commission's views on the weaknesses in the
current congressional oversight model.
Today, DHS officials must come before 88 congressional committees
and subcommittees. How does that impact the Department's ability to
execute its mission and Congress' ability to conduct oversight?
When it came to creating DHS, Congress accepted, on a bipartisan
basis, that the merger of 22 Executive agencies would be required to
ensure greater coordination and accountability.
Congress must now put aside its petty jurisdictional fights and
enhance accountability by adopting a centralized model of oversight.
This is not just my opinion, it's what the 9/11 Commission
recommends.
In fact, the Commission calls on Congress to ``create a single,
principal point of oversight and review for homeland security.'' By the
Commission's own admission, ``[o]f all our recommendations,
strengthening congressional oversight may be among the most difficult
and important.''
As someone who has served in this body for 18 years, I must commend
the Commission for its accurate assessment of the challenges ahead.
I am interested in hearing from Representative Hamilton, a 34-year
veteran of the House, on how to overcome the jurisdictional hurdles and
develop a centralized approach to oversight.
I am also interested to hear the panelists' views on making this
Committee permanent--as the primary House Committee in charge of
overseeing the Department of Homeland Security.
After months of study, I strongly believe that this Committee is
uniquely situated to undertake the challenges of enhanced congressional
oversight. Congress should make this Committee permanent to do just
that.
I also must reiterate that Congress must act on all forty-one
recommendations. For this to be accomplished, Congress will not only
have to put partisanship aside but also abandon jurisdictional
wrangling. Such action is essential to giving the American people the
homeland security they deserve.
Thank you Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member Turner for holding this
important hearing.
Chairman Cox. Is there objection?
Hearing none, we will move immediately to the testimony of our
distinguished witnesses, the chairman and vice chairman of the National
Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States.
Chairman Cox. Governor Kean, we will begin with you.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE THOMAS H. KEAN, CHAIR, NATIONAL
COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES
Mr. Kean. Chairman Cox, Ranking Member Turner,
distinguished members of the House Select Committee on Homeland
Security, I want to thank you, the ranking member and the
chairman for their statements. We appreciate that it is a
wonderful summary of our recommendations and your statements of
support. I thank you on behalf of the Commission and the
American people very much.
We are honored to appear before you today. We want to thank
you and the leadership of the House of Representatives for your
very prompt attention to our recommendations. We are very
grateful to you and the leadership for that attention.
The Commission's findings and recommendations, as you know,
were strongly endorsed by all commissioners, five Democrats,
and five Republicans. We share a unity of purpose and we call
upon Congress and the administration to display that same
bipartisanship and that same unity of purpose as we all strive
to make our country and all Americans safer and more secure.
How information is shared in our government, and not just at
the Federal level, but with State and local agencies, is a
matter of critical importance to homeland security and to
national security.
As we looked at the 9/11 story, we found that the failure
to share information cost us very dearly. All agencies,
Federal, State, and local, need to have information available
in a timely manner because they all have responsibilities to
protect Americans. We need to get this right.
What we learned in our 9/11 story is that the U.S.
Government has access to a vast amount of information. We have
Customs and immigration information, FBI and police reports,
and so much more. The storehouse of information is immense. But
the government has very weak systems for processing and using
that information it possesses, especially when that information
has to be used across agency lines.
Our report details many unexploited opportunities to
disrupt the 9/11 plot, failures to watchlists, failures to
share information, failures to, as we say, ``connect the
dots.''
The story of Hamzi and Mihdhar in Kuala Lumpur in January
of 2000 is just one of a number of examples. We caught a
glimpse, we found those future hijackers, but we lost their
trail somehow in Bangkok. And because information wasn't shared
when these people came to the United States and were living
openly on the West Coast, Los Angeles and San Diego, the FBI
didn't know about it. And the FBI didn't learn until August of
2001 that Hazmi and Mihdhar were in the United States. And so
they suddenly started pursuing leads, but that was too late,
and time on that fateful day just simply ran out.
Agencies live by the need-to-know rule. They limit the
sharing of information. Each agency has its own computer
system, its own security practices, and these are outgrowths of
the Cold War. Implicit in their practices is the assumption
that the risk of inadvertent disclosure outweighs the benefits
of larger sharing among agencies. And we believe, as a
commission, that that is a Cold War assumption and it is no
longer appropriate.
In the 9/11 story we came to understand the huge cost of
failing to share information across agency boundaries. Yet the
current practices of government, security practices encourage
overclassification.
Now, we understand the critical importance of protecting
sources and methods. We believe it is also important to share
information. There are plenty of penalties for unauthorized
disclosure, but you know there isn't one single penalty for not
sharing information.
We believe that information procedures across the
government need to be changed, that there should be incentives
provided for sharing information. Intelligence gathered about
transnational terrorism should be processed, turned into
reports, and distributed according to the same quality
standards whether it is collected in Indonesia or Minnesota.
We believe the President needs to lead a government-wide
effort to bring the major national security institutions into
the information revolution. The President needs to lead the way
and coordinate the resolutions of the legal, policy, and
technical issues across agency lines so that we can make sure
in the future that this important information is shared.
The model is a decentralized network. Agencies would still
have their own databases, but those databases would be
searchable across agency lines. In the system, in this system,
secrets are protected. They are protected, though, through the
design of the network that controls access to the data. They
don't prevent people from having access to the network.
An outstanding conceptual framework for this kind of
trusted information network has been developed by a task force
of leading professionals in national security, information
technology and laws as they are all assembled by the Markle
Foundation. Its report has been widely discussed throughout the
U.S. Government, but so far it has just been discussed; it
hasn't been converted into action.
The point here is that no single agency can do this alone.
One agency can modernize its stovepipe, but cannot develop a
system to replace that stovepipe. Only Presidential leadership
can develop the necessary government-wide concepts and
standards.
In a hearing that Lee Hamilton and I testified at last
week, a Member of Congress asked us what information about
terrorism did the pilot of American 11 have available to him on
the morning of September 11th? And the answer is very simple:
He had none. Despite his professional training and military
experience, he was given no useful information to help him or
the crew to protect the passengers of that plane. In fact, his
training told him that if there was a hijacking, you submit to
it, protect the passengers, and eventually perhaps you would
land in Havana and then go home.
Now, contrast this with the situation on United 93 when the
passengers and crew learned from phone conversations with their
loved ones about the attacks on the World Trade Center. They
took action as citizens. They saved the Capitol, or the White
House, we don't know which, from probable destruction. An
informed citizenry, a citizenry that knows the facts, is this
Nation's best defense.
For the same reason, we believe it is imperative that as
much information as possible be shared with State and local
authorities. There are a lot more of them than there are
Federal authorities, and they too can take action to protect
the homes of their fellow citizens.
There are some 18,000 State and local law enforcement
agencies in the United States. If we can harness the awareness
and experience of these dedicated professionals, as a Nation we
will greatly enhance our security. Reforms of the kind we
recommend will push more important information out to State and
local agencies. The more everyone charged with our security
knows, the more information they have, and the safer we all
will be.
Let me turn for a moment to some of our findings and
recommendations. As our report makes clear, the decade before
9/11 border security was simply not seen as a national security
matter. From a strategic perspective, border policy focused on
counternarcotics efforts, illegal immigration, and more
recently perhaps, the smuggling of weapons of mass destruction.
Our government simply did not exhibit a comparable level of
concern about terrorists' ability to enter and stay in the
United States. During that same period, Al-Qa'ida was working
very hard. They were studying all our systems. They were
learning how to exploit gaps and weaknesses in our passport
system and our visa system, our entry systems of the United
States and other countries. Al-Qa'ida actually set up its own
passport office in Kandahar and developed working relationships
with travel facilities, travel agents, some of them witting,
some of them unwitting, document forgers, corrupt government
officials to move their people around.
More robust enforcement of routine immigration laws,
supported by better information, might have made a real
difference in stopping these hijackers. Had information been
shared and these terrorists watchlisted, border authorities
could have intercepted up to three of those hijackers. Two
hijackers made patently false statements on their visa
applications. They could have been shown to be false by U.S.
Government records, and those records were available to
consular officials. Many of the hijackers lied about their
employment or lied about their educational status. Two
hijackers could have been denied admission to ports of entry
based on violations of immigration rules themselves governing
the terms of admission. Three hijackers violated the
immigration laws after entry. One who said he was going to
enroll in school and then never did, two by overstays of their
terms of admission.
Although the intelligence as to their tactics was not known
at the time, examining their passports could have allowed
authorities to detect at least four and possibly up to 15
hijackers.
Neither the Intelligence Community, nor the border security
agencies or the FBI, had programs in place to analyze and act
upon intelligence about terrorists' travel tactics--how they
obtained their passports, how they made travel arrangements and
subverted national laws and processes governing entry and stays
in foreign countries.
Now, Congress during the 1990's took some steps to provide
better information to immigration officials by legislating
requirements for a foreign student information system and
entry-exit system. As we know, these programs had not yet
successfully been completed by 9/11.
Since 9/11, some important steps have been taken to
strengthen our border security. The Department of Homeland
Security has been established, combining the resources of the
former Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Customs
Bureau into new agencies to protect our borders and to enforce
the immigration laws within the United States. The visa process
and the terrorist watchlist system have been strengthened. DHS
has begun to implement, through the US VISIT program, a
biometric screening system for use at the borders.
Now, we believe, as a commission, there is no question that
these efforts have made us safer, but they have not made us
safe. As a nation, we have not yet fully absorbed the lessons
that we should have learned from 9/11 with respect to border
security. When they travel, that is the time that terrorists
are at their most vulnerable. You see, they have to leave safer
havens where they have been. They have to travel secretly. They
have to use evasive techniques, from altered travel documents
to lies or cover stories. Terrorist entry can often be
prevented and terrorist travel can be constrained by acting on
this knowledge and understanding it. Targeting terrorist travel
is at least as powerful a weapon against terrorists as
targeting their finances. The Commission therefore has
recommended that we combine terrorist travel intelligence,
operations, and law enforcement in a strategy to intercept
terrorists, find terrorist travel facilitators, and constrain
terrorist mobility.
Frontline border agencies must not only obtain from the
Intelligence Community, on a real-time basis, information on
terrorists, they must also assist in collecting it. Consular
officers and immigration inspectors, after all, are the people
who encounter these terrorists. They encounter travelers, they
encounter their documents.
Specialists must be developed and deployed in consulates
and at the border to detect terrorists in their travel
practices, including looking very carefully at their documents.
Technology has a vital role to play. Three years after 9/11 it
is more than time for border officials to integrate into their
operations terrorist travel indicators that have been developed
by our Intelligence Community. The Intelligence Community and
the border security community, they really haven't been close
partners in the past. This simply must change.
We also need an operational program to target terrorist
travel facilitators--forgers, human smugglers, travel agencies
and corrupt border officials. Some may be found in this
country. Most will be found abroad. Disrupting them will
seriously hurt the terrorists. While there have been some
successes in this area, intelligence far outstrips action. This
should be rectified by providing the interagency mandate and
the necessary resources to Homeland Security's enforcement arm,
immigration and customs enforcement, and other relevant
agencies, including, by the way, the FBI.
This problem illustrates the need for a National
Counterterrorism Center. Investigations of travel facilitators
invariably raise complicated questions. For instance, should a
particular travel facilitator be arrested or should he be the
subject of continued intelligence operations? If he is going to
be arrested, in which country do you do it? A National
Counterterrorism Center is needed to bring the numerous
agencies to the table so that they can talk together in a
unified way, decide in each case what is the best course of
action.
And I now turn to my partner and friend and teacher, Lee
Hamilton.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE LEE H. HAMILTON, VICE CHAIR,
NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES
Mr. Hamilton. Thank you very much, Governor. Let me join
you in thanking you Chairman Cox, Ranking Member Turner,
Congresswoman Dunn, for your really superb statements. It was
very pleasing to us to hear the manner in which you summarized
our report.
I want to say just a word, that it has been a high personal
privilege for me to work with Tom Kean. He is a consensus
builder, a talent I think that is rare even among politicians
today. And it has been one of the great privileges of my public
career to work with Tom.
And I also want to express a word of personal appreciation
to each of the members for returning for this hearing in
August. That is really unprecedented. And Tom and I and the
Commission are very grateful to you for your interest in our
report.
I will begin on screening systems. To provide better
information to our consular officers and immigration
inspectors, the government must accelerate its efforts to build
a biometric entry and exit screening system. This is an area in
which Congress has been active since the mid-1990's, and it has
been a frustrating journey.
Congress first legislated an entry-exit system in 1996 to
increase compliance with our immigration laws. It was not
associated with counterterrorism nor with biometric
identification. As a practical matter, the entry-exit effort
was not seriously funded until the end of 2002. By that time,
aspects of the system were directed by four separate laws. The
establishment of the Department of Homeland Security then
changed the organizational context for implementing those laws.
The new department is emerging from its difficult start-up
period and is, we believe, poised to move forward to implement
Congress' mandates in this area. We stress four principles that
we believe must guide our efforts:
First, the U.S. border security system is effectively a
part of a larger network of screening points that includes our
transportation system and access to vital facilities such as
nuclear reactors. The Department of Homeland Security should
lead an effort to design a comprehensive screening system,
addressing common problems and setting common standards with
system-wide goals in mind.
Second, a biometric entry and exit screening system is
fundamental to intercepting terrorists, and its development
should be accelerated. Each element of the system is important.
The biometric identifier makes it difficult to defeat a
watchlist by slight alteration in the spelling of a name, a
technique relied upon by the terrorists. The screening system
enables border officials' access to all relevant information
about a traveler in order to assess the risk they may pose.
Exit information allows authorities to know if a suspect
individual has left the country and to establish compliance
with immigration laws.
Third, United States citizens should not be exempt from
carrying biometric passports or otherwise enabling their
identities to be securely verified, nor should Canadians or
Mexicans.
Fourth, there should be a program to speed known travelers
so inspectors can focus on those travelers who might present
greater risks. This is especially important for border
communities.
We believe that the schedule for completion of this
biometric entry-exit screening system should be accelerated to
the extent feasible. This will require additional annual
funding and a mandate to a central organizational authority
such as the US VISIT office to manage the effort. We need much
greater collaboration with foreign governments on border
security. This means more exchange of information about
terrorists and passports and improved global passport design
standards. Implicit in this recommendation is continued close
cooperation with Mexico and Canada.
It is especially important to improve screening efforts
prior to departure from foreign airports, especially in
countries participating in the visa waiver program. We must be
able to monitor and respond to entries along our long borders
with Canada and Mexico, working with those countries as much as
possible.
Our law enforcement system ought to send a message of
welcome, tolerance, and justice to members of the immigrant
communities in the United States. Good immigration services are
one way to reach out that is valuable, including for
intelligence. State and local law enforcement agencies need
more training and partnerships with Federal agencies so they
can cooperate more effectively with those Federal authorities
in identifying terrorist suspects.
Finally, secure identification should begin in the United
States. We believe the Federal Government should set standards
for the issuance of birth certificates and sources of
identification such as driver's licenses.
The agenda on immigration and border control, then, is
multifaceted and vital to our national security. The bottom
line is that our visa and border control systems must become an
integral part of our counterterrorism intelligence system. We
must steer a course that remains true to our commitment to an
open society and that welcomes legitimate immigrants and
refugees, while concentrating our resources on identification
of potential terrorists and prevention of their entry into the
United States.
We recommend that homeland security assistance should be
based strictly on an assessment of risks and vulnerabilities.
Now, in 2004, Washington, D.C., and New York City are certainly
at the top of any such list.
We understand the contention that every State and city
needs to have some minimum infrastructure for emergency
response. But Federal homeland security assistance should not
remain a program for general revenue sharing. It should
supplement State and local resources based on the risks or
vulnerabilities that merit additional support. Congress should
not use this money as a pork barrel.
The 9/11 attacks showed that even the most vigorous
emergency response capabilities can be overwhelmed if an attack
is large enough. We recommend that emergency response agencies
nationwide should adopt the incident command system. When
multiple agencies or multiple jurisdictions are involved, they
should adopt a unified command. Both are proven frameworks for
emergency response.
We strongly support the decision that Federal homeland
security funding will be contingent, as of October 1, 2004,
upon the adoption and regular use of ICS and unified command
procedures. In the future, the Department of Homeland Security
should consider making funding contingent on aggressive and
realistic training in accordance with ICS and unified command
procedures.
The inability to communicate was a critical element at the
World Trade Center, Pentagon, and Pennsylvania crash sites
where multiple agencies and multiple jurisdictions responded.
The occurrence of this problem at three very different sites is
strong evidence that compatible and adequate communications
among public safety organizations at the local, State, and
Federal levels remains an important problem.
Congress should support pending legislation which provides
for the expedited and increased assignment of radio spectrum
for public safety purposes. Furthermore, high-risk urban areas
such as New York City and Washington, D.C., should establish
signal corps units to ensure communications connectivity
between and among civilian authorities, local first responders,
and the National Guard. Federal funding for such units should
be given a high priority by Congress.
The private sector controls 85 percent of the critical
infrastructure of the United States. The Department of Homeland
Security's mandate includes working with the private sector to
ensure preparedness. Preparedness in the private sector and
public sector for rescue, restart, and recovery of operations
should include a plan for evacuation, adequate communications
capabilities, and a plan for continuity of operations.
As we examined the emergency response to 9/11, witness
after witness told us that despite 9/11, the private sector
remains largely unprepared for a terrorist attack. We were also
advised that the lack of a widely embraced private-sector
preparedness standard was a principal contributing factor in
this lack of preparedness. The Commission, therefore, endorses
the American National Standard Institute's recommended standard
for private preparedness, and we thank them for developing
that. We were encouraged by Secretary Tom Ridge's praise of the
standard and urged the Department of Homeland Security to
promote its adoption.
We also encouraged the insurance and credit rating
industries to look closely at a company's compliance with the
ANSI standard in assessing its insurability and
creditworthiness. We believe that compliance with the standard
should define the standard of care owed by a company to its
employees and the public for legal purposes.
Private-sector preparedness is not a luxury, it is a cost
of doing business in the post-9/11 world. If we ignore it, the
potential costs in lives, money and national security will be
inestimable.
Mr. Chairman, we believe the recommendations we have
presented this morning, as well as the many other
recommendations we have made on foreign policy, public
diplomacy, and transportation security, can make a significant
difference in making America safer and more secure.
We also recommend reforms in the structure of the executive
branch and the Congress. We believe that organizational reforms
in the absence of implementing the other reforms and
recommendations in our report will have significantly less
value than the value of these reforms as a complete package.
In short, while we welcome each step toward implementation
of our recommendations, no one should be mistaken in believing
that organizational reforms alone can address the current
terrorist threat we face. We are very gratified by the rapid
response of the President and the White House to our
recommendations. We welcome the President's support for a
National Intelligence Director and National Counterterrorism
Center. We welcome the support of Senator Kerry.
We look forward to working with you on our recommendations.
We should seize this historic opportunity and move
expeditiously. With your counsel and direction, we believe the
Nation can and will make wise choices.
And we are pleased now to respond to your questions.
[The statement of Messrs. Kean and Hamilton follows:]
Prepared Statement of Chairman Thomas Kean and Vice Chair Lee Hamilton
The 9/11 Commission's Findings and Recommendations
Chairman Cox, Ranking Member Turner, distinguished members of the
House Select Committee on Homeland Security. We are honored to appear
before you today. We want to thank you and the leadership of the House
of Representatives for your prompt attention to the recommendations of
the Commission. We are grateful to you, and to the leadership of the
House.
The Commission's findings and recommendations were strongly
endorsed by all Commissioners--five Democrats and five Republicans. We
share a unity of purpose. We call upon Congress and the Administration
to display the same spirit of bipartisanship as we collectively seek to
make our country and all Americans safer and more secure.
How information is shared in our government--not just at the
federal level, but with state and local agencies--is a matter of
critical importance to homeland security, and to national security. As
we looked into the 9/11 story, we found that the failure to share
information cost us dearly. All agencies--federal, state, and local--
need to have information available in a timely manner to protect
Americans. We need to get this right.
Unity of Effort in Sharing Information
What we learned in the 9/11 story is that the U.S. government has
access to a vast amount of information. We have customs and immigration
information, FBI and police reports, and much more. The storehouse of
information is immense. But the government has weak systems for
processing and using the information it possesses, especially across
agency lines.
Our report details many unexploited opportunities to disrupt the 9/
11 plot: failures to watchlist, failures to share information, failure
to connect the dots. The story of Hazmi and Mihdhar in Kuala Lumpur in
January 2000 is a telling example. We caught a glimpse of the future
hijackers, but we lost their trail in Bangkok. Agencies did not share
information. The FBI did not learn until August, 2001 that Hazmi and
Mihdhar had entered the United States. Late leads were pursued, but
time ran out.
Agencies live by the ``need to know'' rule. They limit the sharing
of information. Each agency has its own computer system and its own
security practices, outgrowths of the Cold War. Implicit in their
practices is the assumption that the risk of inadvertent disclosure
outweighs the benefits of wider sharing. We think this Cold War
assumption is no longer appropriate. In the 9/11 story we came to
understand the huge costs of failing to share information across agency
boundaries. Yet, in the current practices of government, security
practices encourage overclassification.
We understand the critical importance of protecting sources and
methods. We believe it is also important to share information. There
are plenty of penalties for unauthorized disclosure; there are no
punishments for not sharing information.
We believe that information procedures across the government need
to be changed, to provide incentives for sharing. Intelligence gathered
about transnational terrorism should be processed, turned into reports,
and distributed according to the same quality standards, whether it is
collected in Indonesia, or in Minnesota.
We believe the president needs to lead a government-wide effort to
bring the major national security institutions into the information
revolution. The president needs to lead the way and coordinate the
resolution of the legal, policy, and technical issues across agency
lines so that information can be shared.
The model is a decentralized network. Agencies would still have
their own databases, but those databases would be searchable across
agency lines. In this system, secrets are protected through the design
of the network that controls access to the data, not access to the
network.
An outstanding conceptual framework for this kind of ``trusted
information network'' has been developed by a task force of leading
professionals in national security, information technology, and law
assembled by the Markle Foundation. Its report has been widely
discussed throughout the U.S. government, but has not yet been
converted into action. The point here is that no single agency can do
this alone. One agency can modernize its stovepipe, but cannot design a
system to replace it. Only presidential leadership can develop the
necessary government-wide concepts and standards.
Sharing Information with State and Local Authorities
In a hearing last week, a Member of Congress asked us: what
information about terrorism did the pilot of American 11 have available
to him on the morning of September 11? He had none. Despite his
professional training and military experience, he had no useful
information to help him or the crew protect the passengers or plane.
We contrast this with the situation on United 93. When the
passengers and crew learned from phone conversations about the attacks
on the World Trade Center, they took action. They saved the Capitol or
White House from destruction. An informed citizenry is the nation's
best defense. For the same reason, we believe it is imperative that as
much information as possible be shared with state and local
authorities. They, too, can then take action to protect their homes and
fellow citizens.
There are some 18,000 state and local law enforcement agencies in
the United States. Harnessing the awareness and experience of these
dedicated professionals can greatly enhance our security. Reforms of
the kind we recommend will push more important information out to state
and local agencies. The more everyone charged with our security knows,
the more information they have, the safer we will all be.
We will turn to some of our other findings and recommendations.
Border Control
As our Report makes clear, in the decade before 9/11, border
security was not seen as a national security matter. From a strategic
perspective, border policy focused on counternarcotics efforts, illegal
immigration, and, more recently, the smuggling of weapons of mass
destruction. Our government simply did not exhibit a comparable level
of concern about terrorists' ability to enter and stay in the United
States.
During that same period, however, Al-Qa'ida studied how to exploit
gaps and weaknesses in the passport, visa, and entry systems of the
United States and other countries. Al-Qa'ida actually set up its own
passport office in Kandahar and developed working relationships with
travel facilitators--travel agents (witting or unwitting), document
forgers, and corrupt government officials.
More robust enforcement of routine immigration laws, supported by
better information, might have made a difference in stopping the
hijackers.
Had information been shared and the terrorists been
watchlisted, border authorities could have intercepted up to three of
the hijackers.
Two hijackers made statements on their visa applications that
could have been shown to be false by U.S. government records available
to consular officers.
Many of the hijackers lied about their employment or
educational status.
Two hijackers could have been denied admission at the port of
entry based on violations of immigration rules governing terms of
admission.
Three hijackers violated the immigration laws after entry, one
by failing to enroll in school as declared, and two by overstays of
their terms of admission.
Although the intelligence as to their tactics was not
developed at the time, examining their passports could have allowed
authorities to detect from four to 15 hijackers
Neither the intelligence community, nor the border security
agencies or the FBI, had programs in place to analyze and act upon
intelligence about terrorist travel tactics--how they obtained
passports, made travel arrangements, and subverted national laws and
processes governing entry and stays in foreign countries.
Congress during the 1990s took some steps to provide better
information to immigration officials by legislating requirements for a
foreign student information system and an entry-exit system. As we
know, these programs were not successfully completed before 9/11.
Since 9/11, some important steps have been taken to strengthen our
border security. The Department of Homeland Security has been
established, combining the resources of the former Immigration and
Naturalization Service and the Customs Bureau into new agencies to
protect our borders and to enforce the immigration laws within the
United States. The visa process and the terrorist watchlist system have
been strengthened. DHS has begun to implement, through the US VISIT
program, a biometric screening system for use at the border.
Targeting Terrorist Travel
These efforts have made us safer, but not safe enough. As a nation
we have not yet fully absorbed the lessons of 9/11 with respect to
border security. The need to travel makes terrorists vulnerable. They
must leave safe havens, travel clandestinely, and use evasive
techniques, from altered travel documents to lies and cover stories.
Terrorist entry often can be prevented and terrorist travel can be
constrained by acting on this knowledge. Targeting terrorist travel is
at least as powerful a weapon against terrorists as targeting their
finances.
The Commission therefore has recommended that we combine terrorist
travel intelligence, operations, and law enforcement in a strategy to
intercept terrorists, find terrorist travel facilitators, and constrain
terrorist mobility.
Front line border agencies must not only obtain from the
Intelligence Community, on a real-time basis, information on
terrorists, they must also assist in collecting it. Consular officers
and immigration inspectors, after all, are the people who encounter
travelers and their documents.
Specialists must be developed and deployed in consulates and at the
border to detect terrorists through their travel practices, including
their documents. Technology has a vital role to play. Three years after
9/11 it is more than time for border officials to integrate into their
operations terrorist travel indicators that have been developed by the
intelligence community. The intelligence community and the border
security community have not been close partners in the past. This must
change.
We also need an operational program to target terrorist travel
facilitators--forgers, human smugglers, travel agencies, and corrupt
border officials. Some may be found here, but most will be found
abroad. Disrupting them would seriously constrain terrorist mobility.
While there have been some successes in this area, intelligence far
outstrips action. This should be rectified by providing the interagency
mandate and the necessary resources to Homeland Security's enforcement
arm, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and other relevant
agencies, including the FBI.
This problem illustrates the need for a National Counterterrorism
Center. Investigations of travel facilitators invariably raise
complicated questions: Should a particular travel facilitator be
arrested or should he be the subject of continued intelligence
operations? In which country should he be arrested? A National
Counterterrorism Center is needed to bring the numerous agencies to the
table to decide on the right course of action.
Screening Systems
To provide better information to our consular officers and
immigration inspectors, the government must accelerate its efforts to
build a biometric entry and exit screening system. This is an area in
which Congress has been active since the mid-1990's. It has been a
frustrating journey.
Congress first legislated an entry-exit system in 1996, to increase
compliance with our immigration laws. It was not associated with
counterterrorism, nor with biometric identification. As a practical
matter, the entry-exit effort was not seriously funded until the end of
2002. By that time, aspects of a system were directed by four separate
laws. The establishment of the Department of Homeland Security then
changed the organizational context for implementing those laws.
The new Department is emerging from its difficult start-up period
and is, we believe, poised to move forward to implement Congress's
mandates in this area. We would like to stress four principles that we
believe must guide our efforts in this arena.
First, the U.S. border security system is effectively a part of a
larger network of screening points that includes our transportation
system and access to vital facilities, such as nuclear reactors. The
Department of Homeland Security should lead an effort to design a
comprehensive screening system, addressing common problems and setting
common standards with system-wide goals in mind.
Second, a biometric entry and exit screening system is fundamental
to intercepting terrorists and its development should be accelerated.
Each element of the system is important. The biometric identifier makes
it difficult to defeat a watchlist by a slight alteration in spelling
of a name, a technique relied upon by terrorists. The screening system
enables border officials access to all relevant information about a
traveler, in order to assess the risk they may pose. Exit information
allows authorities to know if a suspect individual has left the country
and to establish compliance with immigration laws.
Third, United States citizens should not be exempt from carrying
biometric passports or otherwise enabling their identities to be
securely verified. Nor should Canadians or Mexicans.
Fourth, there should be a program to speed known travelers, so
inspectors can focus on those travelers who might present greater
risks. This is especially important for border communities.
We believe that the schedule for completion of this biometric
entry-exit screening system should be accelerated to the extent
feasible. This will require additional annual funding, and a mandate to
a central organizational authority, such as the US VISIT office, to
manage the effort.
International Collaboration
We need much greater collaboration with foreign governments on
border security. This means more exchange of information about
terrorists and passports, and improved global passport design
standards. Implicit in this recommendation is continued close
cooperation with Mexico and Canada. It is particularly important to
improve screening efforts prior to departure from foreign airports,
especially in countries participating in the visa waiver program.
Immigration Law and Enforcement
We must be able to monitor and respond to entries along our long
borders with Canada and Mexico, working with those countries as much as
possible. Our law enforcement system ought to send a message of
welcome, tolerance, and justice to members of the immigrant communities
in the United States. Good immigration services are one way to reach
out that is valuable, including for intelligence. State and local law
enforcement agencies need more training and partnerships with federal
agencies so they can cooperate more effectively with those federal
authorities in identifying terrorist suspects.
Finally, secure identification should begin in the United States.
We believe that the federal government should set standards for the
issuance of birth certificates and sources of identification such as
drivers' licenses.
The agenda on immigration and border control, then, is multi-
faceted and vital to our national security. The bottom line is that our
visa and border control systems must become an integral part of our
counterterrorism intelligence system. We must steer a course that
remains true to our commitment to an open society and that welcomes
legitimate immigrants and refugees, while concentrating our resources
on identification of potential terrorists and prevention of their entry
into the United States.
Setting Priorities
We recommend that homeland security assistance should be based
strictly on an assessment of risks and vulnerabilities. Now, in 2004,
Washington, D.C., and New York City are certainly at the top of any
such list.
We understand the contention that every state and city needs to
have some minimum infrastructure for emergency response. But federal
homeland security assistance should not remain a program for general
revenue sharing. It should supplement state and local resources based
on the risks or vulnerabilities that merit additional support. Congress
should not use this money as a pork barrel.
Command, Control, and Communications
The 9/11 attacks showed that even the most vigorous emergency
response capabilities can be overwhelmed if an attack is large enough.
We recommend that emergency response agencies nationwide should adopt
the Incident Command System (ICS). When multiple agencies or multiple
jurisdictions are involved, they should adopt a unified command. Both
are proven frameworks for emergency response.
We strongly support the decision that federal homeland security
funding will be contingent, as of October 1, 2004, upon the adoption
and regular use of ICS and unified command procedures. In the future,
the Department of Homeland Security should consider making funding
contingent on aggressive and realistic training in accordance with ICS
and unified command procedures.
The inability to communicate was a critical element at the World
Trade Center, Pentagon, and Pennsylvania crash sites, where multiple
agencies and multiple jurisdictions responded. The occurrence of this
problem at three very different sites is strong evidence that
compatible and adequate communications among public safety
organizations at the local, state, and federal levels remains an
important problem.
Congress should support pending legislation which provides for the
expedited and increased assignment of radio spectrum for public safety
purposes. Furthermore, high-risk urban areas such as New York City and
Washington, D.C., should establish signal corps units to ensure
communications connectivity between and among civilian authorities,
local first responders, and the National Guard. Federal funding of such
units should be given high priority by Congress.
Private-Sector Preparedness
The private sector controls 85 percent of the critical
infrastructure of the United States. The Department of Homeland
Security's mandate includes working with the private sector to ensure
preparedness.
Preparedness in the private sector and public sector for rescue,
restart, and recovery of operations should include (1) a plan for
evacuation, (2) adequate communications capabilities, and (3) a plan
for continuity of operations. As we examined the emergency response to
9/11, witness after witness told us that, despite 9/11, the private
sector remains largely unprepared for a terrorist attack. We were also
advised that the lack of a widely embraced private-sector preparedness
standard was a principal contributing factor to this lack of
preparedness.
The Commission therefore endorses the American National Standard
Institute's recommended standard for private preparedness. We were
encouraged by Secretary Tom Ridge's praise of the standard, and urge
the Department of Homeland Security to promote its adoption.
We also encourage the insurance and credit-rating industries to
look closely at a company's compliance with the ANSI standard in
assessing its insurability and creditworthiness. We believe that
compliance with the standard should define the standard of care owed by
a company to its employees and the public for legal purposes.
Private-sector preparedness, we believe, is not a luxury; it is a
cost of doing business in the post-9/11 world. If we ignore it, the
potential costs in lives, money, and national security will be
inestimable.
Closing Comments
Mr. Chairman, we believe the recommendations we have presented this
morning--as well as the many other recommendations we have made on
foreign policy, public diplomacy, and transportation security--can make
a significant difference in making America safer and more secure.
We also recommend reforms in the structure of the Executive branch
and the Congress. We believe that organizational reforms, in the
absence of implementing the other reforms and recommendations in our
report, will have significantly less value than the value of these
reforms as a complete package.
In short, while we welcome each step toward implementation of our
recommendations, no one should be mistaken in believing that
organizational reforms alone can address the current terrorist threat
we face.
We are gratified by the rapid response of the White House to our
recommendations. We welcome the President's support for a National
Intelligence Director, and a National Counterterrorism Center. We
welcome the support of Senator Kerry.
We look forward to working with you on our recommendations.
We should seize this historic opportunity and move expeditiously.
With your counsel and direction, we believe that the nation can, and
will, make wise choices.
We would be pleased to respond to your questions.
Chairman Cox. I thank you both for your excellent
statements.
I would like to begin with the point that Lee Hamilton has
just made, that organizational changes will not be enough--your
report makes this very, very clear--unless we also address the
deep-rooted cultural resistance to sharing that is shot through
the executive branch. Your report states that, quote, ``The
biggest impediment to all-source analysis is the human or
systemic resistance to sharing information.''
I want to ask you whether or not one of the highest
purposes, therefore, to which a National Intelligence Director
might be addressed is enforced sharing. Might we not consider
that the National Intelligence Director have as his or her
highest order of business the enforced sharing of information
across jurisdictional lines?
You mentioned, Governor Kean, the Markle report, which you
have also drawn attention to in your Commission report. It is
something that we have focused on in this committee. We must
move, in my view, I agree completely, to a trusted information
network along the lines of the Markle commission has proposed
because agency-owned databases have to be made accessible
across agency lines.
That is a step beyond the TTIC concepts. Might this not be
something that the National Intelligence Director would be
tasked with enforcing?
On the other side of this coin, I would like you to address
concerns that a National Intelligence Director, to the extent
he or she has programmatic responsibility, might homogenize the
requirements that are currently in place across the
Intelligence Community.
As you know, we employ enough people in the Intelligence
Community to populate a midsize U.S. city. There are 15
separate intelligence agencies, each with their own unique
capabilities and missions, each of those critical to our
national security. Currently, our chief national security
priority is fighting terrorism, but if history is any guide, we
will in the future at some point in the indefinite future face
a war between nations. And one of the highest purposes of
intelligence is to forestall conflict between nations.
What can we do to make sure that we don't dilute the
positions on the field played by each of these intelligence
agencies, to make sure that by funneling everything through a
single National Intelligence Director we don't--to make sure
that we maintain the distinct purposes of each of these 15
agencies in our Intelligence Community.
Separately, from NID, I would like you to address the
question of the National Counterterrorism Center, in specifics,
its relationship to the Department of Homeland Security. As you
know, Congress created within the Department of Homeland
Security the Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection
directorate with the purpose of fusing both domestic and
foreign intelligence and then disseminating that to State and
local government and the private sector. One of the reasons,
one of the several reasons that CIA was not given this function
is that there is significant reach into our local communities,
into the domestic United States, into the private sector beyond
anything that we have asked CIA to do in the past; and we have
abiding civil liberties concerns with breaching those walls
that have been erected in the past for a very good purpose.
The Department of Homeland Security now having been created
for that purpose, TTIC now having been created separately from
it outside the department, we are now faced with a proposal for
a National Counterterrorism Center. Will it subsume TTIC? Will
it subsume IAIP? Will it move its analysis directly to State,
local, and private-sector entities?
So if you would please address both the National
Intelligence Director and the National Counterterrorism Center
proposals and recommendations with those questions in mind, I
would appreciate it.
Mr. Hamilton. That is a very formidable list you have us,
Mr. Chairman. On the first point, you are absolutely right. We
think that someone has to enforce sharing and that is a
principal role of the national intelligence director. You have
a lot of marvelous groups out here in the intelligence
community who do very good work. The intelligence community is
organized basically on the method of collection. And they do an
excellent job in developing information through their
particular means of collection. What does not happen is that
intelligence community agencies share that information and our
analysis of 9/11 was that a principal cause of 9/11 was because
the intelligence agencies did not share. You have to find some
way to smash the stovepipes.
And I think that can be done--has to be done by someone
above them and therefore, the national intelligence director
would have that role and it is a critically important role as
we understand it. You simply got to get a better flow of
intelligence information across all of the intelligence
agencies and make that information available, more available
than it is--has been in the past. I think some progress has
been made here since 9/11. I know a lot of dedicated patriotic
officials are trying to do a better job of it, but the
organization is standing in the way of the sharing.
Now the second point you raised with regard to homogeneity
of intelligence is likewise an enormously significant question
and one that we wrestle with a great deal. We do not believe
that combining the intelligence agencies under one official
undermines competitive analysis. Indeed, we want to encourage
competitive analysis, and I think everybody does. It is a
question of how best to put the structure together. I don't
think anyone can claim that the current structure fosters tears
competitive analysis. We just had the Senate report come out
the other day on group think. And the whole idea there is that
everybody is thinking the same way with regard to Iraq and you
did not have competitive analysis. So it seems to me the status
quo is not satisfactory with regard to the competitive
analysis. Under our system, I want to emphasize that we have
recommended not all of the analysis would fall under the
director. The State Department would still have the INR. The
Treasury would still have their intelligence. The Energy
Department would still have their intelligence. The Army, the
Air Force, the Navy, the Marine Corps would all have their
intelligence units.
So the competitive analysis situation is very lively and
viable. And the other point I would want to make here is that
the focus we put on open source information, indeed we make it
a special part of the national counterterrorism center, calls
for the development of a new office or agency to collect and
analyze intelligence that is available on the open source. I
know that kind of runs counter to what you think with regard to
intelligence agencies, but if you look back on 9/11, the fact
of the matter is that almost all of the information that was
available was available to all of us. All you had to do was
read the newspaper. The problem was we just didn't put it
together, none of us put it together, or at least very, very
few of us put it together. So open source analysis is important
and will help competition.
So we don't see any reduction of competitive analysis under
our plan. We think even more. And we also would mention that
very same objection was made to Goldwater-Nichols prior to that
being brought into effect. We think our military is the best in
the world today. We think it performs far better than ever
because of the joint command system, and we believe that the
intelligence community will perform better with joint mission
centers.
The final point you made with regard to the NCTC, its
relationship to the DHS, let me just say that the there are two
parts of our organizational chart. I don't know if you have
that in front of you. It perhaps would be helpful if we did
have it, the DHS, the Department of Homeland Security, is very
much a part of the national intelligence centers. And they sit
on the agency or the board where you have the deputy national
intelligence director, who oversees homeland security. There
are three deputies to the national intelligence director. One
relates to the foreign field. That is CIA clandestine services.
The other relates to defense. That is NSA, NGA, NRO. And the
third relates to homeland security or homeland intelligence and
that is where the tie would be to DHS. We think that TTIC is
the right concept, but it needs to be strengthened.
Mr. Kean. I would add just very little to that except that
we believe our proposal will strengthen analysis and enhance
competitive analysis, right now viewed as marginalized from
some of the agencies. And it can have dire consequences. An
example, easy example of not sharing information is when we
found Moussaoui. The FBI identified him as the guy trying to
learn how to fly jumbo jets and not much else. That information
was gathered by the FBI. It got to the CIA. It went right up to
the director of the CIA. The director of the CIA said that is
an FBI matter, and so he ignored it. It never got to the FBI.
If there was at that point a counterterrorism center, that kind
of information would have surfaced and people would have shared
information and we believe there would have been fairly prompt
action. And of course, there was no action on this before 9/11.
Mr. Hamilton. You mentioned, Mr. Chairman you mentioned
specifically and I neglected to respond to it, what happens to
IAIP, the information analysis and infrastructure protection
agency within the Department within the homeland security, the
answer is under our proposal, the locus of analysis moves to
the national counterterrorism center, but IAIP continues to
exist and continues to support the Department requirements,
infrastructure protection, support to State and local
authorities, but the overall analysis moves to the national
center.
Chairman Cox. I thank you. We have a great deal more to
delve into on these subjects, but my time has expired and I
want to move this along, we are going to be operating on a
strict five-minute rule to give members who travelled great
distances to be here, the opportunity to ask their questions.
And I now recognize Mr. Turner for his questions.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Governor Kean, in your
statement, you say, and I am looking at it here, we believe the
President needs to lead a government-wide effort to bring the
major national security institutions into the information
revolution. And you also say further down in your statement,
only presidential leadership can develop the necessary
government-wide concepts and standards. And I hope we don't
miss that message, because as I have reviewed the efforts to
bring about an integrated information sharing system, it is
clear to me that the Congress has made repeated efforts to
accomplish that. We have passed, as Lee Hamilton said, four
separate laws mandating an interoperable border security
system. Back in 2000, Congress created an independent
commission appointed by the Attorney General to report on how
border agencies could efficiently and effectively carry out the
mission of creating an integrated collection and data sharing
system, including an integrated entry and exit system which was
mandated by the Congress in 1996. It seems that this law
creating this independent commission followed 4 years of costly
delays at the former INS when they failed to develop such an
integrated entry exit system. Congress authorized the task
force that was created. It authorized funding for fiscal years
2001 through 2008. In the first report of that Commission
issued in December, 2002, the task force included an entire
chapter on subjects that the task force would continue to
research through 2003 and 2004, which included the development
of an interoperable entry exit border system.
In December of 2002, Attorney General Ashcroft renewed the
task force charge to study this issue, provided $5.6 million to
do it and assigned seven new staff divisions to accomplish it.
And among the most significant efforts of this task force was
to employ a group of eight scientists from the Los Alamos labs
to study the 50 major border IT systems that are used in our
government and to make recommendations. And when they issued
their report in December of 2003, which, by the way, was on the
eve of the implementation of this new U.S. VISIT program, these
Los Alamos scientists stated that most of the existing border
security systems could be readily integrated into an
interoperable network so that one query could search numerous
data bases simultaneously. They cautioned that the underlying
technical infrastructure at the borders needed to be replaced
with a more modern foundation in order to achieve
interoperability.
It seems clear to me--oh, by the way, this task force was
dismissed by the Department of Homeland Security after the task
force warned, in its December 2003 report, that entry-exit U.S.
VISIT is a critical component of the broader DHS strategy and
any system that is designed or perceived as a stand alone
system simply would not fit into a post-September 2001 world.
The report went on to recommend an independent evaluation of
U.S. VISIT. It seems very clear that this task force suspected
that we were once again building another stovepipe. And it
comes back down to your initial statement that I read when I
began my question and that is, it takes presidential leadership
to develop the necessary government-wide concepts and standards
to have an interoperable system.
So I ask each of you if you were advising the President
this morning and he were to say, yes, I will call in all the
relevant players, the Cabinet secretaries and I will try to
find out why after 3 years, we haven't created this
interoperability that is so critical to preventing another 9/
11, I would like you, based on your experience, to tell me what
kind of excuses would we get from the relevant players for not
moving forward more expeditiously to solve this problem? Where
is the problem? You say it is presidential leadership. But even
if the President were to lead, what kind of excuses would he
get for this problem not being solved today?
Mr. Hamilton. Well, first excuse would be need to know, I
believe, because that is so embedded in our intelligence
community today and we don't mean to dismiss that. That can be
very important in protecting sources and methods. So you have
to get a balance here. You have to get a balance on need to
know on the one hand and need to share on the other. But the
way we produce our intelligence in each of these areas, HUMINT
over here, satellites over here, interceptions over here and
other means, they all kind of hanging on to that information.
And because the need to know philosophy is so deeply embedded
in the intelligence community, they hang onto it. And they say,
we are the only ones that really have to know this information.
Now that is understandable and it probably historically has
validity to it, but we are in a different world now with
terrorism. And we think that you have to elevate the need to
share up to the need to know and maybe the balance has to tip a
little towards need to share because it was precisely the lack
of sharing of information that Tom has cited just a moment ago
that created the circumstances that permitted 9/11 to occur. In
addition to this, as we say in our report, there is this very
strong urge, which every one of you has countered to
overclassify. Look, a document becomes secret before a person
has the authority to classify or not classify. He or she looks
at that document. There is no incentive for that person to make
it public. The incentive is to classify it and protect himself
from the possibility of the information getting out and causing
a problem, so they stamp it secret. And we pile up enormous
amounts of information, warehouses of information that are
secret because of the incentives are all on the side of
classification.
Now this is a problem we think that no agency can deal
with, no agency can solve this problem. It has to be done above
an agency. And it has some very tough problems in it. There are
technical problems, there are legal problems, there are
political problems. And I think only the President can resolve
those matters and has to resolve them, I believe, or you will
not get the kind of information rights management that we think
is necessary to protect ourselves.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from Washington is recognized
for her questions.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Congressman Hamilton, 12
years ago, as you may recall, you and I served together on the
joint committee for the organization of Congress. Our report
included specific recommendations on consolidation within the
committee structure. You devote some of your report to this
subject, specifically noting that congressional oversight for
intelligence and counterterrorism is dysfunctional. My question
to you and certainly Governor Kean, please jump in because you
have been through this thing for the past many months, and we
are very intrigued to hear the results of your experience on
this, if you were in charge of organizing Congress to provide
particular focus to this new threat of terrorism, where would
you start?
Would you, for example, divide the responsibilities for
oversight and authorization in appropriations? What would you
do with the terrorist watchlist, which is not currently under
the aegis of our Select Committee on Homeland Security? What
kind of a committee would you see happening? Would it be a
joint committee between the House and the Senate? And I would
suggest to you that just as you see what we are going through
today with such a massive committee, it is hard for us to bore
in and spend the time we need to spend to get precise answers
and to follow up. It is very challenging. But the goal of all
of us is to provide focus. I think, for example, that if
something else does happen here in the United States, people
will turn to Congress and say they had the chance to do the
best job they could ever do to put such an oversight committee
together. And so I am asking for your experience and for your
thoughts as you have heard from other groups you have testified
before and from the people who testified before your committee
in the many, many hearings you have held, what is your
suggestion to do with Congress?
Mr. Kean. Well, we have general, what we have said has got
to be consolidated. The importance came to me and I got this
from the outside in that in this whole area, normally in areas
other than intelligence, there is a lot of oversight from the
press and from the public. People press in. People want
questions answered. When you get into the counterterrorism
area, so much of it is secret that that whole area doesn't
exist. So you depend much more heavily on the Congress to do
the oversight than you do than in almost any other area of
government. And if the Congress can't get it done, nobody gets
it done. If these agencies are allowed to go their own way or
make use of multiple jurisdictions or not answer the questions
properly from the Congress, then there is no oversight at all.
And we suggest in the report that--particularly homeland
security where there is mention, they are responsible to 88
different committees. That doesn't mean oversight at all. What
it does mean is that people who should be spending their time
protecting us all are spending an enormous amount of time of
time testifying before a whole vast majority of committees. We
suggest consolidating homeland security into a committee in the
House and committee in the Senate. We suggested intelligence
doing something radical and that is taking the authorization
and budget functions and combining them into one committee
because we sense the intelligence committee without any budget
authority doesn't really have the clout with the intelligence
community that they need to do their job.
So it is moving in those directions so there is more
concentrated oversight that can really understand these
organizations, which are very complicated. Lee Hamilton knows
more about this than I will ever learn in a lifetime, but he
tells me that in the intelligence area, it is 4 years, 6 years
before you really understand these agencies and are really able
to ask the intelligent questions. So it is a question of
consolidation. More authority for the committees.
Mr. Hamilton. I think Tom has made the essential points. I
must say, I have considerable sympathy for the Congress in
putting this together, because Congresswoman Dunn, you and I
served on the Joint Reform Committee and I might say that when
the Democrats controlled the Congress, we weren't all that
successful in making these reforms. It is very tough to do. I
appreciate that. Very difficult to do, because when you are
talking about reform of committee jurisdiction, you are talking
about allocation of power, and power is the name of the game.
Now what we are saying to you here is that this threat of
terrorism is so urgent, so long-term, so difficult that not
only must we do some reorganization of the executive branch, we
also have to reorganize the Congress as well. And I will be
quick to admit that it is a lot easier to say this from outside
the body than from inside the body.
But I think you folks are at a crunch point. And I think
you are exactly right when you say that if another incident
were to happen and the Congress had done nothing to put its own
house in order, I think the institution, and maybe some of you
individually would be heavily criticized for not acting. In
other words, I think there is a political risk here. I may be
wrong about that. I don't think so. I certainly don't think
that the particular suggestions we made are carved in granite.
You have to analyze the situation, understand the internal
dynamics better than I do and you have to figure it out, but
you have to get your house in order so you can have robust
oversight of the Department of Homeland Security.
The Department of Homeland Security needs your advice and
counsel. And they want to be able to come--as Secretary Ridge
said to us, I want to be able to come to one body of expert
members of the Congress and lay out my problems to them and
tell them what we have done and tell them what we haven't done
and get their advice and counsel, rather than going to 88
subcommittees, which Tom mentioned, 88 subcommittees. That
really is absurd. And it is not fair, it simply is not fair to
the executive branch to make them do that, I don't believe.
So we say OK, we have to have robust reform. Let me tell
you what I did in the Senate. I was making a presentation on
this for the Senate not long ago, and I asked them how long did
you spend in the appropriations committee on review of the
intelligence budget? And one Senator spoke up and said 10
minutes. The defense subcommittee appropriations in the United
States Senate spent 10 minutes reviewing what we all know to be
a $40 billion budget. I used that illustration in another group
of senators a day or two later. And one Senator got up and say
Hamilton, you are all wrong, you greatly exaggerated it. It was
5 minutes. Now nobody can say that is robust oversight. And it
is a very, very serious matter. So you work it out. We have
made our suggestions on it. You know this place better than I
know it, now.
But I think it is important for the Congress to get itself
in shape so that it can perform one of its constitutional
duties, which is oversight.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Thompson.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And let me welcome
the two gentlemen here this morning. Let me join my colleague,
Ms. Dunn, in saying that the notion that we have all these
jurisdictional issues before us is a real problem and it is
both--it is a bipartisan problem. Mr. Hamilton, you are
absolutely correct. This institution loves power, individuals
love power and the homeland security issue is really one that
should not be about power, but one about the people and how we
can secure the homeland.
So I will join you and other colleagues who testified
before this committee that we ought to have a standing
committee with all the jurisdictional authorities right within
the committee. So I appreciate your comments on that respect.
But there are some other issues associated with your report.
One, it has to do with transportation. Many individuals in the
public would like for people to try to prioritize
transportation problems. Did you all look at transportation and
try to give it a pecking order in terms of security or what did
you do?
Mr. Kean. I don't think we gave it a pecking order, but
what we did was identify the various problems that had to be
addressed in the transportation and security areas. And we are
spending most of the money now on air safety, but we recognize
that the transportation of containers, transportation of people
via rail or subway, there are a number of other areas we have
got to give if not equal attention to at least more attention
to than we are giving them right now.
Mr. Hamilton. Mr. Thompson, I think we look quite a bit at
the transportation sector and there are so many possible
recommendations that you could make there. We did not try to do
that. But what we did say is that you have to plan. We have
been doing is planning on planning for the last 3 years. We
have got to put into place plans and it has to be done
urgently. A comprehensive plan for the entire transportation
system that Tom mentioned, aviation, rail, all the rest of it,
and likewise, sector plans so that you have some way of
measuring what you have done, you know what your goals are, you
establish your priorities, you do your budgeting and all the
things that are necessary in good planning, we are not there
yet.
We heard yesterday from the assistant secretary, Asa
Hutchinson. We are moving forward on this. And I think some of
these plans will be ready by the end of the year. We think it
is terribly important to have integrated security plans for all
of these modes of transportation. And the other things we
mentioned were with regard to aviation security was to make
sure you had layers of security, not just one checkpoint. What
happened with the 9/11 terrorists was there was no layered
security.
They had to get by one principal problem and that was the
check-in. And incidentally, a number of them were screened
twice, but we didn't stop them. But I think everybody
acknowledges that in order to have an effective security
system, you have to have layers of checks and so we emphasized
that. We put a lot of emphasis on explosives, because we think
that is a very major problem in transportation security today
and recommended among other things, for example, that every
airplane have an explosive proof container on it and very few
airplanes have that today.
So those are some of the comments we made with regard to
aviation security and rail security. But we didn't try to deal
with it comprehensively but picked out two, three things that
we thought were especially important.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Smith. If the
gentleman would suspend in order to permit time for all
members' questions, I would ask that both members and our
witnesses observe the green, amber and red lights that are
there for your convenience. The gentleman from Texas.
Mr. Smith. Chairman Kean, my first question is addressed to
you and this goes to the statement on page 1 of your testimony
today where you say the failure to share information cost us
dearly. Today as we sit here, does ICE within the Homeland
Security Department, the FBI and the CIA have the computer
interface capability to exchange information, not whether they
should exchange any and all information, but do they have the
ability to exchange information?
Mr. Kean. No.
Mr. Smith. Do you have any idea when they will have that
ability?
Mr. Kean. No. We don't know what the timetable is. We know
they are working on it, but we have not been given a timetable.
Mr. Smith. Mr. Hamilton, page 3 of your testimony suggests
pretty strongly that if a previous administration had enforced
the immigration laws then in effect, we might have stopped the
terrorist attack from occurring. You specifically refer to a
number of laws, including laws--one law passed in 1996,
Immigration Reform Act, which called for a entry-exit system,
called for standardized birth certificates, called for better
scrutiny of student visas.
And you give examples, in fact, there on page 3 of your
testimony that pretty clearly implied that a majority of the
terrorists might have been apprehended or at least not admitted
had those and other laws been enforced. You then say that
eventually in 2002, they were implemented or beginning to be
implemented or enforced then. But we did have a terrorist
attack in 1993. The basement of the World Trade Center was
attacked. You are suggesting something pretty seriously.
If the Clinton administration had enforced the 1996 law
which was passed by the House by a 3-to-1 margin, and in the
Senate by a 9-to-1 margin, we might have avoided the terrorist
attack; is that right?
Mr. Hamilton. We certainly say that more robust enforcement
of routine immigration laws supported by better information
might have made the difference. Tom and I have been very, very
careful not to say that if this step or that step had been
taken, it would have prevented 9/11. Causation is much too
complex to draw that conclusion.
Mr. Smith. You said might have stopped. That is a very
astounding statement. And is there any good explanation as to
why the previous administration didn't enforce a lot of these
laws considering the overwhelming support in Congress and
considering the wake-up call we had in 1993?
Mr. Hamilton. Two administrations have not enforced the
1996 law with regard to entry and exit systems.
Mr. Smith. The current administration is enforcing that.
Mr. Hamilton. I think our enforcement is better, and I
agree with that, because we have learned a lot. Why didn't we
enforce it back then, the reason is that none of us thought
that this could happen. We just didn't expect it. And I think
that made us all kind of lax probably in enforcement. What we
are saying today--
Mr. Smith. Let me interrupt you quickly. The 1996 bill was
passed just a couple of years after the 1993 World Trade Center
bombing. It seems to me that we were pretty much on notice that
we should start enforcing immigration laws especially those
that were passed by Congress. Is there any good explanation as
to why we did not?
Mr. Hamilton. I thought I just answered that. Any reason we
why we did not enforce?
Mr. Smith. 1993. We passed major legislation in 1996. It
was ignored. I know we are talking in retrospect, but it seems
to me that was a dangerous position.
Mr. Hamilton. I think in retrospect, it is easy to see
there should have been a much more robust enforcement of our
immigration laws.
Mr. Smith. Let me squeeze in one more question. The
Commission relied upon an individual foreign national security
advisor to provide the Commission with information as to
whether the previous administration had--how they had handled
the Al-Qa'ida terrorist threat. Don't you think there was some
conflict of interest on relying upon a national security
advisor with a previous administration to tell the committee
whether or not the previous administration had, in fact,
handled the Al-Qa'ida threat well or no? Wasn't there some
conflict of interest relying on a biased source there?
Mr. Hamilton. We took the testimony of hundreds of people
and I don't think we relied on anyone. We tried to sort through
all of it. And we certainly gave the national security advisors
of both administrations ample opportunity to defend their
administrations and they both did a very good job of it.
Mr. Smith. My time is up. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Pascrell. Mr. Chairman, point of inquiry?
Chairman Cox. Gentleman of New Jersey.
Mr. Pascrell. I must say after that line of questioning--
Chairman Cox. If the gentleman is not stating a procedural
inquiry, the gentleman is going to recognize the gentlelady
from California.
Mr. Pascrell. We have not had time for questions at our end
many, many times on both sides. And I think that the line of
questioning is improper and does not sit well--with the
findings of this--
Chairman Cox. The gentleman will suspend. The gentleman
will suspend.
Mr. Pascrell. You can suspend all you want.
Chairman Cox. The Chair will take this opportunity to
announce that in order to permit time for all members to ask
questions, we are going to proceed in the order of questioning
for this panel that we have been following until 12:15 when our
panel members must leave, and then the testimony of the second
panel. We will continue in that order without interruption. So
we will not resume with questions from the chairman and ranking
member until every member has had an opportunity to ask
questions. The gentlelady from California is recognized for her
questions.
Ms. Sanchez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you again,
gentlemen. I had the pleasure of questioning you last week in
the defense committee. I have two questions, one for Governor
Kean and one for my former colleague and let me say them both.
The first one would be to Governor Kean. It is about the whole
issue that you wrote about with respect to the relationship of
strengthening and in some cases repairing our relationships
with other countries. In your report, you recommend the
formation of a flexible contact group of leading coalition
governments. Can you elaborate more on what you meant by this;
how do you see this contact group functioning; what would be
its relationship to other multinational groups, like NATO, for
example?
And then to my former colleague, great again to see you. If
you take a look over there on the majority side right after Ms.
Dunn, you will see a lot of empty seats. Those are all chairmen
of other committees. I also sit on the subcommittee of this
group, which is the rules subcommittee, the one tasked with
trying to figure out how we make this or if we make this a real
standing committee with real jurisdictional power. When we had
testimony before that rules subcommittee, most of those
chairmen said make this go away. Comes back to that power
struggle that you were talking about.
So I would like to ask you, after all of the experience
that you have had and the changes that you were able to
construct within the Congress, how do we get these gentlemen to
sit here and have a real discussion about not having 88
subcommittees for the homeland security agency to report before
the Congress?
Mr. Kean. I guess I will start. Our recommendation was that
there should be some sort of a forum. We have no forum now for
talking with the countries of the Arab world. We meet a number
of times a year with the European union and we have an
organization to discuss with them. The Asian countries and we
have a forum to discuss things with them. If you take the
countries of the Muslim world, there is no forum of that kind
and there is no occasion to get together with them to share our
thoughts and share our differences and get to know each other
in that kind of a relationship. And so the point of that
recommendation is just to suggest that such a forum be created.
And that we as a country, therefore, would have the ability to
have the same kind of conversations with that part of the world
as we do with other parts of the world.
Mr. Hamilton. I am not sure I can be helpful to you in
trying to figure out the best way to deal with your very real
problems of jurisdiction, except I would recommend to you the
Tom Kean approach. Tom deserves much of the credit for the fact
that we had a consensus report. And it is worth looking at why
we were able to reach it and I think it may have some lessons
for the Congress. The first rule was that we are going to agree
on the facts. It is amazing how often we disagree on facts. And
the Commission again and again--somebody would say, what is the
fact, what is the fact here? And we would kind of suspend
everything in the work of the Commission until we agreed upon
the fact.
So you have to figure out what the problems are and what
the facts are. And then if you can get an agreement on the
facts, it becomes not a cinch, but it becomes easier to get
agreement on recommendations. But it can only be done with
extended dialogue and deliberation. One of the things that
really boaters me about the Congress today, looking at it from
my posture is how difficult it is for you to deliberate, and
that really is what the body is all about or should be,
deliberation. But your schedules are so hectic and the time
that you have to sit down with your colleagues and work through
difficult problems is limited. I think one of the things you
really have to do is to figure out how to engage in dialog with
one another. And so much of the activity on the floor of the
House, you are just kind of reading speeches and making
speeches past one another. That is not deliberation. That is
not dialog. That is not the way the body is supposed to work.
And so I have that advice for you. And it all came about
because of the remarkable leadership that Tom Kean showed in
bringing a very disparate group of commissioners together. It
is a hard business and it is tough to do and takes a lot of
time.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Shays.
Mr. Shays. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I just want
to say to both of you as the chairman and vice-chairman, I am
in awe of the work you did on the 9/11 Commission. I am
absolutely in awe of it. I am grateful that you made it
unanimous and you didn't have to work hard to do that part. I
mean, you had to work hard to make sure it didn't become
partisan. And it is very clear that you put criticism on
previous administrations, the present, Congress, our oversight
and yet, you did it in a way that I thought was helpful in our
getting and moving forward.
I believe some of this can be done in executive order,
regulation, law and House and Senate rules. And I just want to
say publicly that I will not, and if I am reelected and in a
position to vote on the rules, I am not going to vote for any
House rule that doesn't include a permanent committee on
Department of Homeland Security, for instance. I just simply
will vote against any rule. I will not vote for a rule that
places our country in jeopardy because we don't have the good
sense to make this a permanent committee.
And I think my colleague is correct that when she points
out that the people who aren't here today are the Chairmen of
the other committees. It is outrageous. We have to put this
aside and do what is right and have a permanent committee. Lots
of things to talk about with the limited time I have, I would
like you both to address the whole issue of overclassification.
And I would like you to just tell me when you see what is the
incentive for change? I mean, we all know that we have too much
classification. We read documents. And I think, Governor Kean,
you told me that you just were amazed at the fairly average
stuff you read that was classified.
So what is the incentive, though, that we put in to change
that? We are going to have a hearing, my subcommittee is going
to have a hearing on this next week, called too many secrets,
overclassification, it is a barrier to information sharing. But
I don't know what the incentive is. Tell me what the incentive
is so we don't have so much overclassification?
Mr. Kean. It is hard. I will tell you, Congressman, you are
absolutely right, coming from the outside, it just absolutely
amazed and appalled me the amount of information I read that
was stamped, classified, top secret, all these stamps on it and
then you would read it and it wasn't anything you hadn't read
in the newspapers. And I was asking one of my watches that we
used to call them and I said, why would 300 pages of it--why is
it classified? And he said because he didn't know it was true
when he read it before.
That is no answer. That is no answer. I think this
overclassification is hurting us terribly right now. The public
is not an enemy, it is an ally in this war against terrorism.
The more they know, the more they can help us. The more local
law enforcement knows, the more they can help us. I don't know
whether you have somebody with all the incentives to declassify
that you now have to classify. What Congressman Hamilton said
before was absolutely right. If you have a document, you get in
no trouble for classifying it secret. You might get in trouble
if you don't. So everything is stamped secret. You have to
somehow put the motivation on somebody to look at all this
stuff and say why shouldn't the American people have this
information? Why shouldn't it be in the paper? Wouldn't it help
if it was? Knowledge is power.
Mr. Shays. It would strike me that if you didn't classify
as much, you would then know what are those classified pieces
of information that have to be shared from one agency to
another. So it seems to me like a huge issue. I have been
wrestling with what the incentives are.
Mr. Hamilton.
Mr. Hamilton. Congressman Shays, I am immensely pleased to
learn that you are having a hearing in this area because it
really does need to be explored and we need to get some more
ideas into it. And what I am going to suggest may not be too
palatable to this group. But my experience is the Congress has
just defaulted on the question of classification, just been too
timid and has said in effect, Mr. President, you deal with it.
The President today--and look, presidents have many things on
their plate. Presidents of the United States do not sit around
stamping documents secret. They have the authority, but they
delegate that authority all over the place so that every
department of government you go into, they have classifiers
whose job it is to stamp documents secret. And believe you me,
they have got a good stamp.
I think the Congress has to assert itself and begin to find
ways and means of setting standards, for example, for when a
document should be classified and when it should not be
classified. Now I don't suggest that is easy. It will be a
tough task. It hadn't been done before. But I think the
tumidity of the Congress, the willingness just to defer to the
President, whoever the President is, the authority to stamp--to
delegate this authority without any real review by the Congress
is a major default of responsibility.
So I will be following your hearings. I would like to
hear--we did not have time, I guess, maybe that is not a very
good excuse--we did not get into the question of what
incentives, the one you are raising--it is a hard one to
answer--I would like to see what you come up with.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman's time has expired. I will
interject at this point that the comments that have been made
about chairmen of other committees should be clarified by
observing that the questioner himself is the vice chairman of
the Full Committee on Government Reform and Oversight and top
representative of that committee on the select panel. He is, of
course, here today and has endorsed the concept of creating a
permanent homeland security committee. Likewise, the chairman
of the Committee on Intelligence who, with his ranking member,
has strongly endorsed a permanent--
Mr. DeFazio. Mr. Chairman, we are running out of time. You
said there would be no extraneous statements. Could we move on?
We are not going to have a chance to ask questions.
Chairman Cox. I appreciate the gentleman. I think we wish
to point out that the chairman of the Intelligence Committee
has recused himself from today's hearing because he has been
nominated as Director of Central Intelligence, and likewise,
the chairman of the Committee on Armed Services strongly
supports the recommendations of this commission. The gentleman
from the State of Washington, Mr. Dicks is recognized.
Mr. Dicks. I, too, want to thank the chairman and vice-
chairman for their great work for the country--
Chairman Cox. Would the gentleman yield for just a moment?
I failed to recognize that Mr. Goodlatte, the chairman of the
Committee on Agriculture is present.
Mr. Dicks. I want to thank you for your great service and I
know particularly Lee Hamilton chaired the intelligence
committee. I served for 8 years on the Intelligence Committee.
One of the things that Secretary Kissinger reminded us of
yesterday was that one of the biggest breakdowns is not
necessarily in the collection of the information, but in the
assessment of that information and it in almost every one of
these intelligence failures we have had, we have had the
information.
Either we have collected it through our national, technical
means or we had information like that from the FBI field
offices, but it was the failure of higher-ups who got that
information to act upon it. When we think about this whole
issue, we need to remember that. In many of these cases, we had
the information. It is tragic, but we had it and we just didn't
act on it. The group think, you know, like that which occurred
going into the Egyptian-Israeli of 1973.
Another classic example was right before Desert Storm and
Desert Shield. The information was there. We saw the tanks
being fueled, but the President was talking to leaders in the
region and they said Saddam won't do it and he did it. And to
President Bush's great commendation, he came out and said this
wasn't an intelligence failure but a failure to act on the
intelligence.
But I think that is one thing we need to consider here. I
think John Hamre has made an important point in his statement.
Remember, this is the start of the debate. This is far too
important a point on whether we create a national intelligence
director and how that is done because you have the classic
problem here. 80 percent of the intelligence budget is in the
Defense Department. 20 percent is over at CIA. So how do you
work out an arrangement so the Director of the Central
Intelligence Agency, who has community-wide responsibility, can
actually have authority over this budget? Hamre puts out a
pretty good point.
You could put the NRO, the NSA, NEMA and the interspacial
group all together and put the intelligence director over that
so you would have diversity and you would have the CIA and
director of CIA. You would have the DIA over in the Defense
Department and their services.
So I think that deserves some consideration. Another idea
here that we need to think about in trying to figure out a
solution is there is a model where the head of the NRO, Peter
Teets, is also the assistant secretary of the Air Force for
science and space. You could have a model where the director of
the Central Intelligence Agency would also be the deputy
Secretary of Defense for intelligence. He would still have to
work out his arrangement with the Secretary of Defense, but you
could have then one person in charge of the entire intelligence
community in terms of formulating the budget and the policy,
but also he would have to coordinate with the Secretary of
Defense, which is the situation that we have today.
So there is some concern, I think, about if we create a new
national intelligence director, then we are going to have to
create a new bureaucracy and all the staff to support that
person. And what does the Director of the Central Intelligence
Agency do besides run the CIA as part of this operation? I like
the idea of the center. I think it is good. But I make the
point. All this discussion about information sharing and
tearing down the stovepipes, we have done a lot of that work. A
lot of these interagency centers can get the work done. But
don't forget, it is the failure of assessment. That is where
the real failures have occurred in our history. I just would
make that point.
Mr. Hamilton. Well, Congressman Dicks, the two articles
that you referred to by former Secretary Kissinger and John
Hamre, need to be looked and studied carefully because both are
highly respected figures who have had a lot of experience in
this field. Secretary Kissinger obviously is correct when he
says we have got to get the assessments right. The question I
raise about that is how can you possibly get the assessment
right if you don't have accurate sharing? You have to have the
sharing of the information so that the analyst is able to see
what these various agencies of intelligence have done. You have
to pool that information. You have to bring it together
somewhere or you cannot get an accurate assessment.
And that is what we are saying. We are saying we have to
share that information and only then can the analysts have a
chance of getting an accurate assessment. There is no quarrel
with the idea that you have to put emphasis on assessment. I
think he is exactly right in many respects. We have put most of
our resources in intelligence on collection. And we collect so
much data that we can't process it all.
Mr. Dicks. That is true. As you well know, there is only a
fraction of this information that is analyzed in real-time, and
that is a major problem. The assessment thing has to be
considered. I agree completely with you on the information
sharing, and I think that is a great concept. But it is the
assessment phase, getting the equipment and getting the
information so you can analyze this information as much as
possible in real-time and then having people who are smart
enough to be able to conclude that something is happening and
convince their superiors to act upon it. Don't forget that
part.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from--
Mr. Kean. May I say one comment? You are absolutely right
on the assessment side. And we think the director of the CIA is
going to have a full-time job rebuilding the CIA. It will take
5 years to do that. We hope he can do it faster, but that is
going to be a full-time job, getting diversity, language skills
and getting the right people on board. So we think that is
very, very important. And looking at the assessment, I will
tell you, having read, I guess, the highest level briefings
that were given to two presidents, I will say only as a citizen
coming from the outside, I think our intelligence agencies
failed two presidents.
Neither president had the information that he needed to
assess the situation properly and make correct decisions. So I
think the one thing we cannot do is allow a lot of status quo
to exist.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Camp.
Mr. Camp. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for your
service in making our country safer. My question is this, you
both referred to our porous borders and some of the things we
have done to address that issue. Certainly creating the
Department of Homeland Security is one of those things to
secure our borders. There is this U.S. VISIT program. The
administration is ahead of the congressionally-mandated
schedule. But my question is this recent change. As you know,
border protection could deport at airports and seaports people
found illegally. Now that has been extended to those found
within 100 miles of our border. It is a new responsibility of
our border protection. Is that something you would agree with?
Is that moving in the right direction in terms of trying to
address our border issue?
Mr. Hamilton. Mr. Camp, I am not clear on what change you
are talking about.
Mr. Camp. The law was that if someone was found within 100
miles of our border, border patrol did not have the authority
to deport people. However, if they were at a airport or seaport
they were immediately deported to another country. There has
been an administrative change allowing now inspectors at our
borders to deport people who are found in this country
illegally. Is that the sort of thing that would fit in with
attempts to address our porous border?
Mr. Hamilton. That is the so-called expedited removal
program that was announced this week. That was announced after
the Commission had completed its work. We do want to emphasize
the need for terrorists' travel intelligence and operational
strategy in this. And that step when I read it, I thought my
reaction was positive to it. Of course it is implemented and
makes all the difference, but it is a means of making a
decision on site as I understand it, is that correct, to act?
Mr. Camp. Yes, it is.
Mr. Kean. It does give us an opportunity. Everybody who we
catch who crosses the border on phony documents we shouldn't
just send them back. We should get those documents, find out
where those documents came from. Because if we can crack these
illegal terrorist facilitators who are doing this work, we will
go a long way to stopping the problem.
So I think we should look at any of these people we catch
as not just somebody but as an opportunity to learn more.
Mr. Camp. My second question is on the issue of airline
security and particularly the No-Fly Lists and attempting to
compare every passenger list with comprehensive lists or
terrorist lists. This has been done primarily by the airlines.
Recently, there is a suggestion to move that to TSA. And I
would like to get your comments. It would seem to me that if
the more everyone knows, the safer we are, I don't see why the
airlines should not have a role in that as well. But I would be
interested in both of your comments in that area.
Mr. Hamilton. One of the recommendations we made was that
you have to have an improved No-Fly List and you have to have
an improved automatic selectee list and that we ought not to
delay the development of those while the argument goes on about
the successor to the CAPS program.
We believe the screening function should be performed by
the TSA, not by the air carriers. It certainly has to utilize
the set of terrorist watchlists, all of them, that we have that
are maintained by the Federal Government; and air carriers
should be required to supply information that is needed for the
system.
Mr. Camp. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Frank.
Mr. Frank. In your report you have a great deal about the
FBI and quite thoughtfully note that there were past problems
with the FBI in terms of getting into impingement on political
freedom. And I was struck by the thoughtfulness with which you
said that your recommendations--essentially, you rejected the
notion that there should be a new agency that would take a big
chunk out of the FBI but did say quite thoughtfully that you
are expressing the hope that the FBI will be able to reform. We
all share that hope.
I must say that my hope in that regard was given a little
bit of a jolt yesterday when I read the New York Times article
by Eric Lichtblau headed ``FBI goes knocking for political
troublemakers.'' FBI officials, it says, are urging agents to
canvas their communities for information about planned
disruptions aimed at the convention and other coming political
events.
Essentially what it says is that a significant number of
FBI agents are questioning people about whether or not they
know whether or not somebody is going to do something violent
at the Republican convention. They had apparently done it with
regard to the Democratic convention. The New York Times in
today's editorial says, quite accurately, I believe, these
heavy-handed inquiries are intimidating and they threaten to
chill freedom of expression. They also appear to be a
spectacularly poor use of limited law enforcement resources.
You pay some attention, I was pleased to see, about privacy
and civil liberties. I wonder if you have any reaction to this.
I mean, the notion the FBI is out there asking people if they
plan to do things, there is a troubling tendency here to take
the doctrine of preemption, which seems to me controversial
enough in the international area, and apply it domestically. It
is none of the business of law enforcement in the United States
to preempt people of what some might think are whacky political
views and I might think because they might be about to do
something.
We have this new notion of free speech zones. Many of us
had always thought that the free speech zone was called the
United States of America, and efforts to kind of make it
anything less than that were grave error.
In your judgment--you spent a great deal of time on this--
is there any reason why we should be having the FBI going
around anticipatorily asking people if they know anybody who
plans to divert attention? Is the FBI that deep in extra agents
that they got people with nothing else to do for the summer to
go out and do this? I wonder if this in your mind raises the
concern that it raises in mine.
Let me read, in your report, on page 75, you note Attorney
General Levi, who did great work when he was under Gerald Ford
in this regard, tried to clean it up and then talked about
Attorney General Smith's revision. But this is the key point:
Smith's guidelines, like Levi's, took account of the reality
that suspicion of, quote, terrorism like suspicion of, quote,
subversion could lead to making individuals targets for
investigation more because of their beliefs than because of
their acts. I am wondering if you think have we gotten that out
of our system? Is it coming back?
Mr. Kean. I don't know the facts other than what you have
read behind this particular case. What we do believe is that,
as we try to protect ourselves, there is always the danger as
we get into these new methods of protection that our civil
liberties will be jeopardized; and we have recommended creating
something that does not exist right now, which is a board
within the executive branch to examine these various things
where in cases like this are raised to actually look and see is
this getting unnecessarily into the jeopardies of our--
Mr. Frank. Thank you, Chairman Kean. I would hope very
strongly that we would make that part of any report. I hope it
will get the attention.
Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to put into the
record the New York Times article and the editorial.
Chairman Cox. Without objection.
[The information follows:]
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
August 16, 2004 Monday
Correction Appended
Late Edition--Final
SECTION: Section A; Column 2; National Desk; Pg. 1
LENGTH: 1605 words
HEADLINE: F.B.I. Goes Knocking for Political Troublemakers
BYLINE: By ERIC LICHTBLAU
DATELINE: WASHINGTON, Aug. 15
BODY:
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been questioning political
demonstrators across the country, and in rare cases even subpoenaing
them, in an aggressive effort to forestall what officials say could be
violent and disruptive protests at the Republican National Convention
in New York.
F.B.I. officials are urging agents to canvass their communities for
information about planned disruptions aimed at the convention and other
coming political events, and they say they have developed a list of
people who they think may have information about possible violence.
They say the inquiries, which began last month before the Democratic
convention in Boston, are focused solely on possible crimes, not on
dissent, at major political events.
But some people contacted by the F.B.I. say they are mystified by
the bureau's interest and felt harassed by questions about their
political plans.
``The message I took from it,'' said Sarah Bardwell, 21, an intern
at a Denver antiwar group who was visited by six investigators a few
weeks ago, ``was that they were trying to intimidate us into not going
to any protests and to let us know that, `hey, we're watching you.' ''
The unusual initiative comes after the Justice Department, in a
previously undisclosed legal opinion, gave its blessing to
controversial tactics used last year by the F.B.I in urging local
police departments to report suspicious activity at political and
antiwar demonstrations to counterterrorism squads. The F.B.I. bulletins
that relayed the request for help detailed tactics used by
demonstrators--everything from violent resistance to Internet fund-
raising and recruitment.
In an internal complaint, an F.B.I. employee charged that the
bulletins improperly blurred the line between lawfully protected speech
and illegal activity. But the Justice Department's Office of Legal
Policy, in a five-page internal analysis obtained by The New York
Times, disagreed.
The office, which also made headlines in June in an opinion--since
disavowed--that authorized the use of torture against terrorism
suspects in some circumstances, said any First Amendment impact posed
by the F.B.I.'s monitoring of the political protests was negligible and
constitutional.
The opinion said: ``Given the limited nature of such public
monitoring, any possible 'chilling' effect caused by the bulletins
would be quite minimal and substantially outweighed by the public
interest in maintaining safety and order during large-scale
demonstrations.''
Those same concerns are now central to the vigorous efforts by the
F.B.I. to identify possible disruptions by anarchists, violent
demonstrators and others at the Republican National Convention, which
begins Aug. 30 and is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of
protesters.
In the last few weeks, beginning before the Democratic convention,
F.B.I. counterterrorism agents and other federal and local officers
have sought to interview dozens of people in at least six states,
including past protesters and their friends and family members, about
possible violence at the two conventions. In addition, three young men
in Missouri said they were trailed by federal agents for several days
and subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury last month,
forcing them to cancel their trip to Boston to take part in a protest
there that same day.
Interrogations have generally covered the same three questions,
according to some of those questioned and their lawyers: were
demonstrators planning violence or other disruptions, did they know
anyone who was, and did they realize it was a crime to withhold such
information.
A handful of protesters at the Boston convention were arrested but
there were no major disruptions. Concerns have risen for the Republican
convention, however, because of antiwar demonstrations directed at
President Bush and because of New York City's global prominence.
With the F.B.I. given more authority after the Sept. 11 attacks to
monitor public events, the tensions over the convention protests,
coupled with the Justice Department's own legal analysis of such
monitoring, reflect the fine line between protecting national security
in an age of terrorism and discouraging political expression.
F.B.I. officials, mindful of the bureau's abuses in the 1960's and
1970's monitoring political dissidents like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther
King Jr., say they are confident their agents have not crossed that
line in the lead-up to the conventions.
``The F.B.I. isn't in the business of chilling anyone's First
Amendment rights,'' said Joe Parris, a bureau spokesman in Washington.
``But criminal behavior isn't covered by the First Amendment. What
we're concerned about are injuries to convention participants, injuries
to citizens, injuries to police and first responders.''
F.B.I. officials would not say how many people had been interviewed
in recent weeks, how they were identified or what spurred the bureau's
interest.
They said the initiative was part of a broader, nationwide effort
to follow any leads pointing to possible violence or illegal
disruptions in connection with the political conventions, presidential
debates or the November election, which come at a time of heightened
concern about a possible terrorist attack.
F.B.I. officials in Washington have urged field offices around the
country in recent weeks to redouble their efforts to interview sources
and gather information that might help to detect criminal plots. The
only lead to emerge publicly resulted in a warning to authorities
before the Boston convention that anarchists or other domestic groups
might bomb news vans there. It is not clear whether there was an actual
plot.
The individuals visited in recent weeks ``are people that we
identified that could reasonably be expected to have knowledge of such
plans and plots if they existed,'' Mr. Parris said.
``We vetted down a list and went out and knocked on doors and had a
laundry list of questions to ask about possible criminal behavior,'' he
added. ``No one was dragged from their homes and put under bright
lights. The interviewees were free to talk to us or close the door in
our faces.''
But civil rights advocates argued that the visits amounted to
harassment. They said they saw the interrogations as part of a pattern
of increasingly aggressive tactics by federal investigators in
combating domestic terrorism. In an episode in February in Iowa,
federal prosecutors subpoenaed Drake University for records on the
sponsor of a campus antiwar forum. The demand was dropped after a
community outcry.
Protest leaders and civil rights advocates who have monitored the
recent interrogations said they believed at least 40 or 50 people, and
perhaps many more, had been contacted by federal agents about
demonstration plans and possible violence surrounding the conventions
and other political events.
``This kind of pressure has a real chilling effect on perfectly
legitimate political activity,'' said Mark Silverstein, legal director
for the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado, where two groups of
political activists in Denver and a third in Fort Collins were visited
by the F.B.I. ``People are going to be afraid to go to a demonstration
or even sign a petition if they justifiably believe that will result in
your having an F.B.I. file opened on you.''
The issue is a particularly sensitive one in Denver, where the
police agreed last year to restrictions on local intelligence-gathering
operations after it was disclosed that the police had kept files on
some 3,000 people and 200 groups involved in protests.
But the inquiries have stirred opposition elsewhere as well.
In New York, federal agents recently questioned a man whose
neighbor reported he had made threatening comments against the
president. He and a lawyer, Jeffrey Fogel, agreed to talk to the Secret
Service, denying the accusation and blaming it on a feud with the
neighbor. But when agents started to question the man about his
political affiliations and whether he planned to attend convention
protests, ``that's when I said no, no, no, we're not going to answer
those kinds of questions,'' said Mr. Fogel, who is legal director for
the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York.
In the case of the three young men subpoenaed in Missouri, Denise
Lieberman, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union in St.
Louis, which is representing them, said they scrapped plans to attend
both the Boston and the New York conventions after they were questioned
about possible violence.
The men are all in their early 20's, Ms. Lieberman said, but she
would not identify them.
All three have taken part in past protests over American foreign
policy and in planning meetings for convention demonstrations. She said
two of them were arrested before on misdemeanor charges for what she
described as minor civil disobedience at protests.
Prosecutors have now informed the men that they are targets of a
domestic terrorism investigation, Ms. Lieberman said, but have not
disclosed the basis for their suspicions. ``They won't tell me,'' she
said.
Federal officials in St. Louis and Washington declined to comment
on the case. Ms. Lieberman insisted that the men ``didn't have any
plans to participate in the violence, but what's so disturbing about
all this is the pre-emptive nature--stopping them from participating in
a protest before anything even happened.''
The three men ``were really shaken and frightened by all this,''
she said, ``and they got the message loud and clear that if you make
plans to go to a protest, you could be subject to arrest or a visit
from the F.B.I.''
URL: http://www.nytimes.com
CORRECTION-DATE: August 17, 2004
CORRECTION:
A front-page article yesterday about efforts by the F.B.I. to
interview prospective political demonstrators in advance of the
Republican National Convention in New York misidentified the Justice
Department office that found the bureau's monitoring of previous
protests to be constitutional. It is the Office of Legal Counsel, not
of Legal Policy. A caption with a picture of four Denver residents who
were questioned in the effort referred incorrectly to two of them in
some copies. Sarah Graves, not Christopher Riederer, is the housemate
of Sarah Bardwell.
GRAPHIC: Photo: F.B.I. agents and Denver police officers visited Sarah
Bardwell, right, and a housemate, Sarah Graves, and two neighbors,
Christopher Riederer, second from right, and Blake, who would not give
his last name, at their homes to ask them about political and antiwar
protest activities. (Photo by Carmel Zucker for The New York Times)(pg.
A11)
LOAD-DATE: August 16, 2004
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
August 17, 2004 Tuesday
Late Edition - Final
SECTION: Section A; Column 1; Editorial Desk; Pg. 20
LENGTH: 542 words
HEADLINE: Interrogating the Protesters
BODY:
For several weeks, starting before the Democratic convention,
F.B.I. officers have been questioning potential political
demonstrators, and their friends and families, about their plans to
protest at the two national conventions. These heavy-handed inquiries
are intimidating, and they threaten to chill freedom of expression.
They also appear to be a spectacularly poor use of limited law-
enforcement resources. The F.B.I. should redirect its efforts to focus
more directly on real threats.
Six investigators recently descended on Sarah Bardwell, a 21-year-
old intern with a Denver antiwar group, who quite reasonably took away
the message that the government was watching her closely. In Missouri,
three men in their early 20's said they had been followed by federal
investigators for days, then subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury.
They ended up canceling their plans to show up for the Democratic and
Republican conventions.
The F.B.I. is going forward with the blessing of the Justice
Department's Office of Legal Counsel--the same outfit that recently
approved the use of torture against terrorism suspects. In the Justice
Department's opinion, the chilling effect of the investigations is
``quite minimal,'' and ``substantially outweighed by the public
interest in maintaining safety and order.'' But this analysis gets the
balance wrong. When protesters are made to feel like criminal suspects,
the chilling effect is potentially quite serious. And the chances of
gaining any information that would be useful in stopping violence are
quite small.
The knock on the door from government investigators asking about
political activities is the stuff of totalitarian regimes. It is
intimidating to be visited by the Federal Bureau of Investigation,
particularly by investigators who warn that withholding information
about anyone with plans to create a disruption is a crime.
And few people would want the F.B.I. to cross-examine their friends
and family about them. If engaging in constitutionally protected speech
means subjecting yourself to this kind of government monitoring, many
Americans may decide--as the men from Missouri did--that the cost is
too high.
Meanwhile, history suggests that the way to find out what
potentially violent protesters are planning is not to send F.B.I.
officers bearing questionnaires to the doorsteps of potential
demonstrators. As became clear in the 1960's, F.B.I. monitoring of
youthful dissenters is notoriously unreliable. The files that were
created in the past often proved to be laughably inaccurate.
The F.B.I.'s questioning of protesters is part of a larger campaign
against political dissent that has increased sharply since the start of
the war on terror.
At the Democratic convention, protesters were sent to a depressing
barbed-wire camp under the subway tracks. And at a recent Bush-Cheney
campaign event, audience members were required to sign a pledge to
support President Bush before they were admitted.
F.B.I. officials insist that the people they interview are free to
``close the door in our faces,'' but by then the damage may already
have been done. The government must not be allowed to turn a war
against foreign enemies into a campaign against critics at home.
URL: http://www.nytimes.com
LOAD-DATE: August 17, 2004
Mr. Frank. One last question. I was struck when you talked
about the failure of immigration enforcement to exclude some of
the people who came in. I was involved to state my role during
the 1980's and 1990's trying to change the rules. I thought
they were unduly restrictive on political grounds of people
coming in. I take it from reading your report that you don't
find that the problem is in the definition statutory of who can
be excluded but rather in the failure to use that definition
appropriately. Am I reading that accurately?
Mr. Kean. I think you are reading that accurately. We had a
wonderful example of an immigration official in Orlando,
Florida, who simply asked a couple of questions. A lot of these
people just automatically granted access even to those that
made false statements.
Mr. Frank. Can I just say that the key point is that under
the statutes as they now exist those people were excludable if
the right procedures had been followed. It is not that the
statute allows--
Mr. Kean. No, they were excludable, and they were not. I am
saying there was at least one case of a very alert Customs
agent who simply started asking questions, and that was
probably the 20th hijacker who was excluded because of a good
civil servant doing his job.
Mr. Frank. We have FBI agents asking too many questions and
immigration officials not asking enough. Maybe they can trade
off.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Virginia, the
distinguished chairman of the Committee on Agriculture, Mr.
Goodlatte.
Mr. Goodlatte. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for
holding this very important hearing. Thank you for the
excellent work that both of you and your colleagues have done
in preparing this report and providing us with many thought-
provoking ideas that the Congress and the executive branch need
to act upon and act upon aggressively.
I would like to follow up on two areas that have been
talked about thus far. Governor Kean, you mentioned in your
opening comments and in the report your note that in the past
the wall that we have built between intelligence-gathering
agencies like the CIA and law enforcement agencies like the FBI
was due to the risk of inadvertent disclosure that outweighs
the benefit of sharing information with other agencies.
That certainly is one of the concerns, certainly, on the
part of intelligence agencies why we had that wall, but it was
not by any means the only reason. Another reason that the wall
was built up was to address the concern about the use of
intelligence gathering which is done with regard to foreign
nationals but necessarily involves also gathering information
about U.S. citizens when those foreign nationals have
communications with them and so on. Even when done properly,
information is gathered, and the concern was then that law
enforcement agencies which could abuse that information would
not have access to it.
Obviously, there is a big flaw in that; and September 11th
is the greatest proof of that flaw. But, nonetheless, while we
did in the PATRIOT Act, I would note, partially tear down that
wall to enable the sharing of that information, we have also
been careful to make sure that we not have the kind of abuses
that some have suggested could occur.
I wonder if you have additional comments that you might
make or recommendations that you might make to how the Congress
can assure the public that the action taken as a part of the
PATRIOT Act was a sound one for the reasons of September 11th
but not one that should cause them concern that their civil
liberties are going to be abused.
Mr. Kean. You know, in that regard I would say there is
probably no substitute for the oversight of the committees. I
mean, that is another argument for really having very, very
vigorous oversight on the part of the Congress, to make sure
that the public can be assured that it is being done properly.
Mr. Goodlatte. Thank you.
Congressman Hamilton.
Mr. Hamilton. Well, we think the provisions of the PATRIOT
Act that facilitate the sharing of information between the law
enforcement people on the one side and the intelligence on the
other are very beneficial and very important in terms of a
counterterrorism strategy overall. We are not experts on the
PATRIOT Act, and there are many provisions of the PATRIOT Act,
but this provision we think is very, very important.
Mr. Goodlatte. Let me follow up also on the questions
related to immigration. I was pleased to hear you both say that
more robust enforcement of routine immigration laws--and the
example you just cited is clearly one of those--is very
important. I wonder how serious you are about that. This is, as
you probably know, a major political issue here in the
Congress. There are very widely differing opinions about what
types of overall reforms, some related to national security,
some related to a whole host of other interests, should take
place. But we have been unable to reach conclusions about that
except the law that we passed in 1996 that did provide for
greater crackdown on illegal immigration.
Nonetheless, since that time I would argue, in part because
of lack of enforcement of our current immigration laws, we have
seen the number of illegal immigrants in the country rise.
Obviously, not all of those are threats to our national
security, but it is very difficult when have you a lack of
information because people are operating below the radar screen
which ones are and which ones are not of concern to the country
because of national security. How aggressively should we be
enforcing our immigration laws overall to avoid that very type
of problem when that individual presented himself to that
particular immigration officer in Florida, that officer had no
reason before asking the questions whether that particular
person was a threat.
We also have millions of people who never check in with an
immigration officer to go through that kind of questioning who
are here in this country, some of which have malicious intent;
and I wish you would comment on the need to enforce our
immigration laws overall and address this problem.
Mr. Hamilton. I want to say, first of all, in responding to
your question, that we were given a mandate and we did not
construe that mandate to mean that we should review all of
these immigration questions that you have presented.
Mr. Goodlatte. I understand. I am talking about enforcement
of current law.
Mr. Hamilton. I think the enforcement has to be very
robust. Let me say that we believe that border security is a
part of national security and that we have to have an
integrated, modern border and immigration system. You can't
look at them as two separate things. You have got to have a
border and immigration system that meshes. We make three
specific recommendations, and they are fairly broad, but there
is where we focused our interest.
Number one, we said you must move towards a biometric entry
and exit system as soon as you possibly can. We think that is
absolutely essential to getting control of the border and to
providing an integrated border immigration system. So number
one is the adoption of a biometric entry exit system.
Number two is to have accessible files on visitors and
immigrants so that officials at all points who deal with people
coming into this country--Customs, Border Patrol, immigration,
visas, passports, whatever--you have to have an accessible file
that people can tap into to learn about that person. Is that
person who he says he is or she is? And we have got to be able
to put that all together and integrate it.
And the third thing we say is you have to use intelligence
on indicators of the terrorist travel tactics. Terrorists are
great travelers. They have all kinds of tactics which we have
already referred to earlier in our report, and you have got to
get intelligence on those tactics so that you can effectively
defend your borders.
We do not, Mr. Goodlatte, get into more detail on
immigration than that. What we have suggested is--calls for
major change, and I must say it is not inexpensive. It is going
to cost a lot of money.
Mr. Kean. It is probably the largest expense of all of our
recommendations.
We also believe, by the way, as we move in this direction
if possible it be coordinated with other countries,
particularly like the European Union who have the same interest
we do. And because the terrorists are so vulnerable when they
are traveling, if we could have a biometric system as
integrated with as many countries as possible, it is going to
make the terrorist's job a lot tougher.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from California, Ms. Harman.
Ms. Harman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would first like to observe that many members of this
committee in the lower rows here have traveled across the
country today to participate, and I would urge you to gavel
each person's questions closed at 5 minutes sharp, including
the answers, because it is really unfair to other members that
they will have so little time.
Chairman Cox. I appreciate the gentlelady's comments.
Ms. Harman. And please gavel me closed. I don't plan to
exceed the 5 minutes.
I would like to welcome our witnesses. I have had a lot of
time to talk to them, to read their report carefully. I think
it is an exceptionally good report. I think we will be
measured, all of us in this committee, all of us in Congress,
and the President, by whether we step up and act on the
recommendations, not just talk about them but act on the
recommendations.
If there are representatives of the 9/11 families in the
audience today, as there have been in so many hearings, I would
like to welcome you and tell you that, certainly speaking just
for me, I will do everything I can to make sure that these
recommendations are acted on in a timely way in this term of
Congress.
I just want to mention several things. I was one who
testified before the Rules Committee as a ranking member of the
Intelligence Committee. I testified in favor of making this
committee permanent, making it have real jurisdiction so that
it could truly authorize a real homeland security budget. That
will mean other committees giving up jurisdiction. I think we
should be for that.
Similarly, I feel that the Intelligence Committee--realize
I have an interest in it, but even if I were not a member--
should have real jurisdiction and should have, as both
witnesses have testified, control over both the authorization
and appropriations of a standalone intelligence budget. We do
not have that. In fact, the defense appropriations budget is
already law. It appropriates funds for intelligence programs
that have not yet been authorized. I think that that is a sad
commentary on the state of power of the Intelligence Committees
in the Congress.
At any rate, I want to focus today on one of what I think
are two glaring gaps. One glaring gap is information sharing.
We have had lots of conversation about the need--and I share
this--for a national intelligence, a national counterterrorism
director, technology reforms and so forth. These are great
ideas.
I want to talk about the other glaring gap, and that is
interoperable communications. Congressman Hamilton mentioned it
this morning. Congressman Kean testified about it yesterday.
There is a recommendation in your report that specifically says
Congress should support legislation to expedite the assignment
of radio spectrum. Legislation introduced in the House 17
months ago by Congressman Curt Weldon and me has been
languishing because of jurisdictional disputes in various
committees. It would close the gap and make certain that
adequate spectrum is available by the end of 2002 which was the
promise--2006, excuse me, a promise Congress made in 1997.
My question to you is, when you say we should expedite the
assignment of radio spectrum, are you talking about closing the
loopholes and making certain that that spectrum is available by
2006 or are you trying to argue that we should transfer that
spectrum even sooner?
Mr. Kean. As soon as possible.
Let me tell you what she is talking about. We have been
told by respondents--firemen, policemen, first aid people--who
respond to the scene that they do not now have the ability to
communicate with one another and therefore save lives together.
It puts their lives in jeopardy, and it puts people's lives in
jeopardy. They can't do it because they don't have enough
spectrum for their radios. This is a plea that came to us
particularly from the New York Police Department and Fire
Department but a number of others, also.
I recognize this is a tougher one because I guess you would
be taking on the National Association of Broadcasters. They win
most of their fights. But it is absolutely essential for the
protection of the American people.
I can't tell you how important that is. Talk at home, talk
to your responders, talk to your fire and police, talk to the
people in your districts, because this has to be done. This is
something which will not only in case of a terrorist attack but
in case of the kind of terrible tragedy we had in Florida with
the hurricane, in case of any other emergencies like that,
giving spectrum to our public safety officials is just going to
make your constituents and our countrymen and women a lot
safer.
Ms. Harman. Governor, I thank you.
I would like to quote Senator McCain from yesterday. He
said, ``I have been on this committee''--that is the Commerce
Committee--``for 18 years and they''--that is the
broadcasters--'' won every time. Maybe we will have a victory
on behalf of the American people. I surely hope so.''
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. I agree.
The gentleman from New York, Mr. King.
Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First of all, I want to thank Governor Kean and Congressman
Hamilton for the great job they have done. The country owes you
a tremendous debt.
Also, as someone who lost well over 100 friends, neighbors,
and constituents on September 11th, I want to thank
Congresswoman Sanchez and Congressman Shays for the remarks
they made about the importance that Congress has to give to
this committee and to this entire issue of homeland security. I
think it is really unfortunate that too many Members of
Congress are still living back on September 10th, 2001. If
another attack does come, we haven't done our job. There will
be no forgiving any of us for not having moving forward when we
should have.
Congressman Hamilton, I think my main question is to you.
You touched on this before, but it is often the whole issue of
TTIC and the National Counterterrorism Threat Center. I would
ask you--first of all, I read the report. I am not certain
exactly what you mean by saying that you would build on TTIC.
In other words, will it still be there? Will it continue to
function?
Second, if you could give us your analysis of the job that
TTIC has done and is doing and how you expect that to be
improved by the National Counterterrorism Threat Center. How
and why will there be a better job done in the future than
there will be now under TTIC?
Mr. Hamilton. I think TTIC is a valuable concept. It is
working reasonably well. We are concerned that the people that
are assigned to TTIC are not at the highest level. In other
words, it tends to be junior level people; and it doesn't quite
have the overall clout that you want.
What you have today is a lot of different fusion centers
around the government, and TTIC is one among several fusion
centers, maybe even one among many. What we are suggesting here
is a National Counterterrorism Center which would take the lead
on strategic analysis and develop net assessments, and it would
really have--it would not--it would replace all of the other
fusion centers. This would be the center that you would look to
for your strategic analysis, the President and Members of
Congress, and to make assessments and to provide warnings of
possible terrorist attacks. It would have the responsibility of
tasking collection requirements.
In other words--and that is a terribly important role in
the Intelligence Community--to say, OK, you are going to go
after this, you are going to use these assets to go after this
kind of intelligence. And it would be--it would have that
responsibility both inside and outside the United States. It
would be a very--it would absorb and we think strengthen the
analytic talent that exists today in TTIC and not just TTIC but
the Counterterrorism Center, the DIA's Joint Intelligence Task
Force combating terrorism. So it is a newer and much more
powerful fusion center.
In addition to what I have said, it would have not just
responsibilities in intelligence but it would have
responsibilities in operational planning as well. And this is
an important concept that we borrow completely from the
military. It is not just an intelligence entity, it is a place
where you pool and collect and analyze all of the intelligence
from the various intelligence agencies of the United States,
but, beyond that, it is an operational center in the sense that
it plans operations.
The Governor mentioned early on in his testimony the case
of these two muscular hijackers in San Diego. We had bits and
information--bits and pieces of information about them. Nowhere
did it all come together. Nobody was in charge in the sense of
managing the case. And that is what you need. You need someone
to step forward and say we are going to manage the case.
George Tenet was informed in August of 2001 about Moussaoui
in Minneapolis. We asked him about it; and he said, first of
all, he assigned some of his people to work with the FBI on it.
Then we said, did you talk to the President about it? And he
said, no, and said this was the FBI's case.
I don't think that answer was wrong. It was the FBI's case,
but clearly insufficient. What was the problem? The problem was
nobody was managing the case. Nobody was saying to themselves,
I know about these two fellows out on the West Coast. I know
this about them. I know that about them. It raises red flags.
And somebody has got to take hold of that and management case,
plan it operationally. And that is what this counterterrorism
would do.
They are appointed by the President. It reports to the
National Intelligence Director. It is a very, very important
center. May I say that it is not just a center that deals with
counterterrorism--excuse me, beyond that, we create centers for
other threats. Because the same thing is needed with regard to
other threats. WMD or maybe you put China or maybe you put the
international crime and narcotics on the list. Whatever you
think the major threats to the national security are, we create
a center, if you would, to deal with it. Those would change
from time to time, and the responsibility would be not just to
pool all of the intelligence you have got but to operationally
plan it and to see that the policy decisions of the President
and the National Security Council are in fact carried out.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Cardin.
Mr. Hamilton. It is a very new concept, and it is not easy
to get hold of.
Mr. Cardin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me also offer my congratulations to Governor Kean and
to Congressman Hamilton for their extraordinary service to our
country. I also want to compliment the other members of your
Commission for the extraordinary work that you were able to do.
It is a very professional document.
I hope the fact that we are holding these August hearings,
which are extraordinary for Congress to do, means that we will
have action in September establishing a single point, single
person for the collection and analysis of intelligence
information and strengthening the entire process for dealing
with intelligence information and protecting us.
I also cannot help but look at a comparison to the Cold
War. Growing up in the Cold War, the fear of communism and the
Soviet Union really prevailed throughout our community, similar
to how the fear of terrorism is today. We developed a strategy
in the Cold War to develop a very strong national defense, and
we did that in the United States. But we also recognized we
couldn't win the war on terrorism alone and the war against the
communists alone, that we needed to develop international
support. We worked with our friends in Europe, and we developed
NATO, which was a way of shoring up our defense in Europe, and
we shared a lot of information with the Europeans. And we won.
We developed a war of ideas, and we used new technology at
that time to get information behind the Iron Curtain that there
was a better way of life, with democratic principles and
respect for human rights that led to economic advancements. And
more and more people, more and more nations agreed with us; and
we won the Cold War.
So I guess my point is, I looked at your report, and I am
impressed by your commitment to expand our efforts
internationally. Yes, we need to develop our capacities here
for sharing information, but we also need to work with our
friends around the world to share information. The people who
travel to the United States, the terrorists go through other
countries; and we need to share that information.
In 1975, we developed the Helsinki Accord, the organization
for security and cooperation in Europe to develop an
international regional forum to share a commitment towards
democratic principles and respect for human rights. It helped
us during the Cold War with a forum that we could go to
challenge the actions of other countries and to help people who
in their own countries were fighting a battle of ideas.
There is interest in the Middle East to do that, to develop
forums where we can show hope to people and look at longer-
range solutions to this battle.
So I just really wanted to give you an opportunity to
underscore the importance not just for us to look inward at our
own Nation to improve the collection of intelligence
information and to deal with a better sharing of information,
but this battle, if we are going to win it, also has to be
engaged internationally with the U.S. leadership working with
our friends around the world, particularly in the Middle East.
Mr. Kean. Congressman, thank you very much for making that
point. Because that is a very strong and important area of our
recommendations and hasn't received the focus, frankly, that
some the rest of it has. We have got to have a consistent
message going out to that part of the world. And it is a
message of hope. You are absolutely right. Bin Laden's message
is one of despair that leads eventually to death. That is what
he is talking about. If we don't have a message to these people
to show there is a better life, that we can actually provide a
path to that better life, that we are on their side, not
somebody else's side, we are not going to win this.
Because, as Secretary Rumsfeld said to us once, you know we
can kill these terrorists, but if they are being created faster
than we kill them, we are not going to win this one. That is
one thing, the message of hope, certainly working with our
friends and allies who have some of the same interests we do
and share the same hopes and dreams and way of life and ideals,
getting those across. We have specific recommendations, as you
know, for some of the most important countries, we believe--
Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan. The emphasis on those
three countries in our report is very, very important.
We believe the whole way in which we do business in that
part of the world, once we get a consistent message, has got to
change--if we are, for instance, upset, as we should be, that
these madrasas that kids are going to in that part of the world
are teaching hate and teaching hate of the West and all of
that, well, there has got to be some alternative. A lot of the
young children are going to those madrasas because there is no
other school. There is other opportunity for parents to send
them anywhere except the madrasas. All right, let's help these
countries to build alternatives.
There are a number of recommendations along this area in
our report. We believe, frankly, they are among the most
important recommendations.
Thank you very much for bringing them to our attention.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Linder.
Mr. Linder. I want to thank you both for being here and for
your service to our country. We appreciate it.
Lee, you mentioned something about biometrics early on. It
strikes me that the terrorists need access to our traveling
systems, our airplanes, our trains, and if we could get to
biometric identifiers on people who are not risks quickly,
could we spend more of our time on those who might be risks and
cannot be identified with the biometrics? Would you expand on
that?
Mr. Hamilton. You always have a tension here. Most of the
people that come into this country are peaceful and have good
intent. The overwhelming number that come into the country do.
You have a lot of people who come into the country every day to
work and go back and you have to develop systems that sort
these people out very quickly. That is one of the goals, I
think, of the biometric entry exit system.
We have to develop the technology and the skill to let the
peaceful people, if you will, through quickly and the person
who is a regular commuter across the international boundary, to
let him go through quickly; and we think the biometric system
integrated with both border security and immigration is the way
to do that. It is the quickest way to do it.
To pick up on the previous question, you have to have
international cooperation on that. We want to develop a
biometric system that is internationally recognized. Now, that
is not going to be done in the next year or two, but it ought
to be the goal in the long term, and it is the way to assure
fluid commerce.
We are very concerned about the anecdotal, I guess,
information we were getting about the number of scholars who
are not coming into the country and the number of students who
are not coming into the country. This is a serious matter for
us in the long term, and we have to figure out a system. Now,
we have talked to all of the top officials about this. They are
very alert to it. They know the importance of it. So I think
the system will move forward. But we have got to accelerate it.
If we don't, we are going to be denying ourselves and this
country a lot of talent that we need.
Mr. Linder. Governor, you think alluded twice to are we
staying ahead, are we killing more terrorists than we are
creating or than are being created? You referred to the
madrasas. I would like to ask you very bluntly, can we deal
with this without dealing directly and frontally and bluntly
with Saudi Arabia?
Mr. Kean. No. And the relationship with Saudi Arabia has
got to change. Our relationship in the past with Saudi Arabia,
to be very blunt, is, as I understand it, has been oil. That
has been the relationship with Saudi Arabia. Allies to the
royal family, they ensure us enough oil, and that has sort of
been the relationship.
That can't be the relationship anymore. We have got to
continue to work with the royal family. There is no question
about it. But we got to work with the royal family to bring
some changes in that country.
It seems they are now recognizing that their way of life,
the royal family's leaders of Saudi Arabia, is under attack;
and these Islamic militants would like to overthrow them just
as much as they would like to injure us at the moment. So they
are, of necessity, our allies; and they also realize the need
for change within their own borders. We have got to work with
them on that. We have got to help them on that. We have got to
work with them instituting the changes that are possible and
then try to push and shove a little bit and get a few more
changes to the system.
Because if Saudi Arabia--I mean, we identified those three
countries--Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan--because if any
one of them went the wrong direction, we would have a world of
trouble on the international stage and in the terrorist
problem. So, yes, the relationship with Saudi Arabia has to
change, must change.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from New York, Mrs. Slaughter.
Ms. Slaughter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am so happy to
see both of you here this morning.
I think the whole world owes you thanks for what you have
done. I want to express my thanks to your amazing staff as
well. The report that they have produced is unequal to any
report I have seen in three legislatures, and I am very
grateful for that.
Personally. I lost any confidence I might have had that our
intelligence agencies were any good when the CIA let Aldrich
Ames sit with them for 8 years as a Russian spy and the FBI let
Robert Hanssen do the same thing here in the shadow of the
Capitol. It certainly was not lost on me that if they couldn't
even find spies in their midst that worked with them on a daily
basis that they probably weren't doing a great deal to protect
us. So I was not surprised at that.
I agree with you absolutely about congressional oversight.
We have got to get some control in this House and make this a
strong committee that really has the jurisdiction it needs to
see to give the American people and the rest of the world
confidence that we are doing our part to keep America secure.
In that regard, I have only got one complaint. I represent
Niagara Falls, New York; and you have recommended that DHS lead
the effort for the comprehensive integrated system. I would
like to ask you to reconsider that. After 3 years, DHS has
still not given us a threat assessment. At this point, Wyoming
is getting the same amount of aid from our national security as
New Yorkers on a per capita basis. This makes no sence since
all of us are aware that if terrorists strike, two things they
are going to want to do is, one, kill as many people as
possible and, two, cause as much economic damage as possible.
And while I don't mean to denigrate Wyoming, that is not likely
to happen there.
On our border, since 9/11 there has been a complete backup
of both commerce and people at our border crossing. It it takes
about five hours to get across. At the same time, you can still
come across in a rowboat from Canada to the United States at
many, many points; and people do that. DHS' plan for security
on the Great Lakes was to set up something that would require
every boat on the lake to report to a video phone somewhere,
many, many of them 60, 70 miles apart, which are continuously
out of order.
Now what people tell me is that fewer than 5 percent even
attempt to use those video phones. The only thing that people
who do not do so have to worry about, in some of our rural
counties, is that the sheriff might somehow pluck them up from
all of the hundreds of boaters who are there.
It simply does not work; and, beyond that, it doesn't make
any sense.
At the same time, we have tightened up so much on our
border on our side you cannot come in from Canada literally for
hours. I am meeting tomorrow with my Canadian counterparts to
see what we can do. DHS has come up with a Nexus card, which I
think Congressman Hamilton referred to, which would work except
it costs $80 for 5 years and nobody will pay. In addition, in
my area, you can only buy it in Canada.
So these are some of the things that we should be able to
deal with, but at this point I would like to see if you would
re-consider your border recommendation and see if one of the
national laboratories or NIST or GAO or somebody could develop
a better border plan do that in a hurry. Because we can't wait
3 more years for something like that.
So that is my major concern at this point having--
representing one of those border States, I need to tell you
that what DHS is doing there simply does not work.
Citizens tell me that in these rural towns, they see boats
come in, cars drive on the bridge, pick up somebody or
something from that boat and go away all night long. By the
time they call the sheriff, they are long gone.
So this is a wide-open area which is of some concern. What
the answer is eludes me, but I am very much concerned that
after 3 years I think that all that we have accomplished there
basically is to aggravate almost everybody who lives in that
area. Most of these people cross this bridge almost on a daily
basis; and if they try to get to the Nexus lane, they can't.
They are tied up so much in traffic.
So these are some of the things on a local basis that we
are trying to deal with. My sense about DHS is 170,000 people
trying to learn how to get along. I am not sure they are
anywhere near close to that at this point.
So I just throw that out for your recommendation. But,
beyond that, I cannot tell you how impressed I am on the work
that you have done. Like Congressman Shays, I will certainly
pledge to you my strong support that we will get your
recommendations enacted into law. Thank you very much for what
you have done and I appreciate, despite all that other work you
have done, that you continue to make all these rounds and talk
to all of us. Thank you both very much.
Mr. Kean. Thank you very much.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Arizona, Mr. Shadegg.
Mr. Shadegg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman; and, gentlemen, I
would like to echo the appreciation of the others on the panel.
I greatly appreciate the work you have done. I think it is a
great contribution to our efforts here in the Congress to move
forward and to improve homeland security.
I want to begin with a question that goes to kind of one of
the thrusts of the report. A great deal of your recommendations
go to restructuring, restructuring particularly of the
Intelligence Community, and not substantive recommendations.
Some have criticized that. One prominent individual within the
CIA has criticized that rather strongly. Others have said that
at least a flaw they see in your overall report is its failure
to emphasize revitalizing the clandestine service to infiltrate
and destroy terrorist organizations, as opposed to making
structural or restructuring recommendations.
I would like to give you a chance to respond to that and
tell us why you think focusing on restructuring is important
and, second, how important you personally believe it is to
increase our efforts through the clandestine service to
infiltrate and destroy terrorist organizations.
Mr. Hamilton. We put a lot of emphasis on strengthening
human intelligence, and I think that is part of the
conventional wisdom today. Everybody agrees with it. I don't
know anybody that disagrees with it.
Now, there are two problems with it. One is that it is
very, very tough to penetrate these cells; and that is why you
have to have a lot more diversity into the CIA. But these cells
are very small. I suspect they are the most difficult
intelligence targets there to penetrate. We must not have
exaggerated expectations about our ability to do it.
I am all for doing it, I am all for strengthening the human
intelligence, and it clearly needs to be done. But may I cite
to you when I was chairman of the Intelligence Committee back
in the late 1980's and the early 1990's that we were talking
about strengthening human intelligence. This is not a new idea.
It is just very hard to do. And Tenet testified before us that
it will take him at least 5 years from now to get intelligence
clandestine service where he wants it to be.
The second problem that I think we often overlook with
regard to intelligence HUMINT, human intelligence, is you are
asking a person to live a very dangerous life for a very long
period of time, away from family, away from country, and it is
not the easiest thing to recruit those kind of people. They
have to be absolutely fluent in the language. They have to be
able to be absorbed into the culture so that nobody would
recognize them.
So I am all for human intelligence. I think it needs to be
strengthened, but I also think we have to have some reasonable
expectation of its limitations.
The second point about why did we put so much emphasis on
the structure, I would only say to the person that made that
criticism they haven't read the report. Look, we talk in here
about the military actions that are necessary, attacking the
Usama bin Ladens of the world, of not providing any
sanctuaries. We have a whole chapter devoted to American
foreign policy and how you prevent the growth of terrorism, how
you have got to engage with ideas, how our policies have to
understand the--we have to understand the consequences of our
policies. We talk about the elements of a coalition strategy,
public diplomacy, scholarship exchanges, agenda of opportunity,
a better vision. We talk about how to stop terrorist financing
or use terrorist financing to your advantage; and we have a
whole list of recommendations, many of which we have been
talking about today, about how to protect ourselves better.
So I understand that a lot of the discussion in the public
press and in the media has been on institutional reform, and
that is understandable because--but--
Mr. Shadegg. I have just a little bit of time. Let me get
in one other question.
Under the structure you envision there will be--several
agencies will be able to search the database--we are talking
about intelligence-gathering agencies--the database of other
agencies. I think that is clearly necessary. But my question
is, is not that or did you give thought to the fact that might,
in fact, be a disincentive for the agencies to put information
into their database and--since human nature being what it is--
and are there recommendations you think within your report that
go to that particular point?
Mr. Hamilton. It is a good point, and what it means is you
have to have someone above the agency who has the power to
impose rules and regulations to force that sharing. I think you
put your finger on a very good point. It is not automatic that
you get the sharing, and the tendency of keeping the
information you have got from everybody else is a very human
one and a very strong one. The only way I know you can deal
with it is through superior authority.
Mr. Shadegg. I thank you for your report.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Oregon, Mr. DeFazio.
Mr. DeFazio. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, thanks
for convening the committee during the August recess.
I have several questions. Stansfield Turner and others have
postulated that a number of the more urgent reforms and
requirements that you are putting forward in terms of a
National Intelligence Director, budgetary control, basically
putting someone in charge and making the agency share could be
done by executive order or modification of Ronald Reagan's
executive order regarding the intelligence services. So that
would be one question, to comment on whether or not, given the
fact Congress won't act at least until September, very likely
may be not even until later than that, shouldn't the President
look at implementing some of these changes more quickly by
executive order?
The second would be, you commented on interoperability and
the focus was on spectrum, but I would like you to focus, if
you could, on cost of interoperability. Because that seems to
me to be the major barrier to all of the first responders I
talked to. In fact, the President's budget this year zeroed out
interoperability funds from the Federal Government. What
priority would you put on that since you have talked about the
fact that the funds are spread widely, but would you put a
priority on a national interoperable communications system for
all level of government since you rightly pointed out that
Federal, State, and local are the eyes and ears and first
responders are the State and local and they need to be there.
So, first, the executive order; second, interoperability;
and then, third, if you could just come back to--I continue to
be frustrated. I thought I was told at an aviation hearing that
we now had an integrated watchlist or it was announced actually
at a hearing by Admiral Stone, as I recall, that by the end of
that month--and I believe that was the month of June--that
there would be an integrated watchlist available so that the
agencies and the TSA could access that.
If you could comment on those three things.
Mr. Kean. I guess I will start.
While some of it could be done by executive order, we felt
very strongly--we talked about this and talked about this on
the Commission--that the Congress really ought to--is it ought
to be law and Congress ought to have the input and Congress
ought to be the designer and it ought to be permanent. And that
things done by executive order are not permanent and sometimes
they are not agreed to by the Congress and that creates all
sorts of problems. So we felt very strongly in the Commission
as we talked about it that this really should be
congressionally inputted.
Mr. DeFazio. Quickly, because I hope you can cover the
other two points, but I mean is it urgent that we begin to
force the coordination more quickly and that perhaps at least
as an interim step the President could appoint somebody or
could force that change in terms of authority to the CID?
Mr. Kean. He could do anything, I guess, in consultation
with the Congress. My worry is if you start to put a new system
in place or a new individual in place or what have you and then
the Congress comes along behind that--for instance, a person
who we would recommend should be Senate confirmed because it is
such an important position. So you put somebody in, it is
just--it raises problems that we would much rather have the
Congress to obviously act with due deliberation but act as
hastily as possible because we believe that until this
information is shared the American people are not going to be
as safe as they should be.
As far as the cost of trying to make a communication
system, we leave it--we believe it is a national priority.
These first responders and people who are going to come to
national emergencies need help and everything we can do to help
them I think we ought to do.
And the third point.
Mr. DeFazio. Watchlist. We have been told it was going to
be up and running.
Mr. Hamilton. Our impression is we do not have a totally
integrated watchlist, and there is still a number of different
watchlists, and we are urge, of course, that it be integrated.
Mr. DeFazio. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Indiana, Mr. Souder.
Mr. Souder. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to pursue a
little bit the biometric indicators on the licenses. We have
had a little bit of discussion about this, mostly as it relates
to borders.
A couple of premises. One is that not every terrorist is
going to cross the border. Some may already be here. second,
they may even in fact, since they don't seem in a rush, get
themselves into regular crossings and get into the fast pass
lanes, get secured. It seems to me, in addition to kind of the
way we are doing it now, the random or unexpected or occasional
terrorist, we also have to have a system that has biometric
indicators or other things more than just that.
Could you elaborate a little bit more on whether you see
this as a watermark, whether you see this as indicators, what
type of things, whether you see this for all citizens, for
people who have Green Cards? And also address the question, as
many cities in Indiana and other places are starting to accept
non-American identification, which would include setting up a
bank account which would make it very difficult for us to track
financial funding, be able to go to a store to pick up
precursor chemicals for bombs using a non-American ID, could
you elaborate more in detail and specific how we should start
to address this question?
Mr. Hamilton. I don't think, Mr. Souder, that we consider
ourselves any kind of experts on what kind of a biometric
screening system you have. It is a complicated, technical
question; and you do want to try to begin to implement the
system as soon as you can and not wait for the perfect system
to come along.
What we say is that the goal is an effective biometric
entry/exit screening system, that it needs to be compatible
with other countries to the extent possible so that we can
exchange information about these people that cross
international boundaries. We need to have border officials who
have access to interoperable--access I guess to all of the
information about an individual traveler; and we think it is
just common sense to have a modern, integrated border
immigration system.
Now, all of that, of what I have said to you, are kind of
general principles and statements. That is as far as the
Commission went in addition to saying that you have got to have
all of the intelligence you can about individual travelers.
When you get into the questions you are raising about the kinds
of biometric systems and all, we did not address those.
Mr. Souder. Don't you agree it isn't just a matter of
travelers? They may already be here. People can move and get
work permits and say something more than a passport. Don't we
need a system internally as well? Can you comment on how can
you track intelligence if you can't track the individuals? What
good will a national intelligence center do if people can start
bank accounts and pick up bomb supplies and we don't know who
they are?
Mr. Hamilton. Well, it is a very important point because
what we know is that the terrorists are very good at exploiting
the gaps. And if we have a marvelous system that works at the
borders but it doesn't catch the illegals and it doesn't catch
other people who come in different ways, it is not going to
work. And that is really what we mean by the word integrated.
It has to include all of the ways that we check on people
coming into this country.
Mr. Souder. Mr. Hamilton, I have a question. As a fellow
Hoosier, one of the difficult things we have, and you have this
in your report, that we have to put the money to targeted
higher-risk areas. Bottom line what that means is moving money
from Indiana to the East Coast and hardening targets in the
East Coast, which potentially leaves us more vulnerable in
Indiana. We saw the incident in Ohio, that it can move to other
places.
How do you advise those of us who are in those places to
deal with this difficult political question? It is fine to say
that is the case, but the terrorists may move around. They are
going to go to softer targets. You may get copycats. What do
you recommend we say, those of us who already see a lot of our
dollars go to the East and West Coast?
Mr. Hamilton. There are limited resources, and you have to
make some tough judgments. I think it is likely that every
State could make a claim for some of these funds. But to
suggest that you are going to predict a rural county in
southern Indiana--I will say southern rather than northern
Indiana--to the extent that you protect New York City or
Washington, D.C., just doesn't stack up with the intelligence
information.
So you have a limited number of dollars. You can't protect
against every threat, you cannot protect against every tactic
that a terrorist will use, and you have to make some very tough
judgments as to where you put those dollars. I know that those
are very difficult judgments to make because you are dealing
with a question of priorities, and priorities is always the
toughest question in government. Where do you put limited
resources?
The intelligence chatter is very clear. The intelligence
chatter is that New York and Washington, D.C., are the primary
targets and, therefore, the bulk of your resources have to go
there. I know that may not be an easy message for somebody from
Indiana because they see it, but I also think that there are
many facilities--I mentioned in the testimony 85 percent of the
facilities that need protection are in the private sector. You
folks know better than anybody what facilities in your district
need protecting, and I suspect some Federal funds should be
made available for these most vulnerable facilities. You have
to also take into account not just the vulnerability of the
facility but how much damage would be done if the facility, in
fact, were attacked.
Mr. Hamilton. How many lives would be lost, what are the
risks, all of those things have to be sorted through, and so we
say money should be distributed largely on a risk assessment
basis.
Mr. Kean. There are two targets that come over and over and
over again. These people want to kill as many of us as
possible, so they are going to pick targets where the most
people are. And second, they talk about the symbols of America.
And so where those symbols are located are where the targets
will be. We have to direct our resources to the places where
those large numbers of people congregate and where the symbols
exist.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from New York, Ms. Lowey.
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I want to join my
colleagues in welcoming you, Chairman Kean and my good
colleague, Lee Hamilton. I really appreciate your last
comments, because it is an excellent segue way to several of
the issues that many of us have been working on as New Yorkers.
First of all, I would like to generally ask you to continue
your involvement, to continue using your clout and influence in
implementing the recommendations that don't require overall
structure change. I support the structure change, but for those
of us who have been trying to move some of these issues
forward, we share the frustration of many here in this Congress
that we can't get it done.
First of all, John Sweeney and I and others have been
working on formula change. We have not been able to get that
done. I won't repeat the statistics. You know, and Louise
Slaughter mentioned it as well, when you compare the per capita
of New York to the other areas, it should be an embarrassment
to all of us: $10.12 compared to the $38 to other parts of the
country. So please continue your advocacy. Whether it is done
through the Congress or executive order, it must be done and it
must be done as soon as possible, and I know you agree.
second, many of us have been talking about airport
security. In your report, you say, quote, ``It must take into
consideration the full array of possible enemy tactics, such as
the use of insiders.'' Did the Commission intend for airport
workers, cabin cleaners, maintenance crews, caterers who are
currently permitted to bypass metal detectors, or should
everyone have to go through metal detectors? And I have been
repeatedly told by TSA it is too inconvenient and costly to
screen airport workers despite the fact that 100 percent of
workers are physically screened at airports like Heathrow,
almost 100 percent at Charles de Gaulle. This doesn't make
sense to me. If you could, continue to weigh in on that issue,
because I am sure you agree that everyone should be going
through metal detectors. And I--as a New Yorker, it disturbs me
that currently, we are so worried about security in the New
York area, yet thousands of people are going through airports
every day with antiquated identification badges.
I also would like to comment on your eloquent statements
about education. You are very well aware that the whole budget
for the foreign aid appropriations bill is $19.3 billion--I
happen to be the ranking member--and the budget for the
military is upwards of $416 billion.
We managed to get education dollars from $100 million to
$400 million. I would be interested to know whether you think
the current estimate of $10 billion or more should be validated
by this committee and this Congress by adding dollars to our
overall allocation for education. The $19.3 billion goes, as
you know, to HIV-AIDS, goes to all the work of US-AID, goes to
education. I would like to hear your recommendations.
And since my time is running out, if you could comment on
the formula change, if you could comment on airport security in
particular, the fact that thousands of people are not going
through the metal detectors with their badges; and third with
regard to our foreign aid budget.
Thank you very much.
Mr. Kean. Everybody should go through metal detectors, my
belief, without exception.
Mrs. Lowey. Do we have to wait for structural change or do
you think it can be implemented now, or can it be implemented
by executive order? We can't seem to move the FAA or TSA, and
business keeps talking about an inconvenience. How can we get
that done now?
Mr. Kean. You probably could answer it better than I could.
I don't know how you can do these things by executive order, or
whether you can, or whether you have to have something through
the United States Congress. I don't have the expertise to
answer that, but it should be done. No question about it.
I believe that if we are going to create fewer terrorists,
change minds in the Arab world, we have got to change--we just
can't be viewed as a military power. We have to get back to
some of the things we used to do in the Cold War, to try to win
that Cold War and change minds, and that involves not only
education expenses, but cultural exchanges, ways in which there
are student exchanges, ways in which we allowed these people to
get to know us and we get a better understanding of them. We
have to get into those soft areas.
We have got to get into them. We have to let these people
know who we are, and we have to understand in a much better way
who they are. And I am not talking about the small percentage
who want to kill us, but I am talking about the much larger
percentage that don't really like us at all because of what
they know of us right now, but if we are able to send a
different message, might like us a bit better.
And the third question--
Mrs. Lowey. The formula.
Mr. Kean. My view and the Commission's view: You have to
put the money where the greatest danger is, and that is
measurable due to the chatter we hear and the estimates from
the intelligence agencies. We know where the greatest danger is
and that is where the money ought to go.
Mr. Hamilton. Let me add to what Tom has said. What you are
really wrestling with here is, what should the elements be of a
counterterrorism policy. And the answer to that is that it
takes a lot of elements. And if you think only in terms of one
or two of those elements, you are not going to get it together.
You have to have military force. You have to have covert
actions and the right kind of diplomacy, the right kind of
public diplomacy, the right kind of law enforcement. You have
to have the right kind of action in the Treasury Department to
trace the flow of monies.
And I think the risk that you face in thinking about
counterterrorism policy is that you grab on to one or two of
those and say you are going to solve counterterrorism with
covert action or with military action or with educational
reform.
You are not going to do it. You have to get the whole thing
in balance and integrate it, and that is the big challenge of
counterterrorism policy.
With regard to the education matter, we think that is a
very, very important part of it. I want to pick up on what Tom
has said. The challenge to American foreign policy is not the
Osama bin Ladens. We know what we have to do with them. We have
to remove them. We have to kill them. We think and we believe
that is a very small portion of the Muslim world.
The challenge to American foreign policy is the great vast
number of Muslims who are sympathetic to Osama bin Laden, who
may admire him, but do not support the idea of violence. And
that is--if you are going to win the war on terrorism, you have
got to prevail, you have got to persuade those people that we
offer a better vision and an agenda and an opportunity for
them.
Now, you work all the time with the foreign aid budget and
you know the limitations of that budget, but you also know the
importance of it. You cannot solve the problem of these schools
in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in the United States--can't do it.
You have money in the foreign aid budget today for Pakistani
schools. What is it, 100 million or so?
Mrs. Lowey. Out of the 600 million about 30 million is
going to education.
Mr. Hamilton. It is a drop in the bucket, isn't it? But it
does say to these people who are seeking a better life, who
want some of the same things you and I seek, that we are on
their side and we are trying to help them with their problem;
and that is a very important message to convey.
Fundamentally, Pakistan has to solve its own education
program and so does Saudi Arabia. As Tom said a moment ago, you
have to push and prod them in that direction. And we certainly
do, and we could maybe encourage them a little bit with a few
million dollars here and there, but we cannot solve their
problem. But we want to let them know that it is not only in
the American national interest that they reform their school
systems; it is in their national interest that they do it, and
if they don't do it with all of the technology available today
to let these people know that their life is pretty miserable,
if they don't begin to deal with those problems, they are not
going to be in charge.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Nevada, Mr. Gibbons.
Mr. Gibbons. Thank you very much. And gentlemen, thank you
very much for your patience with us here today. Your dedication
to helping us better understand these issues is greatly
appreciated. Thank you for your assistance in helping make
America safer. We appreciate that as well.
Let me say that over the last 3 weeks as I sat here
listening to each of you, I know we have talked about
information sharing, the need for information sharing, the
management and direction that information sharing should take.
We have talked about the overclassification of information,
but you do not make a recommendation; in fact, you oppose a
recommendation for an internal MI5-style intelligence agency
which would look at domestic or U.S. citizens' intelligence. I
want to build on that concept, because I think the confluence
of understanding your recommendations and our taking action has
to understand a better--little bit better, this idea. Because
what I see is an agency, the FBI, as needing some reform
itself, because we have a construct in the FBI today which says
that when we gather intelligence information in FBI, we are
focused on prosecution and criminal action cases, rather than
on anti terrorism intelligence.
Now, the focus on prosecution is highly appropriate for a
law enforcement agency, but it is not appropriate for
intelligence gathering in a counterterrorism, antiterrorism
type environment. Should we, and here is my question and I will
leave it to one question--should we divide the FBI into two
intelligence-type agencies leaving to it law enforcement for
the conviction and prosecution and that construct, and giving
it an additional role, a different agency, which is
intelligence gathering for antiterrorism?
What are your thoughts on that?
Mr. Kean. Under the reforms that the director is trying to
implement in the FBI, that would in a sense be a division in
the FBI, an important division of the FBI, and that would be
their job. Their job would be to collect information against
terrorist efforts.
We on the Commission wrestled with this FBI problem,
because the history of the FBI and the culture of FBI is as you
so correctly stated. As you know, you break down the door, you
make the case and you take somebody to trial and convict them.
That is not gathering information for counterterrorism
purposes.
There is now a large part of the FBI that is starting to be
devoted to collecting information for counterterrorism
purposes. But it is being done from a very top-down reform by
Director Mueller. Our concern on the Commission was that this--
these reforms were based on the work of two or three people at
the very top, and if they were to retire, to leave or die or
whatever, that the FBI culture would go right back to the way
it was.
So we think it is very important and this again comes to
oversight. I don't think you have to create something
different, but you have to systematize these reforms. You have
to make sure that the FBI doesn't slide back. The people that
go into the intelligence gathering side have to have the same
chances at promotion, same chances of salary increases, same
chances to get to the top of the FBI as the people under the
old J. Edgar Hoover side. If that doesn't happen, then it is
not going to work.
So we endorsed the director's reforms with the proviso that
the Congress in particular look and make sure that these
reforms are implemented not only under this director, but with
future directors. Because without it, it doesn't work. That was
basically the view we came to.
Mr. Hamilton. I think the Commission believed that there is
a very important synergy between intelligence gathering on the
one hand and law enforcement on the other, and you ought not to
put a wall between them. The guy out here who is trying to
prosecute somebody collects a lot of information. The fellow
out here who is doing some surveillance on a prospective
terrorist is also collecting a lot of information. And you want
to make sure that they are talking to one another and that
there is interaction between them and that you not build that
wall too solidly. So that is what we are really driving at.
Now, when you talked about the FBI collecting all
antiterrorist intelligence, you are not talking about the
foreign side?
Mr. Gibbons. No.
Mr. Hamilton. I may have misunderstood. We do think this
synergy is very, very important and each benefits from the
other in effect.
Mr. Gibbons. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Andrews.
Mr. Andrews. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to express to
Mr. Hamilton the honor of having served with him in this
institution, and on behalf of our fellow New Jerseyans, express
our pride to Governor Kean and the work you have done here. We
are proud of you.
One of the most compelling parts of your report is the
riveting discussion of those moments on the morning of
September 11th when there were still two planes in the sky and
there was a muddled and dysfunctional series of communications
among decision makers as to what to do about those two planes.
And in your report you address that, I think, in two places.
One is in Recommendation 26 about incident command systems and
the other is in Recommendation 40 about the role of the
Northern Command.
I want to ask you this question based upon this chilling
hypothetical. If we knew right now that someone had hijacked a
tanker truck on the New Jersey Turnpike filled with chlorine
gas and that the person was headed toward Washington, D.C., on
I-95 and that their intention was to blow up that chlorine
tanker truck and in fact create a chemical weapon on the
Capitol Mall, and we had to make a decision about what to do
about that truck right now, who should be in charge of making
that decision and what should the chain of command be?
Mr. Kean. Under the present system or under the system we--
Mr. Andrews. What does the Commission believe it ought to
be?
Mr. Hamilton. The question of who is responsible for
defending us at home?
Mr. Andrews. During an imminent ongoing emergency.
Mr. Hamilton. Very tough question. We think there are two
answers. One is the Department of Defense, the Northern
Command, and the second is the Department of Homeland Security.
They both have the responsibility and the authority for
defending the country. Now they have to work that out, how that
authority is split.
I don't know the answer to your question specifically.
Mr. Andrews. As my colleague knows, one of the vexing
questions here is the doctrine of posse comitatus and how it
would play into the answer of this question.
I don't want in any way to erode our important tradition of
separating the military from the control of civilian life. I
think that is one of the key precepts of the country. On the
other hand, just because something is taking place on or above
our soil does not mean it is a domestic matter. And I think
that is one of the key issues we have to grapple with.
My own suggestion is that we have to revisit the doctrine
of posse comitatus in this terrible new world. We need to do so
in a way that doesn't undermine civil liberties, but sorts this
question out.
To answer my own hypothetical, if a decision were made to
take paramilitary action to stop that truck, scramble a
helicopter and shoot the driver of the truck, that is a
function that I want the Department of Defense to lead and be
responsible for. On the other hand, I think it has to be under
extremely egregious and emergent circumstances like those on
the morning of 9/11.
I think one of the most chilling things I read in your
report is that the order that was given by President Bush to
Vice President Cheney and then passed down the command to--as I
understand it, to intercept and shoot planes that were hijacked
was not communicated to the pilots in the cockpit; that they
received an order that they should identify tail and type of
the airplanes, but that is it.
That could have been--and I ascribe no fault here, but I
blame all of us--that could have been a terrible
miscommunication. I am interested in the Commission's thoughts
on how to fix it.
Mr. Kean. I had exactly the same reaction you did.
And there is another part to that story, that the Secret
Service had some control of National Guard planes that they
sent up, and they had the order to shoot. So the National Guard
planes, without getting an order from the President, might have
shot these planes that were supposed to have orders from the
President to shoot, wouldn't have shot.
So we are told in questioning that that command and control
problem has been straightened out. We hope it is true, but that
was a moment for me, too, when I heard that information.
Mr. Andrews. This fall, the GAO will be issuing a report
that examines in the war game context whether the problems have
been straightened out, and we are anxiously awaiting that
report and we would be interested in the Commission's review of
it.
Mr. Kean. Command and control, that whole day in the fog of
war, as the President told us, Air Force One didn't work
properly. The President was not--did not have the communicative
skills above Air Force One as commander in chief. Now he told
us as a commission when we met him that that has been
straightened out.
We have to be sure of these things. It is too important for
the defense of this country that these things cannot occur that
way again.
Mr. Hamilton. I want to amend. I think I said there are two
people who had the responsibility to defend, the Department of
Defense and Department of Homeland Security.
The Department of Defense would only defend in the event of
a military attack, I think. And what you described, the example
you gave about the truck on the turnpike, I think probably
would not qualify as a military threat.
As a practical matter, if something like that happened, we
would put every resource we had into it to try to stop it. That
would include local sheriffs, National Guard and probably some
military components as well.
Mr. Andrews. The question is not how we categorize it, but
how we stop it.
Mr. Hamilton. Mr. Chairman, we are hitting 1:00 and I had
kind of planned finishing at 12:15 or 12:30.
Chairman Cox. I understand and I want to at this point
recognize that we have members on both sides of the aisle who
have not yet had the opportunity to put questions, but out of
courtesy to both of you, we will adjourn this panel at this
time. And we want to thank you very much for the extended
period of time that you have spent with us this morning. I know
that when Congress reconvenes in 2 weeks that you will be
available to continue to work with us on the implementation and
further consideration of your recommendations.
At this time--
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Mr. Chairman, I have an inquiry, please.
This is such a moment in history and time for this committee,
and I respect the gentlemen's time and I am always grateful for
their work.
My request to the chairman, because other members have not
had a chance to inquire and other members may have been on
other committees, that the gentlemen be asked to come back.
This is crucial. We are not acting, we are only hearing and
listening. This committee is burdened with the responsibility
of doing something. And I would ask respectfully if we could
inquire of the gentlemen through the committee and have them
come back to the Homeland Security Committee, the very
committee you have asked to take up the responsibility
singularly of oversight of the Homeland Security Department.
And I ask the chairman for a response, and I know the
gentlemen may not have their schedules, but looking at the
smiling face of the Governor, it looks as if we can work that
out. You are cutting us off from doing the questions with
respect to the gentlemen's time, and I do respect their time.
Mr. Chairman. I yield back to the chairman.
Chairman Cox. I know that both the chairman and vice
chairman have committed to continue to work with this
committee, both formally through the hearing process and
informally. As part of the latter, I hope that members who have
additional questions will feel free even before Congress
reconvenes. And the hearing record will be held open for that
purpose.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Will the gentleman extend an invitation to
the Chair and Cochair? That is my inquiry and my question, and
I think they would be receptive to that invitation. This is a
work in progress and it is not complete.
Mr. Shays. Would the gentleman yield? It may be if these
gentlemen cannot attend that--we had Mr. Lehman and Senator
Kerrey come before us and they likewise did an excellent job
and I think that is the strength of this Commission. There are
other members who could come before us as well.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I would welcome that. I welcome any
opportunity for us to pursue the work of the Commission. I
think the two Chairs, Cochairs have done an excellent job. I
think we should do that.
Chairman Cox. Well, I don't wish to speak for our
witnesses, but I know that they have on multiple occasions
extended their full cooperation to this committee, and I expect
they and their staff and other commissioners will continue to
do so.
We will be seeking that cooperation. It is a vital concern
to our Nation. It is a point that I know we are in complete
accord on.
There being no further questions at this time, I thank you,
Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton, for your testimony. And at this time
you are excused, and I call up our second panel. Members should
be advised as we call up the second panel, following the
testimony of this panel, questioning will resume with Ms.
Granger and Ms. Holmes Norton; and we will proceed, continuing
in the order that we have already adopted.
Our witnesses on this second panel will include Hon. J.
Cofer Black, Counterterrorism Coordinator for the Department of
State; Patrick Hughes, Assistant Secretary For Information
Analysis for the Department of Homeland Security; John Brennan,
Director of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center; and
Maureen Baginski, the Executive Assistant Director for
Intelligence for the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Some of our witnesses are involved in White House
discussions today on the very proposals for restructuring the
Intelligence Community that are the subject of this hearing.
Members are informed that Mr. Hughes must depart no later
than 2:45 p.m. today. Mr. Brennan will be with us until 3:45
p.m. We will do our best to get as much questioning done as we
can today before those deadlines.
As the witnesses take their seats, I ask members to take
their seats. The chairman will recognize first Mr. Black and
Mr. Hughes, Mr. Brennan and Ms. Baginski. I think our panel is
now all seated.
Chairman Cox. Welcome, Ms. Baginski, Mr. Brennan, General
Hughes, Mr. Black. Thank you very much for being with us. We
look forward to an opportunity to have significant discussion
with you.
I know that you have offered to forgo your opening
statements and go directly into questions. We would like,
nonetheless, to have you put a summary of your statement on the
record; members, I think, will benefit from that. And we will
begin with the Counterterrorism Coordinator for the Department
of State, Cofer Black.
Mr. Black, your statement, please.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE J. COFER BLACK, COORDINATOR, OFFICE
OF THE COORDINATOR FOR COUNTERTERRORISM, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF
STATE
Mr. Black. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much, distinguished
members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to
testify on the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. I will
attempt to summarize my formal, written statement and ask that
you include my full testimony in the record.
Today's hearing offers a timely opportunity to examine
broad recommendations to reorganize the national security
institutions of the U.S. Government in order to combat
terrorism. I welcome the invitation to contribute to this
important debate on how to protect American citizens at home
and abroad.
Following the September 11 attacks, the administration
developed the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, which
outlines the broad policy framework for coordinated actions to
prevent terrorist attacks against the United States, its
citizens, its interests and its friends around the world. The
national strategy is premised on the systematic application of
the key elements of national security, diplomacy, financial,
law enforcement, military and intelligence and information
sharing. Today I would like to address the process in place at
the Department of State.
The Bureau of Intelligence and Research, or INR, is the
Department's liaison to the Intelligence Community at large. My
office works closely with INR, with the Bureau of Diplomatic
Security's Office of Intelligence and Threat Analysis, to
assess the current intelligence information related to
terrorist threats overseas and at home. Through these
relationships, the State Department has ample opportunities to
provide input to the U.S. Government's process for collecting
and analyzing intelligence for counterterrorism purposes.
Finally, as a participant in the National Security
Council's Counterterrorism Security Group, I have frequent
interactions with other interagency officials who shape and
direct the counterterrorism policies of the U.S. Government.
The State Department will play a crucial role in the
President's strategy to implement reforms that will make
Americans safer at home and abroad. I look forward to the role
that the Department and my office will play in this process
through the intra--and interdepartmental relationships briefly
outlined in my testimony today.
Mr. Chairman, with this background and experience in mind,
I will conclude my formal testimony. Thank you again for the
opportunity to appear before your committee. I will be happy to
take questions.
Chairman Cox. Thank you.
[The statement of Mr. Black follows:]
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Cofer Black
Chairman Cox, Distinguished Members of the Committee, thank you for
the opportunity to testify today on the recommendations of the 9-11
Commission to reorganize the national security institutions of the U.S.
Government to better combat terrorism. In light of the testimony you
will hear from my co-panelists and other witnesses, I will keep my
remarks brief.
Following the September 11 attacks, the Administration developed
the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, which outlined the
policy framework for coordinated actions to prevent terrorist attacks
against the United States, its citizens, its interests, and its friends
around the world. Our work to implement the National Strategy will
ultimately create an international environment inhospitable to
terrorists and all those who support them. We have implemented this
strategy to act simultaneously on four fronts:
Defeat terrorist organizations of global reach by
attacking their sanctuaries, leadership, finances, and command,
control and communications;
Deny further sponsorship, support, and sanctuary to
terrorists by cooperating with other states to take action
against these international threats;
Diminish the underlying conditions that terrorists
seek to exploit by enlisting the international community to
focus its efforts and resources on the areas most at risk; and
Defend the United States, its citizens, and interests
at home and abroad.
Today's hearing offers an opportunity to examine the 9-11
Commission's recommendations on information and intelligence sharing. I
welcome the invitation to contribute to this important national debate
on how better to protect American citizens at home and abroad. The
National Strategy for Combating Terrorism is premised on five key
elements of national security--diplomatic, financial, law enforcement,
military, and, as we will discuss today, intelligence and information
sharing.
Intelligence Analysis and Information Sharing
When discussing ways to improve information and intelligence
sharing for counterterrorism, it is important to consider the
foundation upon which we must build, in this case, the elements of
intelligence analysis in place at the Department of State. The
Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) is one of the 15
members of the U.S. Intelligence Community. My colleagues in INR share
my opinion that we need to do much more to make it easy, not just
possible, to share information across agencies, with state and local
officials and with our foreign allies. This is especially important to
the State Department because widespread, timely, and routine
information sharing facilitates decentralized and competitive
intelligence analysis crucial to our mission. My office also works
closely with the Bureau of Diplomatic Security Office of Intelligence
and Threat Analysis (DS/ITA), which focuses specifically on threats
against U.S. interests, to assess the current intelligence information
on terrorist threats overseas and at home.
We also agree with the 9-11 Commission's recommendation to move
from a system based on ``need-to-know'' to one based ``need-to-share,''
consistent, of course, with the 9-11 Commission's recommendation to
``safeguard the privacy of individuals about whom information is
shared.'' Mechanisms for separating content from source information
could help with classification levels. This is already accomplished to
a certain extent with tear lines. Web-based systems will undeniably be
part of the solution, given the ubiquitous nature of this technology.
By following the progression of technology advances in the open market,
information sharing can be made technologically easier and less
cumbersome.
The Counterterrorism Security Group
Intelligence sharing within the Department and with other agencies
was a reality before September 11, but it has since improved. Deepening
our intelligence sharing through personnel liaison, we have provided
the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), among others, with
State Department detailees, and we host detailees from the CIA and
other agencies as well. In addition to the intelligence analysis work
of INR and DS/ITA, S/CT and the Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of
Diplomatic Security participate in the Counterterrorism Security Group
(CSG). The CSG is chaired by the National Security Council and serves
to share information and coordinate the response to terrorist threats
against U.S. interests domestically and abroad. Each morning we join
the NSC-chaired meeting of high-level representatives from the Homeland
Security Council, the Departments of Defense, Justice, Treasury, and
Homeland Security, the CIA, FBI, and TTIC. A staff-level meeting of CSG
participants is conducted every afternoon.
Within the CSG structure, the Department has frequent and direct
interactions with the other senior interagency officials who shape and
direct the counterterrorism policies of the U.S. Government. Through
these relationships, we have ample opportunity to provide input to the
U.S. Government process for collecting and analyzing intelligence for
counterterrorism purposes. The quality of information exchange and
effectiveness has improved significantly since 9/11 partly because the
CSG mechanism promotes proper coordination among agencies regarding
terrorist threats globally on a daily basis.
Other Department Contributions to Information Sharing
Since 9/11, the Department of State's Bureau of Consular Affairs
has worked with other agencies to make significant improvements to our
ability to share information. Thanks to this new level of
collaboration, the data holdings in the Department's consular lookout
system now total almost 18 million records on people potentially
ineligible to receive visas, nearly triple what we had prior to
September 11. We now have more than eight million records from the FBI
alone in our system. In fact, the majority of the data in the consular
lookout system now derives from other agencies, especially those in the
law enforcement and intelligence communities. Information sharing, of
course, must be mutual.
The Department now provides access to 75 million visa records in
our consular database so that Department of Homeland Security officers
at ports of entry can view the electronic files of every passenger with
a visa entering the United States. This database permits detailed
examination of the information in near-real time for all visas issued,
including the photographs of nonimmigrant visa applicants. We are also
sharing our consular database with the National Targeting Center, a 24/
7 operation of Customs and Border Protection in DHS.
The Department of State joined in the establishment of the
Terrorist Screening Center (TSC), which integrates terrorist watchlists
and serves as the centralized point of contact for everyone from the
U.S. police officer on the beat to the consular officer in the farthest
reaches of the globe. Together with TTIC, which maintains the principal
database on known and suspected international terrorists in a highly
classified form, we rely on the TSC to ensure that consular officers
have access to the information they need to scrutinize applications and
deny visas to those who would do us harm. These institutions rest on a
foundation that the Department laid in the form of TIPOFF, a pioneering
system in the use of classified information for screening purposes.
Much of the cost of developing and operating TIPOFF was funded through
the Border Security Program, which the Bureau of Consular Affairs
manages for the Department. The TIPOFF database with its approximately
120,000 records, more than double the amount since September 11, is now
housed at TTIC. TTIC and TSC together eliminate the stovepiping of
terrorist data and provide a more systematic approach to posting
lookouts on potential and known terrorists.
Conclusion
The President indicated in his speech on August 2nd support for the
key recommendations of the 9-11 Commission, including the establishment
of a National Intelligence Director and a National Counterterrorism
Center. The Department of State will play a crucial role in the
President's plan to implement reforms that will make Americans safer at
home and abroad. I personally look forward to the role that the
Department and my office will play in this process, through the intra-
and interdepartmental relationships briefly outlined in my testimony
today.
With this background and experience in mind, I will conclude my
formal testimony. Thank you again for the opportunity to appear before
the Committee. I would be happy to take your questions.
Chairman Cox. General Hughes.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL PATRICK M. HUGHES, USA, RET.,
ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR INFORMATION ANALYSIS, U.S. DEPARTMENT
OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Mr. Hughes. Good day, Mr. Chairman and members of the
committee. It is a privilege to appear before you today as I
have in the past. And today, I would like to just give you a
short version of my views.
We are very supportive of efforts to improve and enhance
the Intelligence Community that are ongoing in the aftermath of
the 9/11 Commission's report and recommendations. Today's
hearing, I think, is in the context of information sharing and
improvements; and in that category, the glue that links and
holds our national intelligence and counterterrorist activities
together is indeed the professional exchange of information
that empowers knowledge and action, often referred to as
``information sharing,'' but we would like to include the idea
of ``collaboration'' in the construct.
We are supporting making information readily available
rapidly to all who need it to accomplish their mission, while
at the same time facilitating interaction to better understand
and use the knowledge that collaboration produces while always
protecting sources and methods.
It is a very simple philosophical underpinning; and I think
I will give the rest of my time back to you, sir, and say I am
willing to answer any questions you have today.
Chairman Cox. Thank you.
[The statement of General Hughes follows:]
Prepared Statement of Patrick M. Hughes
Good morning Chairman Cox and distinguished members of the
Committee. I am privileged to appear before you today to discuss the
role of the Office of Information Analysis (IA), within the Information
Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate (IAIP) of the
Department of Homeland Security (DHS), as well as IA's intelligence,
coordination, and information sharing efforts to date.
September 11, 2001 forever transformed our nation. In one moment,
we came face to face with a known enemy. . .on American soil. . .and a
changed condition threatening to our way of life. This day seared
images of devastating loss and destruction into our national
consciousness, images that we--I--will never forget. I was present at
the Pentagon minutes after the plane struck and I saw once again
something I have become all too familiar with over the years. . .the
violent outcome of a terrorist attack against unwarned unprotected
people. The anguish and fear of the moment was written on the faces of
many of my colleagues who never dreamed that their place of work in a
bastion of Democracy would be struck. Our co-workers, soldiers all, lay
in the wreckage. The damage was done.
However, on that day, something far greater than fear and something
much stronger than despair took root. An unshakeable faith in our
fellow citizens, in our ideals, in our nation and an unwavering
determination to protect and preserve what we stand for as a country
emerged from the destruction, to guide our efforts in the fight against
terrorism and the quest to preserve liberty. I am at my place of work
at the Department of Homeland Security because of that motivating set
of beliefs.
In the aftermath of 9/11, the Department of Homeland Security was
envisioned, formed, and is now in operation. Standing up the
Department, the largest reorganization of government in fifty years,
has been a great undertaking. Many employees of DHS have assumed new
responsibilities, and all have put in long hours to ensure that while
our strategies may change to meet the terrorist threat, our course as a
nation will remain constant. President Bush's decision to establish the
Department has enabled us to unify our resources into one team, to
ready ourselves against our enemy, and to ensure the highest level of
protection for our country and the citizens we serve.
I became a direct part of this Department's effort when I became
the Assistant Secretary for Information Analysis, part of the
Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate, on 17
November 2003. Through the Homeland Security Act of 2002, IAIP is
charged with integrating relevant information, intelligence analyses,
and vulnerability assessments (whether such information, analyses, or
assessments are provided or produced by the Department or others) to
identify protective priorities and support protective measures by the
Department, by other executive agencies, by State and local government
personnel, agencies, and authorities, by the private sector, and by
other entities.
The philosophical underpinning of IA as an integral part of the
IAIP Under-Secretariat of DHS is to provide the connectivity, the
integration, the communication, the coordination, the collaboration,
and the professional intelligence work necessary to accomplish the
missions of, and the products and capability necessary for the
customers and the leadership of DHS. Simply put, we perform the
intelligence and threat analysis of Department of Homeland Security.
IAIP is moving forward in carrying out our statutory
responsibilities which include:
Providing the full range of intelligence support to
senior DHS leadership and component organizations and to state
and local and private sector respondents
Mapping terrorist threats to the homeland against
assessed vulnerabilities to drive our efforts to protect
against terrorist attacks
Conducting independent analysis and assessments of
terrorist threats through competitive analysis, tailored
analysis, and an analytical red cell
Assessing the vulnerabilities of key resources and
critical infrastructure of the United States
Merging the relevant analyses and vulnerability
assessments to identify priorities for protective and support
measures by the Department, other government agencies, and the
private sector
Partnering with the intelligence community, TTIC, TSC,
law enforcement agencies, state and local partners, and the
private sector, as well as DHS' components to manage the
collection and processing of information within DHS involving
threats to the Homeland into usable, comprehensive, and
actionable information
Disseminating time sensitive warnings, alerts and
advisories to federal, state, local governments and private
sector infrastructure owners and operators
It is the mandate to independently analyze, coordinate, and
disseminate information affecting the homeland that makes IA unique
among its Intelligence Community partners. The analysts within
Information Analysis are talented individuals who draw on intelligence
from other components within DHS, IA's fellow Intelligence Community
members, the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), and federal,
state and local law enforcement and private sector entities. The
analysis produced is coordinated with the vulnerability assessment and
consequence predictions identified by the Infrastructure Protection
half of the IAIP Directorate.
The Office of Information Analysis communicates timely and valuable
threat products to state and local officials, federal sector specific
agencies (as indicated in Homeland Security Presidential Directive-7,
``Critical Infrastructure Identification, Prioritization, and
Protection''), and the private sector as is appropriate. The
relationship IA and indeed the entire Department of Homeland Security
has with these contacts results in the IAIP Directorate being in the
position to effectively manage information requirements from the state
and local governments and private sector entities that are vital to
protecting the homeland. DHS will continue to work in close
communication with these officials, as well as with the other
organizations it receives inputs from, to maintain the effective
relationships that have been established.
IA is the heart of the intelligence effort at DHS. It is
responsible for accessing and analyzing the entire array of
intelligence relating to threats against the homeland, and making that
information useful to first responders, state and local governments,
and private sector officials. As such, IA provides the full-range of
intelligence support to the Secretary, DHS leadership, the
Undersecretary for IAIP, and DHS components. Additionally, IA ensures
that the best intelligence information informs the administration of
the Homeland Security Advisory System.
Central to the success of the DHS mission is the close working
relationship among components, the Office of Information Analysis and
the Office of Infrastructure Protection (``IP''), and the Homeland
Security Operations Center (HSOC), to ensure that threat information
and situational awareness are correlated with critical infrastructure
vulnerabilities and protective programs. Together, the three offices
provide real time monitoring of threat information and critical
infrastructure to support the Department of Homeland Security's overall
mission. This permits us to immediately respond to and monitor emerging
potential threat information and events, and to take issues or
information for more detailed analysis and recommendations for
preventive and protective measures. The integration of information
access and analysis on the one hand, and vulnerabilities analysis and
protective measures on the other, is the fundamental mission of the
IAIP Directorate.
IA and TTIC
The close professional associations that have been forged between
the two offices will allow both organizations to work on complimenting
each other in the best interest of the nation's security. For example,
IA is responsible for translating the analysis done at the TTIC into
actionable data for State, territorial, tribal, local, and private
sector officials responsible for homeland security. From a personal
standpoint, I believe both organizations are fulfilling their missions
and enriching both each other and the wider Intelligence Community. My
relationship with TTIC Director John Brennan could not be better. At
present, we talk at least daily and as specific threats pertinent to
the homeland arise. This opinion is backed by the tremendous track
record of success TTIC has in supporting the Department of Homeland
Security and its needs. As partners, IA and TTIC spend much time
communicating, both through the DHS representatives located at TTIC and
through direct communication of leadership.
IA and TSC
The Office of Information Analysis has a similarly productive
relationship with the Terrorist Screening Center. While both perform
duties that result in information being passed to local first
responders and State, territorial, tribal, and local officials, both
entities have separate missions. IA provides the full spectrum of
information support necessary for the operation of the Department of
Homeland Security and for the benefit of Federal, State, territorial,
tribal, local, and private sector officials throughout the United
States, to secure the homeland, defend the citizenry and protect our
critical infrastructure. In contrast, the TSC is in the process of
developing a fully interoperable watch list database which will provide
immediate responses to border-screening and law-enforcement authorities
to identify suspected terrorists trying to enter or operate within the
United States.
Just as TTIC plays a vital role in supplying its federal partners
with the broad threat picture, the TSC has quickly become an essential
resource for local law enforcement, its federal government
contributors, and other users. Through the matching and cross-
referencing of lists, the TSC is allowing those personnel on the front
lines of the fight against terrorism to access the information they
need to identify and detain suspicious individuals.
DHS, IAIP, and especially IA will continue to work with the TSC to
coordinate information sharing efforts and to establish requirements
for accessing information. IA and the TSC will grow together in their
effort to serve the people and guardians of this nation.
Improving Information Sharing and Collaboration
While existing relationships are gaining momentum every day, we
must assure that we formalize a process which will improve information
sharing and collaboration. The Department is charged with this
responsibility by law and by Executive Order.
Our goal is to effectively, efficiently, and synergistically pass
and receive information in all of its forms for the benefit of the
United States Government, our State, tribal, territorial, local, and
private sector partners, and other DHS entities. In order to achieve
this goal we must develop technical and procedural transparency and
interoperability in mind to the greatest extent possible. However, the
most significant impediments to information sharing are not
technological, they are legal and cultural. We needed to start with the
``business case'' and work toward a common, integrated, and rational
vision for the Department. That is precisely what we are doing.
Information sharing involves working with the Department of Justice
(DOJ), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and Department of Defense
(DOD), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the State Department and
others. For instance, as part of this effort, the DOJ and DHS
information sharing staffs are working hard to bring the Homeland
Security Information Network (HSIN), Law Enforcement Online (LEO), and
the Regional Information Sharing System (RISSNET) together with the
goal of making the systems more compatible as quickly as possible. As
we rely on existing systems, we recognize the significant work needed
ahead to achieve compatibility and interoperability to meet the
challenges faced by DHS.
In Conclusion
The Office of Information Analysis' unique position, roles and
efforts have lead to many challenges. However, the work is not done.
These challenges now lead us to the next logical step in protecting the
nation, its people, and its infrastructure. Following careful review of
the 9/11 Commission report, President Bush announced his support for
the creation of National Intelligence Director (NID) and the
establishment of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC). We at the
Department of Homeland Security look forward to continuing to work with
the Congress to take these important steps in preventing terrorist
attacks against the United States.
The Department of Homeland Security is a prime example of how
changes have already been made to the Intelligence Community and the
counterterrorism community as they existed before September 11th, 2001.
The creation of the NID and NCTC will enhance DHS' ability to better
identify threats and map those threats against vulnerabilities.
However, these are not the only recommendations the Commission made.
The Commission also recommended continued improvements in information
sharing among agencies involved in national security. DHS, especially
the IAIP Directorate, plays a central role in this effort as we
continue the work of communicating both with our partners in the
federal government as well as with the State, territorial, tribal,
local, and private sector officials charged with protecting the people
and infrastructure of this country.
Building up the IA office, increasing our information capabilities,
and coordinating information sharing across the entire federal
government are monumental tasks. And, while we have accomplished much
in a short period of time, we continue to press forward to strengthen
this vital office and our ability to support the overall DHS mission of
securing our homeland. In order for the Office of Information Analysis
to accomplish its unique mission, we need the right organizational
structure, qualified and cleared personnel, resources, and technical
capabilities.
We are working hard to coordinate and integrate the intelligence
and information necessary to protect our people and our critical
infrastructure. Yet, we still have much work to do. We have made
tremendous progress and the dedication and devotion to duty of those
who do the work of intelligence at DHS is unparalleled.
We are meeting threats to the homeland with determination and
dedication to lead this nation to a higher level of protection every
single day. The sheer depth and breadth of our country means that one
slip, one gap, one vengeful person, can threaten the lives of our
citizens at any time, in any number of ways. There are no guarantees,
but I firmly believe the American people are more secure and better
prepared than before September 11th 2001, directly because of the
Department of Homeland Security.
A brief note about the threat: it is real. Terrorists are at work
around the world and when they succeed it seems our best efforts in
intelligence, security, defense and protective measures have somehow
failed, despite the many successes we have against terrorists. We
continue to receive substantial information concerning terrorist intent
to strike us again in our homeland. As we approach the period of our
national political process and the many associated events, it is my
view that we are entering a period of significant risk, perceived by
those who would strike us as an opportunity to tear our societal and
cultural fabric. We cannot relax, we cannot falter, we cannot live in
fear. Instead, we who do the work of intelligence and law enforcement
must persevere and provide insight and knowledge to those who lead and
decide.
We have accomplished much in IA since our inception and we are on
course with our partners and colleagues to continue to achieve. We are
fully connected to the U.S. Intelligence Community and well informed.
We are integrated into the workings of the domestic security structure.
We are connected with law enforcement. We have working analysts poring
over the detail of intelligence and law enforcement reporting to
discover the hidden patterns and concealed threads of terrorist
activity and the manifestation of other threats to America from crime
with national security implications and from other disasters and
threatening conditions that come our way. We have a sense of purpose
and we have embarked on what has likely never been done before with
regard to information fusion. . .to fully understand the threat and the
conditions extant in the ``new normal'' United States context that we
see now and in the future. The 9-11 attacks, the December 2003--
February 2004 period of heightened concern, the recent attack in Madrid
and potential but largely interdicted attacks elsewhere, and the fact
of anthrax and ricin attacks here in the United States, combine to form
this ``new normal'' condition of constant possibility that we cannot
ignore.
At the same time we are--I am--most mindful of the need to protect
the civil liberties and personal privacy of our citizens and to
preserve and defend our Constitution and our way of life. In the end,
we are--I am--focused on defeating the terrorists before they can
strike. That is why we exist.
Chairman Cox and Members of the Committee, this concludes my
prepared statement. I would be happy to answer any questions you may
have at this time.
Chairman Cox. Mr. Brennan.
STATEMENT OF JOHN O. BRENNAN, DIRECTOR, TERRORIST THREAT
INTEGRATION CENTER
Mr. Brennan. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and members of
the committee. It is a pleasure to appear before you today to
talk about information sharing and homeland security. And I
would like to offer just a few brief ideas, as well as lessons
learned from the TTIC experience on information sharing.
In order to minimize the potential for dangerous seams and
coverage as well as to optimize the use of finite resources, we
must continue building and implementing a national framework
for the origination, analysis and dissemination of terrorism
information by the U.S. Government. The delineation of such
responsibilities must be as unambiguous and as straightforward
as possible to ensure we continue building an agreed-upon
information sharing architecture, both horizontal and vertical,
that is based on a clear understanding of who is responsible
for what.
Such an architecture must include an overall Intelligence
Community business model framework to ensure comprehensive,
robust and as appropriate, alternative terrorism capability; a
national information sharing framework based on increased
clarity of mission roles and responsibilities, including an
understanding of the information needs of the Federal
Government, State and local officials and law enforcement and
the private sector; an overall blueprint for information
technology systems, including strategic prioritization,
implementation schedules and sunset requirements for legacy
systems that impede interoperability; community-wide standards
for reporting formats, dissemination requirements,
interoperable hardware and software; and role-based data
access.
There are important lessons in the establishment of TTIC.
Assignees to TTIC retain authorities to home organizations,
which allows TTIC to access more information than in any single
government department or agency.
Now, a key TTIC objective has been to develop an integrated
information technology architecture so its sophisticated
analytic tools and search capabilities can be applied against
the many terabytes of data available to the Federal Government.
We must be able to cross-check these different data sets which
are collected by departments and agencies statutorily
authorized to do so. Our approach for this is called the
Sanctum architecture, which will allow analysts to conduct
simultaneous and federated searches against data sets resident
on separate networks. By the end of this month, we will be able
to conduct federated simultaneous searches against the data
contained in six separate networks, and other networks will be
added throughout the year.
An additional challenge is dealing with disparate
information technology systems and nonstandardized information
technology practices, processes and procedures, including a
plethora of legacy information systems and networks that impede
interoperability. This is not to say that there should be a
single integrated database of all terrorism information in the
U.S. Government. However, overall guidelines for U.S.
Government information technology systems and enforced
community-wide standards regarding metadata tagging, security
practices and procedures would go a long way toward
implementing an overall national framework that promotes
interoperability and information sharing.
And I look forward to taking your questions.
[The statement of Mr. Brennan follows:]
Prepared Statement John O. Brennan
Good afternoon, Chairman Cox, Ranking Member Turner, and the
Members of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security.
I appreciate the opportunity to join my colleagues from the
Departments of State and Homeland Security, and the Federal Bureau of
Investigation, to discuss progress made, lessons learned, and areas
that might be strengthened regarding information sharing and associated
activities to protect U.S. interests at home and abroad from the
terrorist threat.
Significant progress has been made on information sharing
throughout the Federal government and beyond since the tragic events of
September 11, 2001. The implementation of streamlined processes and
procedures, enhanced partnerships bridging organizational boundaries,
and the deployment of new technologies have enabled the integration and
dissemination of information on terrorist threats to U.S. interests at
home and abroad in a more timely and comprehensive manner than ever
before. Likewise, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are expediting the provision of
terrorist threat-related and associated information to state and local
government officials, the private sector, and law enforcement entities.
As we collectively continue efforts to improve information sharing,
as well as move toward implementing recommendations made by the 9/11
Commission, I offer some core concepts as well as lessons learned based
on the experience establishing the multi-agency joint venture known as
the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC).
It is my personal opinion that in order to minimize the potential
for dangerous seams in coverage as well as to optimize the use of
finite analytic resources, we must continue building and implementing a
national framework for terrorism analytic responsibility in the U.S.
Government. The delineation of substantive responsibilities for
terrorism analysis among the various members of the Intelligence
Community must be as unambiguous and as straightforward as possible,
while still allowing alternative views to be heard. An unambiguous
delineation of roles and responsibilities is critical to ensure that we
continue building an information-sharing architecture--both horizontal
and vertical--that is based on a clear understanding of who has
responsibility for analytic ``output.'' With well-defined
responsibilities, we will have a system that identifies ``who'' is
responsible for providing ``what'' to ``whom.'' We must continue
progress already made in clarifying roles and responsibilities and the
building of an information-sharing architecture, with particular
emphasis on establishing:
An overall Intelligence Community business model
framework to ensure comprehensive, robust, and, as appropriate,
redundant terrorism analysis capability.
A national information-sharing framework based on
increased clarity of mission roles and responsibilities, with a
common understanding of the information requirements of
individual U.S. Government components and beyond. This
information-sharing framework should extend beyond the
Intelligence Community and where appropriate, include linkages
to state and local officials and law enforcement; commercial
industry; foreign entities; and other non-traditional partners.
An overall blueprint for information technology
systems, including strategic prioritization, implementation
schedules, as well as establishment of a ``sunset'' list for
legacy systems that impede interoperability.
Community-wide standards for reporting formats,
dissemination requirements, and interoperable hardware and
software, with an information technology architecture for role-
based data access.
There are some relevant lessons from the establishment of TTIC.
Assignees to TTIC carry the authorities of their home organizations
with them, such that in TTIC there is the ability to access more
information than in any single independent agency or department. In
fact, TTIC has direct access connectivity with 26 separate U.S.
Government networks, enabling access to terrorism-related information
systems and databases spanning the intelligence, law enforcement,
homeland security, diplomatic, and military communities. This
unprecedented information access allows for a more comprehensive
understanding of terrorist threats to U.S. interests at home and abroad
and, most importantly, enables the provision of this information and
related analysis to those responsible for detecting, disrupting,
deterring, and defending against terrorist attacks.
A key TTIC objective is to develop an integrated information
technology architecture so that sophisticated analytic tools and
federated search capabilities can be applied to the many terabytes of
data available to the Federal Government. We must be able to cross
check these different data sets, which are collected by departments and
agencies statutorily authorized to do so, in a manner that allows us to
identify terrorists and their supporters before they reach our shores
or when they emerge within our midst. Simply put, we need to create new
knowledge from existing information currently resident in a distributed
architecture. We must also implement the appropriate controls to ensure
security and privacy of information. Progress has been made toward this
end. Our approach, called the ``Sanctum Architecture,'' is expected to
reach initial operating capability later this month, allowing analysts
to search against data sets resident on 6 separate networks. Over time,
the goal for the Sanctum architecture is to expand this capability to
enable federated searches across multiple data sets--in other words,
one query against the holdings of multiple systems and databases on
multiple networks.
An additional challenge is that of disparate information technology
systems and non-standardized information technology practices,
processes, and procedures, including a plethora of legacy information
systems and networks that impede interoperability. This is not to say
that there should be a single, integrated database of all terrorism
information in the U.S. Government. However, overall guidelines for
U.S. Government information technology systems and enforced community-
wide standards (metadata tagging, security practices and procedures,
etc) would go a long way toward implementing an overall national
framework that promotes interoperability and information sharing.
In conclusion, as we move forward with information sharing
initiatives as well as address the broader issues associated with
intelligence reform, integration of effort should serve as an important
organizing principle. In particular, we need to enhance orchestration
of the broad array of counterterrorism activities across the U.S.
Government and beyond. In this regard, I support the concept of
establishing a National Counterterrorism Center to orchestrate and
integrate, as appropriate, the myriad of activities working to protect
U.S. interests at home and abroad from the scourge of international
terrorism. We all have a shared responsibility to continue implementing
a new information sharing paradigm and an overall national
counterterrorism system that maximizes the security and safety of all
Americans, wherever they live or work. I look forward to continue
working with my colleagues here today and with the Members of this
committee toward this end.
Chairman Cox. Ms. Baginski, I should note for members, the
title Executive Assistant Director refers to the Bureau and you
are in fact the Director of the Office of Intelligence.
STATEMENT OF MAUREEN BAGINSKI, EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT DIRECTOR FOR
INTELLIGENCE, FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION
Ms. Baginski. Thank you very much. It is a pleasure to
appear before you and I will make my remarks brief.
We applaud--at the FBI we applaud the work of the 9/11
Commission. We are grateful for their fine work. We are pleased
they have embraced our reforms to date, and we agree with them
wholeheartedly that we have additional work to do.
The adversary we face today is networked and enabled by
information technology that allows it to have a shared view of
the objective, a clear understanding of roles and
responsibilities in carrying out the objective and very tight
decision loops in taking action. To defeat this adversary, we,
the intelligence and homeland security communities, have to
look just like it. Each of us sitting here at this table
represents a node on the Federal network. Our job is to
interoperate with each other, but also ensure that we can
interoperate with other information networks, particularly
those at the State and local and tribal level, who will be the
first to encounter threats and the first called upon to defend
against them.
At the FBI, we define intelligence very simply. We call
intelligence vital information about those who would do us
harm; and we see the only true measure of intelligence, good
intelligence, is whether or not it helps someone make a better
decision. The decision makers who have to defend our Nation are
varied indeed, and they range from the President to the
patrolman. So our first commitment on the intelligence side is
to invest very substantial resources in understanding the
decisions that have to be made and ensuring that we provide the
proper information to do that.
Over 2 years ago, Director Mueller recognized this and
appointed an Assistant Director of the FBI for Law Enforcement
Coordination. That Assistant Director is sitting behind me, Mr.
Louis Quijas, who comes to us from High Point, North Carolina,
where he was a police chief, and before that, the Kansas City
chief.
Everything we have done since 9/11 in the FBI and across
the Federal, State, local and tribal governments has been
designed to create this information network, and it has been an
evolutionary process. We began, I think, immediately after 9/11
with bringing foreign and domestic intelligence about the
terrorist threat together in the Oval Office in the President's
briefings. That evolved into the creation of a TTIC where we
institutionalized the bringing together of information around
the threat.
And we brought together intelligence and operations in the
counterterrorism strategy security group headed by the National
Security Council. We stood up the Department of Homeland
Security designed to really overlay those threats, over our
critical infrastructure, and to ensure that we were protected.
And the reforms that the President has announced, the ones he
has accepted from the creation of the National Counterterrorism
Center and the creation of a National Intelligence Director are
embraced as logical next steps.
There is great parallel to that progression in the course
we have taken with intelligence at the FBI, a very evolutionary
path, beginning immediately after the events of 9/11 and
standing up a very robust intelligence capability within our
counterterrorism directorate focused basically on raw
intelligence production and finished analysis; and then
gradually, over a 3-year period, migrating to the creation of
an enterprise-wide intelligence program led by an Executive
Assistant Director. And I was pleased and honored to join the
FBI in that position in May of 2003.
Our intelligence program is actually built on four key
principles. We want an independent collection and requirements
management system. What we can do and what we can collect
should not be driving what we collect. What we must collect
should be driving what we need to know and have to know to
defend the country has to be defining it. So that process is
managed in my office.
Another core principle is centralized management of
intelligence. The power of the FBI intelligence process is in
its distribution geographically in its 56 field offices, 400
resident agencies and worldwide legal attache offices. My trick
is to ensure that that process is managed against common
threats, but not micromanaged from headquarters so we unleash
the power that is out in the field.
The third principle is focused strategic analysis. If all
of our attention is on current reporting, then we are failing
to devote the resources we need to step back from the threat so
that we understand what we don't know and need to know, to put
all of that information so we can make better decisions.
And finally: the core principle of integration of
intelligence with law enforcement operations.
Those are our four principles.
I am the FBI official responsible for information sharing.
So if there are problems with information sharing and
information policy, you are looking at the person who has to
put in place the proper policies to do that.
I come before you today to tell you we have made a very
good step and we have more work to do. So that there is no
confusion for you, it is my responsibility both within the FBI
and outside of the FBI to ensure that the proper information is
delivered to key decision makers, and with the timeliness they
need it and at the classification level that they need it.
In the interest of brevity, I want to share with you some
of the key accomplishments we have made, because they are
substantial and they are a good start, but they are not yet
enough.
First, we have issued our first-ever FBI intelligence
requirements and collection tasking documents. These
requirements are completely lined up with the national
intelligence priorities framework and emanate from it. We have,
in addition, issued an unclassified version for our partners in
State, local and tribal law enforcement who continue to ask me,
we will give you whatever it is you want: just tell us what it
is you need from us.
We have become full members of the DCI's National
Intelligence Collection Board and National Intelligence
Analysis and Production Board, and we are participating in the
drafting of national intelligence estimates.
We have created a collection capabilities database that
tells us what sources we have and could bring to bear on all
threats facing the Nation. Most importantly, this database
allows us to identify where we have critical gaps and need to
develop new sources.
I chair a daily intelligence board every day to ensure that
critical decisions are made about information sharing and that
cross-programmatic analysis is done so all information is
brought to bear on threats.
We completed our first-ever FBI dissemination manual. It is
based on the principle ``right to release'' and requires a new
classification requirement, ``required to release.'' We write
to the lowest classification. We separate sources from methods.
And we have just developed a Web-based intelligence authoring
tool that requires the author to write their first version at
the lowest classification level.
We have set unified standards and policies for training
intelligence analysts. We are in the process of changing the
critical performance criteria for agents to include emphasis on
source development and production of intelligence.
We have tripled our raw intelligence production this year
and doubled our production of Presidential assessments--of
intelligence assessments.
I want to tell you the final thing we have done is to
develop metrics to tell you, ourselves and others whether these
changes are making any difference. And with that, I will be
happy to take any of your questions.
[The statement of Ms. Baginski follows:]
Prepared Statement of Maureen A. Baginski
Introduction
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee. It is my
pleasure to come before you today to discuss the recommendations of the
9-11 Commission, specifically information sharing issues that face the
Federal Bureau of Investigation and other members of the Intelligence
and Law Enforcement communities. As Director Mueller has said, the FBI
has worked closely with the Commission and their staff throughout their
tenure and we commend them for an extraordinary effort. Throughout this
process, we have approached the Commission's inquiry as an opportunity
to gain further input from outside experts. We took their critiques
seriously, adapted our ongoing reform efforts, and have already taken
substantial steps to address their remaining concerns. We are gratified
and encouraged that the Commission has embraced our vision for change
and has recognized the progress that the men and women of the FBI have
made to implement that vision. Our work to date has been on
strengthening FBI capabilities so that we can be a strong node on the
information network of those who defend the nation. Vital information
about those who would do us harm is not produced by the federal
government alone. We are proud to also be part of an 800,000 strong
state, local, and tribal law enforcement community who are the first to
encounter and defend against threats.
On August 2nd, the President announced his intention to establish a
National Intelligence Director (NID) and a National Counter Terrorism
Center (NCTC). We look forward to working with you on these vital
reforms.
Our core guiding principle at the FBI is that intelligence and law
enforcement operations must be integrated. Under the direction of
Director Mueller, the FBI has moved aggressively forward in this regard
by implementing a comprehensive plan that has fundamentally transformed
the FBI. Director Mueller has overhauled our counterterrorism
operations, expanded our intelligence capabilities, modernized our
business practices and technology, and improved coordination with our
partners.
A prerequisite for any operational coordination is the full and
free exchange of information. Without procedures and mechanisms that
allow information sharing on a regular and timely basis, we and our
partners cannot expect to align our operational efforts to best
accomplish our shared mission. Accordingly, we have taken steps to
establish unified FBI-wide policies for sharing information and
intelligence both within the FBI and outside it. This has occurred
under the umbrella of the FBI's Intelligence Program, and is my
personal responsibility as the FBI executive for information sharing.
We have made great progress and we have much work ahead of us.
Intelligence Program
The mission of the FBI's Intelligence Program is to optimally
position the FBI to meet current and emerging national security and
criminal threats by (1) aiming core investigative work proactively
against threats to US interests, (2) building and sustaining
enterprise-wide intelligence policies and human and technical
capabilities, and (3) providing useful, appropriate, and timely
information and analysis to the national security, homeland security,
and law enforcement communities. Building on already strong FBI
intelligence capabilities, Director Mueller created in January 2003 the
position of Executive Assistant Director (EAD) of Intelligence and an
Office of Intelligence. I was honored to join the FBI in May 2003 as
the first EAD Intelligence.
Core Principles
We built the FBI Intelligence Program on the following core
principles:
Independent Requirements and Collection
Management: While intelligence collection, operations,
analysis, and reporting are integrated at headquarters
divisions and in the field, the Office of Intelligence
manages the requirements and collection management
process. This ensures that we focus intelligence
collection and production on priority intelligence
requirements and on filling key gaps in our knowledge.
Centralized Management and Distributed
Execution: The power of the FBI intelligence capability
is in its 56 field offices, 400 resident agencies and
56 legal attache offices around the world. The Office
of Intelligence must provide those entities with
sufficient guidance to drive intelligence production
effectively and efficiently, but not micro-manage field
intelligence operations.
Focused Strategic Analysis: The Office of
Intelligence sets strategic analysis priorities and
ensures they are carried out both at headquarters and
in the field. This is accomplished through a daily
production meeting that I chair.
Integration of Analysis with Operations:
Intelligence analysis is best when collectors and
analysts work side-by-side in integrated operations.
Concept of Operations
Concepts of Operations (CONOPs) guide FBI intelligence processes
and detailed implementation plans drive specific actions to implement
them. Our CONOPs cover the following core functions: Intelligence
Requirements and Collection Management; Intelligence Assessment
Process; Human Talent for Intelligence Production; Field Office
Intelligence Operation; Intelligence Production and Use; Information
Sharing; Community Support; Threat Forecasting and Operational
Requirements; and Budget Formulation for Intelligence.
Accomplishments
What follows are some of our key accomplishments:
We have issued the first-ever FBI requirements and
collection tasking documents. These documents are fully aligned
with the DCI's National Intelligence Priorities Framework and
we have published unclassified versions for our partners in
state, local, and tribal law enforcement.
We are full members of the National Intelligence
Collection Board and the National Intelligence Analysis and
Production Board, and soon will be participating in the
drafting of National Intelligence Estimates and the National
Foreign Intelligence Board.
We have created a collection capabilities database
that tells us what sources we can bring to bear on intelligence
issues across the FBI.
We have created FBI homepages on INTELINK, SIPRNET,
and Law Enforcement Online (LEO) for dissemination and
evaluation of our intelligence product.
We have established a daily Intelligence Production
Board to ensure that timely decisions are made regarding the
production and dissemination of all analytical products. The
Board reviews the significant threats, developments, and issues
emerging in each investigative priority area, and identifies
topics for intelligence products.
We have completed the first-ever FBI intelligence
dissemination manual.
We have proposed and are building an Intelligence
Officer certification program for Agents, Analysts,
Surveillance Specialists and Language Analysts. Once
established this certification will be a pre-requisite for
advancement to Section Chief or Assistant Special Agent in
Charge, thus ensuring that all FBI senior managers will be
fully trained and experienced intelligence officers.
We have completed and begun to implement the CONOPs
for Intelligence Analysts. We have set unified standards,
policies, and training for intelligence analysts. In a new
recruiting program veteran analysts are attending events at
colleges and universities throughout the country and we are
offering hiring bonuses to analysts for the first time in FBI
history.
We are in the process of changing the criteria on
which Agents are evaluated to place more emphasis on
intelligence-related function.
We are on course to triple our intelligence production
this year.
We have placed reports officers in our Joint Terrorism
Task Forces (JTTFs) to ensure vital information is flowing to
those who need it.
We have developed detailed metrics to judge the
results of our intelligence initiatives and are prepared to
regularly report performance and progress to Congress and other
stakeholders, partners, and customers.
We have established Field Intelligence Groups (FIGs)
to integrate analysts, Agents, linguists, and surveillance
personnel in the field to bring a dedicated team focus to
intelligence operations. As of June 2004, there are 1,450 FIG
personnel, including 382 Special Agents and 160 employees from
other Government agencies. Each FIG is under the direct
supervision of an Assistant Special Agent in Charge.
From October 2003 to April 2004, the FBI participated
in more than 10 recruitment events and plans to add at least
five additional events through September 2004. A marketing plan
also was implemented to attract potential candidates. In
February 2004, an advertisement specific to the Intelligence
Analyst position at the FBI was placed in The Washington Post,
The Washington Times, and the New York Times, and has since
been run several more times. Our National Press Office issued a
press release that kicked off an aggressive hiring campaign.
The College of Analytic Studies (CAS), established in
October 2001, is based at the FBI Academy in Quantico,
Virginia. Since FY 2002, 264 analysts have graduated from the
College's six-week Basic Intelligence Analyst Course. 655 field
and headquarters analysts have attended specialty courses on a
variety of analytical topics. 1,389 field and headquarters
employees have attended specialized counterterrorism courses
offered in conjunction with CIA University, and 1,010 New Agent
Trainees have received a two-hour instructional block on
intelligence.
The Basic Intelligence Course currently offered by the
CAS is being revised and updated to incorporate key elements of
our intelligence program. Upon completion of this effort, the
course will be retitled: Analytical Cadre Education Strategy I
(ACES I) as outlined in the Human Talent CONOPS. An
intermediate course entitled ACES II is anticipated in the
future that would target more experienced analysts. Practical
exercises and advanced writing skills will be emphasized, as
well as advanced analytical techniques.
The ACES I course will incorporate seven core elements
of intelligence relevant for new agents and new analysts.
Additionally ACES I will focus on assimilation, analytic
tradecraft and practice, thinking and writing skills,
resources, and field skills.
Complementing ACES I and ACES II, the Office of
Intelligence, in coordination with the FBI Training and
Development Division, will identify, facilitate, and exploit
training partnerships with other government agencies, academia,
and the private sector to fully develop the career choices of
FBI analysts. Whether an analyst chooses the specialized,
interdisciplinary, or managerial career path, s/he will have
the opportunity to attend courses offered through the Joint
Military Intelligence Training Center, other government
training centers, and private companies.
The Office of Intelligence is also establishing
education cooperative programs where college students will be
able to work at the FBI while earning a four-year degree.
Students may alternate semesters of work with full-time study
or may work in the summers in exchange for tuition assistance.
In addition to financial assistance, students would benefit by
obtaining significant work experience, and the FBI would
benefit through an agreement requiring the student to continue
working for the FBI for a specific period of time after
graduation. This program will be implemented in FY 2005.
An Analyst Advisory Group has also been created
specifically to address analytical concerns. I established and
chair the advisory group--composed of Headquarters and field
analysts. The group affords analysts the opportunity to provide
a working-level view of analytic issues and to participate in
policy and procedure formation. They are involved in developing
promotional criteria, providing input for training initiatives,
and establishing the mentoring program for new FBI analysts.
The Career Mentoring Working Group of the Analyst
Advisory Group is creating a career mentoring program to
provide guidance and advice to new analysts. Once implemented,
all new Intelligence Analysts will have a mentor to assist
them. The career mentor will have scheduled contact with the
new analyst on a monthly basis throughout the analyst's first
year of employment.
As of this year, the Director's Awards will feature a
new category: the Director's Award for Excellence in
Intelligence Analysis. Nominees for this award must display a
unique ability to apply skills in intelligence analysis in
furtherance of the FBI's mission, resulting in significant
improvements or innovations in methods of analysis that
contribute to many investigations or activities, and/or
overcoming serious obstacles through exceptional perseverance
or dedication leading to an extraordinary contribution to a
significant case, program, threat, or issue.
Turning to intelligence training for our agents, we
are now working to incorporate elements of our basic
intelligence training course into the New Agents Class
curriculum. We expect that work to be completed by September. A
key element of this concept is that agents in New Agents
Training and analysts in the College of Analytic Studies will
conduct joint training exercises in intelligence tradecraft.
The first offerings to contain these joint exercises are
expected in December of this year. In addition to this, we are
in the process of changing the criteria on which agents are
evaluated to place more emphasis on intelligence-related
functions and information sharing.
On March 22, 2004, Director Mueller also adopted a
proposal to establish a career path in which new Special Agents
are initially assigned to a small field office and exposed to a
wide range of field experiences. After approximately three
years, agents will be transferred to a large field office where
they will specialize in one of four program areas:
Intelligence, Counterterrorism/ Counterintelligence, Cyber, or
Criminal, and will receive advanced training tailored to their
area of specialization. In our Special Agent hiring, we have
changed the list of ``critical skills'' we are seeking in
candidates to include intelligence experience and expertise,
foreign languages, and technology.
Our language specialists are critical to our
intelligence cadre as well. The FBI's approximately 1,200
language specialists are stationed across 52 field offices and
headquarters, and are now connected via secure networks that
allow language specialists in one FBI office to work on
projects for any other office. Since the beginning of FY 2001,
the FBI has recruited and processed more than 30,000 linguist
applicants. These efforts have resulted in the addition of
nearly 700 new linguists with a Top Secret security clearance.
In addition, the FBI formed a Language Services Translation
Center to act as a command and control center to coordinate
translator assignments and maximize its capacity to render
immediate translation assistance.
Information Sharing--Our Relationship with the Intelligence and Law
Enforcement Communities
The FBI shares intelligence with other members of the Intelligence
Community, to include the intelligence components of the Department of
Homeland Security (DHS), through direct classified and unclassified
dissemination and through websites on classified Intelligence Community
networks. The FBI also shares intelligence with representatives of
other elements of the Intelligence Community who participate in Joint
Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) in the United States or with whom the FBI
collaborates in activities abroad. FBI intelligence products shared
with the Intelligence Community include both raw and finished
intelligence reports. FBI intelligence products shared with the
Intelligence Community include Intelligence Information Reports (IIRs),
Intelligence Assessments, and Intelligence Bulletins. To support
information sharing, there is now a Special Agent or Intelligence
Analyst in the JTTFs dedicated to producing ``raw'' intelligence
reports for the entire national security community, including state,
municipal, and tribal law enforcement partners and other JTTF members.
These reports officers are trained to produce intelligence reports that
both protect sources and methods and maximize the amount of information
that can be shared. It is the responsibility of the FIGs to manage,
execute and maintain the FBI's intelligence functions within the FBI
field office. FIG personnel have access to TS and SCI information so
they will be able to receive, analyze, review and recommend sharing
this information with entities within the FBI as well as our customers
and partners within the Intelligence and law enforcement communities.
In addition, classified intelligence and other sensitive FBI data
are shared with cleared federal, state, and local law enforcement
officials who participate in the JTTFs. The JTTFs partner FBI personnel
with hundreds of investigators from various federal, state, and local
agencies, and are important force multipliers in the fight against
terrorism. Since September 11, 2001, the FBI has increased the number
of JTTFs from 34 to 100 nationwide. We also established the National
Joint Terrorism Task Force (NJTTF) at FBI Headquarters, staffed by
representatives from 38 federal, state, and local agencies. The mission
of the NJTTF is to enhance communication, coordination, and cooperation
by acting as the hub of support for the JTTFs throughout the United
States, providing a point of fusion for intelligence acquired in
support of counterterrorism operations. The FBI will continue to create
new avenues of communication between law enforcement agencies to better
fight the terrorist threat.
The FBI has also established a robust channel for sharing
information with the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC) by
providing direct electronic access to classified and unclassified
internal FBI investigative and operational databases, with narrow
exceptions for certain types of sensitive domestic criminal cases
unrelated to terrorism. TTIC also has direct electronic access to
internal FBI headquarters division websites and e-mail capabilities on
the FBI's classified intranet system. Both FBI and non-FBI personnel
assigned to TTIC have access to this information.
The FBI has agreed to provide a substantial permanent staff to
TTIC. TTIC's mission is to enable full integration of terrorist threat-
related information and analysis. It creates a structure to
institutionalize sharing across appropriate federal agency lines of
terrorist threat-related information in order to form the most
comprehensive threat picture.
Although the FBI retains authority to approve dissemination of raw
FBI information by TTIC to other agencies, the FBI authorizes the TTIC
to share FBI intelligence products by posting them on the TTIC Online
website on Intelink-TS. The TTIC Online website provides additional
security safeguards, and access is granted to Intelligence Community
users who have a need-to-know for more sensitive classified
intelligence on international terrorism from the FBI and other
agencies. The FBI also authorizes the National Counterintelligence
Executive (NCIX) to share FBI counterintelligence products on the
Intelink-CI(iCI) website with similar safeguards and access by users
who have a need-to-know for more sensitive classified
counterintelligence products.
In addition to this, the Bureau also fully contributes intelligence
analysis to the President's Terrorist Threat Report (PTTR). These
products are coordinated with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA),
DHS, and other federal agencies. In addition to the PTTR, the FBI
provides Presidential Intelligence Assessments directly to the
President and the White House Executive Staff.
The FBI is also committed to providing those tools which assist law
enforcement in intelligence-led policing--from the National Crime
Information Center, the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification
System, and the Interstate Identification Index, to Law Enforcement
Online (LEO), a virtual private network that reaches federal, state,
and law enforcement agencies at the Sensitive but Unclassified (SBU)
level. LEO user's total nearly 30,000 and that number is increasing.
That total includes more than 14,000 state and local law enforcement
members. LEO makes finished FBI intelligence products available,
including Intelligence Assessments resulting from analysis of criminal,
cyber, and terrorism intelligence. Our LEO Intelligence Bulletins are
used to disseminate finished intelligence on significant developments
or trends. Intelligence Information Reports also are available on LEO
at the Law Enforcement Sensitive classification level. The FBI also
recently posted the requirements document on LEO, which provided state
and local law enforcement a shared view of the terrorist threat and the
information needed in every priority area.
LEO also has secure connectivity to the Regional Information
Sharing Systems network (riss.net). The FBI Intelligence products are
disseminated weekly via LEO to over 17,000 law enforcement agencies and
to 60 federal agencies, providing information about terrorism,
criminal, and cyber threats to patrol officers and other local law
enforcement personnel who have direct daily contacts with the general
public. The FBI will use an enhanced LEO as the primary channel for
sensitive but unclassified communications with other federal, state and
local agencies. LEO and the DHS Joint Regional Information Exchange
System (JRIES) will also be interoperable.
In the spring of 2002, the International Association of Chiefs of
Police (IACP) met and agreed that a collaborative intelligence sharing
plan must be created to address the inadequacies of the intelligence
process that, in part, led to the failure to prevent the events of
September 11. In response, the Global Justice Information Sharing
Initiative (Global), which is a Federal Advisory Committee to the U.S.
Attorney General, formed the Global Intelligence Working Group (GIWG).
The GIWG is comprised of experts and leaders from local, state, and
federal law enforcement, including members from the FBI. Their efforts
resulted in the creation of the National Criminal Intelligence Sharing
Plan (NCISP).
On February 11, 2004 the Attorney General announced the creation of
the Justice Intelligence Coordinating Council (JICC). I currently chair
this Council, which is comprised of the heads of Department of Justice
(DOJ) agencies with intelligence responsibilities. The Council works to
improve information sharing within DOJ, and ensures that DOJ meets the
intelligence needs of outside customers and acts in accordance with
intelligence priorities. The Council will also identify common
challenges (such as electronic connectivity, collaborative analytic
tools, and intelligence skills training) and establish policies and
programs to address them.
On February 20, 2004 the FBI formed the Information Sharing Policy
Group, comprised of Executive Assistant Directors, Assistant Directors,
and other senior executive managers. I serve as the co-chair. This
group is establishing the FBI's information and intelligence sharing
policies.
At the same time, we have intelligence analysts from other agencies
working in key positions throughout the Bureau. The Associate Deputy
Assistant Director for Operations in the Counterterrorism Division is a
CIA detailee. This exchange of personnel is taking place in our field
offices as well.
We have also worked closely with DHS to ensure that we have the
integration and comprehensive information sharing between our agencies
that are vital to the success of our missions. The FBI and DHS share
database access at TTIC, in the National JTTF at FBI Headquarters, in
the Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force (FTTTF) and the Terrorist
Screening Center (TSC), and in local JTTFs in our field offices around
the country. We worked closely together to get the new Terrorist
Screening Center up and running. We hold weekly briefings in which our
Counterterrorism analysts brief their DHS counterparts on current
terrorism developments. The FBI and DHS now coordinate joint warning
products to address our customers' concerns about multiple and
duplicative warnings. We designated an experienced executive from the
Transportation Security Administration to run the TSC, a DHS executive
to serve as Deputy Director of the TSC, and a senior DHS executive was
detailed to the FBI to ensure coordination and transparency between the
agencies.
In order to improve the compatibility of information technology
systems throughout the Intelligence Community and increase the speed
and ease of information sharing and collaboration, the FBI's
information technology team has worked closely with the Chief
Information Officers of DHS and other Intelligence Community agencies,
to develop our recent and ongoing technology upgrades to ensure the
interoperability of the various information systems. To facilitate
further coordination, the FBI Chief Information Officer (CIO) sits on
the Intelligence Community CIO Executive Council. The Council develops
and recommends technical requirements, policies and procedures, and
coordinates initiatives to improve the interoperability of information
technology systems within the Intelligence Community.
The CIO is also working with DOJ on interfaces between the
Intelligence Community System for Information Sharing (ICSIS) and the
Law Enforcement Information Sharing (LEIS) initiative, with the FBI's
Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) Division, to increase the
sharing of intelligence-related information to and from state and local
officials.
In conclusion, the FBI has a responsibility to the nation,
Intelligence Community, and federal, state, and local law enforcement
to disseminate information, and to do so is an inherent part of our
mission. Sharing FBI information will be the rule, unless sharing is
legally or procedurally unacceptable.
Next Steps
We have made great progress, but we have much work to do. Our plan
is solid and we believe we are heading in the right direction. We have
enjoyed much support from your committee and we are very appreciative
of the time your staff has spent in learning about our initiatives and
giving us advice. What we need more than anything else is your
continued support and understanding that a change of this magnitude
will require time to implement. With your help, we will have that.
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to testify before you today
and I will be happy to entertain any questions you may have.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you, each of you, for your statements. We
will begin the questioning with the gentleman from Florida, Mr.
Diaz-Balart.
Mr. Diaz-Balart. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to thank you for testifying before us today.
The first question I would like to address is to Mr. Brennan.
The 9/11 Commission report recommended expanding TTIC,
enabling it to share foreign and domestic intelligence and
conduct joint operational planning. So what I would like to ask
you about is, in your opinion, what legal changes would be
needed to accomplish that?
Mr. Brennan. Congressman, I think there is still a lot of
discussion going on right now to determine exactly what the
NCTC should do. The President has announced support for it and
there have been important meetings over the past several weeks
to look at the details on that. And depending on the extent of
the change and the NCTC's responsibilities, I think there would
have to be a careful look at whatever types of legislative
action or executive order language that would need to be put
forward. I think that is open to discussion; and as you point
out rightly, it is talking about a new dimension to provide to
TTIC in terms of this joint operational planning. And I think
the 9/11 Commission report says that decisions would have to be
made about how much authority should, in fact, be vested in the
NCTC on that score.
Mr. Diaz-Balart. Ms. Baginski, I appreciated very much your
testimony, and as an admirer of the FBI, as I am--and you have
a very solid team in south Florida dealing with multiple
challenges on a daily basis--the community is very proud of the
FBI.
The criticism in the Commission's report of the FBI was
perhaps stinging, not only of the FBI, but as an admirer of the
FBI, I noted it with much interest. You explained in some
detail, and I appreciate you having done so, steps that the FBI
has taken since September 11 with regard to the very specific
criticisms by the Commission. And so I don't want you to expand
more on those steps. But what I would ask you is to facilitate
the steps you are taking, because some of them are continuing
obviously. Especially with regard to information sharing, how
can we in Congress be of help to you, to the FBI in the efforts
being taken to improve information sharing?.
Ms. Baginski. The first dimension is the recognition that
it is going to take some time. There are dimensions in this
that are information technology, that are people, that are
training issues. So that would be helpful to recognize. It is a
combination of things.
And then, from our perspective, our biggest needs are for
secure communications to our field offices and for secure
compartmented information facilities. And these are not small
requests. In order to join this large Intelligence Community
and to be a healthy node on this network, we have to be able to
operate in their information environment.
So those are the two areas. And I think third is to foster
the debate that is necessary on important issues that people
are raising about civil liberties as this work is done.
Mr. Diaz-Balart. Look forward to continuing to work with
you.
Ms. Dunn. The gentlelady from California, Ms. Lofgren.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you and thanks for your service to our
country.
You know, as I have been listening both to the Chair and to
the Vice Chair of the Commission before you and the questions
of my colleagues, my thoughts have really turned to a broad
question, which is the deployment of technology in the Federal
Government. And we have talked about information sharing, but
it is not just information sharing, it is the deployment of
technology generally.
Listening to one of my colleagues talk about enforcement of
the immigration laws, I was mindful of Commissioner Ziglar
telling us that they didn't catch the terrorist who applied for
a student visa because the application was on a piece of
microfiche in a bucket in Florida and you couldn't do a data
search of the microfiche in the bucket.
Listening to Mr. Andrews' hypothetical about a hazardous
material truck on its way to blow up the Capitol, there is
technology that Lawrence Livermore Labs has today that could be
inserted on HAZMAT trucks that would allow those trucks to be
stopped remotely, and yet we don't deploy that technology. Why
not?
I am interested, obviously--have been on the Judiciary
Committee since I became a Member of the House in January of
1995, and I have complained for nearly 10 years now about the
lack of technology in the immigration function. And when our
markup was interrupted before we recessed, I had several
amendments that I had planned to offer and I shared with the
majority to automate the I-94 entry-exit form, which is
something that Director Mueller told me was a high priority for
him and yet has not occurred, to require a study on digitizing
all immigration applications and petitions with a mind towards
cataloging all immigration applications by a unique biometric
identifier such as a fingerprint and have the NIST biometric
study go forward.
I understand since that time, US VISIT has ditched the idea
of a broad biometric that would be cross-platformed and cross-
agencied and instead is proposing to use the IDENT system,
which uses a nonstandard fingerprint format. And maybe we need
to do that because we need something in place. I voted to
continue that, as a matter of fact, for that very reason, but
it looks like we have now stopped the deployment of the broader
effort.
So I guess my question to all of you is, in the Homeland
Security--in the 9/11 Commission report, there is a
recommendation that DHS take on the lead for integrating the
larger network in terms of entry-exit. And the question I have
is, is DHS capable of actually getting the technology deployed?
If so, how are they going to do it? They haven't shown any
capacity to do it yet. If not, how do we get technology
identified and deployed on a Federal Government-wide basis to
keep our country safe here?
Any of you who can answer.
General Hughes. I am the representative from the Department
of Homeland Security. I think the answer is that we can and are
deploying technology across the board for many biometric and
sensory missions to include on the borders and to include in
ports of entry.
Ms. Lofgren. Can I interrupt? I recently did some study on
what technology is actually along the borders and interviewed a
team that had been out from the national labs, had gone out to
the borders. And this is 2 weeks ago. Basically, no technology
has been deployed. They are short of gasoline for the trucks.
They don't have any of the cutting-edge technology that America
owns through our very excellent science centers. Why is that?
General Hughes. May I ask which part of the border?
Ms. Lofgren. They went to the southern border with the
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. It has a whole unit to
establish this technology.
General Hughes. I am not familiar with which border site
they went to, but if they covered the entire southwest border,
they talked to the wrong people.
There are, of course, some problems. I am not sure what--
some border areas being not directly covered by technology, but
much of it is covered. We are flying unmanned aerial vehicles
over the southwest border. We have placed sensors at border
control points. We have a variety of checks against the
immigration documents, persons coming across the border--there
are a large number of illegal immigrants coming across the
border every single day.
Ms. Lofgren. I see that my time has run out, but we are
still issuing paper on I-94s.
General Hughes. That is true. We have not yet digitized the
entire system. We are in the process, however, of trying to
upgrade to a digital environment.
Ms. Dunn. The gentleman from New York, Mr. Sweeney.
Mr. Sweeney. I thank the Chair. We have limited time and I
want to thank our witnesses. I have about eight questions, two
for each of you, so I am going to try to give them to you in
``machine gun'' fashion. Before I do that, I want to look back
to the last panel and correct the record if I could regarding
the contention by some that the Administration's proposal for
funding on interoperability zeroed out the budget, as I am on
the Appropriations Committee.
That didn't happen. There was a different set of priorities
established and, in fact, $2.5 billion first responder grant
monies was put in the budget for those communications, and $20
million specifically for DHS. I wanted the record to reflect
that because I think it is important we have the facts.
The 9/11 Commission report says a lot of things. One of the
things I think it says is that there is a general sense, an
overwhelming sense, that we still don't have it right and what
we effectively need, as Vice Chairman Hamilton said, is some
superior authority over the information sharing part of this
process. And, that is the reason why there is the call for the
National Intelligence Director.
I have a real concern about it all, because as we all know,
the IAIP directorate was set by Congress and the Executive
branch to address the information sharing issues. What I have
seen is that in a year and one half, we are at the point where
it is all starting to come together. The right people have been
hired, and we are beginning to set up protocols and standards
that are beginning to be used. And I am worried about starting
over, and I am worried about layering bureaucracies on top of
each other.
General Hughes and Mr. Brennan, you two are going to be the
ones who are going to probably most directly be impacted. I
know the President has said he supports the idea of the
national director. I don't expect you are going to be able to
tell me as definitively or not whether you are, as well,
concerned, but it is a concern I have in the creation of that
position or any others. And I just don't know how it is going
to work. I think it is important that we deliberate this in the
next couple of weeks.
Mr. Black, can you guarantee that relevant information we
receive from foreign partners gets to the FBI?
Mr. Black. The systems are in place. As an example, we have
communications connectivity where the FBI has access to the
traffic that we produce. We spent a lot of our time supporting
the various elements, the practitioners of counterterrorism,
whether it be intelligence, FBI and the rest. So we have an FBI
officer in my office whose sole job is to facilitate this
process.
Mr. Sweeney. Ms. Baginski, that is happening? You are
getting it into the threat integration center networks and it
is getting out there?
Ms. Baginski. Yes, sir. But I wouldn't be passing it to
threat integration. That actually happens from Cofer's
organization itself.
Mr. Sweeney. So that is happening?
Mr. Black. Sure.
Mr. Sweeney. One hundred percent capacity? How much
improvement? How do we measure that?
Mr. Black. In terms of all of our cable traffic, it has
full connectivity with the screening elements. So that, as an
example, everything that we have, Visa Viper mechanism, which
is a retrievable terrorist information system, is made
available, 100 percent of it, to the Terrorist Threat
Integration Center and the Terrorist Screening Center. And we
have plugged in the system that we started off and
contributed--TIC, the tip-off program, has been moved, so I
think we are well ahead of the curve in making the information
collected by the Department of State--
Mr. Sweeney. Are we fully exchanging information with
India, who has had hundreds of years of fighting Islamic
extremists? Are we fully engaged in the exchange of
information?
Mr. Black. We are fully engaged. I am always queasy when we
use figures like 100 percent. There is not much in life that I
would raise my hand to 100 percent on. But I could tell you--
Mr. Sweeney. That is why you want us to quantify things?
Mr. Black. In all professional candor, this process has
gone forward tremendously and that the impetus is on making all
of the information that we have available to the practitioners
of counterterrorism.
Mr.Sweeney. Okay, Mr. Brennan, do all the analysts at TTIC
receive full access to databases which TTIC has access to, or
do providing agencies limit distribution of that information?
Mr. Brennan. As I mentioned, we have over 22 networks that
come into TTIC. Access within TTIC is based on what the role
and the function of the analysts are, and so many analysts have
access to many--most all of the information streams. All of
them don't need all of the access.
Mr. Sweeney. Could I follow up and have a real sense of the
protocols that are in place there?
Mr. Brennan. Sure.
Mr. Sweeney. Last question to you--have a couple more I am
going to ask others for the record--but do you believe that
some terrorist organizations have the intention, organizational
capabilities, or technical acumen to produce and deliver a
nuclear weapon to U.S. cities?
Mr. Brennan. I do not believe at the current moment that
any terrorist organization has the capability to do that. I
believe that terrorist organizations are pursuing a nuclear
capability to include radiological devices, nuclear devices and
other types of materiel. But I don't believe they have the
capability right now to do that right now. No.
Mr. Sweeney. Thank you. I thank the Chair.
Chairman Cox. [Presiding.] The gentlelady from Texas, Ms.
Jackson-Lee.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank the Chair very much and the
Ranking Member for both convening this meeting, and I thank him
for allowing me to pursue the line of questioning relating to
the importance of the work of this body and the need to
reconvene with the two members of the 9/11 Commission. I must
say, Mr. Chairman, that in conversations with both the Governor
and the Co-Chair Hamilton both agreed to welcome both an
invitation and to return before this committee.
Because, as I said in the open session and as I have said
in this direct conversation with them, this is ours, and our
work is securing the homeland. Abbreviated hearings, mixed with
no congressional and executive action, giving no legislative
direction to the securing of the homeland is playing with fire.
It almost reminds me of Rome burning while music plays. So I
would just start out by saying then that I call upon the
Speaker of the House to convene a session in Congress so that
the legislative matters that need to be acted upon the 9/11
Commission Report can be done now and can be done immediately.
Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to submit into the
record the first page of the legislation that I have offered
giving Cabinet status to the National Intelligence Director--
Chairman Cox. Without objection, so ordered.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. --which would oversee budget operations
and personnel of the entire Intelligence Community.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Let me qualify it is Cabinet status
without the responsibilities of policy. It will be operational,
but that individual will have budgetary responsibility and
control. It is crucial that these legislative initiatives be
able to be filed and that we act upon them immediately.
Let me thank the panel, and I realize that we may be at a
disadvantage for some of the concerns that I have, because, as
I indicated, I frankly believe that Rome is burning and that we
are literally playing with fire.
In conversations that have gone on that have evidenced
themselves in the press, it is well-known that some terrorist
act is expected before the elections. It is also well-known
that we as Americans will not be intimidated, but certainly
Congress has a crucial responsibility to be able to be part of
the firewall, if you will, in protecting the American people.
We cannot do that in an abbreviated framework, albeit with
respect to our committee leadership, and with a Congress that
is not in session.
So, first of all, I think that we must frame this in a way
that Co-Chair Hamilton said, and that is to smash the stovepipe
on intelligence. Because the very core of the disaster of 9/11
was the lack of transferring intelligence as it was needed.
So I would clearly like to hear from this group your sense
of smashing the stovepipe and whether or not you believe it
will interfere with competitive analysis. I say that
straightforwardly, because I believe that our previous
director, certainly a distinguished public servant, failed us
in the inability to see the big picture, as did our other
agencies pre-9/11.
Likewise, there was a failure in oversight in the
intelligence disseminated on Iraq, and there was no objectivity
as I perceived it in our Intelligence Community. It was only a
``yes, sir, yes, boss'' attitude in terms of taking America to
war.
That is my first question.
The second is, any impressions, Mr. Brennan or General
Hughes on a national I.D. card? My understanding is the
Commission, has not, has not, has not confirmed or recommended
such. Your view of that.
Civil liberties, I would like your view on the
implementation of a board inside of the intelligence center
that will be created that will oversee the protection of civil
liberties.
And I would appreciate, Ms. Baginski, your comment on the
FBI's seeming siege on peace activists in the United States and
whether that has anything to do with protecting the homeland.
And lastly, the need for border security to be combined
with intelligence, meaning to enhance the capabilities of
border personnel in securing intelligence.
If I could get an answer to at least one of those questions
since the Nation is at crisis.
Mr. Brennan.
Mr. Brennan. I will start. First of all, smashing the
stovepipes and competitive analysis, I think we are all
committed to smashing any stovepipes that remain. It is not
sufficient though just to share hard copy information. It is
important to have an information technology architecture that
allows institutions to share information with institutions so
that in fact you can search, retrieve that information in a
systemic manner, as opposed to having a lot of different hard
copy files. That is not what we need, because there are so many
different elements of the U.S. government that need that
information. We need to put in place that architecture.
Competitive analysis, I am fully supportive of competitive
analysis but done thoughtfully, as opposed to unnecessary
redundancy that wastes resources. And, as I said in my
statement, what we need to do is have a framework that allows
for allocation of roles and responsibilities to include the
assignment of competitive or alternative analysis.
Regarding national ID cards, I would refer to DHS on that,
but what I would do is say the administration is looking at
different standards and biometrics that in fact makes sense to
apply at borders in other orders.
Civil liberties, since TTIC has access to so much data, we
take very seriously the protection of U.S. citizens' rights and
privacy obligations and we are committed to working with the
rest of the government as far as having some type of board that
in fact look at those issues very seriously.
General Hughes. And I will have my views that we definitely
believe in breaking or ending any barriers that exist. The term
stovepipe is a little bit emotional, as far as I am concerned.
We are in favor of horizontal and vertical integration at every
part of the government, if we can get it. We are in favor of
protecting civil liberties at every opportunity. I personally
am and so is the Department. We are in favor of a board to
oversee if this is a necessary development.
We are also working on the national I.D. card issue. It is
more complex than simply saying, yes, we are in favor of it or,
no, we are not. It has great implications for the United
States, and one of the implications is the civil liberties of
individuals. We have to deal with that, and so we are
considering the issue.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Well, obviously, General Hughes, you will
do that with the consent of Congress, because there are those
of us who are not conceding a national I.D. card and
particularly I do not sense and did not read that the
Commission recommended a national I.D. card, and that is
correct?
General Hughes. That is correct.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Thank you, sir.
Ms. Baginski. Yes, ma'am, on two issues. Stovepipes are not
necessarily all bad. A stovepipe around an area of expertise,
an analytical area of expertise, a center, if you will, is not
something that necessarily would be negative.
But what I would say is we have done a remarkable job
unifying our disparate collection resources against threats,
and I think that is the core of the progress that we have made
over time.
In response to your question about the articles that
appeared in the New York Times, the--both the Democratic
National Convention and the Republican National Convention have
been designated national security special events. In accordance
with that, every effort is made to insure that any threat to
the security of that event is taken care of within the confines
of the Constitution and the law as we always do. There is
absolutely no truth to the allegation that any of these things
were undertaken outside of predication and outside the bounds
of the Constitution.
I understand the press article. I did read it. I understand
the concerns of citizens. But I also know the organization that
I work in, and these were all done with regard for specific
intelligence that caused us to have concerns about attempts to
disrupt this event, and we had a similar series of events for
the Democratic National Convention.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Well, I would ask that any peace activist
that believes that they have been intimidated just for their
opposition and first amendment rights need to be contacting
both Members of Congress who are concerned, and I hope that you
will be responsive to our calls regarding this intimidation.
Ms. Baginski. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Security is one thing, but intimidation
and oppression is another thing.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady's time has expired.
Ms. Baginski. We would be very anxious, ma'am, to have
those reports and deal with that.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank you very much, thank you.
I thank the gentleman.
Chairman Cox. Are there other members of the panel that
would like to address any of the questions that have been put?
Mr. Black. I would just add one concluding remark. I think
the stovepipe issue is very important. We are trying to
institutionalize this. I think, Congresswoman, it is not only
institutional but employees and individuals involved in this
process don't have to put in Herculean efforts all the time.
I think in the past we have been relying on the work ethic
of people working around the clock in defense of this country.
What we are trying to do is put in a system that lends itself
to people routinely doing their job in a more productive way.
We no longer the have the luxury to rely upon people working
around the clock with no sleep, and I think we are heading in
that direction.
I would also underscore that my exposure to this issue in
terms of civil liberties is that we are very and profoundly
interested in this. We are in the business of defending
America, and America is based upon civil liberties. They go
together. You can't have one without the other.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Oklahoma, Mr. Istook.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Thank you.
Mr. Istook. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to address to the panel the issue of blind
spots. We are all concerned, of course, realizing that
terrorists want to attack us where we are not expecting it. We
recognize the great symbolic value of attacks upon icons such
as the World Trade Center, the U.S. Capitol or the Pentagon.
Yet, being from Oklahoma City, I am certainly aware that
terrorism can strike in the heartland.
It can strike where it is unexpected. In fact, that is the
goal of terrorists is to do so. I am also aware that terrorism
does not necessarily come totally from foreign nationals.
Again, I cite the Oklahoma City example, although it was for
different motives than Al-Qa'ida is pursuing.
But I would like the members of the panel to address these
aspects. For example, in the testimony this morning, when we
are talking about the great desire of people to blend into the
landscape and to acquire documentation that will help them to
escape detection--Mr. Kean certainly testified that terrorists
are most vulnerable when they are traveling. So we have
established networks, and we are trying to make them more
robust, with the entry and exit programs focused mostly again
on foreign nationals. Yet we have not only a great number of
people who are in the country illegally, but we also have
people who are American citizens that are involved in things,
not just a Tim McVeigh. We have the American Taliban we have
arrested that have been made up of American citizens in
connection with foreign activities.
One thing that I did not see, and perhaps I overlooked it,
but did not see among the Commission's recommendations was
focusing on better screening in the naturalization process
where someone wishes to become an American citizen, wishes to
acquire a U.S. passport, to enable them to escape some levels
of scrutiny.
We had several years ago a situation where some people said
it was 50,000, some will say it was 100,000, people who applied
to become American citizens were not put through the routine
criminal background screenings. I do not know, and you perhaps
can tell me, of any access to these information systems that is
part of the naturalization process currently to make sure that
the same level of screening that we are applying to people that
want to come in and out of the country freely applies to people
who want that great credential of U.S. citizenship and thus
access to U.S. passports.
So I would appreciate the panel addressing how much of a
potential blind spot we have when we either do not put enough
focus on the soft targets or fail to recognize that some of the
targets may have American citizenship or may be pursuing
American citizenship.
General Hughes. Perhaps I will start, since primary
responsibilities lies with the Department of Homeland Security
for these issues. I think I have got two questions here.
Mr. Istook. Yes.
General Hughes. The question of blind spots, especially
dealing with documentation of proof of who you are and what you
are doing, there are a variety of issues at work here, but the
primary one is to focus on those persons that either have
documentation that is questionable or illicit more--or on those
persons who have a history or record we have now recorded in
databases and in other ways that tells us that there are
terrorists or terrorist-connected persons.
That testimony is not perfect, sir--and I would be the
first one to admit that--but working; and it is being improved
all the time.
The good news is that once again I think something that
began before the Commission and the 9/11 report is--continues
until this day is attempting to coordinate, collate and
interact with all of the databases and all of the repositories
of information.
Mr. Istook. Is that being done in the naturalization
screening processes?
General Hughes. Yes, it is. Yes, it is. Our Office of
Citizenship and Immigration Services is the office that
undertakes that. They are not as fully integrated yet into the
system as they will be in the future because when we absorbed
them they were an analog organization largely. They are making
rapid process to bring themselves into the digital environment,
as Ms. Lofgren and others have remarked on here earlier, and
that is an ongoing process.
I would like to just mention that the idea of blind spots
is of great importance certainly to all of us here, I think,
and we have detected instances where American citizens, where
people with very, very good documentation who were indeed
terrorists or terrorist connected have been able to travel or
transit in some way across our borders. We regret that. We are
trying hard to figure out how to solve it.
I think in the case of the American citizens who do want to
do ill to the United States, we are not dealing there with
identity, mirror identity. We are dealing also with their
belief system, their values and their actions, and that is a
more difficult kind of thing to reduce to a data entry that
will show that in every case.
So we are trying to come to grips with that, but it is at
that time primarily an interface process where we come to those
persons, understand their actions or their professions, the
views and ideas that they give, and then we deal with them on
that basis. But their documentation or their previous identity
may not show anything else at all that is wrong.
Mr. Istook. Other panelists.
Mr. Brennan. The issue of blank spots is a very important
one, and that is why I am a strong advocate of making sure that
there is an allocation of responsibilities. Because there is a
vast horizon of issues that need coverage from an analytic as
well as a collection perspective, and the more that we can
identify that universe and that horizon and assign
responsibilities the better chance we are going to be able to
cover that horizon.
On the issue of individuals here in the States who may in
fact be part of transnational terrorist groups, the Homeland
Security Presidential Directive 6, HSPD-6, that was promulgated
last September streamlined the whole watchlisting and database
process. It is still in the process of being streamlined and
overhauled, but in the past when there were 12 different
databases and nine different departments and agencies, that no
longer is the case.
There is the terrorist screening center. That falls on the
FBI that has responsibilities for and in fact providing the
support to those screeners and watchlisters. TTIC now has the
national responsibility to maintain the national database on
known and suspected transnational terrorists to include U.S.
citizens who are here in the United States. So we have absorbed
from the State Department the tip-off program that has been in
existence for close to 20 years. We are putting into that the
names of U.S. citizens who are known or purported to be part of
transnational terrorist groups, and we work very closely with
the FBI on domestic terrorism responsibilities.
Mr. Istook. And would that show up on a background check
for someone seeking U.S. Citizenship?
Chairman Cox. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Istook. Thank you.
Chairman Cox. But the panel may address the question
further if you choose to do so.
If not, the gentlelady from the Virgin Islands.
Mrs. Christensen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am going to go
right into my questions.
Welcome, panelists. I wanted to follow up on the question
on the board to protect civil rights and liberties, because my
understanding is that the recommendation is that the board
would insure that the government is adhering to guidelines and
protocols for protecting civil rights and civil liberties. Can
one person answer for me? Are there guidelines and protocols in
place at this time for the government to adhere to?
Ms. Baginski. Speaking from the FBI perspective, there
clearly are those guidelines. We conduct all of our
intelligence activities and all of our investigative activity
under the attorney general guidelines that were just recently
updated; and they give us those guidelines, clear guidelines,
for predication for when one can collect information on U.S.
citizens and under what circumstances. So those guidelines are
in place and have been in place for many years, yes.
Mrs. Christensen. OK. Unless we get good-quality
intelligence, the best organization and collaboration won't
help to give the people of this country the kind of protection
they deserve.
I wanted to raise an issue that I wanted to ask the last
panel about, which is diversity within the Intelligence
Community, and it also speaks to how the data will be analyzed.
We are dealing with people from a faraway country, different
cultures, different ways of approaching things. What is the
level of diversity, for example, within the FBI, TTIC? My
experience in speaking with people within the Intelligence
Community, from the African American point of view, is that
they are few and far between and even rarer at the top of the
spectrum. So what is it and to what extent are you seeking
actively to bring diversity into the Intelligence Community?
Ms. Baginski. I think the DCI--former DCI Tenet in fact led
a very, very focused study of this issue; and I know that I in
fact testified in front of this group on behalf of the FBI.
Within the FBI, there is very great diversity among our
intelligence analyst program. So I will just speak for that
portion, not for the law enforcement portion.
What I would say is that your observation is correct in
terms of African Americans and leadership positions, but we
have a very healthy diversity, both in terms of gender--what
Director Mueller's guidance to me is is to bring in people who
understand the cultures, that we are actually--that we are
actually analyzing that and that we are actually studying, as
that is part of a very focused recruiting process, 33
recruiters focused on universities to be able to bring that
kind of diversity thinking.
Mrs. Christensen. So that focused somewhat also on HPCUs
and Hispanic surveys of Americans?
Ms. Baginski. Yes, ma'am.
Mrs. Christensen. Anyone else? TTIC want to answer?
Mr. Brennan. TTIC doesn't have direct hiring authority. We
rely on the different agencies and the departments. But
integration by definition is diversity, and so what we are
trying to do is make sure we have that diversity perspective
which includes diversity in terms of background.
Mrs. Christensen. OK. One of the other recommendations is
on incentive for information sharing. Personally, I don't see
incentives as being the answer, because I believe that we
should have a centralized system and one director. But if there
were incentives for information sharing, what would you
envision them to be?
Mr. Brennan. I agree with you completely that the reference
in the 9/11 Commission to creating incentives to better balance
security with information sharing, I believe it should be
institutionalized, not incentivized. You want to make sure that
you are able to facilitate that flow of information and require
and mandate, in fact, that information be shared and so not
leave it discretionary. What you need to do is put together a
framework, though, that is sensible, that you can protect
information as well as get it out.
Mrs. Christensen. Can I just follow up with you?
Mr. Brennan, because you talk about--you said--talked
several times about the architecture that needs to be in place
to facilitate this, to what extent is any of it in place at
this point? Where are we in having the kind of infrastructure
to facilitate the collaboration and the sharing of information?
Mr. Brennan. I think there are many pieces of an
architecture in place. But when we talk about a national
architecture, you are talking about a very complicated
multidimensional architectural system that in fact is trying to
take shape right now. The FBI and DHS and other departments and
agencies have their systems and networks that they are trying
to interact with.
Mrs. Christensen. But some of them don't talk to each
other. Some of them are not able to talk to each other.
Mr. Brennan. That is a question in terms of
interoperability. That is why we have to look from a
government-wide perspective across all the departments and
agencies. But then it is complicated by the fact you are
bringing in State and local entities and local law enforcement
that have their own systems, and so this is a challenge of, you
know, enormous magnitude, and I think--
Mrs. Christensen. So are we at the beginning of that
process? Are we just at zero?
Ms. Baginski. No, actually, ma'am, I don't think that we
are at zero at all. In fact, in terms of the Intelligence
Community classified architecture, that is very well
established and we have been joining it.
I think in terms of the secret level and then in the
sensitive but unclassified level there have been enormously
positive efforts between DHS and the FBI to take the existing
sensitive but unclassified infrastructure and join it with the
DHS architecture so that they interoperate and so that
information appears seamlessly to the users so that they don't
have to actually worry about whose network that was actually
carrying on. So I think there is very positive work going on
there.
And in terms of incentives for information sharing, I
happen to agree with John. I don't think he can do this through
incentives, so we have actually done it through rules, which is
essentially--we have created a category of information that is
required to share, and our authoring tool for reports requires
the first version to be written at a low classification.
General Hughes. Would you mind if I gave a brief follow-on?
Chairman Cox. Please do.
General Hughes. I would like to tell you last week we
convened 324 persons from States, the territories and
possessions, from a few localities here in D.C. and began in
the process of training them in the handling of U.S. Federal
Government information up to the Secret level. The system that
will provide that information to them is also being fielded
now. It is almost complete, called the Homeland Security
Information Network, which was complementary and parallel with
the JTTF structure from the FBI and other systems that are in
use throughout the country. So we are definitely more than
talking about or thinking about this. We are doing it, and we
are some distance into it.
Chairman Cox. The Chairman will recognize himself for 5
minutes.
Ms. Baginski, as the person responsible within the FBI for
information sharing and also as part of a bureau that has
nearly 100 JTTFs operating, not to mention the field offices
and so on, do you see it as the role of the FBI to take the
lead on information sharing with State and local governments?
Ms. Baginski. We actually see it as the responsibilities of
DHS and the FBI to speak from the Federal level to the various
components of State and local government. In our case, we are
focused on the law enforcement community. In DHS's case, they
are focused on the municipal and the private sector.
Chairman Cox. I am not quite sure I understand how that
works. What you are saying is that information that is finished
intelligence, analytical product, is in some cases shared by
DHS with State and local government and some cases shared by
FBI, but there isn't anyone with a lead on it?
Mrs. Baginski. Actually, what General Hughes and I have
done--and I think we are both enormously proud of it--when
those communications occur, we have been doing them in the form
of bulletins. I think you probably recognize those. Before, we
were in a position where the FBI was issuing its own to the
local law enforcement community and the DHS was issuing its own
to the municipal and government and private sector.
What we have done is we issue now one bulletin, one set of
information with both seals, so that the Federal voice to the
local community is a single voice, and I think that is a very
positive step forward that we have worked as a personal
partnership and that our folks have executed very, very well
over the past couple of months.
Chairman Cox. So there isn't a customer that is getting
information from FBI that is not under the aegis of DHS?
Ms. Baginski. Yes, there is.
Chairman Cox. There is. What customers are those?
Ms. Baginski. The Intelligence Community is one of those
customers. We, I think, as you know--
Chairman Cox. I am sorry, talking within the realm of State
and local governments in the private sector?
Ms. Baginski. Uh-huh.
Chairman Cox. Any customers within that realm?
Ms. Baginski. Yes, I think it is fair to say in the State
and local law enforcement community, we are, in fact, producing
a number of intelligence assessments to include the raw
intelligence that we produce that the Director of the FBI is
actually responsible for producing; and through a number of
mechanisms, to include our law enforcement online sensitive but
unclassified Web-based network, we are posting intelligence
assessments and raw intelligence for passage for our State and
local partners at the same time that we are passing it to our
partners at the Department of Homeland Security.
Chairman Cox. We have simultaneously the bulletins going
out which are jointly produced by DHS and FBI and we have
things going directly from FBI that don't go through DHS? Same
customers?
Ms. Baginski. That is correct. And I think it is important
to note here that you might be thinking about just terrorism,
but you understand that we have three other missions as well,
and there is the traditional criminal mission, where we produce
a lot of intelligence that is of direct use to State and local
law enforcement.
Chairman Cox. Could be, but I am not addressing my question
to that.
Ms. Baginski. I am sorry.
Chairman Cox. I am addressing my question entirely to the--
Ms. Baginski. Counterterrorism.
Chairman Cox. --issue that we have been focused on this in
this hearing.
Ms. Baginski. I am sorry, this is actual information that
goes to State and local law enforcement and, of course, our
JTTF constructs which is, of course, our operational arm.
Information is in fact going in there to the JTTFs to take
action on as well as the DHS, and the elements of DHS are
partners in that.
But when you ask me the information--is there specific
information, State and local, not going to DHS, our answer is
yes. Our bulletins are putting threat information in
perspective and giving State and local authorities a sense of
what countermeasures they can take and be on the lookout for.
Chairman Cox. I am sorry. My time is just about running
out. I want to get to one other aspect here.
My question is that I don't think we have yet licked the
problem of complete coordination between the Federal
Government, certainly not through DHS and the State and local
governments and the private sector customers for finished
intelligence products. That raises then the question about the
National Counterterrorist Center and the degree to which it
might be viewed by some people, now that it is in the planning
stages, as acquiring the responsibility that I think by statute
now in section 201 under the Homeland Security Act is given to
DHS.
General Hughes, since my time has expired, let me leave
that question in your lap. What do you think we are headed for
in terms of the executive branch's points of view on this? Is
the National Counterterrorism Center going to be in the role of
distributing information to State and local governments? Is DHS
going to want to continue to do this, FBI or TTIC, or is TTIC
going to be subsumed in this? We don't know any more than what
we read in the newspapers about this right now. While you are
at it, what do you think will happen to IA in all of this
process?
General Hughes. I think the process and the point we were
discussing, these issues, I don't think decisions have been
made. If they are, I am not aware of them.
With regard to the idea that supposed that information will
flow from the National Counterterrorism Center out to the
States and localities, there is some discussion about that, how
it will go, whether it goes through DHS or through law
enforcement channels or through a direct channel. Because we
certainly could do it directly. And, by the way, probably
concurrently to not only the respondents of the State and local
but also to Federal partners, much as Ms. Baginski just
described, that has yet to be determined.
That is one of the many--I would say many thousands of
details we have to work through here. But certainly it is
intended for the National Counterterrorism Center to be the
focal point for threat assessments regarding terrorism for the
United States. So I can assume from that title, that idea, that
concept, that if the NCTC embraces that mission, they will be
issuing products that one way or another through a variety of
conduits will go to the State and local level in our country.
Chairman Cox. Mr. Etheridge.
Mr. Etheridge. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Folks, we are here today because of this report. We would
not have a meeting in August if it weren't for this 9/11
Commission, a Commission that many people in this body opposed
and people in high office didn't want to happen. But because
the families pushed hard and some Members did, we are here, and
I want to thank them and the families, because they more than
anyone else bear a lot of the burden of 9/11, and we want to
fix that problem.
The previous testimony from two speakers talked about a
problem that we face, one of many. I am going to ask my
question, and I want each of you to comment on it, because they
discussed the inordinate amount of classification of
intelligence data, data and information that no one has any
doubt about what it is, not really sure that it is secret,
classified, et cetera, and that information is then out of the
public domain.
Over the last couple of weeks I have had the opportunity to
visit with a lot of police officers, police departments, fire
departments, rescue squads and people that we say we really
want to be in touch with, that we really need their help and
their input. We are now just talking about the information that
we are going to get to them. The problem is we don't get them
the information quickly and we classify stuff that shouldn't be
classified that would help.
I remember in the last several weeks--whether it comes to
anything or not--a police officer just doing his duty saw
someone in Charlotte filming buildings, may not mean anything.
But that is how we get the job done. But if we classify
everything that crosses our desk, they won't get the
information.
So my question is this--and I don't think there is an
adequate flow of information getting to locals, either that or
the people I am talking with are not being honest with me, and
I think they are being honest with me. I just think they are
not getting the information. I would like for each of you to
discuss any attempt that your organizations are making to
coordinate and revise the classification strategies that would
make the accuracy, the collection and the effective information
available to the first responders across this country and what
is being done to put the stamps of classification to the side
when it doesn't have to be put there. I think this is a huge
problem that no one is doing any talking about yet. Because if
we move all the blocks and the chairs we want to on the decks
of the Titanic, if we keep doing that, we never get the
information out in time no matter how many people we move and
change.
Whoever would like to go first.
Mr. Black. I guess I have been elected to start.
I think you have asked one of the most profound questions
for the future of this issue. I think it is important to note
that essentially we are in a different environment than we were
in the past. This is not the Cold War. The Cold War was slow
and ponderous. It rewarded attention to detail. It rewarded
secrecy. It rewarded keeping secrets from as many as possible
to protect the source.
Immediate response to the high-velocity threat of terrorism
requires accurate information, yet it requires speed. So I
think the correct solution is to move away from where we were
in the past. Speed counts, information has to be disseminated
quickly so that people can take action to protect, especially
since we are not interested in writing a intelligence report
for its own sake. We are interested in using this information
so it can protect people.
In the overall context, this is where we are going. This is
the future. There is the caveat that has to be the preserve of
the Intelligence Community and the FBI, and that is to protect
those sources that do need protection.
Sometimes sources that are highly significant are rare.
They need to be protected. But I think the community is working
on that, and I would have to defer to Mr. Hughes and Mr.
Brennan. But there is an effort in this direction.
So I think the answer--the response to your question would
be, in the past everything was classified because it was slow
and ponderous. Now you require speed for action purposes, yet
at the same time we have to increasingly identify those several
sources of those limited numbers of sources that need to be
protected, because they are so hard to replace.
Ms. Baginski. Yes, sir. I would like to comment on that. I
think you have asked a very, very important question.
Our initiatives are twofold. The first is to separate the
information from the source; and we think that can, in fact, be
done. As long as you try to merge those two things, you are
often dealing in a very difficult classification situation.
At the same time, when you separate those two things, we do
require from the FBI analyst a source commentary that attests
to the pedigree of the information, which generally can be
described as the degree of separation of the source from the
actual information itself and some characterization about its
reliability. So there are two things, separation that allows us
to write it to release it at the lowest classification in
accordance with a DCI directive, I might add, a DCI directive
that has been on the books since 1989 or before, requiring us
to alternate at the lowest possible classification level.
Mr. Brennan. It is not just an issue regarding
classification. It is the entire way that data is originated
within the U.S. government. We need to reengineer that
origination process.
And, as Maureen said, right to release, so that the
technology exists right now that the thread of information that
is required overseas can move at the speed of light all the way
down to the police chief in a local jurisdiction where the
thread of information focuses on.
But the policies and practices and procedures have to be
put in place to reduce the number of human interventions that
are required as the case exists right now. So what we need to
do is--the natural default over the years in the intelligence
business has been to declassify something. It is changing that
mindset to make sure that the first piece out of the box in
fact goes to the classified level that can go to the first
responder or somebody else. Then you can follow with the more
detailed, sensitive information.
General Hughes. I will just give three short bursts here.
We are routinely producing in this community highly-
classified information with tearlines or excerpts out of the
information that are either at a reduced classification level
or at unclassified level, sensitive but unclassified or law
enforcement sensitive, that can be sent out to the field. That
is an ongoing mechanism, and it seems to be working very well.
It may not be yet where we would like it to be, but it is
certainly a big improvement over the past.
Second, we have direct automated communications that are or
were at the unclassified level every day going to all of the
States. Many of the localities in this country are also
receiving that information. It is not all-inclusive. We are
Federal officers. We are bound to protect according to the law,
the information we invest so much in and worked so hard to get.
So we are doing the best we can right now with this effort.
I would also mention telephone calls, sir. Many of us make
telephone calls. I personally make them to persons who are
not--who do not have available to them some other kind of
communication system that works. Sometimes those calls are
secure, over classified telephone systems. Sometimes they are
unclassified over the regular telephone system. Depends on the
information. But that is happening now.
And the last point I would like to make to you is
classification is really not a barrier to the communication of
information if indeed the information indicates an impending
act or a crisis or some kind of a problem that needs to be
acted upon immediately. I can look you and any Member here in
the eye and tell you that we will get that information out of
its classified restricted environment and give it to the people
who need it as rapidly as possible.
Chairman Cox. Thank you.
The gentlelady from Washington.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Welcome to our panel today. It is very helpful, your
testimony. We have appreciated it.
I have a couple of questions. I was very happy to hear Ms.
Baginski talk about metrics being involved. Now measurements of
success, those are vitally important, and we take them
seriously, but we also all know that structural change such as
the sort of change we have gone through with the Department of
Homeland Security can be as rational as possible and yet not
really work because of cultural problems.
I am interested in asking you, first of all, what sort of
challenges have you run into in terms of the culture of the
organizations that you lead. In two of the cases, General
Hughes, Mr. Brennan, you are leading new agencies since 9/11.
You are dealing with details from legacies, responsibilities.
Some of you are having problems attracting talent to come to
work in your departments. What have you done within your
departments since 9/11 to make sure that we can meet some of
the--that we already have some of the shortcomings that were
listed in the 9/11 Commission's report, and what do you have
left to do?
Mr. Brennan. First of all, as far as we in TTIC have
different representatives, there are assignees in the different
organizations, people have asked how do you bring those
different cultures? Quite frankly, we haven't had to work at
it. Because if you give people an important mission like
terrorism, you give them access to information across the U.S.
Government. You find that they will work together seamlessly
and collaboratively in a way that they haven't done before. So
we feel as though there is a real benefit of the integration
and colocation of these individuals with information systems.
This has been working in concert with FBI, DHS, CIA and
others to bring together this--what I refer to as an
architecture that is not just information technology
architecture, it is also the business practices and
interactions.
So I think one of the things that we represent up here is
that we have regular interaction. And if we have the
interaction at senior levels, the individuals who are working
on the challenges really feel at liberty to be sharing this
information among themselves to find the ways that they can in
fact facilitate that sharing of information.
General Hughes. I would like to give you just two quick
answers here.
First is what we have done since 9/11, and in my case we
are a couple of months beyond a year old, in organizational
terms. Our mere--the mere fact that we have come into being is
a response to the need for some organizational entity to
provide an umbrella for many disparate organizations to work
under the Department of Homeland Security and then to use the
power of those organizational elements that were legacy
organizations to feed information into a central repository, a
central location and interact in the Federal and the State and
local environment to make sure that information has utility.
That is the single biggest thing I can think of.
We have many other issues, but I think that is enough on
that topic.
I would like to say that the idea that it was hard to get
legacy organization personnel to work together, in my case, is
the same as John Brennan has characterized it. If you give them
a mission and if you give them an identity, especially that
goes with that mission, an organizational identity or even
perhaps a philosophical identity, they will do the job very
well. They are, in fact, patriots as much as they are any other
members of an organization.
So on behalf of the country, I haven't encountered any
problems with people working together. Once they come into the
Department of Homeland Security, they do very, very well
together.
Mr. Black. I would just say that personally the threat of
terrorism is not foreign to the State Department. We all know
we have had our embassies overseas and Foreign Service
personnel being blown up and dying in large numbers over the
years. So this is not anything new to us under the leadership
of Secretary of State Powell. He has reinforced in the minds of
our employees but also the mission.
When we talk about counterterrorism, things come to mind
like the FBI, CIA and the rest. The reality is that the
Department of State has the privacy to be able to enable these
other agencies, these practitioners of counterterrorism, to be
able to do their work overseas and to prepare for that. To
facilitate it, we have changed completely how we do our
business. New officers coming in receive training in
counterterrorism. Our consular programs receive pro forma
counterterrorism training, how to contribute to the system. New
ambassadors coming in, whether they are career with years of
experience or new political appointees, get training programs.
They are provided education in counterterrorism and the like.
We also have diplomatic security that does for us our
threat assessments globablly around the world. We also, through
diplomatic security, have programs that reach out to the
business and private sector around the world. We have 81
different offices overseas.
So--I mean, I have only been in the State Department a
couple of years, having come from intelligence. The great thing
about the State Department in the past was to protect U.S.
persons overseas, to conduct diplomacy and to facilitate the
process of containing the Soviet Union under the Cold War.
Secretary Powell has completely changed that. Counterterrorism
is one of our primary missions, and our success is important to
the country, and we are determined to be successful in that
regard.
Ms. Baginski. Ma'am, if I might, I think what is more
interesting to me is I haven't found the challenge--I think
what I hear is what you have probably all heard, that there is
something that is inherently incongruous between law
enforcement operations and intelligence operations, and I can
honestly say from the day I arrived there, I found just the
opposite to be true. Just like my time working in DOD where we
had fully integrated military operations and intelligence, what
I have seen is fully integrated law enforcement operations and
intelligence.
I have also seen two very strong strengths that actually
come from intelligence being in the law enforcement community,
and they are very important, the first being that there is
enormous attention paid to the pedigree of the source. That
comes from the heritage of the law enforcement culture that
says that they would have to appear in court, therefore, they
must be credible, and we must check them out. It is incredibly
important to our intelligence capability. That kind of
attention to pedigree of sourcing is critical to a good
intelligence capability.
And the second I would say there is an enormous rigor and
discipline in intelligence analysis that I find very
comfortable for me, coming from the second world, which is that
facts are facts and conjecture is marked as conjecture, and
that also comes from the law enforcement community.
My challenges, though, have to do with an organization that
has long been optimized for one of its missions, its law
enforcement mission, and not as optimized for its overall
intelligence mission. So in terms of infrastructure, hiring,
training, recruiting, those kinds of issues, those are where I
have had to spend the majority of my time.
Chairman Cox. Mr. Langevin, the gentleman from Rhode
Island.
Mr. Langevin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to thank the panel for being here today and for your
testimony. I could probably follow up on Ms. Dunn's question in
the area of organizational culture, start with that.
It is clear from the findings of the 9/11 Commission report
and subsequent things that we have heard in testimony, both on
my work in Armed Services and also here at Homeland Security,
that the way that we were fighting the war on terrorism, both
before 9/11 and in many ways after 9/11, was according to the
way we fought the Cold War, using the Cold War battle plan, if
you will. And clearly that plan may have been successful in
winning the Cold War, but it is not going to work in fighting
this war on terrorism.
Now, Public Administration 101 will teach you that
bureaucracies by their very nature are intransigent and that
one of the most difficult things in changing the mission of an
organization is changing its organizational culture. People
basically keep doing things the way they have always done them
because that is the way they have always done them.
I really do want to hear more about and I want to focus on
the issue of incentives and what is being done to encourage
information sharing. Mr. Brennan, you said that you want to
institutionalize this effort to information share. Ms.
Baginski, you said you have done it basically through
rulemaking.
I have found in my experience that it doesn't work that
way. You have got to have incentives to get people to buy into
this. You either have to terminate people that are there--
bviously, you are not going to do that across all lines and
terms of the various agencies that deal with this--or you have
to incentivise people to buy into changing the mission.
Clearly, patriotism is a major incentive. I will concede
that. But there are also going to have to be additional things
done to change the mission. So we need to focus on that, and I
would like to hear more about that.
The other thing I wanted to ask, my second question, is
that the Commission's recommendations for a National
Intelligence Director have received a great deal of attention.
In particular, I would like to ask about the recommendation
that there be a Deputy of Homeland Intelligence, one of three
deputies who would serve under the DNI. Basically, the
Commission suggests that this role should be filled by either
the Executive Assistant Director for Intelligence at FBI or the
DHS Undersecretary of Information Analysis and Infrastructure
Protection.
I would like to hear your thoughts on which of these two
would be the best option and how we can insure cooperation
between the FBI and IAIP, if only one of the two were directly
represented in the Office of the National Intelligence Director
as a deputy.
A related question, is it even necessary or advisable to
create these dual roles for certain intelligence officials?
Ms. Baginski. I will go to your first question and then the
second one. I think the notion of incentives is very powerful,
and I hope I didn't misspeak. Rulemaking actually is a very
strong incentive in the FBI through an inspections process, and
what people get measured on is what they get evaluated on.
So when you create those rules that say you must do the
following and you follow that up by inspecting them and
ensuring that they are doing it, that actually becomes my
incentive. So I didn't mean to suggest I was just writing
manuals and hoping that they would--
Mr. Langevin. So pay measurements are in some way
associated with--
Ms. Baginski. Yes. Yes. And then I think the other big
incentive for us is to actually change the critical elements on
which agents are judged to include performance in source
development and intelligence production, and those are going to
be very, very strong incentives in our culture.
So I think you and I are in violate agreement on what needs
to be done, and we are searching for those things that actually
work within a very proud and wonderful culture, actually, that
the FBI has.
To your second issue of the deputies, I think as you know,
nothing is off the table in the discussions. There are very
high-level discussions occurring now. The three of us have been
involved in them, and there is a lot of discussion about what
is--what are the details surrounding the implementation of this
particular model and the President's support for the NID, the
national intelligence director.
The more important question is, organization or not, how do
the two of us ensure that we are actually sharing the
information so that--in coordinating, so that we are providing
the information. And I think that General Hughes and I did have
an agreement--and I know that he will tell me if we do not. I
have a responsibility to produce raw information on all kinds
of threats.
So there are many missions where my path is very, very
focused on the terrorism mission, and my job is to get him the
dots and to get John Brennan the dots, frankly, so that they
can produce the all-source analytic work and path in
particular. General Hughes can then overlay them on the
territory of the United States so that he can do the very hard
analysis he has, which is to do vulnerability assessments and
to provide countermeasures.
So a good deal of our interaction is getting those
relationships right. I have to serve John Brennan, and I have
to serve Pat Hughes in order for both of them to be successful.
So our 12,000 collectors of information out there are passing
that information in such a way that it reaches all who have to
act on it. Pat acts in a certain domain. John Brennan acts in a
certain domain, and Cofer Black acts in a certain domain, as
well as do our State and local and tribal partners. I hope that
made some sense.
Mr. Langevin. Thank you.
Mr. Brennan. Maybe it is a difference in terms of our
interpretation of the world scene, but I will stick with my
earlier position that I don't think settlements work. I believe
enforcement and compliance of standards, rules, regulations and
the law--and if you look at the memorandum of information
signing that was signed by Attorney General Ashcroft, Secretary
Ridge and DCI Tenet in March of 2003, it lays out very clearly
what the obligations are, the very positive obligations on the
part of the law enforcement and the intelligence community, and
those obligations need to be enforced and complied with; and so
therefore--whether it is not--you know, an evaluation of
somebody's performance, again, I don't see incentives, because
I see that as more discretionary. I want to have compliance
enforcement and make sure that the obligations--the positive
obligations on individuals are being fulfilled.
As far as the deputy's issues, I will defer to FBI and DHS
on this, but I just don't think that the model that is proposed
by the 9/11 Commission is workable.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Shays.
Mr. Shays. Thank you. All of you obviously are intricately
involved in homeland security. I would like to know what you
agreed with most with the 9/11, the recommendation that you
thought was the soundest, the one you supported the most and
the one you had the greatest reservation about. Why not the
gentleman from Stamford, Connecticut answer first.
Mr. Black. I think that is a good choice. I think in
reading the report, the recommendation that jumps to mind is
what I recall would have been the advantage of centralization
in terms of leadership and resources. In this and other
hearings, oftentimes you hear a lot of emphasis on an
organizational chart, how essentially units would be integrated
among themselves.
I think in the past, we had very good people working very
hard. I think it was over time from the 1990's underresourced.
So I personally have put the greatest weight on the
centralization of having a director of national intelligence. I
think that is a very good idea.
I also like the idea of a director of national
counterterrorism. As a customer now being at the State
Department, because I think there is great advantage to have
essentially one-stop shopping. Otherwise, it invariably puts me
as the customer and the State Department into the business of
having to evaluate competing analyses. Competition is good. I
think competition is good among the collectors and those that
analyze information. It is not necessarily good in terms of the
customers.
The recommendation--maybe a little outside of the reserve
of this--that I am a bit apprehensive about is that the idea of
having the Department of Defense assume complete responsibility
for paramilitary affairs. On the one hand, I like this very
much, the greatest fighting force known to man. These are the
people to go to, but I also at the same time think the Central
Intelligence Agency is very adept at the use of clandestinity
and that type of activity. So what I would encourage would be a
solidification, a merger, not necessarily one subsuming the
other.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Mr. Hughes. In my case, I agree with the recommendations on
information sharing. I support everything they advocate. I
think actually I would like to go further perhaps in achieving
information transparency inside this community so that the
professional persons who work in this community under a common
security standard know everything that they ought to know in
order to accomplish their mission.
The thing that I like the least--there are two or three
things I don't agree with, but I think the one that I will
mention here is the organizational chart for the national
intelligence director on page 413.
I don't believe that they got that right in several ways,
and I believe that the administration and leadership here in
Congress should carefully review the ideas regarding that
structure and the missions and functions that a national
intelligence director would have. That is my view.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Mr. Brennan. I agree with what my colleagues have talked
about as far as conceptually I agree with a national
intelligence director and a national counterterrorism center.
There is so much engineering that needs to go on in order to
make both of those very successful, and I think that is what we
are seeing right now.
Quite frankly, the recommendation about having more
streamlined congressional oversight I think is a good one. I
think that is the way the executive branch needs to reshape
itself so it does the legislative oversight function.
The reference here that the President should lead a
governmentwide effort to bring the major national security
institutions into the information revolution, it is
tremendously important that if we are going to achieve a
national framework of sharing of information, that there needs
to be this overarching effort on the part of the nation, not
just the Federal Government, to ensure that we are moving
together in concert as opposed to separate initiatives that are
not in fact finding a way to meld together.
Ms. Baginski. From our perspective, we were pleased with
the FBI recommendations, I am sure as would surprise you. We
were. But for us, the key recommendation is the director of the
national intelligence director to allow the fusion of domestic
and foreign intelligence. We are very excited about that.
Like Cofer, my personal reservations are with the
recommendation to transfer all paramilitary activity to DOD. I
think there is some complexity there that probably needs study.
Mr. Shays. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. Mr. Meek.
Mr. Meek. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank our
panelists that are here today. I just have an observation. I
know we had the last panel with 9/11 Chairman and Vice Chairman
Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton, and I just couldn't help but think
about their experience in this area. I mean, you have a past
governor, past speaker of the New Jersey House, and majority
and minority leader Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton spent 34 years in
this body, several of those years on the Intelligence Committee
serving, doing this kind of work.
You had 78 staff members on this 9/11 Commission that
worked very hard over a period of 18 months, took a lot of
testimony from everyday individuals, victims, families, also
those that were injured in 9/11, professional staff, even in
some of your own offices. Probably some of you came before the
Commission.
And, you know, I couldn't help but take an opportunity to
look at and go through the 9/11 book and really read some of
the--I just wanted to just talk about chapter 8, where it says
the system was blinking red, and then you go on to page 254,
and it said, the summer of threat. And then you can go to
chapter 13 and it says, how do you do it? A different way of
organizing the government. You know, that is the most, I think,
interesting chapter in the whole book when you start talking
about how do you reorganize a government. That is just
something that doesn't happen overnight.
General Hughes, I know you know that we had an opportunity
and you were before our subcommittee, and it was maybe about 4
months you were on the job, and there is a lot of positive--and
I want to commend you for your honesty, because a lot of the
members on the Homeland Select Committee was, like, oh my God,
we are in real trouble here, because this man doesn't have what
he needs. You know, we talked about your clearance versus your
No. 2 persons--or person clearance. If you caught a cold, he
wouldn't have the clearance to be able to hear what you could
hear, and you are the guy, you are the gate to getting
information out.
We have this commission that is saying that we have a
problem, and I will tell you many Members of Congress, I was a
Member of Congress when they passed the PATRIOT Act. They
couldn't tell you what was in the PATRIOT Act. They just voted
for it, and that is dangerous. And I feel--and I agree with
you, Director, when you said we need enforcement and we need
oversight.
Well, you are testifying in front of a committee that is
not even a committee. We are a Select Committee. We are
temporary. We are like a syndication pilot that is out there
right now, and we are here to hear you, but we don't even know
if we are going to exist in the 109th Congress.
So we can, you know, go through and talk about what we
agree and what we don't agree with, but the bottom line and the
final analysis, it is people like yourselves that are sitting
on this panel, the panel before you, the Commission and vice
chairman and the commissioners don't demand a professional
committee in this Congress to be able to become professionals
in what we are talking about here, then we are just spinning
our wheels.
And as far as I am concerned, with all due respect to my
colleagues, to be able to pass something without a standing
committee to say report to 88 committees so when something
happens, the Congress can just do this, you know, is really
inadequate and a disservice to those that have lost their lives
and all this time that we are spending.
So I hope as we start to bubble things up to the director's
office and to other folks that are making major decisions, even
to the White House as they start talking about who is going to
have power and who doesn't have power, that there is some
discussion about sharing some of the decision making and also
some of the thought as it relates to protecting the homeland
with the Congress. And some folks are going to have to give up
power in this Congress, and for folks to start doing the
Potomac two-step saying we have done something when we really
haven't in the final analysis, it is really a disservice.
So I would hope--I am not asking you to make a career
decision, but I am making a statement here today. But what I am
saying is that we have to man-up, woman-up and leader-up to be
able to let folks know that it is imperative that we have this
kind of oversight, because if we don't have it, you can go
before 100 committees before you circle back around to this
one, but we can say can we pick up where we left off. And we
have this 9/11 report out, and we are not the only ones reading
it. I guarantee you that it is in the hands of terrorists
abroad and domestic looking at where they can see through our
lines of what we feel the defense that they know is not defense
and take advantage of it.
So to move fast and quick is important, but to also have
what we need is also important. I share that. I am on the Armed
Services Committee that meets in this room. I shared that with
the panel that came before us. I am sharing it with you,
because I think it is the most important thing that we can do
in correcting the oversight and making this Congress aware of
what is going on and paying a service to those of you that are
working professionally in this area to have members that
understand the issues and are able to get you what you need as
it relates to oversight and authority and all of those things
what comes along with it.
So I just want to--Mr. Chairman, I am sorry for going over
the time, but I just want to share with the panel if they can
please pass that on to their superiors and colleagues.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman's time has expired.
The gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Goodlatte.
Mr. Goodlatte. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Brennan,
currently the Terrorist Threat Integration Center, TTIC, does
not collect intelligence. That function remains among the
various other agencies within the intelligence community. TTIC
analyzes the information provided by the community. How can a
TTIC analyst trust raw data when he or she is not provided with
some analysis on the background of the information, and how
would the National Counterterrorism Center that is been
proposed avoid this stovepiping that the report describes is a
problem?
Mr. Brennan. Well, first of all, TTIC has access not just
to the raw data, but the information that sort of underlies
that in terms of information on sources. We have real-time
access to the FBI's information system so that when an
electronic communication comes in from New York into FBI
headquarters, we see it at the same time the FBI headquarters
sees it. When an operational cable comes in from the CIA, from
overseas into CIA headquarters, we see it at the same exact
time. So we have full insight, full transparency into that,
which really helps to educate the analysts and inform them
about the nature of the information that they are seeing so
they can, in fact, tell us where it came from, how it was
acquired, and as Ms. Baginski said, the pedigree of the
information and the sourcing.
The national counterterrorism--
Mr. Goodlatte. Let me ask you, with regard to that, do you
feel that then that TTIC is already serving some of the
functions of this suggested National Counterterrorism Center,
then, if you are already--
Mr. Brennan. By all means. In fact, the Commission says
that the National Counterterrorism Center shall be built upon
the foundation of TTIC, because TTIC right now has been charged
with the responsibility to access the information and provide
all-source analysis that will integrate the information that is
collected domestically as well as from abroad; so yes, we are
far down this road to the National Counterterrorism Center
analytic responsibilities.
Mr. Goodlatte. Will the Center add another layer of
bureaucracy, or will it enhance the process? In other words, in
other words, we don't want information--the problem we had in
the past is information would be gathered and it would lie on
somebody' desk in somebody's computer and not get in the hands
of people who can act upon it. The more people who can lay
their hands on the information it could mean more people are
aware of the problem and get to address it, or it could mean it
has got to go through one more channel before it actually
arrives where it is needed.
Mr. Brennan. Our obligation is to make sure we leverage
that information to make it available to the different
departments and agencies, and I talk about the architecture
that is required in order to allow different departments and
agencies to search against the largest volume of information so
they can bring up the information that they need in order to
fulfill their missions.
So what we are trying to do right now and the
administration is to determine exactly what this National
Counterterrorism Center should, in fact, include and involved.
The 9/11 Commission talks about basically two distinct
functions that TTIC does not do right now. One is joint
operational planning and the second is doing net assessments,
which is, you take the threat and the capabilities of the
terrorist organizations and you apply it against the
vulnerabilities and the infrastructure that is going against.
We don't do that kind of assessment now.
Mr. Goodlatte. As I understand it, TTIC is overseen by the
CIA; is that correct?
Mr. Brennan. No, it is not. It is a direct report to the
Director of Central Intelligence. So I don't have anybody in
the CIA to go through, directly report to the DCI. Now, the DCI
is dual-hatted as well as the director of CIA as well.
Mr. Goodlatte. And how will this new--in your view. I don't
know if it is specified in any of the discussions you have had
already, but how will the new National Counterterrorism Center
fit into that framework? Is it going to be overarching above
all of the different intelligence agencies, or will it also be
under the direction of the director of the CIA?
Mr. Brennan. Since it doesn't exist yet, I can talk about
what the 9/11 Commission recommends, which is that the National
Counterterrorism Center would be a direct report to the
national intelligence director, so that it would not, in fact,
go through any individual department or agency, but those digs
are yet to be made about that--
Mr. Goodlatte. Would that alter--in your view, would that
or should that alter who you report to and where your
organization lies in that framework?
Mr. Brennan. I think the reporting chain right now from
TTIC to the Director of Central Intelligence is the appropriate
reporting chain of command, and if, in fact, a national
intelligence director position is established, I believe that
the director of the National Counterterrorism Center should
report to the national intelligence director.
Mr. Goodlatte. So you think it should or should not be
changed if that entity were created?
Mr. Brennan. I don't think that the--well, you will have a
different person at top if the national intelligence director
position is, in fact, legislated.
Mr. Goodlatte. And you would report directly to them or
continue to report to the director of Central Intelligence, in
your opinion?
Mr. Brennan. Well, the national intelligence director would
take the place of the director of Central Intelligence, and so
in the future, if what they are proposing here, the director of
CIA would be separate from the national intelligence director,
so you would have two people there. Right now you just have
one.
Mr. Goodlatte. I understand, but which of those do you
think you should be reporting to?
Mr. Brennan. The national intelligence director. We should
not be embedded in one single department or agency since that
transcends those individual mission responsibilities of
individual departments and agencies.
Mr. Goodlatte. Very good. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. Mr. Turner.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Brennan, you have
been a very active proponent of an integrated information-
sharing architecture, and you have talked a lot about your
efforts to get us there.
You mentioned in your statement that as of the end of this
month, you will have six separate networks that will be
integrated in such a way that searches can be done on all six
separately accessing those networks as you do now at TTIC.
What networks are those going to be that are now going to
be integrated?
Mr. Brennan. Believe it or not, it is different and
distinct CIA networks. There is the CIA classification--
classified system. There is the unclassified system. There is
the open-source information system, the FBIS. And I will get
back to you with precisely which of those networks, in fact,
will be ready by the end of this month.
Mr. Turner. When you make the effort to get integration,
who leads in that? Who provides the necessary leadership, as
you have said, to basically say this has got to be done, we
have got to integrate these databases? Who does that?
Mr. Brennan. Right now there is an information program
sharing office that TTIC chairs that includes the Department of
Homeland Security and the FBI. It is to fulfill obligations
that are contained in the MOU and information sharing in March
of last year, and so there are a number of individuals who are
a part of this information-sharing program office and a number
of groups that have been established to address issues such as
third-party rule, originated control, tear line standards and
other types of things. So it runs across the different agencies
and departments, these there is nobody at the top.
Mr. Turner. Governor Kean this morning, in his oral
statement, as well as his written statement, said, ``Only
presidential leadership can develop the necessary
governmentwide concepts and standards,'' referring to
information sharing.
Do you agree with that?
Mr. Brennan. I think looking across the different
departments and agencies and based on the statutory
authorities, vested in those departments and agencies, it would
then go to presidential leadership to initiate an effort on the
part of the executive branch to work with the Congress, to be
able to transcend those different bureaucratic boundaries.
Mr. Turner. Do we have any timetable that has been set
forth by the President for integrating these databases?
Mr. Brennan. There is a timetable that we are operating
within in the intelligence community structure to try to bring
those different elements of the intelligence community
architecture together, and I believe that the administration
said that every one of the commission's recommendations are
being followed up on and acted upon, and I know that there are
efforts underway to try to address that specific recommendation
here.
Mr. Turner. But do we have timetables? Do we have
benchmarks, goals that we are trying to integrate a certain
number of databases by a certain date? Do we have an overall
objective that is expressed as a time frame within--
Mr. Brennan. Across the U.S. Government?
Mr. Turner. Yes.
Mr. Brennan. I don't believe. I would defer to the Office
of Management and Budget on this issue since it, again, goes
across them. We have one for TTIC internally.
Mr. Turner. All right. When I look at the changes that are
recommended by the 9/11 Commission in the area of the
counterterrorism center, it seems that TTIC would be absorbed
into that new organization and that this new responsibility of
planning, joint planning, as they refer to it, would be an
additional responsibility.
Is it your view that this new counterterrorism center is
the best entity for carrying out that kind of joint operational
planning?
Mr. Brennan. There is a lot that is to be defined by the
term ``joint operational planning'' and what would actually be
done within the center and what would be done outside in those
individual agencies, departments that actually carry out those
operations, and that is what the discussions have been taking
place over the past two or three weeks have been, to try to
define that appropriately to make sure that we continue to have
chains of command between cabinet officers and the President,
the White House and the Security Council.
So I am a strong opponent of a National Counterterrorism
Center, but, again, like other things, the devil is in the
details here, and you have to make sure that you understand
what you want to invest in that entity and what you want to
leave outside.
Mr. Turner. One of the comments that was made, I believe by
General Hughes, expressing some concern about the proposed
structure of the National Counterterrorism Center, am I correct
to assume, General Hughes, that your concern relates to that
portion of the proposed counterterrorism center that requires a
deputy national intelligence director to oversee the operations
of DHS and specifically the operations of your particular
directorate?
General Hughes. Sir, I believe that I don't think they have
got the organization for the national intelligence director
right, not the National Counterterrorism Center.
Mr. Turner. Oh, all right. I am sorry.
General Hughes. Sure.
Mr. Turner. You agree with the proposed organizational
chart on page 413 that you refer to?
General Hughes. I do not think it is what we ought to do.
Mr. Turner. Well, so specifically, what on that chart on
page 413 do you disagree with?
General Hughes. As a personal view, not representative of
the DHS consolidated view, my personal view is that there
should be three principal deputies, one for foreign
intelligence, one for domestic intelligence and one for
community management; and beneath those three principal
deputies--and there could be other principal deputies, too,
though. I am not sure, but I think the division of labor
between foreign and domestic is an important issue to keep in
mind in a bureaucratic sense.
Beneath those principal deputies, I personally think that
there are to be an array of organizations and entities. Some of
them would be the departments and their intelligence
organizations that currently exist. Some of them would be
offices and functional areas of the intelligence community that
currently exists or may need to exist in the future, and of
course there would be centers like the National
Counterterrorism Center reporting directly to the national
intelligence director. So it is kind of a mixture of issues
here, and I personally do not think the three-deputy mechanism
that is portrayed on this chart is the right approach. It
doesn't incorporate all of the issues that the national
intelligence director is going to be faced with. So I have a
different hierarchical, organizational view than that portrayed
by this chart.
Mr. Turner. All right. Thank you, sir. Is my time up?
Chairman Cox. The gentleman's time has expired.
The gentleman from New York, Mr. King.
Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank, again,
all of the members of the panel for their appearance here
today, and I would like to direct my question to Ms. Baginski.
On the question of sharing intelligence and sharing
information, I would like to focus on the issue of sleeper
cells in this country. For instance, if you could give any
detail on the extent of cooperation that you are receiving from
the Muslim community, and when you do get information, how
quickly would you share raw data, for instance, with the local
police? I am thinking of the NYPD, for instance, where they
have a number of mosques, where they received information that
maybe isn't actionable but may be of some means to the NYPD who
has its own operations going. How quickly in real-time would
that type of information be made available to the NYPD, and how
closely is the level of cooperation at that level?
Ms. Baginski. I would characterize the level of cooperation
maybe three months ago and the level of cooperation today, and
I personally have been involved in a lot of very hard work to
close some of those seams.
What we did for the Republican National Convention was
actually to accomplish an information architecture that made us
actually write down the protocols for passing this information
quickly, beginning with what it was the NYPD wanted from us,
and this is just a first step, but we have, I think, very, very
good working relationships when we are in a crisis situation
and when it is identified as such.
I think we have work to do to make that the way we do
business every day, and in a ready sense, we pass information
to them, but also my talks with Dave Cohen have been about them
passing that information to us and through the JTTF construct.
I am very encouraged. With the working with a foundation who is
actually helping us pull this together and engineering what the
information sharing should be, and I have this responsibility
myself given to me by the Director to make sure that we smooth
this out in concert with Pat D'Amuro and Chuck Frahm, who is
now up there, and I think we are making enormous strides, but
we still have much work to do.
Mr. King. Now, David Cohen, the one you deal with from--
Ms. Baginski. Yes. David is the one I will deal with. We
are going to do intel to intel so that we have the strength in
that relationship that we have always had ops to ops.
Mr. King. How concerned are you with the issue of sleeper
cells, and I am concerned particularly with the city of New
York, but nationwide.
Ms. Baginski. I think we are always concerned about what we
don't know. What I am encouraged by is that we have begun to
attack that issue as an analytic problem, which is to say if
there were, how would you find out, and then finding clues from
intelligence reports that tell us they will use these kind of
operatives, they want to come in from this kind of area and
actually begin a full-court intelligence press to try to locate
such cells. So I am encouraged with our methodology, and I am
encouraged--I am concerned just as any citizen is with what we
don't know.
Mr. King. Do you believe you are making progress in
developing sources in the community?
Ms. Baginski. I do indeed.
Mr. King. And without going into much detail, is much of
the information you are getting overseas from overseas relating
to operations here in the United States?
Ms. Baginski. I think that is fair to say, sir.
Mr. King. Thank you very much.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Thompson.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Based on the 9/11
report and everything you have learned to date--and I am
speaking specifically about Iraq--what additional steps can we
take to ensure that the mistakes of the past won't be repeated?
And it is based on this issue of faulty intelligence and the
notion of weapons of mass destruction and a lot of other
things. What have we done since the invasion of Iraq from an
intelligence standpoint to get better intelligence from the
field?
Ms. Baginski. I can take a stab at it, and this would apply
to, I think, all threats, not just Iraq.
There may be a difference between faulty intelligence and
faulty intelligence analysis or insufficient intelligence
analysis, but for us it is actually the core approach that we
are taking to the whole business of intelligence, which is to
understand at the base what information is necessary to make
decisions but also accurately report what we know and what we
don't know in terms of doing the analysis and then dedicating
resources that specifically have the full-time job of positing
hypotheses and then interacting with the data to prove or
disprove certain theories.
So we have issues of analytic bias. We have issues of
reporting only that which we have information on but not
necessarily stepping back and saying, well, these are pieces of
information that we have, but what are the pieces we don't have
that would be necessary to actually help us make those
decisions.
So mine are less about Iraq than analytic methodology is
what I am actually responding to.
Mr. Thompson. Well, I guess in layman's terms, help me out.
Who would make the call in terms of the intelligence that was
being reviewed? Are the agencies now talking to each other so
it would be a joint decision as to what this intelligence
really means, or are we still separate and apart?
Ms. Baginski. No, sir. I do not think we are separate and
apart. I think that under the existing DCI, there have been
processes and procedures that begin with national intelligence
requirements and joint community assessments on issues that are
actually performed, and all of us are, I think, very keen to
improve the analytic methodology, the analytic discipline and
the analytic trade craft that goes into providing those
assessments to include competitive analysis and what others
might call contrarian analysis.
Mr. Brennan. The whole concept of TTIC is to bring together
those different agencies that have a shared responsibility to
make sure they are sharing information, that they understand
each other's assumptions, to make sure that there is a full
transparency into sources and methods and so that there is no
mistakes made or to minimize the chance of mistakes.
You want to put a rigor in analytic effort, an think that
is what we have done in the terrorism environment, and so TTIC,
which is very innovative within the U.S. Government, is
basically the embodiment of FBI and Department of Homeland
Security, State Department, CIA working collaboratively
together to share that information and provide integrated
assessments, working with them to identify if there are
differences of view, you don't want to have just group think.
You want to make sure that you are able to present different
hypotheses and different perspectives, so this, in fact, is
giving birth to trying to do this in other areas as well such
proliferation, and so there are initiatives underway to try to
have a proliferation, in fact, integration center.
So I think the lessons of 9/11, the lessons of Iraq have
really propelled the government as a whole to try to find ways
that you can share this information and have the best darn
analysis and output possible, and that has to be fueled then by
enhanced complex and TTIC doesn't do collection, but, you know,
the FBI and CIA and others are, in fact, trying to improve
their entire collection effort as well. So it is a cycle of
collection, analysis, dissemination, the entire system.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Oklahoma, Mr. Istook.
Mr. Istook. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Before I ask another question, I would like to go back to
what was hanging out there when my time expired earlier. I
would like to make sure that I understand clearly, against what
lists or databases currently are people checks when they are
either, one, seeking to become a citizen, or they are seeking
an adjustment in immigration status, whether it be permanent
residency, entry-exit visas? What are those lists against which
they are currently checked? Is there a difference between the
lists against which they are checked depending upon whether it
is naturalization status and so forth? And the last part of
that is when will any differences be resolved? When are other
cross-checks supposed to be coming online?
General Hughes. If you don't mind, I would like to get you
a written answer to that question. I think it is a very good
question, and we ought to give you the right information. It is
a little too complex for me to relay all of the databases or
lists that are now used and whether or not there are some
problems with one check being made with one group of knowledge
bases and another check being made with another group of
knowledge bases.
So I would like to reserve an answer to writing, and we
will provide it to you as soon as we possibly can.
Mr. Istook. I would appreciate that definitive answer,
because obviously what I am concerned with, as I expressed
earlier, is potential blind spots, and we know that this is
part of the overall data integration that we are seeking to
resolve.
Let me go on to the second topic. There was a lot of
discussion about culture changes when you have the different
information agencies, the consolidation of the homeland
security, the potential further consolidations or revisions.
According to the 9/11 Commission. And we have had discussion
about culture changes among the Federal agencies, but culture
changes are not confined to those agencies. You have a huge
country, and if we want to take advantage of the citizenry, of
the private sector, of the local and State, the law enforcement
officials and take their knowledge of and put this to work,
then we have to understand the culture of the country.
I think Governor Kean certainly made that point this
morning, when he said that if we have everybody focused upon
homeland security and we are able to use their input, then we
are going to achieve the results that we want. We have more
people helping.
But when there is constant change in the lines of
authority, in the organizational structure, you confuse those
potential people. A private citizen, if they see some sort of
suspicious activity, typically will think of calling one of two
law enforcement agencies, I believe. They will contact their
local police, or if in their mind they say, well, this is
something bigger, they are going to think of the FBI. They are
not going to think of any of the alphabet soup of other
agencies which we are discussing about the reorganization.
I am concerned that further reorganization may create
problems with culture change that requires a culture change of
the entire Nation if we do not give easy-to-understand lines of
authority that the private citizens can understand so that they
can therefore be active helpers in our war against terrorism.
I would appreciate your comments and feedback on that
concern.
Ms. Baginski. Yes, sir. I would actually like to start with
that. I take your point, and I think it is a very, very
important point about passage of information to State and
locals.
What I would like to highlight here is our agreement with
you that this is terribly complex, and what we actually think
is the solution, which is the Joint Terrorism Task Forces that
we have had for many years, but I think as we have said earlier
today, we are up to almost a hundred of them, which are
literally that, joint task forces, State, local, tribal, DHS,
intelligence community personnel, all in one area so that when
that information is received that you are talking about, there
is one place to go, into that task force, information is
received, and there is the network that can pass it on to all
of the people who need to know and to the appropriate people to
act.
So I think in the operational construct what we have hit
upon is a JTTF, and I think those things are some of the best
operational paradigm I have ever seen. Whichever--
Mr. Istook. A private citizen is not going to think of a
joint task force.
Ms. Baginski. But that is the FBI is the point I am saying,
they would call the FBI, and that is done under their--
Mr. Istook. They are the clearinghouse.
Ms. Baginski. Yeah. And so General Hughes and I, our work
is about ensuring that 99 know what the 100th is doing and
getting that information passed between them for analysis, and
that is what we are working on.
General Hughes. Well, I think, first, I agree with your
sentiments, and I think it is a concern. It is something we are
going to have to work on. I am not sure if a single agency or a
single organizational element can do the complete job. I am not
positive of that, because there are differences between
providing information to a law enforcement organization,
providing information to a homeland security organization,
providing information to an intelligence organization,
specifically, and then providing information to other
organizational entities that respond to the people of the
United States.
Those differences have to be accounted for. I, indeed,
think they are a part of our culture. We haven't got it right
yet, but I think we have a lot of ideas and possibilities, and
out of the 9/11 Commission report, this issue is being
discussed and considered. As I think Chairman Cox asked me a
question earlier about how the possible changes would affect
the Department of Homeland Security, and I think there will be
some changes coming to our Department out of the 9/11
Commission recommendations, as there probably should. We need
to adapt and find the right pathway toward the future. Just
what those are, it is premature to say, but if you could just
accept the idea of that I personally agree with your concerns.
I think the Department of Homeland Security has your concerns
in mind, and we are going to try to achieve the right answer
for our country and our culture.
Mr. Istook. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from California, Ms. Sanchez.
Ms. Sanchez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you all for
being before us today.
I have three quick questions. The first one is to Mr.
Brennan. When my colleague, Mr. Meek, was questioning you, you
said TTIC has been charged to analyze what has been collected.
Who gave you that charge?
Mr. Brennan. I am sorry. Could you repeat that question?
Ms. Sanchez. You said that you had been charged to analyze
the information that had been collected who gave you your
charge? Who gave you your charter? Who put you up? How did we
create you? Where did you get that charge from?
Mr. Brennan. First of all, the President announced in
January of 2003 in the State of the Union address that was
directing the director of Central Intelligence and the director
of the FBI to form an integration center to deal with the
terrorist threat. I was appointed in March of 2003. In May 1st
we stood up. The Director of Central Intelligence issued a
Director of Central Intelligence directive in May of 2003 that
laid out under the DCI's authorities what the responsibilities
would be of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center and what my
charge and the charge of the TTIC would be.
Ms. Sanchez. What would you say to some of my colleagues
here in the Congress who believe that as a joint sort of
situation, really not under the jurisdiction of any particular
statute or place in the Congress to have set you up, that, you
know, they are not very happy, they don't feel that they have
much oversight, much control or much ability to bring you
forward and sort of figure out what you all are doing? What
would you say to that comment?
Mr. Brennan. I would say it would be incorrect, because I
have appeared in many different committees and subcommittees
over the past year and a half. I think this is the third or
fourth time I have appeared here. I also hope your colleagues
would say that it is very good that the executive branch has
found a way to bring together those different systems and
agencies with shared statutory authorities and work together
collaboratively in an integrated environment. I hope that is
what they would say.
Ms. Sanchez. And then I have two other questions that I
would ask of any of you or all of you. The first is what do you
say to--you know, we are not the only ones who hopefully are
reading this report, but there are a lot of Americans out
there, and one of the things I am struck by when people ask me
this, you know, we want to create this big position of a guy or
gal overlooking intelligence. They are going to be in charge of
these 15 agencies or departments or pieces or there might even
be more, as some of us know. What would you say to the question
about don't you think a lot of these agencies are duplicating
effort or have the same information or why didn't the
Commission address getting rid of some of these or really
rearranging things? What would you say, you know, to those
people who say we just don't need to put somebody at the top
and then put everybody underneath? Why don't we really make a
reorganization?
That would be that question, and then the next question
would be what role did each of your agencies play in the
analysis of the information that Al-Qa'ida was trying to target
the financial buildings in DC, New Jersey and New York City?
And do you agree that Secretary Ridge should have issued that
warning?
Mr. Brennan. On reorganization issues, I think it is a very
worthwhile question to take look at all of those different
intelligence agencies and what the responses are, and the ones
that have been in fact set up by individual statutes. So I
think that is an appropriate question for a review to take a
look at ultimately.
Regarding the role of TTIC in this analysis, we, in fact,
were working very closely with the Department of Homeland
Security, FBI and others, as that information was coming in,
and we had to integrate the information and put it in a context
for the Department of Homeland Security. And we worked very
closely with Secretary Ridge as he moved forward with his
announcements and decisions.
General Hughes. And I will chime in now and say I agree
with the idea that these are very good questions to ask, and we
should consider them in the future. With regard to the
duplication of effort, the plethora of organizational entities
and functions, we ought to try to more carefully consolidate
and focus our efforts in some way.
With regard to the role that DHS played, we were the
recipient of information from others. We examined that
information in the cold light of day. We determined that we had
a duty, and in fact, a promise to the American people to warn
them about information that rose to the level of detail and
importance that would generate an action on our part. The
Secretary made a final decision in consultation with the other
secretaries of the government and the leaders of the executive
branch and went forth with the more precise raising of the
alert level, focused on specific facilities that you know
occurred. Not a generalized alert, not a broad warning but a
very specific kind of function based upon the information.
I, as his intelligence officer, advised him on that,
supported him on that. I believe that it was the right
decision, and we did the right thing in this case with regard
to our duties to the American people.
Ms. Baginski. We received and reviewed a lot of the raw
intelligence, shared it immediately with both of these
gentleman and with Cofer as well and are fully supportive of
the action that the Secretary of Homeland Security took in
issuing the warning.
In terms of a duplication of effort, I think you are
absolutely right to raise this issue, that it is a very fair
thing to do, and I think as the President has made very clear,
nothing is off the table as we look at intelligence reform.
Mr. Black. Lastly, I would just add having a strong
national director of intelligence would allow this man or woman
to rationalize the intelligence system so there would be some
economies. One would hope along those lines. I think the
warning was appropriate. The Department of State was a
recipient of this information, and our function was to
communicate it overseas to our embassies and see if there is
anything that is applicable to U.S. interests overseas.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Indiana, Mr. Souder.
Mr. Souder. Thanks. I first want to say to Mr. Brennan, I
agree with you. I am glad the President didn't sit around
waiting for Congress to act. He needed to act far faster than
we are going to get legislation done, and I appreciate that he
attempted at least to bring as much fusion as possible.
I also want to thank all the men and women in your
agencies, because, in fact, we have intercepted at least many
potential incidents, and that is because of our increased
efforts. It is not perfect. We clearly are moving far ahead,
but we should thank the patriots on the line who have risked
their lives and who have, in fact, averted continual incidents.
But one thing that really troubles me about today's
hearing. I raised it in the first panel. We go there this big
report and we talk about new information systems. I spent 3
years doing hearings on our borders and sitting in the booths
with our people, but, you know, if they don't have an accurate
ID, we put them into a system, and we don't know whether it is
the same person.
So it isn't going to pop up if they are a terrorist that
they have a fake ID. I have been at the State Department desks
and other places. If the ID changes, they get false ones, they
use different names, hey, our whole system, the idea of
intelligence is that you are pooling, having a whole bunch of
meetings about people who may have 16 different names in common
with a hundred or thousands of other people in the United
States. We have already had cases of identity theft where
people have stolen people's IDs, and then one of the most
common questions I get from Republicans, Democrats, all kinds
of people in my district, is how do I get off a watchlist?
Well, if we had a biometric indicator, whether it is an eye
or a fingerprint or a watermark so that you can't be
duplicated, then we wouldn't have this problem. How in the
world do we justify to the taxpayers not doing this type of
thing and investing millions of dollars in new border
equipment, millions of dollars at the airport? Every airport
screener I talked to says it is so hard to match any kind of ID
with the ticket. People's pictures don't look the same. You are
guessing. These people have multiple names. How can we even be
discussing all of this investment, billions of dollars, if
everybody is afraid to go on record and say, look, this whole
system isn't going to work unless we know the person we are
dealing with is the person we are looking for? Any comments on
this?
General Hughes. Well, first, I think your characterization
of this is right. It is a very difficult job, and we are not
doing it perfectly in all cases. That is for sure.
I will have to tell you, sir, that there are others who
have a differing view. They view a biometric identification as
a controlled by the government as a potential for misuse.
There are other issues involved here, collecting the
biometric, placing it in an identification medium that could be
relied upon, suffering the cost of doing this across the
country. That sort of thing is all the problems that we are
trying to come to grips with. On the face of it, emotionally, I
agree that we ought to have a reliable form of identification
for persons who come into the United States and those who
reside here, but for the reasons that I mentioned and many
others, it is proving harder than mere sentiment.
Mr. Souder. Let me follow up on that. Let me ask for the
record--and you can just say yes or no--do you all agree,
because certainly in material that has been released, that
American citizens are included among the terrorist risks. It
isn't just people who are foreigners. Let the record show do
you agree with that, Mr.Black, that there are American citizens
who are on terrorist watchlists as well?
Mr. Black. I think it would be prudent to assume that, yes,
sir.
Mr. Souder. And do you agree that we have had some reports
now of people being contracted as mules like in narcotics where
people could bring money in for terrorists, people could bring
other things in who are American citizens, who get contracted
like they do in narcotics. They might not even realize they are
part of a bigger plot but can do that.
In other words, this just isn't about foreigners, and
furthermore, it isn't just about American citizens who go
across the borders. It is about--and even for those foreigners,
they can get false U.S. IDs. I have been against the national
ID card. I am one of the conservatives who had a fear about
this, but I don't hear anything that you are telling me today
that gives me any comfort if you don't know who the individual
is, and that the civil rights question, it can be done with a
watermark.
There are other ways to do it other than something
completely invasive, and besides that, if you are following the
law and you have an eyeball scanner or a fingerprint, what is
invasive about it if you are following the law? You have a
social security number already, or you are supposed to in the
United States. We have driver's licenses. What is the
difference between a number with a picture--and a picture on
your driver's license and a picture that actually is proven to
be yourself as opposed to a phony picture?
I don't understand why a picture on a driver's license--I
have a lot of Amish in my district. They are objecting to the
pictures religiously, because they don't believe in a
photograph, a graven image. OK, that is a problem on a
spiritual way, so then they should have a fingerprint, but we
actually require a picture of people, a number of people. I
don't understand what exactly the civil liberty question here
is and what is evasive--invasive about a fingerprint or an eye
print as opposed to a picture and a number. That is the part I
don't understand, and it is important, I believe, for the
people who are doing this to let the American people know that
we are dependent on the stupidity of the terrorists to use
their real name. That is basically what we are right now. That
is what we are dependent on, to use the same ID with the real
name.
We just took down two fake IDs places in one of my mid-
sized counties that were producing fake IDs. We are completely
vulnerable unless we address this question.
General Hughes. Would you mind if I just gave a very brief
reply to the last issue?
Chairman Cox. Please do.
General Hughes. We do use fingerprints very successfully,
sir, to identify persons. We do it at the borders, and we do it
internal to the country.
Mr. Souder. Thank you.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Frank.
Mr. Frank. Ms.Baginski, I apologize. I took about 20
minutes off to do business, and I missed your colloquy with Ms.
Jackson-Lee, and I apologize for that and I want to go back to
it.
I will tell you why I am disturbed. I was at the Democratic
Convention, and the way the protesters were treated there was
simply wrong. We had a case, for example, in South Carolina of
a man who is now being prosecuted federally because he was
carrying the wrong sign in a free speech zone, not that he was
carrying a sign but it was the wrong sign. And I understand the
need for security.
I also think too much attention is being given to our
desire not to have our feelings hurt and that it isn't always
easy for you to sort out, but I am troubled by this, and I am
troubled again by the preemption doctrine. I don't want people
to commit violent acts, but I don't think law enforcement
should be spending a great deal of time--preventing violent
acts, yes.
If you have got intelligence, fine, but questioning people,
questioning people about what they know, asking them what their
plans are and then getting into their politics, which I am told
sometimes happens, seems to me entirely inappropriate. And the
opinion or quote in The New York Times dismissing the chilling
effect as being outweighed as the potential for cutting out
grounds, yeah, you have a right to cut out grounds, but I think
the chilling effect ought to be a fairly high barrier.
I am told you said there were legitimate needs. I would
like to ask this and get it back in writing. How many inquiries
did the FBI make with regard to the two conventions? How many
different individuals were questioned? And I would like--and I
appreciate what you said about getting out information and
sources. So forget the sources and methods. What kind of crimes
were you trying to forestall? You mentioned a couple, but what
were the leads, and so I would like to know how many people
were questioned, how many leads were there, and of what sort of
crimes? Because I really am troubled.
Now, you tell me that nobody was questioned unless there
was a reason to think that he or she--let me ask this, that
they were going to engage or violence or they knew someone who
would? Which is it?
Ms. Baginski. I think it is both, but I would be loath to
comment. I think your solution is the right one. This is a very
reasonable request.
Mr. Frank. I will tell you in the interim one of the things
I did when I went off was to write to the Director to tell him
that I was troubled by the New York Times article; if it was
accurate, it seemed to be an overreach. So I would really like
to know how many people were questioned? And it is hard--I know
the people in charge don't--we don't like to be yelled at, some
of us. Some of us don't mind. I find if you don't like being
yell at, then you lose your right to yell. I would rather
preserve both.
But the other point we have is this: I know it has sort of
been ramped up since September 11, but they are unrelated.
September 11, the terrible tragedy of September 11, the
murdered innocent people, it is no reason to interfere with
what people say, and I am troubled by what seems to me to be a
crossing of that line.
Ms. Baginski. We appreciate your concern. We do not
consider that article to be accurate, but we will provide the
information.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Frank. Let me ask you while I have a couple of minutes
left, you heard Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton talk about this
proposal for a board that would look into privacy and civil
liberties. Do you all endorse that? Are you familiar with that
recommendation? It would be particularly relevant to General
Hughes and Ms. Baginski, but to everybody, do you endorse that,
and what kind of powers would that board have? Would you agree
that such a board ought to be able to commandeer any
information from you it would want, the government officials?
I would hope that if we had such a board, they would have a
pretty firm right to go to any of your agencies and get the
information with appropriate secrecy that they had. Would you
be supportive of such a concept? We will start with Ms.
Baginski.
Ms. Baginski. I am sorry. Yes. I think that that kind of
concentrated look and responsibility at the whole civil
liberties issue as we--
Mr. Frank. I am talking specifically about their right to
go to you and say we--you know, really full investigative
powers, almost like an inspector general across the board with
a civil liberties mandate.
Ms. Baginski. There are many bodies that have that
responsibility now.
Mr. Frank. I am asking about this one.
Ms. Baginski. I wouldn't hesitate to give that kind of
information to any of the investigative bodies. If such a body
were created, we would certainly do the same.
Mr. Frank. General, you would be relevant as well.
General Hughes. I think the answer is, as I tried to
express earlier, if such a board is needed--
Mr. Frank. Is such a board needed, General? Let me ask you
a question. You have had a lot of opinions. I have been
impressed by a lot of them. It is a little late for ``if.'' Do
you think such a board is needed?
General Hughes. Yes, I believe it is.
Mr. Frank. Thank you. And you think it should have then the
full powers?
General Hughes. I think it should have full powers, but it
should follow the same rules as the government officials whom
they are asking information from with regard to the
safeguarding of the--
Mr. Frank. Absolutely. Thank you.
Chairman Cox. The gentlewoman from California Ms. Harman.
Ms. Harman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. I am sorry, Ms. Harman. I did not see that
Mr. Shadegg was here. So we are going back and forth. The
gentleman from Arizona Mr. Shadegg.
Mr. Shadegg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate all of your being here, and I appreciate your
testimony. I think you have given thoughtful input to us on
which of the recommendations are most valuable and which you
have concerns about.
I have some concerns about some of them. I particularly
have concerns about the issue of whether or not a clandestine
military effort should be, in fact, handed over to the
Department of Defense. I am not certain that it isn't important
to preserve that capability within the CIA.
But the issue I want to focus you on is one that orients
itself towards human nature. The 9/11 Commission has
recommended that the current spoke-and-wheel structure of our
intelligence network where each agency cannot look at the
other's database needs to be replaced with one where each
agency can look at the other's database. While I see an
advantage to that in terms of making sure that the information
is out there for everyone to see, I am worried that human
nature will cause that to cause perhaps a diminution in the
value of the information that is put into the database.
It seems to me that human nature might cause an agency to
put on the database--I don't want to be harsh about this, but
there might be a tendency to put on there only things that were
not particularly valuable, only things that they knew everybody
else already knew, or only things that they were willing to let
others know, and if it was this key bit of information that
they wanted to take advantage of, it might not be put on the
database. Short of--when I asked the Commissioners, the two
vice chairs, cochairs, who were here earlier this question,
their response was, well, that is why we have a singular czar
overhead--I guess ``czar'' is a word not to be used--a singular
person in charge over top to lay down edicts to force that data
to be placed into the information network so that it can be
accessed by everybody.
I am interested in, since you deal with this kind of data
all the time and these kinds of incentives, your thoughts on
how we approach that problem, or perhaps it is not a legitimate
concern. We can start with whoever has strong feelings on it.
Mr. Brennan. The term ``database'' is used in different
ways by different people. You can be talking about one set of
data that is all together, that is just melded together, and
everybody has access to that big soup, or you can talk about a
database in terms of the distributed architecture where you
have connectivity between the different data holdings that
reside in different networks. And I think what the Commission
is looking for is to have some type of overall architecture
where there are connections between those different data
holdings and data networks so you can pulse them to bring up
the information.
That doesn't mean that everybody has access to everything,
because I think that would be just a disaster. You want to make
sure you maintain compartmentation for those things that need
to be compartmented, but you want to make sure you make
available to those individuals who need the information
everything that should be made available to them. So I think it
is more of an architecture as opposed to a single database.
General Hughes. I will just add that some elements of the
information should not be visible to everybody, but the essence
of the information between databases I believe should be
available generally. We should figure out a technical way to
compartment sensitive sources, methods, and other identifying
data that would give too much information to the broad user;
but the essence of the data can be somehow provided to the
larger audience. And I think that is a direction we ought to go
in.
Mr. Shadegg. Ms. Baginski, did you have--
Ms. Baginski. Very similar to my colleagues, I think the
truth of the matter is that when we each built our individual
databases, there was never any thought about their utility
outside of us. So what has happened is we have mixed things
that are legal and things that are source and method, and so
sometimes it looks to you like we are always saying no, but
really you either have an all yes or all no answer. I mean, we
haven't set these up to be flexible.
So my view is the solution is what you want to be able to
do is essentially what you do in your living room, right, or
wherever you might do your own Internet work, which is to do
federated queries across disparate databases that are
structured similarly so that they provide you results and
answer questions that you may have. And what that is going to
require is for each of us to agree to different standards, data
standards, flagging, tagging, and the separation of the source
and method so that we can provide that access, and I think--
that is where I think we are moving.
Mr. Shadegg. If you move in that direction, will there then
not be a problem with agencies withholding data from that
database which is accessible to other agencies?
Ms. Baginski. There will be less of a problem. I guess we
learn to never say never, right? But there will be less of a
problem if the sourcing material is not automatically linked to
the data. I think there will be less of a problem.
Mr. Shadegg. So one agency would be able to get the data,
but not necessarily the source of that information?
Ms. Baginski. Exactly. I mean one example is to look at
what State and local law enforcement have done for years with
things like NCIC. There is a price of admission. It is called
flagging and tagging data in certain ways, and you are able to
ask questions of it and get answers back. And I think there is
actually a lot the Intelligence Community could learn from the
law enforcement community on this one.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from California Ms. Harman.
Ms. Harman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was happy to defer
my time to a USC parent.
Chairman Cox. That makes at least three of us up here on
the panel.
Ms. Harman. I would like to welcome our panel and make a
couple of comments about several of them, whom I have known for
some years. Ambassador Black's last incarnation was as head of
the CTC at the CIA. He was there after 9/11 and before 9/11.
His response to 9/11 is, I think, an example of the response of
the hard-working men and women of the Intelligence Community,
and his response was basically to camp out in his office for
some weeks or months to make absolutely certain that he let
nothing slip. And many of us worried about his health. He knows
this. And all of us are very grateful for his dedication. And
on behalf of those in Congress who knew you then and have
watched you since, thank you very much personally for your
service, and thank you to all of the men and women of the CTC
for everything they have done and are doing.
Mr. Black. Thank you very much. You are awfully gracious. I
appreciate it.
Ms. Harman. There are others on this panel, too, Mr.
Chairman, who have done a great deal. Mr. Brennan runs a very
interesting operation. I have been there. I don't know whether
one can describe where it was or is, so I won't. But I have
been to someplace called TTIC, and one of the interesting
metaphors is that under the desks of the people that work there
are all these hard drives lined up next to each other. Those
are the stovepipes. I mean, you can visually see the fact that
we don't have an integrated database. We have had a lot of
conversation about this, and I guess we are getting there, but
it has been a very hard slog. I think everything would agree.
And to Ms. Baginski, who worked at the NSA before this,
that agency and her present agency, the FBI, have made enormous
progress. I like to say that the FBI has transitioned from the
abacus and the smoke signal in the 14th century to the late
20th century. You have only got about 5 years to go and you
will be up to date, but it has been a huge transition. So many
of us appreciate what you do.
Having said that, Mr. Chairman, we are the Homeland
Security Committee. It may be that we don't have all the
jurisdiction we need, but we are the Homeland Security
Committee. So my one question to all these witnesses is what in
your personal view is the likelihood that we will be attacked
again? What is the time frame? And if you could just tell us on
the public record to the extent you can what is the basis for
your view?
Mr. Brennan. There will be inevitable attempts, I believe,
including this year that try to carry out an attack by Al-
Qa'ida. Since we are talking about anytime, anyplace, anywhere
by Al-Qa'ida, I think Al-Qa'ida will succeed in penetrating
certain security defenses whether it be overseas, potentially
here in North America and the United States. I think that the
Bureau, the Agency, Department of Homeland Security, have done
a tremendous job as far as making this a very inhospitable
environment.
Ms. Harman. I appreciate, that Mr. Brennan, but I asked you
what the likelihood is that we will be attacked, and I mean in
the homeland, again; not what you have done to protect it--
Mr. Brennan. Ever by any transnational group, I think it is
probably inevitable that at some point in the future there will
be a transnational terrorist attack here in the United States.
Ms. Harman. Others?
Mr. Black. I think the use of the word ``inevitable'' is
good. I think from a standpoint of counterterrorism, we must
consider it to be probable unless we work against in that
process--we reduce the threat as much as possible to defeat
them and, should they become successful, minimize the damage as
much as possible.
General Hughes. I don't think it is inevitable at all. I
personally believe that we can succeed against the terrorists,
and we are so far doing that.
Ms. Harman. Ms. Baginski.
Ms. Baginski. I think Cofer said it the best. I think it is
probable, and we are doing the best we can to make it
inhospitable, but I do think it is likely.
Ms. Harman. I agree. I think it is likely, and I think the
time frame is short, and I think the need to act is urgent, and
I certainly hope that this committee gets real jurisdiction and
that this Congress gets it and we move ahead on very careful
recommendations to provide us the kind of interoperable
communications and information sharing that are absolutely
critical to making us aware of a threat in advance and
hopefully preventing the next attack.
Thank you all. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. The gentleman from Maryland Mr. Cardin.
Mr. Cardin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me ask also thank our witnesses not only for their
testimony today--this has been a long hearing--but for your
service to our country. And what Ms. Harman said I would just
like to underscore, particularly to the men and women who work
in your agencies day in and day out at a great personal
sacrifice under very difficult circumstances. If you would
express our appreciation to the type of work they are doing for
our country, I think every member of the committee would
appreciate that.
Many of the areas that I was interested in inquiring have
been asked, so I want to spend my time on one area that has
been continuously brought to my attention by local law
enforcement. I hear over and over again that, yes, things are
much better than they were before September 11; however, it is
still not where it should be. And part of it, they believe, is
the culture of a resistance to consider local law enforcement
full partners in the war against terrorism, and that there is
not a view that there is really a willingness to totally share
information, although they know under the current scrutinies
that they will get access to some information.
So I really want you to go through for me where we are in
this. If I am a detective in a Palmer City Police Department,
and I am working on an investigation perhaps unrelated to
terrorism, but I have reason to believe that there may be some
connection to terrorist organizations, what do I have to go
through in order to complete my investigation to make sure that
there is not a terrorist contact here? Can I get the type of
access to all the information I need, or do I have to send this
to a third party, go through my Joint Terrorism Task Force?
What have I got to do in order to be able to fully access in a
realistic time frame to complete my investigation?
Ms. Baginski. I think you have raised a very, very
important point, so let me be the first to say I think we have
a lot of work to do. I think there are three dimensions, but
the most inhibiting is the technology dimension, and that is
the actual connection of our various systems, the State and
local systems, the systems at the JTTFs. They are, in fact,
different, and we do have plans to actually work on that.
I think there is a cultural issue. My personal belief is
that initiatives like the global--the criminal intelligence
information-sharing plan that I am sure you have heard of is
the notion that in terms of State and local, we have to allow
State and local to lead and to dictate State and local needs as
opposed to sort of coming in there like Big Brother and saying,
we will tell you when you need to know something. So there is
an interaction that needs to occur that has our State and local
and tribal partners sitting at the table as a full partner
expressing their needs from the Federal family. That is
actually--I am watching that develop in certain areas, and I am
actually fairly encouraged by that. And the day-to-day
operational level, what would have to happen for us to resolve
the issue I think you laid out is if there were some suspicion,
it would be into the JTTF, and the answer to the question would
come from the JTTF, and I think what you are suggesting is that
might not be the most efficient way to get the information.
Mr. Cardin. Exactly. I understand that. And our Joint
Terrorism Task Force is working, I think, very effectively, and
I am very pleased by the way it is working. But to expect that
a first responder needs to go through another layer of
bureaucracy when they already are pressed for time and time
might be of the essence, and then they have to fight with the
priorities within the Joint Terrorism Task Force, I am not sure
that is the most efficient or the best way for that information
to be handled. Again, I think there is a view among the first
responders that there is not really a trust in letting them
have access to the type of information they need.
Ms. Baginski. I can honestly tell you it is not a trust. It
is not malice. It is incompetence perhaps sometimes or
ineffective execution, and it definitely is not helped by a
very difficult information technology issue.
Mr. Cardin. On the technology point, let me point out that
under our current system, of course, almost all of the funding
has to go through the State. Now, our State, again, is working
very carefully with local governments, but there are many local
governments, and we don't always get the same degree of
attention to the technology compatibilities for local law
enforcement dealing directly with Federal agencies because it
needs to go through the State as far as approval process is
concerned. One of the issues came out again with the 9/11
Commission's recommendations on the funding issues, I think,
also may play into making it a more cost-effective way for
local law enforcement to access this information.
Ms. Baginski. From our perspective, getting the Federal
family sort of information act in order is job one so that we
can interoperate with the State and local and tribal families
systems, which they actually must have a voice in and lead in.
We cannot be dictating hardware and software and business
process to them. It is not effective.
Mr. Cardin. Thank you very.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Cox. I thank the gentleman.
We have two Members who have not yet had the opportunity to
question the panel, and with the indulgence of the panel, I
know we are keeping you here an awfully long time, but if you
will bear with us, I will give every Member here the
opportunity to put questions.
The Chair recognizes the gentlelady from New York, Mrs.
Lowey.
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to add my
appreciation to the panel for spending so much time with us
here today.
Mr. Brennan, I wanted to follow up on a couple of things
that were said. Lee Hamilton was here earlier, as you know, and
he said TTIC is the right concept, but needs to be
strengthened. And then in your presentation you said the model
of the 9/11 Commission is not workable. You also referenced the
memo of 2003 where you said there was an encouragement of
cooperation and sharing of information, and in further remarks
you said that that is improving. Then there was some discussion
about upgrading computer technology and how it is so very
essential.
What I am trying to understand is can TTIC and all the
other agencies which you coordinate do the job that is
recommended by the 9/11 Commission? What will be different by
the institution of the NCTC if all the agencies are already
willing to share and there isn't some embedded, shall we say,
determination not to share? Why couldn't it be done right now
with TTIC?
Along with that, I am concerned, and I would appreciate it
if Mr. Brennan or each of you could answer, are there enough
good intelligence people around? How do we encourage more
people to enter the field? Should we be doing more training? I
believe it is estimated that the new recommended agency will
require over 100 new personnel.
So back perhaps to Mr. Brennan, given the fact that Lee
Hamilton and the Governor both said that the concept is based
on TTIC, from your perspective why can't you accomplish the
goals of the new recommended agency? Is it that there isn't an
adequate directive from on high? Is it that you haven't been
given the authority on high? Is it that the President, as the
Markle Foundation has stated, has to have a direct connection
to this agency in order to make it succeed?
So perhaps I am throwing several questions, but after
listening here all day, I am trying to understand whether it is
structure or personnel, whether it is practice or it is policy,
or whether it is inadequate directives? Why can't you do the
job? I mean that seriously, obviously.
Mr. Brennan. First of all, when I made reference before to
the model of the 9/11 Commission not being workable, that was
the reference to the overall reform of the Intelligence
Community, the National Intelligence Director, and the diagram
that is on page 14 of their Commission report. That is what I
said is not workable, and General Hughes did a good job of
explaining some of the concerns that we have with that.
As far as the National Counterterrorism Center itself, the
concept that is put forward by the 9/11 Commission, again, it
calls for two things differently--two things that the NCTC
would do that TTIC does not necessarily do. First is the joint
operational planning, and second is net assessments, taking the
threat and basing it against the vulnerabilities of a target.
Mrs. Lowey. Why don't you do that, and could you do it?
Mr. Brennan. We can do anything that we are directed to do
and we get the appropriate resources to do. Right now what the
arrangement is within the Federal Government is that in the
Department of Homeland Security there is the Information
Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate that this
committee was instrumental in setting up. The infrastructure
protection element has the responsibility for assessing the
vulnerabilities of U.S. critical infrastructure--
Mrs. Lowey. Should it be there, or should it be in TTIC?
Mr. Brennan. Right now it is there by statute, and what we
do is we work very closely with the Department of Homeland
Security so that the information is shared back and forth.
There is a lot of work that needs to be done on the
information protection side in terms of identifying those
targets, assessing what the potential vulnerabilities are and
what weaknesses that the terrorists could exploit. So what we
are trying to do, I think, with this National Counterterrorism
Center is try to identify all the responsibilities that need to
be carried out and then have the right framework that can
fulfill them.
Mrs. Lowey. I don't mean to cut you off, but I see the
yellow on. I just want to say I am a New Yorker. I lost
hundreds of constituents on 9/11. It is 3 years later that we
are still getting organized and the Department of Homeland
Security is still getting organized. Although I believe we have
to act expeditiously to implement the recommendations, I wonder
if some of these recommendations couldn't be implemented by
personnel or different personnel or additional personnel at the
current structures. And I think this is a very important
discussion, and it is unfortunate that my red light is on.
The Chairman is not paying attention, so you can respond.
Mr. Brennan. Just a quick comment on that. I think the
secret is that a lot of the recommendations included in here
are already being implemented. A lot of work has gone on as far
as information sharing and making structural change. So there
is still more work to be done, but a lot of things that are
entrained already will, in fact, give us a lot of things that
are called for in here.
I am not opposing the idea of intelligence transformation.
I am one of the biggest advocates of it, in fact a maverick
within my own home organization, but I think there have been a
number of things that have been done. We represent here on the
panel TTIC, the Office of Intelligence, and the IAIP, a clear
manifestation of all the changes that have taken place. So what
they are calling for here is a continued sort of strategic path
that we need to be on, but a lot of things that are called for
here are already done.
Mrs. Lowey. Mr. Brennan, just in conclusion, with the
indulgence of the Chair, I read it a little differently, and as
a New Yorker, when I hear from several people on this panel
that another attack is imminent, we don't have the luxury, and
I keep asking why the current structure can't move more
quickly, and why we keep creating bigger structures, and where
are we going to get all those people to fill those positions?
And this is probably another hour conversation. So I just wish
you good luck, and I hope that you move to implement these
plans, frankly, before another attack, and I hope that you take
an aggressive role in reporting to somebody that they had
better take action on recommendations that don't need structure
changes, such as having airport workers, all of them who are
going into a sterile secure area, go through a metal detector.
There are things that have to be done now, and I, frankly,
representing my constituents, am quite worried that we are not
doing the obvious. So at the same time I want to thank you, but
I hope that will speed up the normal pace of the bureaucracy
and make us all safer now, and, as Mr. Hughes said, hopefully
avoid another attack. Thank you very much.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady from the District of Columbia.
Ms. Norton. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I apologize to the
witnesses. Just as it came my time to speak, I was called away
on a matter that I will take as a kind of case in point. I am
working with security officials of the Capitol and of the
District of Columbia concerning the present orange alert and
its effects around this Capitol and on this city. And I take it
as a case in point, and my question is really based on what
amounts to a case study on how much integration is occurring
and how it is implemented in the field. In a real sense it may
be the best evidence.
I have now had two meetings with security officials in the
Senate, the House, the District of Columbia. One of the first
agreements we reached, I think, would astound the public. We
reached agreement that the executive branch, the congressional
branch, and District of Columbia security officials would
develop a citywide plan for protecting the Nation's Capital.
That means there was none, gentlemen. What we had and what we
have had and what was all too clear following this orange alert
is that the executive moved to do what it believed was
appropriate, the congressional officials moved quickly and with
astounding reaction, and the city believes overreaction, and
they moved in very different ways.
And this is why I want to put the question to you, for
example, Mr. Hughes, is the information analysis and
infrastructure protection at the Department of Homeland
Security, they moved in very different ways. This is right here
in the Nation's Capital where I would think that attention and
planning and integration of threats and how to respond would be
at their best. They moved in very different ways. The executive
along 15th Street where the Treasury Department is, a few
blocks from the IMF and the World Bank, moved obviously with--
first of all, there was some consultation with the District of
Columbia. There was almost none on the congressional side--with
some calculation of risk in deciding what to do. Already trucks
don't go up 17th Street, so virtually nothing was done on 17th
Street. 15th Street is where the Treasury Department is. What
they did on 15th Street was to decide to close the sidewalk on
the Treasury Department side of 15th Street. It makes good
sense to us; some inconvenience to walk on the other side of
the street, but be my guest. They may be doing what they have
been doing all along, some randomizing of trucks and larger
vehicles, but they calculated that you had to continue to have
traffic up 15th Street unless the risk was so great that you
wanted to take more severe actions. It is the kind of sensible,
but we think assessment--somebody was doing some analysis.
Somebody was thinking through all of the factors that had to be
considered.
Go to the other side of town, further away from at least
the targeted threat, but certainly a place where you would
better take some action. One of the reasons why you would
better take some action is that terrorists know enough how to
play chess rather than checkers and how to move around what
they are going to do. So if there is a threat on one side of
town, they will ride on this side of town to begin to take
action.
But the action was very different from the action taken
closer to the threat. The Treasury Department is closer to the
IMF, is closer to the World Bank and is arguably more related
to those institutions than we are, at least as related. No
check points on that side of town. The only reason this city
isn't closed down is because it is August, and nobody is here
but you all and the few of us who are left. No closing of
streets.
This is anathema to any big city, absolutely anathema, and
the one thing the city will not tolerate is the last-resort
measure that you would expect on a red alert, a closing down of
a street leading to the major transportation hub of the
District of Columbia, Union Station, rail, Metro, light rail,
the whole kit and caboodle. You can't get there from there; the
streets to that hub already closed down, the next street down,
which is the Senate street, closed down. You have got to go all
the way back up and get down. This is not a matter of
convenience. We had to even have consultation on making sure
emergency vehicles, fire, police, EMS, could get through.
I mean, this is a case study, gentlemen, it seems to me, in
whether or not there is any integration of terrorist threat
going on and any analysis of response is occurring from the
absence of a plan to what appeared to be kind of seat-of-your-
pants reactions.
I have to ask you what is your role here? Do you have any
relationship to the people on the ground? Is your threat
analysis conveyed in such a way that Federal officials on the
ground have some basis to take reasonable and coordinative
action related to the threat that has been identified? And I
would like to know the role of your agency in that regard,
particularly here in the Nation's Capital where it seems to me
it would be paramount.
General Hughes. I will start by saying that the Department
of Homeland Security gives advice and assistance in these
matters. We also provide threat information, and in this case
we did provide threat information directly to the many
officials involved. There are quite a few.
As you know, this is a somewhat complex jurisdictional
issue here in the District of Columbia and the two States that
encompass it, Maryland and Virginia. We try to inform everyone
involved, and in this case it may not have been a perfect job,
but we did the best we could at the time. I have to say that
the actions, the decisions and actions, are left to local
authorities. In this case that would be both--
Ms. Norton. I am quite aware of that. That is not my
question. I know who did it. I am not accusing you of doing it.
I am trying to find out whether or not the nature of the
analysis of the threat as conveyed to the people on the ground
is such that they are doing anything but acting in an ad hoc
and uncoordinated manner. And my question really isn't meant to
be recriminatory to you. I am just trying to make a link here
to an actual case in point because I think we might learn from
it.
And by the way, if I may say so, we are the one
jurisdiction that does have a coordinator. It is in the
statute. So if anything, it is easier here than it would be
elsewhere because there is a paid coordinator who is in the
Office of the Secretary himself precisely because this is the
Nation's Capital, and yet this is what has happened here only
within the last 2 weeks.
General Hughes. The answer in this case is that the threat
information regarding the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank buildings were communicated directly to appropriate
authorities here in Washington, DC.
Ms. Norton. Does anybody else have anything to say about
the relationship between the analysis and how those on the
ground who are not experts at analysis and therefore have to
depend upon the analysts, about that link which is the link I
am trying to get at?
Ms. Baginski. Yes, ma'am. General Hughes and my
organization have, in fact, done a series of joint advisories
and bulletins for State and local authorities to share as much
specificity as we can about the nature of this particular
threat that would allow them to take countermeasures. So in
this case we have a unique situation in that we have detail. I
think the frustration in other cases is there is that lack of
specificity to begin with, there isn't a lot of detail, and so
the analysis that you can do on an isolated threat is--
Ms. Norton. But I congratulate you that for the first time
you really did have, and we are all grateful for the fact that
you had, the most specific information we have had since 9/11,
and yet we see this seat of your pants all over the city, do as
you care to do without much guidance in the analysis of the
threat from somebody who knew more than they knew. That is my--
that is what I am focusing on.
Ms. Baginski. We actually think that we did provide this
analysis, but I think it is worth our going back and taking a
look at it for you.
Ms. Norton. I would appreciate it.
Chairman Cox. The gentlelady's time has expired. Each
member of the committee having had the opportunity to ask
questions of this panel, I want to at last excuse you long
after our intended departure time. I know that several of you
had to in real time change your schedules today. I know what is
going down at the White House concurrently, and we very much
appreciate your being with us here for such a long period of
time here today.
At this point I would yield to the Ranking Member.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I, too, want to thank
the witnesses for your patience and indulgence today. We had
obviously such a broad scope of issues to delve into, I am sure
we could spend many more hours on these subjects, and I hope we
will, in fact. And I want to thank each of you for your
dedication, for your service and your commitment to making
America safe.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Will Mr. Turner yield for a question,
please?
Mr. Turner. Yes, I will yield.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I heard Mr. Frank's questioning regarding
the peace activists and others. I would appreciate it if the
same responses or written answers that you might give to him
that you would forward to me as well.
And also I wanted to make sure that the questions dealing
with the power of the board governing civil liberties, if you
were going to give written answers, if you will include me as
well. I know you might be giving them to the committee. I
wasn't sure, and I wanted to make sure that those questions
came in. Thank you.
Ms. Baginski. Yes, ma'am.
Mr. Turner. It would be helpful if you would just send that
to all members of the committee.
Ms. Baginski. We will.
Chairman Cox. I thank the gentleman.
Again, I thank each of our witnesses for your valuable
testimony. The members of the committee may have some
additional questions, as Ms. Jackson-Lee indicated. We would
ask you to respond to these in writing. The hearing record will
be held open for this purpose for 10 days.
[The information follows:]
FOR THE RECORD
Questions and Responses for the Record
Questions from the Honorable John Sweeney for Ms. Maureen Baginski
1. Does the FBI have real time secure digital communication networks
capable of handling Top Secret SCI level information connected to all
84 JTTFs?
Response: The FBI is connected to the rest of the United States
Intelligence Community (USIC) at the Top Secret Sensitive Compartmented
Information (SCI) level via the new SCI Operational Network (SCION).
SCION is currently available to over 1,000 users at FBI Headquarters
(FBIHQ). The FBI has initiated a pilot project whereby SCION will be
deployed to the FBI's Field Offices in New York, Boston, and Kansas
City, with plans to deliver SCION to all FBI Field Offices as funding
becomes available. While in most Field Offices there are two
Intelligence Information System Network (IISNET) workstations, which
permit communications to the USIC's Intelink system, these are
difficult to use and are housed in small SCI Facilities (SCIFs) that
are not located near the IISNET users. An impediment to field expansion
of SCION is the current lack of SCIF space for Field Intelligence Group
and Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) personnel, who are the most
likely users. Currently, SCION is available to six of the 100 JTTFs.
2. Will the Integrated Data Warehouse be fully functional and available
to state and local analysts by the end of December as Director Mueller
promised?
Response: Yes. The Integrated Data Warehouse (IDW) is currently fully
functional with approximately 6,000 users, including approximately
2,500 users in state and local law enforcement and numerous federal
government agencies. Although IDW can only be accessed from the FBI's
internal network, it is available to users in all Field Intelligence
Groups (FIGs) and all JTTFs and, through these users, IDW is available
to the thousands of federal, state, and local officials assigned to
these entities. IDW contains more than 30 million FBI terrorism-related
documents and bi11ions of database records relevant to counterterrorism
and intelligence.
Questions from the Honorable Edward J. Markey
3. On page 380 of the Commission's report, the Commission recommended
that ``The United States should engage its friends to develop a common
coalition approach toward the detention and humane treatment of
captured terrorists.'' (emphasis added) The Commission further
recommends that these ``new principles might draw upon Article 3 of the
Geneva Conventions on the law of armed conflict'' which notes ``was
specifically designed for those cases in which the usual laws of war
did not apply'' and is generall accepted throughout the world as
customary international law.
As you know, Article 3 deals with conflicts that are not of an
international character, such as civil wars, and it includes a specific
prohibition on ``violence to life and person, in particular murder of
all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture'' and ``outrages
upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading
treatment.''
Can I conclude, based on these passages in its report, that the
Commission is recommending that captured terrorists should be afforded
these types of protections--protections against murder, mutilation,
torture and degrading treatment?
Response: The FBI respectfully defers to the 9/11 Commission regarding
the recommendations contained in the Commission's report. With regard
to the FBI's participation in the interrogation of terrorists outside
the United States, FBI agents deployed outside the United States in
connection with the war on terrorism have been directed not to
participate in the use of interrogation techniques that would not be
permissible if used within the United States.
4. There is another Convention that the Commission did not specifically
mention in its report--the UN Convention Against Torture. The U.S. is a
signatory to that Convention. Article 3 of the Torture Convention
provides that ``no state party shall expel, return, or extradite a
person to another State where there are substantial grounds for
believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.''
Do you also believe that the U.S. should follow this prohibition in
dealing with captured terrorist suspects?
Response: It is my understanding that it is the policy of the United
States to comply with the United States' obligations under the
Convention Against Torture.
5. The Bush Administration unfortunately appears to be pursuing
policies that are inconsistent with the Commission's recommendation.
Specifically, instead of ensuring that the prisoners captured are
treated humanely, the Administration continues to practice a process
called ``rendition,'' in which it sends suspected terrorists to be
interrogated in third countries. such as Syria or Saudi Arabia. that
our government has determined, within the context of the State
Department's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. are known to
practice torture. This practice is very difficult to reconcile with
President Bush's own declaration, following the exposure of abuse at
the Abu Ghraib prison, that: ``We do not condone torture. I have never
ordered torture. I will never order torture. The values of this country
are such that torture is not a part of our soul and our being.''
Perhaps there are some who would argue that as long as we ask
others to do the torturing for us, the U.S. is not, strictly speaking,
doing the torturing.
Do you agree that if we are to realize the Commission's goal of
having the U.S. serve as an example of moral leadership in the world,
we should renounce the policy of rendition, which amounts to
``outsourcing torture''?
Response: Your question assumes a number of facts that do not involve
the FBI. The FBI respectfully defers to entities in the Executive
Branch in a better position to respond.
6. If we are to ``develop a common coalition approach toward the
detention and humane treatment of captured terrorists''--as the
Commission has recommended, do you agree that the U.S. should comply
with Article 3 of the Torture Convention and train our service men and
women so they understand what is required to comply with Article 3?
Response: It is my understanding that it is the policy of the United
States to comply with the United States' obligations under the
Convention Against Torture.
7. I have recently introduced H.R. 4674, a bill to stop the rendition
to countries that torture prisoners. My bill has been endorsed by
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the World Organization for
Human Rights, USA, and the New York Bar Association.
Do you think it would be consistent with the Commission's
recommendations regarding torture for the Congress to enact this type
of bill into law?
Response: The FBI defers to other, more directly concerned parties
regarding this question.
Chairman Cox. I would like to thank all the members of this
committee as well as the witnesses on the first panel, the
Chairman and Vice Chairman of the 9/11 Commission for an
extraordinary piece of business today which required Members to
travel from all over the country to be here, and in some cases
from other countries.
There being no further business before the committee today,
committee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:15 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]