As we noted in GAO’s strategic plan, the United States and other nations face increasingly diffuse threats. In the future, potential adversaries are more likely to strike vulnerable civilian or military targets in nontraditional ways to avoid direct confrontation with our military forces on the battlefield. The President’s December 2000 national security strategy states that porous borders, rapid technological change, greater information flow, and the destructive power of weapons now within the reach of small states, groups, and individuals make such threats more viable and endanger our values, way of life, and the personal security of our citizens. Hostile nations, terrorist groups, transnational criminals, and even individuals may target American people, institutions, and infrastructure with weapons of mass destruction and outbreaks of infectious disease. They may attempt to disrupt or destroy our information systems through cyber warfare. International criminal activities such as money laundering, arms smuggling, and drug trafficking can undermine the stability of social and financial institutions and the health of our citizens. As we witnessed in the tragic events of last week, some of the emerging threats can produce mass casualties. Others can lead to mass disruption of critical infrastructure and can hold serious implications for both our domestic and the global economy, as we saw when the New York Stock Exchange re- opened for trading this past Monday and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell more than 600 points. Terrorist attacks also could compromise the integrity or delivery of water or electricity to our citizens, compromise the safety of the traveling public, and undermine the soundness of government and commercial data systems supporting a myriad of activities. A basic and fundamental role of the government under our Constitution is to protect America from both foreign and domestic threats. The government must be able to prevent and deter threats to our homeland as well as detect impending danger before attacks or incidents occur. However, it may not be possible to prevent, deter, and detect every threat, so steps should be taken to harden potential targets. We also must be ready to manage the crises and consequences of an event, to treat casualties, reconstitute damaged infrastructure, and move the nation forward. Finally, the government must be prepared to retaliate against the responsible parties in the event of an attack. Now I would like to turn to what the government could do to make our homeland more secure. First, I will discuss the need for clearly defined and effective leadership with a clear vision of what needs to be accomplished. Second, I will address the need for a coordinated national strategy and comprehensive threat assessment. Yesterday, we issued a report that discusses challenges confronting policymakers in the war on terrorism and offered a series of recommendations. One of these recommendations is that the government needs more clearly defined and effective leadership to develop a strategy for combating terrorism, to oversee development of a new national threat and risk assessment, and to coordinate implementation among federal agencies. Similar leadership also is needed to address the broader issue of homeland security. Specifically, a national focal point will be critical to articulate a vision for ensuring the security of the American homeland and to develop and implement a strategy to realize that vision. The entity that functions as the focal point should be dedicated to this function. In addition, the person who heads this entity should be dedicated full-time to this effort and consideration should be given to a term appointment in order to enhance continuity. In testimony on March 27, 2001, we stated that overall leadership and management efforts to combat terrorism are fragmented because there is no single focal point managing and overseeing the many functions conducted by more than 40 different federal departments and agencies.Also, our past work in combating terrorism has shown that the multitude of federal programs requires focus and attention to minimize redundancy of effort and eliminate confusion within the federal government and at the state and local level. Homeland security will rely on the concerted efforts of scores of agencies, which may exceed the number in the fight against terrorism. Consequently, the need for overall leadership is even more critical. At present, we do not have a national strategy specifically for ensuring homeland security. Thus, the strategy must establish the parameters of homeland security and contain explicit goals and objectives. It will need to be developed in partnership with Congress, the executive branch, state and local governments, and the private sector (which owns much of the critical infrastructure that can be targeted). Without such a strategy, efforts may be fragmented and cause confusion, duplication of effort, and ineffective alignment of resources with strategic goals. Consequently, clarifying the roles and responsibilities of the various levels of government and the private sector will be a critical function for the entity that is given oversight responsibility for homeland security efforts. The United States does not have a national threat and risk assessment to help guide federal programs for homeland security. A threat and risk assessment is a decision-making tool that helps to define the threats, to evaluate the associated risk, and to link requirements to program investments. In our March 2001 testimony on combating terrorism, we stated that an important first step in developing a strategy for combating terrorism is to conduct a national threat and risk assessment to define and prioritize requirements.. Combating terrorism is a major component of homeland security, but it is not the only one. It is essential that a national threat and risk assessment be undertaken that will address the full range of threats to the homeland. Results from hearings and other studies also underscore the importance of a national threat and risk assessment. For example, in a July 2001 letter to the vice president from several senators, the senators stated that federal programs to combat domestic terrorism are being initiated and expanded without the benefit of a sound national threat and risk assessment process. In a May 2001 Center for Strategic and International Studies’ report on homeland defense, the authors stated that an annual threat assessment would provide federal planners with the basis for assessing the emerging risk of attacks and developing an integrated analysis structure for planning. We recognize that a national-level threat and risk assessment will not be a panacea for all the problems in providing homeland security. However, we believe that such a national threat and risk assessment could provide a framework for action and facilitate multidisciplinary and multi- organizational participation in planning, developing, and implementing programs to enhance the security of our homeland. Given the tragic events of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, a comprehensive national-level threat and risk assessment that addresses all threats has become an urgent imperative. Now, I would like to discuss some elements that may need to be included in the development of the national strategy and a means to assign roles to federal, state, and local governments and the private sector. Three essential elements provide a basis for developing a national strategy: a risk assessment, vulnerability analysis, and infrastructure criticality analysis. This approach, developed by the Department of Defense for its antiterrorism program, could be an instructive model in developing a homeland security strategy. First, our nation must thoroughly assess the threats posed by nations, groups, or individuals and, to the extent possible, eliminate or reduce the threat. Second, we have to identify the vulnerabilities and weaknesses that exist in our infrastructure, operations, planning, and exercises and then identify steps to mitigate those risks. Third, we must assure our ability to respond to and mitigate the consequences of an attack. Given time and resource limitations, we must identify the most critical aspects of our infrastructure and operations that require the most immediate attention. Our strategy, to be comprehensive in nature, should include steps designed to reduce our vulnerability to threats, for example, by hardening targets to minimize the damage from an attack; use intelligence assets to identify threats; stop attacks before they occur; and manage the consequences of an incident. In addition, the strategy should incorporate mechanisms to assess resource utilization and program performance as well as provide for training, exercises, and equipment to respond to tragic events such as those that occurred last week. Because we may not be able to eliminate all vulnerabilities within our borders, prevent all threat activity, or be completely prepared to respond to all incidents, our strategy should focus finite national resources on areas of greatest need. Once a strategy is developed, all levels of government and the private sector will need to understand and prepare for their defined roles under the strategy. While the federal government can assign roles to federal agencies under the strategy, it will need to reach consensus with the other levels of government and with the private sector on their roles. In the 1990s, the world was concerned about the potential for computer failures at the start of the new millennium, an issue that came to be known as Y2K. The Y2K task force approach may offer a model for developing the public-private partnerships necessary under a comprehensive homeland security strategy. A massive mobilization with federal government leadership was undertaken in connection with Y2K which included partnerships with the private sector and international governments and effective communication to implement any needed corrections. The value of federal leadership, oversight, and partnerships was repeatedly cited as a key to success in addressing Y2K issues at a Lessons Learned summit held last year. Developing a homeland security plan may require a similar level of leadership, oversight, and partnerships with nearly every segment of American society—including individual U.S. citizens—as well as with the international community. In addition, as in the case of our Y2K efforts, Congress needs to take an active, ongoing, and crosscutting approach to oversight in connection with the design and implementation of the homeland security strategy. We at GAO have completed several congressionally requested efforts on numerous topics related to homeland security. I would like to briefly summarize some of the work that we have done in the areas of combating terrorism, aviation security, transnational crime, protection of critical infrastructure, and public health. Given concerns about the preparedness of the federal government and state and local emergency responders to cope with a large-scale terrorist attack involving the use of weapons of mass destruction, we have reviewed the plans, policies, and programs for combating domestic terrorism involving weapons of mass destruction. Our report, Combating Terrorism: Selected Challenges and Related Recommendations, was issued yesterday and updates our extensive evaluations in recent years of federal programs to combat domestic terrorism and protect critical infrastructure.