U.S. has strategy for homeland security, but are we ready?

• Author: Farrell, Lawrence P., Jr.
• Position: PRESIDENT'S PERSPECTIVE

One big question in many people's mind is whether, despite repeated assurances from public officials, the U.S. government is really prepared to cope with these threats.

In October, the White House issued an updated "National Strategy for Homeland Security," which is intended to guide, organize and unify the nation's homeland security efforts. The strategy was meant to reflect our post-9/11 increased understanding of the threats confronting the United States and incorporates lessons learned from real-world catastrophes. The strategy recognizes formally that similar skills, organization, resources, planning and response are the same for both natural disasters and security-related events. It notes the need to unify and coordinate resources at federal, state and local levels. The strategy recognizes the burden falling on those who will be first on the scene, local first responders.

The notion of a nationally unified effort toward homeland defense indeed is a tall order that deserves full attention.

But many unanswered questions remain as to how this new strategy will actually help in the event of a catastrophe. One major concern is whether all levels of government--federal, state and local first responders--are fully resourced to accomplish the goals set forth in the strategy.

The issue of resources is not just money but training, preparedness, coordinated planning, and the actual joint exercising of plans by all who have a responsibility to respond. Peter Verga, deputy assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense and America's security affairs, noted during a speech to an NDIA executive breakfast that most federal agencies other than the Defense Department and the Department of Homeland Security are unprepared to do their part in the event of a catastrophic terrorist attack or a natural disaster.

If a dirty bomb went off in a U.S. city, the Department of Health and Human Services or Environmental Protection Agency, for example, should be expected to perform certain functions, Vergas said. "Typically what happens is people just say, 'well, we'll do what we do and the Defense Department will do everything else,' and we find that not particularly helpful."

Vergas' boss, Assistant Secretary Paul McHale, highlighted serious weaknesses in the federal response to California's wildfires last fall.

Speaking to NDIA's Coast Guam symposium in New Orleans, McHale said the government should be able to respond to multiple simultaneous disasters, such...