Recalibrating Homeland Security: Mobilizing American Society to Prepare for Disaster
![handle is hein.journals/fora90 and id is 536 raw text is: Recalibrating
Homeland Security
Mobilizing American
Society to Prepare for Disaster
Stephen Flynn
THE UNITED STATEs has made a mess of homeland security. This
is hardly surprising. The policymakers responsible for developing
homeland security policy in the wake of September 11, 2001, did so
under extraordinary conditions and with few guideposts. The Bush
administration's emphasis on combating terrorism overseas meant
that it devoted limited strategic attention to the top-down law
enforcement and border-focused efforts of the federal departments
and agencies assigned new homeland security responsibilities. President
Barack Obama has largely continued his predecessor's policies, and
congressional oversight has been haphazard. As a result, nearly a decade
after al Qaeda struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon,
Washington still lacks a coherent strategy for harnessing the nation's
best assets for managing risks to the homeland-civil society and
the private sector.
For much of its history, the United States drew on the strength
of its citizens in times of crisis, with volunteers joining fire brigades
and civilians enlisting or being drafted to fight the nation's wars.
But during the Cold War, keeping the threat of a nuclear holocaust
at bay required career military and intelligence professionals operating
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STEPH EN FLYNN is President of the Center for National Policy.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/fora90&div=53&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Recalibrating Homeland Security: Mobilizing American Society to Prepare for Disaster
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