The December 2020 Special COVID Issue of Homeland Security Affairs features eleven essays which chronicle agency and jurisdictional responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and the lessons learned thus far. The essays focus on how agencies or jurisdictions changed their operations to deal more effectively with the pandemic, as well as how the conditions of the…
Warnings Unheeded, Again: What the Intelligence Lessons of 9/11 Tell Us about the Coronavirus Today
By Erik Dahl Abstract This article argues that the coronavirus pandemic represents a global intelligence failure on the part of the traditional intelligence community as well as the national and international medical intelligence and surveillance systems designed to detect and prevent outbreaks just such as this one. Comparing these failures with intelligence failures of the…
COVID-19 Effects and Russian Disinformation Campaigns
By Wesley R. Moy and Kacper Gradon Abstract The effects of the novel coronavirus and its related disease COVID-19 have been far reaching, touching American society and its Western partners’ health and mortality, economics, social relationships, and politics. The effects have highlighted longstanding societal divisions, disproportionately harming minority groups and the socioeconomically disadvantaged with Black…
COVID-19: Public Health, Privacy, and Law Enforcement, A Precarious Balancing Act
By Christopher Whiting Abstract In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the health community faces the delicate balancing act of preserving public health by containing the outbreak, while at the same time insuring that individual health information remains protected. Playing critical roles in both areas during the COVID-19 outbreak are communicable disease reporting systems. Unfortunately,…
Pennsylvania’s COVID-19 Response vs. Homeland Security Frameworks and Research: Masking the Whole Community
By Alexander Siedschlag Abstract This essay offers an intermediate discussion of select policy, strategic, operational, and tactical issues that demonstrate where and how the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s novel coronavirus response on the one hand, and homeland security frameworks and research on the other, converge or—more often so—diverge, and how to narrow this gap. Although typically…
The Role of Elected Executives in Pandemic Response: Reflections from Salt Lake County
By David Schuld Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic rages on across the country, with many areas feeling pressure due to the length of the virus’ wrath and the associated fatigue of response for all members of the community. As communities look to winter months, where their residents and businesses begin to move indoors, and the threat…
Toward a Science-Based Management Approach to Stealth Threats: A Case Study Using The Novel Coronavirus
By Thomas J. Mackin Abstract The modest early stage impact of slow-moving threats makes it easy to underestimate their impact. These threats grow and evolve unnoticed until reaching dramatic impacts in both scope and scale. Since slow-moving threats can grow to catastrophic magnitudes that threaten our very survival, they are more aptly identified as ‘stealth…
Pandemic Policy and the Logistics of COVID-19 Mass Vaccination
By Thomas Russo Abstract The sudden emergence of the H1N1 Pandemic in 2009 tested the nation’s pandemic plans. It was learned that the nation did not have a well-defined, tested and reliable twenty-first century vaccine distribution system. The existing planning model, the public health model of the 1950s and 1960s served as the basis for…
Two Transformations In, USCIS Confronts Further Change in Post-Pandemic Future
By Michael S. Locke Abstract The Covid-19 pandemic both upended the day-to-day workings of U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) and presented an opportunity to reexamine where policy and practice impede future productivity. The agency has already undertaken two transformations in the first two decades of this century, to varying success: its reestablishment as an…
Wearables: Useful Sentinels of Our Health?
By Matthew S. Austin Abstract As U.S. Coast Guard units develop strategies and policies aimed at safely reconstituting forces in the next phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, the ability to identify and isolate personnel who may be infected as early as possible is critical to protecting the organization’s most critical resource. Existing wearable technologies provide…
How Should The National Guard Be Employed for The Next National Disaster?
By Paul Jara “I think the best use of the Guard right now is doing what they are doing. And that is working in what we call a Title 32 status for the governors of their states and then dealing with the challenges that the governor needs them to deal with at the state and…
Book Review: A Woman’s Place: U.S. Counterterrorism Since 9/11 by Joana Cook
Reviewed by Beth Windisch Suggested Citation Windisch, Beth. Review of A Woman’s Place: U.S. Counterterrorism Since 9/11, by Joana Cook. Homeland Security Affairs 16, Article 4. hsaj.org/articles16072 In her foundational work in feminist international relations theory, Cynthia Enloe asked “Where are the Women?” 1 Joana Cook answers with her new book, A Women’s Place: U.S.…
The Case for Adaptive SOPs in Complex Crises and Unpredictable Operating Environments
By Shawn Harwood and Wayne Porter, Ph.D. Abstract Standard operating procedures (SOPs) guide emergency responders in a crisis, providing predetermined steps to manage anticipated events. Modern disasters, however, often manifest as complex systems—susceptible to nonlinear interactions and feedback in the environment that produce unanticipated outcomes. As a consequence, the application of prediction-dependent SOPs to prediction-defiant…
Assessing the Impact of the Boston CVE Pilot Program: A Developmental Evaluation Approach
By Elena Savoia, Megan McBride, Jessica Stern, Max Su, Nigel Harriman, Ajmal Aziz and Richard Legault Abstract This article describes the use of developmental evaluation as applied to countering violent extremism (CVE) programs. It discusses the application of this method to an evaluation of the Boston CVE Pilot Program, with specific attention given to two…
Border Management in Europe: Is the Paradigm Evolving?
By Nadav Morag Abstract This article focuses on the European Union’s approach to border management. The concept of border management includes not only: 1) the physical control over borders and the flow of goods and persons through ports of entry; but also 2) the management of immigration, migrant flows, and asylum request;, as well as…
Book Review: Inside the Enemy’s Computer: Identifying Cyber-Attackers by Clement Guitton
Reviewed by Mark T. Peters II, USAF, Retired Suggested Citation Peters, Mark T. Review of Inside the Enemy’s Computer: Identifying Cyber-Attackers, by Clement Guitton. Homeland Security Affairs 16, Article 2. www.hsaj.org/articles/15817 Expanding cyber-domain conflicts challenge modern strategists to create definitive attribution standards for who did what to whom, especially in developing national policy. Attribution’s importance…
Enhancing the Organization of the United States Department of Homeland Security to Account for National Risk
By Michael H. Brody Abstract The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) must enhance its organization to more fully account for, align resources against, and act on the prioritized risks of the homeland security enterprise. This will require: (1) enhanced regionalization of DHS, achieved through the networking of stakeholders within and between DHS operational regions; (2)…
Volume XV Notes from the Editor
The December 2019 issue of Homeland Security Affairs features a research article proposing a new paradigm for dealing with transnational criminal organizations (TCOs), an essay reviewing an important new book on catastrophic hurricane response, a research article which provides a premortem analysis of the security threats posed by climate change, and an essay reviewing a…
Lines, Flows and Transnational Crime: Toward a Revised Approach to Countering the Underworld of Globalization
By Alan Bersin and Lars Karlsson Abstract This article proposes a “paradigm shift” in the means and methods of combating transnational criminal activity. It contends that global illicit flows, engineered by organized crime on a massive scale alongside lawful trade and travel, represent a principal challenge to public safety and civic order. It proposes further…
Book Review: Out of the Whirlwind; Supply and Demand After Hurricane Maria by Philip J. Palin
By Kristopher Thornburg Suggested Citation Thornburg, Kristopher. Review of Out of the Whirlwind: Supply and Demand After Hurricane Maria, by Philip Palin. Homeland Security Affairs 15, Article 7. www.hsaj.org/articles/15492 The 2017 hurricane season left wide swaths of destruction across parts of the southern United States. Puerto Rico was hit the hardest, beginning with a glancing…
Climate Security: A Pre-Mortem Approach to a Sustainable Global Future
By John Comiskey and Michael Larrañaga Abstract Climate change is a viable threat to U.S. homeland security and is likely the most significant risk facing humanity. A consensus of the scientific community concludes that climate change is occurring, is relatively irreversible, and that aggressive mitigation of climate-change drivers is necessary. Climate-change impacts include surface-air temperature…
Book Review: How to Think About Homeland Security: The Imperfect Intersection of National Security and Public Safety by David H. McIntyre
by Caleb S. Cage Suggested Citation Cage, Caleb. (2019) Review of How to Think about Homeland Security: The Imperfect Intersection of National Security and Public Safety by David H. McIntyre. Homeland Security Affairs 15, Article 9. https://www.hsaj.org/articles/15587. Since its relatively recent establishment, homeland security as an organizing concept for government services has received its share…
Capability Gaps Threatening CBP’s Present and Future Operations
By Thomas P.M. Barnett Abstract Thanks to an enduring burst of domestic populism, the United States is knee-deep in a tumultuous renegotiation of its superpower relationship with the world. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) faces two possible paths: transformation or trivialization. The agency either embraces the mission-creep demanded by this moment or surrenders responsibility to…
Book Review: Spying: Assessing US Domestic Intelligence Since 9/11 By Darren E. Tromblay
By Erik Dahl Suggested Citation Dahl, Erik. (2019) Review of Spying: Assessing US Domestic Intelligence Since 9/11 by Darren E. Tromblay. Homeland Security Affairs 15, Article 4. https://www.hsaj.org/articles/15391 . This book is a welcome addition to the rather small literature on domestic and homeland intelligence in the United States. It will interest more than just…
How to Learn About Homeland Security
By Christopher Bellavita Abstract The article describes how one can begin to learn about homeland security. Starting with institutionally approved, rather than objectively-tested and validated, foundational knowledge may provide academic order, but the order is achieved at the cost of constraining prematurely what homeland security could become. The method presented in this essay starts with…
How FEMA Could Lose America’s Next Great War
Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum (If You Want Peace, Prepare for War) By H. Quinton Lucie Abstract The United States lacks a comprehensive strategy and supporting programs to support and defend the population of the United States during times of war and to mobilize, sustain and expand its defense industrial base while under attack from…
Incentivizing Cyber Security Investment in the Power Sector Using An Extended Cyber Insurance Framework
By Jack Rosson, Mason Rice, Juan Lopez, and David Fass Abstract Collaboration between the DHS Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and public- sector partners has revealed that a dearth of cyber- incident data combined with the unpredictability of cyber attacks have contributed to a shortfall in first-party cyber insurance protection in the critical infrastructure…
Defending Cities Against Nuclear Terrorism: Analysis of A Radiation Detector Network for Ground Based Traffic
By Edward Cazalas Abstract This article describes a specific, promising concept for a traffic-based radiation detector network concept deployed on roads/highways/stoplights/etc. The detector network concept is intended to help defend urban areas against nuclear attack by adversaries. The network has two potential functions: to detect and localize the covert transport of nuclear materials or weapons…
Causes & Explanations of Suicide Terrorism: A Systematic Review
By Vanessa Harmon, Edin Mujkic, Catherine Kaukinen, & Henriikka Weir Abstract The frequency of suicide terrorist attacks has increased dramatically since the year 2000, creating a renewed interest in this area of study, as well as an increase in the importance of understanding individual and organizational motivations behind engagement in suicide terrorism. The following is…
Risk-Based Performance Metrics for Critical Infrastructure Protection? A Framework for Research and Analysis
By Eric F. Taquechel & Marina Saitgalina Abstract Measuring things that do not occur, such as “deterred” or “prevented” terrorist attacks, can be difficult. Efforts to establish meaningful risk-based performance metrics and performance evaluation frameworks based on such metrics, for government agencies with counterterrorism missions, are arguably in a nascent state. However, by studying…
Learning From H.I.M. (Harvey, Irma, Maria): Preliminary Impressions for Supply Chain Resilience
By Phillip J. Palin [The observations and analysis offered reflect the author’s best judgment as of late 2017. The essay is intended to encourage more detailed research and deeper consideration.] Abstract The 2017 Atlantic hurricane season challenged critical infrastructure and key resources across a wide area. Harvey, Irma, and Maria each exposed different aspects of…
Operator Driven Policy: Deriving Action From Data Using The Quadrant Enabled Delphi (QED) Method
By Lilian Alessa, Sean Moon, David Griffith & Andrew Kliskey Abstract To close the gap in operator-driven policy for the homeland security enterprise, we argue for a bottom-up policy process that acknowledges operator knowledge and opinions. We propose a practical approach to enable policy-makers to incorporate operator knowledge and experience, or operator driven policy…
SCADA Fusion With Commercial Fission
by Matthew Horner Abstract Nuclear power plants rely on digital components, like supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) devices, to perform daily operations. These devices can contain software vulnerabilities. To address SCADA and other cyber threats, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued directives for licensed operators to submit cybersecurity plans for their facilities.…
Book Review: Illusions of Terrorism & Counter-Terrorism by Richard English
reviewed by Scott Romaniuk Suggested Citation Romaniuk, Scott. “Book Review: Illusions of Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism by Richard English (Ed.). (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015). 174pp., £40.00 (h/b), ISBN 9780197265901.” Homeland Security Affairs 14, Article 5 (April 2018). https://www.hsaj.org/articles/14313 Terrorism, counter-terrorism, and their intersection have produced painful experiences for peoples and communities in many societies.…
Defected from ISIS or Simply Returned, and for How Long?– Challenges for the West in Dealing with Returning Foreign Fighters
by Anne Speckhard, PhD., Ardian Shajkovci, PhD., & Ahmet S. Yayla, PhD. Abstract Many of the 38,000 foreign fighters ISIS has managed to attract to Syria and Iraq will return home. As increasing numbers of ISIS cadres flee the battlefield, some as defectors and others as returnees still aligned with ISIS’ goals and ideology, the challenges…
Improving Maritime Transportation Security in Response to Industry Consolidation
by Nick Monacelli Abstract Containerized cargo is the single largest security vulnerability in maritime shipping. Recent consolidation in the maritime shipping industry, along with freefalling shipping rates and increased vessel sizes, combine to cause concern for the future of containerized shipping security. Maintaining security in the maritime shipping industry is critical. Programs including the…
Book Review: Preventing and Countering Extremism and Terrorist Recruitment: A Best Practice Guide by Hanif Qadir
reviewed by Caitlin Ambrozik Suggested Citation Ambrozik, Caitlin. “Book Review: Preventing and Countering Extremism and Terrorist Recruitment: A Best Practice Guide by Hanif Qadir (Melton, Woodbridge: John Catt Educational Ltd, 2016).” Homeland Security Affairs 14, Article 3 (January 2018). https://www.hsaj.org/articles/14267 A parent logs into a child’s computer and a chat…
Cyber Border Security – Defining and Defending a National Cyber Border
by Phillip Osborn Abstract Concerns stemming from the convergence of border and cyber security threats are nothing new to those involved in both disciplines. Criminals and foreign actors have been exploiting computers and cyber methods to circumvent physical border security for decades. Today nearly every crime or homeland security threat that once required some physical…
Applying an Organizational Framework to Examine Jihadi Organizations as an Industry
by Michael Logan, Gina Ligon, and Douglas Derrick Abstract The Leadership of the Extreme and Dangerous for Innovative Results (LEADIR) project, funded by The Department of Homeland Security, Science and Technology Directorate, Office of University Programs (DHS S&T OUP) since 2010, uses an industrial and organizational psychology approach to assess the characteristics of violent extremist…
Incorporating Prioritization in Critical Infrastructure Security and Resilience Programs
by Duane Verner, Frederic Petit, and Kibaek Kim Abstract Protecting critical infrastructure, especially in a complex urban area or region, should focus on identifying and prioritizing potential failure points that would have the most severe consequences. Such prioritization can inform targeted planning and investment decisions, such as what infrastructure should be hardened or relocated first…
A Right-Brained Approach to Critical Infrastructure Protection Theory in support of Strategy and Education: Deterrence, Networks, Resilience, and “Antifragility”
By Eric F. Taquechel and Ted G. Lewis Abstract How is the theory behind critical infrastructure/key resources (CIKR) protection evolving? Practitioners who implement strategies should be confident their strategies are based on sound theory, but theory evolves just as strategy evolves. Many theories, techniques, and models/simulations for CIKR protection have been proposed and developed over…
The Roots of Community Resilience: A Comparative Analysis of Structural Change in Four Gulf Coast Hurricane Response Networks
by Thomas W. Haase, Gunes Ertan, and Louise K. Comfort Abstract Despite the emphasis on resilience, disasters continue to challenge the response capacities of communities around the United States. These challenges are generated by the complexities and uncertainties present in the post-disaster environment. This article presents the findings of an exploratory investigation into the development…
Unpacking and Exploring the Relationship between Crisis Management and Social Media in the Era of ‘Smart Devices’
by Eric K. Stern Abstract The rise of social media and the broad diffusion of ‘smart devices’ in contemporary society have profound implications for crisis management. The emergence of social media and smart devices pose both major challenges and major opportunities to crisis managers (c.f. Palen, 2008; Veil et 2011). These social practices and technologies…
The Cold War on Terrorism: Reevaluating Critical Infrastructure Facilities as Targets for Terrorist Attacks
by David Riedman Portions of this article are excerpted from the author’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security master’s degree thesis “How Critical is Critical Infrastructure?” The full document is available in the Homeland Security Digital Library.1 Countries are inverted pyramids that rest precariously on their strategic innards–their leadership, communications, key production, infrastructure, and population.…
Cognitive Defense: Influencing the Target Choices of Less Sophisticated Threat Actors
by Jesse Wasson & Christopher Bluesteen Abstract With the emergence of non-state threats and new operating environments since the end of the Cold War, the relevance of deterrence as a security tool has repeatedly been called into doubt. Modern adversaries often lack territory, militaries, economies, or even identities to threaten and retaliate against. Their motivations are…
Coordination in Crises: Implementation of the National Incident Management System by Surface Transportation Agencies
by Nicholas B. Hambridge, Arnold M. Howitt, & David W. Giles Abstract For more than a decade, the National Incident Management System (NIMS) has served in the United States as the mandated framework for coordinated organization, operational command, and implementation of response to emergencies nationwide. This article examines whether surface transportation agencies are developing the capabilities…