The May 2023 Issue of Homeland Security Affairs features a policy essay that warns of conflicts between Emergency Management and Homeland Defense missions in the event of a major war and a research article that assesses how DHS has incorporated climate change into its mission portfolio. Read more.
In reorganizing homeland defense after 9/11, the government had three options: White House control, power sharing between agencies, or congressional control.
By Charles Perrow
The technological ability to distinguish drug plants from other plant types has important implications for law enforcement (LE), wildfire recovery, reservoir protection, environmental impact, agricultural issues, and military concerns. This ability, termed “deconvolution,” can be a valuable technological tool to fight drug trafficking and thus the war on terror.
By James Tindall
FEMA was used once before, under President Reagan, for counter-terrorism and as a result, natural disaster response and mitigation suffered. It was repaired under President Clinton, but again, counter-terrorism has eaten up FEMA’s natural disaster budget and skills.
By Charles Perrow
Hurricane Katrina shattered belief that the nation’s homeland security system was ready for a major terrorist attack. Public administrators staff that system. Katrina provides an opportunity to review the central normative premise of public administration: competence.
By Christopher Bellavita
Unified Command, as a part of the National Incident Management System (NIMS), was successfully used in the state-federal response to the catastrophic disaster caused by Hurricane Katrina in Mississippi in 2005.
By William Carwile
The concept of predictable surprises, i.e. failures to take preventative action in the face of known threats, was outlined by Max Bazerman and Michael Watkins in their book by the same name. This paper discusses predictable surprises as primarily organizational events that result from failure of organizational processes to support surprise-avoidance rather than surprise-conducive actions by individual members.
By Larry Irons
The national strategy for the protection of critical infrastructure and key assets is not working due to a number of failed strategies, which this article examines in detail.
By Ted G. Lewis and Rudy Darken
Beginning in 2004, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) began to define and implement a national domestic all-hazards preparedness goal, intended to improve the nation’s preparedness for national catastrophes, including terrorist attacks.
By Sharon Caudle
As a maritime nation, the United States is economically and strategically reliant on its ports, a fact well known to our potential enemies in the Global War on Terror. A successful attack against maritime critical infrastructure in our ports has the potential to cause major economic disruption and create mass casualties and conflagration.
By Robert Watts
Under the new “Joint Force” concept of operations model, the U.S. Navy has taken on added prevention responsibilities that include strategic and operational responses to asymmetric warfare.
By David Longshore
