Congress Should Look Into DHS’s ‘Homeland Threat Assessment 2024’
Is its anodyne explanation for the Biden border surge driven by politics or incompetence?
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By Andrew R. Arthur on October 17, 2023
I recently analyzed the potential terrorist threats posed by the millions of migrants who have crossed the Southwest border illegally since Joe Biden became president, particularly in light of the recent savagery caused in Israel by Hamas terrorists who crossed illegally from Gaza. l specifically referenced passages from DHS’s recently released “Homeland Threat Assessment 2024” that focused on border vulnerabilities terrorists could (and likely will) exploit. The report was prepared by the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A), headed by Undersecretary Kenneth L. Wainstein. Congress may want to call him in to discuss those vulnerabilities, and also to ask him questions about I&A’s take on the reasons for the recent border surge — and one particularly questionable piece of artwork therein.
Intelligence, September 11th, I&A, and the “Homeland Security Act”. I&A is likely not as familiar to most as other DHS agencies like ICE and CBP, but its role, at least as originally envisioned, is every bit as crucial to homeland security.
That’s because as much as anything, September 11th was a massive intelligence failure. As the RAND Corporation has explained:
The Cold War methodology of intelligence involved the gathering and keeping of "secrets" and was organized in a "stovepipe" manner according to the government source from which it originated. There were a limited number of sources, such as the National Security Agency (NSA) or the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA). Intelligence analysis was centralized, but not monopolized, by the CIA.
Agency “stovepiping” of intelligence might have made sense when we were in a Cold War against one opponent, but it became an impediment when the United States was facing a wide range of adversaries, some state-supported and others decidedly not.
https://cis.org/Arthur/Congress-Should-Look-DHSs-Homeland-Threat-Assessment-2024
