1.1 What is Homeland Security?

WHO? Homeland Security is about everybody, including you.

WHAT? Homeland Security is about safeguarding the nation from domestic catastrophic destruction.

WHEN? Catastrophe can strike anytime making Homeland Security an ongoing concern requiring continual vigilance.

WHERE? From a US perspective, domestic catastrophic destruction is a concern specific to US territory.

From a global perspective, domestic catastrophic destruction is a concern to every country.

WHY? Because we now face a new threat of catastrophic destruction from non-state actors.

“What is Homeland Security?” Ask this question to most Americans today and they will tell you that Homeland Security has something to do with terrorism. And that would be almost completely wrong. Although terrorism is a concern, it is not the primary concern of Homeland Security. Homeland Security is about safeguarding the United States from domestic catastrophic destruction. Let us repeat… Homeland Security is about safeguarding the United States from domestic catastrophic destruction. Got it? Catastrophic destruction is the key to homeland security. Preventing, protecting, responding, and recovering to domestic catastrophic destruction is what homeland security is all about. The thing is, though, nobody has defined what constitutes “catastrophic destruction”. We don’t know what the threshold is from “really big” to “catastrophic”. We do know, though, that it’s on the order of 9/11, because that’s what brought homeland security to the forefront of US policy concerns. Using 9/11 as a benchmark, then “catastrophic destruction” is something on the order of 3,000 deaths and $40 billion in damages, either one or both. As we will learn later, Hurricane Katrina also serves as a benchmark for homeland security. By that measure, “catastrophic destruction” is something on the order of 1400 deaths and $96 billion in damages, either one or both. And as these two benchmarks demonstrate, it doesn’t matter what causes the catastrophic destruction. The destruction can be inflicted by man, as was the case with 9/11, or it can be inflicted by nature, as was the case with Hurricane Katrina. It’s not the cause but the effect that counts. But more importantly, Homeland Security is about SAFEGUARDING the nation from domestic catastrophic destruction. As was already said, safeguarding includes actions to Prevent, Protect, Respond, and Recover to domestic catastrophic destruction. Prevention and Protection are homeland security actions taken BEFORE a catastrophe happens, and if successful, might avoid it altogether. Response and Recovery are homeland security actions taken AFTER a catastrophe happens, and their primary aim is to reduce the consequences as much as possible. What is interesting about this concept of “safeguarding” is that it comes with no guarantees. If it were possible, we would prefer to prevent all catastrophes from ever happening. Unfortunately this is impossible. It is impossible to prevent hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanos, and a whole host of natural disasters. Likewise it is impossible to stop a determined attacker. No defense is invulnerable. Given enough time and effort, the attacker will eventually prevail. Failure is implicit to homeland security. Eventually something bad will happen. It’s only a matter of time.