Homeland Security – Napolitano Offers Shift in Tone
Homeland Security Secretary Janet A. Napolitano on Wednesday called for closer collaboration with foreign partners, more intensive cooperation with local law-enforcement officials, and greater involvement by citizens in watching for and responding to terrorist threats.
“For too long, we’ve treated the public as a liability to be protected rather than as an asset in our nation’s collective security,” Ms. Napolitano said during a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. “This approach, unfortunately, has allowed confusion, anxiety and fear to linger.”
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“The terror threat is even more decentralized, networked and adaptive than on 9/11,” she said. “The United States needed an approach that was “more layered, networked and resilient.”
In her speech, Ms. Napolitano seemed intent on a shift of tone, a recasting of the way Americans view the terror threat. Implicitly, she seemed to rebuke the approach taken by the Bush administration, which critics said too often seemed to exaggerate threats and sow a sense of fear.
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Ms. Napolitano said she had traveled 30,000 miles just in the past few weeks — “from Islamabad to Seattle” — while brokering new international agreements to improve security arrangements that would be effective even before potential terrorists reached American shores.
She also emphasized the importance of the facilities, called intelligence fusion centers, that have been set up nationwide to improve and streamline communications between the local officials most likely to see the first signs of suspicious activity — like a flight school student showing interest in learning to take off but not to land a plane — and state and federal officials.
