Homeland Security

In the years since 9/11, homeland security has turn out to be frequently and generally identified as both a word and as a Federal department. However, a large amount has been learned since 9/11 concerning the array of further challenges we face. Hurricane Katrina strongly illustrates the general impact of weak preparedness and response in the face of severe natural disasters. Widespread international cyber attacks from some of the most sophisticated denial-of-service efforts to persistent and rising attacks on U.S. Government cyber systems reflect the increasing importance of securing the information systems that are the very lifeblood of so much of our critical energy, financial, health, commerce, and transportation infrastructure (U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2010). Global criminal groups that have made stretching efforts to cross our borders with prohibited goods, currency, and trafficked persons which signifies an increasing threat to the prosperity, security, and quality of life to U.S. citizens at home and abroad.

As we have seen with H1N1 influenza, the express worldwide spread of infectious diseases can produce great disruptions at home. Stopping these and further risks from threatening our nation has come to be essential to homeland security. The 2010 National Security Strategy states that homeland security is “a seamless coordination among federal, state, and local governments to prevent, protect against, and respond to threats and natural disasters (Reese, 2010). Homeland security demands organization since various federal, state, and local entities have responsibility for numerous homeland security activities. The increase of responsibilities titled to homeland security undertakings is for several reasons. One reason homeland security established from the pre-9/11 view of law enforcement and emergency management.

Another reason is the definition of homeland security is constantly changing. These changes make it difficult for “policymakers respond to events and crises like terrorist attacks and natural disasters by using and adjusting strategies, plans, and operations, which evolve to reflect changing priorities” (Reese, 2010). Since the definition of homeland security changes in accordance with these strategies, plans, and operations it leaves the door open for unlimited responsibilities. Before 9/11, the United States focused on cries through independent spectrums within national defense, law enforcement, and emergency management. 9/11 triggered a planned approach that contained a debate over the development of homeland security policy. As mentioned above the concept of homeland security has evolved over time. Homeland security as a concept was triggered by the terrorist attacks of 9/11 but after the attack policymakers determined that a different approach was necessary to address an extensive terrorist attacks.

A presidential council and department were established, and a series of presidential directives were issued in the name of “homeland security” (Reese, 2010). These directives established that homeland security was a clear, but indefinite concept. Later, the federal, state, and local government responses to disasters such as Hurricane Katrina expanded the concept of homeland security to include significant disasters, major public health emergencies, and other events that threaten the United States, its economy, the rule of law, and government operations (Reese, 2010). Homeland security, despite the definition or strategic document, it remains a mixture of law enforcement, disaster, immigration, and terrorism concerns.

Homeland security is a widely distributed and diverse but unmistakable national enterprise. Homeland security has rested on four key activities prevention, protection, response, and recovery oriented principally against the threat of terrorism (U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2010). Preventing a terrorist attack in the United States remains the cornerstone of homeland security. It is clear, however, that this stress on terrorism does not capture the full range of unified threats and challenges that distinguish today’s world. A robust notion of homeland security must take account of our essential need to safely, securely, and intensively engage the rest of the world through trade, travel, and other exchanges (U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2010). So basically what they are saying is a place where the American way of life can flourish.

There are five homeland security missions are preventing terrorism and enhancing security, securing and managing our borders, enforcing and administering our immigration laws, safeguarding and securing cyberspace and ensuring resilience to disasters (U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2010). Preventing a terrorist attack in the United States remains the foundation of homeland security. Accomplishing this idea entails us to emphasis on the primary goal of preventing terrorist attacks, emphasizing the challenges of preventing attacks using CBRN weapons and handling risks to critical infrastructure. A safe and secure homeland demands that we uphold applicable control of our air, land, and sea borders.

Secure, well-managed borders should not just protect the United States versus threats from abroad they need to also accelerate the safe movement of legal travel and trade. It is also vital to encourage legal immigration, accelerate administration of immigration assistance, and support the assimilation of lawful immigrants into American civilization. As we transfer even more of our financial and social transactions to cyberspace, these benefits are derived through increasing risk. To accomplish securing cyberspace we must first assist in creating a safe, secure, and resilient cyber environment, and seconding it’s important to promote cyber security knowledge and improvement. Ensuring resilience to disasters is reinforced in four conventional elements of emergency management: hazard mitigation, enhanced preparedness, effective emergency response, and rapid recovery.

These missions and their associated goals and objectives tell us in detail what it means to prevent, to protect, to respond, and to recover, as well as to build in security, to ensure resilience, and to facilitate customs and exchange (U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2010). Homeland security is intensely ingrained in the security and resilience of the Nation, and simplifying legal trading with the world. Homeland security explains the connection of developing threats and hazards through the conventional governmental and public duties of civil defense, emergency response, law enforcement, customs, border control, and immigration.

Homeland security is designed to indicate a intensive, combined effort to guarantee a homeland that is safe, secure, and resilient against terrorism and additional hazards where American welfare, desires, and condition of life can flourish. Although the definition of homeland security is always evolving some aspects of homeland security will always remain and can be defined as the means of domestic efforts to stop terrorism and hazards or mitigate its risk and consequences.

Reference:
U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Quadrennial homeland security review report: A strategic framework for a secure homeland. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 2010. http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/qhsr_report.pdf.

Reese, Shawn. “Defining Homeland Security: Analysis and Congressional Considerations.” Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, 2012. www.fas.org/sgp/crs/…/R42462.pdf