Homeland Security and Intelligence

Based on the findings in the first and second study papers, the homeland security and intelligence final assessment offered four suggestions. The first assignment covered a terrorist group that could potentially conduct terrorist acts in the US. Al Qaeda's was chosen because, despite the remarkable advancements made in the war on terror, it posed a serious threat to homeland security. The first task covered the history, ideology, operational foundations, leadership structure, funding, training methodologies, and communication methodologies. Other issues that were taken into consideration included surveillance and delivery of weapons. In the second part, the intelligence gathering programs employed by law enforcement agencies in collecting information such as the IMINT, HUMINT, OSINT, and SIGINT approaches were discussed in detail.

The HUMINT approach involved the use of intelligence officers in the collection of intelligence information. In contrast, electronic signals such as the interception of communication from the terror organizations were employed in the SIGINT intelligence program. Other intelligence programs that were enforced by the CIA included MASINT approach, which primarily relied on nuclear, infrared, and radar intelligence. After a critical review of the intelligence gathering programs adopted in the war against Al Qaeda before and after 9/11, it was concluded that the SIGINT strategy was most efficient based on past operational successes where it was successfully employed to obtain actionable intelligence from terrorists working for Al Qaeda.





Recommendations

In light of the significant threats posed by the terrorist organization, four recommendations were advanced to prevent Al Qaeda from planning terror activities on US homeland. One of the recommendation was that the US security and intelligence services should adopt the robust point of entry and consulate screening of all immigrants from countries with a history of radical Islamism.

The recommendation was informed by the fact that the 9/11 attacks that resulted in the loss of 3,000 lives (Nacos, 2003) were executed by terrorists who used legal channels to enter the US. Besides, all came from countries with a history of radical Islamism namely Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, UAE, and Egypt. According to investigative reports after the 9/11 attacks, it was noted that all of the 19 terrorists most of whom were Saudi Arabian had been issued with travel visas to travel to the US. Notably, some of the 9/11 terrorists had traveled to the US on a regular basis. For instance, Hani Hanjour – one of the terrorists, had traveled to the US on several occasions as an English student and later to attend flight school training (Federation of American Immigration Reform, 2011). Despite the fact that the subject had traveled to the US on several occasions, the weak immigration system was not able to flag off the movement or activities of the terrorist.

Additionally, the border control measures adopted post-9/11 had mixed outcomes. For instance, the measures had suppressed the threat posed by Al Qaeda; however, they had not eliminated the ability of Al Qaeda to conduct isolated attacks that compromised the security of US homeland. The new measures increased the operational expenses in the Department of Homeland Security given that there was a sevenfold increase in border patrol personnel from 3,000 to 21,000 (US Customs and Border Protection, 2017). Besides, security agencies had adopted smart technologies such as unmanned aerial vehicles and motion sensors. Additionally, new background checks and visa interviews for all persons traveling to the US were instituted (Mittelstadt, Speaker, Meissner, & Chishti, 2011). Besides, all US citizens were required to travel with their passports outside the US. However, based on recent events it was noted that the security measures in place had not completely neutralized the terrorist threats. Isolated terror events were reported in 2009 after Abdulhakim Muhammad opened fire on fellow soldiers (Jacobs, 2017). Such acts had informed Trump’s administration to limit the entry of residents from certain countries. Currently, the Trump administration is also planning to erect physical barriers along the southern border. Besides, after assuming office, Trump’s administration published an executive order on border security. However, the order primarily focused on the security situation along the US Mexico southern border (The White House, 2017).

The second recommendation was that the US should adopt more sustainable approaches to border security that does not require the installation of physical barriers and the deployment of additional border patrol personnel. Given that the US security agencies had tightened the screening measures on all legal points of entry such as the airports, and the seaports, it was postulated that most of the terrorists would use illegal channels to gain entry into the US.

Wein, Liu, & Motskin (2009) observed that there was a high probability that terrorists including Al Qaeda affiliates would gain entry into the US through the porous US-Mexico border. Nonetheless, the researchers noted any measures aimed at preventing illegal movement of the persons would be capital intensive. Previous studies noted that the efficiency of security measures instituted along the southern border in the US was compromised by the policies regarding sanctuary cities (Chen, 2016), which safeguarded illegal immigrants from deportation. Besides, the guest worker programs (Ruhs & Martin, 2008) and legalization of undocumented workers were considered as part of the barriers that compromised the security of US homeland. Despite the fact that these policies were aimed at safeguarding the interest of the agricultural sector, which benefited from cheap Mexican labor, it was postulated that Al Qaeda terror cells could take advantage of such policies to gain access to the southern states from where they could plan terror activities.

According to a border security mathematical model developed by (Wein et al., 2009), it was noted that the deployment of additional border patrol agents along the porous border was not efficient primarily because most of the illegal immigrants crossed the border along remote areas where there were no border patrol agents. Recent plans by the US government to construct a physical barrier along the US Mexican border were considered unfeasible primarily due to the scale and the length of the wall. For instance, the US-Mexican border has a length of close to 2,000 miles and it traverses four states namely Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. According to Bloomberg, the entire cost of the project was estimated to cost $15 billion (Ingold, Whiteaker, Rojanasakul, Recht, & Halford, 2017). Apart from the costs associated with the construction of the wall, it was noted that the actual implementation of the plan would be impeded by various legal issues. For instance, the proposed border wall would be erected on private land or on territories that belong to Indian tribes. A large segment of the land is owned by private landowners who are unwilling to cede part of their land without compensation from the government. The DHS failures erecting a fence in Texas were a case in point (Miller, 2010).

The third recommendation is that the DHS together with federal agencies such as the FBI, CIA, and Customs and Border Patrol agencies should renew their focus on Al Qaeda. The escalation of the threat posed by ISIS and its affiliates in the recent past had contributed to the gradual shift in focus from Al Qaeda to ISIS. The approach had provided Al Qaeda with the latitude to regroup and enhance its operations. A study conducted by the Brooking Institute established that Al Qaeda had taken advantage of the failures of the Arab spring in Syria to advance its terror cell network and proxies in the conflict (Byman, 2013). Notably, the expansion of Al Qaeda operations in the Middle East poses significant threats to homeland security taking into consideration past trends. For instance, the terrorists who took part in the 9/11 attacks were trained in the Middle East by Bin Laden’s foot soldiers. A report by the US Army War College also noted that the failed Arab spring had offered new channels for Al Qaeda to regroup through a network of independent jihadists such as Al Nusrah and Salafists (Ibrahim, 2014). The escalation in the activity and territorial scope of such groups had compromised the security of the US homeland. Therefore, in light of the renewed operations of Al Qaeda in Syria and Iraq, it was postulated that the CIA should enhance its intelligence gathering approaches to forestall terror plans on US homeland before such plans are actualized. The focus on Al Qaeda could be implemented using diverse approaches that had been proven effective in the past such as the interception of communication and use of satellite technologies to monitor the activity of the terror organization.

The fourth recommendation was that the Department of homeland security should establish an anti-terrorism agency with a wide mandate as the FBI or the CIA. The envisaged organization would have its own budgetary allocations and human resources in place of the FBI, National Guard, and CIA personnel. The availability of adequate labor and financial resources would enable the proposed agency to neutralize all terror risks posed by Al Qaeda and other Islamist groups. The proposal was informed by the fact that the current approaches in the war on terror were uncoordinated because they were handled by multiple agencies. After 9/11 the US government had established an anti-terrorism task force and advisory council (US Department of Justice, 2017); nonetheless, these approaches were considered as unsatisfactory. Additionally, the mandate of the current Bureau on Counterterrorism was limited to the neutralization of terror threats abroad (US Department of State, 2017). Besides, the current approach in which the security and intelligence agencies cooperated out of necessity rather than their free will had compromised the war against Al Qaeda.

Conclusion

The current research article presented four recommendations that were aimed at safeguarding homeland security and preventing Al Qaeda and its affiliates from launching terror attacks on the US homeland. The approaches included the establishment of an anti-terrorism agency that was primarily dedicated to countering terrorist threats on US homeland. The second recommendation was that US security agencies should renew their focus on Al Qaeda because the escalation in the threats posed by ISIS had shifted focus from Al Qaeda. The third and fourth recommendations were that comprehensive measures should be adopted in the points of entry and smart approaches should be adopted to limit the movement of illegal persons along the US-Mexico border, respectively.



References

Byman, D. (2013). The Resurgence of al Qaeda in Iraq. Retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/testimonies/the-resurgence-of-al-qaeda-in-iraq/

Chen, M. H. (2016). Trust in Immigration Enforcement : State Noncooperation and Sanctuary Cities After Secure Communities. Chicago-Kent Law Review, 91(1), 13–57.

Federation of American Immigration Reform. (2011). Identity and Immigration Status of 9/11 Terrorists. Retrieved December 29, 2017, from https://fairus.org/issue/national-security/identity-and-immigration-status-911-terrorists

Ibrahim, A. (2014). The Resurgence of Al Qaeda in Syria and Iraq.

Ingold, D., Whiteaker, C., Rojanasakul, M., Recht, H., & Halford, D. (2017). Here’s What We Know About Trump’s Mexico Wall. Retrieved December 29, 2017, from https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-trump-mexico-wall/how-much-would-the-wall-cost/

Jacobs, B. (2017). America since 9/11: timeline of attacks linked to the “war on terror.” Retrieved December 29, 2017, from https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/01/america-since-911-terrorist-attacks-linked-to-the-war-on-terror

Miller, N. (2010). How Property Rights Are Affected by the Texas-Mexico Border Fence: A Failure Due to Insufficient Procedure. Texas International Law Journal, 45(3), 631–654. Retrieved from connection.ebscohost.com/.../how-property-rights-are-affected-by-Texas-.

Mittelstadt, M., Speaker, B., Meissner, D., & Chishti, M. (2011). Through the prism of national security: major immigration policy and program changes in the decade since 9/11. Migration Policy Institute, 1–17.

Nacos, B. (2003). The Terrorist Calculus behind 9-11: A Model for Future Terrorism? Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 26(1), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/10576100390145134

Ruhs, M., & Martin, P. (2008). Numbers vs. rights: Trade-offs and guest worker programs. International Migration Review, 42(1), 249–265. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-7379.2007.00120.x

The White House. (2017). Executive Order: Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements. Retrieved from https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-border-security-immigration-enforcement-improvements/

US Customs and Border Protection. (2017). Border Patrol Overview. Retrieved December 29, 2017, from https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/along-us-borders/overview

US Department of Justice. (2017). Anti-Terrorism. Retrieved December 29, 2017, from https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdoh/anti-terrorism

US Department of State. (2017). Bureau of Counterterrorism and Countering Violent Extremism. Retrieved December 29, 2017, from https://www.state.gov/j/ct/

Wein, L. M., Liu, Y., & Motskin, A. (2009). Analyzing the Homeland Security of the U.S.-Mexico Border. Risk Analysis, 29(5), 699–713.







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