Page images
PDF
EPUB

STATEMENTS OF RICHARD DAVIS, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYSIS, NATIONAL SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS DIVISION, U.S. GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE, ACCOMPANIED BY DAVI D'AGOSTINO, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYSIS, NATIONAL SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS DIVISION, U.S. GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE; AND LARRY JOHNSON, FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF COUNTER TERRORISM, DEPARTMENT OF STATE

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, sir. I am pleased to be here today to discuss our work and observations on Federal efforts to combat terrorism. As you know, we have been studying the cross-cutting aspects of terrorism for nearly 2 years at the request of Congressman Ike Skelton and Senator John Glenn, in addition to this subcommittee. I would like to just offer at this time a few brief comments. I would ask that my statement be included in the record. And I'll just briefly summarize it.

Mr. SOUDER. So ordered.

Mr. DAVIS. Conventional explosives and firearms continue to be the weapons of choice for terrorists. Terrorists are less likely to use chemical and biological weapons and conventional explosives, although the likelihood that they may use chemical and biological materials may increase over the next decade according to intelligence agencies.

More than a decade ago, the Vice President's Task Force on terrorism highlighted the need for improved centralized interagency coordination. Our work suggests that the government should continue to strive for improved interagency coordination today. In fact, in testimony before two senate committees yesterday, Attorney General Janet Reno said that we must achieve even greater interagency coordination than exists today. The need for effective interagency coordination both at the Federal level and among Federal, State, and local levels is paramount.

The challenges of efficient and effective management and focus for program investments are growing as the terrorism area draws more attention from Congress, and as there are more players and more programs and activities to integrate and coordinate. The United States is spending billions of dollars annually to combat terrorism without assurance that Federal funds are focused on the right programs or in the right amounts.

As we have emphasized in two reports, a critical piece of the equation in deciding about establishing and expanding programs to combat terrorism is an analytically sound threat and risk assessment using valid inputs from the intelligence community and other agencies.

Threat and risk assessments could help the government make decisions about how to target investments in combating terrorism and set priorities on the basis of risk; identify unnecessary program duplication, overlap and gaps; and correctly size individual agencies' levels of effort.

In 1996, Congress passed the Defense Against Weapons of Mass Destruction Act, which authorized the Nunn-Lugar-Domenici Domestic Preparedness Program. That program is to provide Federal training and assistance to local emergency response personnel for

dealing with a potential weapons of mass destruction terrorist incidents. That legislation does not require threat and risk assessments be performed and, as currently designed, the program does not incorporate that. Our recent report to you and Mr. Skelton recommends that Congress consider amending legislation to require that threat and risk assessments be included and funded as part of the assistance under this act. The concept we recommend is a Federal-city collaborative efforts with the FBI taking the lead in facilitating the assessments with inputs from the intelligence community and appropriate Federal agencies, including the Department of Defense.

The assessments should be used to guide decisionmaking on cities' training and equipment requirements and their priorities in alignment with the most likely threat scenarios with the severest consequences. Finally, there are different sets of views and apparent lack of consensus on the threat of terrorism, particularly weapons of mass destruction terrorism.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes my summary remarks. Ms. D'Agostino and I would be happy to answer any questions. [The prepared statement of Mr. Davis follows:]

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

I am pleased to be here today to discuss our work and observations on federal efforts to combat terrorism. As you know, we have been studying the crosscutting aspects of the terrorism area for nearly 2 years at the requests of Congressman Ike Skelton and Senator John Glenn, in addition to this Subcommittee. This horizontal approach to our worklooking at terrorism matters across several agencies-offers a very different perspective on the issues to the Congress than if we looked at individual agencies and their programs separately. I will first briefly talk about the foreign-origin and domestic terrorism threat in the United States as we understand it from intelligence analyses and the origins and principles of the U.S. policy and strategy to combat terrorism. Then I would like to share some of our observations about issues that warrant further attention.

SUMMARY

Conventional explosives and firearms continue to be the weapons of choice for terrorists. Terrorists are less likely to use chemical and biological weapons than conventional explosives, although the likelihood that they may use chemical and biological materials may increase over the next decade, according to intelligence agencies. More than a decade ago, the Vice President's Task Force on Terrorism highlighted the need for improved, centralized interagency coordination. Our work suggests that the government should continue to strive for improved interagency coordination today. The need for

effective interagency coordination-both at the federal level and among the federal, state, and local levels-is paramount. The challenges of efficient and effective management and focus for program investments are growing as the terrorism issue draws more attention from the Congress and as there are more players and more programs and activities to integrate and coordinate. The United States is spending billions of dollars annually to combat terrorism without assurance that federal funds are focused on the right programs or in the right amounts. As we have emphasized in two reports, a critical piece of the equation in decisions about establishing and expanding programs to combat terrorism is ar analytically sound threat and risk assessment using valid inputs from the intelligence community and other agencies. Threat and risk assessments could help the government make decisions about how to target investments in combating terrorism and set priorities on the basis of risk; identify unnecessary program duplication, overlap, and gaps; and correctly size individual agencies' levels of effort. Finally, there are different sets of views and an apparent lack of consensus on the threat of terrorism-particularly WMD

terrorism.

THE FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC TERRORISM
THREAT IN THE UNITED STATES

We are all aware that certain key large-scale terrorist incidents at home and abroad since 1993 have dramatically raised the public profile of U.S. vulnerability to terrorist attack. The bombings of the World Trade Center in 1993 and of the federal building in Oklahoma

City, Oklahoma in 1995, along with terrorists' use of a nerve agent in the Tokyo subway in

1995, have elevated concerns about terrorism in the United States-particularly terrorists' use of chemical and biological weapons. Previously, the focus of U.S. policy and legislation had been more on international terrorism abroad and airline hijacking.

The U.S. intelligence community, which includes the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and others, has issued classified National Intelligence Estimates and an update on the foreign-origin terrorist threat to the United States. In addition, the FBI gathers intelligence and assesses the threat posed by U.S. or domestic sources of terrorism.

What is important to take away from these intelligence assessments is the very critical distinction made between what is conceivable or possible and what is likely in terms of the threat of terrorist attack. According to intelligence agencies, conventional explosives and firearms continue to be the weapons of choice for terrorists. Terrorists are less likely to use chemical and biological weapons than conventional explosives, although the likelihood that terrorists may use chemical and biological materials may increase over the next decade. Chemical and biological agents are less likely to be used than conventional explosives at least partly because they are more difficult to weaponize and the results are unpredictable. According to the FBI, the threat of terrorists' use of chemical and biological weapons is low, but some groups and individuals of concern are beginning to show interest in such weapons. Agency officials also have noted that terrorists' use of

« PreviousContinue »