Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much for your testimony. If I could ask you just one question. As you have mentioned, there are 40 different organizations working with this and recently there has been much discussion about the National Security Council and the National Guard. Would you comment how you think we might best structure the Federal Government's efforts to combat terrorism both for crisis management and consequence? Mr. SKELTON. There is no easy answer to this. But you must prioritize. You must have an Indian chief running the show. The left hand must know what the right hand is doing. That's what got me involved in this whole effort to begin with. Not knowing whether one agency, whether the State Department, FBI, Department of Defense you choose it—really knew what the other was doing. So, there must be prioritization of who is running what type of operation. Second, you must make sure that they are coordinated, not just with themselves. The 40-I think there are actually 43 different organizations, Mr. Chairman-and that they know what they are doing. But there is necessity to coordinate in the event of a domestic attack with the various law enforcement agencies in a State or in a city. This is a daunting task and one that is going to take tremendous leadership by the lead agency, which ever it was. And as you know, as I said a few moments ago, FEMA has withdrawn as the potential agency. So, I think those are the priorities that we must cause to happen. Because to begin with, they help deter. No. 2, should an event occur, we will want to capture the suspects, try them, and if found guilty, punish them properly. No. 3, there must be a proper response to those people that are injured and lose property, or have problems that are connected with such a disaster. Those three elements must be included in any prioritization that we offer. Mr. SOUDER. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate your leadership on National Security and Intelligence and look forward to working with you this year. The hearing stands in recess until we can get back from our vote. Thank you. [Recess.] Mr. SOUDER. The second panel could come forward. The committee is again in order. Thank you for coming today. We have with us Mr. Richard Davis, Director of the National Security Analysis, National Security and International Affairs Division, U.S. General Accounting Office. Accompanying Mr. Davis is Ms. Davi D'Agostino, Assistant Director, National Security Analysis and we also have Mr. Larry Johnson, former Deputy Director of the U.S. Department of State, Office of Counter Terrorism who will also testify. Mr. Johnson's experience includes teaching a senior crisis management seminar for foreign governments, designing terrorism exercises for the Department of Defense, and supervising security assessments for several U.S. businesses. Mr. Johnson also worked for the Central Intelligence Agency and currently is a partner at Berg Associates. Thank you for joining us, and we look forward to your testimony. I have to swear you in. Would you rise and raise your right hands. [Witnesses sworn.] Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Davis, will you please proceed? 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 We are all aware that certain key large-scale terrorist incidents at home and abroad since |