The Role of DoD In Homeland Security

By Michael O'Hanlon

There are two central questions for the Department of Defense in the homeland security debate today.  First, what is its overall relationship with the rest of the government, and DHS in particular, in protecting the American homeland from possible terrorist attack?  This is largely a question about Northcom’s role.  Second, should its force structure, and in particular its Reserve and National Guard force structure, be significantly modified in light of the new threats facing the country?  This article focuses on the first.                                                                                 

After September 11, 2001, the U.S. military added a major command to its operational structure--one focused on the American homeland.  In previous decades, DoD had devoted attention to direct protection of this country's territory only through the NORAD air defense operation conducted jointly with Canada, as well as various ballistic missile defense programs.  It had not created a broader organization similar to regional commands focused on the greater Middle East, the Pacific, Europe and Africa, or South America.  But with the creation of Northern Command on October 1, 2002, the U.S. military added an organization designed to carry out the general defense of North America as well as oceans out to several hundred miles’ distance from shore. [1]

Creation of this command reflected recognition of the fact that the military will sometimes now play a significant role in homeland security—specifically, in those aspects described as homeland defense.  It will as noted above generally be a support role, since most counterterrorist efforts involve painstaking work to track or secure modest numbers of individuals and modest quantities of dangerous materials.  The FBI, DHS, and the intelligence agencies are better suited to such work, and DoD’s recent strategy document on the subject explicitly rules out any Department of Defense jurisdiction over such matters. [2] 

But there are times when DoD's capacity for providing large numbers of people and assets quickly is extremely important.  For example, military reservists were mobilized to monitor traffic near bridges and tunnels and protect high-value infrastructure such as airports and nuclear power plants after 9/11.  It has also deployed troops to events such as State of the Union addresses, national political conventions, the 2004 G-8 summit in Georgia, and the funeral of former President Ronald Reagan.  (Sometimes troops were deployed under the formal authority of governors, as National Guard forces can be, in part so that they would not be restricted by posse comitatus legislation that severely restricts the use of federal troops in domestic law enforcement activities.) [3]   Some describe such activities, including protection of key sites, as constituting homeland defense in contrast to the broader concept of homeland security.

The Hurricane Katrina experience showed that, even if DoD is usually in a support role in catastrophes (natural or man-made), that support role can be quite significant in scope.  This requires two changes in policy.  First, DoD must plan much more effectively for immediate response in such situations.  The paradigm in the past has been rapid but not emergency response (that is, over days, not hours).  But when lives are at risk, people and assets from the active force as well as the reserve component must move out to an afflicted site as it becomes obvious that a storm (or an attack) is severe.  It is not acceptable to only then begin serious planning and mobilization.  Second, in my view the posse comitatus legislation needs a fourth exemption to allow DoD to carry out any and all activities, including law enforcement, in the event of major national catastrophe.  Existing exemptions for insurrection, nuclear crime, or chemical/biological emergency need to be complemented with a fourth that would allow the president to order active-duty forces into response in a situation like that witnessed during the approach and immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Like the other commands, Northcom is administratively modest in scale.  Located at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado, it has a dedicated staff of about 1,200, including about 800 military personnel and 400 contractors, and a budget of just under $200 million. [4] But it has the ability to call on forces not normally devoted to its mission if and when a crisis occurs.  It also has jurisdiction over NORAD (a command still jointly maintained with Canada, and now focused on missile as well as air threats) [5] as well as a subordinate command in the Washington, DC area, and a joint task force for civil support at Fort Monroe, Virginia. [6] NORAD might usefully be broadened to include maritime surveillance as well, and to coordinate use of combined multinational land forces in response to an emergency.  It might also be extended to involve Mexico as well as Canada and the United States. [7] 

Among DoD's activities focused most directly on protection of the North American continent, national ballistic missile has received the greatest amount of attention.  It need not be analyzed in detail here because it receives substantial scrutiny elsewhere--and because it is most doubtful that terrorists could get their hands on large rockets (a SCUD launch from a modified ship is not entirely out of the question for a rogue state, but even this type of ballistic missile threat would likely be beyond the reach of a terrorist).   

Less frequently discussed is defense against a type of threat that could also be launched at American targets from beyond its borders, but that is much more likely to be available to terrorists--the cruise missile.  Many variants weigh only a ton or so, a fifth to a tenth as much as a SCUD, and could be easily placed inside a shipping container.  If armed with chemical or biological agent in particular, and properly outfitted to disperse agent in an efficient way, such attacks could--particularly with potent biological agent--kill many tens of thousands. [8] DoD’s homeland defense strategy document does discuss this subject, but acknowledges that present capabilities are highly limited and localized. [9] 

The American military services have numerous programs relevant to cruise missile defense.  Most of them are designed to protect forward-deployed forces within reasonably limited geographical zones.  In theory, many of the capabilities that they are working towards could be linked up into a national defense of some kind, assuming proper systems integration and networking.  But this could be done only at large cost and with very significant operational challenges such as a high risk of shooting down small aircraft. [10] Additional sensors, and a host of interceptor missile bases deployed around the country's perimeter, would ultimately be needed if this threat were to be addressed seriously.  Cost estimates for such a capability begin around $20 billion. [11] And that presupposes that some outstanding technical challenges, such as reliable discrimination of cruise missiles from other flying objects, could be solved.  It may be a decade before such a defense is truly practicable. [12] 

DoD could have other specific roles in homeland security as well.  It possesses robust communications networks that DHS and other agencies may need to employ in the event of catastrophic attacks that leave normal communications nonfunctional, should massive power outages or other systemic failures of infrastructure require it, as witnessed to a substantial degree in Hurricane Katrina in 2005. [13] Its technology development efforts are also potentially quite useful to the homeland security mission in a broader sense.   For example, unmanned aerial vehicles are already used in border surveillance at times; aerostats could be as well.  Unmanned aerial systems might also help with monitoring of key infrastructure. [14]    

Michael O'Hanlon is a senior fellow in Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, where he specializes in U.S. defense strategy, the use of military force, homeland security and American foreign policy. He is a visiting lecturer at Princeton University, and a member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies and the Council on Foreign Relations. O’Hanlon’s latest book is Defense Strategy for the Post-Saddam Era (Brookings, 2005).

Notes

1. United States Northern Command, "U.S. Northern Command's Strategic Vision," Internal Working Paper, October 1, 2003, p. 2.

2. Statement by Honorable Paul McHale, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense, before the Senate Committee on Armed Services, March 25, 2004, p. 7; and Department of Defense, Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support (Washington, D.C.:  2005), p. 5, available at www.defenselink.mil/news/June2005/d20050630homeland.pdf.

3. David Kelly, "Command Shifts Amid Fears of Terrorist Attacks on Ports," Los Angeles Times, November 6, 2004.

4. Telephone conversation with Lt. Col. Sean Kelly, NORTHCOM public affairs office, February 1, 2005.

5. Government of Canada, Defence:  A Role of Pride and Influence in the World (Ottawa, Canada, 2005), p. 22.

6. Josh White, "New Headquarters Will Guard Capital Area," Washington Post, September 21, 2004, p. 6; John Conger, “Unique CBRNE Training Issues Face Joint Task Force-Civil Support,” Homeland Security  (April 2004), available at www.homelandsecurity.org/journal/articles/Burmood_Lucas_conger.html; and James Jay Carafano, "Shaping the Future of Northern Command," CSBA Backgrounder (Washington, D.C.:  Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, April 25, 2003).

7. Council on Foreign Relations, Canadian Council of Chief Executives, and the Consejo Mexicano de Asuntos Internacionales, Building a North American Community (New York:  Council on Foreign Relations, 2005), p. 11.

8. Office of Technology Assessment, Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction:  Assessing the Risks (Washington, D.C., 1993), p. 54.

9. Department of Defense, Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support (Washington, D.C.:  2005), pp. 25-26, available at www.defenselink.mil/news/June2005/d20050630homeland.pdf.

10. Loren Thompson, Cruise Missile Defense:  Connecting Theater Capabilities to Homeland Needs (Washington, D.C.:  Lexington Institute, 2004).

11. Michael E. O'Hanlon, Peter R. Orszag, Ivo H. Daalder, I.M. Destler, David L. Gunter, James M. Lindsay, Robert E. Litan, and James B. Steinberg, Protecting the American Homeland:  One Year On (Brookings, 2003), p. 15.

12. Randy Barrett, "Cruise Missile Defense System At Least 5-8 Years Away," Space News, July 5, 2004, p. 6.

13. Adrian A. Erckenbrack and Aaron Scholer, "The DoD Role in Homeland Security," Joint Forces Quarterly, no. 35 (October 2004), p. 35.

14. See Amy Butler, "Upcoming UAV Roadmap to Include Homeland Security Missions," Defense Daily, December 16, 2004, p. 1.