I need help. I don’t understand what the Dept. of Homeland Security does that the FBI, CIA, NSA, and so on doesn’t do. I mean, what does it do, besides annoy people at the airport? Why do we need it?
Um…it’s responsible for immigration? That’s all I’ve got.
Back when it was set up, the rationale seemed to be to coordinate and rationalise various federal agencies that could deal with events like 9/11 – both prevention and response.
- Get the living shit scared out of us seven years ago
- Political posturing leads to statements that 9/11 could have been prevented if the agencies have coordinated better.
- Calls begin for creation of DHS and folding all such agencies under its flag for better coordination.
- President dislikes idea.
- Congress likes it, President gets on board.
- DHS created. Supposedly gains efficiencies in intel sharing and responsiveness.
Yeah, it didn’t really create anything new. It just bundled together a bunch of things that already existed, and elevated it to a cabinet level post. You can see the list of agencies on Wikipedia. The biggies were the Secret Service, the Coast Guard, the INS, and Customs.
You could visit the horse’s … and see for yourself.
DHS doesn’t do what the FBI, CIA, NSA, and other agencies do. Like SmackFu said, most of the department is agencies that existed in other cabinet departments that didn’t really fit in with the mission of those departments, in the view of some. For example, the Secret Service had been in the Department of Treasury, the Coast Guard had been in the Department of Transportation, FEMA was an independent agency, and so on. The prevailing view was that these were sort of orphan agencies within those departments, so the secretaries of those departments didn’t pay enough attention to what they were doing, and that bringing them together in one department would assist them in working together and getting them the proper level of attention, in terms of better budgets, better oversight, etc.
In addition to realigning existing agencies, the Department created several new organizations that were intended to address gaps in the missions of other agencies. For example, the FBI has responsibilities for federal criminal law enforcement in general, but the prevailing view was that creating a new structure to specialize in analyzing intelligence relating to terrorist threats to the US would be advantageous. That would allow the Department of Homeland Security to focus on terrorism, and the FBI to focus its intelligence analysis on things like espionage, drug trafficking, and so on.
This division of responsibilities, in the broad view, really isn’t surprising. One could just as well ask why we have the NSA if we have a CIA. The answer in that case is that the NSA focuses on a specific mission, and the CIA leaves that work to them.
But if I were to offer a simple, one line explanation of what DHS does, it is the cabinet department focused on securing the borders of the United States, coordinating efforts among federal, state and local agencies involved in preventing and responding to terrorism, and managing the response to disasters (natural and otherwise).
Seriously, read Richard Clarke’s book “Against All Enemies” and you will better understand why there was a perceived need for a DHS after 9/11. Apparently, the CIA and FBI were so at odds with each other that vital information was not shared. Clarke contends that all the knowledge was out there to stop the 9/11 attacks but bureaucracy and lack of communication prevented the pieces from being put together.
The creation of the DHS was an immediate political act to put the information gathering departments under one umbrella. Whether that has in fact happened is another question.
Yeah - what a conservative approach, to eliminate inefficiencies by creating an entire new department! :rolleyes:
DHS was/is yet another aspect of “security theater.” Gives the impression of doing something without having to worry about actually accomplishing anything (other than buying a whole bunch of new equipment).
In my limited experience, many agencies that were required to “contribute” staff to DHS took the opportunity to get rid of their lowest performers and malcontents. Yeah - DHS is a model of efficiency! :rolleyes: