Sprint sent a letter to President-elect Barack Obama and his incoming administration requesting that $2 billion be set aside specifically for a wireless network serving the nation’s first responders. According to Reuters, “Sprint’s plan calls for 100 satellite-based light trucks that would respond to emergencies, and 100,000 or more mobile handsets and equipment at up [...]
When senior FBI official Joseph Persichini takes his 5 a.m. jog down Washington’s National Mall, he imagines everything that could go wrong at Barack Obama’s inaugural next week. He said he thinks about the possibility of a sleet storm, bombing, chemical attack or — perhaps hardest to guard against — the lone gunman bent on [...]
A U.S. intelligence report says there is no credible threat of terrorist attacks at the Feb. 1 Super Bowl, but police said Wednesday that visitors should still expect the type of heavy security typical of every Super Bowl since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. While no specific threat was identified, a joint FBI and [...]
Fewer domestic passengers left the nation’s airports through the first seven months of 2008, with fewer flights filling the friendly skies. But while a bleak economic outlook may not perk up those numbers in the short term, the federal guardian of the gates says it has no intentions of trimming its workforce in this region [...]
There’s a name for public officials who are willing to fight the powerful in defense of the weak, even if it jeopardizes their careers: leaders. Over the years, that’s not a word that I’ve often heard used to describe Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, President-elect Barack Obama’s choice for secretary of Homeland Security. Napolitano is an [...]
The federal government has gained approval to build a new headquarters for the Department of Homeland Security in the nation’s capital. The “Washington Post” reports the three-point-four-billion dollar facility would be one of the largest construction projects in the DC area since the building of the Pentagon back in the 1940s. (MSNBC)
If Mexican drug violence spills across the U.S. border, Homeland Security officials say they have a contingency plan to assist border areas that includes bringing in the military. “It’s a common sense extension of our continued work with our state, local, and tribal partners in securing the southwest border,” DHS spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said Friday. [...]
Testimony of Under Secretary Charles Allen before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
By M. Powell, Ph.D. – In the past few months, the debate over the continued need to maintain a separate Homeland Security Council (HSC) in addition to the National Security Council (NSC), and their respective staffs, has reached a crescendo. The HSC and the NSC and their staffs are supposed to work in parallel, but [...]
The New York Police Department wants to be able to shut down cell phones, in case of a terrorist attack. During last month’s massacre in Mumbai, terrorist handlers over micromanaged via mobile phone the assaults on the hotels, train stations, and Jewish center that killed more than 170 people. In testimony today before the Senate [...]