WASHINGTON: The Obama administration is reaping what it sowed. Toss out someone without good cause and few people will want to work for you once word gets around. Former defense policy undersecretary Michele Flournoy ducked out last week. Now Jeh Johnson, head of the Department of Homeland Security and former top lawyer at the Pentagon,… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The House Armed Services Committee will be led through the shoals of sequestration, military pay, weapons costs and a volatile world by a reform-minded and dynamic legislator. I’ve covered Rep. Mac Thornberry since before the turn of the century (that hurt) and have always found compelling his willingness to delve beneath the surface of what the… Keep reading →

CAPITOL HILL: The rumor has been rife for weeks: Cyber Command is about to be elevated to a command equal to the powerful regional combatant commands such as Central and Pacific Commands. This would make what many observers regard as the natural maturation of the increasingly important command, as well as its separation from the… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The nation’s top military cyber commander offered his version of how government and military agencies are likely to work together when America suffers cyber attacks, and warned that industry needs to take a greater role. “We have laid out lanes of the road,” Gen. Keith Alexander, commander of Cyber Command and director of the… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: One of the grand old men of biodefense, Dr. Matthew Meselson, left his Harvard lab and came to Washington to call for greater international cooperation in monitoring new diseases, whether they arise in the wild or in the lab. The Department of Homeland Security’s process for reviewing potentially dangerous research, he said at an… Keep reading →

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD: The Coast Guard is shrinking and may have to cut back on traditional missions like fisheries protection and drug interdiction to free up resources for new issues like cybersecurity and the thawing of the Arctic, warned the service’s commandant, Admiral Robert J. Papp, this morning at the Navy League’s annual Sea-Air-Space convention.… Keep reading →

A well-trained workforce familiar with cyber security issues can help companies train for emergencies, respond effectively and learn from their experiences. A truly resilient enterprise dynamically innovates and changes its practices, policies, and processes, both in response to changing threats from the outside and changing requirements from the inside. Resilience is achievable, but companies will… Keep reading →

President Obama’s new counterterrorism strategy reflects a profound misreading of the nature of the global transnational threat. If we follow this strategy for a few years we will be right back where we were on September 10, 2001. The new blueprint misses what should be the primary goal of U.S. counterterrorism strategy: to prevent the… Keep reading →

This article marks the beginning of our examination of just what America’s national security leaders should do next to secure our national security, 10 years after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. We will post at least one analytic piece each day until the anniversary. One of the lasting legacies of 9/11 that continues… Keep reading →

The nation’s first Secretary of Homeland Security said Congress has “failed” America’s first responders by not acting on legislation that would dedicate wireless communications spectrum to a nationwide, interoperable, public safety network and said it is unlikely anything will pass before the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. “It’s wrong. It’s really wrong for them… Keep reading →