United States Leadership Forum

WASHINGTON – September 11, 2011.

The best way to honor those who were killed and injured during the September, 2001 terrorist attacks is to work harder to prevent a repeat of that dark day and to take care of those who take care of us.

Certainly some great progress has been made during the past ten years. The establishment of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in 2003 coordinated the efforts of many agencies to protect our homeland. Transportation security is much more professional and technologically sophisticated than it used to be. FEMA has made great strides in disaster preparedness and response since the Hurricane Katrina debacle. And the FBI, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and our intelligence agencies have identified and stopped potential terrorist and criminal suspects before entering the U.S.

More needs to be done.

My most urgent recommendations are to treat our first responders with the respect and care they deserve. Why were first responders not invited to the 9/11 ceremonies in New York? Why did it take so long for Congress to pass the 9/11 first responders health care bill? Why are first responders, who are increasingly becoming victims of cancer as a direct result of the toxins they absorbed during the 9/11 attacks, not being taken care of?

After listening to more than 1,000 federal, state, and local officials at our homeland security forums, plus the business community, the following are also my long-term recommendations to make our country safer:

• Congress has more than 100 committees and subcommittees involved in security and intelligence oversight. The House and Senate should eliminate duplication by working together through special oversight panels.
• A coordinated approach within specific homeland security sectors is needed. For example, public health security and bioterrorism response is the mission not only of the Department of Homeland Security, but also of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, the Food & Drug Administration, and the Centers for Disease Control. In the rapidly growing sector of cybersecurity, there are separate and distinct cybersecurity programs coordinated not only by the Department of Homeland Security, but also by the FBI, U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force, and U.S. Navy.
• We need better pre-positioning of disaster response resources around the United States, so that urgent supplies such as food, water, medicine, and shelter reach victims in the critical hours and days following a disaster.
• Congress needs to ends its failure to allocate the radio spectrum space needed by first responders to avoid the communications problems that cost too many lives at Ground Zero on 9/11.
• Border security is stalled along the southern border with an increasingly dangerous Mexico following the failure of the multi-billion-dollar Secure Border Initiative. Border security with Canada, other than at airports and check points, is almost non-existent. We need a comprehensive and effective southern and northern border security strategy.
• We need new technologies to keep up with the continuous threat of explosives on the bodies of potential terrorists as well as explosives in cargo.
• And we must stop transporting hazardous cargo in or near highly-populated areas.

Perhaps the most overlooked area which could prevent another 9/11-style attack is to mount a major offensive to prevent the desire of those who might wish to harm America and Americans in the first place. We have such an opportunity. From Libya to Syria, thousands of average citizens are risking their lives every day to bring historic democratic change to a region which has previously provided the seeds for violent radicalism. They want our help and we should give it to them in a much bigger way.

We should:

• More aggressively aid citizens in those countries which are still ruled by tyrannical dictators.
• Help build the economies and governance of those countries which have transitioned, notably Tunisia, Egypt, and now Libya.
• Empower massive people-to-people programs between the United States and the Middle East & North Africa, much as we did to empower the transition of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

We honor those who were killed and injured ten years ago by implementing these recommendations.

William Loiry is Chairman of the United States Leadership Forum. Since 1998 – three years before 9/11 – he and his team have brought together thousands of government, military, business, and nonprofit leaders to identify effective homeland security solutions.