| Bush sets out security strategy Matthew Engel, Washington from: the Guardian Wednesday July 17, 2002 President Bush yesterday unveiled a comprehensive strategy for national security, with a warning ringing in his ears that the whole plan threatens to become a bureaucratic nightmare. The White House wants to merge all or part of 22 separate agencies into a huge Department of Homeland Security, with 170,000 staff and a $38bn budget. The president immediately sent four of his cabinet ministers to Capitol Hill to lobby for the plan before a House of Representatives committee. However, a Brookings Institution report warned that the department will be too unwieldy: "The danger is that top managers will be preoccupied for months, if not years, with getting the reorganisation right, thus giving insufficient attention to their real job: taking concrete action to counter the terrorist threat at home." The administration has rejected a national ID card, but driving licences - issued by the individual states - effectively perform this function anyway. Under the new scheme a national standard for the licences will be set. The report also covers plans for new extradition and secrecy laws, vaccines, greater vigilance at borders and ports, the protection of infrastructure and hi-tech methods of identification. However, it does not appear to give a route to greater control and coordination of the FBI and CIA - perhaps the most glaring weakness of the present setup. |
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