The Department of Homeland Security is undertaking a comprehensive review of its southern border security strategy at the direction of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, Francis Taylor, undersecretary of Homeland Security for Intelligence and Analysis said on Wednesday.
The concept for the strategy was just approved by Johnson and it will contain an intelligence annex, Taylor told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. The strategy is just beginning to get the “meat on the bones,” he said, adding that it will address the risks to the southern border and to better focus efforts on security gaps that are identified.
Taylor mentioned the southern border strategy in response to a question by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), the ranking member on the committee, who said that based on DHS documents there are 700 miles of unsecure southern border.
In a prepared statement provided by Taylor and Suzanne Spaulding, undersecretary of Homeland Security for the National Protection and Programs Directorate, the DHS official stated that one of Johnson’s earliest “initiatives was directing development of a Southern Border and Approaches Campaign Planning effort” that will establish a strategic framework for boosting security at the southern border.
“The plan will contain specific outcomes and quantifiable targets for border security and will address improved information sharing, continued enhancement and integration of sensors, and unified command and control structures as appropriate,” Taylor and Spaulding stated. “The overall planning effort will also include a subset of campaign plans focused on addressing challenges within specific geographic areas, all with the goal of enhancing our border security.”
They also said that Taylor’s office is helping to make sure that “threat information drives efficient use of border resources.”
The Senate panel’s hearing also included witnesses from the FBI and the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) and examined terrorism, cyber security and evolving threats to the homeland. Committee Chairman Tom Carper (D-Del.) said in his opening remarks that the nation is more secure “in many ways” than it was on 9/11 while Coburn disagreed, saying “I don’t think we’re any safer today. I think the threat to our country is just as great as it was pre-9/11 based on what’s happening in the world, the absolute lack of control of our border, especially our southern border, and the corruption on both sides in terms of law enforcement on the border.”
The most immediate threat to the homeland is from homegrown violent extremists, Nicholas Rasmussen, the deputy director of the NCTC, told the panel. As for foreign terrorist organizations, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is the most likely to carry out transnational attacks while the Islamic State in the Levant (ISIL), which is controlling territory in parts of Iraq and Syria, poses the biggest threat to the United States and its interests inside Iraq. He said ISIL’s ability to carry out large-scale, sophisticated attacks beyond its power base “diminishes.” ISIL still poses a threat outside the region, he added.