Edwards Calls for New Domestic Counter-Intelligence Agency
Most of the Washingtonians who watched or listened to the President's speech on Iraq Monday night probably had some difficulty focusing on the threat to our security posed by Saddam Hussein when there was a much more immediate threat stalking local citizens at random with a high-powered rifle. No, there's not any evidence at present that the bizarre shootings are linked to any politically motivated terrorist activity, but the fear that currently grips this region is a reminder that security begins at home.
It's appropriate, then, that on the same day as the President's address on the overseas threat from Baghdad, Sen. John Edwards (D-NC) made a speech that reminded Americans of the need for an effective homeland security apparatus to protect us from terrorist threats, whatever their genesis, here at home.
In particular, Edwards called for the creation of a new domestic counter-intelligence agency, similar to Britain's MI5, that would take over intelligence gathering about terrorist threats here at home from the FBI. DLC President Bruce Reed and Senior Policy Advisor Jose Cerda proposed this idea in the July-August 2002 issue of Blueprint magazine, dubbing the new agency "3D," for Domestic Defense Division.
Edwards covered a lot of ground in his remarks to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, smartly criticizing the Administration's "preemption" doctrine; supporting military action if necessary to disarm Saddam Hussein; and calling on the President and Congress to get much more serious about proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in places other than Iraq.
But he also addressed the failure of both the Administration and Congress to deal with the country's dysfunctional intelligence-gathering capacity. "A lot of good people have put a lot of time into the Department of Homeland Security [legislation]. I believe it is valuable and ought to pass. But the most urgent priority for our domestic defense today is not moving boxes on an organizational chart. Our most urgent priority is stopping the enemy in our midst: identifying the terrorist cells within the United States, penetrating them, using them to gain more information about the larger network, and stopping them before they harm us."
In Edwards view, the FBI is incapable of competently meeting this challenge. "Why has the FBI failed? In large part because the FBI is a law enforcement agency, and it simply doesn't have the right skills, strengths, or staff to be a successful intelligence agency.... Instead of attempting to turn the FBI into something it is not, I believe we should establish a new agency that is focused on gathering intelligence about terrorist threat here at home."
Edwards, a frequent critic of the Justice Department's civil liberties record since 9/11, also suggested that a new domestic counter-intelligence agency would be more likely than the FBI to avoid abuses. "With the right safeguards, a new agency can do a better job tracking terrorists and a better job protecting our freedoms.... [T]here is no need to abandon our traditions in order to protect our national security."
Moreover, there's no need to make the attention we pay to Saddam Hussein detract from the equally critical attention we pay to homeland security. The President said on Monday night that Americans "refuse to live in fear." If that's true, then we should demand security at home as well as abroad.
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Link to today's New Dem Daily on the Web: "Edwards Calls for New Domestic Counter-Intelligence Agency" http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=250937&kaid=131&subid=192
Related Material:
Remarks By Sen. John Edwards to the Center for Stategic and International Studies, October 7, 2002: http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=106&subid=122&contentid=250935
"Homeland Security Begins at Home," by Bruce Reed and Jose Cerda III, Blueprint Magazine, Volume 17, July/August 2002: http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=250677&kaid=124&subid=307