Keeping Us Safe: Secret Intelligence and Homeland Security

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How can the United States guard against a clever unknown enemy while still preserving the freedoms it holds dear? Hulnick explains the need to revamp U.S. intelligence operations from a system focused on a single Cold War enemy to one offering more flexibility in combating non-state actors (including terrorists, spies, and criminals) like those responsible for the attacks of September 11, 2001. Offering possible solutions not to be found in the federal commission's official report, Hulnick's groundbreaking work examines what is really necessary to make intelligence and homeland security more efficient and competent, both at within the United States and abroad.

The U.S. government's progress in establishing a system for homeland security is considerable, yet, besides shifts in alert status, most U.S. residents are unaware of the work being done to keep them safe. Describing the system already in place, Hulnick adds further ideas about what more is needed to protect Americans in the ever-changing world of intelligence. To create a truly valuable program, it is suggested the the United States consider not only new strategies and tactics, but also the need to break down the barriers between intelligence agencies and law enforcement.

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Keeping Us Safe: Secret Intelligence and Homeland Security Review

This is a very disappointing book. Arthur Hulnick is certainly a very knowledgeable and perceptive observer of the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC). He also understands the collection and analytic processes that are the core of the IC. Yet this book still disappoints for three primary reasons.

First, time has passed this book by. After the book was written, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) got a new director in one Michael Chertoff and set up its own intelligence office under Charlie Allen with whom I am sure Hulnick is familiar. It also was written before the Hurricane Katrina debacle that revealed a highly dysfunctional DHS and its subordinate Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). In the same manner the book was written before Ambassador John Negroponte was appointed as Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and under whose stewardship the Office of DNI grew into a major bureaucracy (some 1,500 employees and rising) while avoiding any substantive reforms of the IC. One can only speculate what Hulnick would have concluded about DHS and DNI had this book been written in 2006 not 2004.

Second, Hulnick appears primarily interested in defending the performance of the IC against criticism that arose after the surprise of 9/11 and in the dubious intelligence that was used to fuel Operation Iraqi Freedom. While he is correct that much of these criticisms were unfair, it is also true that the IC as a whole and CIA in particular could have done a lot better than they did in both instances. Indeed some of Hulnick's comments appear very one sided. For example, he points out that in his experience the clandestine CIA officers he encountered were always knowledgeable, target smart, and culturally sensitive. Yet this is not a complete picture. Would he have us believe that there are no mediocre or incompetent officers? Experience would suggest that CIA, like the IC as a whole, has more than its share of mediocre or incompetent officers.

Third, Hulnick appears reluctant to actually investigate any real reforms of the IC and the way it does business. To his credit he does recognize David A. Steele as the leading advocate for more effective use of open sources by the IC. Yet he does not acknowledge that Steele also has advocated a profound transformation of the way the IC does business. Hulnick recognizes the need to transform the culture of CIA, but only in terms of improving the co-operation between it Directorate of Intelligence and it Directorate of Operations. This like the other reforms he advocates can only be classed as too little too late.

All in all his first book "Fixing the Intelligence Machine" (Amazon.com) is by far the better book.

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