This week Air Force Secretary Michael W. Wynne announced that the 8th. Air Force will become the service's new cyberspace command. Much more on this can be found in the Armed Forces Press Service article on the new command. The Air Force is already fighting in cyberspace however as the AFPS article points out those efforts are widely scattered.

Ground work needed to stand up the new command is expected to take about four months.

THOUGHTS FROM ME

I like this idea alot ! I would be the last to take away from the job that U.S. Computer Emergency Response Teams are doing. However as the AFPS article points out, we are already at war in cyberspace. We need our military to have a proactive role in this fight. This new command is designed to give us just that, in a more focused way than ever. This new command under Lt. General Robert Elder will provide a command structure under which we can amass and coordinate resources like never before.
Telecommunications including the internet and several other areas targeted by the new command are a "level 1" critical infastructure. The only mystery to me is why we didn't do this a long time ago !

Yesterday the latest issue Of Emerging Infectious Diseases came out. In it was an interesting article called Prophylaxis and Treatment of Pregnant Women for Emerging Infections and Bioterrorism Emergencies This article is a great overview on the current state of the art in using prophylatic treatment in pregnant women. For those who are unclear, prophylatic treatment is not aimed at curing a patient that is already sick. Its intent is to prevent exposed persons from becoming sick to begin with. This is often done with one of many medications. Such treatment is important because in a biological attack it may be days of weeks before symptoms appear. By that time available treatments may be much less effective. In addition each infected person then has the opportunity to infect untold numbers of other people before symptoms alert us to a potential problems.

Use of prophylaxis in pregnant women is hampered among other things by the lack of hard data. Because of ethical issues surrounding safety of the fetus, drug trials are not performed on pregnant women. The issue is also complicated by the nature of pregnancy itself. Hormones and other aspects of a pregnant woman's body are constantly in flux. The above article goes into much more detail on these and other concerns. Including is the simple fact that there is just so much that is not know about how a pregnant woman's body will react to the medications normally used in these situations.

In homeland security we may need to relook at our prophylaxis planing. It is likely that pregnant women may need more individualized prophylatic treatment as opposed to other segments of the impacted population.

We also need to plan for such decisions in advance, like everything else we may need to provide in an emergency. I urge you to read this article and others. Discuss them with your disaster medical team. Work through the logistics etc. before an emergency thrusts these decisions on you, and the people you protect.

Back on Thursday President Bush signed a bill authorizing 700 miles of fence along the U.S.- Mexico border. The new law also authorizes cameras, sensors, and other hight tech measures along that same border.

It should be very good news for those of us concerned with homeland security. However there's one big problem. The new law provides no money to make any of this happen ! Maybe congress will appropriate the needed funds later, maybe not. In the meanwhile it will remain way too easy for terrorists, or their supplies, communications etc. to join the flood of people crossing our borders in violation of our laws.

This game of authorize but not allocate funds is not a new game for congress. Both parties play it. Those of us who are leaders on homeland security related policy need to put an end to it !

Yesterday a judge in Ontario threw out the part of that country's anti-terrorism law that defines terrorism. Superior Court Judge Douglas Rutherford ruled that the part of the law limiting the definition of terrorism to acts involving "religion, politics, or ideaology" violated Canada's Charter of Rights. The rest of the law was left intact. Interestingly some of our neighbors to the north feel that this will actually make it easier to prosecute terrorism in Canada overall.

Why should we care ? One Canada is our neighbor across our entire northern border. Anything that impacts homeland security in Canada, at least indirectly impacts homeland security here.

But more than that, its a lesson in just how tricky it can be to craft legislation which protects both our rights and our safety. Granted Canada is a different country, with a somewhat different political system. However both our countries are democracies based on English Common Law, so the lessons learned are not completely irrelevant to us either.

I think this shows how criminal legislation, including that concerning homeland security should not be enacted in haste. In the public safety/ national security arena there is a natural push to do something, and do it now ! We must reign in this urge to act prematurely. Especially when it comes to homeland security we must be sure the needed criminal laws are enacted such that they will withstand review by the courts and the public.

So you think that defining terrorism is easier than this ? Schmidt and Youngman in their book POLITICAL TERRORISM cited 109 definitions of the term ! We have courts exactly because as I have said before "Any two honest, intelligent people will eventually disagree." We must work to ensure that when disagreements arise the safety of those we protect is not compromised in the process.

My point is this. Just as we should make the fullest use possible of lessons learned in other areas, lessons learned must become a part of enacting homeland security related criminal statutes. We can't just assume what hasn't worked elsewhere will work here. We are not the only democracy in the world, and homeland security does not stop at our national border. We must borrow from the experience of others. Not only will this give us stronger legislation, but make us safer and save us time as well.

Stay Vigilant !
Robert

I'm finishing up some training over the next few days. So posts to this blog may be frief and far between until around October 25th.

Robert