Judge FREEH. 44 overseas.

Mr. RUDMAN. Plus there are the 44 overseas. This is the best collection that you are going to get domestically. Of course there are many other agents in other places. The problem has been, I think, not quite as you posed the question. The problem has been that they have had a law enforcement mind-set as they approach it. I think that Mary Jo White's testimony was extraordinarily useful in looking into how a U.S. Attorney in the most critical area of the country in this area had to look at this issue and how to deal with it.

To me it is not a question of trying to get a new agency to do the domestic intelligence, counterintelligence; it is a question of the resources that were asked for. I can tell you that in 1998 or 1999, Director Freeh came to me and asked me to enlist my support with people on the Hill to try to do some of the things that he felt at that time were necessary, and as I recall, they were personnel but they were also technology. It was the technology. They recognized they couldn't get a grip on all the information that was coming in. I did try and they had some success but, for reasons we all understand, the Congress can't always do what agencies think are vital. But as you heard his testimony, I think the numbers, 800 requested and five granted in the account of money and technology, I don't think the Bureau was given the resources it needed during the mid- to late-1990s to develop the kind of intelligence efforts it needs. I think they can do it but they need a lot of resources, and I think Director Mueller has moved strongly in the right direction in taking what Director Freeh started and building on it to have truly a domestic intelligence unit that is strong on analysis. They have already got the collection.

So that would be my answer.

Senator FEINSTEIN. Thank you very much. Thanks, Mr. Chair

man.

Chairman Goss. Mr. Roemer.

Mr. ROEMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator, nice to see you up here. Thank you for your help in the past as well, too, on many of these important issues. I want to thank you as well for your work on the commissions that you served on. I happen to agree with your bottom line that a new blue ribbon, independent commission is needed in this instance and I want to come back to your service on the commission that reported to Congress some very important findings.

One of the problems around Congress is that they don't implement some of the good recommendations made by very knowledgeable people in law enforcement, in public service, in intelligencegathering that serve on these commissions.

In your testimony, you mentioned that a couple of Members had worked to implement the Homeland Security Department, which is now in a state of nowhere-we don't know what is going to happen to that-but I would appreciate just very succinctly three other high priority recommendations made by your commission that this Congress should act on and act on quickly.

Mr. RUDMAN. You are talking about the Hart-Rudman Commission?

Mr. ROEMER. Yes, sir.

Mr. RUDMAN. The Homeland Security, as you know, that department was our number one priority for the very kinds of things you have heard today about stovepipes, having to go over the wall with information. We have got 44 different agencies right now who have some piece of this. They have separate information technology. They have separate missions. That has to be brought under control. I would urge the Congress and the administration to settle whatever disputes you have over these labor issues and please get this thing established, because frankly we haven't got anything done yet and until that gets deployed, it will take a year to a year and a half to get it working. So I think that is number one in priority. The second priority I believe is starting to take form. If we have-it is not a question of if. When we have another terrorist incident in the United States, and we will have one, we have recommended in our report in great detail the fact that we have citizen soldiers in this country deployed all over America called the National Guard that are the best line of defense in terms of first response, because if we have a weapon of mass destruction in this country, no one other than the United States military will be able to respond and help citizens. They are the only ones who are trained, who have the equipment, who have the communications. The National Guard should be dually trained. They should have their regular mission, but there should be strong dual training in responding to terrorist attacks.

If something happened in New England, you have got the Guard units from all over New England that could focus on, let's say, Boston. In California you have got those from the western States, from Oregon, Seattle and the State of California. As we looked at these Guard units, we felt they really ought to be the core of the first response to major terrorist attacks, be it medical, communications, transportation, law enforcement. And so that would be my second priority.

My third priority is port security, which I just certainly hope that appropriate committees will start to take a look at. With all due respect, I'm a little tired of having my shoes taken off at LaGuardia Airport. I usually dress like this. I don't think I look much like a terrorist, and how many dollars have been spent examining my shoes I don't know. But I tell you this much, that 50,000 containers are coming in every day into every port in this Nation, 12 percent are being inspected, who knows what they contain. It is a high priority, and the problem is something is going to happen and then we're all going to say, well, but we didn't know. Well, we did know and it is not only our commission that has made that statement.

Those are my three priorities right now.

Mr. ROEMER. Thank you.

Chairman Goss. Senator Roberts.

Senator ROBERTS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me say, Warren, that your words of wisdom did not fall on deaf ears, at least in terms of the official report, which we hope hasn't simply collected dust. We have your report, Preparing for the 21st Century, the Cole Report, which just popped out here, what, a week ago, the Jeremiah Report, the CISI, Defending America in the 21st Century, the Gilmore Commission on Terrorism and the Bremer National

Commission on Terrorism and the Odom study, which was back in 1997.

I just tried to add up the similar recommendations by all of these commissions, and I think I have 95 recommendations.

Mr. RUDMAN. That is about right.

Senator ROBERTS. They were made in an early September closed hearing part of this official record, so we do have a good foundation. One of the things that I would like to ask you, you mentioned how many agencies were involved in regards to the agencies that think they have the jurisdiction in regards to terrorism and homeland security. I can't remember the number you just said. What? Mr. RUDMAN. About 44.

Senator ROBERTS. We asked 46 a year ago July to come before some appropriators, the Intelligence Committee and the Armed Services Committee. This is some 15, 16 months ago. At that time there were 46. We asked them what their mission was, what they really did and who was in charge. At that time, according to my count, the staff, or my staff estimated there were 14 subcommittees and committees in the Senate alone that allegedly had jurisdiction. Since that time, we have been able to identify 80 Federal agencies who have some degree of jurisdiction in regards to homeland security and terrorism. I am not making this up. According to the leader, Tom Daschle, and also Trent Lott, or the leadership, there are 88 subcommittees and committees now that feel they have some jurisdiction.

It seems to me the Congress of the United States has a responsibility to get our act together just as we do in terms of trying to really coordinate homeland security. You are a former chairman of this outfit. It seems to me that we could possibly think about joining the House and Senate into a joint committee, not make it a select committee, make it permanent, reduce the numbers and tell the Members who serve on the Intelligence Committee they are limited to some degree with the outside committees upon which they serve. I'm not sure what we would have the term limits in there as well. What do you think of that?

Mr. RUDMAN. Senator Roberts, if you turn to either recommendation 49 or recommendation 50 of the Hart-Rudman Commission, you will find your words are embodied into a recommendation. We believe that the vastness of this jurisdiction over homeland security is so different than anything else the Congress has dealt with before that you must, you must, have a consolidation of committee responsibility for homeland security, certainly in both the authorizing and the appropriating area. It is absolutely essential.

If you don't, then whoever the new Director is, instead of spending time with these five and six new key agencies that are going to be coming into his new Cabinet department and giving them mission statements and building the kind of lateral communications you need and having the diversity of leadership you are going to need to move across these heretofore stovepipes, he is going to spend all of his time up here. He is going to be here all the time. With all due respect, when I was here I used to sometimes wonder whether or not we weren't bearing too hard on the Director of the FBI or the Secretary of Defense. These people have to spend so much time up here. A lot of it is necessary. After all, the over

sight comes from the Congress and I understand that. But in homeland security, unless you adopt some sort of a different plan with the House and the Senate, either jointly or each having one or two committees, I frankly think you are going to really cause enormous problems, not only time problems but frankly there is going to be a difference of opinion among all these committees about how certain things ought to be done.

So I would commend you look at our report, 49 and 50. It was a unanimous recommendation.

Senator ROBERTS. I looked at the report, and I introduced legislation and it is collecting dust.

Mr. RUDMAN. We appreciate it. As a matter of fact, Senator Roberts, I would thank you. You are one Member of Congress among five or six who came to the press conference in January of 2000— December-when we announced that report.

Chairman Goss. Chairman Graham.

Chairman GRAHAM. Senator, as you said, the centerpiece of your recommendation was the establishment of a Department of Homeland Security. I think that is close at hand, but it is also going to be occurring at a time when we have intelligence information that indicates we might have additional risk as a result of what is happening around the world. In fact, earlier today the Director of Central Intelligence sent to this committee a letter in response to our request for further declassification of the National Intelligence Estimate that was issued last week.

In the letter, Mr. Tenet states, "Baghdad for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or chemical or biological weapons against the United States. Should Saddam conclude that a U.S.-led attack could no longer be deterred, he probably would become much less constrained in adopting terrorist actions. Such terrorism might involve conventional means, as with Iraq's unsuccessful attempt at a terrorist offensive in 1991, or chemical and biological weapons.'

So we are at a point that the threat level is up and we are about to pass this new department and you indicate correctly, maybe conservatively, that it is going to take some period of time for the new department to go through its transition period and be fully effective. With that as a predicate, any suggestions of what we should be doing in the early stages of this new department so that we don't have the unintended consequence of making us more vulnerable because of the almost unavoidable disruptions that such a major new reorganization entails?

Mr. RUDMAN. That is a very interesting question. I want to give you an answer because I have thought about it a bit, not in quite the way you phrased it. But let me put it this way.

One of the things that is vastly understood, certainly in the country and maybe in parts of the Congress, is that each of these agencies going into the Homeland Security Department is going to maintain its identity. The Coast Guard will still be the United States Coast Guard. FEMA will still be FEMA. INS will be INS. The Secret Service will be Secret Service. And the one or two others that they have added to our recommendations. What they are going to have the advantage of is being parts of one department

I think it is very important that once this legislation passes, that the Congress in the transition section of the statute, either in report language or in statutory language, make it clear that these agencies are to continue to operate at their present levels of activity, in whatever their tempos are, irrespective of the fact they are being merged into the new agency. The merger can take place administratively but the people in the field who are doing the work cannot be deterred from what they are doing. That would certainly apply to the Border Patrol, the Coast Guard and the INS. I think it is a very good question. I don't think-as I remember the statute, there is nothing in there regarding that.

I think you get my point, that they better keep doing their job as they are moving into the new agency. It is like consolidating two fire departments. You want to make sure the engines are running while the transition is going on, lest the town burn down.

Chairman GRAHAM. If I could ask one more question along the same lines. It comes from one of the recommendations that Director Freeh made. It was number 10. He calls for establishing a Domestic Public Safety Office in the executive with responsibility for coordinating and supporting national law enforcement issues. There has been a proposal that within the Department of Homeland Security, in addition to creating the department, that an office similar to what Mr. Freeh has suggested be established in the White House in much the same way that after the 1947 National Security Act we created the National Security Council to be the coordinative agency and the most direct adviser to the President on national security issues.

Do you think we need within the executive branch, potentially within the White House itself, a Domestic Public Safety Office for similar coordinative and supportive functions?

Mr. RUDMAN. We now will have a Department of Homeland Security, but as I understand, the President intends to keep by executive order a homeland security unit within the White House. And you have got the NSC. I'm not sure if I agree with Director Freeh on that. I would have to think about it. The problem I have is when you start-if it was organized in the right way, maybe it would work.

But right now the person who ought to be doing that is the Attorney General of the United States, it seems to me. He ought to be the domestic security officer for the country. He is a member of the Cabinet, he is a statutory member of the National Security Council. I would think if the talents of that department are utilized properly, that he ought to be able to do it.

On the other hand, I have not sat where Louis Freeh has sat, so I don't want to criticize it. I worry about creating more czars, if you will, in the White House for everything, because they tend to have their authority diffused unless they have got budget authority, and none of them do. I'm kind of a little uneasy about that, but Director Freeh I am sure can explain it fully this afternoon.

Chairman Goss. Thank you, Senator. Senator DeWine. Senator DEWINE. Thank you, Senator, for joining us and all of the witnesses. You have been very, very good and helpful.

Senator, I think as a result of September 11 we on this committee need to reexamine at least and think about what our role