Earlier this month, Sami Osmakac, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in the former Yugoslavia, was arrested near Tampa, Florida, after federal officials uncovered his plan to unleash terrorism upon the United States. After receiving an anonymous tip, undercover FBI agents met with Osmakac and learned the details of his terror plot. Osmakac described his intentions of setting off car bombs in crowded areas throughout Tampa, following such explosions with high-powered assault weapons attacks against the public. “I want to do something terrifying, like one day, one night, something’s going to … More

A recent analysis of data accumulated by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at the University of Maryland reveals a disturbing depth to the level of extremism and violence perpetrated within the United States over the past decade. In sum, START’s Global Terrorism Database, an open-source database comprising “information on over 87,000 domestic and international terrorist events around the world since 1970,” identified over 200 acts of terrorism having occurred in the United States since 2000. Of those acts, 17 resulted in fatalities. … More

On November 8, officials in Springfield, Illinois, discovered that cyber hackers had gained remote access to the city’s water utility. As The Washington Post reports, the hackers first stole the password and access codes from a local company that develops Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems. SCADA systems are operating systems that run many manufacturing plants around the globe. The hackers then used the stolen codes to manipulate the utility’s operational system. As a result, at least one water pump was damaged and burned out. According to a Department … More

On Tuesday November 22, The Heritage Foundation will co-host a GOP primary debate on foreign policy and national security along with the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and CNN. There are several ways you can interact with Heritage on the night of the debate. In preparation for the debate, we will be having our “Lunch with Heritage” chat on Friday, November 18 from 12-1 ET. We will be joined by Heritage’s National Security expert James Carafano. He will be taking your questions about what defense and homeland security threats we should take … More

Recently released information from the 9/11 Commission reveals that its original recommendation to condense and consolidate congressional oversight for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has yet to be implemented. This leaves homeland security at risk and bound by its own committees. In 2003, DHS was subject to oversight by 86 congressional committees and subcommittees. Today there are more than 108. Compare that to the 36 committees and subcommittees with oversight for the Department of Defense, which has a budget 10 times greater than DHS and millions more employees. This … More

The White House has recently announced more details about the European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA), a ballistic missile defense plan for the protection of allies and friends in Europe and the U.S. homeland in its later stages. While the EPAA has certain good aspects, including advancing the Aegis sea-based missile defense capability, it would not provide the kind of robust missile defenses needed by the United States and its friends and allies. For example, it is not until the Phase Four (2020) timeframe that the plan would provide additional defensive … More

While opinions about America’s post–9/11 policies come and go, facts remain: The U.S. has thwarted 40 terrorist plots through an aggressive and prioritized plan of offense to protect America. That is not a plan to abandon now, in an age of increasingly high-tech terrorism. As John Yoo, a former official in the U.S. Department of Justice between 2001–2003, said yesterday at The Heritage Foundation, “The most important thing to happen in the U.S. in the last 10 years was nothing… the most important question to ask is why and whether … More

Last week, the Bipartisan Policy Center’s National Security Preparedness Group (NSPG)—a follow on to the original 9/11 Commission—reported that, 10 years after 9/11, nine of the 41 recommendations made by the commission remain unfulfilled. With scores like that, this report card certainly isn’t going to make it on anyone’s fridge. The NSPG’s findings point to several key recommendations of the commission that have not been met. For one, some seven years after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was created, congressional oversight remains abysmal. DHS remains subject to oversight by … More

Heritage’s Jim Carafano appeared on CBS’s “Early Show” to discuss the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) wanting a blank check. FEMA says it has too little money in the Disaster Relief Fund (DRF) due to its federalizing a record number of natural disasters this year. (Watch the video here.) As Carafano notes, FEMA needs to save its resources—funding especially—for truly catastrophic events, and get out of the business of bailing out states for natural disasters that occur with fairly predictable regularity. This issue of federalization of disasters is vividly illustrated … More

Many will quietly and somberly remember 9/11 on the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks that killed over 3,000 Americans. Indiana resident Karen Hall will do it a bit more loudly, leading a caravan of patriots across the country with the flags of each of America’s 50 states sailing out their windows. It was three days after 9/11 when Hall first rallied a similar flag parade together in Key West, Florida, where she was living at the time. In an effort fueled by passion and love of country, Hall gathered … More