Combating Catastrophic Terror, A Security Strategy for the Nation

Watching CNN I'm hearing the same old stuff about how the Democrats can only criticize the Bush administration and doesn't have a plan to put forward.

BULLSHIT!!!

From Yahoo News on October 26, 2005

Pelosi and Reid Call on Bush to Release a Comprehensive Counter-Terrorism Strategy

WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Four years after September 11, 2001, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid joined together today with former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta, former National Security Council Counter-Terrorism Director Rand Beers, former Assistant Secretary of State Susan Rice and former Assistant Secretary of State Wendy Sherman to call on President Bush to finally release a comprehensive counterterrorism strategy after months of delay over bureaucratic infighting. The leaders argued that together, America can do better and they unveiled a letter to the President outlining his failure to outline a counterterrorism strategy, and analysis that the Administration is not fully prepared to protect Americans from a terrorist strike here at home. Along with the letter, they released a new report from national security experts, led by Albright and Podesta, outlining the effects of Bush's failed strategy and new proposals to help guide the Administration in formulating their strategy.

<snip>

The report entitled Combating Catastrophic Terror: A Security Strategy for the Nation, offers the President a vision for what his Administration has not produced -- a comprehensive, end-to-end strategy for defeating terrorism and the violent extremist threat. The report details ideas on three fronts: tactical counterterrorism, strategic counterterrorism and homeland security. It offers ideas on eliminating terror cells, changing the balance of opinion in the Muslim world and doing more at home to protect Americans from a terrorist strike. The Democratic Leaders urged the President to consider the recommendations as they urged the administration to end their bureaucratic infighting and formulate an integrated strategy.

And from the letter sent by the Democrats to Bush:

We are concerned that more than four years have passed since the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and your administration lacks the comprehensive strategy for winning the global war on terrorism that you have repeatedly promised. Despite continued assurances from Administration officials over the past several months that the White House was prepared to release a new, more coherent strategy to deal with catastrophic terror attacks, we understand that this new strategy has been mired in bureaucratic in-fighting and has been delayed indefinitely.

<snip>

Unfortunately, to the extent the Administration has any counterterrorism policies, they appear to be outdated or ineffective, in part because they have become entangled in the proliferation of overlapping initiatives. For example, the 2002 U.S. National Security Strategy, which made unilateral military preemption a centerpiece, has largely been discredited. This document has not been revised since its release, despite its obvious shortcomings and despite the annual requirement to produce an updated strategy. In addition, your National Strategy to Combat Terrorism was last published more than two and half years ago, while the National Strategy to Combat WMD has not been updated in nearly three years. Contributing to the confusion and disarray is the fact that some 10 different strategies currently guide the federal government's response to terrorism and catastrophic attacks to the nation.

Despite the overlapping and multiple government strategies, there are still few meaningful indicators for measuring your Administration's performance in the war on terrorism. The American public is still not able to answer fundamental questions about your success, such as ones asked by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld in October 2003:

"Today we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror. Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us? Does the US need to fashion a broad, integrated plan to stop the next generation of terrorists?" (Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld's memorandum to General Dick Myers, Paul Wolfowitz, General Pete Pace, and Doug Feith, October 16, 2003)

Link to Yahoo article with letter to Bush: http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnw/20051026/pl_usnw/pelosi_and_reid_call_on_bush_to_release_a_comprehensive_counter_terrorism_strategy126_xml;_ylt=Alc1DB6cpK3HaA7ZC0tEaHmyFz4D;_ylu=X3oDMTA5aHJvMDdwBHNlYwN5bmNhdA--


The Democrats proposal, "Combating Catastrophic Terror, A Security Strategy for the Nation" is available here: http://www.americanprogress.org/atf/cf/{E9245FE4-9A2B-43C7-A521-5D6FF2E06E03}/combating_catastropic_terror%20.pdf

Table of Contents:

I Preamble: The Enemy and Its Goals
A. The Contemporary Terrorist Threat
B. Goals (of the terrorist movement)
C. The Stakes
D. Future Threats
II The Context
A. Causes
B. Geography/Key Theater
III The Fundamentals of a Strategy
A. Tactical Counterterrorism
B. Strategic Counterterrorism
C. Homeland Security
IV Tactical Counterterrorism
A. Preventing a Terrorist Attack with WMD
B. Intelligence and Law Enforcement
C. Military Force
D. Afghanistan and Iraq
V Strategic Counterterrorism
A. Encouraging Progress witin the Muslim World
B. Key Emphases for Reform
C. Weak States and Conflict Zones
D. The MEPP (Middle East Peace Process)
E. The Revival and Strengthening of America's Alliances
F. Institutionalizing Cooperation in the War on Terror
VI Homeland Security
A. Domestic Prevention
B. Consequence Management

A week ago Wednesday there was a press conference with Dem leaders and some of the authors of this report - only on C-span of course.

Reid and Pelosi said this will be their approach to the major issues facing the US like the economy, environment, health care, etc. To work with the leaders in each field to develop comprehensive, written plans.

This is what we've been asking for folks. The Democrats' plan.

:kick: