Re: Comparative Homeland Security: Global Lessons (Wiley Series on Homeland Defense and Security) by Nadav Morag (available at
http://www.amazon.com/Comparative-Homeland-Security-Lessons-Defense/dp/0470497149/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1325305479&sr=1-1)
Homeland security has been ill-defined, misconstrued, conflated, and confounded, all the more easily for its susceptibility to taking on the appearance of whatever background any exponent elects to use on this slippery chameleon. Until now, that is. John Le Carré once observed that, for an intelligence officer, nothing exists without a context. Such a context is precisely the missing element that Nadav Morag supplies the reader of Comparative Homeland Security: Global Lessons. This work is invaluable to any serious practitioner likely to one day face a policy maker asking the question, "Why can't we do in America what they do in______?" Why not introduce an American equivalent of Britain's MI5, for example? Why not adapt the French system of having special prosecutors who make entire careers in counter-terrorism?
Dr. Morag, proves a first-rate, analytical teacher in giving the reader the means to answer just such questions, whether the country in the blank is Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Israel, or Australia. Resisting the temptation to serve up easy answers, Morag gives the reader details and examples and context to enable arriving at one's own answer depending on the circumstances. Thus, the book follows a logical order of exposition, beginning with drawing comparative distinctions among select countries to illustrate how their laws and institutions affect the range of feasible options for defending against terrorist attack. The author reveals how counter-terrorism strategy aligns along a continuum, ranging from a law-enforcement to a war-fighting approach (p. 63) where the larger situation dictates which approach is most likely to emerge or avail. Similarly, some countries find it useful to go to great lengths to categorize and define terrorism (pp. 68, 77), while others eschew such detail in order to retain flexibility for implementing ad hoc solutions under rapidly changing conditions (p. 69). Variation in national approaches that heretofore appeared impenetrable or head-shakingly idiosyncratic become demystified and rational to the reader benefiting from the arcane details of government, history, law, and geopolitical imperatives affecting the different countries Dr. Morag analyzes in the 388 pages of this book. To unearth and consolidate such detail otherwise, the reader would have to undertake a research expedition through hundreds of texts and archives, facing a near eternity of sifting through extraneous or confusing information.
The policy analyst who wants a feeling for checks and balances in free countries like Britain, for example, need only to turn to page 85 to find that emergency regulations enacted for safeguarding life must be "geographically specific, cannot amend basic guarantees of human rights, and must be limited in time." What about ticking-bomb situations in countries like Israel, where saving lives and defending human rights may come into conflict? Morag explains the technical exemptions that theoretically protect defenders who save lives only to face prosecution for harsh interrogations (p. 119), but he does not stop there. He also reveals ambiguities in relevant law that ultimately have the effect of telling interrogators that they use harsh measures only at their own risk - no matter how many lives get saved as a result.
Continuing his unvarnished presentations, he often notes what once worked but no longer avails. For example, Morag explains how a once effective approach of destroying the homes of terrorists' family members has, over time, lost much of its deterrent value (p. 129).
Morag's analysis of comparative approaches to terrorist-induced calamaties goes beyond the immediately obvious, touching such areas as emergency medical response, and how the "scoop and run" principle evolved out of fears of secondary terrorist strikes (p. 292).
Wrapping up the discussion, the author again leaves the reader with cogent insights, such as
- Terrorism ... is in its own category because terrorist threats ... are a direct challenge to the government through their attempt to disrupt and produce a lack of confidence in the ability of government to provide stability and security (p. 360).
- Adopting a successful foreign model requires understanding and analyzing the differences in legal frameworks, institutional frameworks, culture/mentality (in terms of what is and what is not publically acceptable), and a range of other variables (p. 361).
- The difficulties ... in adopting strategic-level foreign practices are...considerable but not unbridgeable (p. 361).
Overall, Nadav Morag has made a significant contribution to the field with this book whose value is indisputable in general and priceless in the event one encounters demands for action and consideration of other models of terrorism defense in the immediate aftermath of the next attack.
-- Nick Catrantzos
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Nick Catrantzos + Tom Goff
- All Secure
- NICK CATRANTZOS is the lead author of the All Secure website and is the emeritus security director for a large public organization. He has also managed security aspects of corporate takeovers, response to international hostage situations, and finding and keeping secrets. He has been board certified in security management, licensed as a private investigator, and certified as an incident commander. He worked as a case officer for a discreet branch of public service. He protected stealth technology at Lockheed and, later, as a consulting security director for both Kroll and Control Risks, he assisted executives with workplace violence cases and with protecting VIPs and critical assets globally in volatile areas. Nick's partner, TOM GOFF, was a captain in the Military Police Corps, U.S. Army Reserve and has a law degree from the University of California at Davis. He is a former reporter for Fortune Magazine, was senior editor at New York Magazine and Esquire, and has provided crisis and communications counsel to senior executives at Fortune 500 companies, including Lockheed, ARCO, Microsoft, Nissan, and Sony Pictures.