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Panel endorses domestic intelligence agency
From Jeanne Meserve
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- An influential homeland security panel will recommend the creation of a domestic intelligence agency to collect and analyze information about terrorist threats within the United States. The Advisory Panel to Assess Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction, known as the Gilmore Commission, will issue its fourth report Monday, and officials will discuss details at a news conference. The commission's chairman, former Virginia Gov. James Gilmore, said his panel is not convinced the FBI can redirect attention from prosecuting criminal cases to preventing terrorist attacks, as it has been tasked to do in response to last year's strikes on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Asked if his commission felt the FBI wasn't up to the job, Gilmore said, "Yes. That is a fair conclusion." Gilmore said there is a need for an intelligence "fusion center," outside any existing department or agency, that could bring together information from a number of different sources to "connect the dots" and prevent attacks. Gilmore said that such a center -- unlike the intelligence unit of the new Department of Homeland Security -- would be able to collect intelligence as well as establish any links among the information. Last week a joint congressional panel investigating the intelligence failures that led up to the September 11, 2001, attacks recommended studying the idea of a domestic intelligence agency. The panels, though they have similar missions, have offered differing approaches to the issue of terror. (Full story) However, the concept has raised concerns among civil libertarians who said they fear such an agency would be used to spy on Americans who are obeying the law. Gilmore is recommending that any such agency operate within strict civil liberties guidelines. The commission's report will make a total of 52 recommendations about the proper role of the military in homeland security, ways to improve health and medical response capabilities, how to defend against agricultural terrorism and how to improve protection of critical infrastructure. A source said that some of the commission's recommendations will raise questions about the Bush administration's priorities in the war on terrorism, including its emphasis on weapons of mass destruction. The source said the report will say attacks with conventional weapons, such as truck bombs, are a more imminent threat. Gilmore said some progress has been made to protect the nation from attack but added that much more could be done. He said the country still does not have a detailed homeland security strategy, a system to integrate state and local governments into homeland defense or a method for funding homeland security. Created in 1999, the Gilmore Commission was extended in the aftermath of September 11. Of the 79 recommendations made in its three previous reports, 66 have been adopted in whole or in part.
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