Research Paper on:
Defense Offered by the OHS

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
result was a catastrophic loss of innocent lives, billions of dollars spent for recovery and rebuilding efforts, and a seriously injured national psyche. One month later, in an effort  to mend Americas badly battered collective sense of domestic security, President George W. Bush announced his plans to establish an Office of Homeland Defense (the name was later changed to  the Office of Homeland Security), to be headed by a "czar," then Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, an old Bush friend, who would report directly to the President, and serve as  a liaison to an intricate network of federal, state and local agencies. The mission and functions of the Office of Homeland Security (OHS) were defined in an executive order signed  by President Bush on October 8, 2001. The Offices mission was described in deceptively simple terms, "to develop and coordinate the implementation of a comprehensive national strategy to secure  the United States from terrorist threats or attacks" (Bush, 2001, p. 1434). According to the executive order, the primary function of the Office would be that of coordination, to  "detect, prepare for, prevent, protect against, respond to, and recover from terrorist attacks within the United States" (Bush, 2001, p. 1434). In addition to duties of incident management, public  affairs, and ensuring continuity at all levels of government, the OHS was entrusted with a massive cooperative operation of coordination in areas of national strategy, detection, preparedness, prevention, protection, response  and recovery (Bush, 2001). In terms of National Strategy, the OHS would develop and monitor the effectiveness of detection and response to terrorist threats or attacks, and oversee preventative  measures for defense and recovery, as well as "periodically review and coordinate revisions to that strategy as necessary" (Bush, 2001, p. 1434). The Office would have to work most