The Edge of Disaster
Sat Jun 30, 2007 at 04:49:54 AM PDT
It is illogical to invest so much in confronting the terrorist threat beyond our shores while being so parsimonious whne it comes to protecting ourselves from acts of terror or catastrophic events here at home.
That is a quote from book whose title is the same as that of this diary, The Edge of Disaster: Building a Resilient Nation. The author, Stephen Flynn, is one of the world's great experts on transportation security, and previously authored the bestselling America the Vulnerable This diary will introduce you to his new book, of which Mark Warner has said
Steve Flynn has done it again. As with America the Vulnerable, The Edge of Disaster is the must-read book for every American, elected official, and presidential candidate who is committed to ensuring that our nation continue to thrive in perilous times.
Stephen Flynn is a retired Coast Guard officer who has become consumed with protecting this nation, especially its ports and an its other infrastructure. He was already dedicated to this task when Katrina hit, and was halfway around the world working on a hypothetical "bomb-in-the-box" scenario, a bomb in a shipping container. He writes in his introduction
While watching with growing frustration the mismanagement of Hurricane Katrina's aftermath, I was struck by the fact that as dangerous and disruptive as the container threat could be, only a nuclear warhead could begin to match the damage wrought by this storm.
He decided that his approach to homeland security had to take into consideration not only terrorist threats, but also natural disaster, especially given that
Nearly 90 percent of Americans are currently living in locations that place them at a moderate-to-high risk of earthquakes, volcanoes, wildfires, hurricanes, flooding, or high-wind damage.
He thinks we have to embrace national resiliency as the organizing principle to confront the perils, natural and human, of our age. He notes that such an approach can
- engender public support
- have the potential to help generate economic growth
- support the national security imperative of confronting the terrorist threat
He is very critical of our neglect of infrastructure, noting that
Over the past two decades, we have stopped thinking about the elements of our physical infrastructure as ational security assets. In fact, increasingly it seems that we have stopped thinking about infrastructure altogether.
By the end of the book, we will be prepared for the summary of the key points he has to offer. I will begin with the end, for every journey should have a destination. Flynn criticizes the take-it-or-leave-it approach that has increasingly starved non-defense related activities in the federal budgetary process. Let me offer three quotes from his final chapter, which is entitled "A Resilient Society" and then simply list the ten key points he offers at the end of the book.
As a nation, we can afford to maintain and improve critical infrastructures like our waterways. We can bankroll basic government functions like public health. It is inexcusable that we don't. Not all government is pork. Not all civil servants are incompetent, and we should not be treating them much as we did returning Vietnam War veterans. Many are motivated by a sense that quality public service matters and that their jobs are important, even if largely unappreciated, as my buoy-tender job was.
The Pentagon's budget and the war in Iraq are costing U. S. taxpayers more than half a trillions dollars annually. That amount represent approximately one half of all federal discretionary spending for 2007. It is illogical to invest so much in confronting the terrorist threat beyond our shores while being so parsimonious when it comes to protecting ourselves from acts of terror or catastrophic events here at home.
Taxpayers are currently bankrolling a rapid-reaction military force that is able to deploy to any part of the globe within eighteen hours. But as a general rule, the White House has been telling communities that they should not count on receiving emergency federal assistance for at least seventy-two hours. We can and must do better than that.
And now his ten key points, simply listed:
- Americans must insist that Washington make building national resiliency from within as important a public policy imperative as confronting dangers from without.
- Terrorism is only one of growing list of potentially catastrophic evens that threatens the public.
- Living with ailing infrastructure is foolish and dangerous.
- Our greatest untapped asset is the American people.
- we are failing to adequately tap the ingenuity and resources of the private sector.
- We should not underestimate the value of individual preparedness.
- Let's not pretend that a pandemic won't happen.
- Don't encourage construction along vulnerable coastlines and in flood-prone areas
- Dedicate adequate resources to our local police and emergency responders.
- Promote the concept of resiliency as a global imperative.
Even in isolation, the foregoing 10 points seems like basic common sense, And yet, as Flynn so clearly shows with the examples throughout the book, both real and imagined, we do not apply common sense or critical thinking either to recognize the nature of the problem and risk, or to prepare - for prevention or for recovery. In a chapter entitled "The Best Defense is a Good Defense" Flynn notes that
The kinds of things we need to do to make critical infrastructure more durable so as to reduce its appeal as a terrorist target can simultaneously bolster its capacity to ride out both daily trials and natural disasters. Finally, none of these defensive measure will provide fodder to fuel the jihadists' claim that the United States is at war with Islam.
. The issue about the jihadists comes directly from something unavoidable, which people other than Flynn have noted, as which he puts bluntly:
But the war in Iraq is doing more than producing the angast that expands the ranks of jihadists. It is also becoming a proving gounrd where the sills of planning and conducting an attack within a modern urban setting are proliferating.
He identifies four key methods of reducing the attractiveness of infrastructure as targets by limiting the the damage their destruction would do to the economy:
- hardening key targets against attack: this is applicable only when the critical facility can neither be relocated or replaced. A major dam, the White House, national monuments fall in such a category. So do certain power generating facilities.
- redundancy: having a backup, such as a remote parallel computer server, that can automatically kick in, or having alternative pathways to route electricity
- be prepared to fix it if it breaks: along the Alaska pipeline have prepositioned spare pipes and monitor key points with sensors and cameras in order to respond quickly
- reengineering and relocation: reengineer so that processes make them less potentially hazardous, or physically move some facilities away from populated areas. In the former category for some cost increase we can decrease the danger of chemicals used in the operation of things like plants to make our water potable. In the latter we might move things like Liquid Natural Gas terminals at least a mile outside of a densely populated area, and not have them in places like Boston Harbor where an explosion would wipe out thousands of buildings and key facilities and potentially kill tens of thousands of people.
Flynn explores scenarios both natural and manmade. One of his scenarios - all too realistic and possible - includes simultaneous attacks in the harbors at Boston and Los Angeles. Another is the impact of an avian flu pandemic. Looking at the latter, we have baselines with which to compare. During regular flu outbreaks 200,000 Americans are hospitalized and 38,000 of these die, a mortality rate of .008 (of the total infected national population) at a direct cost of about $12 billion dollars. During the Spanish flue outbreak in 1918, about 675,000 Americans died,an mortality rate of less than 1%. Of the documented cases where humans have been infected with avian flu, the mortality rate has been 54%. If the lethality of the virus were to go down as it mutates to more easily infect humans, consider the impact of a 1% fatality rate, and the crushing impact on our healthcare system:
With a projected 80 million illnesses in the United States, 800,000 Americans would not survive the infection. The millions in need of hospital care would find themselves largely out of luck: the entire inventory of staffed hospital beds within the United States is 970,000.
The limit is not only over total hospital beds. Flynn informs us that since 1991 the total number of beds in burn units has decreased from 1,966 to 1,897 - that's nationally. Were an LNG terminal to be attacked, the number of burn cases that would result would be several multiples of the total national beds. The recent fire in Providence with band Great White caused over 100 people with second and third degree burns and the region could not address the needs of all. Nationally half of hospital emergency departments already operate at or over capacity.
Or to look at other vulnerabilities, think of all the extended power outages endured around the US, caused by hurricanes, tornadoes, tree-limbs that fall upon power lines, and so on. Or the risk of floods, and not just on the Gulf Coast. An earthquake in the Sacramento - San Joaquin River Delta in California could potentially cut much of the water flowing to Southern California for up to 15 months. Is the approximately $3 billion it would take to construct a peripheral canal that could prevent the destruction of the water supply system too much to spend, or is it a drop in the bucket compared to the costs of the devastation, both financially and in terms of human life and health?
Flynn writes a very clear prose. The book is well organized. His observations and analysis are cogent - and frightening. He raises issues for governments at federal, state and local levels; private organizations; and individuals and their families. I have read his earlier book, which Had an impact upon my own thinking. I agree with Mark Warner about the importance of this book, and strongly suggest it as something that should be of interest to anyone concerned about our security. It is tempting to quote many more things, but what I have covered should give a sense of this book. Flynn notes that
Washington has been both underestimating America's growing fragility and failing to tap the long-standing sources of our national strength.
He intends to scare us. But that is to get our attention so that we can properly address the issues before us. At the same time he warns us that
the days of making nondefense federal departments and agencies political punching bags and starving them of resources must come to an end. We will not weather the storm that lies before us with incompetent and bankrupt public institutions. Markets left on their own will not be ale to throw us a life ring with enough buoyancy to keep us afloat. Local and state governments simply lack the jurisdictional reach to tackle challenges that sprawl across state and even national lines.
Ye having scared us Flynn wants us to understand that there is still hope, there is much we can do to ameliorate the situation. Let me close with his final paragraph:
On their face, our growing vulnerabilities, along with the threats we face, are alarming. But there is ample cause for optimism. Americans have always responded well to a challenge. The missing ingredient in our time has been the kind of leadership that reminds us of our better angels and imbues us with a sense of national purpose. Building a resilient society is not abut caving in to our fears. Instead, it is about inventorying what is truly precious and ensuring its durability so that we can remain true to our ideals no matter what tempest the future may bring.
Peace.
