Panel endorses science and tech position in security agency

The President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) on Monday recommended that the proposed Homeland Security Department include a post for an undersecretary of science and technology to coordinate and manage research and development (R&D) within the new department.

The panel, which issued its recommendations in a report requested by President Bush on how technology can be used to combat terrorism, said such an undersecretary would be needed because most senior managers in the department are unlikely to have the scientific or technical backgrounds to strategically manage a homeland security R&D program. The report also suggested that R&D be centralized within the department rather than dispersed throughout.

"Technology is important to the department ... given many of the [terrorist] threats are technical in nature, as are many of the targets ... and technology represents a major part of the solution to some of these threats," said former Lockheed Martin Chairman and CEO Norm Augustine, who chairs the PCAST panel that wrote the report. "We thought technology should be given a position of considerable prominence here."

Congress appears to be in sync with the panel's recommendations. Both the House-passed bill to create a Homeland Security Department, H.R. 5005, and the competing Senate bill, S. 2452, call for an undersecretary of science and technology.

In the PCAST report, the science and technology undersecretary would fulfill the functions of the undersecretary for chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear countermeasures, as well as for cybersecurity.

Under the president's proposal, science and technology development would fall below the leadership of the unit for chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear countermeasures, and cybersecurity would be handled in another division in the department.

The report repeatedly states the need for the science and technology undersecretary to coordinate R&D efforts with the rest of the government, as well as to manage R&D development from funding of the initial projects to transferring the technology to the private sector.

The report also suggests that a large portion of the R&D work can be done in academia, industry and national laboratories through a Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency modeled after the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

The Senate legislation to create the department also calls for the creation of an agency to conduct homeland security research. It would be called the Security Advanced Research Projects Agency.

In other suggestions, the panel recommended that the new department conduct red teaming-the use of individuals to emulate terrorists in selecting targets and planning attacks, based on simulations and field tests-to help the nation determine its vulnerabilities. The report also suggests that the White House Office of Science and Technology work with the new science and technology undersecretary to develop an inventory of government R&D programs with homeland security applications and identify any gaps.