Posted on 06/02/2003 10:30:02 PM PDT by chance33_98
TERRORIST THREAT INTEGRATION CENTER BEGINS OPERATIONS
The Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), whose creation was announced by President Bush in his State of the Union address in January, began operations today.
Among those in attendance at the ribbon cutting ceremony held at CIA Headquarters this morning were Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet; FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III; Department of Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Gordon England; TTIC Director John O. Brennan; Paul J. Redmond, Assistant Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis, Department of Homeland Security; Richard Haver, Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Intelligence; Ambassador at Large J. Cofer Black, Office of Coordination for Counter Terrorism, Department of State; National Imagery and Mapping Agency Director Lieutenant General James R. Clapper (USAF/Ret.); and General John A. Gordon (USAF/Ret.), Assistant to the President and Homeland Security Advisor.
“TTIC offers a new and innovative approach to addressing the terrorist threats that face our nation, and it marshals resources from across the intelligence, law enforcement, and homeland security communities,” Director Tenet said.
FBI Director Mueller stated, “Working side by side, TTIC officers will assess, analyze and disseminate threat information collected from here and abroad to those agencies and officials working to protect our nation.”
“TTIC is absolutely crucial to the Department of Homeland Security,” Secretary England said. “We could not do our job without a center like this. Intelligence is the foundation of what we do. It is the analysis part that enables us to move forward to decide where to invest our money, to put our resources across America, and what we need to do everyday to make America more safe.”
Earlier this week, TTIC Director Brennan briefed the President, the Vice President, and senior administration officials on TTIC’s mission and how it will serve as a hub for terrorist threat-related information collected domestically or abroad. TTIC officers are responsible for assessing, integrating, and expeditiously disseminating available threat information and analysis; maintaining an all-source database on known and suspected terrorists; and identifying collection requirements related to the terrorist threat.
“TTIC is forging new ground by fusing information and the analytic capabilities of different government organizations in an integrated environment to deal with the terrorist threat,” Brennan said.
The senior leadership of TTIC—including Brennan, Principal Deputy Director James Bernazzani from the FBI, Associate Director for Homeland Security William Parrish from DHS, Associate Director for Defense Issues Russell Travers from DIA, and other senior officials from NSA, FBI, CIA, State, and Defense—has extensive experience working terrorism issues.
The doors to TTIC opened at CIA Headquarters today with over 50 officers from the Department of State, the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Intelligence Community. TTIC will gradually grow in size over the next several months, and it will have several hundred officers by the time it moves to a separate facility in May 2004. The FBI’s Counterterrorism Division and CIA’s Counterterrorist Center (CTC) also will relocate to the facility next year.
The Terrorist Threat Integration Center began operations today. Pictured at the ribbon-cutting ceremony are (left to right) Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Richard Haver, Office of Coordination for Counter Terrorism at the State Department Ambassador at Large J. Cofer Black, FBI Director Robert Mueller, Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, and Department of Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Gordon England.
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Testimony by Winston P. Wiley, Chair, Senior Steering Group, Terrorist Threat Integration Center, and Associate Director of Central Intelligence for Homeland Security, before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee
(as prepared for delivery)
26 February 2003 As you know, in his State of the Union address, the President instructed the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI), the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation working with the Attorney General, the Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of Homeland Security to develop the Nation's first unified Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC). In connection with his recent visit to FBI headquarters, the President announced that the TTIC would stand up by May 1 and would, as soon as possible, be housed — collocated — with the FBI's Counterterrorism Division and the DCI Counterterrorist Center at a yet-to-be determined site. We appreciate your invitation to discuss our plans for TTIC and how we intend to ensure that it reaches its full potential.
Let me first outline how we got here. Immediately following the President's State of the Union address, the DCI asked me to chair a Senior Steering Group (SSG) charged with determining how best to realize the President's vision for TTIC. The SSG consisted of a single senior representative of the Departments of State, Defense, Justice/FBI and Homeland Security, as well as of the CIA and the Office of Management and Budget, each of whom is here with me today. Joining me here today are my colleagues on the Senior Steering Group: Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Gordon England; the FBI's Executive Assistant Director for Counterterrorism and Counterintelligence, Pat D'Amuro; Acting Deputy Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, Tom Ferguson, here for Rich Haver, the Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Intelligence; the CIA's Deputy Executive Director, John Brennan; and the Ambassador-at-Large in the State Department's Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Cofer Black.
We on the SSG, in turn, convened a Working Group drawing on the very broadest array of expertise from affected entities. Among those were, of course, CIA, FBI, DHS, DoD, State, NSA, NIMA, and OMB. The SSG reviewed the implementation variables and decision points the Working Group had identified, and on that basis proposed a structure that will fully implement the President's vision for TTIC.
TTIC's Mission and Structure. TTIC's mission is to enable full integration of U.S. Government terrorist threat-related information and analysis. Its structure will promote that. TTIC will be an interagency joint venture where officers will work together to provide a comprehensive, all-source-based picture of potential terrorist threats to U.S. interests. TTIC's structure is designed to ensure rapid and unfettered sharing of relevant information across departmental lines. It will collapse bureaucratic barriers and close inter-jurisdictional seams. The objective is to create value-added efficiencies in analyzing the full array of terrorist threat-related information the U.S. Government has available to it.
Elements of the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI's Counterterrorism Division, the DCI's Counterterrorist Center, the Department of Defense, and other U.S. Government agencies, as appropriate, will form TTIC. TTIC will not, however, involve any of its participating agencies in new missions. It will combine their terrorist threat-related analytic efforts in support of a more focused and comprehensive, Government-wide, counterterrorist intelligence effort.
We want to stress a few of TTIC's most important features. TTIC will:
Have unfettered access to all intelligence information — from raw reports to finished analytic assessments — available to the U.S. Government.
Provide all-source terrorist threat assessments to our national leadership.
Oversee a national counterterrorism tasking and requirements system.
Maintain a database of known and suspected terrorists that will be accessible to federal and, as appropriate, non-federal officials and entities. TTIC will close any gaps separating analysis of foreign-sourced and domestic-sourced terrorist threat-related information. It will provide integrated analysis of potential terrorist threats to all U.S. interests, physical and cyber. TTIC's structure will promote comprehensive analysis of potential terrorist threats and unprecedented information sharing across agency lines to ensure optimum support to a disparate array of customers — not only at the federal level, but also (through the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI) to state, local, and private sector officials who have homeland security-related responsibilities.
Capabilities and Timing. TTIC cannot reach its full, end-state capabilities overnight. Stand-up will occur by May 1. At stand-up, TTIC will focus on integrating terrorist threat-related information. It will produce the daily Threat Matrix, Situation Reports, CT Updates, and inter-agency terrorist threat warnings for senior national leadership. TTIC will also have the support of an Interagency Transition Working Group, comprising representatives from participating departments and agencies, to advise and assist the Director of TTIC in addressing implementation and integration issues.
As soon as possible thereafter, TTIC will become the principal gateway for policymaker requests for analysis of potential terrorist threats to U.S. interests. At this point, TTIC will stock and maintain a database of known and suspected terrorists. TTIC will also be producing current intelligence and terrorist-related assessments, drawing on non-TTIC resources and expertise as necessary. TTIC will, of course, be able to reach back to its participating parent agencies' base resources as necessary to meet its extraordinary requirements. This instantaneous surge capability is one of the benefits of structuring TTIC as a joint venture of its participating agencies.
TTIC will, under its Director's guidance, serve as the U.S. Government hub for all terrorist threat-related analytic work. Individual departments and agencies will retain their current ability to produce tailored analytic products in support of their individual missions, but will routinely augment TTIC's dedicated analytic resources and other capabilities. In sum, at its full, end-state capability, TTIC will have robust inter-agency participation, including, for example, in its 24/7 watch and integrated analytic support teams.
When TTIC reaches its full, end-strength capability, it will be collocated with the DCI's Counterterrorist Center and the FBI's Counterterrorism Division at a yet-to-be-acquired site. Prior to that, TTIC will be located on the CIA headquarters compound, as are many other independent Intelligence Community entities.
TTIC Command Structure. The Director of TTIC will be a senior U.S. Government official who reports directly to the Director of Central Intelligence in his statutory capacity as head of the Intelligence Community. The Director of Central Intelligence, in consultation with the Director of the FBI and the Attorney General, the Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of Homeland Security, will appoint the Director of TTIC. TTIC's Director and its three Deputy Directors (for Analysis, Management, and Liaison) will come from different Government agencies.
The Director of TTIC will be the final review and approval authority for TTIC-generated products. For national-level analysis produced outside TTIC, existing departmental review processes and procedures will prevail until the Director of TTIC has established other arrangements by agreement with the appropriate senior Government officials. At TTIC's end-state, all national-level terrorist threat-related analysis will be coordinated with the Director of TTIC or his/her authorized representative.
Information Access. The President's TTIC initiative seeks to ensure that TTIC has access to the full array of terrorist threat-related information available within the U.S. Government. Consistent with that vision, TTIC analysts with a need to know will — regardless of their agency affiliation — be afforded access to terrorist threat-related information, from raw reports to finished analytic assessments, collected through widely disparate sources, methods, and agencies. TTIC analysts with the need to know will have access, as appropriate, to all terrorist threat-related reporting (disseminated and non-disseminated). Need to know determinations will be based on TTIC's objective of ensuring comprehensive and integrated terrorist threat assessments based on the entire spectrum of available intelligence. The Director of TTIC's own access will be equivalent to that of the Chiefs of the DCI Counterterrorist Center and the FBI's Counterterrorism Division.
Information Technology. TTIC will utilize the most advanced systems and techniques that are available, accredited, and consistent with its mission objectives. TTIC will use the existing and accepted Intelligence Community architecture that enables information sharing across boundaries (i.e., the Intelligence Community System for Information Sharing (ICSIS)). TTIC's information technology will allow unprecedented access to information for all TTIC participants due to the "system high" nature of the access model we have adopted for TTIC.
TTIC analysts will have access to all necessary Intelligence Community networks and, where required, native access to their home agency's internal network. TTIC analysts will also have available to them the Intelligence Community's most powerful analytic tools for searching, analyzing, linking, and visualizing the Intelligence Community's data holdings to best understand the terrorist threat picture. TTIC's information technology implementation program will adhere to Intelligence Community and commercial standards and practices. An executive agent for the DCI will coordinate this implementation program with all TTIC's participating agencies.
Concluding Observation. I want to assure you that we on the TTIC Senior Steering Group wholeheartedly share the President's view that the TTIC is a major step in the direction of comprehensive and seamless integration and analysis of terrorist threat-related information. It builds on our strengths and adds to them new efficiencies. TTIC is very good news for the American people and very bad news for terrorists. My Senior Steering Group colleagues and I would be happy to answer your questions.
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