The Daily Background
| Secret Homeland Security Study on Ports Released
by Arlen Parsa
Associated Press reports on the results of a study titled “Operation Safe Commerce” (what a lame name) which cost tax payers 75 million dollars to conduct, over three years, by the Department of Homeland Security. The results pretty much back up what I’ve been saying all along. I wrote on February 24th:
I think our government should be protecting our ports.
The point to me is, there are many things that we shouldn’t be outsourcing. We shouldn’t have contracted Halliburton in Iraq to charge us 22 dollars for icetrays (which they certainly did, and more). We shouldn’t have outsourced the task of capturing bin Laden back at Tora Bora (where he escaped, after we backed off and sent in contracted warlords to do the job).
Essentially, I said that port control and port security should be taken care of by the government. Not foreign entities, and not private companies. The government. Just like international airports. The study agreees:
The previously undisclosed results from the study found that cargo containers can be opened secretly during shipment to add or remove items without alerting U.S. authorities, according to government documents marked “sensitive security information” and obtained by The Associated Press.
The study found serious lapses by private companies at foreign and American ports, aboard ships, and on trucks and trains “that would enable unmanifested materials or weapons of mass destruction to be introduced into the supply chain.”
You can read the full Associated Press article here.
