The U.S. intelligence community, which includes the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and others, has issued classified National Intelligence Estimates and an update on the foreign-origin terrorist threat to the United States. According to intelligence agencies, conventional explosives and firearms continue to be the weapons of choice for terrorists. Terrorists are less likely to use chemical and biological weapons than conventional explosives, although the likelihood that terrorists may use chemical and biological materials may increase over the next decade. Origins and Principles of U.S. Policy and Strategy to Combat Terrorism

U.S. policy and strategy have evolved since the 1970s, along with the nature and perception of the terrorist threat. This policy resulted from the findings of the 1985 Vice President’s Task Force on Terrorism, which highlighted the need for improved, centralized interagency coordination of the significant federal assets to respond to terrorist incidents. First, in certain critical areas, just as the Vice President’s Task Force on Terrorism noted in 1985, improvements are needed in interagency coordination and program focus. In a second, related observation, more money is being spent to combat terrorism without any assurance of whether it is focused on the right programs or in the right amounts. Our December 1997 report showed that seven key federal agencies spent more than an estimated $6.5 billion in fiscal year 1997 on federal efforts to combat terrorism, excluding classified programs and activities. Because governmentwide priorities have not been established and funding requirements have not necessarily been validated based on an analytically sound assessment of the threat and risk of terrorist attack, there is no basis to have a reasonable assurance that funds are being spent on the right programs in the right amounts and that unnecessary program and funding duplication, overlap, misallocation, fragmentation, and gaps have not occurred. Our third observation is that there are different sets of views and an apparent lack of consensus on the threat of terrorism—particularly WMD terrorism.
Why GAO Did This Study

GAO discussed its work and observations on federal efforts to combat terrorism, focusing on the: (1) foreign-origin and domestic terrorism threat in the United States; and (2) origins and principles of the U.S. policy and strategy to combat terrorism.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) conventional explosives and firearms continue to be the weapons of choice for terrorists; (2) terrorists are less likely to use chemical and biological weapons than conventional explosives, although the likelihood that they may use chemical and biological materials may increase over the next decade, according to intelligence agencies; (3) more than a decade ago, the Vice President's Task Force on Terrorism highlighted the need for improved, centralized interagency coordination; (4) GAO's work suggests that the government should continue to strive for improved interagency coordination today; (5) the need for effective interagency coordination--both at the federal level and among the federal, state, and local levels--is paramount; (6) the challenges of efficient and effective management and focus for program investments are growing as the terrorism issue draws more attention from Congress and as there are more players and more programs and activities to integrate and coordinate; (7) the United States is spending billions of dollars annually to combat terrorism without assurance that federal funds are focused on the right programs or in the right amounts; (8) as GAO has emphasized in two reports, a critical piece of the equation in decisions about establishing and expanding programs to combat terrorism is an analytically sound threat and risk assessment using valid inputs from the intelligence community and other agencies; (9) threat and risk assessments could help the government make decisions about: (a) how to target investments in combating terrorism and set priorities on the basis of risk; (b) unnecessary program duplication, overlap, and gaps; and (c) correctly sizing individual agencies' levels of effort; and (10) finally, there are different sets of views and an apparent lack of consensus on the threat of terrorism--particularly weapons of mass destruction terrorism.