HOMELAND SECURITY
Terry Davis
CJAD 495
Professor R. Moser

Introduction Since the birth of this nation, there has been concern for security and freedom of all the citizens of the United States. We have fought wars across our nation, across borders and across the globe, all in the pursuit to protect our freedom and the American way of life. There have been many threats against the American pursuit of freedom that started with the Revolutionary War, a young nation fighting to break away from a nation of strength. Then our battle over land expansion and the taking of the land from the Native Americans, some perceived them as savages or maybe even terrorist. Then we turned to secure our borders to prevent other nations from coming into our nation and grabbing up land. Then our pursuit of freedom expanded the globe and with other nations as we assisted in the attempt to spread democracy in countries struggling to become nations. In this attempt, there have been many enemies formed that despise the US and the pursuit of freedom. This has become a major concern of the US and on September 11, 2001, this concern became a reality. How could something so devastating be carried out against a world-leading nation? What was wrong with the infrastructure and how could it be fixed to prevent other terrorist attacks. The answer was to form a department in the federal government that would have the power to act and the power to share intelligence information.

Terrorism and US Threats The FBI defines terrorism as “violent acts or acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law; appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; to influence the policy if a government by intimidation or coercion; or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping.” (FBI.GOV, 2015) The definition further defines