A REPORT HAND DELIVERED TO REP. HARMAN :

BY DON KARG 2/22/06 TO 2/24/06

“NO ONE CAN UNDERSTAND THIS DEAL”

“IT WILL SEND A TERRIBLE SIGNAL…”

“MISPLACED PRIORITY”

“NOT GOOD POLICY”

TREASON

Introduction

On February 11 AP broke the story of the October 2005 Development—many in Congress on February 23, 2006 requested testimony---

Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert Kimmitt defended the committee's process, its deliberation and its consideration of all aspects of the merger, including security concerns.

“They were raised. They were resolved. We moved on,” he said.

Congress' skepticism over the deal has elicited cries of bigotry.

Reports CNN.

“The discussion is classified---classified process,” DHS Michael Chertoff.

CFIUS--SIGNED OF ON THE DEAL WITH OUT THE 45 DAY INVESTIGATION--REQUIRED BY LAW

What is a Port?

http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/port

port ¹(pôrt, p rt)

NOUN:

1. Abbr. Pt.
1. A place on a waterway with facilities for loading and unloading ships.
2. A city or town on a waterway with such facilities.
3. The waterfront district of a city.
2. A place along a coast that gives ships and boats protection from storms and rough water; a harbor.
3. A port of entry

_________________________________________________________________________________________

MOST FAMOUS AMERICAN PORT---PEARL HARBOR:

It was on the December 7, 1941 Pearl Harbor was attack by the Japanese.  The attackers caught the majority of American-Defenders off guard.  Three days later, Germany declares war.  On October 20^th, 1942 Congress shuts down Prescott Bush and closed his financial assets--overseas bank accounts to stop him from continuing to finance the Dictator who has declared war on America, 10 months before.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Number of Ports in America:

http://www.aapa-ports.org/govrelations/resources/2-pg%20Campaign%20Brochure.pdf#search='Ports%20in%20America'

America’s Ports Today

“On average, each of our 50 states relies on 13 to 15 ports to handle its imports and exports, which add up to over $1.3 billion worth of goods moving in and out of U.S. ports ever day.”

“In, fact, international trade accounts for fully 24 percent of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as compared to only 9 percent in 1960, for instance—and is expected to reach as much as one third of the GDP by 2020.”

“AMERICA NEEDS ITS PORTS”

“PORTS NEED AMERICA”

“Public ports invest over $1.7 billion a year to update and modernize their facilities to handle international trade.  In turn, America must support its ports in the critical objectives of:

National security, including secure ports

Well-maintained waterways conductive to growing trade and travel

Efficient and coast-effective flow of goods into and out of ports

Sustainable port communities

Expansion of free and fair trade opportunities”

“Ports need America’s support to keep delivering the goods”

Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002
Source: G-IPA/G-MP

The Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 (MTSA), signed on November 25, 2002, is designed to protect the nation’s ports and waterways from a terrorist attack.  This law is the U.S. equivalent of the International Ship and Port Facility Security Code (ISPS), and was fully implemented on July 1, 2004. It requires vessels and port facilities to conduct vulnerability assessments and develop security plans that may include passenger, vehicle and baggage screening procedures; security patrols; establishing restricted areas; personnel identification procedures; access control measures; and/or installation of surveillance equipment.  By creating a consistent security program for all our nation’s ports, we are better able to identify and deter threats.

Developed using risk-based methodology, the MTSA security regulations focus on those sectors of maritime industry that have a higher risk of involvement in a transportation security incident, including various tank vessels, barges, large passenger vessels, cargo vessels, towing vessels, offshore oil and gas platforms, and port facilities that handle certain kinds of dangerous cargo or service the vessels listed above.

MTSA also required the establishment committees in all the nation’s ports to coordinate the activities of all port stakeholders, including other federal, local and state agencies, industry and the boating public.  These groups, called Area Maritime Security Committees, are tasked with collaborating on plans to secure their ports so that the resources of an area can be best used to deter, prevent and respond to terror threats.

___________________________________________________________________________________

http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2004_cr/s100404.html

Congressional Record: October 4, 2004 (Senate) Page S10296-S10358

                NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE REFORM ACT OF 2004

amendment no. 3901

   (Purpose: To require certain overdue reports relating to maritime 

  security to be transmitted to the Congress within 90 days, and for 

                            other purposes)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. DEADLINE FOR COMPLETION OF CERTAIN PLANS, REPORTS, 

                   AND ASSESSMENTS.

       (a) Strategic Plan Reports.--Within 90 days after the date 

     of enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Homeland Security 

     shall transmit to the Congress--

       (1) a report on the status of the National Maritime 

     Transportation Security Plan required by section 70103(a) of 

     title 46, United States Code, which may be submitted in 

     classified and redacted format;

       (2) a comprehensive program management plan that identifies 

     specific tasks to be completed and deadlines for completion 

     for the transportation security card program under section 

     70105 of title 46, United States Code that incorporates best 

     practices for communicating, coordinating, and collaborating 

     with the relevant stakeholders to resolve relevant issues, 

     such as background checks;

       (3) a report on the status of negotiations under section 

     103 of the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 (46 

     U.S.C. 70111 note);

       (4) the report required by section 107(b) of the Maritime 

     Transportation Security Act of 2002 (33 U.S.C. 1226 note); 

     and

       (5) a report on the status of the development of the system 

     and program mandated by section 111 of the Maritime 

     Transportation Security Act of 2002 (46 U.S.C. 70116 note).

       (b) Other Reports.--Within 90 days after the date of 

     enactment of this Act--

       (1) the Secretary of Homeland Security shall transmit to 

     the Congress--

       (A) a report on the establishment of the National Maritime 

     Security Advisory Committee appointed under section 70112 of 

     title 46, United States Code; and

       (B) a report on the status of the program established under 

     section 70116 of title 46, United States Code, to evaluate 

     and certify security systems of international intermodal 

     transportation;

       (2) the Secretary of Transportation shall transmit to the 

     Congress the annual report required by section 905 of the 

     International Maritime and Port Security Act (46 U.S.C. App. 

     1802) that includes information that should have been 

     included in the last preceding annual report that was due 

     under that section; and

       (3) the Commandant of the United States Coast Guard shall 

     transmit to Congress the report required by section 110(b) of 

     the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 (46 U.S.C. 

     70101 note).

       (d) Effective Date.--Notwithstanding any other provision of 

     this Act, this section takes effect on the date of enactment 

     of this Act.

___________________________________________________________________________________

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060223/POLITICS/602230450/1022/rss10

Levin accuses Bush administration of ignoring law in ports deal

Review should have been 45 days longer, Senator asserts

Ted Bridis / Associated Press

Thursday, February 23, 2006

WASHINGTON -- The senior Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee angrily accused the Bush administration Thursday of ignoring the law by refusing to extend an investigation of a United Arab Emirates company's takeover of significant U.S. port operations.  Clashing with a Treasury Department official on a mission to calm a political uproar, Sen. Carl Levin said the law has language specifically requiring a longer review than the one that an interagency committee conducted, if a business deal could affect national security.

"Is there not one agency in this government that believes this takeover could affect the national security of the United States?" the Michigan Democrat asked at a committee briefing. Chairman John Warner, R-Va., in a very unusual procedure on Capitol Hill, allowed reporters to question the administration witnesses.

The Treasury official, Deputy Secretary Robert Kimmitt, and officials from other agencies said a multiagency group spent three months reviewing the port deal and said that all concerns about security were satisfied.  "We're not aware of a single national security concern raised recently that was not part of" the three-month review, Kimmitt said.

Levin insisted that the law that established the multiagency panel specifically said that any such review should be lengthened by 45 days if it could have an impact on national security.

Just hours before the hearing, President Bush declared that "people don't need to worry about security" in the deal.

Levin, raising his voice at the briefing, told Kimmitt, "If you want the law changed, come to Congress and change it but don't ignore it."

Kimmitt responded, "We didn't ignore the law. Concerns were raised. They were resolved."

Warner then jumped in to assure Levin that he would ask Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to prepare a memorandum on the administration's interpretation of the law.

Levin also questioned the UAE's past record on terrorism matters, saying the country backed the Taliban and allowed financial support for al-Qaida. He said the UAE has an "uneven history" as "one of only a handful of countries in the world to recognize the Taliban regime in Afghanistan." He added that millions of dollars in al-Qaida funds went through UAE financial institutions.

Levin at one point noted that a special commission that investigated the terror attacks against the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, concluded that, "there's a persistent counterterrorism problem represented by the United Arab Emirates."  "Just raise your hand if anybody (at the witness table) talked to the 9-11 commission," commanded Levin. There was no response among the handful of administration representatives.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., also was critical, calling the approval process "a failure of judgment" because officials "did not alert the president, the secretary of the treasury and the secretary of defense" that several of our critical ports would be turned over to foreign country.  Sen. John Warner, R-Va., and chairman of the committee, emphasized UAE's cooperation in the war on terrorism, noting that it allows a large number of port calls by U.S. military and commercial ships and that it had made its airfields available to the U.S. military.  But when a round of questioning began, Warner sharply asked Kimmitt whether the reviewing agencies considered UAE's role's in the transfer of money to al-Qaida and of nuclear components to rogue nations.

Kimmitt said those factors were taken into account.

Bush, talking to reporters at the conclusion of a Cabinet meeting earlier Thursday, said that "people don't need to worry about security."  Under secret conditions of the agreement with the administration, the Dubai company promised to cooperate with U.S. investigations as a condition of the $6.8 billion deal, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.  The U.S. government chose not to impose other, routine restrictions.  "The more people learn about the transaction that has been scrutinized and approved by my government," Bush said, "the more they'll be comforted that our ports will be secure."  The president said he was struck by the fact that people were not concerned about port security when a British company was running the port operation, but they felt differently about an Arab company at the helm. He said the United Arab Emirates was a valuable partner in the war in terror.

Critics in Congress, even before Thursday's hearing, had noted that the London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co., which previously operated at those ports, is a publicly traded company while Dubai Ports World is effectively controlled by the government there.  Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., and Clinton have said they will introduce legislation to prohibit companies owned or controlled by foreign governments from running port operations in the United States. 

Bush said his administration would continue talks with members of Congress -- Republicans and Democrats alike -- who have rebelled against the takeover. He said the briefings were "bringing a sense of calm to this issue."  "This wouldn't be going forward if we weren't certain our ports would be secure," Bush said.  In approving the purchase, the administration chose not to require Dubai Ports to keep copies of its business records on U.S. soil, where they would be subject to orders by American courts. It also did not require the company to designate an American citizen to accommodate requests by the government.

Outside legal experts said such obligations are routinely attached to U.S. approvals of foreign sales in other industries.

Dubai Ports agreed to give up records on demand about "foreign operational direction" of its business at the U.S. ports, according to the documents. Those records broadly include details about the design, maintenance or operation of ports and equipment. It also pledged to continue participating in programs to stop smuggling and detect illegal shipments of nuclear materials.

"They're not lax but they're not draconian," said James Lewis, a former U.S. official who worked on such agreements. If White House officials negotiating the deal had predicted the firestorm of criticism over it, "they might have made them sound harder."  The conditions over the sale were detailed in U.S. documents marked "confidential." Such records are regularly guarded as trade secrets, and it is highly unusual for them to be made public.

Rep. Peter King of New York, the Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said the conditions are evidence the administration was concerned about security. "There is a very serious question as to why the records are not going to be maintained on American soil subject to American jurisdiction," King said.

Another critic, Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., added: "These new revelations ask more questions than they answer."

In Lebanon, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Thursday that the agreement was thoroughly vetted in a review process that took approximately three months. "This is supposed to be a process that raises security concerns, if they are there, but does not presume that a country in the Middle East should not be capable of doing a deal like this." She described the United Arab Emirates as "a very good ally" and said "if more details need to be made available then I'm sure they will be."

AP-CS-02-23-06 1502EST

_________________________________________________________________________________________

http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-m/mp/pdf/WorldPortsonNotice.pdf#search='Law%20Ports'

U.S. Law Puts World Ports on Notice

By TIM WEINER

Published: March 24, 2004

PUERTO CORTÉS, Honduras - "Right there," said Manuel Pereira, a security guard here at the largest shipping port in the Caribbean, pointing to the ground beneath his feet. "That's the new border of the United States." Since the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States, American officials have spoken of "pushing back the borders" of the United States in the name of national security. Now they are doing it across the seas.

The threat they envision is a catastrophic attack on a major American port by a ship bearing a bomb. Al Qaeda has sought for seven years to use commercial ships to attack the United States at home and abroad, public records show. A seaborne terrorist attack could cost thousands of lives and inflict billions of dollars in damage, maritime security experts say, while closing major American ports at a cost to world trade measured in tens or hundreds of billions of dollars. "Their ultimate goal is attacking our economy," said Adm. James M. Loy, deputy secretary of homeland security and retired commandant of the Coast Guard. "Our link to the global economy is by water - 95 percent of what comes and goes to this country comes and goes by ships."

The response to this threat is a new law of the sea, spurred by Admiral Loy, passed by Congress and signed by President Bush 16 months ago. A parallel global code was adopted days later under American pressure by the United Nations's International Maritime Organization.

The law and the code set a July 1 deadline for all of the world's ships and ports to create counterterrorism systems - computers, communications gear, surveillance cameras, security patrols - to help secure America against an attack. The cost of compliance at home and abroad will be many billions of dollars. Many American and foreign ports lack the funds to comply. But the cost of not complying could be steeper still. The law's demands create a stark confrontation between world trade and national security. If a ship, or any one of the last 10 ports it visited, does not meet the new security standards, it can be turned away from American waters. If a port falls short, no ship leaving it can enter American harbors. That means ports, and their nations, can be barred from trading with the United States. "We're dead serious about this," said Rear Adm. Larry L. Hereth, director of port security for the Coast Guard. The law holds "some very harsh economic consequences," he said, like banning ships and blacklisting ports, "and we're prepared to do that." Enforcement will largely fall to the United States.

The high costs and the tight deadline have created a scramble in the world's major ports - especially in poor ones like Puerto Cortés, a sprawling, run-down harbor crucial to the livelihood of Honduras and its neighbors in Central America. Some say the price is too high, the task too huge and the time too short to comply. "The developing world is saying that the wealthiest, most powerful nation in the world is exporting the cost of protecting itself onto some of the world's poorest countries," said Stephen E. Flynn, a retired Coast Guard commander and a maritime security expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.

American officials contend that the costs are outweighed by the benefits: higher security against terrorism will also cut cargo thefts and the smuggling of drugs, guns and people. But if the United States cannot balance the competing demands of national security and global trade, "we are playing with fire," Mr. Flynn said. "If the U.S. locks down its ports for more than two weeks, the entire global trade system crashes."

Policing the sea is daunting: the maritime system is bigger, more complex and far less controlled than international aviation. Ninety percent of world commerce moves on water, though, in 46,000 ships plying 3,000 ports. They carry millions of containers with billions of tons of goods. Roughly half of all international shipping is carried out under "flags of convenience" - registries based in countries like Liberia, often intended to disguise a vessel's true ownership.

Here in Honduras, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere, the economy depends on Puerto Cortés, which is about 350 miles south of Cancún, Mexico. More than 100 ships a month leave the port for the United States, carrying everything from bluejeans to bananas, returning with American exports. If the United States were to bar ships from the port for even a week, "our national economy would collapse," said Mauro Membreño, chief of Honduras's new National Commission on Port Security.

The port was a wide-open place, protected mainly by a rusting five-foot-high chain-link fence and a poorly paid police force, until the Honduran government began trying to secure it three months ago. Under an emergency decree, Honduras is spending $4 million to buy computer systems, patrol boats, police cars, cameras and other security gear for Puerto Cortés. "We have gotten moral support from the United States," said the national port director, Fernando Álvarez. "Nothing concrete."

A United States official in Honduras says American pressure to secure Puerto Cortés is intense, but notes that the United States is not paying for security, as it did when it gave Honduras more than $250 million during Central America's anti-communist campaigns in the 1980's. "We've got a gun to their heads," the official said. "If this is the war on terrorism - well, this is not how we fought the war on Communism." Dennis Chinchilla, Honduras's new national port security officer, said "the people who work in Puerto Cortés will have to completely change their way of life" to adapt to the American law. Once the commercial harbor is secured, he said, the law demands that Honduras fix its main tourist port, on the island of Roatán, where 250,000 travelers a year disembark from cruise ships.

The security there today is a dollar-an-hour guard in a shack without a phone. In the United States, many ports and ships missed a Dec. 31 deadline for submitting security plans. Port authorities note that President Bush's budget for port security in the coming year is $46 million, while the costs of compliance in the United States alone will reach $7 billion. The Coast Guard, which must enforce the law, has three people assigned to international compliance, Mr. Flynn said. They confront a tradition of secrecy and deception that makes the maritime trade a tempting target for terrorists. Roughly half of the world's commercial ships fly flags of convenience registered in more than two dozen nations, including tiny tax havens and money-laundering centers like the Cayman Islands and Vanuatu.

The tradition, which began with United Fruit Company vessels in Honduras in the 1920's, was devised to cut costs and, in many cases, evade taxes. "It's a bit like Swiss banks," Mr. Flynn said. Flags of convenience "allow shippers to function with a high degree of anonymity," said Rupert Herbert Burns, a senior analyst at the Maritime Intelligence Group, a security firm in Washington. Maritime security officials say an American port could be struck in several ways. A cargo ship filled with fuel oil and ammonium nitrate fertilizer could become a waterborne fireball; a ship could carry a radiological "dirty bomb" into a harbor; a speedboat carrying explosives could blow up a tanker laden with oil or delivering liquefied natural gas. Admiral Loy, citing court testimony and government reports, warned two years ago in the military journal Defense Horizons that Osama bin Laden, through associates using flags of convenience, controlled a fleet of cargo ships, including the vessel that delivered the explosives that blew up American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. He noted that a month after the Sept. 11 attacks, Italian inspectors found an Egyptian on a ship bound for Canada. The Egyptian, hiding in a shipping container, had a false Canadian passport, a satellite phone, two computers, forged security passes for airports in three countries and papers identifying him as an aircraft mechanic. Uncovering such a suspect is like finding a particular shark in a boundless sea.

United States officials say the threat of an attack demands that nations like Honduras do their part. But Carl Bentzel, a Democratic counsel to the Senate Commerce Committee, said most of the world's ships and ports "have so far to go and the costs are so high that most will not be in compliance" by July 1. If that happens, the United States has three choices, maritime security experts say. It can enforce the law, creating potential economic chaos abroad; bend the law, saying economic imperatives make full enforcement impossible; or apply the law selectively, creating a two-tier system in which rich ports in Europe and Asia trump poor Caribbean ones like Puerto Cortés.

At Puerto Cortés, Fermin Chong Wong, an American-educated computer expert working for the national port authority, is trying to track 400,000 containers and more than 2,000 ships a year. "I don't think there will be enough time to meet the United States requirements everywhere in the world," he said. "I don't think U.S. ports can meet them. Here, we are going to try - and we might. But the time's too short and the money's too scarce to do all this." "We want to protect our borders," said Kim Petersen, who runs one of the world's biggest maritime consultancies, SeaSecure. "But what happens when we cripple the economy of a developing country and create a breeding ground for the very problems we're trying to prevent?"

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Originally published Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Harman questions foreign control of 6 U.S. ports

South Bay lawmaker joins wave of disapproval over sale of East and Gulf coast ports' operations to an Arab company.

By Donna Littlejohn, DAILY BREEZE

Rep. Jane Harman, D-El Segundo, and Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, speaking in Wilmington on Tuesday, joined critics challenging plans to approve an Arab company's takeover of operations at six major American ports.

After a terror preparedness briefing involving the local ports, the two lawmakers said they would introduce a "bipartisan, bicameral" joint resolution of disapproval when they return to Washington.

"The more I learn, the more questions and concerns I have," said Collins, who heads the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. "I'm troubled by the national security implications of allowing this transaction to proceed."

Harman, the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee and a member of the Homeland Security Committee, said, "My concern specifically is having our country lose control over some of the important operations of terminals at our ports. It raises serious questions."  The ports in question are all on the East and Gulf coasts and do not include any in California.

"It's a different situation here," said Port of Los Angeles spokeswoman Theresa Adams-Lopez. "We're the landlord and the (port) land belongs to the people of the state of California. So while we have foreign companies operating here, it's on a lease basis and not land ownership."  Local port terminal leases include those with Denmark and China.

Los Angeles harbor commission President S. David Freeman said the ports transaction with an Arab company is a bad idea.  "We're talking about a part of the world that is not friendly to us right now," he said.

Under the proposed transaction in question, a British company that has been running six U.S. ports would be acquired by Dubai Ports World, a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates.  The British company Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. runs major commercial operations at ports in Baltimore, Miami, New Jersey, New Orleans, New York and Philadelphia.

Both Harman and Collins said more scrutiny by Congress is needed before the deal goes forward as proposed next month.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/judiciary/hju20016.000/hju20016_0f.htm

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY LAW ENFORCEMENT EFFORTS AT U.S. PORTS OF ENTRY
TUESDAY, MARCH 15, 2005

House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism,
and Homeland Security
Committee on the Judiciary,
Washington, DC.

    The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 3:02 p.m., in Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Howard Coble (Chair of the Subcommittee) presiding.

    Mr. COBLE. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. The Subcommittee will come to order.

Today, the Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security, convenes a very important oversight hearing of the Department of Homeland Security to examine the security of the nation's seaports and the cargo entering these ports.

I have long contended that protecting our nation's seaports is a vital aspect of the overall war on terror. Press reports have indicated there's a lack of cargo inspections taking place at our ports of entry. This Subcommittee is concerned about these reports and looks forward to hearing the Department's response to these accounts and the plans to assure adequate inspections to protect our ports and the cargo entering the United States are taking place.

Today's hearing will focus on the efforts of three vital entities charged with protecting our nation's seaports from hostile threats. First, we will hear from the two primary agencies within the Department of Homeland Security charged with protecting our ports, that is the United States Coast Guard and the United States Customs and Border Protection.

The United States Coast Guard is the nation's leading maritime law enforcement agency and has broad multifaceted jurisdictional authority. As part of Operation Noble Eagle, the Coast Guard is at a heightened state of alert, protecting more than 361 ports and 95,000 miles of coastline, which is America's longest border. The Coast Guard utilizes both Maritime Safety and Security Teams as well as Port Security Units to protect our seaports.

Maritime Safety and Security Teams were created in direct response to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, and are a part of the Department of Homeland Security's layered strategy directed at protecting our seaports and waterways. MSSTs provide waterborne and a modest level of shoreside anti-terrorism force protection for strategic shipping, high-interest vessels, and critical infrastructure. MSSTs are a quick response force capable of rapid nationwide deployment via air, ground, or sea transportation in response to changing threat conditions and evolving maritime homeland security mission requirements.

The Coast Guard Port Security Units, the PSUs, are Coast Guard units staffed primarily with selected Reservists. They provide waterborne and limited land-based protection for shipping and critical port facilities, both within the continental United States and in other theaters.

We will also hear from Customs and Border Protection. The CBP anti-terrorism mission is not limited to the physical examination of cargo when it arrives in United States ports. The CBP, or the Customs and Border Protection, is also using intelligence from a number of sources to identify high-risk shipments in order to concentrate its inspection resources on them. For example, under bilateral agreements as part of the Container Security Initiative, CBP inspectors work in nearly 20 foreign ports to help ensure the security of U.S.-bound cargo before it disembarks.

Additionally, in November of 2001, the CBP established the National Targeting Center to serve as the national clearinghouse for targeting imported cargo for inspection. Among other tasks, the NTC interacts with law enforcement and the intelligence community to disseminate intelligence alerts to the ports. NTC, furthermore assists, in conducting research on incoming cargo, attempts to improve the targeting of cargo, and manages a National Targeting Training Program for CBP targeters.

Next, we will hear testimony from a local port authority, the Virginia Port Authority. The VPA has led the nation in radiological testing at its seaports and has successfully employed radiological monitoring equipment since December of 2002. In just this past year, in cooperation with Customs and Border Protection, VPA deployed some of its equipment to national security events, including the Presidential inauguration.

Finally, we will hear testimony from a representative from the International Cargo Security Council. The International Cargo Security Council is a professional association of cargo transportation and security professionals from the entire spectrum of cargo security. One of ICSC's goals is to improve cargo transportation security through voluntary Government/industry efforts.

Please read the complete document……

_________________________________________________________________________________________

http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/display?content=3989

National Targeting Center (NTC)

• The NTC began around-the-clock operations on November 10, 2001, to provide tactical targeting and analytical research in support of Customs anti-terrorism efforts.
• NTC is staffed with 40 permanent expert Targeters and Analysts.
• NTC maintains a contingent of 20 field officers who are detailed for 90-120 days.
• March 1, 2003, the NTC mission broadened commensurately with the CBP role in support of Homeland Security.
• NTC receives 350-400 calls per day.
• NTC generates an average of 175-200 Activity Logs per day.
• NTC processes approximately 60 TIPOFF lookouts daily.
• NTC is now an invaluable anti-terrorism tool, consolidating and analyzing information across several agencies to help prevent further acts of terrorism and national security concerns.
• The NTC uses risk management at a national level to provide tactical targeting expertise, thereby supporting the nation's anti-terrorism efforts.
• NTC supports and provides training to field units.
• The NTC moved into its new, state-of-the-art facilities in January 2003.

National Targeting Center—Current Status  

• Centralized NTC targeting endeavors, combined with intra and interagency collaboration, assure CBP of a coordinated response to terrorist and national security events.
• The NTC is primarily staffed by CBP Officers and Analysts, representing Immigration, Customs and Agriculture expertise, as well as U.S. Border Patrol Officers and CBP Intelligence Analysts.
• December 8, 2003 – CBP Office of Information and Technology, Laboratories and Scientific Services (LSS) opened the Radiation Portal Monitor and Tele-forensics Center at the NTC.
• December 11, 2003, the Food and Drug Administration Prior Notice Center commenced around-the-clock joint targeting operations at the NTC in support of the Bio-Terrorism Act.
• During FY 2003, liaison was also developed with a variety of external organizations, including: U.S. Coast Guard, Immigration & Customs Enforcement, Federal Air Marshals, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Transportation Security Administration, Department of Energy, Department of Agriculture
• NTC works closely with, and supports the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC) & Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) to identify and apprehend persons on the National Terrorist Watch List.
• The NTC staff develops tactical targets from a combination of border crossing data and raw information to detect and prevent terrorists and implements of terror from crossing U.S. Borders.

Was The Law Followed--On Dubai Ports Deal OK?

Forbes.com, Jessica Holzer, 02.23.06, 6:00 AM ET

The firestorm over a Dubai-based company's takeover of five U.S. ports raises some legitimate concerns about the way foreign companies are screened to invest in the U.S.

Some critics are charging that the body that approves such deals, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), skirted protocol when it approved Dubai Ports World's purchase of P&O, the British company that owns the rights to operate the ports. In 1992, the law governing CFIUS was updated to require a 45-day investigation--above and beyond the 30 days set aside for a review--for any state-backed company.

By that wording, CFIUS appears to have flouted the law when it rubber-stamped the deal.

"The law as written was not carried out," argues Patrick Molloy, a trade law specialist and member of the U.S.-China Economic Security Review Commission.

CFIUS did the 30-day review but likely will argue that it is off the hook on the more arduous 45-day investigation, thanks to another part of the law that says an investigation is unnecessary if the company is not deemed a security threat.

Along with clearing up the law's vagueness, there's a strong case to be made that CFIUS should have more time to review a complex deal. At present, an investigation automatically kicks in at the end of 30 days. A September 2005 report from the Government Accountability Office found a concern among CFIUS members that the stigma of an investigation could dampen foreigners' desire to invest in the U.S. In particular, if an investigation isn't resolved by the end of the 45 days, the president must make a decision and deliver a report to Congress.

The fear of stigma creates a perverse incentive to squeeze perhaps the most complex reviews into a 30-day window. All told, only about 20 of the 1,500 companies reviewed by CFIUS have been given a 45-day investigation. Only twice since 1997 has the president reported to Congress on a CFIUS review. However, the last time CFIUS caused a public furor was in 1990, when it approved the Japanese acquisition of Semi-Gas Systems, a maker of gas controls and purification systems used in semiconductor manufacturing equipment, amid worries that the deal would give Japan a big edge on technology.

At the same time, many of the criticisms being lobbed at CFIUS don't stand up to scrutiny. For example, the suspicion that the U.S. Treasury Department waives deals through because it wants to fund America's gaping current-account deficit--and because it fears ruffling the feathers of foreign governments that buy Treasurys--has little merit. While Treasury chairs CFIUS, it has just one vote--the same as the other 11 agency members.

The notion that a Treasury official could get away with riding roughshod over a Defense or Homeland Security Department official with a national security concern is nonsense, says James Carafano, a national security expert at the Heritage Foundation. "He would be shot at dawn."

Much has been made of the fact that CFIUS is "shrouded in secrecy." But there is good reason for this. Since companies come before CFIUS voluntarily, they want assurances that nonpublic information won't be revealed in the review process. "It's a privacy issue," says David Heyman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

And despite the cries for more oversight of CFIUS on Capitol Hill, ramping up congressional scrutiny of foreign investment would be a mistake. CFIUS was created by Congress to conduct nonpartisan reviews. Involving Congress in every deal would just be an invitation for lobbyists, argues Carafano. "We'd undercut the competitiveness of the U.S. economy, and the security benefit would be zero."

Don Karg

3808 W. Rovey Avenue, Phoenix, Arizona 85019

(602) 973-9074

Senator Robert Menendez                                                                                                                                                      February 23, 2006

502 Hart Senate Office Building

Washington, DC  20510
202-224-4744
Re: Nation Security, CFIUS, Boeing, Toshiba, Enron & DP World

Dear Senator Menendez

What is the urgency if we have until March 2^nd for the British to decline the P&O Sell to DP World owned by the United Arab Emirates?

We can trust our presidents when they say trust me---“Read my Lips”----I am sure--there is Father like Son thing here.  Local media has been doing a good job backing up the statement from top-management.  Even CNN 2/23/06 got a union guy, a Longshoreman, Joe Groffo to make testimony on CNN International…“we are not at war with Denmark or China,” the two companies that are own/operate his facility.  This is a false statement to anyone who knows the true meaning of industrial espionage and the CATIC investigations.  Imagine Yuan Li nearly got near killed in his Home Invasion for the Google/Microsoft gig.

Why is this “6 Ports” Deal getting the major attention after the major sell off [“Genocide”] of our manufacturing base in Aerospace and Defense?  We all know that C.O.O. Ted Bilkey is winging it—when suggesting our DHS, and local law enforcement can come to our rescue—Like Michael Brown in New Orleans?  Rayburn [a friend] and I saw this “treatment” coming 100 miles down the road.

Why is the Media finally caring about the America Public?  Even after the largest Journalist blunder of all time—“12 miners rescues after 41 hours, 1 dead”—January 4^th, 2006 in all the newspapers [Foreign Owned] around the Country.

There are many questions to ask as the chairs on the Titanic are being shuffled around…many of your co-workers have expressed over the years [even before 9-11]…one question to ask is: Why is the MEDIA so quiet about the Jeff Skilling and Kenneth Lay Trial?  Now this should be the known “Media Circus” we all grown to love and cherish from the past history records [Lindbergh Kidnapping], “the Largest Criminal Action against the United States”—not a word.

As the CFIUS gains popularity--the Boeing C-17 Program is in jeopardy  [Mothball and Stored in a undisclosed area] and the questionable deal with Toshiba [Submarine Technology to Russia] Company Deal is sliding right by the American Public--similar to the Canadian Arrow Project of the 1950s, Jet Aircraft Fighter, which was very similar to the Russian Mig 25, in the 1960s. 

The CFIUS is chaired by the Secretary of the Treasury [John Snow] and has eleven other members: the Secretaries of State [Colin Powell/ Amb. C. David Welch], Defense [Donald Rumsfeld] and Commerce [Don Evens], the Attorney General [Alberto R. Gonzales], the director of the Office of Management of Budget [Joshua B. Bolten] OBM, the U.S. Trade Representative [Rob Portman] USTR, the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers [Member Matthew J. Slaughter, Member Katherine Baicker] CEA, the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy [Dr. John H. Marburger] OSTP, the Assistant to the President of National Security Affairs [Dr. Condoleezza Rice, Stephen J. Hadley]NSA, the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy[Stephen Friedman]and the newest member , the Department of Homeland Security [Michael Chertoff]. 

In the past the CFIUS has failed big time [CATIC & Associates], the Commerce Department [Don Evans] Department stated, they have… been had …on the Lou Dobbs CNN Show, late last year.  Lou Dobbs was amazed it took him this long to catch on [years].

As I recently thanked Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, on speaking out against the Chinese and his undivided attention on a new threat to our National Security [old unaddressed problem], I was hoping our world would understand the crime in motion.  I hope Rep. Jane Harman also woke up when I contacted her. 

Don Karg

1992 Candidate for the 36^th Congressional District, Los Angeles County, California

2002 Candidate for the 4^th Congressional District, Phoenix, Arizona

2004 Candidate for the 4^th Congressional District, Phoenix, Arizona

2006 Candidate for the 4^th Congressional District, Phoenix, Arizona

http://www.treas.gov/offices/international-affairs/exon-florio/

CFIUS

Executive Order. The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States ("CFIUS") was originally established by Executive Order 11858 in 1975 mainly to monitor and evaluate the impact of foreign investment in the United States. In 1988, the President, pursuant to Executive Order 12661, delegated to CFIUS his responsibilities under Section 721. Specifically, E.O. 12661 designated CFIUS to receive notices of foreign acquisitions of U.S. companies, to determine whether a particular acquisition has national security issues sufficient to warrant an investigation and to undertake an investigation, if necessary, under the Exon-Florio provision. This order also provides for CFIUS to submit a report and recommendation to the President at the conclusion of an investigation.

In 1993, in response to a sense of Congress resolution, CFIUS membership was expanded by Executive Order 12860 to include the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs and the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy. In February 2003, the Department of Homeland Security was added to CFIUS. This brought the membership of CFIUS to twelve under the chairmanship of the Secretary of Treasury. The other members are the Secretaries of State, Defense, and Commerce, the Attorney General, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, the U.S. Trade Representative, and the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers.

Regulations. The Exon-Florio provision requested that the President issue implementing regulations. These regulations were issued in 1991. They set up a voluntary system of notification with the possibility of CFIUS member-agency notice for non-notified transactions. The President retains full authority to protect the national security with respect to any acquisition covered by this statute, regardless of whether the parties file a notification.

_________________________________________________________________________________________http://www.uga.edu/~cits/documents/html/xcnews05.htm

The Center for International Trade and Security
Export Control Newsletter No. 5

Meanwhile, Mr. Korbani, who lost his job a year after the Taliban took Kabul, was approached by a mysterious aid agency called the "Chand Groupi," or "Multi Group," which operated out of a house in Kabul's Wazir Akbar Khan district, where bin Laden kept several safe houses and where many Arab al Qaeda fighters lived. The agency operated separately but was linked to the Ummah Tameer-e-Nau charity, run by the renegade Pakistani nuclear scientist Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmoud, who the CIA has called "bin Laden's nuclear secretary." Mr. Mahmoud is currently under house arrest in Pakistan. Although evidence found by the Sunday Telegraph last November - and more recently, the joint team headed by Capt. Cameron - in Mr. Mahmoud's house revealed that he was engaged in an experiment to float a helium balloon filled with anthrax over the United States, the Multi Group was clearly attempting to construct a nuclear bomb. "They said to me, 'We know you're working for the faculty of nuclear science, and we need you,'" Mr. Korbani said. "They offered me a lot of money and said that they wanted me to find 100 other nuclear scientists and technicians and come to Karachi." Mr. Korbani was then asked to write a paper on atomic energy. "They told me, 'Pakistan has a very powerful atomic bomb, and we are very keen on bringing such a power to Afghanistan,'" he said. The men told him that people in Pakistan's tribal areas would pay for the program. "They kept calling me, but I never returned [the calls]. I knew it was too dangerous."

Capt. Cameron said there was little doubt that al Qaeda and the Taliban were attempting to make chemical weapons. If not for the Kabul University scientists, al Qaeda might have successfully constructed several "dirty bombs," he said. Unlike a conventional nuclear bomb, in which atoms are split to produce a massive explosion, a dirty bomb is simply a conventional bomb wrapped in radioactive material. A dirty bomb is much easier to produce because it requires only a conventional explosive plus some radioactive waste, such as spent fuel from a nuclear power plant or radioactive material used in medicine. "The Taliban would have given their eyeteeth for the stuff these men were hiding, and if they'd found it, I hate to think what they'd have done," Capt. Cameron said.

16. Testimonies of the Meeting at Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities Committee on Armed Services, United

States Senate. http://www.senate.gov/~armed_services/e_witnesslist.cfm?id=219

_______________________________________________________________________________________

U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer stated, “Homeland Security is an accident waiting to happen.”

Rep. Peter King & Robert Menendez both cannot put trust in the DP WORLD Company or into DHS Chertoff’s reinsurance.

Former DHS, Tom Ridge stated, “More Transparency in the deal is needed.”