Quote:National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive
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The National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive (National Security Presidential Directive NSPD 51/Homeland Security Presidential Directive HSPD-20, sometimes called simply "Executive Directive 51" for short), created and signed by United States President George W. Bush on May 4, 2007, is a Presidential Directive which claims power to execute procedures for continuity of the federal government in the event of a "catastrophic emergency". Such an emergency is construed as "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions." [1]

The unclassified portion of the directive was posted on the White House website on May 9, 2007, without any further announcement or press briefings,[2] although Special Assistant to George W. Bush Gordon Johndroe answered several questions on the matter when asked about it by members of the press in early June 2007.[2]
Contents
[hide]

* 1 Details
* 2 Reception
* 3 See also
* 4 References
* 5 External links

[edit] Details

The presidential directive says that, when the president considers an emergency to have occurred, an "Enduring Constitutional Government" comprising "a cooperative effort among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the Federal Government, coordinated by the President," will take the place of the nation's regular government, presumably without the oversight of Congress.[3] Conservative activist Jerome Corsi and Marjorie Cohn of the National Lawyers Guild have said that this is a violation of the Constitution of the United States in that the three branches of government are separate and equal, with no single branch coordinating the others.[4][5] The directive, created by the president, claims that the president has the power to declare a catastrophic emergency. It does not specify who has the power to declare the emergency over.

The directive further says that, in the case of such an emergency, the new position of "National Continuity Coordinator" would be filled by the assistant to the president for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism (this position was held by Frances Townsend until her resignation on November 19, 2007 and is now held by Kenneth L. Wainstein.[6]) The directive also specifies that a "Continuity Policy Coordination Committee", to be chaired by a senior director of the Homeland Security Council staff, and selected by the National Continuity Coordinator, shall be "the main day-to-day forum for such policy coordination".

The directive ends by describing a number of "annexes", of which Annex A is described as being not classified but which does not appear on the directive's Web page:

"(23) Annex A and the classified Continuity Annexes, attached hereto, are hereby incorporated into and made a part of this directive.

"(24) Security. This directive and the information contained herein shall be protected from unauthorized disclosure, provided that, except for Annex A, the Annexes attached to this directive are classified and shall be accorded appropriate handling, consistent with applicable Executive Orders."

The "National Continuity Policy, Annex A, Categories of Departments and Agencies", available from the Financial and Banking Information Infrastructure Committee website,[7] indicates that "executive departments and agencies are assigned to one of four categories commensurate with their COOP/COG/ECG responsibilities during an emergency".

[edit] Reception

The signing of this Directive was generally not covered by the mainstream U.S. media or discussed by the U.S. Congress. While similar executive security directives have been issued by previous presidents, with their texts kept secret, this is the first to be made public in part. It is unclear how the National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive will reconcile with the National Emergencies Act, a U.S. federal law passed in 1976, which gives Congress oversight over presidential emergency powers during such emergencies. The National Emergencies Act is not mentioned in the text of the National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive.

After receiving concerned communications from constituents, in July 2007 U.S. Representative and Homeland Security Committee member Peter DeFazio made an official request to examine the classified Continuity Annexes described above in a secure "bubbleroom" in the United States Capitol, but his request was denied by the White House, which cited "national security concerns."[8] This was the first time DeFazio has been denied access to documents. He was quoted as saying, "We're talking about the continuity of the government of the United States of America...I would think that would be relevant to any member of Congress, let alone a member of the Homeland Security Committee."[8] After this denial, DeFazio joined with two colleagues (Bennie Thompson, chairman of the committee; and Chris Carney, chairman of the Homeland Security oversight subcommittee) in a renewed effort to gain access to the documents.[9]

[edit] See also

* Continuity of government
* Continuity of Operations Plan
* National Emergencies Act
* National Security Directive
* Posse Comitatus Act
* State of emergency
* United States Department of Homeland Security
* Main Core
* Dictatorship

[edit] References

1. ^ HSU, S. S. (2007) Bush Changes Continuity Plan: Administration, Not DHS, Would Run Shadow Government. Washington Post. Washington.
2. ^ a b White House Revises Post-Disaster Protocol - CommonDreams.org
3. ^ [1] by Jerome Corsi
4. ^ Daily Kos: National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive
5. ^ [2] by Marjorie Cohn
6. ^ President Bush Announces Kenneth L. Wainstein to Serve as Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, White House press release, March 19, 2008.
7. ^ "Executive Orders". The Financial and Banking Information Infrastructure Committee. November 2007. http://www.fbiic.gov/executiveorders.htm. Retrieved on 2008-03-01.
8. ^ a b "DeFazio asks, but he's denied access," by Jeff Kosseff, from The Oregonian, July 20, 2007
9. ^ "DeFazio chases secret terror-crisis plan", by Jeff Kosseff, from The Oregonian, July 28, 2007

Quote:The reality of NSPD-51 is almost as bad as the paranoia.
By Ron Rosenbaum

10/19/07 "Slate" -- -- Oh, god. I'm reluctant to write this particular column. I've been scarred by this kind of story before. I've learned that it's difficult to write about the sources of paranoia without spreading paranoia.

But the subject, NSPD-51—that's National Security Presidential Directive 51—and the attendant explosion of blogospheric paranoia about it deserve attention. Even if you don't believe, as I don't, that NSPD-51 is a blueprint for a coup in the guise of plans for "continuity of government" in the event of a national emergency (such as a terrorist attack during an election campaign). Even if you don't believe, as I don't, that it will be used as a pretext for canceling the upcoming presidential election and preserving "continuity" of this administration in office.

Nonetheless, the specifics of the directive are a matter of legitimate concern that has not been given the urgent and sustained attention it deserves by Congress or the mainstream media.

I first became aware of the extent of the paranoia when I read the following comment, which was appended to an essay Naomi Wolf wrote for the Huffington Post:

Scenario for 2008: Sometime in middle to late summer, perhaps early fall, a "terrorist attack," or a natural disaster occurs, allowing Bush to suspend the elections in the name of "national security," and take the control of the government via the "National Security Presidential Directive/NSPD 51" and "Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-20," released by the WH May 9th of this year. He could remain in control as long as he wanted. Now, wouldn't THAT be an interesting nightmare?

Crazy, right? Well after I read it I Googled "NSPD-51" and got something like 36,000 hits. (HSPD-20 is essentially the same directive under a different title.) Most of the ones I sampled elaborated on the "nightmare" coup scenario above. Of course, Google hits are not evidence of the facts, only of the temper of the times, and the times are seething with paranoia.

But that doesn't mean NSPD-51 doesn't deserve careful scrutiny. Consider that an election-eve al-Qaida attack, for instance, is not inconceivable. What if a nuclear device goes off in New York, Chicago, or Los Angeles the weekend before the election and a warning is issued that the other two cities will be hit on Election Day?

Who will decide whether the elections in those heavily Democratic states should be put off or whether the entire election should be postponed until ... when? Until the bodies are cleared, the gamma radiation has subsided? Just how wise and fair—and constitutional—are the brand-new mechanisms for "continuity of government" that NSPD-51 has put into effect with almost no prior and little subsequent discussion last May?

And there's another paranoia-inducing element of the story: The existence of "classified continuity annexes" whose content has been kept secret even from the House Committee on Homeland Security. A troubling aspect of the story that, so far as I know, only one mainstream media reporter, Jeff Kosseff of the Portland Oregonian, has pursued.

As it happens, I had a troubling experience in the past writing about paranoid fears that an unpopular president will cancel a presidential election. The experience helped turn me into a conspiracy theory skeptic, so let me briefly recount that incident—which, curiously enough, also involved the Portland Oregonian—so you'll understand the perspective I bring to the question.

Return with me to 1970, another moment of seething paranoia two years before Richard Nixon's 1972 re-election campaign, before Watergate was even a gleam in Gordon Liddy's eyes. A time of war and of an increasingly frustrated and suspicious anti-war movement. It was my first year as a reporter, and the whole episode started with a cab driver from Staten Island.

As historian and frequent Slate contributor David Greenberg recounts it in his thoughtful book Nixon's Shadow, "the rumor [that Nixon had a secret plan to cancel the '72 presidential election] first appeared in print on April 5 in the Portland Oregonian, the Staten Island Advance and other Newhouse-owned newspapers. According to the item, the administration had asked the RAND Corporation ... to study whether 'rebellious factions using force or bomb threats would make it unsafe to conduct an election' and how the president might respond. Ron Rosenbaum, a reporter from the Village Voice, heard about the article from a Staten Island cab driver and investigated. He reported in The Voice on April 16 that RAND and the administration denied that any such study existed, but then playfully pointed out that they would surely deny it if it were true. Rosenbaum added that the country would just have to wait until 1972 to see."

Lesson here: Don't get too "playful" when writing about conspiracy theories. The problem with being "playful" back then was that much of the anti-war movement read the Voice at the time, and my story ignited a firestorm of paranoia. Soon there were "documents" of dubious authenticity circulating that purported to be RAND memos outlining plans to round up and lock up leaders of the anti-war movement. Eventually Pat Moynihan, then a Nixon consigliere, thundered against the rumor as an example of the intrusion of irrationality into politics.

The thing is, there's nothing wrong with planning for "continuity of government," especially in the nuclear age. Planning for continuity doesn't necessarily mean plotting a coup, although that's the way my story was read and spread. (Of course, meanwhile—proving that reality can outrun paranoia—the Nixon administration was planning to subvert the election, anyway, with the assortment of illegal actions and dirty tricks that became known as Watergate.)

Still, there's nothing I feel the need to apologize about for pursuing that story then (or this one now). Indeed, it was marginally possible back then, when the anti-war movement had become massive and some were turning to violence, that the RAND Corp. might have been involved in planning how to maintain "continuity" in the face of violent disruptions.

But the fact that the extreme worst-case scenario didn't happen in 1972 (no coup attempt) left one big question unanswered—and NSPD-51 illustrates it still hasn't been settled in any satisfactory way: What are the contingency plans for holding or postponing a national election in the midst of a traumatic national emergency?

I've studied the actual presidential directive, which you can find here.

In many respects, it's innocuous. It doesn't, for instance, tamper with the procedures for presidential succession in case, say, the chief executive and vice president are killed. And there's a value to requiring that every government agency prepare a plan to deal with a catastrophe.

But consider provision 2E of the directive:

"Enduring Constitutional Government," or "ECG," means a cooperative effort among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the Federal Government, coordinated by the President, as a matter of comity with respect to the legislative and judicial branches and with proper respect for the constitutional separation of powers among the branches, to preserve the constitutional framework under which the Nation is governed and the capability of all three branches of government to execute constitutional responsibilities and provide for orderly succession, appropriate transition of leadership, and interoperability and support of the National Essential Functions during a catastrophic emergency. (Italics mine.)

Do you see those five weasel words "as a matter of comity"? Just what elements of the legislative and judicial branches will be allowed to participate in "executing constitutional responsibilities" and "providing for orderly succession [and] appropriate transfer of leadership"?

In other words, who gets to call the shots? What does comity mean in this context? Informally, it means good-natured, good-faith camaraderie. In its jurisprudential sense, the American Heritage Dictionary defines it as "the principle by which the courts of one jurisdiction may accede or give effect to the laws or decisions of another."

In other words, in the weasel-speak of NSPD-51, it implies that one or more branches of the government will have to cede power to another. And since everything is to be "coordinated by the president," I'm guessing that the members of the Supreme Court left alive and some congressional leaders left alive (How chosen? What party balance?) will in effect have to sit around a big conference table and do a lot of "ceding" to the executive.

And given the current state of relations between Congress and the executive, such comity will not necessarily translate into camaraderie.

If it comes down to whether to pull the nuclear trigger, who will get to vote, and how large a majority will be required to launch?

Comity—that innocent-sounding word—could well turn out to be the excuse for junking those pesky checks and balances the Founding Fathers seemed so obsessed with. For an indeterminate period of time.

The document is also hazy on when our new continuity policies will be set in motion. The directive tells us that they'll kick in whenever the nation faces a "catastrophic emergency." But look how vaguely "catastrophic emergency" is first defined:

"Catastrophic Emergency" means any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.

These are profoundly, potentially calamitously, broad terms. Who defines what is extraordinary? Who defines how severe severely is? Is there any procedure to challenge the junking of constitutional government?

Worse, "catastrophic emergency"—woefully vague to start out with—is later expanded to include even "localized acts of nature and accidents" as well as "technological or attack-related" emergencies.

In other words, even if you don't believe the most sinister paranoid coup theories, the document does nothing to allay one's fears that it could be used in a sinister way.

I wish I did, but I see nothing in the document to prevent even a "localized" forest fire or hurricane from giving the president the right to throw long-established constitutional government out the window, institute a number of unspecified continuity policies, and run the country with the guidance of the "National Continuity Coordinator" and with the "Continuity Policy Coordination Committee" for as long as the president sees fit.

This order has been issued by executive fiat and has not been subjected to any public examination by the other two branches, which have behaved in a supine way that suggests how they'll behave when comity time arrives and urgent decisions on the fate of the nation and perhaps the world (nuclear retaliation being what it is) need to be made immediately.

The fact that Congress has not scrutinized and challenged the potential here for an emergency-situation power grab is scandalous, unacceptable.

Let Congress pass a law posthaste nullifying the directive, and then when the executive nullifies the nullification, challenge it in the courts. I can't believe even this Supreme Court, with its deference to executive power, could take this clownishly drafted document seriously.

It's not that others haven't noticed the problem. The Wikipedia entry on NSPD-51, for instance, cites rational warnings against it from both right and left:

Conservative activist Jerome Corsi and Marjorie Cohn of the [left wing] National Lawyers Guild have interpreted this as a break from Constitutional law in that the three branches of government are equal, with no single branch coordinating the others. … The directive does not specify whose responsibility it would be to either declare a catastrophic emergency or declare it over.

Good point. And then there are the final two provisions of the NSPD, which mysteriously refer to unseen secret "annexes" to the directive. Needless to say, if what they've made public is so shameless in its disregard for the Constitution, the following two sections on secret provisions don't allay suspicion:

(23) Annex A and the classified Continuity Annexes, attached hereto, are hereby incorporated into and made a part of this directive.

(24) Security. This directive and the information contained herein shall be protected from unauthorized disclosure, provided that, except for Annex A, the Annexes attached to this directive are classified and shall be accorded appropriate handling, consistent with applicable Executive Orders.

So, how many secret annexes are there in addition to "annex A," and what kinds of things do they say that even the paranoia-inducing public document can't include?

Here's where Jeff Kosseff of the Portland Oregonian comes in. In an e-mail to me, he said he believed he was the first mainstream media reporter to pursue the classified annex issue (although Charles Savage reported on the disturbing public aspects of the directive itself in the Boston Globe in May).

Kosseff told me he got onto the story when Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio expressed puzzlement that he was having trouble seeing what was in the classified "annexes." DeFazio was a member of the homeland security committee and cleared to read classified material in a supersecure "bubble room" designed to prevent any kind of surveillance. But DeFazio's initial request was, as Kosseff reported, "denied" by the White House, which cited "national security concerns."

DeFazio said this was the first time he had been denied access to classified documents. He brought in the chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, Bennie Thompson, and the chairman of the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Management, Investigation and Oversight, Chris Carney, to back his request for access to the classified annexes.

In a phone conversation, Jeff Kosseff told me the latest development. In August, these requests were denied as well. On grounds of "national security."

I don't want to be alarmist, I have no evidence there's a coup brewing. But I think the American people and their congressional reps deserve some say in how they will be ruled when the ordinary rules go out the window in a national emergency. For one thing, what will happen to the Bill of Rights' guarantees of individual liberty and the courts that are supposed to enforce them?

If you ask me, setting aside any paranoid fantasies, it is clear on the most basic level—read it yourself—that NSPD-51 is the creation of irresponsible incompetents, bulls in the china shop of our constitutional framework. It is a recipe for disaster. For a catastrophe of governance that would match whatever physical catastrophe it followed and threaten the re-establishment of constitutional democracy. It would make the partisan warfare over the 2000 election in Florida seem like child's play. We might recover from a disaster but we might never recover from the "continuity coordination" that followed, "coordination" that could forever undermine any faith in the actual continuity of constitutional liberty in America since it would put it at the mercy of any president who wants to "coordinate continuity" rather than govern legally.

I think it's urgent that we bring these questions out of the shadows of phony comity. I'd urge readers to call or e-mail their members of Congress and senators now. Call for an emergency joint congressional hearing to end this farce, give us some transparency about what our government will do if we suffer another 9/11. Let all branches of government participate in the attempt to reach some consensus on rational and effective continuity planning. Something more specific and sophisticated than the clumsy but dangerously Orwellian "Continuity Coordination Committee."

Quote:March 31, 2008
Congress, the Bush Adminstration and Continuity of Government Planning
The Showdown

By PETER DALE SCOTT

In August 2007, Congressman Peter DeFazio, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee, told the House that he and the rest of his Committee had been barred from reviewing parts of National Security Presidential Directive 51, the White House supersecret plans to implement so-called "Continuity of Government" in the event of a mass terror attack or natural disaster. (1)

Norm Ornstein, of the conservative American Enterprise Institute, commented, "I cannot think of one good reason" for denial. Ornstein added, "I find it inexplicable and probably reflective of the usual, knee-jerk overextension of executive power that we see from this White House." (2)

The story, ignored by the mainstream press, involved more than the usual tussle between the legislative and executive branches of the U.S. Government. What was at stake was a contest between Congress's constitutional powers of oversight, and a set of policy plans that could be used to suspend or modify the constitution.

There is nothing wrong with disaster planning per se. Like all governments, the U.S. government must develop plans for the worst contingencies. But Congress has a right to be concerned about Continuity of Government (COG) plans refined by Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld over the past quarter century, which journalists have described as involving suspension of the constitution. (3)

In the 1980s, a secret group of planners inside and outside the government were assigned, by an Executive Order, to develop a response to a nuclear attack in which the U.S. government had been decapitated, forcing an alternative to the constitutional rules of succession. Two of these planners were Dick Cheney, then a Congressman, and Donald Rumsfeld, then a private citizen and CEO of the G.D. Searle drug company.

"One of the awkward questions we faced was whether to reconstitute Congress after a nuclear attack.It was decided that no, it would be easier to operate without them," said one of the COG planners in the 1980s, who spoke to James Mann (The Rise of the Vulcans, 141-42). James Bamford reported the same remark in his book Pretext for War (p. 74).

After the end of the Cold War, the urgency of coming up with plans faded. The COG nuclear planning project "has less than six months to live," reported Tim Weiner of the New York Times. (April 17, 1994). Mann and Bamford concluded, wrongly, that all the COG planning of the Reagan era had been abandoned.

In fact, Reagan's Executive Order 12656, issued in 1988, remained in effect. The order states that Continuity of Government procedures are called for in the event of "any occurrence, including natural disaster, military attack, technological emergency, or other emergency, that seriously degrades or seriously threatens the national security of the United States." (4)

Under Clinton, some parts of the planning, presumably military, were continued by a group including Rumsfeld and others whose roster (according to Andrew Cockburn) was "filled almost exclusively with Republican hawks." Cockburn quotes one participant, a former Pentagon official, who said "They'd meet, do the exercise, but also sit around and castigate the Clinton administration in the most extreme way." (5)

According to the 9/11 Commission Report (p. 326; cf. p. 38), "Contingency plans for the continuity of government" were implemented on September 11, 2001. (6) But what measures were invoked remains unclear.

Some clues may be supplied by COG's past history. COG planning in the 1980s was handled by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and its controversial director, Louis Giuffrida. According to a Miami Herald article by Alfonso Chardy on July 5, 1987, Giuffrida's plans included "suspension of the Constitution," along with detailed arrangements for the declaration of martial law. (7)

Those suspicious of what COG means today have pointed to a number of post 9/11 steps to facilitate the implementation of martial law, including the creation of a new military command (NORTHCOM) for the continental United States. They note also Homeland Security's strategic plan Endgame, whose stated goal is the creation of detention camps designed to "remove all removable aliens," including "potential terrorists."

Then in 2007 National Security Presidential Directive 51 (NSPD 51), issued by the White House, empowered the President to personally ensure "continuity of government" in the event of any "catastrophic emergency." (8) According to the Washington Post (May 10, 2007), this directive "formalizes a shift of authority," from the Department of Homeland Security to the White House, in establishing " a shadow government" after an emergency. (9) Congress has yet to hold a single hearing on NSPD 51. (10)

NSPD 51 contains "classified Continuity Annexes" which shall "be protected from unauthorized disclosure." Congressman DeFazio twice requested to see these Annexes, the second time in a letter cosigned by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Christopher Carney. It was these requests that the White House denied.

Without full disclosure, such suspicions will only fester and distract from the real issue: the role of Congress in constitutional government. In the event of national emergency, Congress must be at the heart of the defense of democratic government and American territory. It is reasonable for the citizenry to ask, "How do Continuity of Government plans preserve and protect the role of the popularly chosen branch of government?" The answer is, we simply don't know.

DeFazio's inability to get access to the NSPD Annexes is less than reassuring. If members of the Homeland Security Committee cannot enforce their right to read secret plans of the Executive Branch, then the systems of checks and balances established by the U.S. Constitution would seem to be failing.

To put it another way, if the White House is successful in frustrating DeFazio, then Continuity of Government planning has arguably already superseded the Constitution as a higher authority.

Will Congress insist on its right of review COG planning? The answer to this question will depend on discussion in the blogosphere, the degree of pressure exerted by the electorate on their representatives, and the questions asked the men and women who would be president.

Peter Dale Scott is the author of The Road to 9/11.

Notes.

1. Congressional Record, August 2, 2007. The text of National Security Presidential Directive 51 can be seen here.

2. Jeff Kosseff, The Oregonian, July 20, 2007.

3. Scott, The Road to 9/11, 183-87; citing Ross Gelbspan, Break-ins, Death Threats, and the FBI: The Covert War against the Central America Movement (Boston: South End Press, 1991), 184; Alfonso Chardy, Miami Herald, July 5, 1987.

4. The provisions of Executive Order 12656 of November 18, 1988, appear at 53 FR 47491, 3 CFR, 1988 Comp., p. 585, "Executive Order 12656-Assignment of Emergency Preparedness Responsibilities," . The Washington Post (Gellman and Schmidt, "Shadow Government Is at Work in Secret," March 1, 2002) later claimed, incorrectly, that Executive Order 12656 dealt only with "a nuclear attack."

5. Andrew Cockburn, Rumsfeld: His Rise, Fall, and Catastrophic Legacy (New York: Scribner, 2007), 88)

6. 9/11 Commission Report, 326, cf. 38; Scott, Road to 9/11, 220-29.

7. Alfonso Chardy, "Reagan Aides and the `Secret' Government, Miami Herald, July 5, 1987.

8. National Security Presidential Directive 51.

9. Spencer S. Hsu, "Bush Changes Continuity Plan: Administration, Not DHS, Would Run Shadow Government," Washington Post, May 10, 2007,

10. Lewis Seiler and Dan Hamburg, San Francisco Chronicle (February 4, 2008),

David Guyatt Wrote:In reading the foregoing it looks to me that this Order can come into force anywhere, irrespective of an event taking place inside the continental United States, if it is considered that the event impacts on the US.

"Drastic" is not too powerful a word to use, I think.

Jan Klimkowski Wrote:NSPD51 - why?