The National Strategy for the Physical Protection of Critical Infrastructures and Key Assets

Executive Summary

This document defines the road ahead for a core mission area identified in the President’s National Strategy for Homeland Security-reducing the Nation’s vulnerability to acts of terrorism by protecting our critical infrastructures and key assets from physical attack.

This document, the National Strategy for the Physical Protection of Critical Infrastructures and Key Assets, the Strategy, identifies a clear set of national goals and objectives and outlines the guiding principles that will underpin our efforts to secure the infrastructures and assets vital to our national security, governance, public health and safety, economy, and public confidence. This Strategyalso provides a unifying organization and identifies specific initiatives to drive our near-term national protection priorities and inform the resource allocation process. Most importantly, it establishes a foundation for building and fostering the cooperative environment in which government, industry, and private citizens can carry out their respective protection responsibilities more effectively and efficiently.

This Strategyrecognizes the many important steps that public and private entities across the country have taken in response to the September 11, 2001, attacks to improve the security of their critical facilities, systems, and functions. Building upon these efforts, this document provides direction to the federal departments and agencies that have a role in critical infrastructure and key asset protection. It also suggests steps that state and local governments, private sector entities, and concerned citizens across America can take to enhance our collective infrastructure and asset security. In this light, this Strategybelongs and applies to the Nation as a whole, not just to the federal government or its constituent departments and agencies.

A New Mission

The September 11 attacks demonstrated our nationallevel physical vulnerability to the threat posed by a formidable enemy-focused, mass destruction terrorism. The events of that day also validated how determined, patient, and sophisticated-in both planning and execution-our terrorist enemies have become. The basic nature of our free society greatly enables terrorist operations and tactics, while, at the same time, hinders our ability to predict, prevent, or mitigate the effects of terrorist acts. Given these realities, it is imperative to develop a comprehensive national approach to physical protection.

Defining the End State: Strategic Objectives

The strategic objectives that underpin our national critical infrastructure and key asset protection effort include:

• Identifying and assuring the protection of those infrastructures and assets that we deem most critical in terms of national-level public health and safety, governance, economic and national security, and public confidence consequences;

• Providing timely warning and assuring the protection of those infrastructures and assets that face a specific, imminent threat; and

• Assuring the protection of other infrastructures and assets that may become terrorist targets over time by pursuing specific initiatives and enabling a collaborative environment in which federal, state, and local governments and the private sector can better protect the infrastructures and assets they control.

Homeland Security and Infrastructure Protection: A Shared Responsibility

Protecting America’s critical infrastructures and key assets calls for a transition to a new national cooperative paradigm. The basic tenets of homeland securityare fundamentally different from the historically defined tenets of national security. Traditionally, national securityhas been recognized largely as the responsibility of the federal government. National securityis underpinned by the collective efforts of the military, foreign policy establishment, and intelligence community in the defense of our airspace and national borders, as well as operations overseas to protect our national interests.

Homeland security, particularly in the context of critical infrastructure and key asset protection, is a shared responsibility that cannot be accomplished by the federal government alone. It requires coordinated action on the part of federal, state, and local governments; the private sector; and concerned citizens across the country.

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The National Strategy for the Physical Protection of Critical Infrastructures and Key Assets