WI/AHC: The US Department of Homeland Security is formed before 9/11

[A Piece of History]

After September 11, 2001, the Department of Homeland Security was formed by George W Bush to 'coordinate homeland security efforts'. It incorporates 22 agencies including the ICE, the Border Patrol, Customs and Border Protection, the US Coast Guard and the US Secret Service.

But what would need to happen for something like the DHS to be formed BEFORE September 11 2001 and what kind of impact would this have on US national security?

Also, a related question, were there any proposals for a DHS-like agency to be founded before 9/11?

 

[overoceans]

But what would need to happen for something like the DHS to be formed BEFORE September 11 2001...?

Well, I suppose the obvious answer would be "Something like what happened on September 11 2001, but before September 11 2001.

Do you mean what sort of attack could have taken place, which group would be responsible, that sort of thing?

 

[nbcman]

Maybe a stronger reaction to the DB Cooper style hijackings in the early 1970s than the passenger screening the FAA first enacted in 1973? Or if Samuel Byck succeeded in his hijacking attempt and crashed a plane into the White House to kill President Nixon in 1974? EDIT: or in response to the TWA Flight 847 hijacking in 1985 and Pan Am Flight 103 which further increased aviation security.

 

[Colonel Zoidberg]

The first WTC bombing is much worse, and Clinton does something similar.

 

[Citycat]

There was a lot of domestic terrorism in the US in the 1990s. Perhaps any one of these incidents ends up significantly more deadly than IOTL, so the Dept of Homeland Security or equivalent ITTL is formed.

 

[overoceans]

Maybe a stronger reaction to the DB Cooper style hijackings in the early 1970s than the passenger screening the FAA first enacted in 1973?

You'd need those hijackings to be a lot deadlier to get a DHS-type organization in response. OTL, D.B. Cooper himself was lionized in one of those down-home, yee-haw comedy films that so graced the era.

 

[jocay]

Have the bombs in Columbine's cafetaria detonate and you would have hundreds, if not close to a thousand casualties. A Clinton administration in the summer of 99 creates the Department of Homeland Security.

 

[overoceans]

Have the bombs in Columbine's cafetaria detonate and you would have hundreds, if not close to a thousand casualties. A Clinton administration in the summer of 99 creates the Department of Homeland Security.

But doesn't the whole concept of "homeland security" presume that the country is facing an external, ie. foreign, threat? I realize that the OP probably isn't demanding an organization literally called the Department Of Homeland Security, but I think the idea that they were battling a menace emanating in other countries, not to mention one that involved many, many people working in tandem to attack the US, probably determined the nature of the ensuing department.

Even with a high-casualty Columbine, I still think the response is gonna be less drastic than, say, what happened after the Oklahoma City bombing. The Columbine killers are still gonna be seen as just lone wolves, not neccessarily portending any future actions.

 

[bsmart]

It will take something like 9/11 for Americans to allow such an intrusive police state. That is what the Patriot Act (I hate that name) and the DHS would have been considered before 9/11 shocked people. Oklahoma City didn't do it, The Olympic Park bombing didn't do it.

 

[Whanztastic]

U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century

The original idea was less of a change, independent coordinating agency instead of a complete department reshuffle. If Gore was elected there might’ve been quicker action on this.

 

[SpaceMarathon]

Perhaps the Millennium plot succeeding with the bombing of LAX? Although I'm afraid that prior PoDs would need to get it more plausible.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

It will take something like 9/11 for Americans to allow such an intrusive police state. That is what the Patriot Act (I hate that name) and the DHS would have been considered before 9/11 shocked people. Oklahoma City didn't do it, The Olympic Park bombing didn't do it.

When FEMA was originally formed the people in the Regan administration pushing for it concieved it as a emergency government to deal with a expected collapse of state and local government. Nuclear war was one scenario. Another was a expected surge of tens of millions of refugees from Latin America when Communists took over those Nations. These people apparently thought Federal appointees would be better managers than the Military & Texas or California NG.

FEMA was quietly sidelined by cooler heads, then reconfigured under the Clinton administration into a actual disaster coordination agency.