http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003226851_fragile26.html
Experts warn U.S. is coming apart at the seams
By Chuck McCutcheon
Newhouse News Service
WASHINGTON — A pipeline shuts down in Alaska. Equipment failures disrupt
air travel in Los Angeles. Electricity runs short at a spy agency in
Maryland.
None of these recent events resulted from a natural disaster or terrorist
attack, but they may as well have, some homeland security experts say. They
worry that too little attention is paid to how fast the country's basic
operating systems are deteriorating.
"When I see events like these, I become concerned that we've lost focus on
the core operational functionality of the nation's infrastructure and are
becoming a fragile nation, which is just as bad — if not worse — as being
an insecure nation," said Christian Beckner, a Washington analyst who runs
the respected Web site Homeland Security Watch (www.christianbeckner.com).
The American Society of Civil Engineers last year graded the nation "D" for
its overall infrastructure conditions, estimating that it would take $1.6
trillion over five years to fix the problem.
"I thought [Hurricane] Katrina was a hell of a wake-up call, but people are
missing the alarm," said Casey Dinges, the society's managing director of
external affairs.
British oil company BP announced this month that severe corrosion would
close its Alaska pipelines for extensive repairs. Analysts say this may
sideline some 200,000 barrels a day of production for several months.
Then an instrument landing system that guides arriving planes onto a runway
at Los Angeles International Airport failed for the second time in a week,
delaying flights.
Those incidents followed reports that the National Security Agency (NSA),
the intelligence world's electronic eavesdropping arm, is consuming so much
electricity at its headquarters outside Washington that it is in danger of
exceeding its power supply.
"If a terrorist group were able to knock the NSA offline, or disrupt one of
the nation's busiest airports, or shut down the most important oil pipeline
in the nation, the impact would be perceived as devastating," Beckner said.
"And yet we've essentially let these things happen — or almost happen — to
ourselves."
The Commission on Public Infrastructure at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies, a Washington think tank, said in a recent report
that facilities are deteriorating "at an alarming rate."
It noted that half the 257 locks operated by the Army Corps of Engineers on
inland waterways are functionally obsolete, more than one-quarter of the
nation's bridges are structurally deficient or obsolete, and $11 billion is
needed annually to replace aging drinking-water facilities.
President Bush, asked about the problem during a public question-and-answer
session in an April visit to Irvine, Calif., cited last year's enactment of
a comprehensive law reauthorizing highway, transit and road-safety
programs.
"Infrastructure is always a difficult issue," Bush acknowledged. "It's a
federal responsibility and a state and local responsibility. And I,
frankly, feel like we've upheld our responsibility at the federal level
with the highway bill."
But experts say the law is riddled with some 5,000 "earmarks" for projects
sought by members of Congress that do nothing to systematically address the
problem.
"There's a growing understanding that these programs are at best
inefficient and at worst corrupt," said Everett Ehrlich, executive director
of the CSIS public infrastructure commission.
Ehrlich and others cite several reasons for the lack of action:
• The political system is geared to reacting to crises instead of averting
them.
• Some politicians don't see infrastructure as a federal responsibility.
• And many problems are out of sight and — for the public — out of mind.
"You see bridges and roads and potholes, but so much else is hidden and
taken for granted," said Dinges of the Society of Civil Engineers. "As a
result, people just don't get stirred up and alarmed."
But a few politicians are starting to notice. In March, Sen. Hillary Rodham
Clinton, D-N.Y., joined Sens. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, and Tom Carper, D-
Del., in sponsoring a bill to set up a national commission to assess
infrastructure needs.
That same month, the CSIS infrastructure commission issued a set of
principles calling for increased spending, investments in new technologies
and partnerships with business. Among those signing the report were Sens.
Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., and Chris Dodd, D-Conn.
"Infrastructure deficiencies will further erode our global competitiveness,
but with the federal budget so committed to mandatory spending, it's
unclear how we are going to deal with this challenge as we fall further and
further behind in addressing these problems," Hagel said in a speech last
year. "We need to think creatively."
Copyright © 2006 The Seattle Times Company
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