Introduction.(The Department of Homeland Security Intelligence Enterprise: Operational Overview and Oversight Challenges for Congress)(Report)

A primary mission of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS, the Department) is to "prevent terrorist attacks within the United States, reduce the vulnerability of the United States to terrorism, and minimize the damage, and assist in the recovery from terrorist attacks that do occur in the United States. (1) The current organization of the Department is displayed at Figure 1.

To support this mission, DHS has had an intelligence component since its inception in 2003. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 assigned the original DHS intelligence component-the Directorate of Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection-with responsibility to receive, analyze, and integrate law enforcement and intelligence information in order to "(A) identify and assess the nature and scope of terrorist threats to the homeland; (B) detect and identify threats of terrorism against the United States; and (C) understand such threats in light of actual and potential vulnerabilities of the homeland." (2)

Congress also made information sharing a top priority of the new DHS intelligence organization, requiring it "to disseminate, as appropriate, information analyzed by the …