Napolitano seeks new recruit in terror fight: you

Billed by aides as a major address outlining the Obama administration’s approach to preventing terrorist attacks, Napolitano’s speech marked a striking change in rhetoric from her predecessors under President Bush.

Napolitano mentioned few new programs or specific critiques. Instead, she described a strategy that emphasized collaboration instead of unilateral federal action and spread responsibility for bolstering preparedness and security across society.

“I am sometimes asked if I think complacency is a threat. I believe the short answer is yes,’’ Napolitano said. “But I think a better question is this: Has the US government done everything it can to educate and engage the American people? The answer is no.

“Countering the terrorist threat is not just the efforts of one agency, or one element of society,’’ Napolitano said.

Returning to New York City, where she planned later to visit the site of the World Trade Center towers destroyed on Sept. 11, 2001, Napolitano made her most extended remarks on the subject of domestic counter-terrorism since taking over the 220,000-worker department in January.

Her speech, “Common Threat, Collective Response: Protecting Against Terrorist Attacks in a Networked World,’’ came after critics accused Napolitano of playing down the subject in her first appearance before House lawmakers last winter, when she did not use the word “terror’’ or terrorism in her prepared remarks.

This time, she cited variants 23 times in little more than 20 minutes. She noted the terror threat has not abated. American hotels were targeted in bombings earlier this month in Jakarta, six Americans were among 164 people killed in a commando-style assault in Mumbai in November, and three Americans were among 54 killed in a Marriott Hotel in Islamabad in September, she said.

“While the shock and the pain and images of 9/11 stay with us, the terror threat is even more decentralized, more networked, and more adaptive than on 9/11,’’ Napolitano said.

At the same time, counter-terror efforts need to embrace the same values, she said. For example, the nation needs better technology, training, and linkages with 780,000 local law enforcement agents, promising to support 70 state-run, intelligence “fusion centers’’ that began under the Bush administration. Among other things, intelligence officials are developing a standard electronic system to report and track suspicious activity nationwide.

Napolitano singled out the need for greater cooperation from companies that control most of the critical targets such as power plants and communication systems. More than dollars, Napolitano said, the nation needs “the active engagement of employers’’ to identify key national resources and to plan how to secure them.

“We may be better prepared as a nation that we were on 9/11. But we are nowhere near as prepared as we need to be,’’ Napolitano warned bluntly.

Overseas, she said, Justice Department and homeland security officials were continuing work begun by the previous administration, forging agreements to combat serious crime with 13 countries and working with Europe and others to share more data about air passengers, collect fingerprints from travelers, and scan cargo.

“The consequences of living in a state of fear, rather than a state of preparedness, are enormous,’’ Napolitano said.