Dirk Maurer — Deputy Assistant Secretary for Crisis Management and Defense Support of Civil Authorities, DoD — 3rd Plenary Session

Bio (From the SARMA Conference Agenda)

Mr. Maurer is currently serving in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy as the position posted in the title.  Before that, he served as a Counsel on the Senate Armed Services Committee for the Chairman, Senator John Warner.  Mr. Maurer also served as a Counsel for the Ranking Minority Member and worked as Military Legislative Assistant and Counsel for Senator Susan Collins of Maine.  He received his Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the U. of Washington in 1989 and a Juris Doctorate from Georgetown University Law Center in 2000.  He is a member of the Virginia Bar.

Defense Critical Infrastructure Protection (DCIP)

Mr. Maurer first discussed the DoD’s Critical Infrastructure (CI) Protection (CIP) organizational frame.  He showed us how they want to prioritize DCI to minimize risk.  This plan is layed out in the Overview Strategy for DCI, which includes just five steps.  Next, there needs to be National and Departmental Policy changes to prepare for the future.  the CIP Framework has 3 parts that need to be analyzed; Physical, Human, and Electronic, with a focus on Domestic, Foreign, and our Dependencies.   HSDP-7 was a directive that enhances the protection of the National CI.  We need to Collaborate, Conduct or Facilitate Vulnerability Assessments, and Encourage Risk Management Strategies.  While assessing the risks associated with CI, identification of Critical Assets, Threats of Hazardous Materials, and Vulnerabilities are the three areas that must be covered.  After you have assessed the risk, the responses that could be taken are: Accept Risk, Mitigate Threat, Remediate Risk, or Reconstitute Loss Capability.

DCIP Example

The Basic DCIP Process elements include Risk Assess and Risk Response, as previously mentioned.  However, once you get passed them, you move onto Criticality Identification.  HSPD-7 requires identification of anything like WMD level health or mass casualty affects, undermines state or local governments, etc.  Effective Risk Management Decision Making occurs when you determine which Risk Response options are the best and what is your priority for your mission.

Questions

Which is more of a threat, Natural (Earthquake) or Human (al Qaeda) Hazards?

-Both.  They both can cause equally disastrous situations based on what the scope you are looking at them is.

Are there any new hazards or processes?

-All he said on this topic was that they are continuing to define information and process.  Basically, the answer we were given the entire conference is that this stuff is still being developed.  This isn’t a problem, I’m glad we got exposed to these things early and can watch them blossom.