Monday is the fifth anniversary of the deadly terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, that precipitated the Global War on Terror internationally and the creation of the Department of Homeland Security domestically. While the Global War on Terror has received a vast amount of commentary, less has been said about the effectiveness of the government’s policies to guard against terrorist attacks on U.S. soil. Is there, in fact, enough of a terrorist threat to justify the astronomical sums spent securing landmarks in third‐​tier cities? Has domestic anti‐​terrorism policy actually made us any safer? Was the DHS even a good idea? How is it spending our tax money?


All these questions and more will be debated in the imminent September edition of Cato Unbound, “9/11 Five Years After: Reassessing the Terrorist Threat and Homeland Security.” Ohio State University political scientist John Mueller will kick off the conversation with “Some Reflections on What, If Anything, ‘Are We Safer?’ Might Mean.” Mueller will get feedback and pushback from: Clark Ervin, head of the Homeland Security Program at the Aspen Institute and the first inspector general of the United States Department of Homeland Security; Veronique de Rugy, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and expert on DHS budgeting priorities; and Timothy Naftali, soon‐​to‐​be director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum and author of Blind Spot: The Secret History of American Counterterrorism.