Why do we remain unprepared for the next terrorist attack or natural disaster? Where are we most vulnerable? How have we allowed our government to be so negligent? Who will keep you and your family safe? Is America living on borrowed time? How can we become a more resilient nation? Americans are in denial when it comes to facing up to how vulnerable our nation is to disaster, be it terrorist attack or act of God. We have learned little from the cataclysms of September 11 and Hurricane Katrina. When it comes to catastrophe, America is living on borrowed time — and squandering it. In this new book, leading security expert Stephen Flynn issues a call to action, demanding that we wake up and prepare immediately for a safer future.

"The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and Hurricane Katrina — two distinct, epochal disasters in the space of four years — shook America's swaggering, historical sense of invulnerability. Each also exposed alarming weaknesses in the elaborate systems designed to protect us, including airline security, intelligence-gathering and flood defenses. It was logical to expect that political leaders from... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) President Bush on down would make fortifying America against future disasters job one. Unaccountably, they didn't. The Department of Homeland Security, with its erratic terror alerts and its habit of gracing small Midwestern cities with terror-fighting grants ahead of New York and Washington, is not yet a functional federal agency. And though both politicians and the public seem aware of the nation's vulnerabilities, our levees are still weak, and our ports and chemical plants are still exposed to the opportunistic terrorist. What gives?

In his thoughtful new 'The Edge of Disaster,' Stephen Flynn wrestles with this question. Flynn brings considerable experience to the issue, from a stint as a Coast Guard officer to his current perch at the Council on Foreign Relations, where he studies homeland security issues. His argument is straightforward and sensible: We need to build 'resiliency' into the systems that make modern American life possible — transportation, communications, trade, basic infrastructure and government agencies. Our leaders lecture us that future disasters are inevitable, and they're right. So we'd better start figuring out how to take a punch. By intelligently marshaling our resources before catastrophes occur, we can cushion almost any blow.

Flynn lays out some truly terrifying — and believable — scenarios: A truck-bomb attack on a Philadelphia oil refinery spawns an acid cloud that kills thousands; troubled levees along California's Sacramento River collapse, flooding out millions of residents. He also prescribes policy fixes, including a national project to upgrade aging infrastructure and the interesting idea of coordinating federal disaster response through the Coast Guard — the only agency, he writes, that performed well in Katrina's aftermath.

Flynn points out the foolishness of our current course: 'It is illogical to invest so much in confronting the terrorist threat beyond our shores while being so parsimonious when it comes to protecting ourselves from acts of terror or catastrophic events here at home.'

Indeed. But why is America so cavalier about girding itself for disasters? Flynn circles around that question without quite nailing it. (And it's the nub of the issue, since the answer will also tell us how likely his good ideas are to be implemented.) Is it human nature? The national character? Or is it the present political moment, with a president focused on a debilitating war abroad, not on scanning shipping containers? If the last is the right answer, the next president can change things. Flynn doesn't come out and say so, but that hope is implicit in the book's appearance at the start of a presidential campaign. (Unfortunately, 'The Edge of Disaster's' dry, prescriptive prose sometimes reads like a candidate's white paper.)

This book is strongest on Flynn's specialties, shipping and transportation, and he concisely explains why America's ports remain so vulnerable to attack. Practically speaking, the businesses that run and use U.S. ports are responsible for security, but these firms get little guidance or money from the federal agencies that are nominally in charge of the ports. Flynn quotes shipping executives eager to spring for new security systems, then lists the formidable roadblocks in their way — including the shipping industry's own lobbyists, who fight any government-mandated expenses that would hit their clients in the bottom line. Flynn blames 'Washington's slavish adherence to free-market and small-government orthodoxy,' an analysis that doesn't quite do justice to the nexus of special interests and politics blocking reforms — something that will remain an obstacle no matter who is president.

John McQuaid is the co-author of 'Path of Destruction: The Devastation of New Orleans and the Coming Age of Superstorms' and a Katrina Media Fellow at the Open Society Institute.

" Reviewed by Howard NormanMichael DirdaJohn McQuaid, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group)
(hide most of this review)

"Flynn's book reads like a thriller but has the added punch of reality." Booklist

"Steve Flynn's book makes the very persuasive argument that national security preparedness is linked to natural disaster preparedness. By investing significantly in our critical infrastructure, in citizen preparedness, and most importantly in leadership, we can be better prepared for all hazards. A great book that I highly recommend." James Lee Witt, former director, Federal Emergency Management Agency

"Since 9/11, protecting our nation against a terrorist attack has consumed policy makers in Washington. What Stephen Flynn points out in The Edge of Disaster is that much of this effort has been directed overseas, often at the expense of our homeland and its much more likely areas of vulnerability. Laying out a series of potential disasters both man-made and natural, Flynn calls for a greater emphasis on preparedness and the ability of communities and the nation to recover. Painting an often frustrating and infuriating picture of missed opportunities, The Edge of Disaster is a call to action. The time to act is now. We can only hope that policy makers are listening." Christine Todd Whitman, former governor of New Jersey and former administrator, Environmental Protection Agency

In this eye-opening, vitally important new book, Flynn issues a passionate call to make resiliency to disaster the top national priority. With the wounds of recent national tragedies still unhealed, this is a book no American can afford to ignore.

Americans have been shocked in the past few years to discover how vulnerable our nation is to disaster, be it terrorist attack or act of God. But what’s truly shocking, argues leading security expert Stephen Flynn, is how little we have learned from the cataclysms of September 11 and Hurricane Katrina. When it comes to catastrophe, America is living on borrowed time–and squandering it. In this eye-opening, vitally important new book, Flynn issues an overdue wake-up call demanding that we shake off our denial and sense of helplessness and start preparing immediately for a safer future.

With chilling frankness and clarity, Flynn describes how we have become increasingly vulnerable to disaster by grossly neglecting the complex infrastructure that provides our water, food, health care, electricity, and transportation. Through a series of realistic scenarios, he dramatizes the prime areas of documented risk. An attack on a northern New Jersey chemical plant could kill untold thousands and cripple our largest urban area. A bio-pathogen secretly introduced into the cattle-feeder facilities concentrated around Amarillo, Texas, would turn the nation’s food supply into an agent of death. The destruction of a ship with a cargo of explosive fuels in Los Angeles harbor could bring the West Coast economy to its knees.

Horrifying as another terrorist attack would be, Flynn insists that due to our woeful lack of preparedness for foreseeable disasters, the wrath of Mother Nature may be our gravest threat. We have been taking for granted infrastructure bequeathed to us by earlier generations, which are now crumbling. Decades of skimping on public health leave us dangerously exposed to a flu pandemic that could kill millions. Massive flooding could knock out Depression-era canal locks on the Upper Mississippi, starving power plants of the coal they need to generate electricity. The next earthquake in San Francisco could destroy century-old levees, contaminating the fresh water supply that millions of Californians rely on for their survival.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. After examining why we are more vulnerable to disaster than ever before, Flynn turns the tables and explores what we can do about it, as individuals and as a society. He outlines a detailed, pragmatic program we can embrace right now to enhance our preparedness across the board and ensure true national security.

Hard-hitting yet ultimately optimistic, The Edge of Disaster is a passionate call to make resiliency to disaster our top national priority. With the wounds of recent national tragedies still unhealed, this is a book no American can afford to ignore.

Stephen Flynn is among the world’s most widely cited experts on homeland security and trade and transportation issues. A senior fellow with the National Security Studies Program at the Council on Foreign Relations since 1999, he is the author of the critically acclaimed bestseller America the Vulnerable. Flynn lives in Connecticut with his wife and daughter.