National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC)

Criminology

Introduction

National Counter terrorism Center (NCTC) is a U.S government organization responsible for international and national counter terrorism efforts. NCTC was founded in August 2004 (NCTC, n.d), by President George Bush by presidential executive order 13354 (NCTC, n.d). National Counter terrorism codified by the “Intelligence reform and terrorism prevention act” 2004 (IRTPA). After the incident of 9\11, government of U.S felt the need of separate body that deals with the terrorism activities. NCTC was established to gather all the information regarding the attacks on US and provide warnings to the agencies and potential attacks on United States. It is acquired by the government of United States and has various agencies working all over the world helping to collect information about terrorism and the attacks.

Mission of NCTC

“Lead our nation's effort to combat terrorism at home and abroad by analyzing the threat, sharing information with our partners, and integrating all instruments of national power to ensure unity of effort” (NCTC, n.d).

Vision of NCTC

“Serve as the nation's indispensable source for counterterrorism analysis and strategic operational plans, leading the counterterrorism community by setting the standard for expertise, collaboration, and information sharing” (NCTC, n.d).

Goals

National counter terrorism center's goal is to provide terrorism information to the intelligence community. NCTC have a detailed list of terrorist groups and individuals, they have the access nation wide as well as world wide and respond accordingly. NCTC is the primary organization of US that integrate and analyze the terrorism act (NCTC, n.d). NCTC has the responsibility to save the land the people of U.S from terrorism and collect terrorism information from all over the world.

Products

NCTC produces various products:

1. Daily check and balance of accounting of risks reporting and act accordingly (NCTC, n.d)

2. A depth analysis of terrorism (NCTC, n.d).

3. Providing alternative views on terrorism issues (NCTC, n.d).

4. Warnings, alerts, assessments and advisories, on the subjects of interest that are widely spread to overseas and domestic operations (NCTC, n.d).

Functions

According to Commission, NCTC would have two primary functions:

Joint Intelligence

NCTC would provide a knowledge bank of intelligence and strategic analysis for the whole government of U.S (Masse, 2004). It should have the pool of information regarding terrorism from all over the world and should have access to control. The government suggest that the intelligence role of an NCTC be constructed on the accessible TTIC structure and attract a major portion of the analytical talent now located in the CIA's Counter terrorist Center and the Defense Intelligence Agency's (DIA). However, NCTC would accomplish the track of counter terrorism activities and update strategies to follow through on cases.

Joint Operational Planning

The commission recommended NCTC to perform joint planning; however NCTC would not have the authority to execute these actions. It is executed by other agencies like FBI, CIA, Homeland security, Defense, Combatant commands and others.

Critic analysis

United State of America is not short of challenges in the terrorism field. The strategy of NCTC was issued on 29th of June 2011 (Smith, 2011), which ...