Innovator, The

Sea Power, May 2007 by Barnard, Richard C

Jay Cohen rescues a DHS office from oblivion and charts the technological road ahead

As undersecretary for science and technology at the Department of Homeland security (DHS), Jay M. Cohen is responsible for delivering high-tech solutions to the 22 agencies that comprise DHS. A key to success is linking emerging technologies to "capability gaps" of the customer agencies, helping them counter an enemy he views as "evil and agile."

Among his top priorities is "Chloe," a high-flying unmanned platform to blind shoulder-fired missiles aimed at passenger planes and provide nonstop surveillance on the nation's borders. He also likes SENSIT, a system to identify liquids in passengers' luggage. Others include APE, a way to shape walls to negate shock waves from bombs, and a prototype vessel for the Coast Guard that he hopes will last longer and use less fuel.

During his 38-year Navy career, Cohen held an array of sea and staff commands, and was for six years chief of the Office of Naval Research, where he became renown for his ebullient faith in science to solve problems, pushing his labs to the leading edges of technology and creating networks of university and government labs to address Navy priorities.

Cohen is bringing the same approach to the DHS Science and Technology directorate, which prior to his arrival was hammered by Congress for obscure financial reporting, lack of innovation and rock-bottom morale. He has spent hours on Capitol Hill to restore the credibility of his directorate, and claims some initial success. Within months of his arrival, Congress reversed its decision to slash $200 million from his $807 million budget.

In a recent interview with Editor in Chief Richard C. Barnard, Cohen discussed the challenges ahead. Excerpts follow:

You were sworn in on Aug. 10, the day the British arrested 21 people in a plot to blow up airplanes with liquid explosives while on their way to the United States. How did you respond?

COHEN: I set up a rapid response team similar to what we did in the Defense Department after 9/11. The Department of Energy laboratories and other labs stood up to the challenge. They've got world-class physics and chemistry capability and because of their problem solving, we were able to get small quantities of liquids back on our airplanes in a bit more than two months. That's the 3-1-1 rule (passengers are permitted up to 3 ounces of liquids in one plastic bag, one quart in size).

My next goal again is to find a way that we can all get through screening without taking our shoes off.

What is your office doing to make the American people more secure?

COHEN: Well, MANPADS [man-portable air-defense systems or shoulder-fired missiles] are a real and viable threat [to civil aviation] and it's proliferating. This is nothing new. In the Department of Defense, especially the Navy, we demonstrated [a defensive device] which would detect the thermal plume on launch of the shoulder-fired weapon and send a fairly low-power laser right into the eye of the MANPAD.

The administration and Congress invested in excess of $100 million to see how we might adapt this to commercial aviation. It cost about $1 million to $3 million per plane, it adds weight, it adds fuel-use cost, its reliability requires some kind of maintenance every several hundred hours of operation; it has liability issues, especially if you fly overseas. What if it inadvertently fires at a wrong target? Nothing is perfect. There was customer resistance.

So a year ago, Congress gave my directorate the authority to look at alternative solutions and last fall, we went forward with a ground-based solution. Will it work? I don't know. We're testing it right now.

As I looked at the ground-based solution, it occurred to me we can look into an alternative off-plane solution and we dubbed it "Project Chloe," for the character in the TV program, "24." We envision a platform that would provide persistent surveillance, like a Global Hawk or Predator [unmanned vehicle]. But there could be other platforms. It would fly well above normal commercial aviation traffic - 65,000 feet - and circle above the airport. It would be equipped with the thermal sensor for the launch and [a weapon] to blind the MANPAD.

The goal is to give aerial protection that you could put anywhere but not modify the planes that are landing and taking off.

There are other potential advantages. What if T-Mobile, Verizon and AT&T came forward and paid to put a transponder on Chloe? We add volume, weight and power, and the companies could advertise to their customer base that no matter what happened on the ground, to the cell towers, to the fiber optics, anyone who subscribed would have guaranteed bounce communication from Chloe. Those who were in Washington and New York on 9/11 know the communications outages we suffered.

So the communications companies would be helping pay the cost of Chloe?

COHEN: Right. And what if we also make it available to the first responders in the region? It means our first responders could see on the other side of the building, just as we now do in combat. They can do a low-speed chase [using the thermal imager] without helicopters or police cars. Why wouldn't we want to have that capability?