This week, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is marking its 5th Anniversary with a number of events - including one that brought together President Bush, Secretary Chertoff and Secretary Ridge to reflect on the Department’s creation and look forward to the next steps in its future. The two men who have led the Department during its first five years also took a look back in an op-ed that describes the Department’s “solid foundation” that enables it to fight terrorism by using liberty, “the most effective weapon in our arsenal.” DHS also released a fact sheet detailing some its major accomplishments in this time from disaster preparedness to border security - an impressive list given the obstacles involved in what was essentially a massive merger of several major corporations into a single umbrella organization.

Security DeBrief contributor Rich Cooper - who served in the Department of Homeland Security - offers his own reflections on the Anniversary and the significant progress the Department has made in making the nation safer in a post-9/11 world as part of CQ Homeland’s collection of thoughts on the occasion in a posting here. As part of the same series, Homeland Security Watch’s Jonah Czwerwinski acknowledged the bureaucratic battle the Department fought in its early days and offered some thoughtful advice to the next President charged with defining DHS’s goal.

Elsewhere, another DHS Alumnus and fellow contributor Chris Battle discusses an article by Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post that offered mixed coverage of the milestone, noting the Department’s progress in areas of aviation security while failing on several technology-based initiatives (including the virtual fence) that have been ” ineffective, incomplete or too expensive to sustain.” Listen to Battle’s response in his interview with Federal News Radio here.