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. In this gripping book, leading security expert Stephen Flynn issues a call to action, demanding that we wake up and prepare immediately for a safer future.

The consequences of a 9/11-scale terrorist attack or a major natural disaster can be minimized if “America makes building national resiliency from within as important a public policy imperative as confronting dangers from without,” says Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Senior Fellow for National Security Studies Stephen E. Flynn in The Edge of Disaster: Rebuilding a Resilient Nation.

Stephen Flynn, CFR senior fellow for national security studies, discusses the Department of Homeland Security's controversial distribution of grant money and proposes better practices for securing critical infrastructure.

The central finding of this report is that federal government has had a naïve view of what the market is able to do when left largely on its own to protect critical infrastructure.

Since September 11, Congress has appropriated nearly $180 billion to protect Americans from terrorism. Total spending on homeland security in 2006 will be at least $50 billion—roughly $450 per American household. But far from making us more secure, the money is being allocated like so much pork.

A national survey conducted by Western Carolina University's Institute for the Economy and the Future reveals that America's state officials remain doubtful about federal security and preparedness in several critical areas in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks and the response to Hurricane Katrina.