GSN Digital Edition April 2016

General Barry McCaffrey (USA-Ret.)
presenting of 45 winner’s trophies
to deserving government agencies
and private industry developers of
advanced security and communications
technologies.
The audience was also treated to a
barn-burner of a speech by four star
General Barry McCaffrey (USA-
Ret.), who saluted the public-private
partnership of government and
private business, which he credited
with making tremendous strides
since the “transformational event”
of 9/11/2001 in which “the most
powerful nation literally in the history
of the world” was attacked by
a small number of mostly upper
middle class, highly educated Saudi
boys, who took our own technology
one day and murdered 3,000 of us.”
“The last time we had a casualty
rate like that,” McCaffrey said, “was
in the Battle of Antietam in the Civil
War.”
If there is a more exciting speaker
on this earth than General
McCaffrey, I’ve never met
him or her. There is no doubt
in my mind that every one of
the hundreds of people in
the room that evening believed
that General McCaffrey
was speaking directly to
them.
In following years, GSN
also had the good fortune of
having General Dynamics as
its lead Awards Sponsor. A
later Raytheon became lead Sponsor
and joined GSN in establishing
the GSN/Raytheon Award for Distinguished
Leadership and Innovation
in Public Safety and Security,
with the first Award going to Richard
Reed, Deputy Assistant to President
Obama for homeland security.
Mr. Reed was chosen for his “tireless
work in his key role in leading
the development of national policy
relating to resilience, transborder
security and community
partnerships.”
Former Commandant
of the U.S. Coast Guard,
Admiral Thad Allen,
who came out of retirement
twice to service his
country – once in Hurricane
Katrina and later
in the BP Oil Spill -- was
Winner of the GSN/
Raytheon Award in the
following year, and was
13
as well-deserving of the Award as
anyone could be. As a matter of fact,
as many have repeated, he was probably
one of the few persons in the
country who could cope with Hurricane
Katrina and the BP Oil Spill.
One of my personal favorite experiences
to date in the GSN Awards
Programs history was the story of
the Bastrop County Texas Wildfires,
largest in the history of Texas,
which could not be contained by
one agency after another, as homes
and business burned to the ground
– until county, state and federal government
agencies from all around
the country, including the fabled
Southern Area Red Team, banded
together into the “Bastrop County
Unified Command” to subdue their
egos and put the fire out.
All of the Bastrop County Unified
Commanders came to the Awards
Dinner that year, some bringing
their children and grandchildren.
Glen Woodbury, Director of Center for Homeland Defense
and Security/NPS, accepting award while accompanied by
CHDS graduates