Five years after the start of an unprecedented reorganization of the US intelligence community, the country's anti-terror efforts remain largely uncoordinated, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

The counter-terrorism infrastructure has become so immense and unwieldy that even some insiders have trouble in understanding how it works or how much safer it has made the country, according to the report.

Although the country has spent US$430 billion so far on overseas military and anti-terror operations, and established a number of new anti-terror institutions, critics say that after nearly five years, the fight against terrorism often seems like a chaotic work in progress.

Continuity and coherence have been undercut by rapid turnover among top officials, particularly in the institutions responsible for domestic security and preparedness.

For example, the FBI's sixth counter-terrorism chief since 2001 tendered his resignation in April after 10 months on the job.

Many with government training and security clearances resign or retire, only to sign on at far higher salaries with the burgeoning private-sector security industry.

To address the problem, the National Counter terrorism Center has recently presented US President George W. Bush a 160-page plan that aspires to achieve what has eluded his administration in the five years since the September 11 terror attacks: bringing order and direction to the fight against terrorism.

For the first time, the classified National Implementation Plan sets government-wide goals and assigns responsibility to achieve them to specific departments and agencies.

(Xinhua News Agency August 10, 2006)