Joint Task Force North Mission
Joint Task Force North (JTF North), based at Biggs Army Airfield, Fort Bliss, Texas, is a joint service command comprised of active duty and reserve component Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, Department of Defense civilian employees, and contracted support personnel.
JTF North is the Department of Defense organization tasked to support our nation’s federal law enforcement agencies in the identification and interdiction of suspected transnational threats within and along the approaches to the continental United States.
Transnational threats are those activities conducted by individuals or groups that involve international terrorism, narcotrafficking, alien smuggling, weapons of mass destruction, and includes the delivery systems for such weapons that threaten the national security of the United States.
JTF North’s homeland security support role is articulated in its mission statement:Joint Task Force North provides military support to
law enforcement agencies, conducts theater security cooperation
as directed, and facilitates interagency synchronization
within the USNORTHCOM area of responsibility in order to anticipate, detect, deter, prevent, and defeat
transnational threats to the homeland.
This mission aligns JTF North with U.S. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), its higher headquarters. The Department of Defense established USNORTHCOM in 2002 to consolidate, under a single unified command, existing missions that were previously executed by other military organizations. USNORTHCOM is located in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
USNORTHCOM’s area of operations includes the air, land and sea approaches and encompasses the entire North American continent and the surrounding water out to approximately 500 nautical miles. It also includes most of the Gulf of Mexico.
The JTF North staff of Department of Defense professionals is committed to accomplishing the command’s mission. Their dedication to the homeland security support role is best summed up in JTF North’s motto,"Service to the Nation."
