United States Coast Guard
To go to a more factual encyclopedia go to wikipedia or even to uncyclopedia because even it has more content than CP.
In addition to its national defense role as one of the five U.S. armed services, the Coast Guard is charged with a broad scope of regulatory, law-enforcement, humanitarian and emergency-response duties. The Service operates in a complex and dangerous maritime environment characterized by rapidly changing security threats at home and abroad.
The Coast Guard performs a myriad tasks and operations in direct support of numerous critical maritime security and safety roles that involve it enforcing maritime law, protecting natural resources, mobilizing maritime national defense and securing the homeland on the sea. The Service's missions include: maritime search and rescue, International Ice Patrol operations, polar and domestic waterway icebreaking, bridge administration, aids to navigation, recreational boating safety, vessel traffic management, at-sea enforcement of living marine resource laws and treaty obligations, at-sea drug and illegal migrant interdiction, and port security and safety.
The United States confronts numerous maritime challenges that pose or will pose increasingly significant demands on the Coast Guard and threats to U.S. National Security. The Coast Guard works on illegal migration and contraband smuggling, resource protection threats involving both living and inorganic marine resources, asymmetric threats from weapons of mass destruction and terrorist activities, continued U.S. support of United Nations-sponsored sanctions and security operations, and security, defense, and resource protection implications of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea.
The Service is responsible for the safety and security of America's inland waterways, ports, and harbors; more than 95,000 miles of U.S. coastlines; U.S. territorial seas; 3.4 million square miles of ocean defining our Exclusive Economic Zones; and international waters or other maritime regions of importance to the United States. The Coast Guard's greatest asset is its highly trained and motivated workforce, serving in active-duty, reserve, auxiliary, and civilian capacities. To carry out its diverse and demanding tasks, the Coast Guard operates a fleet of fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, small boats, buoy tenders, ice breakers, and a fleet of "deepwater" cutters capable of protecting America's maritime security interests wherever they might be at risk or the President of the United States so requires.
