The formation of which department represented the largest transformation of U.S. government agencies since the creation of the Department of Defense in 1947?

• A. The CIA
• B. The NSA
• C. The Department of Homeland Security
• D. The FBI

Answer: (C)

The main idea here is understanding a sweeping reorganization of how the federal government handles security, carried out by creating a single cabinet-level department to oversee homeland security. After the 9/11 attacks, Congress established the Department of Homeland Security in 2002, bringing about a major consolidation of roughly two dozen agencies that previously operated under multiple departments. This moved border security, immigration enforcement, disaster response, cyber and infrastructure protection, and other security functions into one integrated agency, aimed at coordinated planning and rapid response.

That scale of change is what makes it the largest transformation since the Department of Defense was created in 1947. The other entities listed—while important agencies with long histories—did not involve creating a new department that unified so many different functions under one organizational umbrella.