Busting Myths About Incognito Web Browsing
Forecasting
Future Terrorist Warfare How Sudan Avoids Responsibility For Terrorism Tackling Horizontal And Vertical Supply Chain Vulnerabilities Use of Drones In Crime Fighting And As Deterrent Against Terrorism Jihad Jane And TheBlackFlag An IACSP Q&A With Jack Carr: Author Of “The Terminal List”
Vol. 24 No. 4 2019 Printed in the U.S.A. IACSP.COM
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Vol. 24, No.4
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Vol. 24, No. 4, 2019 Publisher Steven J. Fustero
Page 26
Senior Editor N. J. Florence
Law Enforcement’s Uses Of Drones
Contributing Writers Jim Weiss Mickey Davis Paul Davis Thomas B. Hunter Joshua Sinai
In Crime Fighting And As Deterrent Against Terrorism
Book Review Editor Jack Plaxe
by Jim Weiss and Mickey Davis
Research Director Gerry Keenan Conference Director John Dew
Page 16
Communications Director Craig O. Thompson
Forecasting Future Terrorist Warfare
Art Director Scott Dube, MAD4ART International Psychological CT Advisors Cherie Castellano, MA, CSW, LPC
by Dr. Joshua Sinai
Counterintelligence Advisor Stanley I. White South America Advisor Edward J. Maggio Homeland Security Advisor Col. David Gavigan
Page 6 Page 8
Personal Security Advisor Thomas J. Patire
SITREP, Terrorism Trends & Forecasts
Busting Myths About Incognito Web Browsing, by David Gewirtz
Emergency Management Advisor Clark L. Staten
Page 10 Tackling Horizontal And Vertical Supply Chain Vulnerabilities,
Tactical Advisor Robert Taubert
Hazmat Advisor Bob Jaffin
by Richard J. Chasdi, Ph.D.
Page 16
Forecasting Future Terrorist Warfare, by Dr. Joshua Sinai
Page 20 How Sudan Continues To Avoid Responsibility For Terrorism,
by Edward Maggio
Page 26 Law Enforcement’s Uses Of Drones In Crime Fighting And As Deterrent
Against Terrorism, by Jim Weiss and Mickey Davis
Page 32 A Look Back At The Terrorists Known As Jihad Jane And
Cyberwarfare Advisor David Gewirtz Cell Phone Forensics Advisor Dr. Eamon P. Doherty IACSP Advisory Board John M. Peterson III John Dew Thomas Patire Cherie Castellano, MA, CSW, LPC Robert E. Thorn Southeast Asia Correspondent Dr. Thomas A. Marks
TheBlackFlag, by Paul Davis
Page 36 Security Driver: A Hired Hand Or A Trusted Partner, by Anthony Ricci Page 38
An IACSP Q&A With Jack Carr, Author Of “The Terminal List”, by
Paul Davis
Page 42
IACSP Homeland Security Bookshelf, reviews by Dr. Joshua Sinai
Page 48
30th Annual SO/LIC Symposium & Exhibition, Conference Report
By Dr. Joshua Sinai
THE JOURNAL OF COUNTERTERRORISM & HOMELAND SECURITY INT’L is published by SecureWorldnet, Ltd., PO Box 100688, Arlington, VA 22210, USA, (ISSN#1552-5155) in cooperation with the International Association for Counterterrorism & Security Professionals and Counterterrorism & Security Education and Research Foundation. Copyright © 2019. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. The opinions expressed herein are the responsibility of the authors and are not necessarily those of the editors or publisher. Editorial correspondence should be addressed to: The Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security International, PO Box 100688, Arlington, VA 22210, USA, (571) 216-8205, FAX: (202) 315-3459 . Membership $65/year, add $10 for overseas memberships. Postmaster: send address changes to: The Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security International, PO Box 100688, Arlington, VA 22210, USA. Web site: www.iacsp.com
Security Driver Advisor Anthony Ricci, ADSI
European Correspondent Elisabeth Peruci Middle East Correspondent Ali Koknar CTSERF Research Professor David Gewirtz, M.Ed
PHOTO CREDITS: Reuters, Army.mil, Navy.mil, shutterstock.com other sources and authors where applicable.
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Vol. 24, No.4
SITREP
TERRORISM TRENDS & FORECASTS Global Overview 2019 1st Quarter In April, war broke out in Libya, a failed opposition uprising in Venezuela increased fears of violent escalation, and over 250 people were killed in terror attacks in Sri Lanka. In Sudan, the end of President Bashir’s almost 30-year rule gave way to a tense standoff between military chiefs and protest leaders. Now that Algeria’s long-time ruler has resigned, the country runs the risk of violent confrontations between protesters and the military, while Egyptian President Sisi consolidated his authoritarian rule. Political tensions rose in Mali and Benin amid opposition protests. Fighting escalated in Yemen on multiple front lines, with risks of more clashes around Hodeida and in the south, and conflict could resume in South Sudan if President Kiir unilaterally forms a new government. In Libya, war broke out when forces loyal to Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar advanced on the capital Tripoli in early April, intent on taking the city from the UNbacked Government of National Accord. As we have warned, the fighting, which has already caused the deaths of at least 300, could es-
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calate further. Both sides consider the fight an “existential war” that leaves no opportunity for a cessation of hostilities. To prevent a protracted proxy war, regional powers should refrain from militarily backing their Libyan allies and instead support calls for a ceasefire and UN-led talks, while the UN should work toward a new negotiating format with political, military and financial tracks. A failed uprising by Venezuela’s opposition leader and “interim President” Juan Guaidó on 30 April led to clashes between troops and defecting soldiers and protesters, leaving scores injured. Further polarizing the country’s dangerous political standoff, these latest developments raise the risk of violent escalation by domestic and even international actors, underlining the need for all stakeholders to support a negotiated settlement between chavistas and the opposition. The ouster of Sudan’s President Bashir after almost 30 years in power triggered celebrations, but also friction between the military council that stepped in and the
protest movement demanding civilian rule. As we have argued, Sudan needs a civilian-led transitional authority that includes the opposition, security forces and civil society. In Algeria, Abdelaziz Bouteflika stepped down, but weekly protests continued, calling for an end to military control of the transition. To mitigate the risk of violent confrontations, the regime should open dialogue with protest leaders and agree on a transition broadly acceptable to all parties. In Egypt, President Sisi entrenched his authoritarian rule – a referendum endorsed his changes to the constitution that could see him stay in power until 2030 – and the authorities intensified a crackdown on civil society and opposition voices. In Sri Lanka, over 250 people were killed in coordinated suicide bomb attacks on churches and hotels on Easter Sunday, which the government blamed on a little-known Islamist militant local group acting with foreign support; Islamic State also claimed responsibility. The attacks represent a departure from previous conflict dynamics, and threaten to open up new ten-
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sions between the overwhelmingly peaceful Muslim community and other ethnic and religious groups. In Yemen, fighting continued to escalate on multiple front lines. With negotiations over military redeployments in Hodeida stalled, rival forces could resume their battle for the strategic port and city, while tensions between nominally allied pro-government forces could spark conflict in the south. Mali’s government resigned in the wake of mass protests denouncing its failure to stop ethnic violence in the centre. Attacks could intensify there in May as tensions between ethnic Fulani and Dogon communities continue to fester. In Benin, security forces cracked down on opposition protests before and after parliamentary elections on 28 April, prompting fears that unrest could escalate in coming weeks. In Cameroon, Boko Haram stepped up attacks in the Far North and Anglophone separatists continued to clash with security forces in the west. Violence could escalate there around 20 May, Cameroon’s National Day. To get to talks, a first
step in ending the bloodshed, Cameroonian and international actors should pressure those who stand in the way of dialogue and reward the more flexible. Conflict Risk Alerts • Mali Cameroon Somalia South Sudan Benin Venezuela Yemen Algeria Libya Resolution Opportunities • None Deteriorated Situations • Mali Cameroon Somalia Sudan Benin Sri Lanka Venezuela Yemen Egypt Libya Improving Situations • None Source: https://www.crisisgroup.org/ crisiswatch
FBI’s Internet Crime Report Is Released The statistics gathered by the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) for 2018 show Internet-enabled theft, fraud, and exploitation remain pervasive and were responsible for a staggering $2.7 billion in financial losses in 2018. In its annual Internet Crime Report, the FBI reports the IC3 received 351,936 complaints in 2018—an average of more than 900 every day. The most frequently reported complaints were for non-payment/ non-delivery scams, extortion, and personal data breaches. The most financially costly complaints involved business email compromise, romance or confidence fraud, and investment scams, which can include Ponzi and pyramid schemes. Reports came in from every U.S. state and territory and involved victims of every age. There was a concentration of victims and financial losses, however, among individuals over the age of 50.
The 2018 report shows how prevalent these crimes are,” said Donna Gregory, chief of the IC3. “It also shows that the financial toll is substantial and a victim can be anyone who uses a connected device. Awareness is one powerful tool in efforts to combat and prevent these crimes. Reporting is another. The more information that comes into the IC3, the better law enforcement is able to respond.” For more information, go to: www.fbi.gov/news/stories/ic3-releases2018-internet-crime-report-042219
Terrorists Continue Exploiting Children For Suicide Attacks Time has proven that there is no action that is too base or vile for jihadists and Islamist groups worldwide to attain their goals, and that includes using children in suicide terrorist operations against their enemies. A 2017 UNICEF report says that 117 children In Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon and Niger were fighting among Boko Haram terrorists after being kidnapped and trained by the group. In 2017, children carried out 27 Boko Haram attacks. In Nigeria, Boko Haram went as far as using a 10-year-old girl to carry out a 2016 New Year’s Eve suicide bombing. The girl approached a crowd gathering to buy noodles, but blew herself up too soon, limiting the casualties to one injured person. The latest example came in an April 9 Egypt suicide bombing in the north Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid. Seven people were killed, including four police officers and a 6-year-old boy. The terrorist was a 15-year-old boy who targeted a busy marketplace. ISIS affiliate Ansar Beit Al Maqdes took credit for the attack. The number of child soldiers across the world jumped 159 percent in the past five years, the London-based Child Soldiers International reported in February. With many children returning from ISIS-controlled territory, the threat posed will be a lasting one. A bullet fired or a bomb detonated by a child is as effective as one fired or detonated by adults. To read the full story, go to: https:// www.investigativeproject.org/7898/terrorists-continue-exploiting-children-for
U.S. State Department Adds Kidnapping Risk To Travel Advisories The risk of being kidnapped or taken hostage is being added to the travel advisories issued by the State Department. State Department advisories have until now included warnings about such things as crime, civil unrest or the potential for terrorism. The new “K” indicator for the potential to be kidnapped is being issued for 35 countries. The department says the new category was added as part of an effort to give Americans comprehensive information about travel safety. The 35 countries making the initial list for the risk of kidnapping and/or hostage taking are: Afghanistan, Algeria, Angola, Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Colombia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Kenya, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Mali, Mexico, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Russian Federation, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine (in Russian-controlled eastern Ukraine), Venezuela, and Yemen The new designation comes days after the release of a California woman who had been held for a week after being kidnapped by gunmen in a national park in Uganda. Source: www.state.gov
DARPA Tests Advanced Chemical Sensors DARPA’s SIGMA program, which began in 2014, has demonstrated a city-scale capability for detecting radiological and nuclear threats that is now being operationally deployed. DARPA is building off this work with the SIGMA+ initiative that is focused on providing city- to region-scale detection capabilities across the full chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive threat space. The chemical sensor network and the data collected during events such as the 2018 Indianapolis 500 were critical to the DARPA effort,
allowing the team to assess the performance of the sensors and network algorithms. These tests were conducted in an urban environment to ensure that the system could handle complex and stochastic signals from species that are ever present in a city’s chemical background. Significantly, the network-level algorithm successfully improved system performance by correctly suppressing false detection events at the individual detector level. The group of DARPA researchers was also able to collect a large relevant data set and valuable user feedback that will guide ongoing system development efforts. For more information, visit: www. darpa.mil
Be Informed While flooding can happen at any time, floods can result from rain or melting snow making them common in the spring. Flooding is a temporary overflow of water onto land that is normally dry. Floods are the most common natural disaster in the United States. Failing to evacuate flooded areas, entering flood waters, or remaining after a flood has passed can result in injury or death. Plan Ahead! Visit the ready.gov website for information about Active Shooters, BioTerrorism, Cyberterrorism and Emergency Alerts. Have you and your family prepared for all possible emergencies. https://www.ready.gov/be -informed
IACSP News Many of our members are not receiving our new monthly CTS Enews (electronic security report) because we either do not have your email address, or you are using a .gov or .mil email address for your membership record. If you would like to receive our CTS Enews, please send me an email with the email address you would like us to use. Also include your current address. Please send the information to my attention to my personal email address: iacsp1@aol.com Until next time, as always, be vigilant and safe. Thank you. Steven J. Fustero Dir. Of Operations/ IACSP
Busting Myths About Incognito Web Browsing By David Gewirtz
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rivacy (or incognito) mode is a feature of web browsers that is often misunderstood, denigrated, and under-valued, especially by law enforcement officials. The prevailing sentiment — and I’ve heard this repeatedly — is that the only folks who use privacy mode are people with something unsavory to hide. While it is true that folks with something to hide might use incognito mode, what they’re hiding may not be unsavory. There are also additional reasons to use privacy mode beyond hiding. We’ll talk about both of these categories in this article.
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Before we go there, it’s important to realize exactly what incognito mode is and what it’s limitations are. To do that, let’s talk about what a web browser does. A web browser is one half of a dance duet. The other partner is the web server. When you visit a site, say Google.com, you’re sending a packet from your browser to a server. That server responds to that packet, sending a bunch of data back to the browser, which deconstructs the data and presents it in a window as a web page.
Incognito mode works only on your browser. According to Google, while
To be fair, there’s a lot more going on. Those packets travel through a whole bunch of intermediary machines, they can be modified in motion, the web page that comes back might be constructed by a whole army of web servers working together, and so on. But the basic idea is that your browser sends and receives data and other systems act on that data.
you’re in incognito
Incognito mode works only on your browser. According to Google, while you’re in incognito mode, your browser “won’t save your browsing history, cookies and site data, or information entered in forms.”
data, or information
That’s it. Remote sites will still know you’ve visited. They’ll know the IP address you used (unless you’re also using a VPN), and if you log into an account, they’ll know all about your account access. If you bookmark something, that bookmark will be kept. If you download a file, that file will stay downloaded. Fundamentally, incognito mode is about what footprints you leave on your own computer. And with that, let’s look at some reasons you might want to use incognito mode. • Job hunting: Let’s say you’re searching at work. You might not want to leave tracks for your employers to see where you’re going or that you’re considering a move. • Health information: You might not always want to share your health concerns with family or co-workers. • Giving a gift: Let’s say you want to give your spouse a gift. If your history is visible, your sig-other might find out and spoil the surprise. • Personal search ranking: For those of you who live and die by your online presence, incognito mode is a way to find out where you stand without your login data influencing results. • Visit like you’re new: Some sites change their behavior for folks
mode, your browser “won’t save your browsing history, cookies and site entered in forms.” That’s it. Remote sites will still know you’ve visited. They’ll know the IP address you used (unless you’re also using a VPN), and if you log into an account, they’ll know all about your account access. If you bookmark something, that bookmark will be kept. If you download a file, that file will stay downloaded.
who’ve already visited. If you want to visit a site as if you’ve never been there before, incognito mode can help out. • Privacy in public: It’s not a great idea to use public computers for private activities, but if you just want to make sure you don’t leave tracks when you leave the computer, incognito mode won’t record your browsing history. • Unbiased searching: Your previous search history can sometimes bias a search engine’s results. If you want search results that are pure, incognito mode is there to give you the facts. • SEO (search engine optimization): This is like the previous reason, but for marketing folks who want to rank better in search engines. • Work in multiple profiles: If you have to work signed into multiple accounts, sometimes sites get confused. By working in incognito mode, sometimes you can keep multiple windows open without confusing your software. • Screen recording: If you’re recording your screen, you might not want your own information to show up. Incognito mode won’t change your bookmarks or other customizations, but it will give your recording a fresh feel. • Classroom presentations: Log your students in as guest mode, and then turn on incognito mode. Each student will have a clean environment with which to do a presentation. • Adult content: No, we’re not talking porn. Sometimes you, as an adult, need to look up something you don’t want your kids to see. Using incognito mode protects their little psyches (at least for now). As you can see, just because someone’s using incognito mode, that doesn’t mean they’re involved in illegal, immoral, or fattening activities. That said, remember incognito mode is just one small tool in an arsenal of computer protection techniques. Don’t trust it for everything, but enjoy the little bit of help it provides.
About the Author CTSERF Research Professor David Gewirtz, M.Ed. is Director of the U.S. Strategic Perspective Institute, Distinguished Lecturer for CBS Interactive, Cyberwarfare Advisor for the International Association of Counterterrorism and Security Professionals, IT Advisor to the Florida Public Health Association and an instructor at the UC Berkeley extension. http://www.zdnet.com/ blog/diy-it/
Tackling Horizontal and Vertical Supply Chain Vulnerabilities:
Hill Air Force Base F-35A Lightning IIs fly in formation over the Utah Test and Training Range, March 30, 2017. (U.S. Air Force photo by R. Nial Bradshaw)
Risks from Interstate Conflict and Terrorism
W By Richard J. Chasdi, Ph.D.
ithin the international business security domain are two broad sets of threats that revolve around the horizontal and vertical vulnerabilities of supply chains. Both of these vulnerabilities have been cast in sharp relief by the prospect of trade wars between the United States, China, and Europe, the threat of terrorism against commercial interests, and the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act’s prohibition against
Chinese firms like Huawei Technologies, ZTE corporation, and Dahua Technology Company from supplying US defense contractors with goods and services1. For international business C-class executives, work to tackle both of these vulnerability types boils down to which factors of each are potentially influenced by the private sector, working in conjunction with national and state government.
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The putative wisdom is, “tariffs beget other tariffs” - ultimately, the imposition of tariffs and counter-tariffs, what Kenneth Waltz calls the “competition of foolishness” in “the legal structure” of an anarchic world makes for an irrational outcome, namely that nation-states are less well off when the original intention was rational - to maximize benefits.2 In some industries such as energy, legal or political context also matters, where long distribution and supply chains are intrinsic to business operations; operations are often encumbered by poor interstate relations, such as the current relationship between Venezuela’s President Maduro’s government and President Trump’s administration, that can affect outcomes, and encumbered by domestic intra-state strife where for example, in Nigeria’s Niger Delta, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) operates against foreign oil interests. Other geo-strategic “choke points” critical to international trade with potential for political and even military violence between states include, but are not limited to, the Strait of Hormuz, the South China Sea, and the Strait of Malacca. Hence, in the case of horizontal supply chain vulnerabilities, the role international business plays is constrained in part by international context: complex political, economic, and military dimensions largely out of the control of business executives. Still, many leaders of multinational corporations continue to focus on decentralization through foreign direct investment (FDI) to lower cost through reduced wages and benefits, to position firms close to markets to reduce logistics and distribution costs, and if necessary, to skirt around import tariffs and other barriers to trade that hurt the consumer (and some manufacturers) with price increases, a reduction in the range of goods available, and reductions in volume of trade. What C-class executives have not emphasized sufficiently in my judgment, is the downside of decentralization – that horizontally, longer supply chains require increased redundancy for critical logistics and distribution operations. How would that work? For example, redundancy measures in North America would benefit from generally recognizable, carefully reasoned redundancy plans with clear lines of intergovernmental agency responsibility for specific contingencies. Those plans would take into account com-
Hence, in the case of horizontal supply chain vulnerabilities, the role international business plays is constrained in part by international context: complex political, economic, and military dimensions largely out of the control of business executives. Still, many leaders of multinational corporations continue to focus on decentralization through foreign direct investment (FDI) to lower cost through reduced wages and benefits, to position firms close to markets to reduce logistics and distribution costs, and if necessary, to skirt around import tariffs and other barriers.
munication difficulties experienced during the aftermath of 9/11 to ensure international compatibilities, mutually understood interpretations of terms in contracts, and other standardization in communication. In my research on international business and security, I write about such issues within the context of two case studies – the Mombasa terrorist assaults in 2002 and the 2013Tigantourine gas facility attack.3 For example, one component of such redundancy plans would focus on how to reroute international trade from Canada sent by land, ship, and air to Mexico for example, to be rerouted into the United States, if a coordinated and multiple target attack by terrorists to shut down the CanadianAmerican border for economic reasons happened. In the broader sense, C-class executives must begin to work closely with national and state leaders in public-private partnerships to isolate and identify vulnerabilities and create redundancies to ensure more seamless business operations. In the case of vertical supply chain vulnerabilities, the problem primarily revolves around the integrity of “Tier 3” and “Tier 2” and “Tier 1” supplier parts or assembled sub-units of component parts provided to Original Equipment Manufactures (OEM’s) for final assembly in an OEM product. This threat is neither new, nor is this work’s focus on it to highlight this threat – for example, the national security threat from foreign powers to sabotage U.S. military hardware is highlighted in the Project on National Security Reform (PNSR) vignette, “A Defense Industrial Base Scenario,” published in 2010.4 What is new, in my judgment, is the scope and the magnitude of the problem. The scope of the problem in the United States is especially acute in terms of US national security, energy infrastructure, and transportation industries – perhaps particularly so in the aviation industry where outsourcing, in the name of cost and at the expense of quality, for aircraft parts and repair/maintenance of equipment, is commonplace to note. The basic concern is that incomplete information about product origins and processes in place to ensure component integrity in the production process, and subsequent handling (e.g., packing and shipping) of sub-components delivered to OEM’s, pose security risks. In addition, in the private sector, there probably remain gaps or in-
consistencies in the standardization and integration of protocols and metrics across Tier levels and across countries of origin that in part stem from the globalized nature of suppliers and production. Those lacunae need to be isolated and identified with stratagems for remediation in mind. This past year, the U.S. Congress took major steps to address many of those vertical security supply chain concerns in the narrower sense, within the context of U.S. defense contractors that conduct business with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD); those steps address both the import and export sides of the national security problem, albeit limited primarily to defense contractors. While a more comprehensive review of the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act (2019) is beyond the scope of this article, efforts to tackle the import side of the national security problem involve several legal stipulations, such as those found in section 889 for example, that forbid or constrained the capacity of US defense contractors and others to utilize parts, apparatus, or technological science that originate from designated firms such as “Huawei Technologies Company, ZTE Corporation....[and] Hytera Communications Corporation....” and/or a “covered foreign country” (i.e., China) “...as a substantial or essential component of any system, or as critical technology as part of any system....” Provisions are also in place to craft processes to ease the transition for “entities” that have used these products and services in the past and to assist in overall compliance.5 In addition, with respect to the export side of the national security problem, this legislation (section 885 paragraph b, sec.1), works to restrict access to U.S. technological science by foreign powers, “through contracts, grants, cooperative agreements or other transactions.” The NDAA’s section 885 describes procedures whereby the U.S. Secretary Defense reports to “congressional defense committees” with monitor and oversight responsibilities about what is required for enactment of protocols and policies to achieve the foregoing objective, and what sanctions might be imposed for infractions, “including intellectual property rights forfeiture.6” In the broader sense, stipulations in section 1613 require the U.S. Secretary of Defense working in conjunction with the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, undertake a review of supply chain susceptibilities as pertains to “covered programs,”such as classified/sensitive satellite dispatches and “satellite programs,” and report to congressional committees with monitor and oversight responsibilities about their status. In the process, recommendations are made about how to reduce supply chain risk.7
This past year, the U.S. Congress took major steps to address many of those vertical security supply chain concerns in the narrower sense, within the context of U.S. defense contractors that conduct business with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD); those steps address both the import and export sides of the national security problem, albeit limited primarily to defense contractors.
What also seems significant is this legislation takes into account other stakeholders beyond U.S. defense contractors with less direct or substantial business lines of operation to the U.S. government. In section 1644 (paragraph a, sec. 1) the U.S. Secretary of Defense, working in conjunction with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is charged to craft and implement what amounts to a federal government program “to enhance awareness” about the cyber-intrusion threat and the damage they might cause to “small manufacturers and universities working on Department of Defense programs and activities.8” These efforts include having DoD share technologies linked to cyber-security with universities and small business manufacturers and DoD
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personnel working with those stakeholders on “cyber planning assistance”(paragraph c, sec. 1, paragraph d). This underlying theme of federal outreach efforts to promote inclusion and pro-active involvement continues in section 1648 with mandated federal government efforts to work with “civil authorities” to confront the prospect of a significant cybersecurity threat, presumably to water or electrical grid infrastructure or other similar infrastructure. In this context, this section describes what amounts to public private partnerships “coordination with an incorporation of, as appropriate, the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and elements across Federal and State governments and the private sector” paragraph b, sec. 4). In essence, that approach serves as part of an overall template for work to establish or upgrade existing cities into “smart cities,” with integrated approaches, strategies, and tactics to confront threat.
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In terms of horizontal supply threat, multinational corporations should spearhead a drive to promote more coordinated and comprehensive public-private partnerships, similar to the ones the National Defense Authorization Act (2019) essentially endorses, to make the case that redundancy plans in terms of logistics and distribution be carefully reasoned and prepared so that terrorist attacks or conflict between nationstates at critical geographical “choke points” will not impact the economy in ways that can cause enormous damage.
Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security International
The twin threats to horizontal and vertical supply chain security are intertwined, as are the lessons C-class executives can glean from a consideration of threat at both dimensions. In terms of horizontal supply threat, multinational corporations should spearhead a drive to promote more coordinated and comprehensive public-private partnerships, similar to the ones the National Defense Authorization Act (2019) essentially endorses, to make the case that redundancy plans in terms of logistics and distribution be carefully reasoned and prepared so that terrorist attacks or conflict between nation-states at critical geographical “choke points” will not impact the economy in ways that can cause enormous damage. The volatility in the stock market and the performance of the bond market, traditionally viewed as a better measure of confidence in the economic future, suggests both a fragile economy with great susceptibility to world events and the imperative of public-private efforts in the horizontal security domain. In addition, other public-private partnership intitatives with defensive purposes in mind must be crafted to tackle issues of corporate security from more traditional geo-strategic and tactical security standpoints.9 In terms of vertical threat, aspects of the National Defense Authorization Act (2019) can be used in this instance as a template for American business organizations such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to begin serious discussions with government at federal and state levels about how to expand the protections afforded primarily to US defense contractors large and small, and affilliated organizations in research capacities, to supply chains in the private sector. For one thing, this is critical because of the information compilation capacities and computer software packages that are consumer off the shelf (COTS) products with daily impact on small business, multinational corporations, and other international enterprises outside of the defense industry that also have needs to protect against cyberthreats. Clearly, there are direct connections between the electricity grids and water infrastructure in the public domain that the National Defense Authorization Act alludes to, and businesses outside of the defense industry where security is paramount, such as hospitals and other medical facilities in the private domain. That conceptual and functional security overlap between
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national defense and non-national defense related industries requires a more holistic approach to security that is more seamless, better integrated, more effective, and efficient in approach. The thoroughness and anticipatory thinking devoted to defense related industries and firms can be replicated on a broader scale to account for broader notions of national security that include public and private transporation such as trains, automobiles, and aircraft as well as medical facilities, food and water facilities, or infrastructure that can essentially be affected by cyber terrorist perpetrators remotely. Even though the RAT (remote access tool) incident in 2015 where a Jeep Cherokee’s “infotainment” system was compromised to take control of that vehicle’s ignition and steering systems was conducted under controlled conditions, that event should serve as harbinger of events to come. There have been similar instances of “war-driving,” where confidential or sensitive information has been accessed by wireless devices on aircraft and elsewhere at other venues.10 The warning signs are in place that require protections be extended to non-defense related industries, both in terms of horizontal and vertical challenges and threats to supply chain security. Let’s not wait for a catastrophe like 9/11 to jolt us out of complacency.
About The Author Richard J. Chasdi, PhD, is Professorial Lecturer, Department of Political Science, The George Washington University. He serves on the editorial board of Armed Forces & Society and Perspectives on Terrorism: A Journal of the Terrorism Research Initiative. He has also served as a member of the international advisory board of Terrorism: An Electronic Journal (TEJ). Chasdi is the author of three other books as well as articles and book chapters. In addition, he was a Fulbright Specialist (Nanyang Technological University, Singapore) where he was a Visiting Fellow at the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR). He received his master’s degree from Boston College and his doctorate in political science from Purdue University.
References 1.
John S McCain National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019 – Conference Report to Accompany H.R. 5515, July 28, 2018 (https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/ CRPT-115hrpt874/pdf/CRPT-115hrpt-874. pdf); Brown, Megan, L., Jon W. Burd, Michael L. Diakiwski. 2018. “Important Cyber ProvisionsNow Law Under the 2019 NDAA.” Wiley Rein LLP. 13 August, pp.1-12 (https://
The thoroughness and anticipatory thinking devoted to defense related industries and firms can be replicated on a broader scale to account for broader notions of national security that include public and private transporation such as trains, automobiles, and aircraft as well as medical facilities, food and water facilities, or infrastructure that can essentially be affected by cyber terrorist perpetrators remotely.
wileyrein.com newsroom-articles-ImportantCyberProvisions-Now-Law-Un...); Meyer, Jonathan E., Townsend Bourne, and Bryce Chadwick. 2018. “The List of Forbidden Products Grows: The NDAA’s Prohibitions on Use of Certain Chinese Made Equipment.” Government Contracts and Investigations Blog, SheppardMullin, 28 November (https:www.governmentcontractslawblog. com/2018/11/articles/china/forbidden-products-...); The Japan News. 2018. “Govt. to halt use of Huawei, ZTE products due to security concerns” The Japan News, 8 December (https://advance-lexis-com.proxy.lib. wayne.edu/document/?pdmfid=1516831&cr id=106ob7...); Telecom Asia 2018. “Trump signs ban on Huawei and ZTE.” Telecom Asia, 15 August (https://advance-lexis.com. proxy.lib.wayne.edu/document/?pdmfid=151 6831&crid=05dfd2). 2. Waltz, Kenneth N. 1973. “The Meaning of Anarchy” In International Politics: Anarchy, Force, Imperialism. eds. Robert J. Art and Robert Jervis, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 11-20. 3. Chasdi, Richard J. 2018. Corporate Security Crossroads: Responding to Terrorism, Cyberthreats, and Other Hazards in the Global Business Environment (Santa, Barbara, CA: Praeger Publishers) 4. Ronis, Sheila R. 2010. “Chapter 5. A Defense Industrial Base Scenario” In Project on National Security Reform Vision Working Group Report and Scenarios, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, July. 5. “Subtitle H- Other Matters” - Sec. 889. “Prohibition on Certain Telecommunications and Video Surveillance Services or Equipment.” - “(a) Prohibitation on Use or Procurement,” subsection (A), (B), “(b) Prohibition on Loans and Grant Funds,” subsection 2; “(d) “Waiver Authority,” subsection B; “(f) Definitions,” subsection (2) “Covered Foreign Country -”; “(f) Definitions,” subsection (3) “Covered Telecommunications Equipment or Services -” (A), (B), (C), (D), pp. 270, 283-285. 6. “Subtitle H- Other Matters” - “Sec. 885. Process to Limit Foreign Access to Technology.” “Paragraph (b) Report. -” pp. 270, 282. 7. “Subtitle A- Space Activities” - “Sec. 1613. Evaluation And Enhanced Ssecurity of Supply Chain For Protected Satellite Communications Programs and Overhead Persistent Infrared Systems.” Paragraph (A) sec (1); Paragraph “(c) Definitions,” section c. pp. 468, 480-481. 8. “Subtitle C – Cyberspace – Related Matters” - “Sec. 1644. Assistance For Small Manufacturers in the Defense Industrial Supply Chain and Universities on Matters Relating to Cybersecurity.” Paragraph (A) sec (1); Paragraph (A) sec (4), pp. 490, 501-502. 9. Chasdi, Richard J. 2019. “A Typology of Public-Private Partnerships and its Implications for Counterterrorism and Cybersecurity.” In Online Terrorist Propoganda, Recruitment and Radicalization ed. John R. Vacca, Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press. 10. Chasdi, 2018, 124, 35.
Forecasting Future Terrorist Warfare Dr. Joshua Sinai
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A Chinese police officer wearing bomb suit takes part in an anti-terrorism drill at a training base for Special Police in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China October 30, 2018. Picture taken October 30, 2018. Zhejiang Daily via REUTERS
t is important to be able to forecast the categories of warfare that one’s terrorist adversary is likely to conduct. Such a forecasting capability is especially crucial when complete strategic, operational and tactical information about one’s terrorist adversaries is lacking because of the difficulty in covertly penetrating them with ‘human intelligence’ (HUMINT) or even with ‘electronic intelligence’ (ELINT). These are the information gaps that forecasting methodologies and technologies are intended to fill. At the same time, however, it is important to distinguish between the categories of terrorist warfare that can be forecasted at the strategic and operational levels, even when only incomplete information is available, such as whether an adversary is a centrally organized group, a loosely affiliated local network, or a lone actor;
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whether a terrorist adversary is likely to employ weapons that will result in conventional low impact (CLI), conventional high impact (CHI), or weapons of mass destruction (WMD) consequences; whether the general tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) will involve firearm shootings or martyrdom suicide
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explosive-type attacks; and whether the attacks will focus on strategic targets that are generally hardened or targets of opportunity that are considered “soft” because of the relative ease of attacking them. Forecasting likely terrorist warfare at the tactical level, however, is more difficult, such as the specific types of weapons and devices that would be selected, specific targets to be attacked, and the specific dates and timing of such attacks. This is also one of the distinctions between forecasting and prediction, with prediction involving asserting, at the tactical level, the likely occurrence of an event with certainty by focusing on the where, how and when of potentially imminent attacks, while forecasting is conducted at a more general level, although it still aims to uncover tactical level activities. The development and deployment of effective forecasting methodologies and technologies that can provide as complete as possible information about the terrorist adversary at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels are, therefore, the goals of effective counterterrorism. The development of such a forecasting capability is important because numerous high visibility terrorist attacks could have been preempted and thwarted if the law enforcement and intelligence agencies that had attempted to track these groups and operatives had possessed such a forecasting capability to thwart them during their formative pre-incident planning and preparation phases. Examples in the United States of such missed opportunities for preemptive intervention in the past where the “dots were not connected” prior to terrorist attacks include 9/11’s attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon; Major Nidal Hasan’s shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas in November 2009; the April 2013 Boston Marathon bombing; the husband’s and wife’s shooting rampage in San Bernardino, CA, in December 2015; and Omar Mateen’s shooting rampage at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Florida, in June 2016. In each of these incidents some or all of the perpetrators were known to counterterrorism authorities but their suspicious pre-incident indicators did not arouse sufficient actionable
“red flags” to prevent them from slipping under the radar to “go operational” in their attacks.
The development and deployment of effective forecasting methodologies and technologies that can provide as complete as possible information about the terrorist adversary at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels are, therefore, the goals of effective counterterrorism.
In such situations where attack-related information may be incomplete about a suspect’s potential violent activities, forecasting methodologies and technologies are especially crucial because they can identify and map the trajectory of intentions, agendas, and preparatory activities that terrorists, whether centrally organized groups, loosely affiliated local networks, and lone actors undertake to carry out their planned operations. Forecasting methodologies and technologies that are valuable in enabling counterterrorism practitioners to forecast likely terrorism by their adversaries include (although not limited to) the following: • Geo-spatial analysis: applies statistical analysis and other informational techniques to predict the geographic location and frequency of future terrorist attacks by accumulating such data on a group’s previous operations. One drawback of this methodology is that it may have a higher predictive value in regions where terrorist incidents are frequent, such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Nigeria, or Somalia, than in Western countries where such incidents are rare events. • Data mining surveillance: forecasts terrorism by “mining” large volumes of data in open source and classified databases. It attempts to uncover anomalies and potentially suspicious behaviors and transactions that might indicate a progression towards possible terrorist activity by individuals, whether operating as centrally organized groups, loosely-affiliated networks, or lone actors (or a mix of them), including other associates who might be part of such plots. • Project management tools: terrorist operations are approached as a project management model, consisting of estimated tasks that need to be completed (whether in sequence or in parallel with each other), precedent relations between tasks, and task schedules. These tasks are operationalized through PERT and Gantt charts, with Monte Carlo sampling and Bayesian probability
formulas applied to estimate the likely activities involved in planning an attack (e.g., intent, planning, preparation, attack, and the aftermath) and the schedule or timeframe of a potential terrorist operation and the intervention points required to thwart it. • Social network analysis (SNA) tools: these tools extract, correlate, and then visualizes sets of data that are mined from various databases about different types of relationships and transactions between individuals at various levels in an organization who might form terrorist networks, whether as networked clusters (region based), hubs (groupbased), or nodes (cell-based). Although they may not have attained such a capability at present, eventually SNA tools are expected to incorporate biographic, psychological, demographic, religioethnic, and other relevant social data in order to map more complete dynamic relationships and profiles of individuals who might comprise a terrorist network. • Analysis of competing hypotheses (ACH): an analytical methodology that is not yet fully developed as a software application. It attempts to generate the best available projection about a terrorist adversary’s potential warfare trajectory based on uncertain or incomplete data by using a matrix to identify at several alternative potential hypotheses (or scenarios) for each possible threat outcome, against each of which data is collected to validate or disprove them. • Red teaming: A group formed to forecast likely warfare by an adver-
While each of these methodologies and technologies are valuable on their own, a comprehensive forecasting capability can be attained by integrating them (as well as others) into a mega suite of tools – a sort of “TurboTax” for forecasting – in which each analytic methodology and technology will support and complement each other. This can be achieved by formulating a standardized set of forecasting indicators and then overlaying them onto these tools.
Members of the New York Police Department Counter Terrorism Squad are pictured outside the Time Warner Center in the Manhattan borough of New York City after a suspicious package was found inside the CNN Headquarters in New York, U.S., October 24, 2018. REUTERS/Kevin Coombs
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sarial terrorist group in which a team is designated as a terrorist adversary (Red Team), another team is designated as the counter-terrorist team (Blue Team), and a team that oversees the speculative exercise (Control Team). The objective is to improve a counter-terrorist organization’s effectiveness by testing how it would likely anticipate and respond to an adversary’s offensive actions. • Artificial intelligence: machine-learning algorithms, that, when combined with other software tools, such as social network analysis (SNA), can harvest vast amounts of data in multi-databases to quickly uncover and correlate potentially suspicious information such as an individual’s association with other terrorists (for example, by identifying such an individual’s contacts on the Internet with other accounts that might point to larger networks), suspicious financial transactions, foreign travel for training purposes, or purchases of weapons. While each of these methodologies and technologies are valuable on their own, a comprehensive forecasting capability can be attained by integrating them (as well as others) into a mega suite of tools – a sort of “TurboTax” for forecasting – in which each analytic methodology and technology will support and complement each other. This can be achieved by formulating a standardized set of forecasting indicators and then overlaying them onto these tools. For example, a four-phased forecasting model can be developed, based on the four phases of group formation, planning an operation, developing a warfare capability, and executing an operation, with each of these phases further broken down into their component early warning indicators. The first phase would include indicators such as types of groups, nature of their leadership, strategy and agenda, propaganda, funding, areas of operation, foreign group linkages, and activities on the Internet; indicators such as the nature of their recruitment and training would constitute the second phase; the third phase would include the indicators of acquisition of precursors and material, development/production, weaponization, and storage facilities; while the fourth phase would include indicators dealing with tactics, logistics, targeting, as well as triggers and internal and external hurdles that might constrain their operations during the pre-incident phases.
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A forecaster also needs to deal with an “independent thinking” terrorist adversary in anticipating its future warfare. A centrally organized terrorist group that is confident in its warfare capability might decide to carry out infrequent, yet lethally catastrophic attacks, while one that is weak may feel forced to carry out more frequent, but low-casualty attacks to demonstrate its continued relevance. It is also important for a forecaster not to “fight the last war” in anticipating future terrorist warfare. Thus, certain types of swarming attacks by terrorist operatives, such as the Pakistani-based Lashka e-Taiba’s November 2008 attacks against multiple targets in Mumbai, India, and al-Shabab’s September 2013 attacks against the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya, were considered at the time models for future types of attacks in the United States, yet such large-scale and simultaneous multi-attacker incidents have not yet occurred, although mass casualty attacks have been perpetrated by single attackers, such as the mass shooting attack in early October 2017 against the concertgoers at the Route 91 Harvest music festival on the Las Vegas Strip in Las Vegas, Nevada. In another example of the mistakenly “fighting the last war” in forecasting, the continued focus by some analysts on the supposed strategic effectiveness of suicide bombing campaigns, has overlooked the reality of terrorist groups, such as Hizballah and Hamas, transforming their warfare tactics to firing rockets against their more powerful Israeli adversary, which has caused a much greater lethal impact than their previously less effective suicide bombing campaigns. Similarly, in another category of terrorist warfare that needs to be forecasted, a centrally organized group that has difficulty deploying its operatives on overseas missions due to the hardening of borders and internal defenses by its adversaries, might decide to call on its radicalized adherents in those countries, whether loosely affiliated network cells or lone actors, to carry out attacks on their own, even if they may be less capable militarily and their weapons less sophisticated. This may be one of the reasons that al Qaida’s “Inspire” and the Islamic State’s “Dabiq” online magazines have called on their followers to conduct operations in their home countries, thereby leading to Boston Marathon, Pulse Nightclub, and other types of “franchisee”
loosely affiliated networked or lone actortype organized attacks.
In another example of the mistakenly “fighting the last war” in forecasting, the continued focus by some analysts on the supposed strategic effectiveness of suicide bombing campaigns, has overlooked the reality of terrorist groups, such as Hizballah and Hamas, transforming their warfare tactics to firing rockets against their more powerful Israeli adversary, which has caused a much greater lethal impact than their previously less effective suicide bombing campaigns.
Forecasters also need to address surprises in adversarial terrorist warfare. When certain terrorist groups decided to retaliate, for instance when their leaders are killed in a targeted assassination, they might select targets that are unpredictable to an unprepared state adversary. This was reportedly the case with Israel’s assassination of Hizballah’s Abbas al-Musawi, Hizballah’s Secretary-General in Lebanon in February 1992, which may have led to Hizballah’s retaliatory suicide bombing attack in mid-March 1992 on the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Although its underlying motivation is still unclear, the July 2012 bombing by a Hizballah operative of a passenger bus transporting Israeli tourists at the Burgas Airport in Burgas, Bulgaria was also likely unanticipated by Israeli security services who did not expect Hizballah to attack Israelis in a country such as Bulgaria. In conclusion, forecasting methodologies are useful to counterterrorism services as educational, analytical and operational tools. It is important to recognize that in the use of forecasting tools there is no “one size does not fit all” applicability, as, for example, geo-spatial findings from high frequency incident regions might not necessarily apply to regions characterized by rare events. Also, the past is not always the best predictor of future types of attacks because terrorists seek to exploit new adversarial vulnerabilities in their attacks. One should also continuously anticipate to encounter new demographic and psychological profiles in adversarial terrorist operatives, who might engage in new unanticipated modus operandi that by-pass traditional indications and warnings (I&W) pathways. An effective forecasting capability, therefore, requires synthesizing available strategic, operational, and tactical information about a terrorist adversary’s likely future warfare that is based on the employment of a suite of methodologies and technologies that generate a “basket of possible threats” against which counterterrorism services need to anticipate and prepare to counteract.
About the Author Dr. Joshua Sinai is a Washington, DC-based consultant in the field of counterterrorism and homeland security studies. He can be reached at: joshua.sinai@comcast.net.
False Redemption:
Sudanese president Omar al Bashir arrives in the southern capital of Juba. 4 January 2011, Al Jazeera English Wikipedia
How Sudan Continues to Avoid Responsibility for Terrorism By Edward Maggio
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udan in recent days has been a nation gripped by demonstrations and riots. President Omar al-Bashir in a desperate act to hold on to power as leader of the nation has declared a state of emergency for one year. In turn, he has now dissolved the Sudanese governmental structure at the federal and provincial levels.1 Giving into pressure from his own political party, he has stepped down as the leader of the National Congress Party.2 The question that now arises is whether the Sudanese people will oust their corrupt leader in the coming days or plunge as a nation further into chaos and violence.
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The United States maintains a complicated relationship with President Bashir and the Sudanese government. Sudan cannot easily escape its past as a nation that supported terrorism. October 6th, 2017 brought an end to U.S. sanctions against Sudan. This marked a new strategy by the U.S. State Department that rewarded Sudanese efforts towards progress in the areas of ending genocidal attacks on civilians in Darfur, halting its destabilization efforts in neighboring South Sudan and open cooperation with the United States on counter-terrorism matters.3 Despite the political applause for Sudan’s efforts, the Sudanese government has failed to acknowledge and compensate the victims of terrorism. The removal of Sudan from the state sponsors of terrorism list would be a failure on the United States government’s effort to obtain justice for those who have waited patiently for it to be delivered.
From Coup d’état to the Rise of Al Qaeda: In 1989, Colonel Omar al-Bashir led the military in overthrowing the democratically elected government of former Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi.4 Realizing the potential for him to be removed from power by a different ambitious military officer, Bashir dissolved the military junta that brought him to power and quickly appointed himself as a civilian president. The goal was to establish his legitimacy as a leader with a stable government focused on imposing Sharia law5. While historians have previously noted the rise of the Islamic revival movement in Iran, they often overlook that Sudan experienced their own revival movement in the 20th century. The National Islamic Front influenced the Sudanese government starting in 1979, and dominated it from 1989 to the late 1990s.6 Through this movement, President Bashir was able to gain additional political support from the National Islamic Front. As an Islamist political organization led by Dr. Hassan al-Turabi, the National Islamic Front was interested in spreading their own doctrinal version of Islam throughout the region. During the same period, Osama bin Laden created Al Qaeda in 1988.7 In need of a base of operations, he found himself banished from Saudi Arabia in 1992 and shifted his base of operations to Sudan.8 Turabi welcomed likeminded individuals to join his movement. He, in turn, ensured that the Sudanese government offered asylum and assistance to non-Sudanese jihadi, including Osama bin Laden and other future Al Qaeda members.9 Osama bin Laden returned the favor in terms of economic development and banking activity. A declassified U.S. Department of State report dated August 1996 and a French investigation
From 1992-1996, the Bashir regime hosted Osama bin Laden and other leaders of the world’s most infamous terrorist group in Khartoum.12 The Sudanese government assisted in establishing terrorist training camps and supporting Al Qaeda operatives.13Sudan was also accused of supporting local insurgencies in Uganda, Tunisia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Eritrea.14 The U.S. State Department first labeled Sudan a sponsor of terrorism on August 12, 1993.15 The consequences of being a terrorist state resulted in pressure on President Bashir’s regime on a global scale.
corroborated that Osama bin Laden invested $50 million of his inherited fortune into AlShamal Islamic Bank.10 This was to be a joint venture with the senior National Islamic Front members who hoped Osama bin Laden would aid them through his previous experience with construction and access to financial resources.11 With a bank at this fingertips and a supportive government on his side, Osama bin Laden was able to establish a new base for Al Qaeda recruits in Khartoum, Sudan.
Deals with Devils From 1992-1996, the Bashir regime hosted Osama bin Laden and other leaders of the world’s most infamous terrorist group in Khartoum.12 The Sudanese government assisted in establishing terrorist training camps and supporting Al Qaeda operatives.13Sudan was also accused of supporting local insurgencies in Uganda, Tunisia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Eritrea.14 The U.S. State Department first labeled Sudan a sponsor of terrorism on August 12, 1993.15 The consequences of being a terrorist state resulted in pressure on President Bashir’s regime on a global scale. President Bashir now was in a difficult, precarious situation. Turabi and Osama bin Laden were both political forces of their own who could usurp President Bashir from the presidency. With the interest of keeping power for himself, he was willing to sacrifice Turabi and Osama bin Laden on the altar of politics. President Bashir made political moves that would lead to Turabi being politically neutralized and ultimately imprisoned in 1999.16 Osama bin Laden would prove to be much more politically difficult to remove from Sudan. With Turabi’s decline from power, Osama bin Laden’s influence continued to rise. He continued to use his wealth at this time to expand Sudanese agriculture development, business activities and physical infrastructure such as roads. His charitable contributions and popularity also meant that President Bashir was aware of the potential reaction if it was perceived that he neutralized Osama bin Laden for his own political self-interest.17 The Sudanese government attempted to engage the United States in finding a solution to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. During this time, The U.S. State Department accused Sudan of being a “sponsor of international terrorism” and supporting Osama bin Laden’s operation of “terrorist training camps in the Sudanese desert.18 As journalist David Rose has noted, from 1996 until just weeks before the September 11th attacks, the Sudanese government made numerous efforts to share its information on Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda with the United States—all of which were rebuffed.19 Trust between the U.S. State Department and President Bashir’s
government was all but erased. As Rose has noted, the September 11th terrorist attacks might have been prevented if the U.S. had accepted Sudan’s offers to enter negotiations regarding neutralizing Osama bin Laden and the growing Al Qaeda threat. It was not until 2000 that the U.S. State Department authorized U.S. intelligence officials to visit Sudan.20 Osama bin Laden ultimately slipped out of Sudan in 1996 to reorganize his terrorist operations in Afghanistan. Sudanese governmental assistance and reliance on Osama bin Laden came at a high cost. The Sudanese government provided Osama bin Laden with the ability to conduct terrorist plans and operations. The activity of President Bashir’s government supporting Al Qaeda led to the 1998 United States embassy bombings in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Nairobi, Kenya that killed 224 people and injured more than 5,000 others.21 Many of those embassy bombing victims and their families are still waiting to be compensated by Sudan for the support given to Al Qaeda’s activities. Besides terrorism, most of the world is familiar with Sudan in relation to the Darfur Genocide. The “Darfur Genocide” refers to the mass slaughter of Darfuri men, women, and children in Western Sudan. The killings began in 2003, as the first genocide in the 21st century.22 Unrest and violence persist today. The genocide was carried out by a group of governmentarmed and funded Arab militias known as the Janjaweed (which loosely translates to ‘devils on horseback’). The Janjaweed systematically destroyed Darfurians by burning villages, loot-
ing economic resources, polluting water sources, and murdering, raping, and torturing civilians.23
In October 1997, the U.S. imposed comprehensive economic, trade, and financial sanctions against Sudan. The sanctions were implemented to stop any transactions using U.S. currency or products. In practice, this meant any business which operated in the United States was not able to trade with Sudan.
JEM rebels. 2007 KALOU KAKA.Wikipedia
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On March 4, 2009, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for President Bashir for crimes against humanity and in July 2010, a warrant for arrest on charges of genocide.24 The government of Sudan, however, has yet to turn him over and since the issuance of the warrants, the country has seen major protests and increased violence. The government has also forcefully expelled aid agencies from the country that has further jeopardized the conditions for thousands of displaced and marginalized civilians.25
Sanctions, Stolen Money and Gray Companies In October 1997, the U.S. imposed comprehensive economic, trade, and financial sanctions against Sudan. The sanctions were implemented to stop any transactions using U.S. currency or products. In practice, this meant any business which operated in the United States was not able to trade with Sudan. With his country experiencing an economic oil boom, President Bashir decided to treat his nation as his own piggy bank. Luis Moreno-Ocampo as chief prosecutor of the international criminal court suggested that President Bashir during this time period had siphoned and stashed as much as 9 billion from his own nation.26 Ocampo suggested that if President Bashir’s stash of money were disclosed, it would change Sudanese public opinion from him being a “crusader” to that of a thief.27 In addition to stealing from his own nation, President Bashir with his immediate family and the ruling elite that support him created and used “Gray Companies.” Gray Companies are entities that appear to be private business organizations but are in fact owned by the Sudanese government. The operational control of these entities are often given away as rewards by the Bashir regime to loyalists in the military, police, and intelligence service.28 By their structure, they avoided the appearance of being run by the Sudanese government itself. These entities operate with the purpose of thwarting sanctions put in place by the United States or to hide from any public scrutiny. This current arrangement and use of gray companies exists today in Sudan and is the primary reason for the wealth inequality that persists in the nation itself.29 With U.S. sanctions in place, President Bashir and those loyal to him were able to enjoy the Sudanese oil boom years from 2005-2010 while the remainder of his nation lived in poverty. With the south of the country seceding in 2011 followed by Sudan itself being plunged into a civil war, the economics of Sudan began crashing with severe consequences. Making matters worse, the inability of the Sudanese banking system to
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trade in U.S. dollars had created a black market so large that it had sucked liquidity out of the formal banking system.30
A Model of Cooperation? Removal of Sanctions Over the years, Sudan took efforts to halt support for terrorists within its borders. The Sudanese government has stated that it has worked diligently to disrupt foreign fighters from using Sudan as a logistics base and transit point to enter Iraq or elsewhere. Arguably, this was done to ensure President Bashir did not have any potential rival political threats more than just the appeasement intended for the U.S. government. The United States acknowledged Sudan’s new initiatives against terrorism and in May 2004, removed it from a list of countries that were “not fully cooperating” in U.S. anti-terrorism efforts.31 By 2007, the U.S. State Department reported that, with the exception of Hamas, the Sudanese government did not openly support the presence of terrorists in Sudan.32 In October 2017, The U.S. government eased sanctions against Sudan in a major step towards normalizing relations. Officials cited improvement on humanitarian access, on the mitigation of conflicts within Sudan and progress on counter-terrorism for the decision.33 A month later, the Trump administration announced it would consider removing Sudan from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.34
The Injustice of Removing Sudan from the List of State Sponsors of Terrorism Despite having judgments against Sudan and any Sudanese entities that supported terrorist activity, the victims of terrorism injured or killed have yet to receive their full compensation as awarded to them through the U.S. court system. As his position of power crumbles due to the economic instability of his nation, President Bashir’s desire to have Sudan removed from the state sponsors of terrorism list is important. The terror designation means that restrictions remain on foreign assistance and defense sales. Sanctions specifically related to the conflict in Darfur also remain in place.35 The Trump Administration is considering removing Sudan from the state sponsor of terrorism list in order for the U.S. to gain more diplomatic influence in Africa as China and Russia vie for influence of their own in the region.36
In October 2017, The U.S. government eased sanctions against Sudan in a major step towards normalizing relations. Officials cited improvement on humanitarian access, on the mitigation of conflicts within Sudan and progress on counter-terrorism for the decision.33 Trump administration announced it would consider removing Sudan from its list of state sponsors of
The State Department announced a plan in November 2018 to accomplish this endeavor. Under the terms of the deal, Sudan must make
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Essentially, President Bashir is playing a precarious balancing act. From his position, there is hope that the Trump administration will remove Sudan from the state sponsor of terrorism list without requiring Sudan to pay any court judgments or victim compensation. In turn, President Bashir needs Sudan’s status to change as a sponsor of terrorism so he can seek international monetary assistance to stabilize his nation’s economy. He needs to make this all to happen soon before the total economic collapse of his country as this could lead to his death, arrest for genocide or exile.
Conclusion
A month later, the
terrorism.34
progress in six areas if it wants to shed the terrorism sponsor designation: expand cooperation on counterterrorism, improve human rights protections including freedoms of religion and press, increase humanitarian access, cease fighting with rebels and work toward peace talks, showcase it has ceased supporting terrorism, and sever ties and cooperation with North Korea.37 What is notably absent in this plan is a requirement for Sudan to pay its judgments to the victims killed or injured by terrorism. Such a condition needs to be satisfied before the terrorism sponsor designation is removed against Sudan. By the end of March 2019, a delegation from the United States Congress is scheduled to visit Sudan to check on the freedoms and human rights situation in the country as well as the conditions in the war-affected areas in Darfur and South Kordofan.38
The argument that the Sudanese government has not sponsored terrorism in years and thus is entitled to a change in its status as a sponsor of terrorism fails to address the grievances of the past. President Bashir’s government has made every effort to hide their governmental involvement in business activities even after U.S. sanctions were lifted. As previously stated, this is a regime which has yet to pay judgments to the victims and their families for its role in facilitating and supporting terrorism. Whether President Bashir leaves office under pressure from his own people or continues activities to solidify his regime, the victims of terrorism still continue to demand that their voices be heard. To remove Sudan from the state sponsors of terrorism list in the near future would be an injustice. Such a removal would lead to immunity being granted to President Bashir and the Sudanese government. Ultimately, it would demonstrate a clear failure by the U.S. government to uphold its own court rulings against a corrupt genocidal tyrant.
About the Author: Edward Maggio is an attorney and researcher with The Miller Firm, LLC in Orange Virginia that specializes in Terrorism Mass Tort Litigation. He is a graduate of Virginia Tech, New York Law School and Oxford
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University. He also holds a professional certification in Homeland Security from New York University. 11. 12.
References 1.
BBC News. (2019). Sudan’s Omar al-Bashir declares a state of emergency. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-47330423 2. Al Jazeera. (2019). Sudan – President Bashir steps down as ruling party leader. Retrieved from https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/03/ sudan-president-bashir-steps-ruling-party-leader-190301132049390.html 3. Harris, Gardiner. (2017). Trump Administration Formally Lifts Sanctions on Sudan. The New York Times. October 6th, 2017. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/06/us/politics/ trump-sanctions-sudan.html 4. Reuters News. (2008). Factbox – Sudan’s President Omar Hassan Al Bashir. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/ uk-warcrimes-sudan-bashir-profile/factboxsudans-president-omar-hassan-al-bashiridUKL1435274220080714 5. Id. 6. Id. 7. United States v. Usama bin Laden et al., S (7) 98 Cr. 1023, Testimony of Jamal Ahmed Mohamed al-Fadl (SDNY February 6, 2001). 8. Fisk, Robert. The Great War For Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East(New York: Harper Collins, 2005) 22. 9. Packer, George. (2008). The Moderate Martyr. Retrieved from https://www.newyorker. com/magazine/2006/09/11/the-moderate-martyr 10. Willman, John. (2001) Trail of terrorist dollars that spans the world. Retrieved from https://
13. 14. 15. 16.
17.
18. 19. 20. 21.
22. 23. 24.
25.
web.archive.org/web/20070311010859/http:// specials.ft.com/attackonterrorism/FT3RNR3XMUC.html Id. Operation Broken Silence (2019). Why Sudan? Retrieved from https://www.operationbrokensilence.org/why-sudan/ Id. Council on Foreign Relations. (2008). State Sponsors: Sudan. Retrieved from https://www.cfr. org/backgrounder/state-sponsors-sudan Id. Deeb, Sarah. (2008). Sudan opposition head: rebel assault may spur more violence. Retrieved from: https://www.foxnews.com/ printer_friendly_wires/2008May17/0,4675,Suda nOpposition,00.html Gallab, Abdullahi A. (2008). The first Islamist Republic: development and disintegration of Islamism in Sudan.(Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate Publishing, 2008). 127. “ Rose, David. (2002). The Osama files. Retrieved from https://www.vanityfair.com/ news/2002/01/osama200201 Supra note xv. Id Lough, Richard (2008). Pursuing AlQaeda in Horn of Africa. Retrieved from https://www.aljazeera.com/focus/2008/08/200881983642167910.html World Without Genocide. (2019). Darfur Genocide. Retrieved from http://worldwithoutgenocide.org/genocides-and-conflicts/darfur-genocide Id. Marlise Simons., Macfarquhar, Neil. (2009). Court issues arrest warrant for Sudan’s leader. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes. com/2009/03/05/world/africa/05court.html Supra note xxi.
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26. Wikileaks. (2009). ICC’s Ocampo on Sudan. Retrieved from wikileaks.org/plusd/ cables/09USUNNEWYORK306_a.html 27. Id. 28. Wikileaks. (2008). Parastatals: The regime’s gray companies will keep it alive. Retrieved from https://wikileaks.org/plusd/ cables/08KHARTOUM374_a.html 29. Id. 30. Malik, Nesrine. (2018). Sanctions Against Sudan Didn’t Harm an Oppressive Government — They Helped It. Retrieved from https:// foreignpolicy.com/2018/07/03/sanctions-againstsudan-didnt-harm-an-oppressive-governmentthey-helped-it/ 31. Supra note xiii 32. Id. 33. Burke, Jason. (2017). U.S. eases economic sanctions on Sudan. Retrieved from https://www. theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/06/us-easessanctions-against-sudan-citing-improvementson-human-rights 34. Moore, Jina. (2017). U.S. open to removing Sudan from terrorism list, diplomat says. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/16/world/ africa/sudan-terrorism-sanctions.html 35. Id. 36. Id. 37. Grammer, Robbie. (2018). Trump administration gives Sudan a way to come in from the cold. Retrieved from https://foreignpolicy. com/2018/11/08/trump-administration-gives-sudan-a-way-to-come-in-from-the-cold-sanctionsrelief-trump-africa-state-sponsor-terrorismhuman-rights-terrorism/ 38. Sudan Tribune. (2019). U.S. Congressional delegation to visit Khartoum this month. Retrieved from http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article67195
Law Enforcement’s Uses of Drones In Crime Fighting And As Deterrent Against Terrorism
C
US Air Force drone is being hand launched. The use of drones, while in its infancy now, has a strong potential to be a game changer for the good guys, law enforcement, firefighters, and our military. Photo by Staff Sgt. Kleinholz.
By Jim Weiss and Mickey Davis
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lose to 1000 drones are already employed by a number of state police, county sheriff’s offices, and police departments in the United States. Their uses are varied. For example, a state highway patrol may use drones to take photos of vehicle and train accidents. Other law enforcement agencies may use their drones in tactical response situations and other incidents during high-risk callouts involving SWAT, as well as in searches for missing persons and fleeing suspects.
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A sheriff’s office in Florida used a drone to monitor the actions of a subject in a car with a gun. In the San Francisco Bay Area, law enforcement used a drone to help track and apprehend a carjacking/attempted kidnapping suspect. In Ohio, the Knox County Sheriff’s Office used a drone during a standoff at an apartment building where the suspect was barricaded inside. The SWAT team broke out the residence’s windows and used the drone to look through upstairs windows to get a better idea of where the suspect was located. Law enforcement’s UASs (unmanned aircraft systems) are primarily mission- and incident-driven. Images collected using this technology are handled and retained within industry standards, consistent with images collected by any camera used by law enforcement. However in some situations like a search for evidence, a search warrant might be needed or advisable. Have drones also been used by bad guys? Yes. They’ve been used to fly near manned aircraft such as passenger planes, to fly over prohibited airspace, and to deliver drugs within correctional institutions. Drone employment by terrorists is a potentially deadly threat – including recon, explosives, etc. Recently, a drone shut down London’s Gatwick Airport for a couple of days causing travel inconveniences for thousands and the cancellation of a few hundred flights. Terrorism was a suspected possible cause, but this was discounted. The following month a drone flew in the restricted airport airspace in Newark, New Jersey. In the USA the most common violations in the uses of drones are flying in prohibited air space. In recent years, one was flown above the Bryant Denny Football Stadium prior to a University of Alabama football game. Another was flown onto the New York capitol building, while another landed on the roof of the AT&T stadium where the Cowboys play. At other times, a drone was flown within 50 feet of an NYPD helicopter, one was flown near the White House that required Secret Service counter-activity, and incidents have been documented in other countries such as one that was reportedly flown into a bank.
There have also been concerns over drones interfering with firefighters – especially with their helicopters and air tankers while fighting forest fires.
Is there public opposition to drones being used by American law enforcement? You bet. People feel they will be used to spy on American citizens; however, there was similar opposition when police switched from revolvers to carrying pistols, when Armored Rescue Vehicles came into use, when SWAT was formed, and when TASERS® began to be used.
Ultimately, the main use of UASs by the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office and elsewhere is to reduce the risk to officers and keep them out of harm’s way. Photo courtesy of Ricardo Requejo Jr.
Is there public opposition to drones being used by American law enforcement? You bet. People feel they will be used to spy on American citizens; however, there was similar opposition when police switched from revolvers to carrying pistols, when Armored Rescue Vehicles came into use, when SWAT was formed, and when TASERS® began to be used.
Pinellas County (FL) Sheriff’s Office Pinellas County, with an estimated population of 970,532, has 846 sworn law enforcement deputies and 687 in detention and corrections. The agency currently has one drone, or what they refer to as a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle). This small drone is assigned to SWAT. It is a DJI™ Mavic Pro intended for use inside buildings. They have tested it outside, but the camera has no zoom or thermal imaging, limiting its use; however the agency is in the process of purchasing a larger, more multifunctional UAV. The Sheriff’s Office drone and all UAVs can be used to gather intelligence, look for suspects, or conduct search-and-rescue missions. Camera images are vital to those missions. A search warrant would be required if the drone is used to gather evidence. There are currently six UAV pilots in the Sheriff’s Office who have their FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) Part 107 UAV license. They log flight hours and work closely with the agency’s Chief Pilot, who is a UAV instructor as well as being helicopter and fixed-wing certified. The agency is looking into more training for the drone pilots to become more proficient. Legalities: Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office’s current UAV is registered with the FAA. Since it has only had its drone for a few months, it is working ascertain the needs of the agency to get a Certificate of Waiver or
Authorization (COA). A COA is an authorization issued by the Air Traffic Organization-the operational arm of the FAA--to a public operator for a specific unmanned aircraft activity. The Air Traffic Organization is responsible for providing safe and efficient air navigation services to 29.4 million square miles of airspace; it generally reviews a request and responds within 60 days.
originally intended to be used for the reconstruction of
Most COAs are for specific uses such as a special event, but public safety will apply for a blanket COA allowing operation in a certain airspace and other special circumstances. The Sheriff’s Office currently has no COAs for night operation, flying beyond visual line of sight, flying over people, flying in controlled airspace, or operation higher than 400 feet. A violation of this can result in fines by the FAA.
major crash scenes
The agency does have Standard Operating Procedures for their UAV which lay out the responsibilities of the flight crew, agency authorization, and usage.
as well as for tactical
Costs: In comparing the sheriff’s drone to their helicopter’s cost, the Sheriff’s Office says it is difficult to provide an exact estimate since the agency does all maintenance on the helicopter in house. The sheriff’s flight section figures that it costs several hundred dollars per hour to operate the helicopter since cost factors include the pilot and pay grade
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The drones were
involving criminal charges, but have evolved to be employed in all major criminal crime scenes support. To do this, the agency uses its drones with Pix4D photogrammetry mapping software to produce 2D and 3D renderings of crime
The initial cost of the UAV includes batteries, lights, prop cages for indoor flights, and getting all six pilots their FAA licenses. This was approximately $3,500. Other expenses can include the time the drone is in flight and any overtime additions to the drone pilot’s salary, and additional equipment or maintenances needed for the UAVs.
scenes. They can
However, the helicopter and UAV really cannot not be compared as neither one could replace the other.
sub-centimeter
then create video animations, as well as measure distances and surfaces with accuracy.
The Commercial drones are DJI Matrice 200s which feature single camera gimbal or pivoted support that allows for rotation. The drones have an operational range of 4.3 miles, maximum payload of 4.4 lbs., ActiveTrack (the ability to track a moving target), and obstacle avoidance. The two compact drones are the DJI Mavic Pro, with cameras that feature 12 MP stills, 4K video at 30 fps (frames per second), an operation range of 4.3 miles, and obstacle avoidance. Uses: The drones were originally intended to be used for the reconstruction of major crash scenes involving criminal charges, but have evolved to be employed in all major criminal crime scenes as well as for tactical support. To do this, the agency uses its drones with Pix4D photogrammetry mapping software to produce 2D and 3D renderings of crime scenes. They can then create video animations, as well as measure distances and surfaces with sub-centimeter accuracy. This produces precise, irrefutable evidence so that investigators, forensic experts, and jury members can revisit the scene at any time and from any location. In tactical support situations, the drones are used where SWAT and/or the negotiators have responded; typically these are stand-off events involving barricaded suspects. The drones are able to provide overhead perspectives of dynamic situations and over-watch for the sheriff’s SWAT operators in the absence of air support helicopters. Another use by SWAT is for building or room clearance during interior operations. Many systems are small enough now that they can be flown indoors and through windows, hallways, and doorways. This provides the SWAT operators with an accurate layout of the building as well as identification of suspects. A UAS can also be utilized as a distraction device, causing the suspect to focus on the drone while the team makes entry from a separate location, overwhelming the suspect before he realizes what is happening.
Bexar County, Texas, Sheriff’s Office
Ultimately, the main use of UASs in these situations is to reduce the risk to officers and keep them out of harm’s way.
Bexar County Sheriff’s Office’s drone fleet is currently made up of two commercial UAS (Unmanned Aerial Systems or drones) and two compact UAS.
The Bexar County Sheriff’s Office adheres to Texas Government Code, Chapter 423: Use of Unmanned Aircraft in situations
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where a search warrant may be required. Training: The sheriff’s UAS drone operators are considered by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to be a commercial entity; operators must obtain an FAA Part 107 Remote Pilot Certification. To earn this, the drone operator must pass an aeronautical knowledge test at an FAA-approved testing center and undergo a Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) security screening. To prepare for the test, drone pilots attend the 100-hour Drone Pilot Inc. (DPI) Eyes Overhead Small Unmanned Aerial Flight Team Training course. This course is a seven-part, proficiency-based, unmanned aerial operations training program for first responder/professional operators. It focuses on safety first, using public safety muscle-memory training techniques to build a professional flight team that can respond to the unique missions of first responders and professional Unmanned Aircraft (UA). This is a demanding class which requires self-paced flight practice several times a week totaling 20 hours between phases. The skill learned in Phase 1 is a building block to Phase 2 and Phase 3. Legalities: The FAA has set regulations on weight and distances a UAS can be flown, and the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office operates in accordance with the FAA regulations. According to the FAA, federal, state, and local government offices can fly UAVs to support specific missions under either the FAA’s Part 107 rule or by obtaining a Certificate of Authorization (COA). These are issued for a specific period of time--usually two years--and include special provisions unique to each proposal, such as a defined block of airspace and time of day the UAS can be used. If an agency wishes to certify, they can submit for a COA, but it is not required. The Bexar County Sheriff’s Office chose to obtain both Remote Pilot licenses for the pilots in accor-
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dance with FAA Part 107 and a COA. Costs: The cost of utilizing the UAS (drones) is approximately $70-$100 an hour with consideration of the UAS pilot’s pay whether on duty or overtime. On the other hand, it costs approximately $900-$1000 an hour for a helicopter, depending on the size of the aircraft.
In tactical support situations, the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office drones are used where SWAT and/or the negotiators have responded; typically these are stand-off events involving barricaded suspects. The drones are able to provide overhead perspectives of dynamic situations and over-watch for the sheriff’s SWAT operators in the absence of air support helicopters. Photo courtesy of Ricardo Requejo Jr.
The initial cost of a commercial drone such as a DJI Matrice 200 series, depending on the model, is approximately $11,000-$14,000 per package. The operational expenses for a DJI Matric 200 series is about $2,900 every other year for a four-battery set and two propeller set replacements. The initial cost of a compact drone such as a DJI Mavic Pro series is approximately $2,000 per package. The operational expenses for this type of drone are about $400 every other year for four batteries and two propeller set replacements. The Bexar County Sheriff’s Office currently has Standard Operating Procedures in place, and Policies and Procedures are actively being completed.
DronesKnox18: In Ohio, the Knox County Sheriff’s Office used a drone during a standoff at an apartment building where the suspect was barricaded inside. The SWAT team broke out the residence’s windows and used the drone to look through upstairs windows to get a better idea of where the suspect was located.
Bexar County Sheriff’s Office’s drone fleet is currently made up of two commercial UAS (Unmanned Aerial Systems or drones) and two compact UAS. The commercial drones are DJI Matrice 200s which feature single camera gimbal or pivoted support that allows for rotation. Photo courtesy of Ricardo Requejo Jr.
Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security International
Aurora, Colorado, Police Department There are 725 sworn police officers on the Aurora Police Department; it has a population 370,000, and covers an area of 154 square miles The Aurora Police Department currently has two drones, a new DJI Mavic Pro Platinum and a DJI Mavic Pro. They have used the Mavic Pro to search for a missing child, to photograph homicide cases, and to search building rooftops for evidence related to a homicide. Training and Legalities: The agency’s operators have FAA Part 107 licenses. According to the National Institute of Justice, flight approval is required to operate a drone; law enforcement agencies are granted flight approval by the Federal Aviation
Administration. The official document Vol. 24, No.4
is referred to as a Certificate of Authorization/ Waiver (COA). This approval process allows public agencies and divisions of government to operate UAS in the national airspace; there are no current regulations in place for UAS operations. In addition, it is recommended that these public agencies establish Policy and Procedures or other guidance documents to operate a UAS. The Part 107 license and agreements with air traffic control in the Aurora area allow the police department to fly after notifying the appropriate control tower. The agency’s policy and procedures are covered within a police departmental special order which is written to provide members of the agency guidance in deploying and using their UAS (drone) in operational and emergency situations in a manner consistent with the regulations and governance set forth by the FAA. Definitions include reference to a UAS as an aircraft without a human pilot but being controlled by an operator on the ground using a transmitter. A UAS observer, in brief, is a person who assists the UAS operator in the duties associated with collision avoidance; departmental approval to do so is set forth in the general order. Under this same general order, a UAS operator is the individual exercising control over the drone during flight. Under policy, an operator may respond to specific incidents to capture images and/or video that may assist investigators. These incidents are limited to search and rescue, crime scene evidence documentation, hazmat scenes, and tactical situations involving a hostage, barricaded suspect, or an active shooter. The policy spells out in detail how a request for such missions must be obtained. Additional details are within UAS policy such as what to do in the case of lost link or loss of communication with the UAS, etc.
Camera images are the primary use of the police department’s UAS. It cannot take thermal images, but it can record HD video. The range of the camera isn’t an issue as the drone may only fly line of sight.
According to Newsweek’s Tim O’Connor, FBI Director Christopher Wray has warned members of the Senate that drones will be used by ISIS and criminal gangs including MS-13 to attack the USA. And, yes, the FBI does make use of drones for surveillance in the US, but this use is minimal.
The Threat of Drones in use by Bad Guys and Counter Measures According to Newsweek’s Tim O’Connor, FBI Director Christopher Wray has warned members of the Senate that drones will be used by ISIS and criminal gangs including MS-13 to attack the USA. And, yes, the FBI does make use of drones for surveillance in the US, but this use is minimal. Are there counter measures that can be used against drones? Yes, these include such things as RF (radio frequency) jamming, disrupting the drone’s GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System) or satellite link which acts as its GPS, taking control or hijacking a drone, using laser energy to crash the drone, and using nets and projectiles. However, there can always be a danger when a targeted drone falls or crashes into the ground. There are federal laws giving certain government agencies empowerment to take on outlaw or misused drones. As for local law enforcement, it can get confusing because of issues such as like false arrest under state law. Also, under federal law 18 USC 32, it’s a felony to damage aircraft (manned or unmanned). The use of drones, while in its infancy now, has a strong potential to be a game changer for the good guys, law enforcement, firefighters, and our military as well as for bad guys, and various brands of terrorists.
About the Authors
This US Army drone is being hand launched. The use of drones, while in its infancy now, has a strong potential to be a game changer for the good guys, law enforcement, firefighters, and our military.
Lieut. Jim Weiss (Retired) is a former Army light infantryman, school-trained Army combat engineer, a former school-trained (regular Army) Army military policeman, former State of Florida Investigator, and a retired police lieutenant from the Brook Park (OH) Police Department. He has written and co-written hundreds of articles for law enforcement and safety forces magazines, most notably Law and Order. Tactical World, Knives Illustrated, Tactical Response, Police Fleet Manager, Florida Trooper, and Counter Terrorism. Mickey (Michele) Davis is an award-winning, California-based writer and author. Her young adult novel, Evangeline Brown and the Cadillac Motel, won the Swiss Prix Chronos for the German translation. Mickey is the wife of a Vietnam War veteran officer and a senior volunteer with her local fire department.
A Look Back at the Terrorists Known as
JIHAD JANE
FBI Mugshot jihad-jane
and
THEBLACKFLAG By Paul Davis
W 32
hy did I do what I was convicted of?” Colleen R. LaRose, aka, “Jihad Jane,” wrote to a criminologist in response to a letter to the convicted terrorist in federal prison. “There are many reasons, but the simplest reason is that I did it for love. Love for my Prophet, love for my Ummah (community) and love for the brother that gave me the assignment.”
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The criminologist, Kimberly MehlmanOrozco, shared the letter with NBC News. “Also, I think I did it for pride. Sisters are never given assignments like the one I was given,” LaRose continued. “I felt my brother had enough confidence and trust in me that he honored me by giving me the assignment. I felt if he loved me that much then I had to do what he needed to be done.” LaRose failed in her assignment, which was to murder Lars Vilks, a Swedish cartoonist. In 2007 Vilks drew the Prophet Muhammad’s head on a dog in a cartoon. The cartoon enraged Muslims worldwide and terrorists placed a bounty on Vilks head in response. LaRose was sentenced to 10 years in prison on January 6, 2014. She was convicted of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists, conspiracy to kill in a foreign country, making false statements, and attempted identity theft. LaRose, a former resident of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, outside of Philadelphia, pleaded guilty to the charges on February 1, 2011. The sentencing was announced to the public by John Carlin, then-Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security, Zane David Memeger, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and Ed Hanko, then-Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Philadelphia Division. “Today, Colleen LaRose is being held accountable for her efforts to provide support to terrorists and encourage violence against individuals overseas,” Carlin said. “This case clearly underscores the evolving nature of the terrorist threat we now face
LaRose and her unindicted coconspirators used the Internet to establish relationships and to coordinate their plans, which included martyring themselves, soliciting funds for terrorists, soliciting passports, and avoiding travel restrictions through the collection of passports and through marriage in order to wage violent jihad. LaRose was charged with stealing another individual’s U.S. passport in an effort to facilitate an act of international terrorism.
John Demers Justice Department Official Photo
US Attorney Eastern PA William M McSwain
in this country,” Memeger added. “The Internet has made it easier for those who want to attack the American way of life to identify like-minded individuals to carry out their terroristic plans. While today’s significant sentence will help protect the community from any future threat posed by the defendant, we as a nation must remain vigilant in identifying and stopping others who are susceptible to engaging in acts of homegrown violent extremism.” Hanko noted that the sentence sent a strong message to those attracted to a terrorist ideology. He said the Joint Terrorism Task Forces and partners in the law enforcement and intelligence communities remained committed to tracking terrorists at every level, whomever and wherever they may be. According to the Justice Department, LaRose, an American citizen born in 1963, and five unindicted co-conspirators located in South Asia, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, as well as the United States, recruited men via the Internet to wage violent jihad in South Asia and Europe. They also recruited women via the Internet who had passports and the ability to travel to and around Europe in support of violent jihad. LaRose and her unindicted co-conspirators used the Internet to establish relationships and to coordinate their plans, which included martyring themselves, soliciting funds for terrorists, soliciting passports, and avoiding travel restrictions through the collection of passports and through marriage in order to wage violent jihad. LaRose was charged with stealing another individual’s U.S. passport in an effort to facilitate an act of international terrorism.
According to the Justice Department, LaRose agreed to carry out her murder assignment, and that she and her co-conspirators discussed that her appearance and American citizenship would help her blend in while carrying out her plans. In 2009 LaRose traveled to Europe and tracked the intended target online. Although she failed to murder Vilks, LaRose said she came close to killing him and achieving martyrdom. She was arrested by the FBI when she returned to the United States. On October 30, 2018 John C. Demers, the Assistant Attorney General for National Security, and U.S. Attorney William McSwain, announced that Ali Charaf Damache, an Algerian, was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment for conspiring to provide material support and resources to terrorists. Charaf Damache, then 53, also known as “Theblackflag,” was indicted in 2011 in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on one count of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists and one count of attempted identity theft to facilitate an act of international terrorism. He was arrested in Spain in 2017 and extradited to the US. He pleaded guilty in July 2018. According to the Justice Department, Damache, his co-defendant Mohammad Hassan Khalid, and others conspired to support, recruit, and coordinate a terrorist cell, con-
Charaf Damache, then 53, also known as “Theblackflag,” was indicted in 2011 in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on one count of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists and one count of attempted identity theft to facilitate an act of international terrorism. He was arrested in Spain in 2017 and extradited to the US. He pleaded guilty in July 2018.
sisting of men and women from Europe and the United States, to wage violent jihad in and around Europe. Jamie Paulin Ramirez, a resident of Colorado, and Colleen R. LaRose, aka “Jihad Jane,” are among Damache’s co-conspirators. The Justice Department contends that Damache was the force behind the terrorist cell that he formed. He enticed LaRose and Ramirez to travel to Ireland to live and train with him, and he convinced Khalid, LaRose and others to recruit men online to wage violent jihad in South Asia and Europe. He coordinated explosives training for his coconspirators. He also trained Ramirez’s son in the ways of violent jihad, on one occasion taking him to a public park for physical training that scared him. “At a time when radical terrorist groups use the Internet to recruit new members and coordinate attacks against innocent people, the National Security Division remains committed to investigating all possible threats to our country aggressively — including those that take place online,” Demers said. “Through close cooperation with our international law enforcement partners and the dedicated work of our agents and prosecutors, we have brought Damache to justice. The sentence in this case and order of removal have made the United States safer, and I applaud the women and men throughout the law enforcement community who made it happen.” “Today’s sentencing marks the end of a long and arduous prosecution that has spanned more than nine years, involved four defendants and five unnamed co-conspirators, and required multiple coordinated international arrests and two extradition applications,” McSwain said.“Damache and his co-conspirators were motivated by hate and prejudice, and their criminal activities presented a very real danger to our country and the world. This case is a prime example of the remarkable results we can accomplish when law enforcement – both foreign and domestic – work together to stop our enemies who intend to wage war on our way of life. As this case shows, our resolve to dismantle extremists groups is stronger than ever.”
About the Author Paul Davis, a writer based in Philadelphia, is a regular contributor to the Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security Int’l.
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O By Anthony Ricci
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nce upon a time, trust was built on people’s actions, their beliefs, how they responded to incidents/ situations and of course it waxed and waned over time. In today’s fast paced world, trust is lost and there is no time for it, however loyalty is demanded. Today’s loyalty is based on a shallow belief and a false trust in things rather than action or proven results. Once upon a time mom and dad taught us never to get into a stranger’s car. Today we call an absolute stranger on an app and pay them to go for a ride in their car!
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We do this with expectations that this driver is working in some way, shape, or form, for a company that is safe and secure. For example, search on Google for ridesharing accidents and all kinds of issues will show up. Issues such as drivers posing as state child welfare social workers picking kids up from school, to a story in Warwick, RI where a couple got into the back seat of the car buckled their seat belts and the driver stated: “I love that sound” while slamming on the gas pedal and giving them a hell ride that ended in a crash. Not picking on ridesharing, just using it as an example of old school trust turning to a new school loyalty approach backed by shallow proof. How many mid to upper level managers are using rideshare sources because they came up in the new world and feel they don’t need a proven trustworthy driver? Trustworthy defined by yourdictionary.com is an honest person who can be entrusted with your secrets or with anything else of importance. An example of trustworthy is the person who babysits your kids or who you tell your secrets to. What does this say about society and what does it say about the position of Security Driver? For many years this was a trusted position highly sought after and held prestigiously by many. As the Security Driver, you had daily contact with the CEO, and sometimes their family. Some drivers were asked to do personal chores and errands for the family during the day and even drop the children off to school. They where trusted with family secrets and held close enough to the CEO that delicate conversation could be had in the back seat of a car and the trusted driver heard nothing.
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For example, search on Google for ridesharing accidents and all kinds of issues will show up. Issues such as drivers posing social workers picking
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kids up from school, to a story in Warwick, RI where a couple got into the back seat of
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the car buckled their seat belts and the driver stated: “I love that sound” while
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slamming on the gas pedal and giving them a hell ride that ended
How can a Security Driver become a trusted member of the team?
proof.
Respect your CEO’s time. Don’t look at being punctual as a good trait, which while it may be, it is better to see lost time as not your own, but your CEO’s
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as state child welfare
While many companies still employ Security Drivers, others out source and even use rideshare from time to time. To me this is scary, and the Security Driver Team member is invaluable, as a trustworthy part of the CEO’s life. According to the New Edelman “Trust Barometer” (a survey of 33,00 people in 28 countries), one in three people don’t trust their employer. They also discovered that trust decreases from top positions to the lowest. For instance, 64 percent of executives trust their organizations. Employees remark that they trust their peers more than the CEO and upper-level executives of their company.
•
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in a crash. Not picking on ridesharing, just using it as an example of old school trust turning to a new school loyalty approach backed by shallow
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time and they run very timely productive lives. For the CEO, 15 minutes late may have large consequences. Humility is imperative. While we always try not to make a mistake on the job, they do happen we are only human. Always admit them and apologize, show that you can be vulnerable. Learn from them, in order to prevent a similar mistake in the future. Be reliable. Outperform and exceed expectations. This is not brownnosing. It is being there for the boss. And being ready with solutions before problems turn into catastrophes. Be honest. This builds trust fast. Always tell the truth and never make up stories whether the intent is to make you look better or otherwise. Show competence, not fake knowledge. Don’t talk the talk, walk the walk. Show your boss you will be there for him or her when they need you most. Be courteous. Try never to bad mouth another person or employee in his or her presence. Make a connection with the CEO. Do so only when it is your turn to talk and if he asked you an opinion. This is your time to find some common interests maybe a favorite team or something you can talk to them about without prying. Be open and approachable. There must be some open communication for the driver/CEO bond to be formed. If the CEO never talks to the driver there will never be a trust bond, and if they talk too much the driver couldn’t do their job. There must be communication, and some degree of team work. Always be a good listener. Remember details and show your boss you remember what he likes and doesn’t like. Remember the little things that make his life easier become a trusted and needed agent.
It may be good for a driver to show loyalty, however, that is half of the puzzle, and it is a one-way street. The other half of the puzzle is to be a trusted employee and gain your bosses loyalty. In order for this to happen the trust bridge must be crossed and a bond must be made. Only then will a Security Driver show his or her true worth.
About the Author Anthony Ricci is President of ADSI (http:// www.1adsi.com)
An IACSP Q&A
Jack Carr
with Jack Carr
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ack Carr is the pen name of a retired U.S. Navy SEAL and sniper who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He is also the author of the thriller “The Terminal List.”
Jack Carr was interviewed by Paul Davis.
IACSP: I read your novel and I enjoyed
it. To begin, why did you write the book? Carr: This is what I’ve wanted to do since I was a little kid. My mom was a librarian, so I grew up reading books that had protagonists with backgrounds similar to what I wanted to have one day. I wanted to be a SEAL ever since I was seven years old. My grandfather was killed in World War II. He was a Corsair pilot. He flew that plane with the gold wings that folded up. He was killed off Okinawa in 1945 when Kamikazes hit the Bunker Hill and almost sunk it and took it out of the war.
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IACSP: Sorry to hear that.
Carr: I grew up with the idea of him as my
hero. I have his medals, his silk aviation maps and all of those sorts of things, so I knew I wanted to go into the military, but I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do until I found out what frogmen were. During that time, I was reading about all the people who were writing thrillers, such as Nelson DeMille, David Morell, Tom Clancy, and all those guys in the 1980s who picked up
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the torch from guys like Ken Follett, Robert Ludlum, Ian Fleming and guys like that. I grew up reading these books and knew that one day after the military I’d give it a shot and try writing one. “The Terminal List” would be my first foray in the world of publishing. IACSP: Pretty good thriller for your first time out. Before we go into the novel, would you describe your career as a Navy SEAL? Carr: Sure. I enlisted because I knew I wanted to be a sniper and typically officers aren’t snipers and I wanted to start in the “mailroom” and work my way up. Once again, here was the influence of popular culture. In the 80s all of those Vietnam movies I saw always had that brand-new lieutenant who had no idea what he was doing and always led his men into an ambush. I did not what to be that guy, so I wanted to be enlisted first and then later become an officer. I did two platoons as an enlisted SEAL and then went to OCS and then right back to the SEAL team as an officer. I ended up doing seven deployments and had a good solid run there from a brand-new guy all the way up to a detachment commander in Southern Iraq for the draw down and eventual withdrawal. IACSP: What were your years of service? Carr: From 1996 to 2016, so, twenty years. IACSP: You said you served in Iraq, did you also make it to Afghanistan? Carr: I did. IACSP: It is amazing to me that military people have made so many deployments. In my day, during the Vietnam War, guys were doing one, maybe two deployments. Carr: I did seven. Ours were shorter. In Vietnam, it was a year, I think. Our tours were typically six or seven months. IACSP: Why did you use the name “Jack Carr,” rather than your real name? Carr: I met Lee Child and he told me that he loved my title, but I needed a pen name. He said why he chose his. Back in late 90s, research showed that of all the best-selling
I enlisted because I knew I wanted to be a sniper and typically officers aren’t snipers and I wanted to start in the “mailroom” and work my way up. Once again, here was the influence of popular culture. In the 80s all of those Vietnam movies I saw always had that brand-new lieutenant who had no idea what he was doing and always led his men into an ambush. I did not what to be that guy, so I wanted to be enlisted first and then later become an officer.
novelists had last names that began with C. There was Tom Clancy, Michael Crichton and all these best -selling authors. He chose Lee Child and suggested I do the same. I was good at taking orders. IACSP: But why a pen name at all. It was not for security, was it? Carr: It was in my mind, as I thought it would be a barrier to anyone who tried to track us down, and then I met Lee Child and he suggested I do it, so I took his advice. IACSP: Well, I suppose John le Carre is a better thriller writer name than his true name, David Cornwell. Carr: It worked for him.
IACSP: I took note that in your novel, your Jack Carr
Navy SEAL character, James Reese, goes up against a gang of corrupt senior military people, civilian officials and business people, rather than the traditional bad guys that you and others fought in Iraq, Afghanistan and other places. Why did you go with these bad guys? Carr: I wrote down about five or six different one-page synopsizes of possible book ideas. Revenge has always spoken to me, and it is also about revenge against a system that sends young men to their deaths. On another level, it is about that. IACSP: One of the things I liked in your book was when Reese goes undercover, he uses the names of historical UDT/SEAL guys like Roy Boehm and Draper Kauffman. Carr: Good catch. I drop those little things in my second novel as well. IACSP: Draper Kauffman was my late father’s boss in UDT 5 in WWII. Have you received any positive or negative feedback from the SEAL community? Carr: I feel very fortunate, and relieved, that everybody I’ve been in contact with has been very supportive of the novel. Of course, it is fiction, and a lot of the controversy is over nonfiction. I never wanted to go that route. IACSP: Another one of the things I liked about your novel was the accuracy about weapons. I’m a gun enthusiast and it annoys me when I see a film or read a book that gets weapons and equipment wrong. I assume that you are right about some weapons I’m unaware of, but you certainly were spot-on about the weapons I do know about. That’s why I like Steven Hunter’s Bob Lee Swagger and Earl Swagger thrillers. He always gets the guns right. Carr: I was just talking to him on email and I’m going to try to get out there and get behind a rifle with him. He’s a great guy and gave me a great blurb for the first novel. I’ve read everything he’s ever written. IACSP: In your novel, you mention “crosscut targeting.” Can you describe this?
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Carr: I got that from a dear friend of mine, finding a reason to live again in the form
David Kilcullen, who was Condoleezza Rice’s advisor at the State Department and General Petraeus’ counterinsurgency advisor during the surge in Iraq. He is one of the foremost modern experts on insurgencies and counterinsurgencies. One of the things we discussed at one point was cross-cut targeting. Essentially, it is to eviscerate the organization but still leave someone to negotiate with at the higher levels. Instead of killing the top-level guys, who are replaced by the next level who come up and learn how the top-level guys had been killed, and eventually become stronger as a result of that. We saw that happening over and over again. Take out all the management of the organization and it makes it hard for the top to communicate with the bottom, and at the same time it leaves someone to negotiate with. IACSP: I see. But in the case of a bin Laden, there can be a psychological as well as a tactical reason. Carr: Yes, absolutely. IACSP: I read that the publication of your next novel is being delayed by the Defense Department. Why the delay? Carr: Who knows? It is the way of bureaucracy, probably. They got the first novel back to me in 45 days, which I thought was pretty good. So, I figured it would be one or two, possibly three months for the second novel. We’re pushing seven months now. We shall see. IACSP: Is there anything in the novel that is controversial? Carr: There is less military references in the second novel than the first one. Maybe there is something in there that they are concerned about. We’ll see. IACSP: What is the title of your next novel and what is it about? Carr: It’s called “True Believer,” and it is a continuation of the story with the same characters and it goes international. So, the first novel was about revenge and revenge without restraint, the second novel is about redemption and James Reese
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of a mission from the government. He has to track down a former friend he worked with in Iraq who is operating in Europe. It is inspired by events that happened to me in Iraq in 2006, and I thought what if the story took a fictional turn and became a lot more interesting? IACSP: What are your thoughts on our conflict with international terrorism? Carr: With the past, we need to learn from the successes and mistakes of those who have gone before us. The past is an invaluable training tool. It is hard to say that all that effort and blood we spilled was worth it. At the very least, at the tactical level, take the lessons they learned in blood, so we don’t make those mistakes in the future, and if nothing else, that is a valuable contribution to special operations. At a strategic level, we have generals, admirals and politicians who change in positions every two, three or four years and they expect us at the tactical level to win every single time. We do a very good job at the tactical level, so for us at the tactical level, we expect those at the strategic level to make good strategical decisions based on the best information available to them. And I think our senior leadership has failed in that respect. That probably comes across in the pages of my novel. Moving forward, we have to have leaders who can make those strategic level decisions. We took Vietnam tactics and dropped those into urban environments, desert environments, and mountain environments. We are very adaptive. That is the reason for most of our successes following September 11th. From close personal protection to direct action, taking advantage of technology for surveillance, targeting packages and all that sort of thing. That is our signature. IACSP: Any final thoughts? Carr: I feel so fortunate to have done the two things I wanted to do in my life, which is serve my country as a SEAL and be writing novels like this. IACSP: Good luck with your novels and thanks for your service and for speaking to us.
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IACSP Homeland Security Bookshelf By Dr. Joshua Sinai Active Threat Workplace 911:
An Expert Guide to Preventing, Preparing for and Prevailing Over Attacks at Work, School and Church
T
Vaughn Baker and Mark Warren, (Kansas City, KS: Strategos International, 2018), 119 pages, $19.99 [Paperback], ISBN: 978-1-7312-5730-7.
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his is an authoritative, user-friendly and concisely written practical handbook about all the measures required to prepare for, respond to, and recover from violent attacks that threaten all types of organizations (which the authors term for the sake of simplicity as “workplace�): businesses, schools, houses of worship, non-profits, government agencies, and others. The authors are former law enforcement officers with special operations experience, and such practitioner expertise informs the handbook.
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Its 12 chapters cover relevant topics such as the components involved in assessing the threat to different types of targets; the nature of the attackers and their motivations (e.g., individuals on the pathway to violence “don’t just snap” but display risky behaviors that can be identified prior to their attacks); the high cost of inaction of not adequately preparing, for instance, in incurring liability and loss of business; the components involved in securing one’s facility in the form of a practical and actionable emergency response plan that is based on a threat assessment and implementing access controls; the importance of training, with “Employees who are trained are more at ease, less anxious and more confident” (p. 58); their recommended response protocols in case of an armed intruder in the form of lock out, get out, and take out, whose sequence of actions they explain “should depend on the circumstances, not a scripted formula” (p. 98) and should also include calling 911 when possible; and preparing to manage the aftermath of attacks, which includes having a “Plan B” in place to continue functioning, providing material and psychological support to the affected victims, and managing crisis communications to relevant constituencies. Vaughn Baker is the president of Strategos International, where Mark Warren is executive vice president. Strategos International is a security consulting and training firm, based in Kansas City, Kansas.
P.A.C.E.: Active Shooter Workplace Violence Preparedness James Cameron, (Las Vegas, NV: Security Concepts Group, LLC 2019), 127 pages, $24.65 [Paperback], ISBN: 978-1-5323-9601-4.
This is an authoritative handbook for public safety practitioners to employ as a reference resource and training guide to prepare to anticipate and respond to potential active assailant attacks. The term “active assailant” is preferred over “active shooter” because, the author explains, it is a more comprehensive term as “threats can come in all shapes, sizes, gender, age, ideology, grievances, and any other reasons someone decides to conduct a mass homicide,” (p. 10) and because, in addition to firearms, “Many types of weapons can be used in mass casualty situations, to include vehicles, knives, explosives, aircraft, hammers, and pretty much any other instrument that can be manipulated to inflict harm or death.” (p. 11) The author is a former U.S. combat veteran, having served as an Army Ranger under the Special Operations Command, and afterwards as a security Detail Leader at the Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Services in Iraq and Afghanistan. This practitioner-based security expertise informs the handbook’s chapters which present the author’s program to decrease vulnerability and increase survivability against the mass casualty threats posed by active assailants, called P.A.C.E. – Prepare, Act, Care, Evacuate. Accordingly, each of these four components form the handbook’s sections, which are explained by their corresponding chapters. The “Prepare” chapters discuss the nature of active assailants; their pathway to violence and their types of violence; the importance of situational awareness of suspicious behaviors, as well as reporting mechanisms to alert authorities about them; and implementing security procedures, including access control. The “Act” chapters elaborate on the OODA Loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act) and the response protocols of run, hide, fight. The “Care” chapters cover the primary principles of immediate medical response to an attack, types of aid required, including “stop the bleed” hemorrhage control and tourniquets, and CPR. Having an understanding of such “medical treatments that can be applied to save lives,” the author explains, empowers one as “a force multiplier, a factor that dramatically increases the effectiveness of a process or system.” (p. 98) The “Evacuate” chapters explain the information to be provided to 911 and how to cooperate with the responding police officers when they arrive at the scene. Also valuable are the book’s introductory chapters which discuss lessons learned in responding to such incidents by first responders, organizations and individuals, and insights regarding the attackers, such as their selection of targets, weapons (such as firearms, knives, vehicles, and homemade bombs). An extensive glossary further defines the terms and names referred to in the handbook. The author is the founder/ owner of Security Concepts Group LLC, based in Las Vegas, Nevada, which provides a range of security services to clients.
Introduction to Security [Tenth Edition]
Robert J. Fischer, Edward P. Halibozek, and David C. Walters, ( Butterworth-Heinemann/Elsevier, 2019), 586 pages, $79.95 [Paperback], ISBN: 978-0-1280-5310-2. This textbook is an authoritative, comprehensive and detailed overview of the security profession, with an emphasis on the theories of security and loss prevention. It utilizes a three-part structure to cover the basics of security operations. The first part, “Introduction,” covers topics such as defining security’s role; career opportunities in loss prevention; security education, training, certification, and regulation; and terrorism as a threat to business. The second part, “Basics of Defense,” covers functional topics in security, such as security and the law; risk analysis, security surveys and insurance; interior and exterior security concerns; the outer defenses; the inner defenses; contingency planning emergency response and safety; fire prevention and protection, and occupational safety; and internal theft controls/personnel issues. The third part, “Specific Threats and Solutions,” examines violence and drug use in the workplace; retail security; terrorism; holistic security through the application of integrated technology; transportation security issues and regulation; selected security threats of the 21st century; and future trends in security, including evolving trends such as active shooters, the role of social media, planning for the outbreak of pandemics, and supply chain security. As a textbook, each chapter is introduced by a section on objectives, an introduction, a summary, a question to evoke critical thinking, review questions, and references.
Jihadist Psychopath: How He Is Changing, Seducing, and Devouring Us Jamie Glazov, (Nashville, TN: Post-Hill Press, 2018), 240 pages, $26.00 [Hardcover], ISBN: 978-1-6429-3007-8.
A highly interesting and original account of how Islamic Supremacism’s onslaught against the West, especially the United States, utilizes a psychopath’s strategies and tactics to “devour” Western civilization, just as an individual psychopath would “hunt their prey.” As Michael Ledeen writes in the book’s Foreword, it is through such an approach that jihadists “have managed to convince their intended victims that the religious/political war is the fault of the West, and that our best strategy is surrender.” (p. xiii) What are the psychopath’s methods? Citing Martha Stout, an author of an authoritative book on the psychology of psychopaths, this consists of “playing the pity card to get people to give him what he wants, which, primarily, means getting them to give him complete power over their lives.” (p. xix) To explain how “Islamic supremacism” employs the psychopath-victim dynamic to gain the upper hand in the war against Islamist terrorist extremism, the book is divided into three parts. The chapters in Part I, “The Seduction,” discuss the Islamists’ success in convincing their Western government adversaries to “See No Islam, Hear No Islam,” even when terrorist attackers are driven by fulfilling jihadism. The chapters in Part II, “Dancing With the Jihadist Psychopath,” present the psychopathic methods used by Jihadists to portray themselves as the “eternal victims” of others’ oppression. The chapters in Part III, “The Devouring,” discuss how the Jihadist psychopaths succeed in controlling their Western adversaries through three levels of attack: Islamic jihad (terrorist attacks), stealth jihad (e.g., non-violent tactics of deceit and brainwashing), and international institutional jihad (e.g., when Muslim countries utilize international organizations to take over their agendas by moving to criminalize “truth-telling” about Islam). In the conclusion, the author wisely recommends that to defeat and dismantle the weapons used by the jihadist psychopath it is necessary to “break our addiction to that pathological perspective – which the Unholy Alliance has forced on us…” (p. 196) This book is an essential guide for understanding the measures required to better understand and counter such religiously-driven terrorism and the sub-cultures that support and sustain them. The author is the editor of “Frontpage Magazine” and host of the web TV show “The Glazov Gang.”
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Guide to Reducing the Risk of Workplace Violence…The Absolute Essentials Nagele, Knowles and Associates, (St. Petersburg, FL: Nagele, Knowles and Associates, 2018), 76 pages, No Cost [Paperback], nageleknowlesandassociates.com/.
This short yet comprehensive handbook is filled with valuable information, diagrams and protocols required to understand how to mitigate the risk of workplace violence. This includes itemizing the four types of workplace violence (criminal, client/customer/patient, employee to employee, and domestic violence); understanding the types of bullying behaviors in the workplace; the roles of Human Resources and management in promoting a healthy and safe work environment, including considerations for terminating contentious employees; the components of a workplace violence prevention program, including the response protocols of run, hide, fight; and the service offerings by Nagele, Knowles and Associates.
Terrorism and Counterterrorism: A Comprehensive Introduction to Actors and Actions Henry Prunckun and Troy Whitford, (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2019), 269 pages, $85.00 [Hardcover], $35.00 [Paperback], ISBN: 978-1-6263-7760-8.
This easy-to-follow textbook covers all the significant topics involved in analyzing the nature of the terrorist threat and how to counter it. This includes defining terrorism from the perspective of democratic governments: a violent political act by a group or by lone actors in furtherance of extremist objectives. Such political violence is criminal because it violates a democracy’s penal laws, and is directed “against a government (via innocent victims) as opposed to aggression that emanates from a [foreign] state’s military.” (p. 5) The authors explain how the resort to terrorism can be traced to Sun Tzu’s doctrine of asymmetric warfare, in which the weaker side exploits vulnerabilities of its more powerful adversary government — that if you “kill one, [you] frighten ten thousand” through the publicity anxiety that accompanies such incidents when widely published. Terrorists’ strategic objectives aim to disrupt the targeted government’s activities to such an extent that it appears incapable of defending its citizenry, and thereby provoking it to overreact by implementing stern coercive response measures that might end up eroding a society’s democratic nature and personal freedoms. This can inadvertently legitimize the insurgent groups’ portrayal of an “unreasonable” government response. Regarding terrorism’s root causes, the authors observe that political violence is often a response to features of the larger context in which terrorists operate as they wrongly believe that only violence can redress their grievances. Such conflicts are difficult to resolve through negotiations because “The philosophy of terrorism does not entertain the possibility of coexistence between the group and society. Rather it seeks to destroy society.” (p. 16) Nevertheless, the authors point out, there are a few instances in which “this absolutist perspective can change over time.” (p. 16) One of these rare instances was the Irish Republican Army’s (IRA) moderation, through Sinn Fein, its political wing, which enabled it to reach a peace agreement with the British government, thereby ending Northern Ireland’s decades’ old conflict. Also covered in this volume are issues such as how radicalization into violent extremism takes place, and the reasons terrorists use to justify their resort to politicallymotivated violence. The authors also explain how terrorists finance their operations (including by cooperating with criminal groups to raise funds). They point to the
increasing lethality of terrorist warfare in terms of weaponry used (including the worst case scenario of weapons of mass destruction) and terrorists’ rationale for targeting high-value human and physical targets, such as 9/11’s simultaneous aircrafts’ destruction of the World Trade Towers, which caused a catastrophic loss of life and major physical damage. Finally, the important topic of media coverage of terrorism is discussed. Here the authors are proposing guidelines for objectively covering terrorist incidents during the initial “fog of war.” Regarding the components of effective counterterrorism, the authors discuss the role of intelligence agencies in tracking down terrorists, using both open source information and covert means — one of the book’s major contributions — and the roles of law enforcement and the military in countering terrorists, whether domestically or overseas. Another crucial component of counterterrorism in preventing future terrorist attacks are various de-radicalization programs established around the world to promote the disengagement of local terrorists from violence. Here the, the authors’ develop an innovative formula for what is required to win the “war on terror.” As part of this formula, the authors recommend applying a risk management methodology — which is usually absent from the academic study of counterterrorism. This consists of five steps: identifying the threat, gauging its likelihood, exploring one’s own vulnerabilities, assessing the consequences of an attack, and constructing a prevention, preparation, response, and recovery (PPRR) emergency plan to prepare a response . With these steps providing an overriding framework for counterterrorism, the authors conclude that while the underlying causes that give rise to terrorism’s grievances need to be understood and addressed, “Simultaneously, we must also take a tougher stance.” (pp. 192-209) Regarding future trends, the authors highlight the continuously evolving nature of terrorist warfare. When it comes to cyber-terrorism (which is still in a nascent form) terrorists might employ cyber weapons to gain remote access to their adversaries’ SCADA systems (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition Systems) to bring down critical parts of a nation’s infrastructure, such as a major electricitygenerating power plants or transportation networks. Fortunately, such attacks have not yet materialized globally. It is such practice-based insights that make this book a valuable guide for understanding the components involved in analyzing terrorist threats and the measures required for effective responses. Mr. Prunckun is a former senior level counterterrorism analyst in the Australian government. He is a widely published author, and a research criminologist in policing and security studies at Charles Stuart University, where Mr. Whitford is a lecturer.
Violence, Terror, Genocide, and War in the Holy Books and in the Decades Ahead
T.P. Schwartz-Barcott, (Amherst, NY: Teneo Press, 2018), 352 pages, $29.00 [Paperback], ISBN: 978-1-9348-4438-0. This is a highly interesting, conceptually innovative, and empirically-based psychological and sociological examination, as explained by the author, of all the verses in the holy books of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam that portray or refer to the use of physical violence and war against these religions’ adversaries. The book’s objective, the author adds, is to “deepen our understanding of how and why some of the passages in the holy books can be used and misused to inspire and motivate some people towards violence, terrorism, and war now and in the years ahead – especially in the next few decades.” (p. xx) To accomplish this objective, the account begins with an introductory profile of several terrorist groups and individuals who were inspired by these three religions to conduct their attacks. This is followed by an objective and detailed examination of
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these three religions’ primary texts in terms of the kinds of written and spoken words, phrases, and statements that appear violent and are likely to provoke engagement in physical violence by people who read and follow them literally. In an interesting chapter that examines the findings of leading academic experts on these issues, such as Robert Spencer, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Mark Juergensmeyer, Jessica Stern, Karen Armstrong, and Philip Jenkins, he finds that “While the authors have been very sincere, they provide very few detailed practical suggestions, and they do not tell us how the suggestions can be implemented.” (pp. 291-292) For this reason, in the final chapter, the author presents ten approaches to “help us disassociate violence from religions and their holy books so as to reduce the risks of violence, terror, genocide, and war.” (p. 292) These approaches call for ignoring the holy books, emphasizing the non-violent passages, deleting the violent passages, embracing one (or more) of the holy books in their entirely, focusing on the less violent holy books of other religions, creating new holy books or “updating” those that exist, acknowledging and sustaining other religions that restrain violence, creating new religions, acknowledging and encouraging those people and groups throughout the world that reduce the likelihood of violence, and improving the monitoring and response to people, groups, and organizations that misrepresent verses in the holy books. (p. 292) An Appendix explains the systematic content analysis and coding procedures used to generate the author’s findings. The author is a veteran academic who has taught at several universities in the field of sociology.
Routledge Handbook of Terrorism and Counterterrorism
Andrew Silke, editor, (New York, NY: Routledge, 2018), 668 pages, $208.25 [Hardcover], ISBN: 978-1-1388-1908-5. This is a comprehensive overview of findings by leading scholars of latest trends in research on terrorism and counterterrorism around the world. Following the editor’s introductory overview on the study of terrorism and counterterrorism, the volume’s next 54 chapters are divided into two parts, with each part further divided into case studies. Part I: “Terrorism,” covers general topics such as defining terrorism; the history of terrorism; terrorism’s root causes; terrorism by states; terrorism by nationalist, separatist, left-wing and right wing groups; terrorism by lone actors; how terrorists are radicalized and their psychological make-up; terrorism in social media; how terrorist groups are organized; the effectiveness of terrorist warfare; the economic impact of terrorism; terrorism and criminality, including their financing; the phenomenon of foreign fighters who join terrorist conflicts in foreign lands; suicide terrorism; the tactic of hostage-taking; the potential use of weapons of mass destruction; and cyber terrorism. The second part presents case studies on significant terrorist groups, such as al Qaida, Boko Haram, Hamas, Hizballah, Islamic State (IS), the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA), the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), and the German Red Army Faction (RAF). Part II: “Counterterrorism,” covers general topics in conceptualizing counterterrorism; the roles of policing, military, and intelligence services in counterterrorism, including deterrence, imprisonment, and practice of targeted killings in counterterrorism; countering terrorist fundraising and finances; promoting the de-radicalization and disengagement of individuals from terrorism; the role of public support in counterterrorism; and the place of ethics and human rights in counterterrorism. These general topics are covered in case studies on counterterrorism in Argentina, Canada, China, France, Great Britain, India, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Spain, Russia, and two chapters on United States counterterrorism pre-9/11 and, by this reviewer, one on post-9/11. The volume’s editor, Andrew Silke, is Professor of Terrorism Risk and Resilience at Cranfield University, England.
About the Reviewer Dr. Joshua Sinai is a Washington, DC-based consultant in the field of counterterrorism and homeland security studies. He can be reached at: joshua.sinai@comcast.net.
30th Annual
SO/LIC Symposium & Exhibition
O
February 5-7, 2019, Arlington, VA.
Paratroopers with the 173rd Airborne Brigade, participate in Exercise Rock Spring 19 at Grafenwoher Training Area, Germany, March 6, 2019. Rock Spring is an annual exercise to validate platoon-level proficiency at conducting offensive operations under live-fire conditions. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Henry Villarama)
Conference Report by Dr. Joshua Sinai
n February 5-7, 2019, the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) held its 30th Annual Special Operations/Low-Intensity Conflict (SO/LIC) symposium and exhibition in Arlington, VA. The event’s theme was “One SOCOM: Synchronizing Policy, Modernization, and Operations.” NDIA (NDIA. ORG) is headquartered in Arlington, VA, and is a leading nonprofit defense and national security association. It has 85,000 individual members and 1,600 corporate members, who are organized into affiliates and chapters around the United States. SO/LIC is one of its 29 topical divisions, with each division organizing symposiums and exhibitions on their respective topics. NDIA publishes “National Defense,” a monthly magazine.
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The conference/exhibition was held over three days. The first day consisted of a half-day general session, a networking social in the exhibit hall, and an evening keynote address and awards dinner. The second day consisted of full-day sessions, with the third day a halfday general session. The panels were tremendously useful counterterrorism professionals in this field, as they presented new approaches by leaders in the military’s counterterrorism community on the operational measures and technologies required to effectively defeat the irregular forces’ adversaries. This account is based on the author’s notes and supplemented by several articles about the event.
SOF’s Multi-Faceted Roles in Irregular Warfare Several speakers addressed the new roles of Special Operations Forces in the rapidly evolving sphere of irregular warfare. In his presentation, Andrew Knaggs (Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Combating Terrorism), said that special operators, who operate at the “tip of the spear,” need to improve their psychological operations (PsyOps) warfare skills to counter the onslaught of propaganda and disinformation being employed by state and sub-state adversaries in what has become a new area of operations (AO) in irregular warfare. This is because adversaries have “weaponized” disinformation as part of their propaganda operations, including disguising the origins of their disinformation attacks, which make it difficult for their targeted adversaries to attribute their online activities to their state sponsors, such as Russia and China. In another component of PsyOps, in conflict regions, such as Syria and other countries, insurgent groups such as the Islamic State leverage the Internet and its social media sites to radicalize new supporters and expand their overall influence. Countering adversarial psychological operations resides within the Special Operations Command (SOCOM), with its mission to influence individuals or populations in a conflict area to take actions in support of a combatant commander’s goals. To get ahead of the warfare curve, Mr. Knaggs explained that “We need to move beyond our 20th century approach to messaging and start looking at influence as an integral aspect of the modern irregular warfare.” He added that this will address shortcomings in the way that Special Forces operate in the “information environment” by incorporating new approaches into operational planning. Specifically, Mr. Knaggs explained, Special Operators require new strategies and tech-
nologies to counter adversarial disinformation campaigns. This includes developing cooperative relationships with partnering individuals and NGOs in the conflict areas to enable the warfighters to collect actionable information about the adversaries’ online activities. Special Operators also require new technologies that will enable them to communicate in austere environments with low bandwidth, he added. According to Brigadier-General Dennis Crall (USMC), Deputy Principal Cyber Advisor, office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Cyber Policy, new technologies are also required that are not just rugged but that can operate efficiently in an “informationcontested environment,” in which a sophisticated adversary, such as Russia or China, is attempting to jam one’s transmissions and hack into a network. In a related area, new stealth technologies are required to enable Special Forces to operate covertly in adversary areas. This is particularly the case when they are inserted covertly into mission areas but are spotted by local inhabitants who can photograph them with their smartphones and instantaneously post items about their presence in social media sites, such as Twitter, where they can quickly reach large audiences. This was the case in May 2011 when the U.S. Seal Team’s supposedly stealth helicopter was spotted hovering above Abbottabad at 1:00 am (on its mission to kill al Qaida’s leader Usama bin Laden) and a local Pakistani IT consultant, who happened to be working at the time, unknowingly reported details about it on his Twitter account. Another technological challenge is to integrate the artificial intelligence capability into huge amounts of data that are pooled together in the cloud, and have it provide a frontline “tactical edge” to the warfighter. In another technological challenge, a “human operator” must still be available to oversee and, if necessary, override the actions of an autonomous weapon, such as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV or drone). Both of these new technologies must also contend with the deployment of automated or autonomous systems by one’s adversary, particularly in identifying weak points that can be attacked electronically. As explained by Dr. Mike Kramer, Technology and Strategy Branch, Joint Improvised Defeat Organization (JIDO), a capability is required to attack the adversary’s “autonomy, not just the platform,” for instance, by hacking, jamming, and other forms of deception to disturb the algorithms that make it function. Finally, with SOCOM assuming the mission of countering adversarial access to and use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), the focus is on identifying and preventing such
potential threats before they coalesce into actual attacks. SOCOM is well positioned to take on this mission because of its specialization in tackling threats that are multidimensional and multi-regional, and require agile, integrated, and innovative warfighting capabilities and technologies.
Industry Exhibition The conference’s industry exhibition was highly informative in showcasing some of the latest development in security technologies for Special Operators. Of special interest were technologies, such as Dexter Edward’s “Fognigma,” which provide traceless, encrypted, on-demand cloud based communications networks that provide deployed warfighters the capability to work together in a protected environment anywhere in the world on any device; the Equitus Visual Ops’ tools and visualizations dashboard which presents in-memory geospatial visualizations and analytics that integrates intelligence tracking in social media and other platforms of adversaries; and the multi-linguistic machine learning tool Rosette Text Analytics by Basis Technology, that is capable of analyzing raw, unstructured text to reveal actionable intelligence about items of concern.
About the Reviewer
Dr. Joshua Sinai is a Washington, DC-based consultant in the field of counterterrorism and homeland security studies. He can be reached at: joshua.sinai@ comcast.net.
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Vol. 24, No.4
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