|
|||||
|
|||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||||
 |
 |
    |
|
|
|||
 |
|
||
|
|||
|
|
|
|
||||||||
|
Bush Inauguration to Have “Unprecedented” Security By Joe Fiorill, Global Security Newswire WASHINGTON — There are no known terrorist threats to this month’s U.S. presidential inauguration, but the security measures planned for the event are “unprecedented,” Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said yesterday (see GSN, Jan. 4). Speaking at a briefing on security measures planned for the Jan. 20 inauguration, Ridge said threat information in March and April of last year indicated an “election-year” plot against the United States but that “the decibel level is down” since then. “There is no specific threat directed toward the inaugural or the inaugural activities,” Ridge said. Defense Department inauguration security chief Galen Jackman told reporters his Joint Task Force-Armed Forces Inaugural Committee has been working with the CIA and FBI in planning inauguration security and responds to new threat information “on a minute-by-minute basis.” “We have monitored the threat intensity over the last several months,” said the general, who commands both the inauguration group and the Pentagon’s permanent National Capital Region Joint Task Force. Ridge said the color-coded terrorist threat level would not be raised for the inauguration but that Homeland Security is “as vigilant as ever.” “The security for this occasion will be unprecedented,” he said, citing harbor patrols, mobile coordination units, round-the-clock surveillance at pertinent facilities and portable x-ray equipment to examine deliveries and visitors’ packages. Ridge said Homeland Security has helped to increase security at Washington’s hotels ahead of the inauguration, including by bolstering defenses against a chemical or biological attack via heating and ventilation ducts (see GSN, Aug. 26, 2004). Other planned security measures for the event include the deployment of the U.S. Marine Corps Chemical Biological Incident Response Force, members of which displayed WMD detection and decontamination equipment for those gathered at yesterday’s briefing. The force will be working to support state and local emergency responders at the inauguration, force public affairs officer Christopher Reed said in an interview. Jackman said the Marine Corps unit “has a very good capability to detect chemical, biological and radiological weapons.” Ridge said the Secret Service, which is part of his department and is the lead agency for security at the inauguration, has prepared for the event for more than a year, holding several interagency training exercises for the purpose. Homeland Security’s Federal Emergency Management Agency is to coordinate emergency management and response at the event. Also participating in the security effort are Homeland Security agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is to provide hazardous-materials response capabilities, and the Coast Guard, which plans to patrol the Washington Channel and the Anacostia and Potomac rivers. More than 60 police agencies are expected to be on hand, Washington Metropolitan Police Department Chief Charles Ramsey told reporters. Ridge estimated the total number of expected police personnel at 6,000. Military personnel assigned to inauguration security will number about 2,500, and another 4,700 troops will be present in ceremonial roles and could be drafted into security duty, said Jackman. “I think people ought to feel very safe coming to this event,” he said.
| ||||||||||
Back to top
