U.S. Response:  Bush Urges Lame-Duck Congress to Approve Security Bills

U.S. President George W. Bush yesterday called on lawmakers to pass legislation to create homeland security department when they return to Washington next week for a lame-duck session (see GSN, Oct. 4).

The creation of a homeland security department is “the single-most important item of unfinished business on Capitol Hill,” Bush said.

Legislation to create the department, introduced in June, has been bogged down in the Democrat-controlled Senate over provisions that would allow the president to suspend labor rights for the new department’s employees if their jobs were considered vital to national security.  Tuesday’s midterm elections, however, returned control of both houses of Congress to Republicans.

Aides to both Democratic and Republican senators yesterday said the Senate might still delay taking action on the homeland security department bill until the new session of Congress.  Once Congress reconvenes, new Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) will have a better chance to gain approval for the legislation without a Democratic filibuster, said a Republican Senate aide.

The aide said he didn’t think Democrats would attempt to block a vote on the bill.  “That’s the reason that some people lost the elections this year,” the aide said.

Terrorism Insurance

Bush yesterday also called on the postelection Congress to pass terrorism insurance legislation (see GSN, Oct. 4).  Passing such legislation would help create “thousands of good hard-hat jobs,” he said (Chen/Gerstenzang, Los Angeles Times, Nov. 8).

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Threat Assessment:  United Kingdom Issues Warning, Replaces It Quickly

Britain’s Home Office warned yesterday of terrorist attacks using poison gas or “dirty bombs,” then withdrew the warning and replaced it with a generic caution, which included the caveat that “no country is immune from attack” (see GSN, June 20; Eaglesham/Huband, Financial Times, Nov. 7).

“Maybe they will try to develop a so-called dirty bomb, or some kind of poison gas; maybe they will try to use boats or trains rather than planes.  The bottom line is that we simply cannot be sure,” the withdrawn first release said.

Officials denied they were trying to avoid causing panic by retracting the statement by Home Secretary David Blunkett.

“We cannot be sure of when or how terrorists will strike, but we can be sure they will try.  They may attempt to use more familiar terrorist methods, such as leaving parcel or vehicle bombs in public places or hijacking passenger aircraft,” the first release cautioned (see GSN, Feb. 21).

The second version avoided any mention of poison gas or radiological devices.  Less than 30 minutes after the first statement was released, journalists were asked to give it back.

“If al-Qaeda could mount an attack upon key economic targets, or upon our transport infrastructure, they would.  If they could inflict damage upon the health of our population, they would,” the second release says.

British intelligence sources said the warnings in Blunkett’s first release — reportedly from a week-old draft — were not linked to specific information, but were intended to ensure watchfulness.

Security preparations in the United Kingdom, however, have been increasing, according to the 35-page report on safety precautions that followed Blunkett’s warnings.  The document was released as Blunkett met with U.S. homeland security chief Tom Ridge.

The United Kingdom has created a stockpile of medicine and medical supplies to respond to anthrax, smallpox or radiological attacks (see GSN, Oct. 9).  British ministers are also establishing a health protection agency, to counter a terrorist attack.  Officials have planned post-attack procedures with essential services and have refurbished the emergency response system; hospitals should receive 300 mobile decontamination units and 8,000 protective suits.

British intelligence and law enforcement have also established a National Counter Terrorism and Security Office, intended to keep track of the threat and prepare Britain’s defense.  A multiagency unit has also been created to fight terrorism (Ford/Tendler, London Times, Nov. 8).

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U.S. Response:  Ridge Pushes Shipping Security

U.S. homeland security chief Tom Ridge urged European countries to join the U.S. Container Security Initiative during a visit yesterday to Rotterdam (see GSN, Nov. 1).

Ridge advocated inspecting cargo manifests 24 hours before loading the goods onto ships on their way to the United States.  The ability to inspect those lists and the cargo itself, “would dramatically increase our security,” Ridge said.

U.S. Customs officials have been working in Rotterdam with their Dutch counterparts for several months to experiment with the initiative (Associated Press/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Nov. 6).

While Ridge was pushing the U.S. plan, however, the European Union was considering penalizing countries that participate.  EU officials said the plan would allow some ports — and cargoes — easier access to the United States, creating backups at participating harbors and putting other countries at a disadvantage.

“Customs policy in Europe,” EU spokesman Jonathan Todd said, “is coordinated by the European Commission.”

The Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and France are among countries that might suffer penalties.

“We regret this action because these are our friends and allies,” Ridge said.

U.S. officials, however, said they feel that they cannot wait to establish an agreement that spans Europe.

“Our objective is to get this done as quickly as we possibly can,” U.S. Customs spokesman Dennis Murphy said.  “We don’t have the luxury of time here,” he said.

U.S. officials said they might announce next week another European country that has agreed to allow U.S. inspectors in its ports, U.S. officials said.  Participation in the container initiative is an attractive option to individual European countries because it allows smoother passage through security and customs processing in the United States, Dutch officials said.

“It’s good for business,” a Dutch customs official said (Gregory Crouch, New York Times, Nov. 6).

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U.S. Response:  New Center Identifies Threats to U.S. Infrastructure

By Bryan Bender
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — A new center dedicated to assessing terrorist threats to critical U.S. infrastructures is reaching out to other institutions to help mitigate the risk of attacks against strategic U.S. industries and government services, according to U.S. officials.

The National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center, or NISAC, located at Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico, has joined in recent months with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Purdue University, Cornell University, Lucent Technologies and Argonne National Laboratory, among others, the officials said recently.

NISAC, which is jointly supported by nearby Los Alamos National Laboratory, is seeking new strategic partners in establishing itself as the primary national facility capable of simulating how catastrophic terrorist attacks could disrupt critical infrastructure, how attacks on one node might affect other elements of national infrastructure and how to recover quickly from such an event.

“Right now we are developing the expertise,” Steve Rinaldi, NISAC’s joint program manager, said in an interview.  “As we need information on specific infrastructures, we will collaborate with those organizations, in the government or private sector, that are willing and able to work with us.”

The USA Patriot Act of 2001 chartered NISAC, which opened its doors April 1 this year (see GSN, Oct. 26, 2001).  It is designed as the “source of national competence to address critical infrastructure protection and continuity through support for activities related to counterterrorism, threat assessment and risk mitigation,” the legislation says.

The center, which is slated to be transferred from the Energy Department to the proposed homeland security department, should help determine which critical infrastructures — from nuclear and electric power, oil, gas, transportation, water, communications, banking and finance, emergency services, law enforcement, government continuity, agriculture and health services — are most vulnerable to attack.

Preventing the “Cascading Effect”

The simulation and analysis center will also assess how such attacks may affect other infrastructures and outline ways to prevent interdependent nodes from suffering a “cascading effect” following a successful attack.  For example, according to Rinaldi, the center will look at how electric utilities rely on natural gas and how an attack on one would likely affect the other.

“NISAC’s unique niche is the interdependency piece of the infrastructure,” Rinaldi said.

Indeed, government officials have increasingly warned that the interdependency of national infrastructures poses a new strategic threat to national security.

“Disruptions in any one of them could jeopardize the continued operation of the entire infrastructure system,” Samuel Varnado, director of infrastructure and information systems at Sandia, told the House Committee on Energy and Commerce’s investigations subcommittee in July.

“In the past, the nation’s critical infrastructures operated fairly independently,” he added. “Today, however, they are increasingly linked, automated, and interdependent.  What previously would have been an isolated failure could cascade into a widespread, crippling, multi-infrastructure disruption.”

According to Janice Stevens, director of business development for Management Technology, a firm that is discussing a possible partnership with Sandia on nuclear power plant security, a successful attack on today’s infrastructure “will cause unacceptable national impacts.”

“The events of 9/11 underscored the growing awareness that terrorist groups are far more capable of mounting critical infrastructure attacks within the United States than previously recognized.  These groups may be able to coordinate activities among multiple terrorist cells for planning and executing relatively sophisticated attacks.”

Private Sector Knowledge is Key

Officials agree that to determine infrastructure vulnerabilities and to derive mitigation strategies, NISAC needs outside help and private sector expertise in particular.

“We realize the industry is the owners and operators” of much of the critical infrastructure, according to Rinaldi.  “They know the assets they have and how they are hooked together.  If you want to model you have to know how the networks are put together.”

He said NISAC is seeking private firms “for their expertise and their data.”

However, private entities are not always willing to divulge what they deem sensitive information and in some cases such reluctance could hold back NISAC’s assessment work.

“Help is needed in working with private industry,” Varnado told Congress in July.  “Many of the private owners of the infrastructure feel that identification of critical nodes and vulnerabilities is sensitive information, and they are reluctant to share it with the government.”

He called for government action “to create a process under which sensitive information can be shared among those in government and industry with a need-to-know.”

Key Objectives

As NISAC develops the capabilities required to conduct the necessary simulations and models, it has set some ambitious goals.  With $20 million in fiscal 2002 and more coming for fiscal 2003, Rinaldi said he hopes to provide four “business lines:”  policy analysis to help policy-makers develop better risk reduction strategies; mitigation planning that best utilizes limited resources; education and training tools for first responders; and real-time assistance in the event of a major infrastructure attack or disruption.

NISAC is also looking to demonstrate a biological surveillance simulation system that will provide an initial capability to examine movement of disease through mobile urban populations and intervention strategies.

By 2005, “NISAC will be fully functional with advanced modeling and simulation capabilities to provide policy analysis, mitigation planning, education and training support, and real-time crisis assistance for a wide variety of users,” according to NISAC literature.

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