U.S. Response I:  First Responders Feel Inadequately Equipped to Respond to WMD Incidents, Survey Finds

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — U.S. emergency responders believe they lack adequate protection to respond to terrorist incidents involving weapons of mass destruction, according to a report released by RAND today (see GSN, Aug. 8).

“The majority of emergency responders feel vastly underprepared and underprotected for the consequences of chemical, biological or radiological terrorist attacks,” the study says.

Researchers from RAND’s Science and Technology Policy Institute interviewed almost 200 first responders throughout the country, including law enforcement officers, emergency medical service responders and firefighters.  Most of those interviewed expressed concern over not having access to adequate protection to respond to a terrorist attack involving biological, chemical or radioactive agents, the report says.

“Men and women who choose to risk their lives to save the lives of others are telling us they need better protection, better safety-training equipment and better coordination to do their jobs,” Tom LaTourrette, lead author of the report, said in a press release.

Many law enforcement officers and firefighters said they did not know what they needed to protect against, what types of protection were appropriate or where to acquire such protection, the report says.  It adds that many of those interviewed were unsure that available protective gear would be able to protect against terrorist attacks involving WMD materials.  For example, hazardous material protective equipment currently in service is designed for use in responding to industrial accidents and is not designed or certified for use in respond to terrorist attacks, the report says.

There is also concern over the vulnerability of nonspecialist first responders who initially arrive at the scene of a WMD-related terrorist attack, the report says.  Already, some emergency-responder departments have begun equipping vehicles with biological and chemical protective gear, it says.

In addition to concerns over personal protective equipment, there are also concerns that “systems-level” equipment, such as communications gear, is also inadequate, according to the report.  For example, a number of first responders said there are “fundamental problems” with the communications systems currently in use, which often are incompatible with each other and cannot easily inter-communicate at the site of an incident, the report said.  While some departments have begun to use digital 800-megahertz systems to replace prior analog radio systems, they have said they were not fully satisfied with the new systems’ performance, the report says.

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U.S. Response II:  Ashcroft Begins Speaking Tour to Bolster Support for Patriot Act

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft began a public relations campaign yesterday to bolster support for the USA PATRIOT Act, which critics have assailed as infringing upon U.S. civil liberties (see GSN, July 24).

During a speech yesterday at the American Enterprise Institute here, Ashcroft defended the act, saying it has played a major role in the war on terrorism.

“We have used the tools provided in the PATRIOT Act to fulfill our first responsibility to protect the American people.  We have used these tools to prevent terrorists from unleashing more death and destruction on our soil.  We have used these tools to save innocent American lives.  We have used these tools to provide the security that ensures liberty,” Ashcroft said.

The act has helped to improve cooperation and information-sharing between intelligence and law enforcement officials, Ashcroft said.  The act has also aided law enforcement officials in tracking down and developing cases against suspected terrorist operatives, he said.

Ashcroft also unveiled a new U.S. Justice Department Web site, www.lifeandliberty.gov, which provides information on the PATRIOT Act and testimonials on its effectiveness from members of Congress and others. 

Despite the support of the Bush administration, the act has come under intense criticism from some members of Congress, civil-liberties organizations and state and local governments.  According to the American Civil Liberties Union, more than 150 communities throughout the country have passed resolutions calling for revisions to the act.  In addition, the ACLU has filed the first lawsuit against the act in an attempt to roll back Section 215, which allows the FBI to access library records without showing probable cause.

Ashcroft warned yesterday, however, against attempts to limit the scope and powers of the PATRIOT Act.

“The PATRIOT Act gives us the technological tools to anticipate, adapt and out-think our terrorist enemy,” Ashcroft said.  “To abandon these tools would senselessly imperil American lives and American liberty, and it would ignore the lessons of Sept. 11,” he said.

Ashcroft’s speech was the first of several planned events throughout the United States to bolster support for the PATRIOT Act.  He is also scheduled to deliver speeches to law enforcement officials in Philadelphia, Cleveland, Detroit and Des Moines, Iowa, according to an FBI press release. 

The ACLU yesterday criticized Ashcroft’s speaking tour, calling it an attempt to gain support for policies that violate civil liberties.

“An attorney general going on the road, away from his official duties, to favorably spin policies violative of civil liberties is troubling, to say the least,” said Laura Murphy, director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office, in a press release.  “It raises two serious questions:  Is this tour … political in nature and how prudent is it to be spending public money on a ‘PATRIOT Act’ charm offensive?” she added.

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U.S. Response I:  Ridge Defends Threat Advisory System

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge yesterday defended the color-coded national terrorism-alert level, which has come under increasing criticism for being too vague to be effective.

While the Homeland Security Department will continue to improve the threat advisory system, in general “it’s a good system,” Ridge said yesterday during a speech to the summer meeting of the National Governors’ Association held in Indianapolis.

“It is a system designed — and I think it’s worked fairly well — to, one, alert the public generally that it is a consensus opinion within the president’s Homeland Security Council … that the level of threat has either gone up or has receded,” Ridge said.

Last week, the Congressional Research Service released a report concluding that the threat advisory system is too vague on the nature of the potential terrorist threat, leading to concerns that the public may disregard the warnings (see GSN, Aug. 13).  The report also said that, when the threat level was raised, only general intelligence information with a lack of specifics was cited as the cause.  In addition, Democrats on the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee last week also issued a report claiming that the threat advisory system needed to be revised to provide more specific information (see GSN, Aug. 14).

In his remarks yesterday, Ridge acknowledged that some governors had expressed frustration with the general nature of the warnings issued through the threat advisory system.  The system is flexible enough, however, to allow for the issuing of specific threat advisories to states or localities if such intelligence were received, he said.

“I assure you, when the information is specific enough to warrant a warning being limited to a particular area, we will do that,” Ridge told the assembled governors. 

Ridge yesterday also called on governors to identify five additional officials in each of their states who will be able to receive security clearances giving them access to classified homeland security-related information.  If any of the five identified officials have already received a security clearance through another U.S. agency, such as the FBI or CIA, then that will be satisfactory for Homeland Security, he said.  In addition, the Homeland Security Department is also planning to develop a secure Web site to allow state homeland security officials to share information on best practices, Ridge said.

“Sharing information … is at the heart of what we need to do as a country,” Ridge said.

In addition to improving information-sharing, the Homeland Security Department also plans to work with state homeland security advisers to determine what permanent security measures can be implemented at 150 high-level targets throughout the country that were identified during Operation Liberty Shield, Ridge said (see GSN, March 18).  He also said the department plans to work with state officials within the next six months to identify and improve security at a second-tier of 180 sites.

Funding

Ridge said he expected Congress to appropriate $3.5 billion in the fiscal 2004 budget for homeland security-related funding to state and local officials.  To help those officials receive such funding, the Homeland Security Department plans to create by the end of the year a “one-stop shop” to aid in applying for federal grants, he said. 

The New York Times reported today, however, that some governors were still concerned about a lack of needed homeland security funding.

“There is always an issue of resources’ not meeting expectations of citizens,” the Times quoted Governor Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kan.) as saying in an interview.  “We’re responsible for border-to-border security in our states in the most difficult economic times since the Great Depression.  Is there more money we could use?  Yes.  Is there enough money?  Not by any means,” she said.

For their part, governors need to submit state security plans to Homeland Security by the end of the year to help the department determine how federal funding is being spent, Ridge said.  “It’s not just a question of input, it’s outcomes as well,” he said.

Ridge praised state and local officials for their part in helping to improve U.S. homeland security following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“We still have a long, long way to go, but I’m confident that if we can work through the governors, and through the governors work down to the mayors and local government, we will get stronger and more secure every single day in the future, as we’ve done every single day since 9/11,” Ridge said.

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U.S. Response II:  Homeland Security Department Set to Become Major Federal Research Funding Source

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Homeland Security Department is set to become one of the largest sources of federal research funding in fiscal 2004, according to a report released today by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (see GSN, July 28).

The report examines the funding allocated for research and development efforts at various U.S. agencies in the appropriations bills completed by the House of Representatives and Senate.  The organization found that most of the planned increases in funding would go toward three U.S. agencies most involved in homeland security efforts — the Defense Department, Homeland Security and the National Institutes of Health — leaving other agencies with little additional funding.

Kei Koizumi, director of the AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program, called the planned funding levels “lopsided.”

“Clearly, investment in the federal R&D under the current plan is more lopsided than AAAS would like to see,” Koizumi said in a press release.

The House has allocated more than $125 billion in fiscal 2004 for federal research and development efforts, an $8.4 billion increase over current funding and $3.6 billion more than the Bush administration’s request, according to the report.  Of that $8.4 billion increase, however, 99 percent is set to go to the Pentagon, Homeland Security and the NIH, the report says.  While the Senate has not completed its work on all 13 appropriations bills, it has closely followed the House on those bills it has completed, the report says.

The House has allocated $1.1 billion to the Homeland Security Department in fiscal 2004, a 60 percent over current funding, according to the report.  The House has allocated $890 million in fiscal 2004 and approximately $6 billion over the next 10 years for Project Bioshield, a Bush administration effort to encourage research into new vaccines and treatments against biological weapons agents.  The House has also provided $900 million in research funding for Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate, the report said. 

The Senate has allocated approximately $1 billion for Homeland Security research and development efforts in fiscal 2004, an increase of approximately 50 percent, the report said.  The largest difference between the House and the Senate is that the Senate has not provided funding for Project Bioshield, according to the report.

The Pentagon is set to receive $66 billion for research and development efforts in fiscal 2004, an increase of more than $7 billion over current funding, the report said.  Most of the additional funding will go toward Pentagon weapons development programs, such as missile-defense efforts, it said.  The Senate has allocated slightly less for Pentagon research and development and science and technology, the report said.

In its appropriations bills, the House has provided the NIH with a total budget of approximately $28 billion, an increase of approximately 3 percent over fiscal 2003, the report said.  This comes after five years of annual 15 percent budgetary increases, it said.  The Senate has allocated more than $28 billion to the NIH in its appropriations bills, an increase of approximately 4 percent. 

Both the House and the Senate have fulfilled the Bush administration’s funding request of $4.3 billion for the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the lead NIH center for biological defense research, the report said, adding that this represents a 17 percent increase over fiscal 2003.  In contrast, most other NIH institutes would only receive increases between 2 and 4 percent, it said.

While most of the increased research funding allocated in fiscal 2004 is set to go toward homeland security-related efforts, all other domestic research and development projects will be left with relatively constant funding levels, the report said.  The House has allocated $55.4 billion for other research and development efforts, an increase of approximately 2 percent, which falls behind expected inflation, it said.  Even though some U.S. agencies would receive research-funding increases, they would be balanced by cuts in other agencies, such as the Agriculture, Commerce and Transportation departments, according to the report.

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Threat Assessment:  United States Ranks Fourth on List of Countries Most Likely to Suffer Attack

A report prepared by the World Markets Research Center ranks the United States fourth among 186 countries most likely to experience a terrorist attack within the next year, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, July 31).

The World Terrorism Index report lists Colombia, Israel, Pakistan, the United States and the Philippines as the countries most likely to be targeted by terrorists.  North Korea was ranked as the least likely to suffer a terrorist attack. 

“Another Sept. 11-style terrorist attack in the United States is highly likely,” the report says.  “Networks of militant Islamist groups are less extensive in the U.S. than they are in Western Europe, but U.S.-led military action in Afghanistan and Iraq has exacerbated anti-U.S. sentiment,” it says.

Several criteria were used to determine a country’s terrorist-risk ranking, including motivation of terrorists, presence of terrorist organizations, scale and frequency of past attacks and number of previously prevented attacks (Audrey Woods, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Aug. 18).

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U.S. Response:  Power Blackout Did Not Result in System-Wide Security Increase at Nuclear Plants

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — While some of the nine U.S. nuclear power plants affected by yesterday’s massive power failure in the northeastern United States heightened security, there was no systemwide security increase, officials and plant operators told Global Security Newswire today (see GSN, Aug. 12).

Yesterday, nine nuclear plants in Michigan, New York and Ohio shut down because of power grid instabilities, which were not believed to be terrorism-related, according to reports.  All nine plants are in “safe condition” and were using backup diesel generators where appropriate, according to a U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission press statement released yesterday.  The NRC said today that eight of the plants had declared an “unusual event,” which is the lowest of four emergency levels. 

An NRC spokesman told GSN today that the unusual events were declared solely because of the blackout and that no “unusual” security measures had been implemented during the blackout.  

Some of the affected plants, however, did heighten security.  Mark Durbin, a spokesman for First Energy, which operates the Perry nuclear power plant in Northeastern Ohio, said emergency teams were activated and would remain in place until the cause of the blackout was determined.  Durban refused to provide further details as to specific security measures the plant had implemented.

The blackout gave the Perry plant a good opportunity to test security procedures, including an opportunity to determine if appropriate measures were in place and if they would work as had been expected, Durbin said.  “That’s a ‘yes’ on both of those counts,” he said.

Steven Stamm, a nuclear industry official, said a power blackout, even one caused by a terrorist attack on the power grid, would have little safety impact on a nuclear plant.

“Taking out the grid is not the way to get to nuclear plants,” Stamm said.

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U.S. Response:  States, Localities Need More Information, Senate Democratic Staff Members Say

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration needs to do more to provide state and local officials with homeland security-related information to better prevent future terrorist attacks, according to a report released yesterday by Democrats on the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee (see GSN, Aug. 13).

According to the report, state and local officials have complained of difficulties in exchanging homeland security information with the federal government, including information on possible terrorists and possible threats, the report says.  Officials have also complained of the cumbersome process they have to undergo to be able to receive classified information, it says.

“Many state and local officials — who also all too often lack the funding, training and technology to counter terrorism — are left, if not entirely blind, straining to see the terrorist threat and how to best respond to it,” the report says.

In interviews with committee Democratic staff, state and local officials said they needed “reliable and timely” homeland security information, but currently there is no effective mechanism for providing information to, or receiving information from, Washington, according to the report.  It calls for the creation of national and regional task forces over the next year to improve information-sharing among U.S., state and local officials.  The report also recommends the creation of 24-hour operations centers in each state to help improve information-sharing between local law enforcement officers and U.S. agencies. 

The report calls for improving mechanisms to relay information on possible terrorist threats and suspected terrorist operatives.  Currently, there is no unified national terrorist “watch list.”  USA Today reported earlier this week that while Homeland Security is working to assemble a list from those used by various agencies, the process has been hindered by technical delays (see GSN, Aug. 11).

“The administration is getting closer to the end of its planning process,” Homeland Security spokesman Gordon Johndroe was quoted by USA Today.  “But this is a very complicated issue, and we’re not going to rush something out that isn’t completely effective,” he said.

In a letter sent last week to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) criticized Homeland Security’s delay in creating a unified watch list.

“This problem needs to be fixed,” wrote Lieberman, the top Democrat on the Governmental Affairs Committee.  “Potentially fatal gaps in our watch-list system should be closed.  It is important to have a consolidated national watch list operating around the clock to alert us to terrorists attempting to enter our country,” he said.

The report recommends that the president immediately issue an executive order to consolidate the various watch lists.  In addition, the Homeland Security Department should provide state and local law enforcement officials with the ability check names against a unified list by the end of the year, the report says.

The report also raises concerns with the Homeland Security Threat Advisory System — the color-coded system used by Homeland Security to indicate various levels of potential terrorist activity risks.  In a separate report issued last week, the Congressional Research Service warned that the system is too vague, and as a result, might be disregarded by the public.  The Governmental Affairs Committee Democratic report calls for revising the system to provide specific information about terrorist threats and detailed information on appropriate protective measures.

In addition to improved information-sharing, the Bush administration needs to do more to improve state and local officials’ access to classified homeland security-related intelligence, the report says.  It calls for an increase in resources to expedite security clearances for designated state and local officials.  The report also recommends examining the feasibility of having agencies proactively recognize security clearances already issued for state and local officials, unless there are compelling reasons not to do so.  A task force should be created to review security clearance procedures with a six-month deadline to propose improvements, the report says.

In a press statement released yesterday, Lieberman urged the White House to do more to improve information-sharing.

“If we are to successfully protect our citizens against future terrorist attacks, there must be genuine collaboration between federal, state and local officials," Lieberman said.  “This is not an easy task, but so far, I haven’t seen the kind of leadership from the administration that is necessary to break down barriers, cut through deeply ingrained cultures and build the partnerships that are absolutely critical to homeland security,” he said.

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