DHS Urged to Implement Ammonium Nitrate Regulations

The Department of Homeland Security is being urged to implement regulations designed to make it harder for terrorists to build homemade bombs. The legislation was created 2 years ago and members of the House Committee on Homeland Security are saying it’s time enact the laws.

From ABC News
“This delay in implementing the rules for ammonium nitrate regulation is unacceptable. We are talking about matters of life and death,” says Rep. Pete King (R-NY), the Republican ranking member of the House Committee on Homeland Security. “The Department of Homeland Security must move quickly.”

Congressman Bennie Thompson (D-MS), Chairman of House Committee on Homeland Security, agrees that the delays have been frustrating and worrisome. “Congress addressed the threat of ammonium nitrate through legislation over two years ago. Regulating the sale of this chemical is vital to the security of the nation.”

The Department of Homeland Security issued a statement saying that the “Notice of Proposed Rulemaking” is complete and that they are in the final stages of internal vetting.

via Read Full Article.

Why Is Terror Alert Threat Level Still Yellow

This week’s “most asked ” question in our email… The answer: DHS didn’t change the threat level before and after agents nabbed Najibullah Zazi because advisories to local police were deemed sufficient. Actually there’s a little more to it than that. James Carafano, a homeland-security expert at the Heritage Foundation in Washington and writer of one of my favorite and perhaps “largest” books on my bookshelf , responds in this article.

The investigation into a potential Al Qaeda plot in the US has triggered a raft of warnings from federal authorities about suspicious activity around stadiums, hotels, and train stations, among other places. But it hasn’t moved the color-coded terror alert system.

The Department of Homeland Security’s national threat level was yellow – or elevated – before and after counterterrorism agents nabbed Najibullah Zazi. He’s the Denver airport shuttle driver at the center the investigation into an alleged plot that authorities say involves plans to build peroxide-based bombs.

In fact, the alert system has been static since 2006, when British officials foiled a plan to blow up transatlantic flights headed to North America from London. That caused the warning to jump to red (severe) for those flights and to orange (high) for general attacks.

But there’s no reason this latest terror investigation should have raised the terror alert, says James Carafano, a homeland-security expert at the Heritage Foundation in Washington.

“What is widely perceived as a system to update the American people about terrorist threats is not really designed for that,” he says. “When you raise the color-coded system, it’s a blunt instrument” that triggers specific actions by law enforcement and federal agencies.

Read Full Article

Mass Transit Warning To Be On Alert For Terrorism

Several news agencies are reporting there’s a reminder today from federal officials that rail and transit systems can be vulnerable to terrorist attacks. A reminder is being sent out to law enforcement around the country. The FBI and the Homeland Security Department warn that improvised explosive devices are the most common method used in attacks on transit systems and authorities need to be vigilant in watching for suspicious items and/or activity.

Officials are recommending that transit system security officials conduct random sweeps at terminals and stations, and that police make random patrols and board some trains and buses.

Officials have said privately that the investigators who searched some New York City apartments earlier this month were worried about the possible use of backpack bombs on New York City mass transit trains.

Source
From Around The Country

Philadelphia – Philadelphia police said they have already been operating on an elevated security level before this weekend, supporting Septa and Amtrak on random sweeps. And for passengers we spoke to they say these days you can’t depend on anything to be completely safe.

“I was surprised there were so many Amtrak police officers here this afternoon. I thought something was going on here,” said Leslie Thompson.

But Thompson suspects they’re trying to make themselves visible after federal authorities say two men could have been plotting to attack the mass transit system somewhere in the U.S. Other passengers noticed.

Source

San Francisco- Bay Area mass transit operators tightening security following a nationwide terror alert. Bay Area operators are heeding the call to conduct random patrols and board some trains and buses to look for anything unusual. BART says it already does this. The agency will not announce any details about exactly how it will adhere to the warning.

“Many of the things that they are suggested are already taking place, many of them are behind the scenes,” BART spokesperson Jim Allison said. “The one exception to that is bag checks, and unless the alert level would be raised to a red level, then we would consider bag checks.”

Golden Gate Transit says it is also following recommendations to tighten security.

Read More – See Video

What To Do If You Spot Suspicious Activity

If you see suspicious behavior, do not confront the individuals involved.

Take note of the details:

S – Size (Jot down the number of people, gender, ages, and physical descriptions)

A – Activity (Describe exactly what they are doing)

L - Location (Provide exact location)

U – Uniform (Describe what they are wearing, including shoes)

T – Time (Provide date, time, and duration of activity)

E – Equipment (Describe vehicle, make, color etc., license plate, camera, guns, etc)

Suspicious activity is often recalled after an event. We must train ourselves to be on the lookout for things that are out of the ordinary and arouse suspicions.

Read More

Germany – al Qaeda Releases New Video, Threatens ‘Bad Awakening’

According to a Reuters report, an al-Qaeda spokesman warned Germans that if they don’t vote to change their government in the Sept. 27 national election, there will be a “bad awakening,” according to the U.S.-based IntelCenter.

On the almost 26-minute video, Abu Talha, also known as Bekay Harrach, spoke in German and told Muslims to avoid vital services for two weeks following the election and for Muslim youth to let al-Qaeda act first if jihad is declared in Germany, the Alexandria, Virginia-based IntelCenter said in an e-mailed report.

Read Full Article

Panel Recommends Changes To Color-coded Terror Alert

Whew…. After a 60-day review of the nation’s terror-alert system, a special task force is expected to recommend that the Obama administration keep color-coded alerts, but reduce the number of colors (possibly to 3 colors) or levels of risk.

Currently our NTARC  “Live Alert” is featured on over 50,000 web pages. If you have the advisory on your website, you will not need to make any changes. We will design the new alert to fit within the same area on your site. We are also planning to take this opportunity and design a couple of updated alerts with additional social media features, once DHS determines the new colors and look.

There are currently five colors in the coded terrorism advisories, long derided by late night TV comics and portrayed by some Democrats as a tool for Bush administration political manipulation.

A bipartisan task force is expected to recommend reducing that to three colors, an official familiar with the review told The Associated Press. The official did not provide details of spoke on condition of anonymity because the results of the review have not publicly been released. The review period concludes Tuesday.

Under the current system, green, at the bottom, signals a low danger of attack; blue signals a general risk; yellow, a significant risk; orange, a high risk; and red, at the top, warns of a severe threat. It was put in place after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and was designed to help emergency responders get prepared. The nation has never been below the third threat level, yellow — an elevated or significant risk of terrorist attack.

From Secretary Napolitano

Secretary Napolitano believes the American people deserve an alert system that is effective and trusted. She thanks the task force for its hard work on this important issue. The Secretary looks forward to reading the report and sharing its recommendations with the White House and other Cabinet officials so that appropriate follow-up action can be taken.

To view the task force report, visit Click Here Click Here

Though some members of the task force argued for scrapping the system altogether, that move could prove complicated because many local governments have policies and procedures triggered when the federal government changes the alert level.

Read Full Article

DHS – New Directives On Screening Electronic Media At Border

US Department of Homeland Security takes critical step to bolster the US efforts to combat international crime and terrorism while still respecting the civil liberties and privacy of individuals. “Keeping Americans safe in an increasingly digital world depends on our ability to lawfully screen materials entering the United States,” said Secretary Napolitano as she announced new directives to enhance and clarify oversight for searches of computers and other electronic media at U.S. ports of entry.

The new directives announced today strike the balance between respecting the civil liberties and privacy of all travelers while ensuring DHS can take the lawful actions necessary to secure our borders.”

The new directives address the circumstances under which U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) can conduct border searches of electronic media—consistent with the Department’s Constitutional authority to search other sensitive non-electronic materials, such as briefcases, backpacks and notebooks, at U.S. borders.

The directives, available at DHS.gov, will enhance transparency, accountability and oversight of electronic media searches at U.S. ports of entry and includes new administrative procedures designed to reflect broad considerations of civil liberties and privacy protections—measures designed to ensure that officers and agents understand their responsibilities to protect individual private information and that individuals understand their rights.

Searches of electronic media, permitted by law and carried out at borders and ports of entry, are vital to detecting information that poses serious harm to the United States, including terrorist plans, or constitutes criminal activity—such as possession of child pornography and trademark or copyright infringement.

The DHS Privacy Office also released today a Privacy Impact Assessment, available at www.dhs.gov/privacy, in connection with the new directives to enhance public understanding of the authorities, policies, procedures and controls employed by DHS during border searches of electronic data to protect individuals’ privacy. The DHS Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL) will also conduct a Civil Liberties Impact Assessment within 120 days.

In conjunction with the Privacy Office and CRCL, CBP will ensure training materials and procedures promote fair and consistent enforcement of the law relating to electronic media searches. CBP will also provide travelers subject to electronic device searches with clear and concise material informing them of the reasons for the search, how their data may be used and detailed information about their constitutional and statutory rights.

DHS conducts border searches of computers and other electronic media on a small percentage of international travelers seeking to enter the United States—searches often as basic as asking a traveler to turn on a device to ensure it is what it appears to be.

Between Oct. 1, 2008, and Aug. 11, 2009, CBP encountered more than 221 million travelers at U.S. ports of entry. Approximately 1,000 laptop searches were performed in these instances—of those, just 46 were in-depth.

The new directives will also allow DHS to develop automated, comprehensive data collection and analytic tools to facilitate accurate, thorough reporting on electronic media searched at the border, the outcomes of those searches and the nature of the data searched—further enhancing transparency and accountability.

Tom Ridge Claims He Was Pressured to Raise Terror Alert

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge claims in a new book that he was pressured by other members of President George W. Bush’s Cabinet to raise the nation’s terror alert level just before the 2004 presidential election.

Ridge says he objected to raising the security level despite the urgings of former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, according to a publicity release from Ridge’s publisher. He said the episode convinced him to follow through with his plans to leave the administration; he resigned on Nov. 30, 2004.

Bush’s former homeland security adviser, Frances Townsend, said Thursday that politics never played a role in determining alert levels.

Two tapes were released by Al Qaeda in the weeks leading up to the election — one by terrorist leader Usama bin Laden and the other by a man calling himself “Azzam the American.” Terrorism experts suspected that “Azzam the American” was Adam Gadahn, a 26-year-old Californian whom the FBI had been urgently seeking.

Townsend said the videotapes contained “very graphic” and “threatening” messages.

Townsend said that anytime there was a discussion of changing the alert level, she first spoke with Ridge and then, if necessary, called a meeting of the homeland security council comprising the secretaries of defense and homeland security, the attorney general and CIA and FBI directors. The group then made a recommendation to the president about whether the color-coded threat level should be raised.

“Never were politics ever discussed in this context in my presence,” she said.

Asked if there was any reason for Ridge to have felt pressured, Townsend said: “He was certainly not pressured. And, by the way, he didn’t object when it was raised and he certainly didn’t object when it wasn’t raised.”

Read Full Article

America Needs A More Effective Warning System

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has appointed a 17-member board to review and evaluate the Homeland Security Advisory System, the familiar, if often ignored, five-color terror-alert warning. The system is long overdue for review and should be improved.

Editor’s Note – I agree that there are long overdue changes needed to the current Homeland Security advisory system. But as pointed out, that doesn’t necessarily mean getting rid of the color-coded system. The color coded system is an widely recognized and could be very useful if specific actions were tied directly to the threat level. I also agree that the appearance or potential opportunity to use it politically needs to removed. A neutral agency or organization could administer the alert according to a very specific criteria, removing any doubt from the public’s mind as to the actual severity of the threat.

The system was established in March 2002 as a readiness measure for state and local law enforcement and the public generally. It has been the butt of many jokes, and most Americans have no idea what the current alert level is at any given time. But the system has some utility. It works best when there are concrete signs of increased terrorist activity. The last time the system went to red alert was in 2006 after evidence emerged about a plot in Britain to bomb trans-Atlantic airliners.

Unfortunately, the alert status often has fallen victim to politics. During the George W. Bush years, the president’s political opponents charged that the administration was trying to whip up hysteria any time the alert status moved up, despite concrete evidence that the terror threat had increased.

The political equation at the lower end of the scale is more mundane. The United States has been at yellow alert (signifying “significant risk” of attack) since 2006, with airlines at orange alert (”high risk”). Some localities maintain their own alert levels. For example, the New York City metro area is at orange alert and generally stays one level above the federal alert status.

Read Full Editorial At The Wash. Times

UK Drops Terror Alert Level To Lowest Level In 2 Years

Britain’s government reduced its terror alert level Monday to its lowest level since the July 7, 2005 bombings of the London transport system but warned that the threat remains serious.

The government did not explain its decision to downgrade the threat from “severe,” which Britain’s domestic spy agency MI5 describes on its Web site as a “high likelihood” of future terror attacks” to “substantial,” which means that such an attack remains a “strong possibility.”

Terror experts were divided on the thinking that lay behind the change.

Bob Ayers, a London-based former U.S. intelligence officer, said officials may have reduced the threat level in an effort to show that the war in Afghanistan — where British soldiers are engaged in an increasingly bloody fight with Taliban rebels — is helping keep the country safe from extremists. But he said the move sat uneasily with dire warnings voiced last year that British security services were tracking 2,000 people and dozens of suspected terrorist plots.

“Where did they go? Have they just disappeared?” Ayers asked.

via The Associated Press: UK drops terror alert level to lowest in 2 years.

Homeland Security Terror Alert System Under Review

A senior U.S. official says the Obama administration will announce Tuesday that it will review the nation’s multicolored terror alert system that was created after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is expected to appoint a panel to reevaluate the system and determine whether it should be changed, or possibly eliminated.

The five-tiered system that goes from green, which signals a low danger of attack, to red, which signals a severe threat of attack, has proven to be confusing at times. Critics say the different colors are too vague to deliver enough information to be useful.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the announcement has not yet been made public.

Our color-coded National Terror Alert “live alert” button was the starting point for this website over seven years ago. It’s now featured on over 50,000 web pages world-wide and viewed by millions, each month.

Source

Take Our Poll

The National Terror Alert Response Center will continue to maintain a “live terror alert” ; however we will wait upon the findings of this review prior to making our decision of how to best move forward.

Our position is that the color-coded system should remain. It’s highly recognizable with strong awareness across all age groups; however it needs to be overhauled. Each level of the alert should require specific criteria be met prior to elevation and correlate to actions needed to be taken by individuals, businesses and government agencies.

We hope to be considered for any “citizen advocate” positions available on the panel.

Should The Color-coded Terror Alert Advisory Remain?

• Yes
• No

View Results

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Warren Air Force Base Conducts National-level Terror Exercise

A simulated terrorist attack on a 90th Missile Wing ICBM launch facility provided the exercise scenario for Nuclear Weapon Accident/Incident Exercise 2009.

This national-level exercise involving 11 federal agencies and 1,300 personnel was the largest and most complex exercise ever conducted at a missile base.

Accident response and associated consequent management procedures are routinely practiced by local responders and the 90th Missile Wing; however, this exercise was made far more complex by the criminal aspect associated with terrorist activities.

Close and careful coordination with a number of federal agencies, particularly the FBI, was essential to gather information swiftly to identify and capture the terrorists responsible for the attack.

The exercise challenged responders in several ways. Balancing the need for personnel safety in a potentially hazardous situation while allowing law enforcement officials to gather time critical evidence for criminal response, required a clear understanding of the risks involved.

Minutes counted in determining which terrorist group was responsible and developing courses of action to track and capture them.

As response elements arrived from across the nation, the wing’s initial response force transitioned to a response task force with a formal transfer of incident command between the wing commander Col. Mike Morgan, 90th MW commander, and the

Twentieth Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Roger W. Burg.

General Burg then led the federal agency response for consequence management along with supporting the FBI in their counter-terrorism mission.

In addition to the FBI, major exercise players included the Department of Energy providing weapon system technical expertise, Homeland Security and FEMA for consequence management, US Northern Command for operational command of the IRF/RTF, the State of Wyoming and the Wyoming Guard for initial response and logistical support, and Air Force Space Command for filling key RTF leadership positions.

“This is the first time the country has brought together military operators with a very robust interagency package,” said Exercise Director and Director of Nuclear Support at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency U. S. Army Brig. Gen. Ernie Audino “This is a complex exercise with many moving parts.” “It is critical to make the U.S. military the best in the world,” he continued. “And it’s not just the extensive training we go through, but it’s how we capture the lessons learned from that training. It is an endless, necessary cycle.”

Source

Al-Qaeda Terror Plot To Bomb Easter Shoppers Broken Up – UK

An al-Qaeda cell was days away from carrying out an “Easter spectacular” of co-ordinated suicide bomb attacks on shopping centres in Manchester, police believe.

Sources told The Daily Telegraph that the arrests of 12 men in the north west of England on Wednesday were linked to a suspected plan to launch a devastating attack this weekend.

Some of the suspects were watched by MI5 agents as they filmed themselves outside the Trafford Centre on the edge of Manchester, the Arndale Centre in the city centre, and the nearby St Ann’s Square.

Police were forced to round up the alleged plotters after they were overheard discussing dates, understood to include the Easter bank holiday, one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year.

“It could have been the next few days and they were talking about 10 days at the outside,” one source said. “We had to act.” Police are now engaged in a search for an alleged bomb factory, where explosives might have been assembled.

If such a plot was carried out, it would almost certainly have been Britain’s worst terrorist attack, with the potential to cause more deaths than the suicide attacks of July 7, 2005, when 52 people were murdered.

A plan to arrest the suspects in a series of co-ordinated raids yesterday morning had to be hastily brought forward to Wednesday afternoon after the country’s most senior anti-terrorism officer, Assistant Commissioner Bob Quick, of the Metropolitan Police, was photographed going into Downing Street carrying a briefing paper with top secret details of Operation Pathway in full view.

Yesterday morning, Mr Quick resigned after he was told by the Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, that he had lost her confidence and that of MI5.

As a result of his blunder, hundreds of police officers had to be scrambled to arrest the suspects, who were being monitored round the clock.

Former police chiefs pointed out that rounding up suspected suicide bombers in public places in Liverpool, Manchester and Clitheroe, Lancs, had put other people at risk and could also have compromised the operation.

Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, described the alleged plot as “very big” and said investigators were looking at links with Pakistan.

Mr Brown said: “We know that there are links between terrorists in Britain and terrorists in Pakistan. That is an important issue for us to follow through and that’s why I will be talking to President Zardari about what Pakistan can do to help us in the future.”

All but one of the men arrested were Pakistani nationals who came to Britain on student visas. This suggested a possible new tactic by al-Qaeda, which had previously used British-based extremists who travelled to Pakistan for training.

The issue of student visas represents a potential security nightmare for the police and MI5. There are 330,000 foreign students in Britain and around 10,000 such visas are issued every year to Pakistanis alone.

Source – Read Full Article

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• U.S. al Qaeda effort lacking, official warns (cnn.com)

al Qaeda-Taliban Combo Has Chemical Weapon Formula

The al-Qaida-Taliban combo plans to use parts of the Middle East as launch pads for attacks against the west. Not only so, the groups

have also developed some expertise in making bio-chemical weapons, NWFP police chief Malik Navid told a Pakistan National Assembly’s standing committee.

Navid warned that the Pakistan government needed to urgently focus on containing militancy as it spread from its bases. “Taliban’s philosophy is to create pockets everywhere,” he said, adding that jihadi groups were moving through southern Punjab and eventually aimed to reach the financial hub of Karachi.

The frank assessment of the police official serves to confirm concerns about whether Pakistan and its military complex in particular was prepared to clearly acknowledge the threat posed by jihadists given the army and ISI see Taliban as allies in ensuring a “friendly” dispensation in Afghanistan while also feeding the jihad in Jammu and Kashmir. The army’s sporadic efforts to roll back jihadis lacked conviction and have predictably shown poor results.

Navid’s testimony also points to the virtual merger of al-Qaida with Taliban, with the latter being both part of the core and the major striking arm. Indian intelligence assessments see anti-India groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba being very much a part of this conglomerate.

via ‘Qaida-Taliban combo has chemical weapon formula’ – South Asia – World – The Times of India.

Thousands Receive Terror Training In UK

Thousands of UK workers are being trained to help respond to a future terror attack as part of an updated counter-terror strategy, ministers say.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said shop and hotel workers would be among 60,000 people able to deal with an incident.

The updated approach, aimed at tackling immediate terrorist threats and the causes of extremism, would be the most comprehensive in the world, she added.

But the Tories said not enough action was being taken against extremists.

The Home Office’s new counter-terrorism document – to be published on Tuesday – will go into more detail than ever before in the interests of public accountability.

It will reflect intelligence opinion that the biggest threat to the UK comes from al-Qaeda-linked groups and will also take into account recent attacks on hotels in the Indian city of Mumbai.

Ms Smith told BBC One’s Politics Show: “What we’re completely clear about is that if we’re going to address the threat from terrorism, we need to do that alongside the 60,000 people that we’re now training up to respond to a terrorist threat, in everywhere from our shopping centres to our hotels.

“We need to do it alongside the 3,000 police officers now working on counter-terror and we need to do it with international partners.

“This is no longer something you can do behind closed doors and in secret.”

The paper – called Contest Two – will update the Contest strategy developed by the Home Office in 2003, which was later detailed in the Countering International Terrorism document released in 2006.

Over the last six years the strategy has concentrated on preventing radicalisation of potential terror recruits to disrupting terrorist operations, reducing the UK’s vulnerability and ensuring Britain is ready for the consequences of any terror attack.

The updated strategy will increase the focus on challenging individuals and groups who undermine the UK’s “shared values” – even if they are not breaking the law.

Source

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