Solutions to the Terrorist Threat

Our job as a nation, and our clear obligation to ourselves and our children, is to prevent September 11 from ever happening again. That seems obvious. At the moment, however, we are nearly as vulnerable as we were on September 11, 2001.

We have made some progress. For example, under President Bush and Tom Ridge there have been noticeable changes at airports, the 2002 Winter Olympics went off successfully and we have dealt a significant blow to terrorist forces in Afghanistan. That is a start.

Complacency

According to this article: "Now, almost six months [after September 11], security is certainly more intense than it was in August. But a kind of complacency seems to have set in, even as senior officials in Washington begin to talk more urgently about the terrorist threat from the sea. Many of the off-duty Port Arthur police officers who were hired to patrol the refineries in the fall have been sent back to the station. The two additional Coast Guard boats sent here to patrol the harbor have left..."

As you have seen on the Scenarios page, however, there is a tremendous amount of work that we must do if we want to truly secure our nation. There are significant threats at nuclear plants, refineries, major ports, chemical plants, power substations, pipelines -- the list is long -- that all need protection. They are wide-open targets right now, and we are already becoming complacent. One goal of EndingTerrorism.com is to help America to see how serious the terrorist threat is, and how much is at stake. We need to build a strong national consensus and take appropriate action quickly.

We must begin eliminating our vulnerabilities one by one in a concerted nationwide effort. The alternative is to wait for the next attack, which will surely be more horrific than the last.

The following list acts as a general blueprint for action. Each of the Scenarios also contains a list of specific solutions. If you have additional ideas, send them to the forums or by email.

Secure the fuel supply, chemical industry, the water supply and the power grid

The oil industry, the chemical industry, the power grid and our water systems were all built largely under the assumption that terrorism does not exist. Now we know that assumption to be untrue. This leaves us with highly vulnerable systems. We must start eliminating the vulnerabilities today. If this process rasises the price of gasoline by 2 cents a gallon, or the price of electricity by a penny per kilowatt-hour, it does not really matter. The economic losses in an attack will be so astronomically greater that there is no comparison.

Short term, the emphasis should be on protecting the systems we have with guards and technology. Long term it means redesigning these large systems to make them far less vulnerable to attack.

See the following scenarios for specific details and solutions:

Secure Our Nuclear Reactors

Nuclear reactors are a special case because an attack on a nuclear power plant can contaminate a large area. All nuclear plants currently have security systems. However, these systems can be easily undermined by determined terrorists because many plants lack physical barriers.

Because of the risks posed by these plants, the short term solution is a significant military presence at each plant. Long term the solution involves very heavy physical barriers placed at multiple perimeters, along with sky survelliance.

See the nuclear plant scenario for details.

Harden Buildings Against Attack

In the past decade we have seen buildings blown up by truck bombs, incinerated by jumbo jets, and contaminated by anthrax. Right now our large buildings are soft. We can harden them by fixing their vulnerable ventilation systems, restricting vehicular access to them, and making airplanes smart enough to know that they should not fly into them. See these scenarios for details:

Make Airplanes "Smart"

As seen on September 11, 2001, jumbo jets are very effective weapons. They carry up to 20,000 gallons of highly flammable jet fuel. Once a terrorist gets control of one, he can fly it anywhere and destroy anything. Logical targets include skyscrapers, stadiums and nuclear power plants.

Much has been made of the idea of "remote control jumbo jets" after September 11. The idea is that, after a hijacking, a person on the ground would take over the jet and fly it by remote control. This is a good idea, but it assumes two things:

  • It assumes that the pilot is not the one hijacking the plane. If the pilot is the terrorist, no one will know that anything has gone wrong until the last minute (see this scenario).
  • It assumes that there is time to react. If the terrorists use a GPS to track the plane's position and hijack it moments away from the target, there might not be time for people on the ground to react.
For these reasons, planes should be smart enough so that they simply refuse to fly in restricted airspace. Using their auto-pilots and GPS systems, this would be easy to do. The plane would have a map programmed into its computer that identifies all restricted areas. These areas would include nuclear plants, large buildings, stadiums, sensitive manufacturing plants, toxic wate dumps, etc. The map can be flexible. For example, the plane might know that it is allowed to fly over a certain facility as long as the altitude is greater than 20,000 feet.

If the pilot tries to steer the plane into a resticted area, the plane simply refuses to do it and sends an alarm to the ground. At that point, the remote-control idea would be useful.

We should make our planes smart enough so that they never fly into a skyscraper or any other large target again.

Solve the Russian Nuclear Threat

It is quite possible that the former Soviet Union is a bigger enemy now than it was during the cold war. Every day in the news there is more concern about nuclear threats emanating from the region. For example:

  • There are big concerns about terrorists acquiring Soviet nuclear suitcase bombs
  • There are big concerns about terrorists obtaining Soviet thermonuclear warheads
  • There are big concerns about terrorists obtaining Soviet weapons-grade plutonium
  • There are big concerns about former Soviet nuclear scientists defecting to the terrorists [article]
  • There are big concerns about large quantities of nuclear materials for dirty bombs being readily available [Article]
We should invest the money, time and effort necessary to solve all of these problems. We should disarm the former Soviet Union. We should shut down their nuclear reactors or bring them up to modern standards in terms of security and safety. We should track down and secure loose nuclear materials. We should find, transplant and employ all former nuclear scientists. Will it be expensive? yes. Should we have to do it? no. Nonetheless, it is a big threat and we are apparently doing nothing of substance about it today. In combination with the elimination of third-world nuclear bombs (see below), we would significantly improve the safety of the planet by doing this.

Protect against EMP

The EMP scenario describes an EMP attack as America's Achilles heel. It is a huge problem today, but we need to start the process of solving it. See the EMP scenario for details.

Protect against biological and chemical attacks in buildings

Every public building today has extensive fire detection and supression equipment. It is time to mandate and install similar equipment for detecting biological and chemical attacks. It is too easy for someone to release sarin, ebola, anthrax or a variety of other substances into a building, mall, subway station, stadium or convention center and jeoprodize the lives of tens of thousands of people.

Eliminate Anonymous Mail

The Unabomber turned letter bombing into a science, and the recent anthrax mailings show just how easy it is for someone to mail a lethal payload right into someone's office or home. What these events show us is that the current mail system, where anyone can anonymously mail anything to anyone anywhere, is a security hole and an anachronism. In today's world, why would anyone allow a totally anonymous stranger to hand-deliver anything they like into our homes? The only reason we accept this huge security risk is because "that's the way it has always been." The solution is to end the ability of a person to mail things with anonymity.

There are technological solutions to this problem that are relatively straightforward. They will raise the cost of postage, but they will secure the postal system against attack. See the Anthrax mail scenario for details.

Eliminate the Terrorists

Without terrorists, there can be no terrorism. Terrorism relies on that tiny fraction of the human population -- perhaps 0.1% at the most -- who feel that something can be accomplished, some statement made, by killing thousands of innocent people indiscriminately and doing billions of dollars in property damage. If we can eliminate these people, we put a big hole in the terrorist threat.

"Eliminating terrorists" is what we are doing in Afghanistan. The September 11 attack was so savage that it demanded a response, so we went after the terrorists directly with massive force. We specifically targeted Osama bin Ladin and his lieutenants. We destroyed all camps and facilities operated by al-Qaeda, the terrorist network Osama bin Laden leads. And we destroyed the Taliban government that harbored and supported these terrorists.

That was an appropriate response. That same response should be applied to other terrorists organizations and states. When a nation or organization declares, "We will use terrorism to get what we want", our response should be swift and immediate termination of that nation or organization. Hamas is a good example. So is Iraq -- a country has certainly engaged in the attempt to create nuclear, biological and chemical weapons of mass destruction, with the intent to use them on targets in the Western world.

If you were Iraq, seething in anger after the Gulf War and free from inspections, what would you be doing right now? You would be building weapons of mass destruction and plotting their deployment. Or you would be orchestrating covert terrorist attacks inside the U.S. using September 11 as a model. The solution is to destroy Iraq's ability to develop weapons or sponsor terrorists, and to then evaluate other countries for similar threats. The ability of these countries to support terrorists with training and weapons should be eliminated. To do otherwise invites attack.

Every terrorist, and every terrorist organization, deserves the same treatment as bin Laden. Terrorism must have terrorists to exist. Every time we eliminate a terrorist, we reduce the threat of terrorism.

At the same time, we should apply decisive force to eliminate the criminal element that seems to run freely in the United States today. An urban gang that harasses and kills people in a city is a terrorist organization. Drug dealers are also terrorists. We should eliminate them. Drug dealers and the import drug trade show the world how wide open our borders are, and how little control we have inside our own society. We should regain control.

When he arrived in office, Mayor Giuliani made a point of deterring a host of seemingly small street crimes like graffiti, loitering, panhandling and prostitution. He did this because he knew that street crime creates an undercurrent of fear for normal citizens. If, every time you turn around, there is another sign of evil -- whether it is spray paint on a subway car or aggressive panhandling -- what it means is that the forces of evil are winning. It also means that society is not working, because the purpose of society is to bring order. In the process of ending these small crimes, Giuliani not only made the city significantly better for both residents and tourists, but he also sent a powerful message to crimanals that helped to reduce overall crime levels throughout the city.

Right now, drug dealers run freely in our society. Tens of thousands of senseless murders occur every year. Burglary is so pervasive that homes and cars are routinely armed with security systems. We should eliminate all of this noise from our society, using the same ideas that Mayor Giuliani used. Illegal drugs, for example, should be impossible to obtain in the United States. Not only would this make our society better and safer for everyone who lives here, but it would also send a message to terrorists that we are running a tight ship rather than a chaotic menagerie.

How would we start? We would first solve the known problems of Hamas and Iraq. We would evaluate and deal with other threats internationally. We would also start a concerted effort to eliminate domestic problems. By sending a force comparable to the force in Afghanistan into the South American drug cartels, and by infiltrating and eliminating drug organizations in the United States, we would end the drug problem. By infiltrating urban gangs, we can destroy their leadership. A decisive effort would make an amazing difference in this country.

Prepare for Terrorism

We need to be prepared to handle known terrorist scenarios. Right now, we certainly are not.

One of the most amazing parts about September 11 was the fact that it caught all of us completely by surprise. Airports were unprepared when 19 terrorists walked through their gates. Pilots and flight attendants were unprepared when the terrorists came at them with box cutters. Air traffic controllers were unprepared when terrorists took over the flights. The Air Force did not respond to force the planes down. In short, no one was ready for the scenario. No one had prepared for or rehearsed a response. The public was completely oblivious to the possibility.

We need to openly discuss and practice terrorist scenarios as a society so we are ready for them if they happen. For example, we need to practice what we would do if 30% of the nation's power generating capacity went off-line. We need to practice for biological and chemical attacks, as well as nuclear scenarios. In other words, we need a "play book" to prepare us for different scenarios and to allow us to handle them if they occur. When was the last time we practiced a civil defense scenario, or even spoke openly about one?

We should have concrete plans in place that prepare us, as a society, for scenarios like:

A good example of unpreparedness was seen when a hunter shot the Alaska pipeline. Apparently the pipeline authority had never practiced a leak scenario, and 300,000 gallons of oil leaked out of one small bullet hole before the damage could be contained. Imagine the response in a real attack. The pipeline authority should be rehearsing disaster scenarios every day, and something as simple as an accidental bullet hole should be handled efficiently and routinely. The fact that it was not shows how unprepared we are.

Widely publicizing civil defense plans would be extremely easy. For example, there could be a section added to the phone book, and then public service announcements would let people know it is there. The civil defense plan for a city would cover scenarios like loss of power, loss of water, major roadway disruptions, evacuation plans, etc. and tell citizens 1) How to prepare (buying a generator, having a supply of bottled water on hand), and 2) what to do in different emergencies. A nationwide effort like this would do a tremendous amount of good in terms of preparation and readiness. In the event of an emergency, our response would be organized instead of chaotic.

Eliminate nuclear capabilities in all unstable nations

India and Pakistan have recently detonated nuclear bombs to demonstrate that they have a nuclear capability. Both explosions came apparently as a total surprise to the U.S. intelligence community. Iraq, Iran and Korea are thought to have nuclear programs under way.

When rogue states and unstable third world countries possess nuclear weapons, it makes the world a dangerous place for everyone on the planet. For example, if Sadam ever gets his hands on a nuclear weapon, it is impossible to predict exactly what he will do. However, it is a safe bet that millions of people will pay with their lives, and the economic toll will be incredible. Nuclear capabilities in the hands of these countries also spreads the technology to terrorists more quickly. Here's an example from the Washington Post: "Most disturbing to U.S. intelligence was another leak from Pakistan's program that has not been mentioned in public. According to American sources, a third Pakistani nuclear scientist tried to negotiate the sale of an atomic weapon design to Libya. The Post was unable to learn which Pakistani blueprint was involved, whether the transaction was completed, or what became of the scientist after discovery. Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is believed to include bombs of relatively simple design, built around cores of highly enriched uranium, and more sophisticated weapons employing Chinese implosion technology to compress plutonium to a critical mass."

The United States should do everything in its power to destroy the nuclear capabilities in India, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, China and Korea, and should do everything in its power to discover and eliminate emerging nuclear threats. The risk is simply too great for us to be as complacent as we are today.

Distribute key people across the country and harden the places where they meet against nuclear attack

As a society, we have a tendency to concentrate key personnel in very small geographic areas. It makes sense from a social standpoint, because it makes face-to-face interaction easier. However, it makes the job of terrorists extremely easy. For example:

  • A nuclear suitcase bomb placed properly in Washinton DC and detonated at the right time could take out the President, VP, cabinet, congress, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and much of the federal bureaucracy. It would completely decapitate the federal government.
  • A nuclear bomb detonated near the financial district in NY city could decapitate the U.S. financial community.
  • A nuclear bomb detonated near the pentagon could decapitate the military.
Anywhere that we concentrate key people, we create a dangerous target.

The solution is to distribute important personnel so that there is never a concentration of them in any one city at any time. When they do need to meet together, it should occur in secure facilities. Today's technology makes spreading people out much easier -- we should take advantage of the technology and accelerate the process.

See The suitcase bomb scenario for more information.

Control the flow of vehicles into urban areas

Allowing vehicles to move freely into an urban area invites terrorists to create car bombs and truck bombs. Monitoring or banning vehicle traffic in key urban areas is now a necessity. Truck bombs are easy to create and pose a major threat.

In some cities this proposal will be difficult to implement city-wide, but in others it would be relatively easy, and there are certainly important areas within any city that can be secured.

There has been talk for some time about banning automobile traffic (except taxis) in Manhattan. That combined with inspections of all incoming trucks would secure Manhattan against truck bombs. In Washington DC, certain streets are already closed to vehicular traffic. A strategic analysis of the city would block off many more.

These scenarios are related:

Ignore Terrorists

In a media-driven society, we have a tendency to pay incredible attention to terrorists. For example, if a Palestinian suicide bomber blows himself up in Jeruselem and kills two Israelis, every news organization in the world reports it. That is exactly what terrorists want. That publicity is one of the primary reasons for terrorism. Terrorists use terrorism to gain attention for their causes and to focus media attention on their demands.

Look at the treatment Timothy McVeigh received prior to his execution. We wrote miles of copy about him. We reported on his every move, twist and thought. We allowed him to speak to reporters and publish his thoughts and opinions. Would we have given Timothy McVeigh one moment of media attention if he had not been a terrorist? Of course not -- he was an idiot and a psychopath.

Imagine how different the world would be if Timothy McVeigh, first, was unknown to us by name. What if he was unable to speak to reporters or the public once captured so that he could not glorify himself or spread his hatred? What if, after a fair trial, he was convicted, sentenced to death and executed immediately without fanfare? In other words, what if we totally ignored him? What if, after capture, he had ceased to exist?

By denying terrorists the opportunity to glorify themselves on national TV, and to voice their hatred, motivation and grievances, we give them one less reason to commit terror.

What Should We Do Today?

Here are several things that we should do immediately:

  • We should make the creation of truck bombs much harder by limiting access to explosives
  • We should post military forces at nuclear plants and harden our nuclear power plants against attack
  • We should post military forces at the nation's largest power plants and transmission substations
  • We should post military forces at the nation's largest refineries
  • We should post military forces at the nation's most dangerous chemical facilities
  • We should do whatever it takes to protect the Alaska pipeline
  • We should create and widely publicize civil defense plans that would help the nation weather a major terrorist attack

In the coming months:

  • We should attack and eliminate all nuclear, chemical and biological threats that we know of worldwide, including nuclear capabilities in India and Pakistan, chemical and biological weapons programs in Iraq, etc.
  • We should control vehicular access to cities
  • We should distribute our oil infrastructure much more widely throughout the nation and start switching to a different energy platform (e.g. hydrogen) that does not require centralization and foreign dependency.
  • We should redesign and decentralilize the water and electricity utilities so that they cannot be affected by point attacks.
  • We should end the illegal drug trade in this country as well as illegal immigration, because both show how wide open our borders are. Illegal drugs and immigrants make America look like the Keystone Cops. Instead we should look like Navy SEALS.
  • We should harden infrastructure and important electronics against EMP attack
  • We should end anonymous mail and inspect all mail flowing through the postal system
  • We should spread key personnel to many different cities instead of concentrating them in small areas.
We should take these steps publicly, domestically under the authority of Tom Ridge and the department of Homeland Defense, and internationally under the authority of the U.S. military and diplomatic channels.

Conclusion

Inevitably, the question arises: What is all of this going to cost, and can we afford it? Think about it this way:

  • If gas prices go up a few cents a gallon to secure the nation's fuel supply, and
  • If power costs a penny or two more per kilowatt-hour to secure nuclear plants, conventional power plants and the transmission grid, and
  • If postage goes up a few cents to secure the nation's postal system, then...
What possible difference does it make? Compared to the unmitigated disasters discussed in the fuel crisis scenario, the nuclear plant scenario and the anthrax scenario, each of which could do trillions of dollars in damage, what meaning does 2 cents a gallon have? To avoid the next attack, we must do the work now to secure our nation.

Right now, the United States is vulnerable to a wide variety of terrorists threats. Many of these scenarios are described on this site. By eliminating the vulnerabilities, we make it harder and harder for terrorists to carry out their missions or to cause significant damage.

As citizens we should demand more from our government and corporations. We should get behind Tom Ridge, the department of Homeland Security and the military and make our nation, and our world, as safe as we possibly can. September 11 showed us the incredible destructive power of motivated terrorists, and September 11 was only the tip of the iceberg. Today what we should be seeing is an incredible, publicly visible effort on a variety of fronts to secure the nation. At this moment we see nothing of the sort. We have a ticking time bomb on our hands waiting for the next psychopath to set it off. We must end that vulnerability today.


Links


For a complete list of terrorist scenarios please click here For solutions
please click here
To comment on any scenario or
suggest new ones
please click here
Newsletter
Enter your email address
to receive the newsletter


© Copyright 2002 by BYG Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.
Home - Scenarios - Solutions - Targets - Weapons
Mission - Why? - Contact - Forums
Legal