4 weather buoys to get transmitters

By Jack Encarnacao, Globe Correspondent | December 31, 2004

The Coast Guard will probably add transmitters next year to at least four weather buoys off the Boston coastline, a move designed to improve security by extending the reach of monitoring signals from large tankers, barges, and cruise ships as they enter area ports.

The buoys are among 70 arrayed on coastlines from Maine to Alaska, a system created to prevent vessel collisions and respond to other maritime accidents, such as the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, by improving communications between ship captains and authorities. After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, officials accelerated improvements to the $50 million system to help improve homeland security.

The new transmitters are designed to bolster the Automated Identification System, which sends data -- such as cargo, crew, and recent ports of call -- to the Coast Guard as vessels approach port. Now, ships begin transmitting within 25 miles of a port. The added transmitters will allow the Coast Guard to receive data from vessels hundreds of miles away.
Dana Goward, who oversees the system for the Coast Guard, said yesterday"

Coral Ring Repelled Waves,
Leaving Lower Death Toll;
Conservation Efforts Pay

By JAMES HOOKWAY
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
December 30, 2004; Page A7

MALE, Maldives -- The pristine coral reefs that draw hundreds of thousands of visitors each year to this far-flung island nation in the Indian Ocean may have spared the country the worst of the devastation wreaked by the tsunami that hammered countries across Asia this week.

Officials here say the extensive reefs that ring the Maldives smothered the tsunami, preventing it from breaking on the archipelago's most heavily populated atolls. Though 69 people are confirmed dead in the country so far, it could have been much worse if unhampered tourism and practices such as dynamite fishing had been allowed to damage the intricate 500-mile network of coral reefs that buffer the islands from the open sea.

"The waves hit the islands flat, with little force. They didn't break, it was mostly just a swell," says Ismail Firag, deputy director of planning and development at the Maldives ministry of tourism, and who once studied the effect of tsunamis in Fiji. "I was worried that the reef would break up, but it didn't."

By KATE WILTROUT, MATTHEW ROY AND TIM MCGLONE, The Virginian-Pilot
December 30, 2004

NORFOLK -� FBI agents and members of the Joint Terrorism Task Force responded to the scene of a reported bomb threat near Norfolk Naval Station shortly after noon today, but there�s no indication that the incident is a genuine terrorist threat, an FBI spokesman said.

�We�re evaluating and assessing the situation,� said Phil Mann, an FBI spokesman. �We have no indication that anybody�s been harmed.�

Two Hampton Roads Transit buses were stopped on Hampton Boulevard near the naval station after a bomb threat was phoned in this morning, officials said. Police have erected barricades on Hampton at Greenbrier Avenue blocking traffic to the base.

Jim Brantley, a public affairs officer for the Navy�s Fleet Forces Command, which is headquartered at the naval station, said at about 12:25 p.m. that Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal teams and civilian police teams were getting ready to inspect the buses. Passengers have been taken off the buses, which were directed to Fleet Park, a Navy park located outside the gates of the largest naval station in the world.

CLEVELAND - Authorities are investigating a mysterious laser beam that was directed into the cockpit of a commercial jet traveling at more than 8,500 feet.

The beam appeared Monday when the plane was about 15 miles from Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, the FBI said.

'It was in there for several seconds like (the plane) was being tracked,' FBI agent Robert Hawk said.

The pilot was able to land the plane, and air traffic controllers used radar to determine the laser came from a residential area in suburban Warrensville Heights.
Hawk said the laser had to have been fairly sophisticated to track a plane traveling at that altitude. Authorities had no other leads, and are investigating whether the incident was a prank or if there was a more sinister motive.

In Colorado Springs, Colo., Monday night, two pilots reported green pulsating laser lights shined into their cockpits. Both the passenger plane and a cargo plane landed without problems.

DOUG SIMPSON

Associated Press


NEW ORLEANS - The Coast Guard plans to use dozens of buoys bobbing off United States coastlines to extend the reach of a security system that monitors large vessels heading in and out of ports.

The buoys, from 9 to 39 feet across, already are in place, used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to collect wind, temperature and wave data.

The weather service has agreed to let the Coast Guard add transmitters to about 70 buoys by 2007, said Jeff High, a director of the Guard's Maritime Domain Awareness Program in Washington, D.C.

The transmitters will connect to a communications network that this year began receiving signals from all large tankers, barges and cruise vessels heading in and out of major U.S. ports. To legally enter a U.S. port, each vessel must be equipped with a machine that automatically radios information - its cargo, crew list, recent ports of call - to the Coast Guard.

The buoys are intended to extend the network's reach - the Guard now receives the automated data only when a vessel is within about 25 miles of a port. The floating transmitters will relay the information from hundreds of miles off shore, from the middle of Lake Superior and off coastlines from Alaska to Maine.

December 28, 2004

GIVEN BOSTON'S population density, airport location, working port, and long list of potential targets, it makes sense that city officials would coordinate certain federal homeland security funds for the immediate region. But with that power comes the responsibility to distribute the funds in a fair and timely fashion as well as build the kind of regional capacity needed to respond to threats or actual incidents of terrorism.

A Globe report yesterday revealed that Boston officials have been slow to fund homeland security initiatives in Brookline, Cambridge, Chelsea, Everett, Somerville, Quincy, Revere, and Winthrop, where public safety officials have received just $939,000 of the $3.6 million due them from a federally funded urban areas security initiative. This is hardly the time for Boston officials to be holding back on their neighbors.

'No local government can respond to a major terror attack by itself,' warns Edward Flynn, the state's secretary of public safety. 'The capacity of its local partners is as important as its own.'

The slow distribution may have as much to do with the inability of vendors to keep up with the demand for protective suits, special respirators, and antidotes for dangerous agents needed by first responders as it does with bureaucratic entanglements. Carlo Boccio, director of Boston's office of homeland security, predicts that 95 percent of the funds -- including Boston's $11.8 million share -- will be expended or encumbered by the coming summer.

HOMELAND SECURITY IS EVERYONE'S RESPONSIBILITY - WE MUST ALL WORK TOGETHER TO PROTECT OUR WAY OF LIFE.

Unfortunately some people think that by ignoring the issue, it will go away. This line of thinking is faulty and hazardous to future generations.

NYSun.com | December 28, 2004
by Jacob Gershman

Furious students and faculty members at the Borough of Manhattan Community College are demanding that the school abandon plans for a certificate program on security management. They view it as an endorsement of the Bush administration's Department of Homeland Security.

Like hundreds of other community colleges across the nation since the September 11 attacks, the two-year CUNY school in Lower Manhattan is hoping to take advantage of the surging demand for security training. The school's faculty proposed a program in May that would teach students about threats to homeland security and how to counter them.

December 27, 2004

Source: www.kval.com
By Carla Castano

Corvallis - The conditions off of the Oregon coast are very close to those impacted by the earthquake in Asia... leaving many to wonder if it could happen here.

Monday scientists at OSU's Hinsdale Wave Research Laboratory conducted a tsunami simulation to learn more about how to reduce the destruction of a tsunami if one were to hit the west coast.

Imperial Hubris: Why the West Is Losing the War on Terror

Listen to NPR Interview

Morning Edition, June 24, 2004 � Imperial Hubris, a new book due out next month, argues that the United States is losing the war on terror. It faults senior U.S. officials who have "delayed action, downplayed intelligence, ignored repeated warnings" and behaved as "moral cowards." NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with the book's author, an active senior CIA officer -- and former head of the agency's Osama bin Laden unit -- who asked to remain anonymous.

SAM HANANEL
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Homeland Security Department has allowed federal grants for improving security at America's ports to be spent on low priority problems rather than the most serious vulnerabilities, the agency's outgoing watchdog says.

In a draft report to be released next month, Homeland Security Department Inspector General Clark Kent Ervin says port security spending should be governed by the most pressing priorities rather than local politics.
Blaming inadequate staffing and poor coordination, Ervin said the department's port security grant program needs better oversight to make sure projects that get money meet security goals.

'The DHS does not have a strong grant evaluation process in place by which to address post-award administration issues, including measuring progress in accomplishing DHS' grant objectives,' Ervin said in a recent summary of the report.

The summary was contained in another report from Ervin's office, 'Major Management Challenges Facing the Department of Homeland Security,' which was posted on the DHS web site.

The grant program has been criticized in the past for being too cumbersome and for awarding money to projects of questionable use. To make his point, Ervin cited the report of the Sept. 11 Commission, which said homeland security spending should not be used as a 'pork barrel' for politicians to send money to their home districts.

The report is one of the last submitted by Ervin, who earned a reputation as a blunt critic of the department before leaving the job earlier this month. Ervin won a recess appointment to the position in December 2003, but the Senate failed to confirm him and the White House appeared unlikely to nominate him again.

Tuesday, December 28, 2004; Page A18

WHOMEVER President Bush chooses as his next nominee to head the Department of Homeland Security would be well-advised to take a look at a spine-tingling new chart before accepting the job. The chart -- too large to reprint here but available for viewing at www.hsc.house.gov -- depicts the intricate web of congressional committees and subcommittees with oversight authority for the gargantuan department. There are 79 such panels; every single senator and at least 412 of the 435 House members have some degree of responsibility for homeland security operations. By contrast, the Defense Department, with a budget 10 times that of DHS, reports to 'just' 36 committees and subcommittees.

From the perspective of national security, this fragmented, dysfunctional structure is sheer lunacy. Department officials spend too much time responding to their many congressional masters; last year alone, according to the departing secretary, Tom Ridge, he and other top department officials testified 145 times before various committees and subcommittees. Moreover, such balkanized oversight is less effective rather than more so, because members of Congress suffer from parochial viewpoints influenced by their individual committee assignments and fail to develop a broad overview of homeland security priorities. "

WASHINGTON The Homeland Security Department is coming under fire from its own inspector general for letting politics influence the use of federal safety grants.

In a draft report to be released next month, Clark Ervin advises that spending should be governed by the most pressing issues, rather than lower-priority problems.

Ervin's report says there's not enough staffing and there is poor coordination in the port security grant program. The report recommends more oversight.

The Department of Homeland Security has distributed about half a (b) billion dollars in grants for port security over the past few years.
Ervin, an outspoken critic of the department, has served out his term and is not expected to be reappointed.

Tsunamis: Facts About Killer Waves

National Geographic News
December 27, 2004

The Christmas weekend tsunami that was generated by the most powerful earthquake in decades is believed to have killed more than 20,000 people and displaced a million more.
The epicenter of Sunday's magnitude-9 quake was under the Indian Ocean near the Indonesian island of Sumatra. Within hours killer waves slammed into the shores of Indian Ocean countries, snatching lives and demolishing property from Africa to Thailand.

While relatively rare in recent centuries in the Indian Ocean, tsunamis have been generated in every ocean of the world, but none more so than the Pacific Ocean. Sooner or later every shoreline is struck by a tsunami.

Find out the essential facts about these giant waves: what causes them, how they work, the most disastrous on record, and signs that warn of their arrival. This is information you need to protect yourself.

Read the full story >>

Homeland Security 101
By MARGOT ROOSEVELT

Monday, Dec. 20, 2004

Three years after the al-Qaeda attacks, academia is embracing the post-9/11 world. Some 200 colleges and universities offer homeland-security studies much as, decades ago, national-security programs sprang up to address the issues of the cold war. Community colleges � already in the business of training fire fighters, police officers and medical technicians to deal with hurricanes and earthquakes � were first to mount new certification programs tailored to unnatural disasters. Four-year institutions quickly followed. Last fall San Diego State launched an interdisciplinary master's degree in homeland security, attracting students from nursing, criminal justice and political science. The University of Southern California is offering an online master's in system safety and security, for which students examine such problems as how to defend civilian airplanes against surface-to-air missiles. Engineering schools are adding classes on potential cyberattacks on the electrical grid. And George Washington University's medical school now requires its students to take an emergency-preparedness course.

By Michael Myser

Source: www.wired.com

02:00 AM Aug. 18, 2004 PT

The tedious task of signing up for classes could become more exciting for students as they return to college campuses this month to find a growing number of homeland security and terrorism course offerings.

In an effort to attract federal funding, draw new students and
prepare graduates for careers in the expanding field of homeland security, universities are augmenting existing courses and launching entire programs around security, defense and terror issues.

Source: www.freep.com

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Fences now enclose many docks on the Great Lakes, extra lighting has been installed, security patrols added and new surveillance cameras positioned to record all traffic in and out.

The changes are required by law at all ports nationwide, but Great Lakes ports, vessels and companies received 2.6 percent of the federal money designated for the upgrades. Most of the cash has gone to coastal ports, which arguably face the greater threat.

Port directors say they are spending money on security that otherwise would pay for improvements -- such as dredging channels -- at the gateways for materials used in construction and to produce steel used in automobiles, appliances and other consumer goods.

The volume of imported cargo moving through U.S. ports is expected to double by 2020, according to the U.S. Customs Service. Canada is the nation's largest trading partner.

'How are we going to handle that and meet these security requirements?' asked Steve Pfeiffer, maritime director for the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority.

Monday, December 27, 2004 Posted: 6:52 AM EST (1152 GMT)

DENVER (AP) -- The catastrophic death toll in Asia caused by a massive tsunami might have been reduced had India and Sri Lanka been part of an international warning system designed to warn coastal communities about potentially deadly waves, scientists say."

Source: www.inc.com

Author: Bo Peabody

There's a formula for creating good fortune in business. Here's how one entrepreneur came upon it.

Luck is a part of life, and everyone, at one point or another, gets lucky. Luck is also a big part of business life and perhaps the biggest part of entrepreneurial life. At the very least, entrepreneurs must believe in luck. Ideally, they can recognize it when they see it. And over time, the best entrepreneurs can actually learn to create luck.

Luck in business is different from regular old luck, like when you find $20 on the sidewalk. First of all, being lucky in business has an intoxicating underbelly called believing you're smart. No one actually believes that he should take credit for finding $20 on the sidewalk. But when people get lucky in business, they are often convinced that it is not luck at all that brought them good fortune. They believe instead that their business venture succeeded thanks to their own blinding brilliance.

The big challenge is that everyone -- the press, your shareholders, your colleagues, your significant other, and your parents -- will work hard to convince you otherwise. They will tell you, over and over again, that you are in fact a genius and should take complete credit for all the great things happening to your company. Why? Because to them, you are one of the following:

A source of professional gain
A source of financial gain
A boss
A lover
Their pride and joy
None of these relationships provide incentive for any of these people to tell you the cold hard truth about your entrepreneurial success: You may have gotten just plain lucky.

The second difference between business luck and everyday luck is that luck in business can be created, whereas everyday luck cannot. You can't will yourself to find $20 on the sidewalk. But you can create a company that gets lucky more often than the average company. Indeed, there is a pseudo-scientific formula for creating business luck. The key element is this: Lucky things happen to entrepreneurs who start fundamentally innovative, morally compelling, and philosophically positive companies.

Why? Because lots of smart people will gather around companies with these qualities. As it turns out, precious few such companies exist. And the vast majority of human beings, and certainly most of the smart ones, are constitutionally caring creatures who would, if given the chance, prefer to spend their valuable time in a positive setting contributing to the betterment of society rather than in a negative setting contributing to its detriment. Shocking, I know, but true.

And when smart, inspired people gather around a fundamentally innovative, morally compelling, and philosophically positive company, they work very hard. And when smart, inspired people work very hard, serendipity ensues. Serendipity -- the faculty of making fortuitous discoveries by chance -- causes lots of unexpected things to happen to a company. Some of these unexpected things are good. Some are bad. But because no one planned for the good things to happen, they appear as luck. In other words, the best way to ensure that lucky things happen is to make sure that a lot of things happen. It's really that simple.

Much of what makes a company fundamentally innovative, morally compelling, and philosophically positive is contained not in the company's business model, but in how the entrepreneur communicates the mission of the company. A company's mission, communicated by the entrepreneur with charisma and passion, is what creates the environment that attracts smart people and gets them inspired in the first place. Which is exactly what gets the luck rolling.

Source: www.cnn.com

Inspector: Stolen passports often work
Lawmaker calls for better coordination between agencies
Thursday, December 23, 2004 Posted: 8:33 PM EST (0133 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Non-residents applying for admission to the United States using stolen passports have little reason to fear being caught and are usually admitted, the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General said in a report issued Thursday.

"Our analysis showed that it made only a small difference whether the stolen passports were posted in the lookout system," said the report. That system contains information about aliens who may be admissible or may be of interest to a law enforcement agency.

Source: www.sddt.com

Coast Guard not equipped to ensure port security
By Larry Stirling
Monday, December 20, 2004

There are a lot of wonderful things about the U.S. Coast Guard, but national harbor security is not one of them.

I do not wish for a moment to, in any way, denigrate the brave men and women of the Coast Guard operating on the water. There is no doubt that in traditional tasks like search and rescue, navigation assistance, and other familiar and popular roles, the U.S. Coast Guard is the best in the world.

Many lives have been saved, and many brave men and women serve every hour of every day to be available to the seagoing public. I applaud them.

But, as in most government agencies, change comes slowly. The Coast Guard is today the modern incarnation of the original navigation-aid and seagoing, anti-smuggler arm of the infant U.S. government set up by Alexander Hamilton when he was Secretary of the Treasury under George Washington.

The fact that the Coast Guard maintains its very traditional stance would be both quaint yet reassuring -- except for the devastating change in the world evidenced by the vicious attack of Sept. 11, 2001.

The United States is not safely insulated by its two oceans from attack, if it ever was.

It is the Coast Guard that the United States Congress entrusted with the mission of defending our ports.

Ask anyone. The Coast Guard is not doing the job and, sadly, neither is anyone else.

I am not telling tales out of school by asserting publicly that our ports and
harbors are vulnerable. Federal studies and the national media have covered the subject repeatedly.

San Diegans have a special interest because we have a very special port.

Terrorists now own weapons that can be fired from 20 miles off shore into port installations.

Source: www.cnn.com

NEW YORK (AP) -- Former police commissioner and one-time Cabinet nominee Bernard Kerik said Wednesday he will leave Giuliani Partners, former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani's consulting firm.

At a news conference in Manhattan, Kerik said he had apologized to Giuliani for being a distraction because of his messy withdrawal as a candidate to head the Department of Homeland Security.

Kerik had been CEO of Giuliani-Kerik LLC, an affiliate of Giuliani Partners LLC. In a statement Wednesday, Giuliani said Giuliani-Kerik would be renamed Giuliani Security & Safety.

Kerik said he told Giuliani his resignation would be effective immediately. He said he would seek other unspecified business opportunities, and did not take questions from reporters.

Source: www.washingtonpost.com
By Stephen Barr
Tuesday, December 21, 2004; Page B02

The Department of Homeland Security appears likely to lose its No. 2 official within weeks of the departure of its No. 1.

James M. Loy, the department's deputy secretary, plans to stay until March 1 or until a successor is confirmed, the agency said yesterday. Secretary Tom Ridge, who announced his resignation from the Cabinet late last month, plans to leave by Feb. 1 if his replacement has been lined up.

In a statement yesterday, Ridge praised Loy as "an extraordinary public servant" and said Loy "was the first federal official to offer me his support" when Ridge worked in the White House on homeland security.

Loy, a former Coast Guard commandant and career officer, has won praise as an innovative manager from industry, public policy groups and members of Congress. Rep. JohnL. Mica (R-Fla.) once dubbed Loy the Bush administration's "Mr. Fix-It," and Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Calif.) said yesterday that Loy had distinguished himself as "a successful hands-on manager."

Source: www.bloomberg.com

Dec. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik, who withdrew as President George W. Bush's nominee for U.S. secretary of homeland security 11 days ago, resigned from former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani's consulting firms.

Kerik, addressing reporters today in Manhattan, said he quit ``in the best interests of my family, my colleagues'' and the clients of Giuliani Partners LLC and its Giuliani-Kerik security- consulting affiliate. ``I plan to take some time off to focus on my family and the things that have to be focused on at this point, and to clear my good name,'' he said.

Giuliani, in a separate news conference outside his offices at Times Square, said he hadn't asked Kerik to resign. Giuliani, who has spoken of possibly returning to politics and has been touted by admirers as a 2008 presidential candidate, said last week he apologized to the White House for his role in pushing Kerik for the Homeland Security job.

Kerik, 49, took himself out of consideration for the Cabinet post Dec. 11 after saying he discovered he failed to pay taxes on a housekeeper and nanny whose immigration status wasn't certain. In subsequent days, reports in the New York Daily News, New York Times and elsewhere raised questions about his conduct while a New York City official, including ties to contractors who did business with the city.

Title: Feds, industry need to share port security costs, DHS says
Source: Aviation Week's Homeland Security & Defense
Date: December 15, 2004
Author: John M. Doyle johnm_doyle@AviationNow.com

Paying for port security has to be a "shared burden" between the federal government and the private sector, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official in charge of protecting transportation.

"There has to be a balance there. It's not simply a federal government responsibility," DHS Under Secretary Asa Hutchinson said Dec. 10 at a Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) border security seminar in Washington.

"I believe our responsibility is to provide leadership and investing in technologies, pilot projects, putting seed money out there to enhance port security," said Hutchinson, head of the DHS Border and Transportation Security directorate.

The Coast Guard has estimated it will cost more than $7 billion over the next 10 years to bring the nation's port facilities up to standards required by the Maritime Transportation Security Act. The fiscal 2005 DHS appropriations legislation provided only $150 million in port security grants.

Maritime interests have formed several groups to lobby Congress and the White House for more money.

But Hutchinson noted that much of the money in port security grants is going to the private sector.

"You have to recognize that that's not simply the port authority property. That may very well include the Exxon facility ...[or] the Mobil facility. It will include the chemical plants that are all privately owned," he said.

Source: washingtontimes.com

By Jerry Seper
THE WASHINGTON TIMES


U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert C. Bonner and White House Homeland Security Adviser Frances Fragos Townsend appear to be at the top of a shortlist of candidates to head the Department of Homeland Security, as the White House seeks to rebound after the unexpected withdrawal of former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik.

Another candidate is Asa Hutchinson, the department's undersecretary for border and transportation security, administration and law-enforcement sources said. Mr. Hutchinson reportedly has lobbied for the post.

Source: www.latimes.com

A terrorist attack involving a dirty bomb hidden in a cargo container wouldn't have to match the human toll of Sept. 11, 2001, to be effective. Shutting down even a few of the largest ports would have a devastating economic effect, so it's puzzling that so little is being spent to avoid such a catastrophe.

Oceangoing freighters will offload more than 9 million cargo containers at U.S. ports this year. Until we can know with certainty what's inside them, the boxes will remain, as U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert C. Bonner has said, "the potential Trojan horse of the 21st century."

Some progress is being made. The major foreign ports have agreed to give U.S. customs agents 24 hours' notice before U.S.-bound containers are loaded, and the port of Dubai on Monday became the first port in the Middle East to join the program. The United States also is dispatching customs agents to the world's busiest ports to establish offices. Shipping companies and cargo handlers around the world are completing self-evaluations to help identify weaknesses that terrorists might try to exploit.

But big problems remain, and most are tied to who's going to foot the bill for added security. Private industry, including manufacturers, parts suppliers and retailers whose goods flow through publicly financed ports, should shoulder a fair share of the financial burden, which means consumers ultimately will pay more for their goods. Government also must play a role. The Coast Guard estimates the cost of security improvements needed at U.S. ports at more than $5 billion over the coming decade. Others, though, set the final cost at closer to $15 billion. Yet Congress this month approved just a third of the $400 million that port operators � most of them public agencies with already tight operating budgets � had set as the bare minimum of federal money needed to help cover security costs during the 2005 fiscal year.

Source: www.news.com.au

By Dennis Shanahan
December 15, 2004

AUSTRALIA is casting a 1000 nautical mile security zone around the coastline as part of a new maritime plan to counter terrorism and protect shipping, ports and oil rigs from attack.

Under the new offshore protection command, the Howard Government will monitor thousands of ships approaching some of the busiest shipping lanes in the world and intercept suspicious vessels.

The new security command will take responsibility from the states and territories for maritime security outside coastal ports.

Existing navy and Customs ships and resources will be used, but much more will be demanded from international shipping in Australian waters.

The $4 million revamp of maritime security arises from a taskforce that identified threats from the sea as fears increase around the world of terrorist attacks through less secure ports and on vulnerable oil tankers.

Australia has been reviewing and upgrading its port security to match the higher standards at airports, introduced since the terror attacks of September 11.

Source: msnbc.msn.com

Bush team either overlooked or ignored damaging details

By Mike Allen and Peter Baker

WASHINGTON - President Bush hoped to limit the political damage from the nomination of Bernard B. Kerik by cutting him loose as soon as he confessed he had not paid taxes for a Mexican nanny who apparently had been in the country illegally. Instead, questions about Bush's judgment have escalated because of a cascade of damaging details about Kerik's business and personal lives that White House vetters either missed or ignored.

A few days of digging by news organizations have revealed that Bush had planned to entrust one of the most sensitive jobs in his Cabinet, secretary of homeland security, to a man who had failed to report lavish gifts he received as a New York City official, had declared personal bankruptcy and was the subject of an arrest warrant in a civil case involving unpaid condominium fees.

Since Kerik withdrew, reports have emerged that he helped a company suspected of doing business with organized crime, and he has been accused of extramarital affairs that his representatives do not deny.

Republicans on Capitol Hill and in the lobbying community, accustomed to a White House that resists any whiff of sleaziness, were left wondering whether it was more astounding that Kerik allowed himself to be considered or that Bush disregarded a forest of red flags and nominated him anyway.

An exhausted staffer who has been closely involved in the matter from the beginning called it "a case of hubris on both sides."

Play Audio

The Second Term

The Tavis Smiley Show, December 15, 2004

With the withdrawal of Bernard Kerik, President Bush renews his search to replace Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge. NPR's Tavis Smiley explores the daunting task of securing the United States in perilous times with guests Phillip Crowley, director of national defense and homeland security at the Center for American Progress, and Lee Strickland, director of the Center for Information Policy.

Play Audio

Weekend Edition - Sunday, December 12, 2004

Bernard Kerik's withdrawal as nominee for Homeland Security secretary Friday is the sole bump in President Bush's smooth replacement of exiting cabinet members. Nine secretaries are being replaced. Hear NPR's Don Gonyea and NPR's Liane Hansen.

NSA methods lag in age of terror

Intercepts: Electronic eavesdropping fails to hear whispered secrets.

By Robert Little

Sun National Staff

Originally published December 9, 2004

At one of his increasingly common public appearances earlier this year, Lt. Gen. Michael V. Hayden, head of the National Security Agency, described the ideal class of recruits for his secretive electronic spying operation. They might have long hair and rumpled clothes, he said, maybe even an awkward, slide-rule and pocket-protector manner. But they would have the brainpower to set the room on fire.

"We don't hire them for their social skills, or how they dress," Hayden told business leaders. "We hire them to be the absolute best at what they do."

Yet what they do at the nation's spy agencies is changing, analysts say, and the eggheads at the NSA could soon be fighting for resources with spies in the trenches of the United States' fight against terrorism. The code-breaking and "signals intelligence" work that the NSA does best - rooted in complex mathematics and linguistic dexterity - will never go out of style as long as nation-based threats such as North Korea and Iran exist, they say. But it is far less vital against an enemy that sleeps in caves and cellars, and communicates in whispers.

"I wouldn't want to suggest that electronic signals intelligence isn't important. It is," said Michael Kenney, a Pennsylvania State University professor who specializes in research on terrorist groups and drug cartels. "But when the government squeezes a terrorist group or a drug-trafficking group, these guys are aware of it, and they're aware of the sophisticated techniques being used. They know they have to stop using their cell phones or satellite phones, and they might switch to couriers. Then you need human intelligence to stay on their trail."

During the recent national debates over reforming the federal intelligence system, which culminated yesterday in the passage of legislation to create a national intelligence director, only the more conspicuous CIA received public calls for increased support. President Bush ordered the CIA last month to increase its staff of agents and analysts by half to "meet the intelligence challenges presented by international terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and other critical national security issues." The Maryland-based NSA, which is thought to employ about 16,000 people in and around its Fort Meade headquarters and an equal number elsewhere in the world, was never mentioned.

Some wonder whether the NSA is getting second-string treatment from government leaders. During the Cold War, when the NSA grew into the nation's largest intelligence operation and claimed victories such as tapping a Soviet communications cable in the Sea of Okhotsk, the agency's electronic eavesdropping was regarded as spying's next generation. Today's era of terrorism requires more "human intelligence" gathered through face-to-face dealings, the primary responsibility of the CIA.

"The NSA is a collecting agency, and it gathers information that is immensely useful," said Arthur Hulnick, a former CIA employee and the author of two books about reforming the American intelligence networks. "But when it comes to fighting terrorism, people think first about the CIA."

The utility of electronic intelligence is apparent from any survey of counterterrorism operations. In September 2000, for instance, the CIA began flying unmanned Predator surveillance aircraft over Afghanistan, twice beaming back video of a tall man in a white robe, surrounded by security guards. Analysts later determined that the "man in white" was probably Osama bin Laden.

Source: www.armedforces.net

Armed Forces Network, Sun Sep 26 2004

By Merrie Schilter-Lowe

Special to American Forces Press Service

PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo., Sept. 10, 2004 -- Though the United States is safer today than it was three years ago from air and land attacks by terrorists, the nation has 'a long way to go' to shield itself from seaborne attacks, said Air Force Gen. Ed Eberhart, commander of North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command.

'I believe that it is just a matter of time until the terrorists try to use a seaborne attack, a maritime attack against us,' Eberhart recently told a group of journalists who visited -- for the first time -- some of the most secure areas in NORAD and NORTHCOM.

Source: www.iags.org

LNG is highly volatile and in the era of terrorism may offer more opportunities for terrorist strikes on vulnerable energy infrastructure targets located near residential neighborhoods. One such disaster scenario was developed by James Fay, a professor emeritus of mechanical engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a former chairman of the Massachusetts Port Authority and a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists. Fay is indeed concerned. He predicts parts of Rhode Island and Massachusetts could be devastated by an attack on LNG tankers regularly passing through navigation canals close to residential areas in Boston and the Rhode Island shoreline on their way to the terminal in Everett, Mass.

In an interview with Energy Security Fay said a terrorist attack by a boat bomb - such as the one used against the USS Cole in 2000 or the French tanker Limburg off the coast of Yemen in 2002 - could cause at least half a cargo hold's worth of LNG to seep out of the ship and ignite. "In just over three minutes, the fire could spread two-thirds of a mile from the ship," Fay said. "There is nothing safety officials can do in such a case. They would have no time to evacuate people or to put out the fire." Fay also predicts damaging thermal radiation within a mile radius of the tanker which could set fire to thousands of homes and cause significant losses of blood and treasure. "Like the attack on the World Trade Center in New York City, there exists no relevant industrial experience with fires of this scale from which to project measures for securing public safety," he says. Fay insists the methodology of his modeling is sound.

Elite business group working on homeland security

Jill Lerner
Atlanta Business Chronicle
Updated: 7:00 p.m. ET Dec. 5, 2004

Imagine this scenario.

A crop duster has just unleashed a biological attack over a crowd at Centennial Olympic Park, and the state must quickly distribute antibiotics to thousands of victims -- all without clogging the already overburdened hospital system.

But how?

The metro Atlanta office of Business Executives for National Security, a group of about 100 local industry titans including The Home Depot Inc.'s Bernie Marcus, Delta Air Lines Inc.'s Gerald Grinstein and Equifax Inc.'s Tom Chapman have been working with Georgia homeland security officials to answer that question.

The scene could play out something like this: United Parcel Service Inc. (NYSE: UPS) might transport antibiotics -- which could be stored in warehouses operated by Pattillo Construction Co., while volunteers from such large employers as BellSouth Corp. (NYSE: BLS) and Georgia Power Co. distribute the medicine. The various responders may rely on procedures taken from a terrorism response 'best practices' database constructed, pro bono, with development talent from Deloitte & Touche LLP and hardware from UPS.

Such an action plan is only part of what BENS is working to accomplish as the group embarks on a new initiative called the Georgia Business Force.

Business Force members, such as the corporations listed in the above scenario, agree to donate resources to help prevent and, if need be, assist in the aftermath of a terrorist attack.

Homeland Security: 2005 priorities

Officials and experts talk about what should come next for homeland security.

BY Dibya Sarkar

Published on Dec. 6, 2004

Source: www.cnn.com

U.S. consulate attacked in Saudi Arabia - Dec 6, 2004: "U.S. consulate attacked in Saudi Arabia

Al Qaeda suspected, U.S. official tells CNN

Monday, December 6, 2004 Posted: 11:26 AM EST (1626 GMT)

(CNN) -- Militants threw explosives at the gate of the heavily guarded U.S. consulate in the Saudi port city of Jeddah on Monday, then forced their way into the building, prompting a gunbattle, officials said.

Saudi security forces killed three of the militants and wounded two others, the Saudi Interior Ministry said.

The U.S. Embassy in Riyadh said five non-American staff members at the consulate were killed. A number of others were wounded, but no Americans were killed or seriously injured.

In Washington, U.S. President George Bush said the incident showed "terrorists are still on the move" trying to get the United States to leave Saudi Arabia and Iraq.

A U.S. State Department official told CNN al Qaeda was suspected in the attack.






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(CNN) -- Militants threw explosives at the gate of the heavily guarded U.S. consulate in the Saudi port city of Jeddah on Monday, then forced their way into the building, prompting a gunbattle, officials said.
Saudi security forces killed three of the militants and wounded two others, the Saudi Interior Ministry said.
The U.S. Embassy in Riyadh said five non-American staff members at the consulate were killed. A number of others were wounded, but no Americans were killed or seriously injured.
In Washington, U.S. President George Bush said the incident showed 'terrorists are still on the move"

Source: http://publish.gio.gov.tw
Book analyzes port security, anti-terrorism

Publish Date:12/03/2004
Story Type:Issues;
Byline:S.P. Seth

The potential for acts of terrorism to be directed at the world's seaports has largely gone unaddressed in the mainstream media, although in "A Time Bomb for Global Trade: Maritime-Related Terrorism in an Age of Weapons of Mass Destruction," author Michael Richardson looks at the possible impact of such a strike, as well as what precautionary measures have been instituted to keep the sea lines of communication around the world open. Regular Taiwan Journal contributor Philip Courtenay offers his evaluation of the book.

A new book published by Singapore's Institute of Southeast Asian Studies illustrates with dramatic clarity the vulnerability of the world's seaports, canals and waterways, and their adjacent cities, to the horrors of terrorist attack by the likes of Al Qaeda.

"A Time Bomb for Global Trade: Maritime-Related Terrorism in an Age of Weapons of Mass Destruction" was written by Michael Richardson, a visiting senior research fellow at the institute, who contends that beefing up maritime security is of paramount importance today, especially for economies like Taiwan that rely on extensive seaborne trade.

In a message from the publisher at the front of the book, the institute's director explains that Singapore's position makes its economy highly vulnerable to any blockages of its sea-lanes, and he assures readers that the city-state has endeavored to address the type of maritime security issues that are discussed in the volume. He describes Richardson's book as a precursor to further research into this vital area of concern to the international community.

The crucial importance of such research is underlined in a short but penetrating foreword by Rohan Gunaratna, head of the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research at the Institute of Defense and Strategic Studies, Singapore. Gunaratna writes that, "With the enhanced security of the aviation and land domains, the maritime domain is increasingly becoming vulnerable to terrorist penetration and attack." At 150 pages, "A Time Bomb For Global Trade" is a relatively slim volume. It consists of nine chapters, some detailed notes on its source material and a reference list, but no index. In his preface, Richardson poses four questions that the book attempts to answer. These concern whether terrorist groups, such as Al Qaeda, are interested in maritime targets for their own purposes, whether one of their aims is to use ships or containers as weapons, and whether such weapons could slow, or even halt, seaborne trade. Finally, Richardson asks what is being done to protect against such threats.

Source: http://publish.gio.gov.tw

Book analyzes port security, anti-terrorism

Publish Date:12/03/2004
Story Type:Issues;
Byline:S.P. Seth

The potential for acts of terrorism to be directed at the world's seaports has largely gone unaddressed in the mainstream media, although in "A Time Bomb for Global Trade: Maritime-Related Terrorism in an Age of Weapons of Mass Destruction," author Michael Richardson looks at the possible impact of such a strike, as well as what precautionary measures have been instituted to keep the sea lines of communication around the world open. Regular Taiwan Journal contributor Philip Courtenay offers his evaluation of the book.

A new book published by Singapore's Institute of Southeast Asian Studies illustrates with dramatic clarity the vulnerability of the world's seaports, canals and waterways, and their adjacent cities, to the horrors of terrorist attack by the likes of Al Qaeda.

"A Time Bomb for Global Trade: Maritime-Related Terrorism in an Age of Weapons of Mass Destruction" was written by Michael Richardson, a visiting senior research fellow at the institute, who contends that beefing up maritime security is of paramount importance today, especially for economies like Taiwan that rely on extensive seaborne trade.

In a message from the publisher at the front of the book, the institute's director explains that Singapore's position makes its economy highly vulnerable to any blockages of its sea-lanes, and he assures readers that the city-state has endeavored to address the type of maritime security issues that are discussed in the volume. He describes Richardson's book as a precursor to further research into this vital area of concern to the international community.

The crucial importance of such research is underlined in a short but penetrating foreword by Rohan Gunaratna, head of the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research at the Institute of Defense and Strategic Studies, Singapore. Gunaratna writes that, "With the enhanced security of the aviation and land domains, the maritime domain is increasingly becoming vulnerable to terrorist penetration and attack." At 150 pages, "A Time Bomb For Global Trade" is a relatively slim volume. It consists of nine chapters, some detailed notes on its source material and a reference list, but no index. In his preface, Richardson poses four questions that the book attempts to answer. These concern whether terrorist groups, such as Al Qaeda, are interested in maritime targets for their own purposes, whether one of their aims is to use ships or containers as weapons, and whether such weapons could slow, or even halt, seaborne trade. Finally, Richardson asks what is being done to protect against such threats.

Hell, there are no rules here�we're trying to accomplish something.

�Thomas Edison

Source: news.yahoo.com

By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - President Bush has chosen former New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik, who helped direct the emergency response to the Sept. 11 terrorist strikes against the Twin Towers, to lead the Homeland Security Department, charged with safeguarding Americans from future attack, administration officials said Thursday.

No! Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try.