TIMING AND SYMBOLISM: WHAT TERRORISTS SEEK HERE

THOUGHTS ON THE WEEK AHEAD

“ The Only Thing We Have to Fear Is Fear Itself”

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1933

TAGS: SEPTEMBER 11, 2001, NYPD, CIA,

TERRORIST THREATS, INCREASED RISKS,

ISLAMIC STATE, NYPD INTEL & COUNTER TERRORISM DIVISIONS,

20^TH CENTURY AMERICAN HISTORY, WARS, ASYMMETRICAL WARFARE,
WTC 9-11-01: "FIRST BLOOD" SACRIFICED IN OUR FIGHT AGAINST TERROR

(Thursday, September 4, 2014 Langley, VA)   Exactly seven days from today we will mark the 13th anniversary of the al Qaeda attacks in New York City, Washington, DC, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.  For most New Yorkers and those in the metropolitan area, September 11, 2001 represents a profound diving line that defines their lives into “before” and “after” time lines.  As has been the case since September 11, 2002, in NYC and DC and elsewhere throughout the land, people will pause to remember their losses, mourn with other fellow travelers who have lived within the narrow confines of grief, anger, and frustration, and otherwise remember, honor and respect all who perished on that Tuesday morning. 

As we roll into this second week of September many among us will have our conscious minds more occupied with vivid 13 year old memories; how could we not?  And, with all the atrocities and horrific mass murdering soaking the sands of Syria and Iraq as the terrorist group known as ISIL or, as they now prefer, the “Islamic State”, intelligence officials from London to New York City are well aware of the increased “chatter” among terrorist groups and cells and are as prepared for this time of increased risk as any organization can be. Just as 9-11-2001 holds a deep national significance for us, it is as potent a day in the minds of many of those who still aspire to repeat a similar terrorist attack. The asymmetrical nature of our fight against terrorists with a global reach, always favors the terrorists; they have to succeed just once while to counter and thwart their evil designs, we need to be right 100% of the time:  a distinctly lopsided equation.

But, as has also been the case, Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA’s) across the country will be on high alert since the day itself represents so much to Americans and New Yorkers in particular.  The Intelligence and Counter Terrorism Divisions of NYPD will do what they do everyday year in year out; they will protect our City using all available legal means necessary. Despite all the condemnations and criticisms of these NYPD Division’s operations and tactics largely emanating from misinformed and ill-informed blowhards, NYPD’s capability in these areas has proven to be not only effective and efficient but is also unrivaled in scale and scope. They are working closely with Interpol, Scotland Yard, the British M15 and M16 units as well as other foreign intelligence sources who have provided credible information in the past. 

INTEL TALK

When intelligence officials and officers speak about terrorist threats to our homeland, they first make the distinction from what we are witnessing on the news from Iraq and Syria and other countries that harbor terrorists, and the nature of their concerns here.  They emphasize that battles raging across the blazing sands of Iraq and Syria constitute actual warfare, albeit guerrilla warfare in most instances, except when the talk turns to the Islamic State or ISIL or ISIS.  This group has carved out a significant segment of territory, has seized huge caches of American made weapons intended for the nascent Iraqi army and security forces, and is more centrally commanded and organized than any force that has opposed them thus far. What has caught the attention of the intelligence community here and in the United Kingdom and France, is the numbers of their citizens who have traveled to war zones ostensibly to join in jihad, and the realization that anyone of them could return to their homeland after acquiring the skills needed to execute a terrorist event. While it is difficult to know with any certainty how many young men from western countries have heeded the call to arms, they all possess “western” passports that likely can deflect scrutiny as they travel back and forth. We have already seen two young men from suburban Minneapolis die for the cause.  As the world knows it does not take many men or much money for a committed, determined, disciplined cell to create death and destruction of epic proportions in America or any of the other countries they have carried out operations including the United Kingdom and Spain, as well as anyone they view as enemies.

TERROR

Terror, in its simplest definition means “extreme fear”.  Terrorism is defined as “the unofficial or unauthorized use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims” and, lastly, a terrorist is  “a person who uses terrorism in the pursuit of political aims.”  Of course each of these definitions is relative.  One man may act out confident and firmly believing he is doing the right, noble and just actions his ideology, religion, tribe, sect, country or group demands of him.  His act might be to shoot dozens of young men standing atop a mass grave where their bodies will fall after the hail of bullets takes their lives.  To the relatives of those young men, the perpetrator of the act is a barbaric savage, a terrorist, extremist or evil incarnate zealot.  You see where this is going.

In a sense terrorism can be more accurately understood as psychological warfare.  While the death and destruction terrorist attacks can unleash, their true goal is provocation; they seek to humiliate their enemies, attract world-wide attention and supporters (particularly financiers) and demonstrate to the world their operational prowess.  They want a reaction from their target.  Osama bin Laden’s primary goal for attacking the United States in such a spectacularly evil manner on September 11, 2001 was to goad us into engaging him and his jihads in a full out war in Afghanistan.  As ludicrous as it obviously did appear to the CIA in the years leading up to 9-11-2001, the notion that a man living in caves in the most remote and rugged terrain on the planet could pose a threat to the homeland, was never taken seriously.  There was one “six man desk” here in the CIA that had been tracking bin Laden and all his militancy and successful attacks on United States interests from the embassies in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi in Africa to the bombing of the USS Cole moored in Aden, Yemen.  But they were lone voices unheard in the din of business as usual in the pre – 9-11-2001 CIA. 

TIMING IS SYMBOLIC

In the years since September 11, 2001, the intelligence community has hotly debated the significance of that particular date 9/11.  Since 911 is universally known in the United States as the telephone number for emergency services, many naturally thought that bin Laden and his cohorts had specifically chosen that date for that reason.  Others dismissed that concept arguing it was more a matter of Mohammed Atta, the leader of the 19 operatives who carried out the attacks, determining the time was right.  They insist that it was more a coincidence that the various flights Atta had determined to be needed for the air assault happened to be available on that Tuesday morning.  Since then it has become common knowledge throughout the intelligence community that the date 9/11 was not just a random date; it was specifically chosen because of what it represents to us.

Just as target selection is important as means for terrorists to achieve their ends, timing is just as important.  The twin embassy bombing in Africa occurred on August 7^th, 1998, the eight year anniversary of the arrival of American military troops in Saudi Arabia to stage their fight to retake Kuwait after Saddam Hussein had invaded that small, oil rich land.  Bin Laden saw the presence of infidels, American troops in the Holy Land of Mecca and Medina. Bin Laden, himself a Saudi national, had offered his services to the House of Saud to defend Saudi Arabia from Hussein’s army but the ruling family opted for United States military intervention instead.  This deeply troubled bin Laden and was the nascent spark that ignited what would become his driving passion to lash out and destroy American much as he believed that he and his fighters had driven the mighty Soviet army from Afghanistan after 10 years of protracted warfare.  Many see that defeat of the USSR (at the hands of American supported mujahedeen) as one of the primary reasons the Soviet empire soon collapsed.

Timing, the desire to pull off a successful terrorist event on a specific date is nothing new.  Virtually every religion, creed, ideology or any group bound by some dogma or doctrine observes the historical significance of various dates.  Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims both have special days that define their religious beliefs through the centuries.  Even the Oklahoma City bomber, Timothy McVeigh chose April 19^th as the date for his attack on the federal building because it was the anniversary of the lethal FBI raid on the home of Randy Weaver, a separatist living “off the grid” with his family and was also the anniversary of the tragic end to a long stand-off between FBI and ATF personnel pitted against the followers of David Koresh who ran a religious commune of a sort in Waco, Texas.

Most recently on the national stage, Libyan extremists attacked the United States Embassy Compound in Benghazi on September 11, 2012 in a surprise attack that left four Americans dead including Ambassador Stevens.  There was nothing coincidental about that date. 

FDR’S ADVICE STILL TRUE TODAY

In the wake on the shocking predawn air raid on the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor Hawaii that decimated the naval fleet of battleships and drew the United States into World War II, President Roosevelt gave one of the most memorable public addresses in our history.  It was in that address he called the date of the Japanese sneak attack a “day that will live in infamy”. He reminded Americans of a belief he first stated in his first presidential inaugural address at delivered on the cusp of the Great Depression: “The only thing to fear is fear itself.”  That one simple statement served as a good hard smack to the collective cheeks of all citizens that broke the spell of numbing confusion and ushered in a new wave of determination and grit that would see us through to victory in 1945.

We will never again engage in the kind of warfare utilized on the numerous fronts during WWII.  It is highly unlikely that another developed country would ever confront us on a conventional field of battle.  Since the days of our protracted involvement in Vietnam, virtually all our “wars” have been asymmetrical in nature.  That is what makes the world exponentially more dangerous; the ability to utilize the tactics of terror against us here at home is the preeminent threat of our time.

NO FEAR

We are a country born out of war.  Our war for independence from the tyranny of the British rule set this ongoing experiment in a democratic Republic possible.  Wars have defined much of our history; we went to war in 1812, suffered our own brutal Civil War, engaged on battle fronts around the world and went through two devastating World Wars in a 40 year span.  We fought to a standoff in Korea and left Vietnam after our first experiences with asymmetrical warfare.  We survived the Cold War, that six decade stretch of time that the USA and the USSR were the two towering Super Powers each possessing sufficient atomic arsenals to destroy the world several times over.  There were some very close calls during those years but, we never wavered, never blinked and continued to grow as a country and as a people.

We first entered the Middle East to protect Saudi Arabia from Iraq’s army that had invaded Kuwait as mentioned earlier. Our troops completed that mission in short order and we followed the well-defined exit strategy that had been crafted before our first troops had stepped foot on Kuwaiti sand.

Since October 2001 we have been engaged in warfare of an entirely new nature, of an infinitely different form than we had ever imagined before September 11, 2001.  Terrorists brought their jihad here, to our shores, to our City and the heart of our military command, The Pentagon.  The fourth plane that the passengers on board managed to wrest control of from the hijackers crashed and burned in an anonymous field in western Pennsylvania.  That plane was most likely heading for the Capitol or White House.  Brave Americans sacrificed their lives to save those targets from the fate of those stricken in New York City and Washington DC already.

How and when or even if our President choses to confront ISIL and the other terrorist groups committing atrocities from the Middle East to sub-Saharan Africa is a matter for another matter for a different time and place.  Our thoughts this week will become increasingly closer to home, more personal and private.  And, that is how it should be.  The wider world roils and broils in chaos and bloodshed but we will take this time to remember and honor those who shed the “first blood” is our continuing fight against terrorism. 

There are 51 other weeks in the year to consider world events and how they may impact us here in America and New York City in particular.  This week is not the time for such pursuits. 

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2014/08/richard-clarke-calls-obama-wrong-on-worlds-dangers/

http://www.netnewsledger.com/2014/09/01/britain-takes-steps-to-fight-domestic-terrorism/

http://www.iberianet.com/opinion/editorials/take-steps-now-to-protect-america/article_2d60086e-30bd-11e4-9a4a-0019bb2963f4.html

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/alleged-isis-terrorists-threaten-u-s-twitter-article-1.1914363

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2014/08/30/Saudi-king-warns-of-terror-threat-to-the-world.html

http://www.peoplespunditdaily.com/2014/08/29/news-events/world/president-obama-u-k-prime-minister-cameron-polar-opposites-isis-world/

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/216328-lawmakers-clash-over-isis-threat-to-us

 Copyright The Brooding Cynyx 2014 © All Rights Reserved

INSECURE AIRSPACE ABOVE NYC?

HARMLESS HOBBYISTS PROVIDE

TERRORISTS WITH INTELLIGENCE

TERRORISTS TAKE NOTE OF RECENT

EPISODE ABOVE GWB.

RADIO CONTROLLED AIRCRAFT HOBBYISTS

UNINTENTIONALLY GIVE A DEMONSTRATION

ABOUT SECURITY OF AIRSPACE ABOVE NYC

TAGS: NYPD AVIATION DIVISION, RADIO CONTROLLED

AIRCRAFT, “NEAR MISS” NEAR GWB?,

NYPD INTELLIGENCE DIVISION, NYC METRO AREA

 THREE MAJOR AIRPORTS IN NYC METRO AREA

(Tuesday July 8, 2014, Upper Manhattan, NYC) Minutes after midnight yesterday an NYPD Aviation Unit helicopter encountered a pair of “drones” while conducting regular aerial patrol operations near the George Washington Bridge (GWB).  According to the NYPD pilots report they were forced to make an evasive maneuver to avoid the small unmanned crafts.  The NYPD helicopter crew was able to provide Patrol Officers on the ground as to where the devices had landed.  Two men were arrested here in Inwood on the uppermost tip of Manhattan after they were discovered with the pilotless aircrafts and radio control devices in their possession.

AGAIN

Time and again we have here reported on security breaches occurring at high-value terrorist targets in New York City and beyond. Just as such lapses in security procedures and policies have been duly noted by the appropriate authorities, there should be no doubt that these  events have been as scrutinized by those bent on bringing asymmetrical terrorist tactics to their war against the United States itself and our overseas interests. 

Just days before this early morning drone incident near the GBW, new heightened security measures had been announced.  Intelligence officials here and abroad were cautioning that bombs undetectable by current technology and screening practices may be concealed in small digital devices including laptops, tablets and cell phones.  Our adversaries in this fight against terrorist have proven their abilities to adapt and be nimble enough to counter some of  our most sophisticated technology, armament, and tactics.  Terrorists have been honing their ruthlessly brutal tactics on the killing fields of Afghanistan and Iraq and many have become particularly adept in constructing Improvised Explosive Devices (IED’s) and in urban warfare.  As their sphere of influence has broadened significantly since September 11, 2001 there has been an alarming proliferation of terrorist groups and alliances and none of them have trouble recruiting new members.  In a perverse twist the Laws of Unintended Consequences has seen the ranks of terrorist groups swell even as our high powered military engaged them in fierce, unforgiving guerilla warfare that required some serious realignment of our military’s doctrine over the course of our protracted engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq. 

ONE TRUE STRATEGY

We have also widely reported on the importance and value of the lowest common denominator, that being vigilance.  Constant rigorous vigilance enlists virtually every citizen to be on the alert when something or someone looks “out of place” near our jobs sites, during our daily commutes and in proximity to the locations we are most intimately familiar with such as our blocks and neighborhoods.   NYPD’s “See Something, Say Something” campaign has proven effective and people riding the MTA buses and subways are much more likely to report an unattended item such as a case, knapsack or shopping bag than they were prior to the rollout of this campaign in 2011. 

FROM A HOBBY TO A WEAPON OF WAR

Flying small radio controlled aircraft has long been a staple of the hobbyist community.  With the advent of smaller, lighter electronics and more sophisticated high resolution digital cameras, radio controlled aircrafts are being flown by a greater number of people than ever before.  In a real sense the pilotless aircraft currently employed by the United States Military and Intelligence communities known as drones, are products of the evolutionary process of pilotless flight. They are the next leap forward in technology and the use of highly advanced air power during military engagements. This generation of drones can be outfitted with a wide range of armament and surveillance platforms.  The military drones can fire rockets and missiles, can fly and hover at impressive altitudes while providing “real time” actual intelligence.  More controversially, the use of drones is not always as precise as it is touted to be.  Drones deployed over combat areas remove the pilot from harm’s way and there have been reported instances when drone attacks have been widely off target and, in reports, claim to have been responsible for the loss of innocent civilians.  In many ways the sophistication of the drones and their weaponry as well as having the “pilot” safely ensconced at a computer station half a world away, have seen the overall incidents of “collateral damage” drastically decreased when compared to conventional air tactics.

RADIO CONTROLLED CONCERNS

There have been several reported security breaches at the three major New York City Metropolitan Area airports since 9/11/01.  Investigative reporters have been able to gain entry to the fuel storage area at JKF approaching the airport via a small watercraft.  Others have gone unchallenged as they sought and gained entry into restricted areas at Newark Liberty Airport in New Jersey.  The most valuable and dangerous airspace for any aircraft  is in the “transition zones” from approximately 2,500 feet above the tarmac when the planes are approaching to land or gearing up for takeoff.  With the volume of air traffic in the NYC Metro airspace, a radio controlled aircraft, even if unequipped with any explosive device could still cause havoc.  A large flock of seagulls brought down US Airways Flight 1549 on January 15, 2009 forcing veteran Pilot Sully Sullenberger to make an emergency landing of the Airbus A320-200 in the middle of the Hudson River.  A single radio controlled craft could be deliberately aimed at an engine during takeoff or landing potentially resulting in mass casualties and fatalities.  We have even seen the airspace over the White House and central area of Washington, DC compromised on several occasions in the last decade.  These incidences expose faults and flaws to our national security and have certainly not gone unnoticed by our adversaries. Given the magnitude of the ineptitude of the Federal Aviation Administration (F.A.A.), and North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) on the morning of September 11, 2001, one would think that the airspace over such vital locations would be far more robust and responsive than it has been at times recently.

As radio control flight enthusiasts defend their activities as a simple hobby, akin to flying a kite, others beg to differ.  Typically, radio controlled aircraft had a top ceiling between 250 and 300 feet.  Now there are models constructed of alloys, carbon-fiber and PCV that are capable of attaining altitudes over 5000 feet. Some of the more advanced and dedicated enthusiasts report their crafts reaching altitudes above 10,000 feet. Granted, the overwhelming majority of radio control flight operators are in fact just hobbyists using this latest generation of materials and electronics for benign purposes.  But an event such as that which occurred at low altitude in close proximity to one of New York City’s most iconic bridges could inspire more malevolent types to undertake different kind of “missions”.

Since the attacks on 9/11/01 were airborne with fully fuelled passenger jets used as guided missiles one would think that the NYC Metro airports would be the most cognizant of the security of the airspace they control.  True, a small radio controlled device that that used yesterday is too small and typically flies far too low to have a radar “signature”, it is disconcerting to imagine the possibilities that commercial jets may encounter at low altitude on the final approach or on the liftoff.  These two phases are the most vulnerable for any aircraft but one need spend too much energy realizing what a bomb or explosive-laden radio controlled craft could do to such a low flying large aircraft.

IRONY

This morning’s edition of the New York Daily News on-line featured a long piece titled, “Beyond the Smoking Guns: Inside NYPD’s 21^st Century Arsenal”,  detailing some of the ultrahigh tech hardware and software currently in use by the NYPD assisting in their historical mission as the City’s Law Enforcement Agency and in its far more shadowy mission regarding Anti - and Counter Terrorism as well as in Intelligence.  NYPD’s efforts and innovation now serve as models for cities around the world.  Everything from top shelf surveillance cameras, facial recognition software, advanced ballistics and other innovative technologies some that were developed under former NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly who early on identified our City’s needs as far as Intelligence gathering, analysis and threat assessments are concerned. 

While NYC, all our waterways, bridges, transportation networks, infrastructure and harbors are under the jurisdiction of NYPD, the United States Coast Guard, the Port Authority of NY/NJ, and MTA Police work in cooperation with each other in an array of unified operations that provide the level of safety and security our City demands and circumstances dictate.  That is why it is so ironic that two men from Inwood were able to navigate their radio controlled airplanes so close to the GWB and NYPD Aviation Unit’s copter.  An historical hallmark of terrorists tactically is the use of sometimes simple, crude almost primitive devices. Those who manufacture IED’s and bombs have gotten increasingly more capable over the last 12 years.  The complexity, efficacy and lethality of the bomb making skills of the insurgency in Iraq increased over the years we were engaged there and much of that bomb making knowledge and technical acumen has been shared between different terrorist factions throughout the world.  Iraq provided a convenient proving ground for IED manufacturers.  Terrorists intent to do us harm continue to refine their devices to better conceal them and construct them with elements that standard screening technology and processes at airports are unable to detect. 

UNDERESTIMATING AT OUR PERIL

We have learned a great deal about our threats over the last 13 years but all of that learning has been reactive.  Our Military, Intelligence, Counter Terrorism and Law Enforcement communities have each had to “adapt on the fly” as one retired Department of Defense Intelligence analyst recently noted.  “They (terrorists) are always forward thinking, always looking for new ways to create the type of destruction and havoc they seek”, he continued.  His sentiments have been echoed by others in the corridors of power in the CIA, DOD, FBI as well as in many foreign countries intelligence services including Interpol and Scotland Yard, that partner with us in our broader national security efforts.  Still, despite all our combined resources and efforts terrorists will always have something of an advantage.  As it has been said since the earliest days of our “War on Terror”, the terrorists only need to be right one time; we, on the other hand, have to be right 100% of the time.  It is such a lopsided equation that it has steered some to promote policies and procedures that take the path of least resistance.  A new measure of “stovepipe thinking”, that narrow focus that came to light after 9/11/01 when we were made aware of the inertia, ineptitude, and inefficiency among our sprawling federal intelligence  apparatus seems to be creeping in to some areas of the vast bureaucracy.  Such return to the pre – 9/11 mindset should not be tolerated and it ought to be countered at every turn.  

While we here in New York City can remain confident that NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton and his Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence John Miller have largely left the outstanding handiwork of former Commissioner Ray Kelly’s Intelligence and Counter Terrorism Divisions intact, we are ever mindful of what our City represents to terrorists.  Conducting another successful attack in NYC is their Holy Grail; their ultimate goal, their preeminent target.

http://diydrones.com/profiles/blogs/how-long-will-unregulated-fpv-and-rc-last

http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/aerospace/aviation/that-toy-is-now-a-drone-says-the-faa

http://nypost.com/2014/07/07/two-drones-in-near-miss-with-nypd-copter-over-gwb/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregorymcneal/2014/07/08/two-drones-nearly-collide-with-nypd-helicopter-operators-arrested/

http://gothamist.com/2014/07/08/drones_nypd.php

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/09/nyregion/two-men-arrested-after-drone-flies-near-new-york-police-helicopter.html?ref=nyregion&_r=0

 Copyright The Brooding Cynyx 2014 © All Rights Reserved

OMINOUS SIGNS OF SHORT MEMORIES: PRE – 9-11-2001 MINDSET EVIDENT

SECURITY MUST BE TOP PRIORITY

'2013 Security Officer of the Year': One World Trade Center guard Abdul Basher

 'exercises' his eyes while on duty at the nation's tallest skyscraper

 and site of the 9/11 terror atrocity

Updated Sunday March 30, 2014

TAGS: 1 WORLD TRADE CENTER SECURITY BREECHES, DRUNKEN SECRET SERVICE AGENTS,

COMMANDERS AND SERVICE MEN MANNING NUCLEAR ARSENAL INCOMPETENT,

AMERICAN MILITARY STILL LEARNING HOW TO CONDUCT

ASYMMETRICAL WARFARE, THE FALSE ILLUSION OF SECURITY,

1WTC SECURITY OUTSOURCED TO LOWEST BIDDER,

OSAMA BIN LADEN’S SON IN LAW CONVICTED IN NY SUPERIOR COURT

(Wednesday March 26, 2014 Reade & Church St., NYC)  From this corner in Lower Manhattan almost equidistant from the New York State Supreme Courthouse and One World Trade Center, two stories were playing out each oddly linked to the other.  It was, however, a case of good news and bad news; very bad news indeed.  In the Courthouse Osama bin Laden’s son-in-law, Suleiman Abu Ghaith, the highest ranking al-Qaeda member to be tried in an American court, was convicted on all counts related to the conspiracy to kill Americans and the actual attack of September 11, 2001 itself.

A few blocks to the south at the site of 1 World Trade Center, just a week after a 16 year old high school student from New Jersey managed to gain access to the spire atop this new imposing structure, the lack of vigilant security and ineptitude was again illustrated in a cell phone camera captured picture of a security guard, a “half-blind” security guard at that, was photographed while asleep at the main entrance to the site.  Apparently security at the site is not a high priority but rather a matter of contracting the lowest bidder.

The bad news side of the equation really began to tip the scale downward as it was revealed that three members of the Secret Service contingent assigned to, the once thought to be elite, Counter Assault Team (CAT) who had been sent to The Netherlands prior to President Obama’s visit to The Hague, had been on a drinking binge that ended with one Agent passed out in a hotel hallway a mere six hours before they were to report for duty.  This is the third such incident of blatantly indiscriminate behavior by those tasked with providing security from the President of the United States; a task that has been exponentially more challenging from the earliest days of Obama’s presidential campaign in 2007.  No other candidate or president has ever received more death threats and required more proactive measures from the Secret Service than the first African American to run for the highest Office in our land and become President.

While in The Hague President Obama participated in the Nuclear Security Summit along with 24 other heads of state.  It was after one of these sessions that President Obama dismissed the recent incursion of Russian troops into Crimea stating that his most immediate threat was a “nuclear bomb going off in Manhattan”, not the Russia/Ukraine/Crimea situation.

Concerning nuclear weapons we learned this week that the men and women serving in isolated bunkers deep beneath the topsoil of military bases in Montana and North Dakota and elsewhere, had regularly cheated on monthly proficiency exams, that one top Commander, while on a visit to Russia last year was seen in the company of young Russian women while he was obviously extremely intoxicated and speaking about the physics of our nuclear arsenal.  By the end of the week he, along with nine other Commanders and 34 junior Officers were dismissed, resigned or reassigned.  The moral and competency of the men and women who literally have access to our over 19,000 ICBM nuclear tipped missiles has now become of great concern.  Endemic among those who serve in these highly technical and dreadfully monotonous posts is a sense that their “mission” is “useless”; that they are kept on a constant state of high alert while no threat is present.  As one Air Force Colonel who asked to speak anonymously stated, “We are fairly certain that there will not ever come a time when we will be called upon to carry out the specifics of our well-defined mission.  Year after year we train and train and have come to recognize that we perform a function, that we represent a segment of our Military arsenal that is highly unlikely ever going to be called upon.  This fact alone saps the morale from all of us living underground.”

ENDEMIC INEPTITUDE

If there is one common thread linking the last five paragraphs it is systemic failures of an egregious nature.  As our troops continue to die in remote corners of Afghanistan, the threat of “home grown” terrorists increases, and we work with other governments to secure the various stockpiles of nuclear material around the world, we are confronted with an alarming reality to say the least.  Anyone of the episodes above is cause for serious concern; collectively they represent a complete lack of respect for the perils in the real world, in real time, affecting real people.  Just as Americans awoke to a new reality on September 12, 2001 with stunned disbelief that a small band of terrorists were able to pull such a diabolically calculated attack, we would learn in the weeks, months and years after that, essentially, no one was “minding the store”.  For all the untold trillions of dollars the federal government has invested in the bottomless pits of the Intelligence and Law Enforcement Community from the CIA. DIA, NSA, NRO, and all the other “alphabet agencies”, the post 9-11 era revealed ineptitude of such a profound nature in the all the federal Agencies and Departments including those mentioned above, that the entire apparatus of securing our country was fatally flawed. 

Once the raging stallions of non-state sponsored terrorism, asymmetrical warfare and the complexities of waging a guerrilla war with radical insurgents were already out of the proverbial barnyard there was no coaxing them back.  We were in a new age indeed.  As is typical of modern day Congress, they exercised their knee-jerk reactions and passed with staggering haste bills and legislation that created new Agencies and rounded up an array of 22 existing diverse Agencies and created the Department of Homeland Security, a Cabinet level post as well as the Director of National Intelligence.  This Hodge-podge shotgun marriage among Agencies so institutionally ossified and vehemently territorial proved to be an awkward, cumbersome beast.  But as the years have come and gone since that immediate post 9-11-01 period when all of America was attuned to the sense of hyper-awareness and appeared ready to do whatever was asked of them, soon the security measures became nuisances; time consuming wastes of time.  Once the threat of another strike on our own soil by some terrorist group began to seem less plausible, slowly but surely we let our guard down, we dropped our hands as quickly as a winded boxer in the last round.

THOSE WHO FORGET TO REMEMBER…

As has become glaringly evident since 9-11-01 is that we, our government, military, diplomatic corps and intelligence machinery, for all its hi-tech sophistication and capabilities never did and continues to not have any practical knowledge of those with whom we are engaged in this “war on terror”.  We have scant understanding of the vast societal, cultural and historical differences between us and, when it comes to a theater of combat such as the notoriously ungovernable land of Afghanistan were tribal and familiar alliances are centuries old, we are at a loss.  When we finally remove the last of our troops from Afghanistan after a13 years of military engagement, in short order there will be no evidence that we had ever been there aside from the billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware and infrastructure that is too costly for us to remove. 

Even in the much more familiarly comfortable conventional methods of combat and defense we have over six decades of experience with, the failures of those charged with overseeing our huge stockpile of nuclear tipped bombs, was another stunner of epic proportions.  Beginning with the creation of North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and the Strategic Air Command (SAC) we have maintained underground silos, subterranean military bases carved into the deep bedrock of the west and Midwest of the United States tasked with being able to deliver nuclear Armageddon   within minutes of a Presidential directive.  Learning of the systemic corruption employed in these still active but, in reality, more relics of our Cold War past, in light of global instability and the Russian annexation of Crimea, was chilling.

As Joseph Cirincione, the president of the Ploughshares Fund, an organization committed to nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation said last week on MSNBC, “The men and women in those bunkers have a thankless job.  Their commanders know and they know they are preparing for a mission they will never be called upon to fulfill.  Morale is poor all the way down the line. The entire nuclear stockpile should be decommissioned and significantly reduced.  Nuclear war is so unlikely to happen.”  While it is true that the United States may never engage an enemy in conventional warfare such as in World War II, there is no imperative at any level of the federal government, the Department of Defense and other vested interests to relinquish our nuclear superiority as part of a pact or treaty.  We’ll keep our nukes, thank you.

SACRED GROUND UNGUARDED

From the day in 1966 that the first demolitions of existing structures began to clear a 16 acre of Lowe Manhattan for the World Trade Center, that plot of NYC has been high value real estate.  As the Twin Towers climbed ever higher for years many said no one will be willing to work in an office so high in the sky.  The architect, Minoru Yamasaki, himself uncomfortable with height, designed two building with exterior cladding interspersed by window no larger than 22 inches.  This was an ingenious solution in that the very narrow windows enabled workers to be more comfortable and less distracted in the highest stories of those Towers than other architectural proposals had specified.  Yamasaki found a kindred spirit and an intellectual peer in the young structural engineer from Worthington, Skilling, Helle, and Jackson (WSHJ), Leslie Robertson who brought Yamasaki’s grand vision to fruition while advancing constructing and engineering techniques that revolutionized how engineers thought about building big.  Within 14 months of the Twin Towers opening over 78% of its office space was leased. 

In a wrenchingly sad twist of fate Leslie Robertson observed the fully fueled passenger jets deliberately smash into the towers he had built.  As the steel warped from the lack of protective fire resistant foam, thousands of gallons of highly flammable aviation fuel, the fire stressed infrastructure succumbed to the elements and with an almost diabolically directed “pancaking effect” both of the Towers were reduced to 16 acres of smoldering rubble and the 7 subterranean levels had turned into a hell on earth for those trapped there when the Towers above them collapsed and sealed their fates.

One would think that almost a full 13 years later, after 11 years of constructing a new soaring structure, this time a single sublimely angular tower, that this 16 acre construction site would be among the most vigilantly guarded and secure as any of the other numerous and symbolic structures in our City.  But, incomprehensively, one would be mistaken; astonishingly mistaken.

A photograph appeared in our NYC local newspapers and on the TV news late last week of a security guard, Abdul Basher, 65, an employee of the subcontractor, Durst Organization Property Management, who is tasked with providing security for this hallowed site.  Basher, leaning back wearing sunglasses was apparently sound asleep at his post; a post that was in fact the primary entry to the building itself.  By his own admission he is “half blind” and has difficulties seeing “people and sometimes stairs.”  So this is what it has all devolved to?  As much as 1 World Trade Center is a 1776 foot testament to our New Yorker Pride, our strength and defiance in the faces of the cowards who brought our old Giant 11 down, it is for many holy, blood soaked ground.   To learn that the security of this site had been outsourced by billionaires to the lowest bidder was just another worm in the apple. 

A NATURAL TARGET

On a cold overcast February 26, 1993, the first attack on our Twin Towers was perpetrated.  Fortunately the terrorists responsible for this act were not as ambitious in their plot nor as astute in their planning as the attackers of September 11, 2001.  However, what they were, what their crime was did little to rattled the cages of those in the federal government to pay attention to an increasingly looming threat.  That ragtag band of terrorists lead by a master bomb maker, Ramzi Yousef, whose uncle is the admitted mastermind behind the 9-11-01 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), were unable to bring our Towers down but eight years later they witnessed success beyond their wildest dreams. 

As any domestic security expert or analysts will say for the public record, 1 World Trade Center will be a choice target for this new generation of terrorists.  Given the dynamics within unstable nations and simmering anti-American tension across the globe, it is safe to say that someone, at this very minute, in a city or rural enclave is already plotting the next attack on NYC and certainly, the defiant middle finger to the rest of the world that is 1 World Trade Center, as their primary target. 

As has been reported in the local media recently there was a contentious turf battle for jurisdiction over the task of providing security for 1 WTC between the Port Authority Police (PAPD) and the New York City Police Department (NYPD).  The Port Authority eventually won that territorial dispute and now, in light of recent gross lapses in securing the site, there may in fact be a jurisdictional review to access what Agency or Agencies will be the primary Law Enforcement Agency at the site, the memorial plaza and surrounding surface streets.  Since the PATH trains that connect New York City to New Jersey have historically been the sole domain of the PAPD, that mission will be continued.   

The PAPD currently are the lone providers to much of the infrastructure of the NYC – North Jersey metropolitan area including, side from the PATH trains, all three major airports, two huge bus terminals and the tunnels and bridges that link NYC to NJ over or under the Hudson River.  It seems obvious that the PAPD should retain the jurisdictional imperative at all the sites they have historically presided including the new 1 WTC.  How they had somehow ceded security control from the site to some half-assed rent-a-cop outfit is beyond comprehension.

WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?

So, in the time elapsed in one seven day period we have learned about extremely distressing realities; we now know our President is in danger due to drunken Secret Service Agents, that our nuclear stockpile is staffed by unqualified, disillusioned, over stressed airmen and women, that a partially blind security guard was the first line of defense at the most sacred ground in NYC if not all of the USA and, by the way, our CIA had completely once again failed to connect the dots as Russian President Vladimir Putin presided over a sham referendum in Crimea wresting that peninsular on the southern border of  the sovereign state of  Ukraine back to Russian control.   

Iraq remains a dystopian state with warring religious and ethnic factions hell-bent on the annihilation of each other.  On another front our puppet drug lord, corrupt, anti-American so called “leader” of Afghanistan continues to poke his wicked fingers into the eyes of the American Military and other Agencies that sacrificed so much to bring some sense of order to his land.  There is not a hot spot in the world where the USA has any leverage or clout and that is the direct result of the war-mongering, imperialist, neo-conservatives of the Cheney/Bush administration.  Despite the armed conflicts we’ve engaged in over all these years, none of them have served to make us any safer than we were on September 11, 2001.

NEW YORK, NEW YORK IS A HELL OF A TOWN

Without any doubt or hint of exaggeration, one solid fact of Americana is that New York City is the premier City on the planet.  The number one destination of worldwide tourists, and, as Howard Cosell once said, “The City whose landmarks are known all over the world.  The center of shipping, transportation, communications, finance, fashion and, of course entertainment”, will always be the preeminent target in the evil eyes of those seeking to bring us death and destruction.  It is for this reason and this reason alone that the entire spectrum of homeland security, intelligence gathering and analysis, signal intelligence and constant vigilance must be maintained.

Ask any terrorism expert, any talking head from a think tank or, for that matter, any NYPD member, and they will to a person tell you their most earnest and frightful belief is that al Qaeda or some derivative thereof is patiently biding their time; watching and waiting for their next opportunity to bring their jihad to American soil.

Until we shore up our security efforts at every level of government we will remain an open target.  Having lived through the hours, days and weeks after our Twin Towers where toppled, it is an ominous reality that so many Agencies and their personnel can be asleep at the wheel at the same time.

The stakes are very high; the threat level while difficult to assess day to day is omnipresent and the consequences could be far worse than all we lived through on September 11, 2001 and since.

Lest we forget; lest our government forget.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/26/eric-holder-terror-trial_n_5036190.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/27/nyregion/bin-ladens-son-in-law-is-convicted-in-terror-trial.html?hp

http://www.ny1.com/content/news/205878/guilty-verdict-returned-in-trial-of-bin-laden-s-son-in-law

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2013/01/secrecy-around-ksm-guantanamo-hearings.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/26/osama-bin-laden-son-in-law_n_5036249.html

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/26/holder-cites-terrorism-conviction-vindication-us-t/

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/26/nyregion/jurors-begin-deliberations-in-osama-bin-laden-relatives-case.html?src=rechp

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/25/us-nuclear-security-summit-idUSBREA2O12820140325

Updated Links:

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/wtc-top-security-official-resigns-urged-step-article-1.1738731

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-air-force-fires-nine-officers-following-nuclear-test-cheating-probe/2014/03/27/9e5eaffa-b5e0-11e3-b899-20667de76985_story.html

http://www.defenseone.com/management/2014/03/9-air-force-officers-fired-nuclear-missile-cheating-scandal/81445/

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