A Real Homeland Threat: IEDs
CBS News producer Robert Hendin wrote this story for CBSNews.com.
It is a security official's worst nightmare:
Late at night on July 3rd...a van filled with some sort of explosive device is discovered by a beat cop in Brooklyn, NY.
The bomb squad is called in and confronts an urgent question:
"Is this a real terrorist attack and are there more explosive laden vans?" Fortunately, the materials are quickly made safe, and no other bomb-filled vans are found. The case is now a criminal matter, with no nexus to terrorism. This was no drill, it really happened, and the scary thing is it happens all the time.
How a police officer responds to that event, how a postal worker or a garbage truck driver reacts when he sees something suspicious and how local law enforcement can learn from the federal government is the emphasis of the Department of Homeland Security's Protective Security Coordination Division. What could be called the the anti-bomb, pro-information sharing office, it's aimed at making every cop in the country more knowledgeable about improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and preventing terrorists from using them here in the US.
"Since 1968, over 90% of the terrorists incidents globally, have been bombings," William Flynn, the director of the protection office told reporters in Washington. "I really think that we will prevent the next terrorist attack, hopefully, we will prevent the next terrorist attack by good intelligence and information sharing."
Sharing information about bombs, real devices like homemade bombs used in world wide terrorist attacks including in Iraq and Afghanistan, or terrorist propaganda, online videos about bomb making, is the focus of the office's new law enforcement website, called Tripwire, or Technical Resource for Incident Prevention. With over 5,000 users from 40 federal agencies, 750 state and local law enforcement entities, 35 different military agencies, and over 75 private sector groups, the website is aimed at providing the most real time information on what terrorists are up to in terms of explosives and letting every possible authority in the country know as soon as possible. Even major stadiums and arenas as well as the country's largest hotel chains are on the site, learning how to identify and prevent such things are suicide bombers, remote controlled IED's and vehicular borne IEDs.
"We've gotten feedback, direct feedback from major law enforcement agencies, that they've changed some of their security and protective measures for special events based on the information that we are able to provide them." on tripwire, said Flynn.
Such information includes how to establish security checkpoints and set-up stand-off distances to build a perimeter around events.
In addition to information sharing, the office also focuses on information gathering...getting information from the field, from employees at stores that sell hydrogen peroxide and other household materials that could be turned into bombs. In fact, DHS along with most major law enforcement agencies actively go to businesses and ask for help, identifying any suspicious purchases of car batteries, peroxide products and fertilizer, over the counter products that have a deadly potential.
"The ability now to take products like hydrogen peroxide and to convert that into a bomb is fairly easy and ... those types of materials can be purchased fairly readily," Flynn said. He spoke of how the bombs that were used in the July 7th, 2005 explosions against London transit were made from hydrogen peroxide and were built at the home of the one of the bombers.
Following the lead of the New York Police Department, now police in DC, Chicago, Las Vegas, Miami, Houston and Los Angeles all have outreach into the business community. In addition, DHS has 79 "protective security advisors" working with authorities in 60 major cities to help the cops better protect their hometowns.
The big question, could suicide attacks happen here?
"I don't think it's as readily able to happen here, recruiting and infiltrating has been made difficult, surveillance, doing the things, getting the truck, getting the materials, getting a hotel room, using an ATM machine, using a cell phone, all of the things that take place, I think we've been able to disrupt that."
But, the threat from improvised explosive devices is real -- one of the greatest facing the US homeland.
By Rob Hendin
