First Responders Check Your IED IQ

October 30th, 2011 | Author: Dr. Ross Riggs

The Police Blotter - If there is anything of which you, as a street police officer, should be aware, it is the violent, indiscriminate murder that is being caused throughout law enforcement and other public safety first responders, by IED’s, Improvised Explosive Devices.

The Homeland Security Network recently ran a series of articles on IED’s which highlights the increase in IED use, some new tactics by those who deploy these vicious weapons against our cops. According to US Army Lt. General Barbero, IED attacks “outside Afghanistan and Iraq have more than doubled in the last three years.” (emphasis added) The key point is outside Afghanistan and Iraq. The simple technology of creating, deploying, and detonating these devices has been turned against law enforcement in our own cities and towns.

This is happening not just in the United States but across the world. Authorities report that

“…from January to September, there were an average of 608 attacks per month in 99 countries; including 367 IED attacks in the US alone during that same time frame.” 

Consider those numbers, 608 deadly attacks in 9 months. That is about 67 per month, more than two every single day. Now, these numbers are not strictly attacks against law enforcement. It can be drug wars between gangs but regardless when that kind of violence happens in our cities and towns, first responders are still laying their lives on the line when they respond to these kinds of calls.

According to the USA Today article quoted in “IED Use on the Rise” in HSN,

“IED’s popularity among criminals, narcotics traffickers and terrorists continues to grow, aided by the spread of online of bomb-making technology, like the 102-page English-language e-book titled ‘The Explosives Course…’ is putting first responders at risk in a way in which they never have been previously."

Very often the street police officer has heard the term that they are the thin blue line of first defense between civilization and anarchy. Now, though, they are truly the first line of defense in an all-out battle for the societies in which we desire to live.

General Barbero wrote that “…the IED is cheap, effective and readily available…” and he also warned each of us that it is and will be an “enduring threat.” Perhaps one of the most horrific ways in which this threat is being carried out against law enforcement and first responders is by luring them into a trap. According to an HSN report on based on information coming out of Mexico this use of vehicle borne improvised explosive devices (VBIED) is call the “Trojan Horse of Terror.”
 

The VBIED is like the original Trojan Horse of the Battle of Troy that allowed the Greeks to final enter the City of Troy and end their ten year siege because “it arouses little suspicion, making it a not uncommon means of deploying devices.” The twist that has been put upon the use of VBIEDs is that officers are being lured to the location of a VBIED rather than trying to force the VBIED into where the police are. One example was a planned aggressive act by the offenders, known drug cartel, armed in a motor vehicle of their own that led the police into pursuing them. The offenders manipulated the pursuit until the officers were within striking distance of the VBIED and detonated it. “This tactic has been used indiscriminately against many targets including first responders.” This type of ‘Trojan Horse’ tactic is becoming more prevalent in the U.S. According to one expert, there were four such incidents in the US between mid-2010 and January 2011. According to ‘InSight Crime’ an organization that tracks organized crime and security issues, there have been at least another three incidents between January and September 2011.

What can you do as a law enforcement officer working the patrol assignment that could come in contact with just such a VBIED or an IED? Education and training are the keys. For example, on-line at the Federation of American Scientists site you can find a military manual of five chapters [PDF] dedicated to identifying and mitigating the risk of IEDs and VBIEDs. There are also a variety of YouTube videos that show the training used to avoid them and the consequences of a close encounter with an IED. The better the training you can arrange for yourself or that can be arranged for your department the better prepared you will be in the event the ‘Trojan Horse’ is set at your gate.

Security Consulting Investigations, LLC can arrange for the training within our department. Contact SCI at director@security-consulting.us. You may also contact us through www.security-consulting.us

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“The Explosives Course” was written by students of Abu Khabab Al-Masri, the al-Qaeda explosives expert killed in a drone attack by US forces in 2008.

Sylvia Longmire, a former Air Force Special Agent, former senior border security analyst for the State of California, and author of the recently published book “Cartel: The Coming Invasion of Mexico’s Drug Wars”

A Wind of Change in the Desert

 

October 20th, 2011 | Author: Dr. Ross Riggs

August 22nd 2011 – the winds of change blew across the Sinai desert and encompassed the Egyptian presidential palace and left in its sandy wake the Mubarak regime a memory and an opening for radical Islamic extremists to take over this prime location on the steps of the Middle East. Two months later, this wind blew again across the African sands. In the wind came NATO airstrikes and as the wind began to subside, on October 20, 2011 Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi lay dead in the dirt streets, surrounded by the poverty he forced upon the Libyan population. The vacuum left in the violent end of Gaddafi’s regime leaves a vacuum that will be quickly targeted by the extremist radical Muslims eager to cement their position on the African continent.

Their goals are twofold… first, to sweep Islamic law into nations and, with Sharia, bring the worldwide caliphate dreamed of by the extremists, and, second, to build the treasuries of Al Qaeda and its counterparts to encourage the on-going jihad against Israel, the U.S. and all non-Muslims around the world. What does that mean for local LEO’s in the U.S.? I think the answer also comes in two parts.

Very often in police work, officers are used to pursuing the leads, tracking the offenders, building the case and marking it ‘closed’ upon the prosecution of those responsible. Perhaps one of the biggest reasons that cops hate calls like domestic disputes is that there is never a resolution, a final ‘case closed’ but it is often a no-win situation that seems to go on and on. Officers are ‘fixers’. They come into a situation that is in havoc, take control, find a solution and move on. They find they cannot ‘fix’ domestics. How does that apply to ‘jihad’?

Never stop 'til the fight is done.

Jihad by definition is an on-going struggle. It never ends for the true believer until he leaves this world. So, for the local LEO’s that are working now, perhaps mid-way through their career; this jihad war will be one that they hand off to the generation of cops that come after them. If you are one of today’s officers, you will learn, educating yourself on all of the risks and tactics of domestic terrorism and the extremists that bring the war into your neighborhoods. And, when it comes to the end of your watch, the next generation will have to pick up where you left off. The level of risk will wane and then intensify based on the geo-political atmosphere of the day. Fusion centers, as a methodology, may come and go, or they may increase in their effectiveness. Information gathering will become even more vital to how the new cops handle the situations they face.

So, do we throw up our hands in disgust, giving in to the notion that we cannot stop it? That can never be our response. For the families living in your communities, raising their children in what they hope is a safe place; there is only one response. In the movie, The Untouchables, law enforcement legend Elliot Ness got into Al Capone’s face in the courtroom upon his conviction and threw Capone’s words back at him… “Never stop, never stop fighting till the fight is done… never stop fighting till the fight is done… here endeth the lesson.” No lesson is more on target in fighting against jihad extremists. None.

Here endeth the lesson.

Dirty Bombs and other Mass Casualty Incidents ~ Police Response

October 13th, 2011 | Author: Dr. Ross Riggs

So, here you are, the day after a mass casualty incident in your city. An event that ‘could never happen here’ has happened. How did you respond yesterday? How will you react today? Your department has taken a public stance and now you are going back out into the community to work the streets and try to communicate to your citizens that they are still safer here than 99% of the rest of the world, and that they can go on with their lives. 

Dirty bombs, terrorist acts, and WMD’s are designed to instill fear into the community. Yet, they are now part of our reality.

Follow the link to read more about the response priorities for officers following large scale incidents.

Situational Awareness

October 1st, 2011 | Author: Dr. Ross Riggs

Sometime back I posted a blog on Situational Awareness and the concept of TEDD: Time, Environment, Distance, and Demeanor. In reply to a question for clarification, I submit to you the following:

Mr. Fred Burton from STRATFOR writes,

 “…one common denominator of all the different potential threats — whether from lone wolves, militant groups, common criminals or the mentally disturbed — is that those planning an operation all monitor their target in advance. However, while pickpockets or purse-snatchers case their victims for perhaps only a few seconds or minutes, a militant organization might conduct detailed surveillance of a target for several weeks or even months.”

The longer that a person or group of persons does surveillance prior to committing any type of criminal attack or other illegal operation, the more susceptible to being discovered and even neutralized. The key, as mentioned, is TEDD.  

T (time) - are these people or is this person with you, or near you for too long a period of time, or at several apparently disconnected times? Do they continue to appear, the same person(s) over and over? To know this you must be paying attention to people, their appearance and dress as well as demeanor. Anything that you can spot quickly that will tell you this is the same person you have seen previously. 

E (environment) – do they not fit in the place you are seeing them? If you want to test this, say for example you are a female being followed by a male. If the person does not seem to have an accomplice who is female, or if you want to see if they might, if you can drop into a place that is usually only for women. A ladies store such as a Victoria’s Secret, even though some men do shop there, if this person follows you in and looks totally out of place; you may have identified a threat. Or, if suddenly a female enters the store and pays too much attention to you or follows you as you leave without buying anything; again you may have found our threat (or at least part of it). 

D (distance) - This can be either too close or strangely too far away at odd times or just a sense you get as you notice someone at that distance. 

D (demeanor) – how do they act, particularly when you turn and face them or purposely put yourself in their way. (This is a tactic that must be used only most cautiously when you have ample witnesses like in a very public area.)

Mr. Barton writes,

“An effective CS program depends on knowing two “secrets”: first, hostile surveillance is vulnerable to detection because those performing it are not always as sophisticated in their tradecraft as commonly perceived; and second, hostile surveillance can be manipulated and the operatives forced into making errors that will reveal their presence.”

There is a great deal more to be said on this particular issue but for now, keep these basic thoughts in mind and if there is a marked interest I will follow up with a series of blogs on this topic.