TERRORISM BEYOND 2000
TRENDS AND THREAT ISSUES

By Geary Sikich

Introduction
We are faced with a growing threat - terrorism. The security of our country's infrastructure is a key concern of the White House. This introductory paper focuses on identifying current issues, introducing key elements for an effective analysis of current trends and issues surrounding the nature of terrorism today and beyond 2000.

Traditional military thought is that the attacker needs more manpower, generally three to five times as much is recommended, to successfully conduct offensive operations. Paradoxically, in terrorist and counter-terrorist operations the reverse often turns out to be true. A small attacking force armed with high firepower weapons has time and again inflicted damage all out of proportion to its size.

That does not invalidate the traditional military thinking on offensive operations. It merely means that in the world of terrorism, the attacker rarely needs to seize and hold territory. Instead the terrorist is primarily interested in the logistically simpler task of inflicting maximum destruction in a strictly limited period of time.

In their favor, the terrorist has tactical surprise on their side. They can choose when and where and how to strike. The terrorist can ensure that, even though outnumbered and outgunned on an overall basis, at the point of contact they have superiority.

Threats: Beyond 2000
In addition to the common threats associated with terrorism we are recognizing threats that include but are not limited to: Workplace Violence, Cyberthreats, Nuclear, Chemical and Biological threats.

Targets
Targets Today: Refineries, Chemical Plants, Gas Processing Operations, Storage facilities, Pipelines, Shipping, Cargo, Basic Infrastructure, Electric Power, Gas & Oil Pipelines, Water Supplies, Telecommunications, Economic System, Education System, Prison System.

Recognizing the Terrorist Threat
The profile of the Terrorist Organization: Infrastructure, Leadership, Organization, Goals, Mission Statement and other aspects are changing.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) offers the following definition of terrorism:

"Terrorism is the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof in furtherance of political or social objectives."

The critical components of the above definition, or any other definition of terrorism one might articulate, then one can argue are:

• Violence
• Audience
• Mood of Fear
• Victims (innocent)
• Political/Social Motives/Goals

Using the above criteria, a broader definition might read:

"Terrorism is a synthesis of war and theater, a dramatization of the most proscribed kind of violence - that which is perpetrated on innocent victims - played before an audience in the hope of creating a mood of fear, for political or social purposes."

Regardless of the definition one uses to describe Terrorism, it must be acknowledged that during the last three decades, terrorism has developed into a powerful weapon for political radicals and a readily acceptable tool, albeit in some cases clandestine, of national policy for certain nation states.

The November 1995 bombing of a US military establishment in Saudi Arabia brings to light that, Americans and American interests, all too often have been targeted by terrorists around the world. For this reason, the Clinton administration has placed the development of a focused, coordinated international strategy against terrorism at the top of its foreign policy agenda.

Each year the United States State Department issues a report entitled "Patterns in Global Terrorism," which describes the main terrorist events of the previous year as well as trends the US counter terrorism community is observing. The 1995 report, highlights an upswing in world terrorist incidents compared to 1994, when the world witnessed an almost 25 percent decrease from 1993 levels.

Terrorist violence in 1995 occurred in 54 countries and brought about a wide range of suffering. There were numerous low-level incendiary attacks in Europe that caused only minor property damage. A smaller number of attacks proved deadly, such as the bus bombings in Israel, and the Sarin Gas attack in Tokyo that produced a huge casualty toll of 12 dead and 5,500 injured. There were 440 international terrorist attacks during 1995, up from the previous year's total of 322, an increase of 37 percent. Ninety-nine of these were anti-US attacks, up from 66 such incidents in 1994. Most of the total increase is due to a campaign of attacks in Europe, largely focused in Turkey and Germany, by the terrorist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which seeks to establish an independent Marxist state in southeastern Turkey. There were 272 low-level arson attacks and similar property crimes against Turkish targets attributed to the PKK during 1995 (11 resulted in the deaths of one or more persons), an even higher number than the group perpetrated during its 1993 campaign. In a different part of the world, Colombia recorded 76 international terrorist attacks last year, up from 41 in 1994. The South American Region recorded an estimated 6,500 kidnappings, costing companies more than $200,000,000.00 US. Kroll and Associates, a New York based security firm estimates that more than 10 kidnappings per day occur in Columbia, accounting for approximately 3,600. Figures are hard to determine due to the fact that many of the kidnappings go unreported.

1995: Significant Acts of International Terrorism
On March 8, two American employees of the US consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, Jacqueline Keys Van Landingham and Gary C. Durell, were killed when their shuttle bus was fired on. A third employee, Mark McCloy, was wounded.

On March 20, members of the Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo placed containers of the deadly chemical nerve agent sarin on five trains of the Tokyo subway system during the morning rush hour. The cultists then punctured the containers, releasing poisonous gas into the trains and subway stations. Despite the extreme toxicity of sarin, the attack killed only 12 persons, but 5,500 were injured, including two Americans. The attack was the first major use of chemical weapons by terrorists.

On June 19, two American missionaries, Steve Welsh and Timothy Van Dyke, were killed by Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas during a confrontation with a Colombian army patrol. The guerrillas kidnapped the two men in January 1994 initially to force the withdrawal of US military personnel engaged in military assistance projects in Colombia. FARC later changed this demand to a monetary ransom.

On June 26, gunmen attempted to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during a visit to Ethiopia. The attempt was foiled by Ethiopian counter terrorist forces. The Islamic Group claimed responsibility.

On November 13, terrorists bombed the Riyadh headquarters of the Office of the Program Manager/Saudi Arabian National Guard, killing seven people, five of them Americans, and seriously injuring 35 others, This was the single deadliest attack against US interests in the Middle East since the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut in October 1993.

International Terrorism
12 Americans died last year as a result of international terrorist attacks in various parts of the world. In addition to the two US consulate employees killed in Pakistan, the two missionaries killed in Colombia, and the five citizens killed in Saudi Arabia, one American tourist was murdered in Cambodia by the Khmer Rouge, one American was killed in a suicide van bombing in Gaza and another died in a similar attack on a bus in Israel. Forty-eight-eight Americans were wounded. The number of worldwide fatalities due to international terrorism was 177, slightly more than half the previous year's total of 314. However, the number of persons wounded increased by a factor of ten: 6,277 persons, 5,500 of them in the Tokyo subway gas attack.

Taken together, these incidents suggest an emerging pattern for world terrorism. One conspicuous feature is the increasingly global scale of terrorism. For example, the suspected mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing had contact with extremists in Pakistan, the Philippines, New York, and elsewhere. The Kurdish PKK has a proven capability to launch attacks throughout Europe, Africa, North and South America, and elsewhere. No country can consider itself immune from terrorist attack.

Another trend that continues is a concerted effort to derail the Middle East peace process. Although Israel, the Palestinians and many Arab states are moving toward peace, Islamic extremist groups such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Hizballah are using terror to undermine this process. These groups have not succeeded, but they still pose a threat to peace. Perhaps the most chilling event of the year was the large-scale Tokyo subway attack, which proved that long-feared terrorism involving materials of mass destruction are now a reality. The advent of this type of terrorist incident illustrates another disturbing trend; the increasing focus. of terrorists on inflicting mass casualties.

International Terrorism: Trends to Watch
The thirty-odd intelligence, policy making, law enforcement and regulatory agencies that comprise the US government's counter-terrorism community are working hard to track future terrorist threats and develop effective strategies to counter them. Several trends bear close scrutiny.

Islamic terrorism, while not a new phenomenon, is growing. Terrorists acting in the name of Islam are increasingly willing to strike at the United States and others outside the Islamic world. The World Trade Center bombing and the related conspiracy in New York were the work of Islamic extremists. So was the bombing in Buenos Aires of the Israeli embassy in 1992, and apparently the almost identical bombing of a Jewish cultural center there in 1994. Islamic extremists continue to use terror and violence throughout the Middle East and North Africa in support of their political objectives, inflicting a heavy toll in lives and civil order. In addition to indigenous extremist groups, hundreds of veterans of the Afghan war have scattered throughout the Middle East and South Asia; a number of them have been implicated in the violence that has enveloped Algeria and Egypt during the last several years, and they may be active in other areas as well. These mujahiden "free agents" may form a nucleus of trained and committed fighters available for hire by various causes and groups, potentially including private sponsors.

Today's transnational terrorist is a sophisticated new breed. They are mobile, knowledgeable about communications, explosives technology, and computers, plus they have contacts all over the world. These modern terrorists are much more difficult to track and apprehend because they do not belong to traditional, established terrorist groups or those sponsored by states. Many of these can be numbered among the ranks of Islamic extremists, like those involved in the World Trade Center bombing.

Religious extremists of other stripes may also turn to terror, as the cult attack in the Tokyo subway demonstrated. These often secretive groups, about whose ideologies, intentions, and capabilities very little is known, pose an especially difficult challenge from a counter terrorism viewpoint.

Pressures from poverty and demography in the Third World, and the centrifugal forces that are ripping a number of nations apart along ethnic and religious lines, have generated increased regional violence and conflicts that could spur an increase in international terrorism. So far this threat has not materialized, but historical hatreds and the level of bloodshed in such places as Russia's "near abroad," Africa, and Afghanistan, to name but a few, is deeply disturbing in this regard and bears close scrutiny.

The danger of weapons of mass destruction, including chemical and biological agents as well as nuclear weapons, being obtained or constructed by terrorist groups is real. Again, as the gas attack in the Tokyo subway demonstrated, materials and equipment to assemble weapons of these kinds are readily available, and even crude versions may prove tremendously destructive.

Finally, connections between well-known terrorist groups and the international narcotics syndicates - as well as the use of terrorism by the narcos themselves - may be on the rise. The increasing ease of penetration of international borders and the access to exchange information by which crime syndicates and terrorist groups are using the international information highway to route financial transactions while disguising their tracks, is beginning to require nations to invest substantial technical skill and law enforcement resources if they hope to succeed in countering these organizations. In a number of cases, however, countries simply don't have such resources at their disposal, or lack the political will to use them if they do.

Counter-Terrorism: Some Rays of Hope
Despite these troublesome developments, some real progress has been made during the last few years in the fight against international terrorism. In fact, absent the most recent terror campaign by the PKK, and the increase of terrorism in Colombia, the level of international terrorism during 1995 would have continued the downward trend of recent years. This is due partly to proactive steps taken by the United States and other governments, and partly to favorable geopolitical trends that have helped erode the terrorists' sources of support and safehaven. Some factors involved include:

• Counter terrorism and law enforcement cooperation among nations has grown, increasing international consensus that terrorism is beyond the pale.
• The Soviet Union, once a protector of terrorist groups and their state sponsors, has dissolved.
• Two radical Arab regimes long involved in sponsoring and supporting terrorism in the Middle East- Libya and Iraq- are isolated and under pressure from international sanctions.
• Iran, while still the most active state sponsor of terrorism, is also under considerable economic pressure, and may for this reason be more circumspect in its choice of targets.
• The conflicts in Northern Ireland and South Africa, regarded in the past as intractable, have moved along the path of peaceful settlement, and the main protagonists halted the use of terror and violence as a political weapon. Although the Irish Republican Army (IRA) rescinded its cease-fire in February of this year, the momentum of earlier peace talks will be hard to break.
• The Arab-Israeli conflict has taken a historic turn toward resolution. Israel and the PLO have concluded an agreement on interim self-government in Gaza and the West Bank, and will soon move on to final status negotiations. Jordan has followed Egypt in making peace with Israel, and other Arab states are establishing contacts with Israel.

The above developments have been important. More and more nations around the world are now cooperating to fight terrorism. In 1995, several governments turned over major terrorists to US government authorities for prosecution, including the reputed mastermind of the World Trade Center bombing, Ramzi Ahmed Yousef. Some of Yousef's suspected gang members were also apprehended; Abdul Hakim Murad, Eyad Mahmoud Ismail Najim, and Wali Khan Amin Shah. All are awaiting trial in the United States. Another major victory for the rule of law occurred in October, when a US court convicted Omar Abdel Rahman and co-defendants of conspiring to wage a war of urban terrorism against the United States.

1995 also saw several international conferences, held to coordinate counter terrorism efforts, and more are scheduled for 1996. During August of 1995 the government of Argentina convened a regional ministerial meeting on counter terrorism, spurred by the bombings in Buenos Aires in 1992 and 1994. Senior officials from Chile, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, the United States, and the host nation discussed the threat posed by international terrorism to the region and ways of better coordinating national responses to that threat.

A first-of-its-kind counter terrorism conference at the ministerial level was held on December 12, 1995 in Ottawa, Canada, to focus on concrete, practical steps to fight the ongoing threat. This conference had its origins in the June 1995 Halifax Summit of the heads of state and government of the G-7 nations and Russia, whose participants called for "specific, cooperative measures to deter, prevent, and investigate terrorist acts." The ministers at the Ottawa conference pledged to take action in the following areas:

• Strengthening the sharing of intelligence on terrorism
• Pursuing measures to prevent the terrorist use of nuclear, chemical, and biological materials
• Inhibiting the movement of terrorists
• Enhancing measures to prevent the falsification of documents
• Depriving terrorists of funds
• Increasing mutual legal assistance
• Strengthening protection of aviation, maritime, and other transportation systems against terrorism
• Working toward universal adherence to international treaties and conventions on terrorism by the year 2000

The United States, for its part, has made progress in many of these areas. For example, the Clinton administration has sought to increase the use of extradition as a counter terrorism tool. In addition, Washington is renegotiating some of its bilateral extradition treaties to exclude the "political offense exception," which, in effect, excused many terrorist crimes as political acts. Five new treaties are pending before the US Senate and approximately a dozen others are currently under negotiation. To inhibit terrorist fund raising here, President Clinton signed an executive order in January 1995 blocking the assets in the United States of terrorist groups and prohibiting financial transactions with these groups.

Overall, the United States has a superb level of cooperation, both at home and overseas, among the many agencies that comprise the US counter terrorism community. Today, the community is working together more effectively than ever. We have made some important strides in improving the safety of Americans abroad, expanding our own counter terrorism capabilities, and helping friendly countries who would do the same. For one thing, we have made significant progress in strengthening security for American embassies and personnel abroad. The Department of State's Bureau of Diplomatic Security has taken the lead in this task. Similar progress has been made by the military and the private sector.

Aviation security is another area where we have made great advances in recent years, working with many governments to improve international airport security and training for aviation security personnel. As the December 1994 hijacking of an Air France jet by Algerian militants proves, however, the threat has by no means disappeared. We have also enlarged our intelligence gathering overseas against terrorists and their networks. This is a top priority for the US intelligence community and there is a high degree of cooperation between US intelligence and counterparts abroad against terrorism.

To harness science and technology in the fight against terrorism, we also have an extensive research and development program, paid for primarily with funds from the Department of Defense, in which we cooperate bilaterally with the United Kingdom, Canada, Israel, and other states on counter terrorism technology. The State Department's Coordinator for Counter terrorism conducts bilateral consultations with many other governments.

There are similar consultations in the G-7 and the European Union. There are now nine treaties and conventions that commit signatories to combat various terrorist crimes. The United States urges governments that have not signed and ratified these to do so promptly.

As the record for 1995 shows, however, we cannot afford to be complacent. Temporary declines in the rate of terrorism attacks can be reversed as terrorists adopt new technologies and strategies, and, as governments learn to better protect their own facilities, shift to softer targets such as office buildings and mass transportation. We must constantly work to improve our own technology, intelligence, and counter terrorism policy in the future.

Last year, at the dedication of a memorial cairn at Arlington Cemetery to commemorate those killed in the Pan Am 103 bombing, President Clinton said, "Today, America is more determined than ever to stand against terrorism, to fight it, to bring terrorists to answer for their crimes." More and more nations are demonstrating that same determination as the international battle against terrorism gets stronger each year. The United States will continue to be in the forefront of this important struggle.

About The Author:
Geary W. Sikich is the author of, "It Can't Happen Here: All Hazards Crisis Management Planning", published by PennWell Books. His second book, "Emergency Management Planning Handbook", is published by McGraw Hill and is also available in a Spanish edition. He is a Principal with Logical Management Systems, Corp. (LMS) based in Munster, Indiana. Mr. Sikich has over 20 years experience in management consulting in a variety of fields. He consults on a regular basis with companies worldwide on crisis management issues.

For more information on Logical Management Systems, Corp. Anti-Terrorism Consulting Services please call (219) 922-7718, www.logicalmanagement.com or Gsikich@aol.com, or write to: Logical Management Systems, Corp. P.O. Box 1998 Highland, Indiana USA 46322-7718

Copyright© 1998, Geary W. Sikich, P.O. Box 1998, Highland, Indiana 46322. World rights reserved. No part of this publication may be stored in a retrieval system, transmitted, or reproduced in any way, including but not limited to photocopy, photograph, magnetic or other record, without prior agreement and written permission of the publisher.