Week One - Michael r. vest



Part One

Choose “one" discussion question from either the chapter 13 or 14 discussion boxes in which to respond. After reading the chapter and the discussion box, you are to “repeat” and comprehensively answer your selected discussion question.

Chapter 13, pg. 469

“How necessary are elite counterterrorism units? Why?” (Martin, 2013)

Elite counterterrorism units are a necessary and effective tool that is used by many countries in their fight against terrorist groups. While counterterrorism primarily focuses on policies for its actions verse antiterrorism which focuses on target hardening, the coconscious among security experts is the counterterrorism can be split into three general areas (Martin, 2013). These areas are political, legal, and prevention (Martin, 2013).

Because counterterrorism covers these three areas, elite counterterrorism units like SEAL Team 6 and others are needed to execute actions against an adversary that violates the sovereignty of a nation and human rights. These teams are often used in cases where large scale retaliation would create more damage than good. They are a surgical strike tool that is highly trained, skilled, and effective at neutralizing and gathering intelligence on an enemy.

Because these teams operate within a small span of control and theater, they can be more precise. For instance, many specialized counterterrorism teams are being used to infiltrate areas along terrorist training camps to gather intelligence and to act as weapons coordinators for precision surgical air strikes as needed. These teams are also used for extraction of personnel and equipment that is critical in the fight on terrorism.

Because of their small sizes, these teams are able to infiltrate an area that is highly guarded with a better chance of success. These teams train, eat, and sleep together to form a team that operates as one. This is critical to the success of missions such as in the retaking a hijacked aircraft. Counterterrorism teams act as one in execution of their mission.

Many terrorist organizations are aware of many of these counterterrorism teams but seem to have little recourse in stopping their actions due to their training, skill, and execution of mission parameters. Counterterrorism teams are able to take out targets that would otherwise cause political problems for a particular government. Many times, these teams will infiltrate into a country’s soil to accomplish a mission without permission from that host nation. If these teams are caught, the political ramifications can be disastrous. On many occasions, these teams actions are never heard about in the news or it is often referred to as a “training accident” when a mission fails and the team is compromised.

Terrorist fight their battles in all arenas. They often commit acts of violence and flee to countries that do not necessarily support their actions but will not turn them over to other foreign countries for prosecution. Many groups are able to escape legal justice in many cases due to corrupt politics and judicial systems. This leaves many countries with no recourse against the group except public outcry. This is where the elite teams come into play. All governments use these teams to accomplish justice when justice fails. They are used to retrieve high profile targets for extraction or execution. They are used to enter foreign soil and destroy equipment that cannot be compromised due to national security.

Counterterrorism teams are a necessity that all nations need but are often unpublished other than in movies. These teams, in many cases, are the ones that imitate preemptive strikes against cells within cities that prevent an event from occurring. They are the unseen warriors against an enemy that chooses not to follow the rules of combat. These teams supply the intelligence that is necessary to help plan the overall strategic view of missions within the terrorist arena. These teams are your worst nightmare if you are a terrorist and these teams are angels if you a prisoner in a country and area that offer little escape except death.

Part Two

Using the recommended web sites at the end of each assigned reading chapter, partially complete “one” Understanding Terrorism end of chapter web exercise. However, rather than answering each exercise question, only choose “one” of the questions to thoroughly answer. Clearly identify the chapter, web exercise and chosen exercise question.

Chapter 13, pg. 470

“3. In what ways do you think the Internet will contribute to the counterterrorist effort in the future?” (Martin, 2013)

Counterterrorism primarily focuses on the political that specifically seek to eliminate terrorist environment and groups (Martin, 2013). These focus using three areas of operating arena. These areas are political, legal, and prevention (Martin, 2013). With the advent of the Internet and digital media, the counterterrorist efforts of the future will expand into the digital realm.

As the Internet and digital media increases exponentially so will counterterrorism and their mission to stop terrorist. The Internet and media are the next battleground for terrorist and counterterrorism. This is why, for example, the U.S. government has recently stood up a new military Cyber Security Command. Their primary focus is to protect and defend the American digital assets for cyber-attacks from all attackers.

Everything is run by electronics today. Electronic bank transfers, business transactions, and shipping of assets all rely on the digital arena for its lifeblood. If the Internet falls, the chance is high for a global event to occur. There are only nine servers that control the entire Internet. These none systems are protected and in undisclosed locations. This is part of their counterterrorism tactics.

With anyone being able to access information at the touch of a button from a cell phone to a PDA to a computer, information intelligence will contribute to the counterterrorism effort in many ways. First, laws are being changed so that counterterrorism and other agencies can bypass certain laws in efforts to stay current with the terrorist groups verse being behind as in the past. Second, as people become more involved, websites that promote intelligence gathering will start to appear. This site will establish steps on how to report suspicious activities to allowing full uploads of intelligence from the common community. Third, many of the Internet providers are getting on board with counterterrorism teams to monitor their networks for activity that can be easily redirected to a counterterrorism monitoring station. This is the extent most Internet providers will go because they still believe in protecting the right of their customer. Finally, the Internet allows information to travel instantly across the world. This allows intelligence from one agency to be transmitted to another agency at a fraction the time it used to take. This time difference often is the difference between an event occurring or being stopped by a counterterrorism team.

As technology expands and new devices are introduced, the intelligence gathering will increase. If you look at the news today, often before the news stations can even break the story it has already made the social media network. Activates like “flash mobs” already demonstrate the capability of syncing thousands of people to accomplish a single event at the same time across the world. This same process can be used to stop a sleeper cell or it can be used to execute the biggest terrorist event the world has ever seen.

Because the Internet offers so much information, it will be difficult to control and monitor, but with certain technologies, it is being done. For example, I have probably already had a background investigation done on me based upon all of the sites I have been going to for this class. Also, because I visit sites on chemical weapons and deployment systems for by Exercise Evaluation Team duties, I am sure my system has been looked at due to key word filters.

Without the Internet and such filters, it would be nearly impossible to track and eliminate many terrorist cells. Imagine how much worse September 11, 2001 could have been if we had not had the electronic media to start actions of retaliation immediately after the attack. In the future, the Internet itself may become the weapon of terrorism because the power of words, perception, and call to duty can become easily persuaded with today’s technology.

Note: Do “not” repeat a classmate's selected web exercise question until you have no choice. If you have to repeat a question, select one or two different web sites.

Part Three

From chapter 13, identify, select and report on three key terms and/or concepts that you were previously unfamiliar with or knew little of prior to your reading. From chapter 14, select two terms/concepts to report on. Provide the appropriate key term/concept definition or explanation.

Chapter 13, pg. 467-468

Biometric technology – Biometric technology is a technology that is uses biometrics to identify certain characteristics that is stored in a database and used as a reference by a machine that scans the biometrics (Martin, 2013). Biometrics has been around for a long time and is often used in high security facilities. By using biometric technology, security personnel can scan individuals through such devices as security cameras. As the crowd is scanned, the information is processed and cross-referenced against a database with known terrorist individuals. If the biometrics indicates a potential match, security forces can detain an individual until the verification is made. One thing with biometrics is that it is only about 75% accurate. It is a good technology to catch initial flags, nut it is not a 100% accurate tool and false positives are common.

Antiterrorism –Antiterrorism is the practice of hardening targets against terrorist threats such as infiltration, sabotage, and theft (Martin, 2013). In antiterrorism, threat assessments are essential to developing sound antiterrorism tactics. Once the threat assessment has been completed, antiterrorism tactics can be put into place. For example, Target and Wal-Mart store have either giant red balls or brown poles in front of their store entrances. Whiles these items may seem decorative to most people, they are really in place to prevent a vehicle from crashing into the main part of the store entry and creating havoc or in a terrorist move, using a vehicle bomb inside of the store killing personnel and damaging infrastructure.

Intelligence community – Intelligence communities are essential in conducting counterterrorism and antiterrorism activities because these communities supply the intelligence needed to address the threats and their potential risk to a given area or location (Martin, 2013). Intelligence communities have been around since early time. The Roman Empire had its spies that would gather information about high profile targets and supply that information back to the Roman Empire. In ancient Japanese culture, the ninja and samurai would gather information for their respective clients or masters. In the case of the ninja, the information would often be used to select a perfect location for an assassination of key rival clan leaders or rivals of their clients. With today’s technology, the Internet has become a vast Intelligence Community because of its open sources. It has been stated in the al Qaeda handbook that over 80% of its intelligence gathering comes from open source like the internet.

Chapter 14, pg. 500

Department of Homeland Security – The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was formed shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks by President Bush (Martin, 2013). The idea of the DHS was to initially tie approximately 23 different agencies into one operation. While this was a good idea, it did not fully succeed. While the DHS still exists today and is operational, many of the agencies still are not willing to share intelligence information across agency channels. It is this lack of wiliness to share that has hindered the DHS and keeps it at the current level of operation. It is getting better but as a new agency, it is going through growing pains as many agencies have done in the past. The DHS has implemented such plans as the threat warning system for America. This color coded system alerted the American public of the current threat level. This system has had one major revision since its inception to simplify the color codes and their meaning.

Racial Profiling – Racial profiling is a circumstance in which an individual is targeted by anyone based upon their racial background (Martin, 2013). Racial profiling has been happening since the beginning of time and still occurs today. After September 11, 2001, racial profiling of Arab Americans became and still is a problem. Many Americans took out their anger on individuals just because of their Muslim background. Many types of Muslin were branded terrorist and even law enforcement and intelligence gathering communities got caught up in the racial profiling. The U.S, is currently dealing the racial profiling at a national level with immigration issues with Arizona and other states. While racial profiling can be dangerous, not reporting suspicious actions because fear of racial profiling is just as dangerous. With the recent case of the Army Major who shot up Fort Hood, evidence has indicated that his leadership saw the warning signs but failed to act because of the fear of being charged with racial profiling. Had his superiors stepped back, looked at the facts, checked their biases, they would have seen that their concern was just and not racially motivated.

Part Four

List and fully explain “two” salient points (key/important/significant point) from any of this week’s assigned reading. Ensure you “identify the chapter” in which your point was taken. Before explaining, first “succinctly state your point” (don’t just discuss a general topic), then fully discuss the point.

Chapter 13, Use of Force

The Use of Force is a policy that allows policy makers to use arms against terrorist and their supporters (Martin, 2013). Examples can be symbolic attacks to systematic destruction of such assets as training camps and personnel infrastructure facilities (Martin, 2013). The Use of Force policy has always been a tricky policy to implement and control. This is due to the very nature of its name.

In today’s world, not everyone thinks all groups are terrorist as the U.S. does and its allies. Some countries think that some of the groups are freedom fighters fighting agonist the U.S. and its allies like the United Nations that are trying to enforce their values onto their culture. It is a political minefield when using the Use of Force because one has to understand the ramifications of their actions and be ready for the outcome.

In some cases, the Use of Force will be in the open public. It will be an attack on a known terrorist camp and training facility that everyone knows. In other cases, the attacks will be covert. In these cases, usually special operations teams are used and the target is a specific person or facility that is essential to the war but yet needs to be handled delicately in the public eye. For example, personnel targets have been selected in the war against al-Qaeda but it is commonly known U.S. policy that assassination is not a tool that it uses. These covert missions of extraction must be a success for it to work otherwise the U.S. must explain why it has invaded a country that it did not have permission and risked an act of war.

Other decision that must be made in using the Use of Force policy is the overall desired outcome. If a terrorist group is living in a religious facility that it captures, it would not be a wise decision to destroy the facility to destroy the terrorist. By destroying a religious facility in some countries actually would give the terrorist more supporters.

The Use of Force policies are tools that many nations use to address the acts of terrorism; however, they must be used very carefully because of their perception to the public. To use the proper Use of Force control measure takes carful calculation and understanding of the results of the actions towards the overall goal. In some cases, it is best to use covert operations verse public displays of force to engage an enemy. It is also important to pick the variation of the Use of Force policy to effectively accomplish the mission will minimizing the damage to the surrounding community.

Fort Hood Incident and America

While the incident at Fort Hood was tragic, it showed a more tragic problem with the American Homeland Security system. The shooting at Fort Hood demonstrated a problem that has been created by our own society, media, and other political missions within the government. The problem that occurred with the Fort Hood shooting was the fear or public outcry because of racial profiling.

As more and more evidence becomes public from the Fort Hood incident, the many red flags that should have triggered closer investigations were ignored because of a fear that the U.S. military would be targeted as a racial profiling entity against Muslim soldiers. When one looks at the past of the soldier, one can see the red flags of potential problems that should have alerted his superiors to act upon. For example, he was known to be very verbal on his beliefs and outcries on the war on terrorism as a war on Islam (Martin, 2013). Secondly, it was later discovered that Hasan had been in communications with the radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki about recruiting western Muslim recruits because of Hasan western background. Third, Hasan started to become very outspoken against the war while being allowed to continue to see patients as a mental health provider. Finally, his superiors chose to do nothing because of fear of being accused of racial profiling.

The problem in this case arose with the system itself. The military has several organizations that are used to investigate such charges as racial profiling, equal opportunity, and other issues that can arise from people accusing other people of unprofessional acts within the military. While Hasan’s supervisors saw the signs and should have reported the problems up the chain of command, they chose to give him stellar evaluations and allowed him to see patients that could be easily persuaded due to their mental health. His superiors refused to press the matter because of fear from its own agencies and what the public would think if they targeted one of their own. The thought of McCarthyism probably crossed their minds.

After the shooting, the problems still existed. Hasan has since been allowed to grow a beard while being an active duty member of the military. This is a clear violation for any solider not just him. The military is treading carefully as to not violate any of his rights verse treating him as he should be treated. He is a military soldier that is under U.S. military rules. He violated these rules and should have been punished well before the shooting.

The sad irony of the Fort Hood shooting is that it never should have happened had his supervisors done their job and reported and corrected his actions as a U.S. soldier and not as a Muslim. The military, like many Americans, are failing to realize that in some cases, what seems like racial profiling is just the agency doing their job and reporting suspicious acts to agencies that will either clear the individual or identify red flags. Imagine if the military had reported Hasan’s actions sooner and his connection with the radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki. He could have been easily reassigned until further investigation was completed. This occurs every day within the military. The commander of the training squadron in Lackland AFB Texas was removed for the sexual assault incident as a normal procedure. The assaults occurred over a long period of time but he was still removed when the cases were made public as a matter of protocol. Imagine if Hasan had been removed as a matter of protocol. The Fort Hood Incident might never have happened.

Part Five

Provide an overview of your research paper. Specifically, relate information from each of the ten required research paper areas identified in the course syllabus. However, do “not” post or attach your paper (submitted via assignments). Also, do “not” copy and paste components of your paper. This part of your assignment should be fluidly written into a solid summary.

The Kurdistan Workers’ Party or the PKK is a terrorist group that follows the practices of a leftist wing organization. They have been around since 1974 and typically follow a Marxist-Leninist belief (Bruno, 2007). Their overall mission is focused on becoming their own state within the Turkey.

The PKK originated around 1974 with the forming of individuals that wanted to fight for the rights of the Kurdistan citizens to have their own country. As the PKK progressed over the years, it reached a point of around 26,000+ member during the 90’s and has since slowly decrease to less than 5,000 members in 2000 (Global Security, Unknown). They have also progressed into the political realm in an effort to fight their battle in the political arena using nonviolent tactics to achieve their goal (Bruno, 2007).

The PKK primarily operate out of the Turkish region but have operations within the areas of Iraq, Europe, and the Middle East (Pike, 2004). They have been known to receive support for Syria, Iraq, and Iran in cases of some operations. The PKK primary means of financing are through criminal activities (Laciner, 2008). They have also been known to set up and use legal organizations such as charities and commercial establishments form many of their operations within Europe and the Middle East.

The primary motivation of the PKK is to become their own independent state for the Kurdistan people. They initially started with a Marxist-Leninist vision. This vision changed and was adjusted as time progressed. They now focus of more national liberalism and yet still stay within the leftist side of the house.

The PKK primarily target the Turkish government and its agencies but have moved to targeting foreigners as necessary to press with the cause. They have the designator or being the bloodiest terrorist group by the U.S. (Laciner, 2008). This is ironic because the PKK actually didn’t start committing acts of violence until 1984.

Many of their attacks are tied to the areas of Turkey, Europe, and the Middle-East. They other tend to use explosives in European areas and tourist sites in Turkey in the effort to reduce revenues from foreigners. They also are known for kidnapping top-level executives and ransoming them for funds to further their causes.

Because the PKK has been decreasing over the past pears, the increase of force used by governments dealing with the PKK has been effective. In many of the PKK engagements, the Turkish government has engaged their special forces, causing the PKK to fall back cue to the advanced training and firepower of the special ops. The capturing and locking of international banking accounts have also hindered their financial operations throughout Europe.

The future of the PKK is limited at best. The organization has shrunk in size from its initial size of 26,000+ to less than 1,000 members as some agencies have reported. The PKK has not been able to garner the support they need to continue their battle either in the battlefield or in the political arena. The PKK will be an organization that will continue to be a thorn in the side of the Turkish government but will only be able to operate within a limited field of operations.

Protecting against the PKK is fairly straight forward. The uses of advanced forces that are trained in combat skills have proven to be successful against the PKK. Due to their nature of tactics used, personnel security is a high concern for top executives that conduct business in Europe and the Middle East. Armored cars and skilled personnel protective agents are a must. Increasing patrols in area that the PKK operate will help to provide a deterrent to their activities especially if the patrols are special operations soldiers. Education and training are going to be an important element for personnel working in an area where the PKK operate.

The PKK was an organization of 26,000+ that has decreased to numbers as low as 1,000; however, this organization operates on both the battlefield and political arena which makes them dangerous. They are known to be the bloodiest of most terrorist organizations and are fighting for a strong cause. Only time will tell of the PKK will survive or succeed in its mission.

References:

Bruno, G. (2007, 10 19). Inside the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Retrieved 08 10, 2012, from :

Global Security. (Unknown). Kongra-Gel; Kurdistan Freedom and Democracy Congress (KADEK); Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) . Retrieved 08 10, 2012, from :

Laciner, S. (2008, 10 30). The PKK: A Privileged Terrorist Organization? Retrieved 07 06, 2012, from :

Martin, G. (2013). Understanding Terrorism Challenges, Perspectives, and Issues. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc.

Pike, J. (2004, 05 21). Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Retrieved 07 13, 2012, from :

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