The war against terrorism - Use of Technology in Asymmetric defence
by Cameron Findley

This paper, prepared from open source material seeks to identify the strategic challenges facing Governments and Commercial bodies as a new world order emerges after the relative stability of the Cold War. It attempts to define the nature of these threats and vulnerabilities faced, offering a view on whether new and emerging technologies might be used to fill the gap existent in systemic defence and policing systems, reducing vulnerabilities and as a consequence the risk.

THREAT X VULNERABILITY = RISK

Threat

Changes in Global power structures

Governments, Intelligence Agencies, the Law Enforcement Community and Commercial bodies are witnessing an unparalleled increase in the security demands placed upon them to protect citizens/employees and Key Economic Points/commercial assets in a time of great flux and change in world security. Put simply, the relative stability and predictability of the previous forty years, the cold war period when two hegemonic structures – West and East – faced each other politically, diplomatically, militarily and economically across the globe, inside a mutually understood framework of threat versus counter threat, has been replaced by a series of unstable, potentially dangerous and possibly irresolvable cultural, socio-political and socio-economic clashes.

Cultural clash – a lateral tension?

The horrific events of 9/11 in the United States of America, brought to global attention an ongoing tension between cultures, variously – and rather luridly reported as ‘Democracy under attack’, ‘West versus the rest’, or ‘A new Crusade?’ More sober analysis suggests that a new post cold war dynamic is evolving, resulting in the emergence of a single hegemonic structure, headed by a pan-global super power, the USA, with other ‘western’ states (perhaps more correctly identified as free market democracies) in attendance, pitted against Extremists of Islamic Origin, manifesting itself as the so-called ‘War against Terrorism’.

However, this too is a simplistic notion; a ‘sound bite’ caption that seeks to explain complex pan global cultural shifts and tensions, but manifestly fails to provide an understanding of contemporary events. Nor does it create a predictive, proactive conceptualisation, a useable frame work to assist those tasked with risk management in taking difficult decisions regarding the most efficient, effective and economic deployment of security resources whether in the Governmental or Commercial sectors.

A new paradigm? – Making sense of the madness

Samuel Huntingdon wrote in 1993 about the ‘Clash of Civilisations’ in which he sought to provide a conceptual framework, a paradigm that would replace those of the cold war and best explain the nature of contemporary events. He suggested all future conflict would tend to occur where ‘civilisations’ more or less defined as discrete geographical regions that share common values and cultures, meet and are in conflict with other civilisations. Where these cultural fault lines develop, tension and potential violence might follow. Accused by some at the time as being ‘too apocalyptic’ recent events invite a rejuvenation and part re-evaluation of Huntingdon, but perhaps in a more confrontational way.

In an attempt to define or conceptualise the ‘post 9/11 New World order’ commentators use the metaphor of ‘seismic or systemic shock’. Careful review of the comments made by the Bush and Blair administrations, indicate an explicit adoption of the central tenet of Huntingdon’s thesis but with an explicit reformulation of one key element. Whilst Huntingdon argued that civilisations would clash, he brought no value judgements to bear on particular civilisations (e.g. Christian democracy good, Muslim autocracy/theocracy bad). The use of the Bush administrations phrase ‘Axis of evil’ to describe states such as Iran indicates a polarising doctrine that perhaps unintentionally is creating a new definition of the International system. That is good (free and democratic systems) will wage war on those who threaten them – evil. Further comments by the Bush administration or close acolytes, namely ‘you (nation states) are either with us or against us’ indicates a potential for this new paradigm to become dominant, in effect raising the stakes whereby nation states have to choose ‘sides’, a non aligned reaction is not permissible. Potentially, this new doctrine is divisive, indeed there is some evidence to support this view; the operational and political split that opened during the second Gulf War between ‘Old Europe’ – Germany and France – and the USA, with the United Kingdom attempting to bridge these two polar views can be offered as an example. This fracture was (and remains) indicative of the dangers of unilaterilism.

A harsh reality too is that this culture clash is not confined to and indeed cannot be confined to geographical areas such as the Middle East. The front line for want of a better expression is pan global, it is amongst, threaded through the very democratic societies that are seeking to defend themselves. Traditional concepts of warfare or conflict, that are inherent in national psyches demand a clearly identified enemy, usually defined as another nation state (or leadership of that state), that can be demonised, providing a focus for citizen, jingoistic anger, a target if you will for collective enmity. Whilst the rationales for the recent war against Iraq were complex, undoubtedly a piece of the geo-political jigsaw was an attempt by political elite’s to furnish their citizens with a hate figure, to justify on going, clandestine and indeed much more challenging operations in the ‘War against terrorism’. Put crudely, to provide a big win.

However, what if the ‘enemy’, has become the ‘enemy within?’ The neighbour? The shop owner? The parent of a son or daughters best friend? This reality challenges concepts of cultural integration, challenges traditional methodology of states to rally their citizens to ‘the flag’.

The Al-Queda network of terrorist groups seeks to exploit this uncertainty. They are arch exponents of asymmetric warfare. They are adept at harnessing Islamic grievance, ensuring a ready supply of volunteers who claim UK, USA, German, French or indeed citizenship of a myriad of other democratic countries. They exploit the weaknesses (as they see it) of democracy using the very freedoms that are structurally inherent in free states to plan, develop and execute acts of violence.

Western democracies are currently assessed by various security services to be at a high state of threat from extreme Islamic terrorism. Given that those who would perpetrate acts of terrorism are well organised, well funded, well trained and have access to sophisticated (and in some cases not so sophisticated) delivery systems, with the pre-requisite religious rigour to take action, then the two components of threat are manifestly fulfilled – capability and intent. Despite the best efforts of Intelligence Services, the military and Law Enforcement Agencies, acts of extreme terrorism have taken place. Additionally, there is an acceptance that serious attacks will continue to take place. In London recently, Eliza Manningham-Buller, Director General of MI5, the UK internal Intelligence Service openly admitted as such during a keynote speech at a Royal United Services Institute in London. To paraphrase the Provisional IRA after the failed attempt to assassinate Prime Minister Thatcher in 1984 ‘we only have to be lucky once, you have to be lucky all the time’. Citizen reaction? Inevitably, fear based.

Political extremists further exploit these fears for their own political agenda. The rise in nationalist socialist credibility in Europe is in part due their exploitation of these fears. In 1998 the Zurich branch of the Schweizer Volkspartei published the following:

“Islam is increasingly becoming the main obstacle to integration and yet the proportion of immigrants from Islamic countries is on the rise. In Europe, we fought for centuries for liberal and democratic values, for the separation of the state and church and gender equality. It is a particular irony of history that the same left wing and liberal forces whom led this fight, are today the most eager to advocate generous immigration policies – policies that threaten occidental values.”

Cultural clashes, lateral shear forces between civilisations are nothing new. It is solely the way in which they now manifest themselves, as a complex series of cultural conflicts both within and external to the nation state, that governments and the agencies tasked with defending the state and its assets now face.

As crude as this suggested paradigm is, if indeed it is dominant (it can be argued that the emergence of a new world order is in its gestation period), it is clear that cultural conflict exists pan globally between militant Islam and the ‘new hegemony’. An acceptance and understanding of this clash is essential for Risk Managers to provide an easily understood and digestible framework in which to take decisions.

Socio economic/socio-political clash – a vertical tension?

Given the acceptance of cultural tension as a lateral inter-civilisational clash and the inherent threat that presents to global and societal stability, it is logical to extend this theorem to examine the intra–civilisational clash or vertical tensions which present as potent a threat to nation state stability as those that may be defined as lateral.

Increasingly it is a feature of democracies that fractures are appearing between the ruling economic/political elites and the citizens they seek to govern. Events such as the involvement of Berlusconni (Italy) and Chirac (France) in serious corruption allegations, the criticism of the Blair administration (UK) as too Presidential, too controlling and the corrupt practices in the USA of corporations such as ENRON and WORLDCOM (with their close links into Capitol Hill, the Pentagon and even the White House) have created an instinctive mistrust amongst electorates about those that seek to rule. Increasing crime rates (with some noticeable exceptions), job insecurity and failures in Education, Health and Welfare programmes have combined with observations of executive greed and political incompetence to create uneasiness amongst the citizenry as to the future. In addition, citizens of nation states are seeing a dilution of their countries ability to determine its future. This is certainly true in Europe where European integration is moving at a pace, driven perhaps by political ego, which is in excess of the individuals’ ability to comprehend and assimilate.

The interconnected world is becoming truly globalised in terms of access to information, communications and ease of cross border travel. Whilst these developments are welcome, nonetheless, it has led to the increasing exposure of economic/political malpractice and greed. The result of this has been the emergence of spin as a methodology to control or direct information flow. However, the citizen still remains much better informed as to intra and inter nation events than they were even ten years ago.

The result? In some respects positive. An increase in the demand by the citizen for more accountability and improved standards in ethical behaviour by political and industrial leaders. The down side? Frustration leading to despondency. The emergence of a live today, forget about tomorrow credo has seen sharp increases in alcohol and drug misuse especially amongst the emergent generation.

Another phenomenon has been the abrogation by the citizen of traditional mechanisms of voicing concern over national issues. In the UK, the significant drop in the number of people exercising their right to vote in the last General Election (some 8.3%) left psychologists reeling at the impact. The voting patterns at local and European level are even worse. What is emerging is a desire by a broad section of the public to take direct action as an effective method of making the voices heard.

Governments no longer have an automatic right to respect, even in time of war. Prime Minister Blair and his administration (as well as others around the world) were on the receiving end of this resentment recently, when very sizeable demonstrations of irate citizenry marched in cross cultural, cross-political and cross socio-economic demonstrations of mutual ire at the UK governments insistence that the recent war in Iraq was a war of liberation, a war to prevent use of Weapons of Mass Destruction against the very citizens who were protesting. In short, they didn’t buy the pitch.

Increasingly direct action is seen as a legitimate method of expressing passionately held views. Previously the reserve of the political fringe, the views are wide ranging, encompassing animal welfare, counter militarism, pro or anti hunting, anti war (however that might be defined) or anti-globalisationist. Of course, the majority seek to express these views peacefully, but significant numbers feel so passionately that they will resort to violence to express this angst. Any city that now hosts meetings of the ‘new hegemony’ (G9 for example) as protesters would perceive it, now have to devote significant resources to intelligence gathering and proactive policing measures to ensure the safety of both delegates and protestors. Often the uniformed police officer is caught in the front line of extraordinary scenes of violence, Genoa 2001 being a prime example.

Additionally, there is a volume of intelligence and evidence to suggest that direct action such as street protest is becoming increasingly sophisticated and co-ordinated, with actions in one nation state (or multiples) being strategically co-ordinated from another. The emergence of quasi-terrorist activity by single-issue protest groups is a worrying trend. An action model that bears some examination is that of Animal Rights activity in Europe (predominantly the UK) and the USA. Increasingly, small groups of individuals are involving themselves in firebombing, acts of criminal damage, picketing of Directors homes or places of work, disruption of commercial activity (including AGM’s) and other various threats to, or action against employees of companies. These companies are often peripheral to those involved in ‘animal exploitation’ such as banks, insurance organisations, commodity suppliers and end users of research.

Vulnerability

Why worry?

In short, ‘there ain’t enough cops to go around’. Defence, Intelligence and Law Enforcement Agencies (Police, Customs, and Immigration) have a seemingly neverending upward spiral of commitments. The “War Against Terrorism” soaks up significant policing resources, abstracting officers from other areas of crime prevention or investigation. Naturally and quite correctly, governments are seeking to protect key economic points leaving depleted resources for more traditional areas of law enforcement.

It is an inevitable consequence that communities, including business, commercial and corporate bodies are more vulnerable to crime whether that is terrorism, disorder or crimes such as theft or burglary.

Whilst some home owners and businesses have taken active steps to secure property and personnel, the advent of new and emerging technology allows for a much more robust self empowerment of security. There are a number of small and medium enterprises who as individual entities with recognised areas of technological expertise, have collaborated and partnered to create and supply much more holistic, integrated security solutions. Threading together IT architecture such as heating, lighting, access control and now visual recorded security information provides those tasked with environmental monitoring with the necessary information to make and take key decisions. Key developments in communications and portability of security systems such as portable CCTV systems, allows a much more flexible deployment of resources to meet demand. In effect an asymmetric response or defence. Technology will never replace a well-trained military, law enforcement or security officer. Nevertheless, what shrewd use of technology can do is reduce demand on such personnel allowing redeployment to meet demands elsewhere.

Additionally target hardening of sites secures employees (or in the case of home owners, individuals) and property perhaps dissuading perpetrators of crime from attacking such sites. Naturally, there is a knock on effect in an increase in the feelings of safety and well being for staff or individuals.

TXV=R

Given that Threat is a product of an organisations or individuals intent and capability and Vulnerability the preparedness or otherwise of an individuals or organisations ability to react to that threat, Risk is the product of both and it is to the reduction or careful management of Risk, that technology can contribute.

Conclusion

Significant security challenges face communities and the governments that seek to secure them. It is vital that businesses and the citizen home owner ‘empower’ their own security and take active steps to safeguard their assets and people, due to the overstretch of the states law enforcement and military capability.

The time for action is now, not after the next attack. Security equipment and systems are no longer a grudge purchase. It is a priority, indeed a responsibility of the citizen and business leaders to ensure resilience and to protect people and profits. Indeed, using an integrated approach, especially with IT, can actually deliver greater efficiency, timely management information and therefore competitive advantage.