Counterterrorism the Future of Counterterrorism

Counterterrorism

The Future of Counterterrorism Policies:

Examining Partnerships

between

Special Operations Forces

Law Enforcement Agencies

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 will never be forgotten by the millions of people who witnessed them, whether live or on television, whether American or foreign, and whether old or young. This date has surely joined others as an infamous date in American history. In addition to the palpable shockwaves of grief and shock that these attacks sent around the world, the September 11 attacks have also ignited a fight between the United States and the forces that plot against it, namely the terrorist forces that exist all around the world, hidden from sight. This "fight" has been labeled by the United States government as a fight against terrorism, and numerous "counterterrorism" measures have been employed since 2001 to attain success. Despite these various efforts, however, one important question still remains. This question relates to how the United States government should, over a decade later, evaluate the success of its counterterrorist measures and how it should, if necessary, improve upon them.

For this reason, this review serves to illuminate upon existing counterterrorism measures, as well as upon proposed improvements, such as the potential for counterterrorism partnerships between Special Operations Forces (SOF) and Law Enforcement Agencies. In order to expand upon this important latter point, the following paragraphs will focus upon governmental efforts that can enable agencies to work in complement with SOF and how such a cooperation will be achieved. These issues will be examined due to the fact that SOF will never attain the efficiency and strategic utility necessary in combating terrorism if it disregards coordination cooperation and combined operations with Law Enforcement Agencies, a point which will also be demonstrated below. More specifically, the following section will also examine whether SOF units need to be trained in police and forensic investigative techniques to work with interagency, particularly the law enforcement community, to achieve mission success, and ultimately, a lasting success for the United States.

Counterterrorism: Background and Introduction

Congress must, at some point, evaluate every single governmental policy in order to determine effectiveness and potential modifications for ensured future success. Such an evaluation came about in 2007, when the 110th Congress was presented with a report written by Raphael Perl, a Specialist in the International Affairs division of the Department of Defense. This report focused on measuring the effectiveness of the country's counterterrorism policies. This was and remains a very important topic in governmental debate, and one which Mr. Perl evaluated in exactly 15 pages.

This report summarized quite succinctly how Congress should look at counterterrorism policies. It began by referencing, not specific actions taken by the nation, but rather broad aspects of its efforts in combating terrorism with just as broad a criteria for evaluation. The report was, therefore, "not intended to define specific, in-depth, metrics for measuring progress against terrorism," according to Perl (2007, p.2). Nor was this report intended to expand upon or evaluate in-depth any other aspects of counterterrorism, such as definitions, statistics, and country profiles (i.e. country-related threats). Such issues were left to other reports, many of which are very hard to find. Indeed, one of the hardest reports to find is an update to Perl's 2007 overview. Thankfully, however, counterterrorism is such a hotly-debated topic that many others have written upon it, and with better analysis.

Despite its relative vagueness, the Congressional report did provide members with some background on the problem of counterterrorism and how it is addressed by the United States. Counterterrorism is defined by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) as those efforts which protect "the American people from terrorist threats," efforts that the Department has as its founding purpose (Department of Homeland Security, 2011, p.1). In this scope, the DHS undertakes "efforts to battle terrorism, [which] include detecting explosives in public spaces and transportation networks, helping protect critical infrastructure and cyber networks from attack, detecting agents of biological warfare, and building information-sharing partnerships with state and local law enforcement that can enable law enforcement to mitigate threats" (Department of Homeland Security, 2011, p.1). Though, again, the report did not examine these definitions it did mention that there were some discrepancies in measurement mechanisms and current strategy. One of the most important sections of the report, though short, was that which commented upon the problem to be examined, and hopefully corrected, by suggestions below, namely "Describing and Measuring Progress against Terrorism" and improving counterterrorism measures in the future.

Today's Counterterrorism: An Evaluation

In order to better contextualize the above-mentioned report and the issues it raises, one must understand how counterterrorism measures work at present. According to Perl, progress and lack thereof may be defined with certain criteria including incidents of terrorist activities, trends towards terrorism, and attitudes towards terrorism (Perl, 2007, p.13). Yet this is not the only criteria that can be utilized to evaluate counterterrorism measures. In fact, it is difficult to find a uniform criteria, which may explain the lack of true evaluation statistics in this respect.

In essence, the point raised by the previous section has been to note that there is a problem, and much confusion, with the way counterterrorism is defined, examined and evaluated. Whereas the DHS has, in its opinion, a clear mission, the fact that this cannot be referenced in a Congressional Report prompts the question of whether there is agreement on the complex topic of counterterrorism, and on the various characteristics utilized to define its success. Thus, such a problem may be remedied by proposing not only a uniform definition for the processes related to counterterrorism, but also a solution for its future, which will be the subject of the next section.

To expand upon today's counterterrorism, however, one need only look at various academic, defense, and news sites. It is here that one will find something truly troubling that the Congressional report did not touch upon: the monetary aspect of counterterrorism. According to a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) report, counterterrorism is expensive in every single aspect, where as terrorism is "cheap, requires little manpower, captures the world's attention and gives the weak the ability to terrify the strong" (Lomborg, 2008, p.1). Counterterrorism is expensive, and potentially ineffective because countries will spend massively simply because of political pressure and extreme risk aversion tendencies.

The question of finances when it comes to funding counterterrorism measures is perhaps one of the most important and least discussed aspects by Congress. In other words, why does the country keep spending money if the policies are effective? Where does this money go? Alternatively, if the policies are ineffective, why is this so and how can it be remedied? These questions are very important, and have come up time and again throughout the research progress, and the next section will aim to propose a first step solution to a large problem. Yet first, there are some important sources that also comment upon the financial aspect, which can be included in this literature review for further validity of the necessity to find a solution to effectively undertaking counterterrorism measures.

The next commentary thus comes from Richard Barrett, the coordinator of the United Nations Taliban and Al-Qaida Monitoring Team. Barrett states that there are direct and indirect consequences of counterterrorism measures that are constantly enacted by various governments, especially that of the United States, and these countries must all make an effort to closely examine their policies and make sure that they are effective first and foremost, and, secondly, ascertain that they are not harmful to the developing world (Barrett, 2006, p.3). Other organizations agree that there are problems including STRATFOR Global Intelligence, in a 2011 report, and the Washington Post, who exposes the redundancies of counterterrorism policies and the misguided hand with which it has been dealt and which it deals, in turn, to the American people, who hope for success, yet receive only more financial requests.

The Future of Counterterrorism: Opening a Partnership

Perhaps, in order to solve such complex problems as presented in the previous section, it is worth looking at a simple and potentially effective solutions. This solution aims at addressing cooperation and streamlining of activities between SOF and Law Enforcement Agencies, with a view to better equip the nation for success against terrorism. The cooperative coordination which can be achieved by the close collaboration of these organizations will amount to the most effective counter-terrorism strategy possible in the 21st century. Struggles will persist, however, as budgets, attention, technology, and politics all interfere with the potentially flawless counter-terrorism strategy created in the wake of the September 11th attacks. Interagency cooperation is, in effect, contradictory to the best interests of the agencies themselves, as clout is delivered to the most successful agency and mistakes are blamed on the less successful. The White House, as well, has its own priorities for the various counter-intelligence agencies, as a large scale terrorist attack would surely harm the political legitimacy of any administration, and therefore the community has gained some redundancy in performance and too high of expectations for perfection. Each level of the counter-terrorism strategy present in the United States has its own flaws and its own weaknesses.

Law enforcement cannot be left behind in the pursuit for more professional counter-terrorist elite units. The New York Police Department sets the bar for what municipal police can put together in terms of counter-terrorism, NYPD Shield, as its known, has conducted several successful operations since its inception in the aftermath of the September 11th attacks. Naturally, New Yorkers feel a special need to create a strong counter-terrorism unit beyond that of the United States government, due to the nature that the city is under constant threat from attacks. (Economist, the 2009). London, too is under this threat, however the London Police are not as well prepared for counter-terrorism efforts as the NYPD has proven to be. (Brant, 2011). Law enforcement's participation is a necessary part of counter-terrorism work for three reasons. First, police and law enforcement officers are already boots on the ground in order to achieve a quick response to new intelligence gathering. This simple fact that police already exist all over the country, and are already paid for by the state, means that properly training the police in counter-terrorism procedures is a great "bang for the buck" strategy. In a country as large as the United States, with so many porous borders and avenues of entrance, simply having every population center covered by trained law enforcement is one of the pillars of America's counter-terrorism strategy. Although the common street officer is not usually a party to classified intelligence, their ability to immediately become a part of the chain of command in an emergency situation is an excellent resource for the protection of the civilian population.

Another reason for law enforcement's involvement in counter-terrorism is for the local understanding of geography, population, and infrastructure, which may not be present in FBI, National Guard or Special Operations soldiers. (Alexander, 2010) This local knowledge not only supplements the advanced training of professional counter-terrorism units, but also allows for the easy canvassing of territory in the event of a need for a massive amount of law enforcement officers in a specific area. Not all missions require small elite CT teams, but rather some may call for creating barricades and blockades, which are in the purview of law enforcement. Also, the police have access to local weaponry and vehicles if the mission calls for these tools in the hunt for terrorists on American soil. There can be no replacement for the organizational value of having a 'reserve' CT force resting idly in every city in the country.

Finally, law enforcement provides an excellent training ground for future counter-terrorism professionals, and many counter-terrorism professionals are chosen from amongst police forces, as real world experience is crucial to the high stress environments that officers may get themselves in to. It must be understood that cooperation is fostered when the various aspects of America's counter-terrorism strategy are trained and chosen from amongst each other, creating bonds which will boost capability if a counter-terrorism event surfaces at any time. The biggest failure of the FBI and the wider intelligence community just before September 11th was the lack of communication and cooperation between the various agencies, often a point of pride and secrecy. The Department of Homeland Security was created in order to overcome this issue, yet the Dept. Of Homeland Security only combined the various counter-terrorism units, but does not control local law enforcement in any way. Rather, DHS helps SOCOM, a military organization, to conduct operations domestically, if necessary, providing a link between SOCOM and local police. (Brown, T.D. 2005). As a law enforcement agent, being able to operate independently from the Dept. Of Homeland Security for most of their service, but then being able to take commands from Dept. Of Homeland Security when needed, creates a very flexible and strong system for meeting all of America's counter-terrorism challenges in the future.

Special operations forces units have become increasingly important to President Obama's wartime strategy, as conventional forces are seen as expensive and ill-trained for the pressures of Special Forces teams. SOF are drawn from all four branches of the U.S. military, and technically, teams such as the Navy's Seal Team Six have very different specialties than Army's Delta Force. The missions undertaken by SOCOM, or Special Operations Command, include, reconnaissance, offensive action, foreign military training, counter-insurgency operations, counter-terrorism, and sabotage or the disruption of enemy logistics. An example of a successful Special Operations mission in training foreign military is in Uruzgan, a tribal central Asian region helped by SOF forces to institute the rule of law in their land. (International Security Assistance Force). Special Forces are not jack of all trades, despite their large mission parameters. By default, SOF must be able to quickly enter and leave a situation, in direct contrast to the CIA which plants spies for years in various parts of the world. Special Forces also are extremely visible, like in Somalia in 1993 when 18 American soldiers were killed, and therefore it is wiser to take months to plan operations and then surgically striking, rather than trying to hold territory or invade capitals, no matter the organizational capacity of the enemy.

The Central Intelligence Agency is America's cloak and daggers organization, filling in every crack in the world, gathering knowledge to be buried in the enormous pile of information collected. The CIA is both feared and misunderstood by Americans and others, as the world knows that most likely, somewhere in their country, there exists an entire network of spies passively collecting data to be processed and used in Washington. The CIA above all else is a forensic organization, truly America's detective agency for the external world at large. As the military mission in Iraq ends in the coming weeks, special forces will no longer have a role in countering Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia, and therefore the U.S. loses one of its greatest counter-terrorism assets in the region. The CIA, however, is not leaving Iraq any time soon, and in fact is working out plans to take over drone operations within the country before the military departs. (Lake, 2011).

The Federal Bureau of Investigation is notoriously private in its domestic counter-terrorism operations, in opposition to the CIA, which often partners with foreign governments and agents abroad. The FBI has possibly the largest burden of the counter-terrorism effort, as intelligence is the most important modern tool in America's arsenal for the early prevention of terrorism on our shores. Rather than being swallowed up by the Dept. Of Homeland Security, the FBI was actually given far more power after September 11th, in large part because of the Patriot Act. This legislation permit the FBI to conduct warrantless wiretapping, as well as warrantless investigation into the spending and daily habits of suspected terrorists in the United States. This power had never before been given, and therefore presented a difficult divide in the federal government over the power of the Constitution and the rights it affords over the necessary countermeasures to terrorist cells working in the United States. Thus far, the FBI has conducted repeated successes in the discovery of potential terrorist cells, whether it is Russian and Iranian spies, or small groups of African and Middle Eastern Islamic terrorists. Despite the success of the FBI, the agency needs to understand its role in the counter-terrorism movement, and local law enforcement as well as military Special Forces need to be interacted with and information needs to be divulged so that terror situations do not flourish in the United States.

Matching Forensics and Intelligence Gathering with SOF Operations

Special Forces are trained to be fast, and to leave very little behind after the end of their operation revealing what they came to do. (Department of Defense, 2011) This policy is in direct contrast with one of the main tenets of effective counter-terrorism, that is the need to gather intelligence. The forensic analysis perfected by the CIA is nowhere to be seen in the set mission of Special Forces, and this may be a problem in the future. SOCOM, Special Ops Command, is increasingly learning how to conduct extremely quick forensic analysis to be processed in Washington from locations as remote as tiny villages in the Afghan mountains, all while trying not to exceed the necessary amount of force applied by Special Forces on the local population, a strategy successfully implemented in 2009 by the Obama Administration. (Amnesty International, 2010). There is a need for Special Forces to cooperatively coordinate with local law enforcement agencies, whether at home or abroad, in order to collectively gather intelligence in a detective/police work style. This role is vastly different than the traditional Special Forces, but as the world's dynamics shifted to counterterrorism and counterinsurgency, so too must the Special Forces update their regimen.

The Osama bin Laden raid in Pakistan, for example, saw a quick 40 minute data collection process by the invading SOF forces, who took pictures and camera evidence for America's records. (Scahill, 2011) This particular mission also took months of observation of the compound by drones and spies in the area. The information collected in Osama bin Laden's compound is invaluable to America's counter-terrorism operations, nearly all of his plans and communications up until his assassination were revealed to be in his possession. Seal Team Six had special training prior, they trained in a mockup of the compound, and were informed in techniques on gathering information effectively and thoroughly. This mission was conducted in a joint operation between the CIA and Seal Team Six, the perfect recipe for an American hard power intervention. The value of teaching Special Forces the practices necessary for effective forensic data gathering was proven beyond a doubt in this successful raid, providing an incentive to America's political class to reduce America's conventional forces presence and to increase the clout of surgical-style SOCOM controlled counterterrorism teams. (Feickert, 2011).