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from the is-there-a-solution-that-is-less-bad-than-the-problem? dept.
If it seems like every week, there's another terrorist attack – well, you're not wrong. According to one crowdsourcing map, there have been over 500 attacks around the world since the start of 2017, with over 3,500 fatalities. For a period in 2016, ISIS-initiated attacks were occurring, on average, every 84 hours.
Despite improvements in methods and coordination among law enforcement agencies over the past 25 years, they're still hamstrung in a number of ways. With large public gatherings of people becoming more attractive targets for terrorists, what are the best strategies moving forward?
[...] But despite huge budgets and the presence of thousands of added security personnel, it's virtually impossible to prevent a determined terrorist, or guarantee absolute safety. While security efforts for events like the Olympic Games have escalated, terrorists today no longer wait for major events that draw global interest.
[...] The odds are in favor of terrorists. All they have to do is succeed once, no matter how many times they try. For public safety professionals to be fully successful, they have to prevent 100 percent of the terror attempts. It's a number to aspire to, but even the most experienced countries fighting terror – such as Israel and the U.K. – can't measure up to this standard.
[...] These days, it's necessary to consider any place where crowds congregate as vulnerable "soft targets" for the attackers. To better prepare for securing soft targets (and this isn't to say threats against "hard targets," like planes, buildings and infrastructure, have diminished) law enforcement agencies must improve coordination among one another, whether it's via intelligence, information sharing and training. And then there's the need for deconfliction, which refers to avoiding self-defeating behavior – from interagency rivalries and poor communication to insufficient coordination – by people who are on the same side.
[...] Given that there is no way to guarantee complete safety, and that the threat assessment expects more attacks, there are two more elements that ought to receive more attention: community resilience and community policing.
https://theconversation.com/how-can-we-better-protect-crowds-from-terrorism-78443
[Related]:
1996 Atlanta Olympic Games: https://www.britannica.com/event/Atlanta-Olympic-Games-bombing-of-1996
Secure Airport Design: https://skift.com/2016/07/04/how-smart-airport-design-can-make-spaces-more-secure/
Do you agree with this assessment of the security situation ? What do you think could be done to mitigate the effects of such asymmetric warfare ?
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday June 05 2017, @10:54AM (3 children)
It goes back so much further than that, to the beginning of recorded history in that region. It will go on until no more humans live there. Their tribal identities and hatreds are bred in the bone. It's tough to get past that even when you're actively trying to forge a new identity without the historical baggage. Take Spain: the Basques are not on board with the Spanish identity and they've been at it for, what, 500 years? The Catalans are trying to move in the opposite direction. The Galicians, Andalusians, and Aragonians, too.
In the Middle East, they don't have any interest in unity or kumbaya. The closest they've had in a while is a shared hatred of Israel.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 05 2017, @03:49PM (2 children)
So completely false.
The shia/sunni enmity is the result of westerners pitting them against each other and venal demagogues making hay of that interference [aljazeera.com] over the last half century or so.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 05 2017, @07:26PM
Oh, FFS, that is so far outside of reality . . . how do people even come up with that kind of nonsense? In your version of Earth History, every single evil that has ever happened in this world, was the result of western civilization meddling? Mmmmm - yeah.
I've got an idea! Why don't you read up on the Muslim split? http://old.seattletimes.com/html/books/2009888664_br18prophet.html [seattletimes.com] The story epitomizes the tribal mentality.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 05 2017, @07:50PM
Better reading here: http://origins.osu.edu/article/tradition-vs-charisma-sunni-shii-divide-muslim-world/page/0/0 [osu.edu]
The Sunni were massacreing the Shia long before there was a United States. Before there was even a British empire, actually. Let me double check that - the term "empire" wasn't used until the late 1500's. You may legitimately claim that England wanted an empire before then, but it was no empire. Sunni-Shia killings began very soon after Moe's death, around 680. But, you go ahead and blame it all on England, or Great Britain, or the United Kingdom, or western civilization in general. Don't let facts get in your way.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.