Tuesday, August 25, 2009

The Latest from National Terror Alert Response Center











The Latest from National Terror
Alert Response Center


Link to Homeland Security News



















Pipe Bomb Closes Hillsdale High School – San Mateo


Posted: 24 Aug 2009 11:13 AM PDT




hillsdale high school


UPDATE: Police in San Mateo, California, said
Monday that “a potentially very drastic event” at a high school was
averted when school personnel subdued a former student who walked into the
school armed with pipe bombs, a chainsaw and a 2-foot-long sword.


“It had the potential to be a catastrophic incident,” said
police Lt. Mike Brunicardi, describing the incident in which two pipe
bombs exploded and at least 1,200 students and faculty were evacuated from
the Northern California school.


No one was injured in the incident, police said.


Brunicardi said a 17-year-old former student wearing a nylon
vest packed with 10 homemade pipe bombs entered Hillsdale High School in
San Mateo about 8 a.m. Monday. He detonated two devices, with smoke
setting off the school’s fire-alarm system, before two teachers confronted
him.


“The suspect was quickly wrestled down by a teacher who, with
the help of the principal and another teacher, were able to hold him down
until police arrived minutes later,” Brunicardi said.


The suspect’s intentions were not clear, police said.



Original Story


Former student set off pipe bomb. Police flooded the
campus of Hillsdale High School in San Mateo Monday morning. Students
were seen leaving the area by the hundreds after authorities canceled
classes for the day following an explosion on campus.


The students gathered at a large black top area behind
Abbott Middle School about a block away from the school. That is where
the school told parents to pick their children up from school.


Police were called to the school at 8:07 a.m. after
reports that someone brought a gun on campus. While police were on their
way, they heard the report of an explosion.


The assistant superintendent for the district Kurt Black
said a former student set off some kind of explosive device inside the
school. He said it didn’t do any damage and nobody was hurt. Black said
the teachers knew the student and somehow were able to take hold of him
until police arrived. He is now in police custody.


One student who was on campus described the sound of the
explosion as “a thousand M-80s going off.”


Another student said her teacher ordered everyone to get
under their desks after he noticed smoke in the hall. That girl said she
saw a guitar case, a chainsaw, a pipe and some brown liquid in the
hallway as she ran out of the school.


Someone else said he saw a kid running down the hall
carrying pipe bombs in his arms with a counselor running after him after
he heard what he described as an explosion.


KTVU is quoting a source that says police found more than
one pipe bomb on campus.


Full Article and Video


This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
homeland security news and information.

Pipe Bomb Closes Hillsdale High School – San Mateo






Nuclear Attack: Terrorists vs U.S., Are We At Risk


Posted: 24 Aug 2009 10:50 AM PDT




nuclear_terrorism


Few people want to think about the possibility of being
successfully attacked by terrorists and/or terror sponsoring nations using
nuclear weapons. Many would like to think that the United States
government is on top of things and watching all avenues of approach. But,
the sad truth is that it isn’t looking everywhere it should be looking.
The reality of the situation is that the Department of Homeland Security
is grossly overwhelmed. From Customs to the Coast Guard the United States
suffers from poor technology, low personnel & equipment numbers,
brutal budget restrictions, and poor training programs. The obvious
avenues of approach are covered well more to provide the citizenry with a
false sense of security than anything else.


Confidential discussions with leaders throughout the Homeland
Security Network of agencies reveal that the prevention of an atomic
attack is not thorough in the United States. In fact, they indicate that
nontraditional infiltration and detonation avenues are barely known and
those that are known are barely covered. The entire East Coast of the
United States is at risk of a nuclear attack, ranging through New York,
D.C., Atlanta, and Orlando. With the Secretary of Homeland Security
declaring that America is safe from any such attack one is left with
asking, “How national security professionals think that it could
happen?”


A briefing before national security professionals has revealed
a particularly spooky scenario. One that is sure to run chills up the
spine of anyone who learns of it and how unprepared the United States
remains. It is an attack scenario that could occur at any moment and
without any warning whatsoever. Naturally, those who know of it within the
government are highly reluctant to allow themselves to be named.


Let’s go into an imaginary world for a moment. Imagine that a
nuclear warhead built in Tehran, Iran and developed jointly by Iran, North
Korea, and Russia becomes a multi-megaton reality. With the United States
and its allies out of Iraq, Iran has an established transport pipe-line to
Syria, a close political and religious ally. Imagine that a Gulfstream or
Hawker long-range executive jet is modified internally to carry the
warhead on a one way trip to the United States.


The aircraft departs Tehran, with its cargo, and lands at a
Syrian Air Base located near Damascus for re-fueling and final checks of
its deadly cargo. From Damascus, Syria the aircraft flies to an airport
inside Bosnia. There, sympathetic officials who have been well compensated
pencil-whip a non-existent customs inspection and allow refueling. It is
then off again.


Traveling across Europe at near sound speeds, the aircraft
follows a properly filed and normal flight plan. Its pilots maintain radio
contact with various centers and draw no unusual attention to it as it
continues on. There are no established radiologic detection mechanisms for
aircraft traveling at high or low speeds. Thus, the aircraft and its cargo
continue on without detection. Many long range executive aircraft are
capable of traveling from countries such as Bosnia or Hungary through to
New York and many East Coast Cities, such as Charleston or even Atlanta,
without having to refuel. There would be no need to stop in advanced
technology capable airports or U.S. allied countries.


The aircraft flies normally across Europe, over Greenland, and
over Iceland as it moves towards the final destination. Again, it
continues to fly without its cargo being detected as U.S. airspace begins
to get nearer. According to anonymous sources, there are no aircraft in
the skies with super sensitive detectors in U.S. airspace searching for
radiological signatures. It is an assumption that has not been directly
inferred but hasn’t been squashed or corrected by the DHS, either. People
just assume that U.S. technology exists to detect this rather simply
approach by enemy force. The reality is that such an approach would happen
without hindrance or detection. That is what makes this scenario so
worrisome to national security experts, military strategists, and the
public in general.


When the aircraft enters American Airspace it continues on to
whatever city airport, most likely an international airport, it has listed
on its flight plan. As it approaches the airport, the co-pilot walks to
the back of the plane and performs the final arming processes following
the controlled decompression of the cabin. Decompressing the cabin allows
a barometric pressure sensitive detonator to have a more accurate reading
of altitude. It will detonate the bomb at a given altitude which is
detected by air pressure. Altitude is key in maximizing the effect of a
nuclear explosion.


Read Full Article.


This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
homeland security news and information.

Nuclear Attack: Terrorists vs U.S., Are We At Risk






Warning On Fake Homeland Security Department Intel E-mails


Posted: 24 Aug 2009 10:30 AM PDT




homeland_security_3


E-mails claiming to be from the Department of Homeland
Security’s intelligence division are making the rounds and DHS is warning
that the emails are fakes and contain malicious software. The e-mails
actually originated from Internet addresses in Latvia and Russia,
according to a three-page alert from the Homeland Security Department’s
counterintelligence unit.


Read More


This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
homeland security news and information.

Warning On Fake Homeland Security Department Intel E-mails






Pakistani Police – 13 Militants Arrested, Terror Plots Foiled


Posted: 24 Aug 2009 10:12 AM PDT




pakistan_2


Pakistani police say they thwarted multiple terror plots by
arresting 13 militants with links to al-Qaida or the Taliban during raids
in southern and eastern Pakistan.


Police said Monday they seized seven men, suicide vests and
explosives during a raid in the southern city of Karachi. Authorities said
the men belong to the banned al-Qaida-linked Sunni extremist group
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi.


The group has previously been suspected of plotting to
assassinate government officials, as well as masterminding last year's
bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad and the bombing of a Shi'ite
mosque in 2003.


And police in eastern Pakistan say they captured six suspected
Taliban militants in Punjab province. Senior police officer Usman Anwar
says the suspected militants had planned to attack foreign targets and
places of worship.


Authorities in both cases say the arrests foiled militants'
plans to stage terror attacks.


Source


This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
homeland security news and information.

Pakistani Police – 13 Militants Arrested, Terror Plots Foiled






White House Sets Up New Terror Interrogation Team


Posted: 24 Aug 2009 10:08 AM PDT




fbi_terrorism


President Barack Obama has decided to set up a new, elite
terrorist interrogation team, but will limit the techniques it can employ
to those already approved for military use — a restriction sure to chafe
some who believe tougher tactics should be allowed against America’s most
determined adversaries.


The announcement comes on the same day that the Justice
Department is expected to release a CIA Inspector General report from 2004
that details some of the most extreme interrogation techniques used under
the Bush administration, including the use of a mock execution and a power
drill to intimidate Al Qaeda operatives.


Read More


New Terror Interrogation Team at FBI: A Shift for
Intelligence


Of all the elements of the new terrorism interrogation teams
set up by President Barack Obama and announced this
morning, among the most important is the fact it will be headquartered at
the Federal Bureau of Investigation rather than at the rival Central
Intelligence Agency.


The new units will include personnel from a wide range of
intelligence and law enforcement agencies, according to White House
officials. But by bringing the interrogation units into the FBI, it moves
them more definitively out from the world of black ops, where they have
resided since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.


Although the FBI has long been the agency responsible for
domestic counterterrorism, its bureaucratic DNA has historically focused
on gathering information and evidence to be used in federal prosecutions.
The CIA, on the other hand, has traditionally been tasked to gather
intelligence by any means necessary.


Read More


This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
homeland security news and information.

White
House Sets Up New Terror Interrogation Team






Al Qaeda Very Capable Of Terror Attack On US


Posted: 24 Aug 2009 09:54 AM PDT




al_qaeda_2


Al Qaeda is still “very capable” of carrying out a terrorist
attack on US soil, according to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Mike Mullen said the war in Afghanistan is still vital because al Qaeda is
benefiting from the support of Taliban fighters in Afghanistan and
Pakistan.


“I think it (the situation in Afghanistan) is serious and
deteriorating and I’ve said that over the last couple of years, that the
Taliban insurgency has gotten better, more sophisticated,” he said.


His warning comes at a time when support for the war in
Afghanistan is low in the US.


A recent survey by the Washington Post suggested 51% of
Americans do not feel the war is worth fighting.


Barack Obama has supported the conflict since becoming
president and has pledged to deploy an extra 21,000 US troops to
Afghanistan by the end of the year.


I think the president really has to face the fact that his own
leadership here is critical. He really can’t just leave this to Congress,
to General McChrystal and say, folks, sort of, discuss this after the
report comes in.


Read More


This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
homeland security news and information.

Al Qaeda Very Capable Of Terror Attack On US












No comments:

Post a Comment