Even though state sponsorship would greatly reduce the technical hurdles terrorists might face in delivering a WMD attack, a number of factors reduce the likelihood of that happening. No evidence of a state-sponsored chemical or biological attack on the American homeland exists. State sponsorship of chem-bio weapons has been extremely rare and confined to highly trained, disciplined special operations units rather than terrorist cells. Rogue states fear potential retaliation upon discovery. Risking retaliation and global condemnation would make even the most marginalized nation reluctant to cross the threshold from conventional explosives to weapons of mass destruction.
Divesting the Active-Duty Military of Domestic Consequence Management
Just as serious analysis of the threat has come under scrutiny, so has consequence management. Rather than having an on-call federal agency flying in at a moment's notice, the first-responders to a WMD catastrophe will be local firefighters, hazardous materials (HAZMAT) teams, police, and emergency medical personnel. Local agencies will contain the scene, provide first aid, begin the investigation, and maintain order. As broader understanding of the chem-bio threat increases, the need for federal involvement--notably the involvement of the active-duty US military--should decrease. Training, expertise, and equipment will still be needed, but state and federal civilian agencies can provide this.
Federal efforts to combat terrorism are organized along a lead agency concept. The Department of Justice, through the Federal Bureau of Investigation, is responsible for crisis management of domestic terrorist incidents. State governments have primary responsibility for consequence management in cases of domestic disasters, including major terrorist attacks; the federal government, under FEMA, can respond to state and local requests for support under the Federal Response Plan. This plan outlines the roles, responsibilities, and emergency support functions of various federal agencies, including DOD, for consequence management.
There are numerous local, state, and federal organizations that can perform consequence management. For example, the General Accounting Office reports that over 600 local and state HAZMAT teams exist in the United States to assess and act on accidents involving highly toxic chemicals and other hazardous materials.[62] In addition, numerous federal organizations provide advice, technical experts, and equipment to local incident commanders. Air Force Colonel Robert P. Kadlec, M.D., a professor at the National War College who also served as the Senior Assistant for Counterproliferation in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, points to "the increased role of nontraditional agencies in national security issues. The threat of CBW has required a coordinated response across the federal spectrum and caused agencies heretofore unconcerned with national security issues, such as the Department of Agriculture, to snap to attention."[63]
As noted earlier, directing the federal consequence management effort is the National Security Council (NSC), which is the overall interagency coordinator for US policy on combating terrorism and federal efforts to respond to terrorist incidents. Under the NSC, the National Coordinator for Security, Critical Infrastructure, and Counterterrorism integrates the government's policies on unconventional threats to the United States. The Department of Justice has responsibility for crisis management in a WMD event. Its Hazardous Materials Response Unit (HMRU) provides laboratory, scientific, and technical assistance to FBI investigations. The FBI also provides training, acts as an advisory group to local agencies, and plans to have HMRU teams in 15 of its 56 field offices. On the scene of the attack, the Federal Emergency Management Agency acts in support of the FBI until the Attorney General transfers the lead to FEMA. Though state and local officials bear primary responsibility for consequence management, FEMA is in charge of the federal aspects of consequence management on the scene.
The Department of Energy maintains the Radiological Assistance Program, which provides 24-hour access to personnel and equipment for radiological emergencies. The department's Nuclear Emergency Search Teams consist of engineers, scientists, and other technical specialists. These specially trained teams are deployable within four hours with equipment to assist the FBI in handling nuclear or radiological threats. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) also prepares and responds to emergencies involving radiological substances. The EPA has approximately 270 on-scene coordinators available across the United States, two Environmental Response Teams, ten Superfund Technical Assessment and Response Teams, and 12 environmental labs--all supported by the EPA's National Enforcement Investigation Center. The Department of Transportation holds the responsibility for protecting airports and responding to terrorist attacks on transportation hubs. Within the Department of Transportation, the US Coast Guard is the lead agency on incidents that occur in coastal waters. The Coast Guard has three National Strike Force teams that are equipped to handle major oil and chemical spills, but can also handle terrorist events such as HAZMAT emergencies.
The Department of Health and Human Services is available for on-scene support with its Metropolitan Medical Strike Team. The Centers for Disease Control is the federal agency responsible for protecting the public health of the country through prevention and control of diseases and other public health emergencies. The US Treasury Department utilizes the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) as the lead agency in investigating armed violent crime, arson, explosions, and large car bombs. The ATF has four National Response Teams that can arrive within 24 hours to major bombing and arson sites.
If, in addition to this extensive civil structure, the government continues to rely on the military services for WMD consequence management, then greater reliance could be placed on the military's reserve components. The Nunn-Lugar-Domenici legislation required DOD to develop a mobilization plan to integrate National Guard and Reserve forces in consequence management. According to the plan issued in January 1998, the Army National Guard and US Army Reserve must be ready "to train local authorities in chemical and biological weapons detection, defense, and decontamination; assist in casualty treatment and evacuation; quarantine, if necessary, affected areas and people; and assist in restoration of infrastructure and service."[64]
The Army Reserve has a disaster recovery mission and is responsible to its local citizenry. It also has 63 percent of the chemical units in the US Army, including 100 chemical reconnaissance and decontamination elements stationed across the United States that can perform basic detection and decontamination operations.[65] The Army Reserve also has eight battalion and three brigade headquarters, 26 chemical companies capable of providing decontamination support to military units or municipalities, two chemical reconnaissance companies, the only deployable biological detection company, and individual expertise that can be deployed as needed.
The Army National Guard, operating in its traditional civilian assistance role, can be a unique and invaluable asset in a WMD emergency. Local understanding of the community combined with training with other federal response teams makes the Guard a front-line defender in WMD consequence management. National Guard units are located in cities and towns across each state and are the governor's primary military asset; each governor commands them until federalized by executive order. The National Guard would be essential in maintaining order following a chemical or biological weapons attack and has taken on an increasing consequence management role following the Nunn-Lugar-Domenici legislation. Twenty-seven National Guard Rapid Assessment and Initial Detection teams have been created to assist local and state authorities in assessing the situation surrounding a WMD attack. These units are located across the country and, according to the DOD plan, may eventually increase to at least one team per state.[66]
Finally, states and local municipalities have begun meeting the consequence management requirement with their own internal resources due to their increased understanding of terrorist capabilities. In a 1999 General Accounting Office report, many state officials indicated that they maintained a reliable consequence management capability and "that their own experienced technicians can not only perform sufficient detection and identification to begin to handle the situation, but also work in the stressful, dangerous environment."[67] States discounted the use of federal assets in some areas because they would not arrive in time to be effective, especially since the federal and military units do not operate routinely with existing state programs. Also, state officials "dismiss the idea of fully relying on federal assets because of concerns about their availability and responsiveness if the state ever needed them."[68] For example, the WMD consequence management effort in the City of Los Angeles is, by design, a self-contained response entity. It is deliberately devoid of federal agencies and resources due to a perception that a federal response will usurp local control without guaranteeing a timely response.[69]
Conclusion
During the middle of the last decade, the nation appeared to be on the brink of a superterrorism emergency, and the military was the only agency thought to be capable of an immediate response. The sense was that "an incident will happen: WMD will be used against Americans in their own country."[70] The United States seemed vulnerable to terrorists with access to technology, materials, and expertise. The US military's organization, discipline, and mission-oriented culture made it an easy choice for policymakers who wanted immediate action to counter the threat of chemical or biological warfare.
The nation and the military have responded. More than 40 federal and 600 local agencies now stand ready to react to a domestic WMD attack--or to an overseas attack if necessary.[71] First-responder training is being conducted in local municipalities, by state WMD units, and across the nation. As the United States continues to prepare and train for a superterrorist attack, the seeming crisis that required immediate military involvement is waning. The abating emergency, changing in part due to more fully developed views of terrorists and their capabilities, marks an appropriate time to wean the active-duty military from WMD consequence management, and to turn those responsibilities over to civilian agencies and the National Guard and Reserve forces.
The sense of immediacy that drove the need for a chem-bio response structure has been reduced, and while the threat remains, the probability of attack is not what it once seemed. Weighing the concerns of military effectiveness, national security, overall public safety, and the nature of the WMD threat, the use of active-duty military personnel to prepare for WMD consequence management is a poor allocation of national resources. The primary reason for having a military is to fight and win the nation's wars. While it can be argued that a WMD attack on American soil and citizens would be an act of war, the diversion of military assets to consequence management is not the answer. Conversely, increasing the consequence management mission by active-duty military may actually increase the threat to the United States by decreasing the military's ability to perform its primary role. Potential terrorists, correctly ascertaining that a WMD attack would redirect large numbers of active-duty forces to consequence management, might be able to divert US combat power and resolve away from their respective region of the world.
Even more troubling is the provision in the Nunn-Lugar-Domenici legislation that basically repeals the Posse Comitatus Act in times of national emergency. The precedent to disregard "a law generally considered a great bulwark in our democratic society"[72] and add domestic roles to the active-duty military suggests a disturbing trend toward infringement of individual rights that makes Charles Dunlap's 1992 Parameters article, "The Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012,"[73] seem eerily prophetic. During debate of Nunn-Lugar-Domenici, Representative Bob Barr stated, "The potential for abuse is frightening, especially when you consider the egregious abuses of federal power that led to the Waco tragedy."[74] In the end, the local citizenry--supplemented with good planning, training, and equipment--will be the most capable responders to confront, contain, and counter a WMD attack.
NOTES
1. US General Accounting Office, Combating Terrorism: Observations on Federal Spending to Combat Terrorism, GAO/T-NSIAD/GGD-99-107 (Washington: GAO, March 1999).
2. Ehud Sprinzak, "The Great Superterrorism Scare," Foreign Policy, No. 112 (Fall 1998), p. 116.
3. For the purpose of this article, WMD refers only to biological or chemical weapons.
4. Stefan H. Leader, "The Rise of Terrorism," Security Management, April 1997. Investigators theorize that the World Trade Center bombers laced the bomb with cyanide due to the large amount of cyanide and manuals found at the bombers' residences. The cyanide was subsequently vaporized in the blast.
5. Colonel Robert P. Kadlec, M.D., USAF, has coined the terms "pre-Cobra Event" and "post-Cobra Event" to apply to the flurry of activity after 1995, referring to the well-publicized response by President Clinton after reading Richard Preston's book by the same name.
6. Senator Richard Lugar, quoted in William C. Mann, "Terrorists with Doomsday Weapons a Growing Threat, Experts Warn," The Atlanta Constitution, 1 November 1995, p. A6.
7. Barbara Crossette, "Iraq Gives UN Fuller Details on its Germ Warfare Program," The New York Times, 23 August 1995, p. A1; Laurie Mylorie and James Ring Adams, "Saddam's Germs," The American Spectator, November 1995, pp. 60-62.
8. Glenn Guenther, "Analysis of the Nunn-Lugar-Domenici Amendment," master's thesis (Monterey, Calif.: Naval Postgraduate School, 1998), p. 17.
9. Judith Miller and William J. Broad, "The Germ Warriors: A Special Report; Iranians, Bioweapons in Mind, Lure Needy Ex-Soviet Scientists," The New York Times, 8 December 1998, p. 1.
10. Peta Thornycroft, "Poison Gas Secrets Were Sold to Libya," Weekly Mail & Guardian, 13 August 1998.
11. Robert Traylor, "All Fall Down," New Scientist, 11 May 1996, p. 33.
12. Barbara Crossette, "Expert Says Iraq Got Bomb Data from U.S.," The New York Times, 23 March 2000, p. A4.
13. Eric Croddy, "Urban Terrorism: Chemical Warfare in Japan," Jane's Intelligence Review, November 1995, p. 520.
14. Walter Laqueur, "Postmodern Terrorism," Foreign Affairs, 75 (September/October 1996), 26.
15. John F. Sopko, "The Changing Proliferation Threat," Foreign Policy, No. 105 (Winter 1996-97), p. 20.
16. David E. Kaplan, "Aum Shinrikyo," (1995), in Toxic Terror: Assessing Terrorist Use of Chemical and Biological Weapons, ed. Jonathon B. Tucker (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2000).
17. US General Accounting Office, Weapons of Mass Destruction: Status of the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, GAO/NSIAD 96-222 (Washington: GAO, September 1996), p. 1.
18. Bill Gertz, "China, Russia Still Producing Biological Weapons," Washington Times, 8 August 1996, p. A6; and Gertz, "16 Biological Sites Identified in the ex-Soviet Union," Washington Times, 3 March 1992, p. A3.
19. Judith Miller, "Evidence Grows on Biological Weapons," The New York Times Magazine, 3 January 1993, p. 33.
20. Tony Capaccio, "CIA: Iran Still Holding Limited Stocks of Biological Weapons," Defense Week, 5 August 1996, p. 1; Barbara Starr, "Egypt and Syria are BW Capable," Jane's Defence Weekly, 21 August 1996, p. 15; Seth W. Carus, The Poor Man's Atomic Bomb? Biological Weapons in the Middle East (Washington: Washington Institute of Near East Policy, 1991), p. 60.
21. US Congress, Congressional Research Service, Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Weapon Proliferation: Potential Military Countermeasures, Report No. 94-528S (Washington: GPO, 1994), p. 3.
22. US Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction: Assessing the Risks (Washington: GPO, 1993), p. 54.
23. Richard K. Betts, "The New Threat of Mass Destruction," Foreign Affairs, 77 (January/February 1998); Ashton Carter, John Deutch, and Philip Zelikow, "Catastrophic Terrorism: Tackling the New Danger," Foreign Affairs, 77 (November/December 1998); Laqueur, "Postmodern Terrorism."
24. Congressional Record, 26 June 1996. Senator Nunn gave this testimony on the Senate floor during the debate of the Nunn-Lugar-Domenici Amendment.
25. US Congress, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1997, Title XIV: Defense Against Weapons of Mass Destruction, Subtitle A: Domestic Preparedness (Washington: GPO, 1996). Also known as Nunn-Lugar II. In October 2000, this responsibility was transferred to the Justice Department (FBI).
26. DOD Directive 3025.15 designates the Department of the Army as executive agent for consequence management planning and implementation with responsibility to task service components and commit assets.
27. Carter, Deutch, and Zelikow, p. 81.
28. Major Adrian T. Bogart III, personal interview with Chief Resource Management Officer, Consequence Management Program Integration Office, US Department of Defense, 4 May 2000.
29. James Fallows, "Military Efficiency," Atlantic, August 1991, p. 18.
30. Charles Lane wrote in "The Newest War," Newsweek, 6 January 1992, p. 18: "The Pentagon resisted the [counternarcotics] mission for decades, saying that the military should fight threats to national security, and the police should fight crime."
31. K. R. Clark, "Spotlighting the Drug Zone," Pentagram, 30 January 1992, pp. 20-21.
32. Douglas Jehl and John M. Broder, "King Case Aftermath: A City in Crisis; Bush Pledges Enough Force to Quell Riots, Los Angeles Times, 2 May 1992, p. A1.
33. Edward Walsh, "GAO: Military Aid in Davidian Siege Proper; '93 Support to FBI, ATF Cost $1 Million," The Washington Post, 28 August 1999, p. A6.
34. H. G. Reza, "Military Silently Patrols U.S. Border," Los Angeles Times, 29 June 1997.
35. Mary Jordan, "Bush Orders U.S. Military to Aid Florida," The Washington Post, 28 August 1992, p. A1.
36. Melissa Healy, "Administration Rushes Storm Aid to Hawaii," Los Angeles Times, 13 September 1992, p. A1.
37. Bob Drogin, "In Mt. Pinatubo's Wake, Buried Dreams and Lives," Los Angeles Times, 18 October 1992; and Reuters, "Hundreds Flee Philippine Volcano," Los Angeles Times, 12 March 1994, p. A11.
38. Scott Shuger, "Pacify the Military," The New York Times, 14 March 1992, p. 25.
39. Kurt Streeter, "Soldiers on the Front Lines of Hope," Los Angeles Times, 25 December 1998, Metro section.
40. Anne Garfinkle, "Going Home is Hard to Do," The Wall Street Journal, 27 January 1992, p. 12; and Peter Grier, "US Defense Department Declares War on Colossal Pollution Problem," The Christian Science Monitor, 2 March 1993, p. 9.
41. Michelle Rushlo, "Military's Role in Species Conservation Grows," Associated Press, 17 May 2000.
42. Helen Dewar, "Nunn Urges Military Shift: Forces Would Aid Domestic Programs," The Washington Post, 24 June 1992, p. A17; and Philip A. Brehm and Wilbur E. Gray, Alternative Missions for the Army (Carlisle, Pa.: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, 17 July 1992).
43. Statement of General Joseph Ralston, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff before the 106th Congress, Committee on Armed Services, US Senate, 9 March 1999.
44. Guenther, p. 57
45. Posse Comitatus Act, section 1385, title 18, US Code, as amended, provides the following: "Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than two years or both."
46. US Department of the Army, "Domestic Disaster Assistance, A Primer for Attorneys," Judge Advocate General's School, Center for Law and Military Operations, Charlottesville, Va.
47. Under 42 U.S.C. 5170b, reference (f), "The President may authorize the Secretary of Defense to use DOD resources for performing . . . emergency work that may ultimately qualify for assistance which is essential for the preservation of life and property." Also, DOD emergency work cannot exceed ten days without specific authorizing action.
48. Thomas R. Lujan, "Legal Aspects of Domestic Employment of the Army," Parameters, 27 (Autumn 1997), 90.
49. See 10 U.S.C. Sections 371-378, codifying judicially created exceptions to the Posse Comitatus Act.
50. Barton Gellman writes in "Strategy for the 90s: Reduce Size and Preserve Strength," The Washington Post, 9 December 1991, p. A10: In "interview after interview across the services, senior leaders and noncommissioned officers stressed that they cannot be ready to fight without frequent rehearsals of perishable skills."
51. Harry Summers, "When Armies Lose Sight of Purpose," Washington Times, 26 December 1991, p. D3.
52. US General Accounting Office, Chemical and Biological Defense: Emphasis Remains Insufficient to Resolve Continuing Problems, GAO/NSIAD 96-103 (Washington: GAO, 29 March 1996).
53. US General Accounting Office, Chemical and Biological Defense: Observations on DoD's Plans to Protect U.S. Forces, GAO/NSIAD 98-83 (Washington: GAO, 17 March 1998), p. 1.
54. Sheryl WuDunn, Judith Miller, and William Broad, "How Japan Germ Terror Alerted the World," The New York Times, 26 May 1998, p. A1.
55. George J. Tenet, "The Worldwide Threat in 2000: Global Realities of Our National Security," Director of Central Intelligence testimony before the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 21 March 2000.
56. During the Tokyo subway gas attack, 4,500 of the 5,000 "injuries" were thought to be psychosomatic.
57. In 1984, members of the Oregon-based Rajneeshee cult deliberately contaminated restaurant salad bars in The Dalles, Ore., with salmonella bacteria, affecting 751 people with diarrhea. Their objective was not to kill people, but to sicken voters and keep them at home in order to throw the outcome of a local election in the cult's favor.
58. Jonathan B. Tucker and Amy Sands, "An Unlikely Threat," The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, 55 (July/August 1999), 18.
59. Brian Michael Jenkins, The Likelihood of Nuclear Terrorism (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, P-7119, July 1985), p. 6.
60. In 1972, an eco-terrorist group called R.I.S.E. was thwarted in its plan to wipe out residents around Chicago with a disease pathogen. Other group members, in disagreement with the apocalyptic plan, informed the FBI.
61. John Parachini, "Combating Terrorism: Assessing the Threat," testimony before the US House Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs, and International Relations, 20 October 1999.
62. US General Accounting Office, Combating Terrorism: Use of National Guard Response Teams Is Unclear, GAO/NSIAD 99-110 (Washington: GAO, May 1999), p. 2.
63. Colonel Robert P Kadlec, M.D., USAF, interview with author on 26 April 2000.
64. US Department of Defense, The Department of Defense Plan for Integrating National Guard and Reserve Components Support for Response to Attacks Using Weapons of Mass Destruction (Washington: GPO, 1998).
65. US General Accounting Office, Combating Terrorism: Use of National Guard Response Teams Is Unclear, p. 14.
66. In 1999, Congress expanded from 10 to 27 the number of Civil Support Teams (CST) of National Guardsmen to deal with nuclear, chemical, biological, or other terrorist incidents. The Rapid Assessment and Initial Detection (RAID) team name was changed in March 2000 as a result of this legislation, but most contemporary literature still refers to them as RAID teams. For the purposes of clarity and consistency, this article refers to the National Guard units as RAID teams.
67. US General Accounting Office, Combating Terrorism: Use of National Guard Response Team Is Unclear, p. 9
68. Ibid., p. 10.
69. Kadlec interview, 26 April 2000.
70. Chris Seiple, "Consequence Management: Domestic Response to Weapons of Mass Destruction," Parameters, 27 (Autumn 1997), 133.
71. The US State Department is the lead agency for managing and coordinating counterterrorism policy and operations abroad.
72. Lujan, p. 84.
73. Charles J. Dunlap, Jr., "The Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012," Parameters, 22 (Winter 1992-93), 2-20. In his article, Dunlap writes from the future to explain how the military lost its fighting capability at the expense of domestic missions as well as its ties to Constitutional government.
74. Pat Towell and Karen Foerstel, "Anti-Terrorist Additions," Congressional Quarterly, 20 July 1997, p. 2062.
Captain Aaron Weiss, USMC, is a contingency analyst in the Programs and Resources Department, Headquarters, US Marine Corps, Washington, D.C. Previous assignments were as the air traffic control officer-in-charge with a Marine Expeditionary Unit; an air defense officer in Cherry Point, North Carolina; and a student at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. In addition to his M.S. from the Naval Postgraduate School, Captain Weiss recently graduated with an M.A. from Georgetown University's National Security Studies Program. His previous publications include a Chase Essay Contest honorable mention in the Marine Corps Gazette (1997).