Terrorism POLS 3135

biological agents

A biological agent—also called bio-agent, biological threat agent, biological warfare agent, biological weapon, or bioweapon—is a bacterium, virus, protozoan, parasite, or fungus that can be used purposefully as a weapon in bioterrorism or biological warfare (BW).

chemical agents

A chemical weapon agent (CWA) is a chemical substance whose toxic properties are used to kill, injure or incapacitate human beings. About 70 different chemicals have been used or stockpiled as chemical weapon agents during the 20th century. These agents may be in liquid, gas or solid form.

taggants

A taggant is also a chemical or physical marker added to materials to allow various forms of testing. It is believed that physical marker taggants generally consist of microscopic particles built up in many layers, which are made of different materials.

airport security

Airport security attempts to prevent any threats or potentially dangerous situations from arising or entering the country. If airport security does succeed in this, then the chances of any dangerous situations, illegal items or threats entering into both aircraft, country or airport are greatly reduced. As such, airport security serves several purposes: To protect the airport and country from any threatening events, to reassure the traveling public that they are safe and to protect the country and their people.

anthrax - three forms

Anthrax is a disease with rapid onset caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis. Most forms of the disease are lethal, and it affects most animals. It can be transmitted through contact with infected meat. Effective vaccines against anthrax are available, and some forms of the disease respond well to antibiotic treatment. Anthrax can occur in three forms: skin, inhalation, and intestinal.[1]

Biological terrorism

Bioterrorism is terrorism involving the intentional release or dissemination of biological agents. These agents are bacteria, viruses, or toxins, and may be in a naturally occurring or a human-modified form. For the use of this method in warfare, see biological warfare.

Boko Haram

Boko Haram, referred to by themselves as Wilāyat Gharb Ifrīqīyyah (Arabic: الولاية الإسلامية غرب أفريقيا‎, (Islamic State West Africa Province, ISWAP),[9] and Jamā'at Ahl as-Sunnah lid-Da'wah wa'l-Jihād (Arabic: جماعة أهل السنة للدعوة والجهاد‎, "Group of the People of Sunnah for Preaching and Jihad"),[10] is an Islamic terrorist group based in northeastern Nigeria, also active in Chad, Niger and northern Cameroon.

Operation Eligible Receiver

Eligible Receiver 97 was a U.S. government exercise conducted under what is known as the No-Notice Interoperability Exercise Program. The exercises were held June 9-13, 1997 and included participants such as the National Security Agency (which acted as the Red Team), Central Intelligence Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation, National Reconnaissance Office, Defense Information Systems Agency, Department of State, Department of Justice, as well as critical civilian infrastructure providers such as power and communication companies.

Eric Rudolph

Eric Robert Rudolph (born September 19, 1966), also known as the Olympic Park Bomber, is an American convicted for a series of anti-abortion and anti-gay-motivated bombings across the southern United States between 1996 and 1998, which killed two people and injured over 120 others.

FALN

FALN is an acronym for Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional (English: "Armed Forces of National Liberation"). It can refer to: Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional Puertorriqueña

GSG-9

Grenzschutzgruppe 9 der Bundespolizei (Border Protection Group 9 of the Federal Police), commonly abbreviated GSG 9 is a German counter-terrorism and special operations unit. Established after the Munich, Massacre.

HAMAS

Hamas (Arabic: حماس‎ Ḥamās, an acronym of حركة المقاومة الاسلامية Ḥarakat al-Muqāwamah al-ʾIslāmiyyah Islamic Resistance Movement) is a Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist organization [6][7] It has a social service wing, Dawah, and a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, and, since 2007, has been the governing authority of the Gaza Strip.

Terrorist Threat Integration Center

In January 2003, the U.S. government announced the start of the new Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), housed within the CIA. Its purpose is to monitor and analyze threat intelligence procured by other agencies. The collaborative leadership for the TTIC is comprised of senior agents of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Department of Defense (DoD), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and the Department of State. Without independent authority to collect intelligence, the TTIC operates by combining the trans-national terrorist activities information collected by component agencies. In December 2004 this agency was superseded by the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC).

FLQ and Canada

In the early 1960's the culture of North America was evolving quickly towards a more action orientated process of change. Quebec was no exception with the ongoing reforms of the new Liberal government and the development of the Quiet Revolution. The impact of revolutionary philosophy and politics also began to spread the doctrines of violent action as a means of legitimate change, among young people and university students. Figures such as Che Guevara, Chairman Mao, and the writer Franz Fanon offered different interpretations of history and politics where violence played a role in their ideas. The frustration at the pace of change in Quebec lead some o believe that only violence would speed the process up.

IRA

Irish Republican Army (IRA), also called Provisional Irish Republican Army, Sands, Bobby: funeral processionJoe McNally/Getty Imagesrepublican paramilitary organization seeking the establishment of a republic, the end of British rule in Northern Ireland, and the reunification of Ireland.

Impact of 9/11 attacks

Ongoing wars - Less than a month after 9/11, U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan in an attempt to dismantle al-Qaeda, the terrorist group that claimed responsibility for the attacks, and remove the Taliban government. Immigration and deportation - With the goal of strengthening border security, the Bush Administration created the Department of Homeland Security in 2002, a cabinet-level office that merged 22 government agencies. The friendly skies - Long airport lines, full body scans, the occasional pat-down (for the lucky ones). It's all par for the course, nowadays, for air travel. But not so long ago, it wasn't unusual to show up at the airport a half-hour before a domestic flight, keep your shoes tied tight, and skip through the metal detector while sipping a Big Gulp, all without ever having to show an ID. A mushrooming surveillance state - The U.S. intelligence state boomed in the wake of 9/11. The growth resulted in a marked increase in government intrusion, primarily through a vast, clandestine network of phone and web surveillance.

Operation Chavin de Huantar

Operation Chavín de Huántar was a military operation in which a team of one hundred and forty-two commandos of the Peruvian Armed Forces ended the 1997 Japanese embassy hostage crisis by raiding the Japanese ambassador's residence and freeing the hostages held there by the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) being considered one of the most successful hostage rescues in the world.

Operation Dark Winter

Operation Dark Winter was the code name for a senior-level bio-terrorist attack simulation conducted from June 22-23, 2001.[1][2][3] It was designed to carry out a mock version of a covert and widespread smallpox attack on the United States. Tara O'Toole and Thomas Inglesby of the Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies (CCBS) / Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and Randy Larsen and Mark DeMier of Analytic Services were the principal designers, authors, and controllers of the Dark Winter project.

Operation Eagle's Claw

Operation Eagle Claw (Persian: عملیات طبس‎‎) (or Operation Evening Light or Operation Rice Bowl)[1] was a United States Armed Forces operation ordered by US President Jimmy Carter to attempt to end the Iran hostage crisis by rescuing 52 embassy staff held captive at the Embassy of the United States, Tehran on 24 April 1980. Its failure, and the humiliating public debacle that ensued, damaged US prestige worldwide. Carter himself blamed his loss in the 1980 US presidential election mainly on his failure to win the release of U.S. hostages held captive in Iran

Entebbe

Operation Entebbe was a counter-terrorist hostage-rescue mission carried out by commandos of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) at Entebbe Airport in Uganda on 4 July 1976.

Capture of bin Laden

Osama bin Laden, the founder and head of the Islamist group Al-Qaeda, was killed in Pakistan on May 2, 2011, shortly after 1:00 am PKT[1][2] (20:00 UTC, May 1) by United States Navy SEALs of the U.S. Naval Special Warfare Development Group (also known as DEVGRU or SEAL Team Six). The operation, code-named Operation Neptune Spear, was carried out in a Central Intelligence Agency-led operation. In addition to DEVGRU, participating units included the United States Army Special Operations Command's 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) and CIA operatives.

Osama bin Laden

Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden (/oʊˈsɑːmə bɪn moʊˈhɑːmᵻd bɪn əˈwɑːd bɪn ˈlɑːdən/; Arabic: أسامة بن محمد بن عوض بن لادن‎, usāmah bin muḥammad bin 'awaḍ bin lādin; March 10, 1957 - May 2, 2011) was the founder of al-Qaeda, the organization that claimed responsibility for the September 11 attacks on the United States, along with numerous other mass-casualty attacks against civilian and military targets.[7][8][9] He was a Saudi Arabian, a member of the wealthy bin Laden family, and an ethnic Yemeni Kindite

PRISM

PRISM is a clandestine[1] surveillance program under which the United States National Security Agency (NSA) collects internet communications from at least nine major US internet companies.[2][3][4] Since 2001 the United States government has increased its scope for such surveillance, and so this program was launched in 2007.

PanAm 103

Pan Am Flight 103 was a regularly scheduled Pan Am transatlantic flight from Frankfurt to Detroit, via London and New York. On 21 December 1988, N739PA, the aircraft operating the transatlantic leg of the route, was destroyed by a terrorist bomb, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew, in what became known as the Lockerbie bombing.

Pol Pot

Pol Pot (/pɒl pɒt/; Khmer: ប៉ុល ពត; 19 May 1925 - 15 April 1998), born Saloth Sar (Khmer: សាឡុត ស), was a Cambodian revolutionary who led the Khmer Rouge[4] from 1963 until 1997. From 1963 to 1981, he served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Kampuchea.[5] As such, he became the leader of Cambodia on 17 April 1975, when his forces captured Phnom Penh. From 1976 to 1979, he also served as the prime minister of Democratic Kampuchea.

Sayaret Mat'kal

Primarily a field intelligence-gathering unit specializing in special reconnaissance behind enemy lines, Sayeret Matkal is also tasked with counter-terrorism, hostage rescue, and foreign espionage.

TREVI

REVI was an intergovernmental network, or forum, of national officials from ministries of justice and the interior outside the European Community framework created during the European Council Summit in Rome, 1-2 December 1975. It ceased to exist when it was integrated into the so-called Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) pillar of the European Union (EU) upon the entry into force of the Treaty of Maastricht in 1992.

SIGINT

Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is intelligence-gathering by interception of signals, whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly used in communication (electronic intelligence—abbreviated to ELINT).

Sovereign Citizens

Sovereign citizens are anti-government extremists who believe that even though they physically reside in this country, they are separate or "sovereign" from the United States.

SAS

Special Air Service. The Special Air Service (SAS) is a special forces unit of the British Army. The SAS was founded in 1941 as a regiment, and later reconstituted as a corps in 1950.

Delta Force

The 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta (1st SFOD-D), popularly known as Delta Force, is a U.S. Army unit used for hostage rescue and counterterrorism, as well as direct action and reconnaissance against high-value targets. Delta Force and its Navy counterpart, the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group (or DEVGRU), often referred to as SEAL Team Six, are the United States military's primary counter-terrorism units and fall under the operational control of the Joint Special Operations Command.

Norway attacks in 2011

The 2011 Norway attacks were two sequential lone wolf terrorist attacks by Anders Behring Breivik against the government, the civilian population, and a Workers' Youth League (AUF)-run summer camp in Norway on 22 July 2011. The attacks claimed a total of 77 lives. The first attack was a car bomb explosion in Oslo within Regjeringskvartalet, the executive government quarter of Norway, at 15:25:22 (CEST).[1] The bomb was made from a mixture of fertiliser and fuel oil[14][15] and placed in the back of a van.[16] The van was placed next to the tower block housing the office of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg.[17] The explosion killed eight people and injured at least 209 people, twelve of them seriously.

Benghazi 2012

The 2012 Benghazi attack took place on the evening of September 11, 2012, when Islamic militants attacked the American diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, killing U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and U.S. Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith.[7] Stevens was the first U.S. Ambassador killed in the line of duty since 1979.[8] The attack has also been referred to as the Battle of Benghazi.

Argentina bombings

The AMIA bombing was an attack on the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA; Argentine Israelite Mutual Association) building. It occurred in Buenos Aires on July 18, 1994, killing 85 people and injuring hundreds.[4] It was Argentina's deadliest bombing ever. Argentina is home to a Jewish community of 200,000, the largest in Latin America and sixth in the world outside Israel

US bombing of Sudan and Afghanistan

The August 1998 bombings of Afghanistan and Sudan (codenamed Operation Infinite Reach) were American cruise missile strikes on al-Qaeda bases in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical factory in Sudan on August 20, 1998. The attack was in retaliation for al-Qaeda's bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania which killed 224 people (including 12 Americans) and injured 5,000 others.

Mogadishu

The Battle of Mogadishu or Day of the Rangers (Somali: Maalintii Rangers), was part of Operation Gothic Serpent and was fought from 3-4 October 1993, in Mogadishu, Somalia, between forces of the United States, supported by UNOSOM II, and Somali militiamen loyal to the self-proclaimed president-to-be Mohamed Farrah Aidid, who had support from armed civilian fighters.

Black Panthers

The Black Panther Party or BPP (originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense) was a revolutionary black nationalist and socialist organization[1][2] active in the United States from 1966 until 1982, with its only international chapter operating in Algeria from 1969 until 1972.

FBI's role

The Counterterrorism Division (CTD) is a division of the National Security Branch of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. CTD investigates terrorist threats inside the United States, provides information on terrorists outside the country, and tracks known terrorists worldwide. In the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks, CTD's funding and manpower have significantly increased.

Interpol

The International Criminal Police Organization (French: Organisation internationale de police criminelle) ICPO or INTERPOL, is an intergovernmental organization facilitating international police cooperation. It was established as the International Criminal Police Commission (ICPC) in 1923 and adopted its telegraphic address as its common name in 1956.[

Munich Massacre

The Munich massacre was an attack during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany, at which eleven Israeli Olympic team members were taken hostage and eventually killed, along with a German police officer, by the Palestinian terrorist group Black September.

Muslim Brotherhood

The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamic organization that was founded in Ismailia, Egypt by Hassan al-Banna in March 1928 as an Islamist religious, political, and social movement.

Italy and the Red Brigades

The Red Brigades (Italian: Brigate Rosse [briˈɡate ˈrosse], often abbreviated BR) was a left-wing [1] paramilitary organization, based in Italy, responsible for numerous violent incidents, including assassinations, kidnapping and robberies during the so-called "Years of Lead". Formed in 1970, the organization sought to create a "revolutionary" state through armed struggle, and to remove Italy from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The Red Brigades attained notoriety in the 1970s and early 1980s with their violent attempts to destabilise Italy by acts of sabotage, bank robberies, kidnappings [2] and murders.[3] Models for the Red Brigades included the Latin American urban guerrilla movements. Volumes on the Tupamaros published by Feltrinelli were influential", a sort of do-it-yourself manual for the early Red Brigades" and also the Italian partisan movement of 1943-45 which was interpreted as an example of a youthful minority using violent means for just ends.[4]

FARC

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—People's Army (Spanish: Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia—Ejército del Pueblo, FARC-EP and FARC) is a guerrilla movement involved in the continuing Colombian armed conflict since 1964. It has been known to employ a variety of military tactics[11] in addition to more unconventional methods, including terrorism.

2nd Intifada

The Second Intifada, also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada (Arabic: انتفاضة الأقصى‎ Intifāḍat al-ʾAqṣā; Hebrew: אינתיפאדת אל-אקצה‎ Intifādat El-Aqtzah), was the second Palestinian uprising against Israel - a period of intensified Israeli-Palestinian violence. It started in September 2000, when Ariel Sharon made a visit to the Temple Mount, seen by Palestinians as highly provocative; and Palestinian demonstrators, throwing stones at police, were dispersed by the Israeli army, using tear gas and rubber bullets.

Special Night Squads

The Special Night Squads (SNS) (Hebrew: Plugot Ha'Layla Ha'Meyukhadot, פלוגות הלילה המיוחדות) were a joint British-Jewish counter-insurgency unit, established by Captain Orde Wingate in Palestine in 1938, during the 1936-1939 Arab revolt.

Aum attack

The Tokyo subway sarin attack, usually referred to in the Japanese media as the Subway Sarin Incident (地下鉄サリン事件 Chikatetsu Sarin Jiken?), was an act of domestic terrorism perpetrated on March 20, 1995 in Tokyo, Japan, by members of the cult movement Aum Shinrikyo.

USA Freedom Act

The USA Freedom Act (H.R. 2048, Pub.L. 114-23) is a U.S. law enacted on June 2, 2015 that restored in modified form several provisions of the Patriot Act, which had expired the day before. The act imposes some new limits on the bulk collection of telecommunication metadata on U.S. citizens by American intelligence agencies, including the National Security Agency. It also restores authorization for roving wiretaps and tracking lone wolf terrorists.

PATRIOT Act

The USA PATRIOT Act is an Act of Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 26, 2001. With its ten-letter backronym (USA PATRIOT) expanded, the full title is "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001".

Seal Team 6

The United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group (NSWDG), or DEVGRU, is a U.S. Navy component of Joint Special Operations Command. It is often referred to as SEAL Team Six, the name of its predecessor which was officially disbanded in 1987.[1][2] DEVGRU is administratively supported by Naval Special Warfare Command and operationally commanded by the Joint Special Operations Command. Most information concerning DEVGRU is classified and details of its activities are not usually commented on by either the White House or the Department of Defense.[3] Despite the official name changes, "SEAL Team Six" remains the unit's widely recognized moniker.

Israeli counterterrorism

The Yamam (Hebrew: ימ"מ‎, an acronym for Special Police Unit (יחידה מרכזית מיוחדת, Yeḥida Merkazit Meyuḥedet)) is an Israeli counter-terrorism unit, one of four special units of the Israel Border Police. The Yamam is capable of both hostage-rescue operations and offensive take-over raids against targets in civilian areas. Besides military duties, it also performs SWAT duties and undercover police work.

Operation Nimrod

The breaking of a terrorist siege in the heart of London in 1980 catapulted the normally secretive SAS onto the world stage. The audacious daylight assault, carried out in the full glare of media scrutiny, made the Regiment and it's motto, 'Who Dares Wins' an indelible part of UK culture. The techniques used in the operation were quickly studied and copied by other special forces and counter-terrorism units around the world.

UK and the IRA

The provisional Irish Republican Army, or IRA, is an outgrowth of an older group known as the Irish Republican Army, which fought an insurgency that successfully challenged British rule in the whole of Ireland in the early years of the twentieth century. The 1916-1921 warfare culminated in the creation of an independent Irish Free State in 1921. But in exchange for its independence, the old IRA's leadership agreed to allow Ireland's six northern counties to remain under British rule. Britain reconstituted these provinces as Ulster or Northern Ireland, and inside the IRA, significant elements rejected this partition and launched a civil war ultimately won by the pro-treaty Irish forces**. Ties between the Free State and Britain remained chilly into the 1970s. Meanwhile, the old IRA maintained a low level campaign of violence aimed at reuniting Ireland. By the 1960s, however, its activities had dwindled significantly.

nuclear weapons - types

There are two main types of nuclear weapons: atom bombs which use fission as the main reaction, i.e. the atoms are split; hydrogen bombs which use fusion as the main reaction, i.e. the atoms are fused together. Materials: The core of a fission bomb is either plutonium or highly enriched uranium.

Department of Homeland Security

Whereas the Department of Defense is charged with military actions abroad, the Department of Homeland Security works in the civilian sphere to protect the United States within, at, and outside its borders. Its stated goal is to prepare for, prevent, and respond to domestic emergencies, particularly terrorism.[7] On March 1, 2003, DHS absorbed the Immigration and Naturalization Service and assumed its duties. In doing so, it divided the enforcement and services functions into two separate and new agencies: Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Citizenship and Immigration Services. The investigative divisions and intelligence gathering units of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) and Customs Service were merged forming Homeland Security Investigations. Additionally, the border enforcement functions of the INS, including the U.S. Border Patrol, the U.S. Customs Service, and the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service were consolidated into a new agency under DHS: U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The Federal Protective Service falls under the National Protection and Programs Directorate.

XKeyscore

XKeyscore or XKEYSCORE (abbreviated as XKS) is a formerly secret computer system first used by the United States National Security Agency for searching and analyzing global Internet data, which it collects on a daily basis.