Preventing Terrorism in the United States

Preventing Terrorism in the United States

Following the Guidelines of the American Psychological Association of Style

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 2

Introduction

“At 8:46 on the morning of September 11, 2001, the United States became a nation

transformed,” (United States Government, 2004). Since this time everywhere in the United

States has become a need for security. Buildings that once could be entered into with ease now

require tight security measures in order to enter. Airspace has been carefully monitored ever

since to avoid from terrorist attacks in America to ever happen again. Here is what happened:

An airliner traveling at hundreds of miles per hour and carrying some 10,000

gallons of jet fuel plowed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in

Lower Manhattan. At 9:03, a second airliner hit the South Tower. Fire and smoke

billowed upward. Steel, glass, ash, and bodies fell below. The Twin Towers,

where up to 50,000 people worked each day, both collapsed less than 90 minutes

later. At 9:37 that same morning, a third airliner slammed into the western face of

the Pentagon. At 10:03, a fourth airliner crashed in a field in southern

Pennsylvania. It had been aimed at the United States Capitol or the White House,

and was forced down by heroic passengers armed with the knowledge that

America was under attack. More than 2,600 people died at the World Trade

Center; 125 died at the Pentagon; 256 died on the four planes. The death toll

surpassed that at Pearl Harbor in December 1941. This immeasurable pain was

inflicted by 19 young Arabs acting at the behest of Islamist extremists

headquartered in distant Afghanistan. Some had been in the United States for

more than a year, mixing with the rest of the population. Though four had training

as pilots, most were not well-educated. Most spoke English poorly, some hardly

at all. In groups of four or five, carrying with them only small knives, box cutters,

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 3

and cans of Mace or pepper spray, they had hijacked the four planes and turned

them into deadly guided missiles (United States Government, 2004).

The purpose of this paper is to answer one question which arises out of the National

Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (United States Government, 2004).

“What can we do in the future to prevent similar acts of terrorism?” (United States Government,

2004). The latter part of the essay will discuss cyberterrorism and computer memory hacking as

well as the negative effects of policing in America.

Findings of the Commission

In general there were four main points that did not prepare the United States for 9-11

from 1998 to 2001: imagination, policy, capabilities and management. The specific findings of

the commission were that unsuccessful diplomacy, lack of military options, problems within the

intelligence community, problems in the FBI, permeable borders and immigration controls,

financing, an improvised homeland defense, emergency response and the congress all

contributed to the problems of why 9-11 was able to take place (United States Government,

2004). Here is how things have improved to make America safer:

Since 9/11, the United States and its allies have killed or captured a majority of al

Qaeda's leadership; toppled the Taliban, which gave al Qaeda sanctuary in

Afghanistan; and severely damaged the organization. Yet terrorist attacks

continue. Even as we have thwarted attacks, nearly everyone expects they will

come. How can this be? The problem is that al Qaeda represents an ideological

movement, not a finite group of people. It initiates and inspires, even if it no

longer directs. In this way it has transformed itself into a decentralized force. Bin

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 4

Ladin may be limited in his ability to organize major attacks from his hideouts.

Yet killing or capturing him, while extremely important, would not end terror. His

message of inspiration to a new generation of terrorists would continue. Because

of offensive actions against al Qaeda since 9/11, and defensive actions to improve

homeland security, we believe we are safer today. But we are not safe. We

therefore make the following recommendations that we believe can make

America safer and more secure (United States Government, 2004).

Cyberterrorism

The mission of the Department of Defense’s cyber strategy is to build and maintain ready

forces and capabilities to conduct cyberspace operations. As well to defend the DOD information

network, secure DOD data, and mitigate risks to DOD missions

Be prepared to defend the U.S. homeland and U.S. vital interests from disruptive or destructive

cyberattacks of significant consequence. Plus, build and maintain viable cyber options and plan

to use those options to control conflict escalation and to shape the conflict environment at all

stages. Build and maintain robust international alliances to deter shared threats and increase

international security and stability.TERNATIONAL ALLIANCES

All three of DoD’s cyber missions require close collaboration with foreign allies and

partners. Given the high demand and relative scarcity of cyber resources, the DoD must make

hard choices and focus its partnership capacity initiatives on areas where vital U.S. national

interests are at stake DoD will focus its international engagement on: the Middle East, the Asia-

Pacific, and key NATO allies.

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 5

Computer Memory Hacking

According to the North Carolina State University Study Guide, they give this definition

of hackers:

Hackers are people who try to gain unauthorised access to your computer. This is

normally done through the use of a 'backdoor' program installed on your machine.

You can protect yourself from these by using a firewall and a good up-to-date

anti-virus program. You would normally get such a backdoor program by opening

an E-mail attachment containing the backdoor program. It is normal for such a

backdoor program to send out more copies of itself to everyone in your address

book, so it is possible for someone you know to unintentionally send you a

malicious program. A few backdoor programs can work with any e-mail program

by sitting in memory and watching for a connection to a mail server, rather than

actually running from within a specific mail program. These programs

automatically attach themselves to any e-mail you send, causing you to

unintentionally send out malicious programs to your friends and associates (North

Carolina State University, 2016).

Computer hackers will sometimes hack computers out of revenge and they tend to target

two different sources: government departments and personal computers. Due to this there are

four types of hackers which emerge (North Carolina State University, 2016). The four different

types of hackers are pranksters, fame seekers, educational and criminals. Next I will discuss

three best practices that a computer user can use to guard against hackers.

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The three best practices that a computer user can use to guard against hackers come from

the North Carolina State University (2016):

A skilled hacker will do whatever it takes to break into your computer. Just ask

Microsoft. Even a giant software company is not completely safe. The company

was hacked by a Trojan-horse program hidden inside an innocent-looking email

attachment. The Trojan horse replicated itself throughout Microsoft's internal

network and eventually emailed proprietary secrets back to the originator of the

Trojan horse. Follow these six steps to protect your computer from being hacked:

Don't let other people onto your computer unless you really trust them. A

great way to do this is to password-protect your computer.

Don't ever open attachments. Avoid Trojan horses and viruses by following

this rule. For more information, go here.

Turn off file sharing if you don't need it. If a port scan is done on your

computer, a hacker may find a back door to your machine and access your

files.

Use an antivirus program and keep it up to date. For more information,

go here.

If you have a constant Internet connection, use a firewall. For more

information, go here.

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 7

Routinely update Windows software. This is extremely important. Updates fix

many bugs and known security holes within the Windows operating system

(North Carolina State University, 2016).

With these best practices kept in mind, this will protect computer users from being hacked.

Policing in America

This section will discuss the forms of police misconduct and argue effectively that police

misconduct does occur on a frequent basis, as well as conclude with suggestions towards

resolving this dilemma. How police get hired for their jobs will be the first topic of discussion is

the fact of racial profiling, followed by the levels of force that police use when apprehending a

suspect, followed by the topic of police corruption and then concluding with how police

misconduct can be resolved.

A police officer who is truly good at his or her job has a commitment to the belief that

they want to serve and want to protect the public good. Not all police officers conduct

themselves this way. As stated by Stoddard (1968) racial profiling is a condition that has been

occurring for a long, long time amongst police officers. The difference is that the people who are

racially profiled have changed throughout history. There was a time when Italian people who are

recently immigrated to the United States during the turn of the 20th century were all considered to

be mobsters and involved in illegal crime activity. There was a time when the Irish people who

tended to immigrate to the United States prior to the Italian people were racially profiled by

police as all violating the prohibition regulations that were in place as well as other illegal

activity. Brown and Chipman (2000) discuss how African American people have been

notoriously racially profiled by police. Many African American people are seen as “guilty by

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 8

being African American,” (30) and a judicial system that punishes the African American person

to the extremities of the legal system such as with the death penalty. Recent news events in the

United States that always consistently seem to be occurring further demonstrate the clashes that

police often have minority communities in America. Peak (2014) argues that more diversity

training and contact with the communities that police serve is vitally needed in order to put an

end to racial profiling. When upstanding minorities of America who are driving in luxury

vehicles get stopped by the police simply because there are not a lot of police officers on the

force who look like that driver, diversity training as well as more employment of minorities to

become police officers could and would be a solution to these problems.

Besides racial profiling is also the issue of related issues to racial profiling such as

violence towards homosexual communities, violence towards people of different religions and

cultures, violence towards poor women who may be involved in acts such as prostitution or sex

work, violence towards poor people and impoverished communities in general, mistreatment of

young people and the automatic suspicions of police that a gang of young people potentially

innocently walking down the street are up to no good are additional forms of police misconduct

that are linked to racial profiling (Peak, 2014). The next issue that will be discussed are the levels

of police force that is used in apprehending suspects.

Stoddard (6) in his classic work regarding police misconduct states that police have been

known to use excessive force when apprehending suspects for crime. Excessive force is basically

defined as conduct that is used to apprehend a suspect that is conducted in an excessively violent

way or that which may cause undue harm to the potential suspect. Excessive force is a criminal

activity when conducted by police and is also an illegal activity. These actions by bad cops so-to-

speak result in millions of dollars lost by the government due to legal repercussions (Peak,

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2014). In 1985, the United States Supreme Court in the case of Tennessee v. Garner, greatly

restricted the use of deadly force, which does happen and has also recently been in the news in

America, against police officers as they apprehend suspects (Brown and Chipman, 2000).

For an officer to use deadly force, the officer must truly believe that their lives or the

lives of anyone involved in the arrest are in danger to the point of death. In these circumstances,

then deadly force can be used. As has been stated by D.K. in The Economist.com, Grill in USA

Today.com, Holloway in CNN.com and Vick in Time.com, the job of a police officer is not easy

in a country as dangerous as the United States of America. In major cities such as New York,

Florida, Texas, California and even Washington as a few examples, the level of crime is so high

and the potential for a police officer’s life to be taken away by the targeted bullet of a suspect

could, can and does lead to many circumstances of deadly force being used to take down a

suspect. In these instances…would you do the same thing? If you thought your life was at risk,

would you shoot first and then asks questions later as the expression goes?

The answers to these questions may lie firmly in what it takes to become a police officer

and the motivations behind why a police officer is doing their job or doing their work. If a police

officer is motivated by the top dollar salaries that they earn and they are doing the job solely to

earn a paycheck every two weeks when they would rather be doing some other job that would

even pay less if they could afford to do so – yes, without a doubt with this attitude just about

anyone would shoot first and then ask the necessary questions later.

If a police officer is motivated by protecting people, understands the foundations of the

U.S. Constitution, knows that a proper arrest must follow protocol and certain standards and that

they are an exceptional human being regarding being calm under the most pressured

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 10

circumstances – I am not saying that for sure the deadly force would not occur depending on the

circumstances, however there would be less probabilities that the deadly force would occur. Also

linking the issue of racial profiling as mentioned earlier into the equation – a police officer who

is free from biased thought, opinion or any prejudice would also exercise a more reasoned

response regardless of the assailant they are facing in any pressurized situation. The next issue

that will be discussed is police corruption.

Picture this, because it happens:

Police raid a money laundering scheme in New York City. There is $50 million dollars in real

United States currency that is littered all over the room. There are five police officers present.

Four of the police officers due their due diligence and arrest the money launderers and collect

the $40 million dollars that they have found. The other one sole police officer out of the five that

is the bad apple in the bunch pockets $10 million of the cash and not ever says a word to anyone

as he quietly leaves the police force a year later to live in Mexico.

Police corruption – it does happen. It takes place in many different forms according to

Stoddard (1968), Brown and Chipman (2000) and Peat (2014). Not only could it involve a police

officer stealing money or drugs from a drug bust or a money laundering situation, police officers

could be violating the law in a variety of ways such as paying their way into promotions, bribing

judges to ensure that a suspect is convicted and going to brothels to sleep with sex workers.

Police do not always even abide by the very laws that they have been hired to serve and to

protect for.

As mentioned in the example above, those were five police officers that went into that

room where the money laundering was taking place and only one of the police officers took the

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 11

money. This tends to be the common circumstance of the approximate ratio of police officers

that are good, versus those police officers who have not been good. Sometimes the police

corruption that takes place could be bigoted comments towards their co-workers of women and

people of color who are on the police force and the exclusionary practices of out-casting these

other police officers who are taking the chance to try to improve things by being on the inside of

the systemically often corrupt system. Police officers who practice bigotry are racially profiling

on one of their own – this is simply a different kind of racial profiling.

Police are given so much power in any given township or county or country that often

many of them abuse it. What has not been discussed yet is the police corruption that also occurs

amongst the federal police bureau, otherwise known as the Federal Bureau of Investigation or

FBI. The FBI has been known historically to racially profile many African Americans and to

target some non-African Americans as being Communist during the McCarthy era when they

were not even Communist. Harassment and prosecution, even imprisonment was the result of

these ignorant acts by the FBI. Currently, many Muslim people are being attacked and

prosecuted in the United States due to the terrorist acts that have been occurring. Innocent

Muslim people who have nothing to do with any terrorist attacks whatsoever and some of them

even with long histories of being American citizens are being targeted, under surveillance and

even sometimes imprisoned by the FBI, as well as state and county police departments.

The Knapp Commission in 1972 identified two different types of forms of police

corruption. They are the following:

Grass Eaters

Meat Eaters

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The definitions of a grass eater are officers who practice more benign aspects of corruption. They

may accept small gifts, money and favors on behalf of someone who has committed a crime and

then they will use false discretion to choose not to arrest them. The definition of a meat eater

police officer in regards to police misconduct are officers that are focused on illegal means to

make money while they are on duty as police officers.

Stoddard (1968) points out a more complete list of police misconduct as listed below:

Bribery: accepting cash gifts in exchange for the a lack of law enforcement

Chiseling: demanding free food, demanding discounts and free admission

Extortion: threatening arrest if a bribe is not given to the police officer

Favoritism: giving family and friends breaks on law enforcement

Mooching: accepting free admission to entertainment, drinks and food

Perjury: lying on behalf of other officers that have done something illegal

Prejudice: unequal enforcement of the law in respect to racial and ethnic minorities

Premediated Theft: planned theft and burglaries (this would be shown in the example

above)

Shakedown: Taking items from a scene of a theft or a burglary (this would be shown in

the example above)

Shopping: taking small and inexpensive items from the scene of a crime

Stoddard covers many areas of police misconduct and the conclusion of this essay will discuss

how police misconduct can be resolved. The following is the conclusion.

Conclusion – Recommendations of Commission for Preventing Terrorist Attacks

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The recommendations include the following coming from the United States Government

(2004):

attack terrorists and their organizations

prevent the continued growth of Islamist terrorism

protect against and prepare for terrorist attacks

How will this be done? (United States Government, 2004):

unifying strategic intelligence and operational planning against Islamist terrorists across

the foreign-domestic divide with a National Counterterrorism Center;

unifying the intelligence community with a new National Intelligence Director;

unifying the many participants in the counterterrorism effort and their knowledge in a

network-based information sharing system that transcends traditional governmental

boundaries;

unifying and strengthening congressional oversight to improve quality and

accountability; and

Strengthening the FBI and homeland defenders.

Now there is also a National Anti-Terrorism Center in the United States that works towards

fighting terrorism (United States Government, 2004).

This essay has described what hacking of memory and/or RAM means. This essay has

examined the common tools that hackers use to hack memory of computer devices, also detailing

two real-life examples of such tools in action. This essay has identified three best practices that

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 14

one should use to protect their computers from being hacked. Finally, this essay has analyzed the

significance of hacking in organizations and modern society.

Police need to be vigilant to have high moral standards and to maintain them regardless

of the daily corruption that they witness and could be affected by through their line of work. This

takes the strength and the stamina of a mind of steel, and this essay would advise that when a

police officer is feeling weak – take a vacation, regroup, recharge and come back to your work

refreshed and ready.

There also need to be strong police policies and protocol for disciplinary action in place

that would greatly deter police misconduct. If police knew that they would be treated in the eyes

of the law equally to those of the suspects in which they apprehend, they may then be greatly

deterred from performing any form of police misconduct. As it stands currently, often police are

not properly punished for their misdeeds in the eyes of the courtroom.

There also needs to be a proactive and constructive internal investigations unit that will

properly police the police. If the police cannot police themselves, which has proven to be true

time and time again, then it is imperative that high moral standing organizations are formed in

order to police the police when there is police misconduct.

Preventing Terrorism in the United States 15

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