Protecting and
securing our
military interests
from terrorist
attack also means
protecting and
securing the communities that host
our bases and
facilities.
Lieutenant J. Michael Barrett, U. S . Naval Reserve
he U.S. armed forces have failed to account for
the real possibility of massive attacks on the infrastructure and communities that support critical
Department of Defense facilities. T h ey also have
failed to address the ways in which such attacks might affect our readiness to assemble, deploy, and employ va r ious elements of our military. This includes the staging
areas and equipment stores of conventional, special operations, consequence management, and humanitarian assistance forces. Base commanders and emerg e n cy preparedness planners must abandon their pre-11 September
security postures and address these new threats if they are
to fulfill their duty to minimize the disruptive effects of
future terror attacks.
Military installations have plans in place to respond to
long-recognized threats, including small-scale penetrations
of their security perimeters, low-level vandalism, and natural disasters such as tornadoes and hurricanes. But the
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threat environment now includes the unique dangers of
“spectacular” mass-casualty terrorist attacks, from suicide
truck bombings to assaults on the civilian infrastructure
to massive area denial attacks using chemical, biological,
radiological or nuclear means. The increased probability
of these threats—terrorist attacks are now at least as likely
to target rear echelon or supporting installations as frontline units—warrants new response plans. This threat is all
the more significant given the growth in recent decades
of the role of contractors; much of the work of the Department of Defense now is conducted outside the relative security of military installations.
As some targets become increasingly denied, the threat
will radiate out to softer targets—the communities that
house DoD facilities, the infrastructure that supports them,
and the sea, air and land lines of communications that sustain them. Consider the impact on the military of a temporary closure of commercial shipping seaports, a persisSeptember 2004 • PROCEEDINGS
61
Security Needs a Professional Officer Community
Captain John H. Orem, U.S. Navy
fter the attack on the Cole (DDG-67)
and the 11 September terrorist attacks, the Navy identified the need to
increase the size of our security forces.
We have nearly quadrupled the Masterat-Arms force, from some 1,700 to
more than 6,000, with plans to ex p a n d
to more than 10,000 over the next five
years. In addition, our security needs
have become more sophisticated. The
addition of waterside security boats, sophisticated waterside sensors, increased
facility hardening criteria, and the need
for creative random antiterrorist measures have moved the scope of the security offi c e r ’s responsibilities from traffi c
management and enforcement to comp r e h e n s ive installation security.
At overseas installations, host-nation
sovereignty issues, dissimilar work and
social cultures, and different political
and legal relationships at every location
complicate the problem.
What is the problem? Simply put, we
have quadrupled the size of our security
forces and tripled their responsibility,
but we have not increased the seniority
or number of security force leaders. I
have an organization working for me as
l a rge as a Navy Hornet squadron that is
run by a lieutenant, with no other officers assigned. This not only has direct
problems, but also creates second and
third order effects in discipline and
management.
Using Naval Station Rota, Spain, as
an example, the driving under the influende (DUI) rate among my Security Department is equal to that of the rest of
my command combined. In my 15
months of command, the only equal opportunity complaint has come from the
A
Security Department. The only civ i l i a n
personnel formal grievance has come
from the Security Department. The only
anonymous letter-writing campaign
complaining about workload has come
from the Security Department. A year
ago, the highest on-base vehicle accident rate was—you guessed it—in the
Security Department.
In one of the the worst episodes thus
fa r, I convicted four of my patrolmen
for a DUI and attempted cove r-up. It
seems that after consuming considerable
alcohol, patrolman one wrecked his car
on the way back to the base. Patrolman
t wo (the passenger) was drunk as well.
Patrolmen three and four were called to
come assist, but as they all had been
drinking together, it is probable they
were legally drunk as well. All four rend e z voused and attempted to extract the
mishap vehicle from the scene but
failed. T h ey then piled into the second
car to go to security, not to report the
accident, but to find a chain to reattempt to move the vehicle. But before
l e aving the scene, patrolman number
one removed the license plates from the
w r e c ked vehicle. W hy? To avoid it
being traced to its owner. W hy? Because the vehicle did not have proper
base registration, a safety inspection, or
insurance. On arriving at the Security
Department, patrolman one, in a wave
of guilt, turned himself in; the other
three quietly departed and did not offer
up their versions of the story until I
c h a rged them with dereliction of duty
and obstruction of justice. During the
fact gathering, patrolman two lied, saying he and patrolmen three and four left
the bar by taxi and were nowhere
around the accident—until investigators
discovered his wallet in the accident vehicle. At mast I took a stripe from each
of them and took their security badges.
I am concerned that the majority of
my significant behavioral incidents and
internal management problems are coming from my department charged with
enforcing the regulations. When security
patrolmen have this level of problems,
t h ey lose credibility as an orga n i z a t i o n
and overall command security and discipline are open to compromise.
This long catalog of incidents might
make it seem that department is failing.
Outwardly, nothing is further from the
truth. The base is secure and safe. Force
protection standards are in compliance
with theater standards. External inspections and audits show all is being done
correctly. Cooperation between my Security Department and the host-nation
security folks is excellent. Interaction
with the local national civil authorities
is excellent. We recently initiated
U.S./Spanish Navy armed wa t e r b o r n e
security patrols, increasing the security
of U.S. and Spanish vessels inside and
outside the harbor. Howeve r, all these
successes could be quickly negated by
an incident or accident in which one of
my security patrolmen demonstrated a
significant lack of judgment.
The episodes of off-duty unprofessionalism and internal management issues stem from a combination of youthful patrolmen and a lack of supervisory
billets. Until recently, the Master- a t Arms rate and law enforcement specialists required a pay grade of E-5 or
above for transition; however, the increase in billets has resulted in direct
tent regional power outage, or—worse yet—a chemical,
biological, or nuclear attack that could put an entire region under quarantine. A ny one of these could dramatically affect the access necessary for military deploy m e n t
or the production of essential military equipment. Only
substantive, deliberate and thorough advance planning will
enable effetive defense against these threats.
ily on the national power supply. Similarly, the interstate
and international commerce systems rely on safe and open
h i g h ways, ports, and borders, and on reliable fuel supplies.
The examples of interconnectedness go on and on, and
t h ey create the potential for multiple points of failure in
our collective security. If future attacks affect lines of communication, power supplies, commercial transit areas, or
other critical infrastructure, the ripple effects will be felt
Potential Impact
across every facet of the Department of Defense, bu t
We live in an increasingly interdependent “system of perhaps most especially its bases and the businesses and
systems” world in which modern communication netwo r k s communities that sustain them.
are the backbone of commerce. These networks rely heavConsider commercial cargo arriving by sea. Every year
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PROCEEDINGS • September 2004
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accessions from boot camp via A
school. When the security force wa s
quadrupled, there was no commensurate
increase in supervisory billets. T h e r efore, the increase in responsibility combined with younger, less mature patrolmen has overwhelmed the hierarchy
within the department. My security officer puts in a longer work week than any
of my other department heads, and only
rarely takes leave. He has no military
assistant to take his place for short periods, and therefore no departmental
sounding board or alter eg o .
Recognizing this lack in leadership
early on, I searched for an officer I
could take out of hide to insert as the
assistant. Howeve r, the lack of seniority
of the security officers severely limited
my options. I needed someone with
more experience than a fleet lieutenant
(junior grade), but who did not outrank
the security officer himself. I finally rec e ived an assistant port operations officer (a chief warrant officer third class
selected for lieutenant [j.g.]) who had
just completed a tour as ship’s bo’sun
on a carrier. He immediately made a
s i g n i ficant difference in the climate and
e ffi c i e n cy of the department. I have
since assigned one of my station pilots,
aviation professionals not cops, to the
department to further ease the strain.
Howeve r, this is only a stopgap.
We need an institutional increase in Security Department leadership and dayto-day supervision. Of my large operational departments, security is the only
one not run by a commander—and
those other departments have lieutenant
commander assistants and numerous
lieutenant division officers. My fire
department has one assistant for each
of four operational shifts.
What is the solution? First, the Navy
needs to invest in more officer billets for
assistant security officers and watch sec-
tion leaders. Second, the rank associated
with the security officer at large and/or
at overseas installations needs to be increased to the commander level. Third,
the security officer career path needs to
be more formally instituted into the officer professional progressions managed
by the Bureau of Personnel. An additional line designator or new staff corps
is required to institutionalize the security
force. In the process, and to provide the
The Navy has quadrupled its security force and tripled its responsibilities, but without
a commensurate increase in leadership. This combination of youthful patrolmen—like
this Master-at-Arms seaman apprentice at Souda Bay, Crete—and lack of supervisory
billets has overwhelmed the hierarchy within base Security Departments.
requisite professional growth, the transition of Security Departments to separate
commands under administrative and operational control of the installation commander might be desirable. Similar
growth in community occurred in cryptology in the 1940s and 1950s, in the
explosive ordnance disposal community,
and recently in information technology.
This increased emphasis and investment
in Navy security professionals will complement and enhance the recent deployment of the mobile security forces and
increase the available talent pool for assignment as force protection officers.
millions of shipping containers are moved globally, and by
most estimates, even today, no more than 4-5% is ever inspected by U.S. customs. In fact, the technical limitations
of the inspection equipment mean even inspected carg o
cannot be guaranteed safe. What happens if terrorists use
one of these ships to get a chemical, biological or nuclear
weapon into the United States? What happens if they stage
an attack using a hijacked tanker by crashing it into one
of several key nodes in our highway system or scuttle the
ship to block a major shipping channel? In the immediate
aftermath, would DoD be able to or even want to use commercial shipping options for its transport needs?
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We also should study the security
structures of our sisters services, where
specific specific career paths are well
d e fined and sufficiently senior, to institutionalize standards and leadership.
The Navy has concluded that today’s
security environment requires significantly more fleet and installation security than in the past. We have increased
manning at the deckplate level. Now
we need to put in place a professional
officer community that is a mixture of
line officers, limited duty officers, and
warrant officers comfortable with the
technical aspects of security and its
c o n t r i bution to the Navy as a whole.
On service selection night at the Naval
Academy, the security officer community needs to be an option, because the
Navy needs it to be a mainstream line
function.
Captain Orem is Commander, Naval Station Rota,
Spain, and Commander, U.S. Naval Activities
Spain.
Today, DoD relies on the commercial shipping industry for the rapid and cost-effective transportation of many
of the goods on which the military relies, including staging and predeployment of materiel. While effi c i e n cy remains important, in the post-11 September era we cannot
afford to maximize effi c i e n cy at the cost of being able to
m ove required goods and materiel in a secure and guaranteed manner, especially in the critical hours and days
immediately following an attack. What legal prov i s i o n s
h ave been made so the military can access its own goods
if they are in a civilian company ’s warehouse when an attack disrupts the transportation netwo r k ?
September 2004 • PROCEEDINGS
63
The impact of the dockwo r ker strikes in 2002 on the
“just-in-time” commercial and agricultural sectors is ins t r u c t ive in depicting what DoD could face. The ten-day
wo r ke r ’s strike that led to the closure of 29 docks was estimated to cost the U.S. economy up to $2 billion a day
because those ports handle approximately 21% of goods
imported into the United States and 9% of all goods exported, as determined by value. The labor strike forced
some manufacturers, including Boeing, GM, and Toyota,
to shut down or realign their assembly processes because
t h ey could not get necessary parts. Perishable goods
spoiled, and even after the strike ended, it took weeks
for the domestic rail, truck, and air transportation networks
to work through the backlog. And there was no damage
invo l ved, no crime scene to investigate, and no area to be
quarantined. There was just a ten-day labor strike.
What would be the impact on a base or other installation that relies heavily on commercial shipping to solve
logistics shortfalls? The answer is that it will have both
foreseeable and unforeseeable effects, and in the absence
of fresh mitigation planning, none of them will be sufficiently countered.
Things We Can Do
The risk DoD faces is a function of two variables: the
probability of an event taking place and the severity of
a ny event that does occur. Steps that decrease the seve rity, therefore, reduce the overall risk. The following actions will help military leaders, base commanders, and
emerg e n cy planners update their response plans to reflect the new realities and threats posed by terrorism.
• Conduct new and thorough vulnerability assessments to
identify each installation’s most critical assets and determine ways to protect them. Reexamine dependence on civilian support infrastructure and create redundant communications, power generation, and food, water and fuel supplies.
Update previous assessment methodologies to incorporate
lessons learned about terrorist tactics, techniques, and procedures, beginning with the truck-bomb attack against the
U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983. Significant emphasis also must be placed on countering the increased risk
of suicide and chemical/biological attacks.
• Develop comprehensive consequence management plans
identifying critical care facilities and assets, decontamination centers, and command-and-control response units.
Delegate secondary units in case primary units become
disabled in the attack or are deployed to other sites. Ensure the widest reasonable basic training in specific areas
such as decontamination, first response, and search and
rescue. All plans will need to include provisions for coordination of mutual assistance agreements with local authorities. This will be significant not just because the scale
of the attack is likely to require diversion of all ava i lable assets to the incident site, but also because many service members’ families live in the areas surrounding DoD
installations and any viable plan must protect them as
well.
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PROCEEDINGS • September 2004
• Build response and recovery plans that cover traditional
p hysical items, such as emerg e n cy communications equipment, and establish predetermined rally points and eva cuation routes. In the case of WMD events, this should include developing logistics response alternatives for
transporting personnel and equipment a substantial distance from the incident site. Consider reserving alternate
workspace in one or more safe locations outside the primary work area, and even outside the installation itself.
This will include provisions for high force protection measures and the unique structural and equipment needs of
sensitive compartmented information facilities. These steps
are necessary everywhere, but especially for critical bases
such as Norfolk, where large numbers of commands could
be affected by a single attack and would be competing for
the available alternative sites.
• Develop a scalable medical response plan. This wo u l d
include chemical, biological, and nuclear attack responses
for both the base and the surrounding community. Develop
standard operating procedure and a response playbook to
ensure the command knows what to do first should an
attack occur. This should include decision points and means
of communicating issues, such as evacuation or “shelter
in place” until local, federal or other assets can respond.
• Modify existing contract requirements to ensure private companies take steps to protect the outsourced wo r kforce that fulfills many critical DoD functions. Work with
DoD contractors to develop comparable civilian response
plans to ensure critical functions will be rapidly reconstituted following any event. Another related issue to address
is DoD’s authority to force (or forcibly prevent) the eva cuation or quarantine of contractors.
• Disaggregate critical systems from back-up systems so
that no single act can destroy both primary and secondary
systems. Similarly, spread emerg e n cy supplies into distributed caches to better ensure access. While efficiency
calls for collocation of assets, the unpredictability of terrorism dictates a more prudent, if more costly, dispersal.
• Plan, practice, plan again, practice again. A critical aspect of developing a plan is to practice it so every player
knows his or her role instinctively. This is how the U.S.
military has long prepared for wa r, and it is how it must
prepare for response and recovery operations.
Worldwide, U.S. military installations, diplomatic facilities, and other interests are lucrative targets for terrorists. Howeve r, the communities that sustain our facilities
also are at risk. Enacting these steps could deter future attacks or, at the least, significantly lessen their impact.
Lieutenant Barrett is vice president of Red Cell Associates, a terrorism
and disaster preparedness consulting firm. He has served as a senior
analyst for the war on terrorism in the Deputy Directorate for Special
Operations for the Joint Chiefs and for the Defense Intelligence Agency;
as lead intelligence analyst in the Special Operations/Combating Terrorism Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict; and as a political-military analyst for
the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He holds a master’s
in international economics/relations from Johns Hopkins and is a doctoral student in complex emerg e n cy and disaster management at Tulane.
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