AL QAEDA AMONG THE CHECHENS , THE CHECHENS IN BOSTON
We don't see much of a maritime connection in the news story that continues to rivet the nation's attention. But today's reports of how the suspects behaved in their firefight and the speculation by police forces that they seemed to have had military like training got our attention. Later reports indicate that at least one of the suspects recently spent time in Russia which leads to speculation that he may have found his way into Chechnya. What's in Chechnya? Al Qaeda. Here is a link to a Christian Science Monitor article from 2004 that delves into the Chechen /Al Qaeda connection:
If you are interested in this angle of the story we thought that you might also be interested in this back ground reading:
This book is available as both a bound volume and a Kindle down load at Amazon click on the link below to go right to the book's two descriptions.
There is a lot to learn from this event. What our foray into background reading basically told us is that we can expect more of this unless DHS forces can interrupt their agents and processes. The interesting thing about DHS is that their work product is simply insuring that "Nothing happens". Indeed since 9/11 very little has, until recently. So was that the result of DHS deterrent efforts that we rarely see? Or have we simply been lucky? Probably some of each.
Unfortunately, officially, the DHS, including the Inspector General's office doesn't think that deterrence is a value that can be measured. At least in the maritime sector, and that is something we know about, we would beg to differ. For example a "persistent Coast Guard (a DHS Agency) presence" has been requested for years along the Rio Grande where the Zata Drug Cartel is causing a lot of grief on our side of the river. That "persistent Coast Guard presence" has yet to be provided. So the deterrence value is obviously zero. A persistent Coast Guard presence is needed in the High Arctic to deter Russian aggressive actions aimed at expanded maritime territorial claims and inroads on our own Arctic resources. Non such has been provided, again deterrence value is zero.
By contrast the Coast Guard introduced bio-metric technology to its migrant interdiction program in the Mona Passage. Before bio-metric technology was introduced to the mission Illegal immigrants were picked up and their identities noted and made record of. The records showed that about half the people picked up had attempted the passage before. After the Coast Guard started using bio-metric technology to identify those they picked up, and started using satellite communications to send the information to the FBI and to hold people with out standing warrants from anywhere in the world, the number of repeat offenders dropped dramatically . The deterrent value can be expressed in the percentage of reduction in repeat offenders. Deterrence can be measured and the DHS ought to start auditing for it in these tight budget times. Some programs are going to have to go, we don't want the ones with real deterrent value cut. Maybe we'll ask Namazu to address this and hope that he doesn't use it as an excuse to hit us up again for that cube farm full of research assistants he wants.
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