Local Police Response to Terrorism - Research Paper Example

? Local police response to terrorism The 9/11 attacks have changed the landscape of the homeland security in USA. The attacks have made it is quite evident that the national security agencies and the army alone cannot win the fight against terror and hence it needs a collective effort on the part of the law enforcement agencies. Therefore the role of the local police has become extremely critical to prevent such terrorist attacks. The present study has been conducted in lieu to analyze the importance of the role of the local police in the fight against terror. Introduction It is quite evident that the 9/11 attacks have changed the United States and this certainly holds true for the local police. It is quite clear that the national security agencies cannot work alone in the fight against terrorism. Hence the situation requires team work among the private and public agencies; most importantly along with the local police. All of them must work in tandem to ensure the security of the country. Getting back to the role of local police it is to be said that local police can definitely identify probable terrorists operating or living in the respective jurisdictions and thus coordinate with the other agencies to prevent or even to respond to terror attacks. However, such responsibilities are of extreme significance and may lead to increase in the work load of the police of force, which to be honest is already quite hectic (Jongman, 2005). The present study looks to analyze the importance of the role of the local police in the fight against terrorism. During the course of the study various aspects such as the effect of political, economic and social changes on the law enforcement agencies including local police; importance of partnership among local communities and local police along with other critical issues such as related to the role of the local police in the battle against terror has been analyzed. The research question for the study could be framed as: Do the local police have a major role to play in the fight against terror? Discussion The importance of the involvement of the local police in the battle against terrorism has been discussed extensively by Researchers. Researchers have argued over the fact that local police a major and critical role in the battle against terror. It has also been claimed by both of them that this role not much different in the role that the authorities play in case of the fight against local crimes. It has also been argued that counter terrorism should be added into the everyday departments. This should be inducted in to the agendas of every meeting. The officers should be communicated and trained regarding the new role to ensure that the prevention against terrorism becomes a part of the daily thought process and routine. However, things are easier said than done. It is needless to discuss that terrorist attacks are quite rare events. Terrorist attacks would not occur as frequently as a homicide or robbery or theft (Miller and Braswell, 2010). The arguments posted by Researchers are absolutely right and has to be agreed. However, the next question that comes to mind would be: What can the local police actually do? One mat say that the local police can collect intelligence about probable terrorism activities; ensure the protection of seemingly vulnerable targets are protected; and there would also be the most obvious response, i.e. the local police should always be in a position to respond to any kind of attack. The last topic is quite controversial and hence in the best interest of the research it has been avoided and hence the first two tasks would be discussed. Such an approach is of great significance because if the phrase prevention is better that cure had to come true then it would be for the battle against terrorism. It is needless to discuss about the devastation of terrorist attacks and hence the prime focus should be on avoiding such disasters rather than any other crime such as murder of robbery, where the main focus would be to ensure that the criminal(s) should be brought to justice. Taking Out Terrorist vs. Prevention Regular police practices quite often follow the assumption that arresting offenders is almost same as the prevention against crime. Despite the best efforts made by the police, presently only a small percentage of crimes are followed by arrest. It is also unclear as to what degree that the percentage can rise. The best known example can be referred to as the lack of statistical evidences when it comes to the capital punishment that discourages murder. Some of the same reasons describe as to why it is quite dangerous to rely on the concept of taking out the terrorists, simply because those who are willing to die for the beliefs are not likely to get discouraged by the risk of death. Getting hold of terrorists or catching them would be quite difficult as terrorists are likely to well trained and more careful than an average criminals. Even when the identities are known the police may not be able to catch the terrorists. Killing the terrorists can have even greater consequences as it may increase bitterness among a population which is already bitter. This is of great significance as terrorists use violence to get support for their cause and hence killing a terrorist would ultimately turn them into martyrs. However, this does not mean that the terrorists should be not hunted or punished once caught as they deserve to get punished for the horrific acts of violence. One may also argue that it can be highly effective to kill the major terrorist leaders to loosen the grip over the followers. But to be realistic, much of this is actually beyond the interests and the abilities of the local police and hence the primary concern should most definitely be on the prevention from terrorist’s attacks. Intelligence based policing The term intelligent based policing was first used by the Kent Constabulary. This concept was developed in the response to the steady increase in the car theft during a time when the police budgets were being caught. Senior officials felt that small groups of people actually carry out the crimes and hence crime can be cut down by developing intelligence units to nail down these suspects. Intelligence based policing have now actually become the base of the national intelligence model. Such model looks to combine the random pieces of information about certain activities of terror. However, such activities can only provide a clear picture once the pieces of the puzzle are put together. Presently the New York police department is leading the country in the intelligence based policing model in the fight against terrorism. However, here it needs to be mentioned that NYPD has already hired more than thousand officials, who are dedicated to counter terrorism only. A lot of financial resources have been invested by NYPD as these officers go through extensive combat training along with other kinds of training such as foreign language training. The idea seem all good on paper, but to be realistic it is highly unlikely that any other police department in the world can match the investments made by NYPD. Apart from budgetary constraints one of the major flaws of the this model; which hold true especially for US is the assumption that the police departments would only collect specific pieces of information and based on such info at some point of time they would be able to identify any kind of suspicious activities. Such activities are often accompanies by the constant reminders to the people by asking them to remind any suspicious activity. However, the term suspicious can often be treated as quite vague. Hence in some circumstances collection of useless information is quite common as compared to useful information. Another flaw could be the dependency of the authorities on agencies and individuals for info sharing. There is no doubts about the fact this model was developed to fight against terrorism by there can be presence of various constraints when it comes to the timely sharing of information related to terrorism. Sometimes it could be lack of trained staff or the lack of presence of appropriate technology. However, the biggest constraint could be the nature. This holds true specifically for the early stages of the inquiry. In these cases the investigators may be facing a dilemma. The investigators may feel that outsiders could be of help in case of info sharing. But then again the investigators could be reluctant to share information with other agencies and the public as it is believed that secrecy is the true hallmark of any operation and rightly so. In this way there could a conflict among the investigating agencies. Also if the investigators decide to share info with public, then it may lead to the problem of info leak and hence the whole operation could be compromised. Community policing Local Police officers tend to have regular presence in the local communities. The officers tend to communicate with the local communities on regular basis which includes the business owner and local residents. Therefore they would be in a position to gauge the responsibilities and activities of the Arabic and Islamic communities. Perceptions of earning trust and obtaining vital information from the communities have to be practiced regularly. This means that it must be made sure that he officers spend quality time to alleviate the problems. This also requires proper management concepts. For example the senior officials of the local police department should make sure that officers who live close to the neighbourhood should have the skills to communicate with the residents. Also it must be ensured that the work hours of the officers are flexible in nature. Also if the officers are likely to work in the field of intelligence it is to be made sure that the officers are trained in what signs or indicators to look for to get relevant info (Johnson, Ledlow and Cwiek, 2005). Also it should be ensured that the officers avoid issues such as the underestimation of the trust of the community trust; costly and unproductive surveillance of sensitive places, etc. An example can be used to showcase the importance of community policing. Saint Leo University has a set of core values such as excellence, community, respect, personal development, responsible stewardship and integrity. Hence it is suggested that the local officers should maintain healthy relationship with the Saint Leo University to get valuable information from the university; especially about the young kids and their background. It is most likely that kids from various contingents may belong to such schools. Also the fact that the seeds of terrorism grow at a very young age among the kids cannot be ignored. Hence proper communication among the officers and the university would play a major role in avoiding terrorism activities. Also the police in coordination with the university authorities can conduct drills about the precautionary measures that can be taken in case of the occurrence. Continuing the topic of relation of police with communities one of the most important factors would be the relationship with the immigration communities. It has been seen quite often that such communities can sometime help the terrorists to develop bank accounts and find places to live in. For example the first attack on the world trade centre was carried out by people living on the Jersey City immigration areas. Therefore it is quite clear in order to gather info about terrorist activities special attention must be paid by the police to the immigrant communities. However, this process has to be carried out in a subtle fashion as heavy handed actions can actually make things worse. On a positive note though, community policing would actually protect the local immigrant communities from becoming victims due to the fear of terrorist attacks. In such a way the police would not only be able to protect the communities, but also would be able to ensure that the immigrants do not support or harbour terrorism (Boyd and Sullivan, 1997). Impact of External Forces of US Law Enforcement Landscape Economic Economic downturn of 2008 has had devastating impact on the US economy and the local law enforcement agencies had to face the wrath of it. According to the reports by National Institute of Justice, US are presently facing the 10th economic slide since the World War II. The economic downturn has resulted in budget cut downs in the local law enforcement agencies. However, according to Bernard Melekian standard of service delivery or the expectations would not be lowered due to lowered budgets. According to Mr. Melekian the economic downturn is likely to continue for the next five to ten years and hence the law enforcement agencies need to come up with different ways to deliver the services. In the context of the response to terrorism Mr. Melekian stated that there are two tiers of services, emergency and non emergency services. The response to terrorism falls under the emergence response category and hence budget constraints would change the level of responsiveness or any other actions related to this category (Miller and Hess, 2007). Legal The 9/11 attacks lead to a significant wide spread o changes in the US legal and foreign policies. Both the parties decided to pass the PATRIOT Act and showed support for the war in Afghanistan. The department also created department of home land security or DHS in a response to the 9/11 attacks. The security policies of the homeland security department are coordinated by the homeland security council at the White House. Social Before the 9/11 attacks the activities of foreigners or Americans was viewed more or less innocently. After the September attacks things have changed. Now the activities of people are looked at with suspicion, especially for those who look like “Arab”. Since the attacks the Muslims, Arabs, Sikhs and other South Asian American people have been fell victims of vandalism, threats and arson. Another impact of the 9/11 attacks have been on the censorship issues. Various programs that included the world trade centre and the twin towers were edited in the re-airings on the television channels. One such example could be the Simpsons. After the 9/11 attacks a list of songs flagged as inappropriate by the clear Channel Communication. The songs were not banned instantly. But the radio stations were advised not to play the songs again Summary and Findings To summarize things it can be said that the local police have a major role to play in the fight against terror as it would be literally impossible for the federal law enforcement agencies to fight against terror on their own. However even before indulging in the fight against terror the local department should understand the impact of the legal, economic and social factors after the 9/11 attacks. Also the local police have to understand that fighting terror is a bit different from solving other crimes and hence prevention is most definitely better than cure in the case of fight against terrorism. Also the relationship with local communities; especially with the immigrant communities could be of great help to gain info that may come handy to prevent terrorist attacks and maintain harmonious environment in the society. References Jongman, J. (2005). Political Terrorism: A New Guide to Actors, Authors, Concepts, Data Bases, Theories, and Literature. USA: Transaction Publishers. Miller, M. And Hess, K. (2007). Community Policing: Partnerships for Problem Solving. USA: Cengage Learning. Miller, S. And Braswell, M. (2010). Effective Police Supervision STUDY GUIDE. USA: Elsevier. Boyd, M. and Sullivan, J. (1997). Emergency preparedness for transit terrorism.USA: Transportation Research Board. Johnson, J., Ledlow, G. And Cwiek, M. (2005). Community Preparedness and Response to Terrorism: The role of community organizations and business. II, Volume 2. USA: Greenwood Publishing Group. Read More