Old is New Again, the Terror Alert System

Jeh Johnson admits the NTAS has never been used but now, we need it?

Wonder when it will be launched and how:

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National Terrorism Advisory System Public Guide

NTAS Public GuideThe National Terrorism Advisory System, or NTAS, replaces the color-coded Homeland Security Advisory System (HSAS). This new system will more effectively communicate information about terrorist threats by providing timely, detailed information to the public, government agencies, first responders, airports and other transportation hubs, and the private sector.

It recognizes that Americans all share responsibility for the nation’s security, and should always be aware of the heightened risk of terrorist attack in the United States and what they should do.

US To Roll Out New Terror Alert System

SkyNews: The announcement comes after President Obama tells the American people that a new phase of terror threats has emerged.

The United States will launch a new terror alert system aimed at better informing Americans about the nation’s security posture, Homeland chief Jeh Johnson has said.

Details about the new system – the country’s third since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks – will be announced soon, Mr Johnson said at a Defense One magazine forum on Monday.

Colour-coded US threat advisory system

The much maligned colour-coded system was replaced in 2011

The Homeland Security boss did not provide specifics, but said the changes will keep the public better informed.

His comments come on the heels of President Barack Obama telling Americans that the US is witnessing a “new phase” of terror threats.

President Obama

In a rare address from the Oval Office on Sunday night, Mr Obama explained how the threat that terrorism posed to the US had changed from the “multi-faceted” attacks of 9/11, to simpler methods such as mass shootings.

Mr. Johnson echoed the President’s words on Monday, telling the forum that terrorist threats to the US have evolved and terrorist-inspired threats are a growing concern.

Since 2011 the US has used the National Threat Advisory System (NTAS), which replaced the much maligned colour-coded system put in place after 9/11.

Extraordinary Tactics to Locate Targeted Jihadis

DailyMail: A crack team from the SAS tracked down IS executioner Jihadi John and called in the air strike that killed him in Syria, it can be revealed today.

Until now the top-secret operation to eliminate the masked British extremist – who beheaded UK hostages Alan Henning and David Haines – was thought to have been conducted entirely from the air without any Western troops.

But The Mail on Sunday has learned that the perilous plan depended on a team of eight men from the Special Forces regiment risking their lives to penetrate deep inside the IS stronghold of Raqqa.

 

And the secret weapon used to identify Jihadi John was a 1lb helicopter drone launched by the soldiers. The daring mission began in darkness on November 11 when two US Chinook helicopters skimmed low across the Syrian desert to land at an isolated spot.

Avoiding all roads, the team of soldiers drove in desert buggies 35 miles south towards Raqqa. At about 3am, they ‘dug in’ five miles outside the city, where they remained undetected.

The following evening, while the rest of the team were on lookout, one man assembled four 3ft nano-helicopters with infrared and night-vision cameras in the nose. They were pre-programmed to fly to Jihadi John’s hideout – a six-storey building in Raqqa.

The first drone set off towards its target, then entered ‘hover and stare’ mode, recording the movements of IS suspects at a building near the Sharksa mosque. 

It beamed footage by satellite back to SAS HQ in Hereford and the US Central Command in Doha, Qatar.

Eight SAS soldiers sneaked to within five miles of ISIS's de facto capital of Raqqa in Syria and from there, they flew four 'nano helicopters' fitted with cameras that spied on Jihadi John

At 8.30pm, with the first drone low on power, a second one took over, and after another fruitless wait, it was replaced at 10pm.

But when the third suddenly shot back images of Jihadi John – real name Mohammed Emwazi – the tension in the control rooms was palpable.

A source said: ‘US commanders re-tasked a Reaper drone armed with Hellfire missiles. At 11.40 a car pulled up and he got inside. The Reaper locked on to its target and Jihadi John was history. The guys were chuffed to get that maniac.’

£9million Tornados protected… by a 5ft fence 

The Mail on Sunday can today reveal glaring security lapses at an RAF base where Tornado strike jets are protected by a flimsy 5ft-high picket fence.

Two Tornado GR4 fighter-bombers took off from RAF Marham in Norfolk last week to join the fight against Islamic State in Syria.

But the wooden fence at the end of the base’s runway appears shockingly inadequate and could easily be knocked down by a would-be terrorist.

Although a hedge grows along most of the quarter-mile section of fence on the north-east corner of the base, reporter Andrew Young discovered an 8ft-wide gap, allowing him to go straight up to the fence.

The spot is just 300 yards from a path on which the bombers, which each cost £9.4 million, taxi down before they take off on the main runway.

The reporter, carrying a large rucksack which could potentially have hidden a bomb or weapons, stood by the fence for more than an hour on Wednesday as five of the jets took off on training missions.

At no time was he challenged by personnel at the base.

An RAF spokesman said last night: ‘As a matter of policy, neither the RAF nor the Ministry of Defence discuss security measures. However, we can confirm security measures in place are robust and multi-layered, and are not solely dependent on perimeter fencing.’

 

THAT Terror Watch List Includes TSA Employees

People are nominated due to certain conditions and points to go on the terror watch list. The report is here.  .

Obama’s solution to terror was to expand the stipulations to be on the list, keeping the country safe?

72 DHS Employees on Terrorist Watch List

FreeBeacon: At least 72 employees at the Department of Homeland Security are listed on the U.S. terrorist watch list, according to a Democratic lawmaker.

Rep. Stephen Lynch (D., Mass.) disclosed that a congressional investigation recently found that at least 72 people working at DHS also “were on the terrorist watch list.”

“Back in August, we did an investigation—the inspector general did—of the Department of Homeland Security, and they had 72 individuals that were on the terrorist watch list that were actually working at the Department of Homeland Security,” Lynch told Boston Public Radio.

“The [former DHS] director had to resign because of that,” he said.

DHS continues to fail inspections aimed at determining the efficiency of its internal safety mechanisms, as well as its efforts to protect the nation.

Lynch referred to a recent report that found the Transportation Security Administration, which is overseen by DHS, failed to stop 95 percent of those who attempted to bring restricted items past airport security.

“We had staffers go into eight different airports to test the department of homeland security screening process at major airports. They had a 95 percent failure rate,” Lynch said. “We had folks—this was a testing exercise, so we had folks going in there with guns on their ankles, and other weapons on their persons, and there was a 95 percent failure rate.”

Lynch said he has “very low confidence” in DHS based on its many failures over the years. For this reason, he voted in favor of recent legislation that will tighten the vetting process for any Syrian refugees applying for asylum in the United States.

“I have very low confidence based on empirical data that we’ve got on the Department of Homeland Security. I think we desperately need another set of eyeballs looking at the vetting process,” he said. “That’s vetting that’s being done at major airports where we have a stationary person coming through a facility, and we’re failing 95 percent of the time.”

“I have even lower confidence that they can conduct the vetting process in places like Jordan, or Belize or on the Syrian border, or in Cairo, or Beirut in any better fashion, especially given the huge volume of applicants we’ve had seeking refugee status,” Lynch said.

*** There are more details:

TheIntercept: Nearly half of the people on the U.S. government’s widely shared database of terrorist suspects are not connected to any known terrorist group, according to classified government documents obtained by The Intercept.

Of the 680,000 people caught up in the government’s Terrorist Screening Database—a watchlist of “known or suspected terrorists” that is shared with local law enforcement agencies, private contractors, and foreign governments—more than 40 percent are described by the government as having “no recognized terrorist group affiliation.” That category—280,000 people—dwarfs the number of watchlisted people suspected of ties to al Qaeda, Hamas, and Hezbollah combined.

The documents, obtained from a source in the intelligence community, also reveal that the Obama Administration has presided over an unprecedented expansion of the terrorist screening system. Since taking office, Obama has boosted the number of people on the no fly list more than ten-fold, to an all-time high of 47,000—surpassing the number of people barred from flying under George W. Bush.

“If everything is terrorism, then nothing is terrorism,” says David Gomez, a former senior FBI special agent. The watchlisting system, he adds, is “revving out of control.”

Back at the Border(s), Bigger Issues ~ Chilling Report

Breitbart: MATAMOROS, Tamaulipas— The lack of security conditions in this border city fuel the terror that its citizens live under and led to the U.S. Consulate in Matamoros being the latest target for a bomb threat.

According to information released by the Tamaulipas Command Control and Computing Center (C-4 similar to a police communication center), authorities received a call about an explosive device at the consular office on Thursday afternoon. The alert raised the security levels in the Jardin neighborhood, which is just yards away from two international bridges that connect this border city with Brownsville, Texas.

Mexican soldiers and federal police officers rushed to the neighborhood and sealed off the area for several hours. One of the security blockades was placed near the intersection of First and Azaleas streets in Jardin neighborhood.

As part of the security protocol, the U.S. Consulate was fortified by Mexican troops who surrounded the building while special teams went into the building to search for the explosive devices. Mexican authorities used police dogs to search the area and after a careful search of the building were able to determine that the threat was false.

The threat to the U.S. Consulate Office in Matamoros is just one of many daily occurrences in this city. Earlier this week, the HEB shopping center had to be evacuated after a similar bomb threat was called in.

As Breitbart Texas previously reported, two congressmen wrote a letter to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry demanding answers for the lack of security in the consular offices in Mexico.

The U.S. Consulate Office in this border city has previously been the victim of other bomb threats and also the theft of thousands of U.S. crossing cards that were stolen by the Gulf Cartel out of a delivery truck, Breitbart Texas previously reported.

So, what does the Congress know and have to say? They got the report:

Massive Senate report: Mexican AND Canadian borders are ‘significant’ terrorist pathways

The U.S.-Canada border is the likely path for terrorists to invade the country, according to top national security experts and Congress’ most comprehensive review of America’s 19,000 miles of coasts and land borders.

“The nexus between known or suspected terrorists in eastern Canada and the northern parts of the U.S. represent [sic] a significant national security threat,” said a new report from the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, a conclusion reached as Canada decided to settle 25,000 Syrian refugees by March.

“The border is not secure,” Sen. Ron Johnson, the Wisconsin Republican who is chairman of the committee, told Secrets. He included the southern border, where he said that drug cartels are teaming with “potentially Islamic terror organizations.”

He raised concerns about the rushed refugee plans of new Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. “It is a concern with the new prime minister, Trudeau, opening up his border to refugees. They can come into America, so I would say that increases our risk,” Johnson said.

His panel’s new 100-page report, show in pdf form at the end of this story, is based on dozens of hearings, interviews and trips, cites terror arrests in Canada and U.S. border states of Islamic State threats and quotes several experts raising concerns about how easy it is for illegal immigrants and terrorists to cross in from Canada.

“Security observers have argued that Canada represents a substantial vulnerability, because it provides immigrant visas to individuals who pose a significant threat,” said the report, “The State of America’s Border Security.”

“Witnesses testified before the committee that if someone gets into Canada, they will most likely be able to enter the U.S.”

And for thousands of miles of border, for most there is only a shallow ditch and forestlands to stop them. “There is currently no fencing on the northern border. Instead, the demarcation line between the two countries is often marked by a ditch, approximately six inches deep,” says the report.

It offers several details of terrorist attempts and also charts how the U.S. and Canada are working to fight it. Consider this entry about terrorism from page 42:

The nexus between known or suspected terrorists in eastern Canada and the northern parts of the U.S. represent a significant national security threat. Communities in Minnesota and New York, which are adjacent to Ontario and Quebec, have recently experienced apprehensions of individuals on terrorist charges. For example, on November 26, 2014, two men in Minneapolis, Minnesota were charged with recruiting and conspiring to provide support to ISIL. Similarly, on September 17, 2014, a man in Rochester, New York was arrested on similar charges after the FBI provided evidence showing that he attempted to recruit fighters and funds for ISIL.

And it’s not just a northern border problem. Johnson said the highly trafficked U.S. border with Mexico is also a pathway for Islamic terrorists, especially as they team up with drug cartels that have carte blanche on their side of the line.

Those cartels “are also combining with transnational criminal organizations, potentially Islamic terror organizations,” he said.

Johnson in his report steers clear of the heated presidential campaign rhetoric on how to handle the border and notes that “it’s not a war zone.”

Solutions for the southern border include development of a guest worker system, a new campaign against drugs, and more efforts to secure the border. He also talked favorably of a recent Bush-era campaign to send those caught at the border home immediately, an effort that led to a drop in illegal border crossings.

Up north, he wants a “threat analysis” to see what more can be done to stop terrorists from slipping in. “Start now,” he said.

THE STATE OF AMERICA’S BORDER SECURITY

Senator Ron Johnson, Chairman

Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs

United States Senate

16 Terrorists in S. California Since 9/11

WHAT IS IN YOUR STATE?

NYPD, the premier law enforcement agency with a distinct terrorism division published a radicalization report in 2007, anyone take heed?

US terrorist database growing at rapid rate

ALEXANDRIA, Virginia (AP)— The U.S. government is rapidly expanding the number of names it accepts for inclusion on its terrorist watch list, with more than 1.5 million added in the last five years, according to numbers divulged by the government in a civil lawsuit.

About 99 percent of the names submitted are accepted, leading to criticism that the government is “wildly loose” in its use of the list.

Those included in the Terrorist Screening Database could find themselves on the government’s no-fly list or face additional scrutiny at airports, though only a small percentage of people in the database are actually on the list.

It has been known for years that the government became more aggressive in nominating people for the watch list following al-Qaida operative Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s failed effort to blow up an airplane over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009.

But the numbers disclosed by the government show submissions have snowballed. In fiscal 2009, which ended Sept. 30, 2009, 227,932 names were nominated to the database. In fiscal 2010, which includes the months after the attempted Christmas bombing, nominations rose to 250,847. In fiscal 2012, they increased to 336,712, and in fiscal 2013 — the most recent year provided — nominations jumped to 468,749.

What the FBI published on terrorism and the database. The searchable global terrorism database.

16 Southern California residents have been linked to Islamist terrorist activity since 9/11

LATimes: The FBI announced Friday that it is investigating the mass shooting Wednesday in San Bernardino as an act of terrorism. Tashfeen Malik, one of the assailants, pledged allegiance to an Islamic State leader in a Facebook posting before the attack, two federal law enforcement officials said Friday.

If the FBI declares the shooting an act of terrorism, it would be the first Islamic-terrorist attack in Southern California. But the region has experienced activities related to Islamic terrorism. The House of Representative’s Committee on Homeland Security said 16 Southern California residents have been tied to such activity since 2001:

Los Angeles

March 23, 2003

Hasan Akbar

Army Sgt. Hasan Akbar, who grew up in Watts, turned on his fellow soldiers while serving in Kuwait in 2003, shooting at officers and tossing grenades into their tents. Two officers were killed and 14 others wounded in the attack. In 2005, a military jury sentenced Akbar to death.
Read more »

July 27, 2005

Kevin James, Levar Haley Washington, Gregory Vernon Patterson and Hammad Riaz Samana

Law enforcement officials stopped a terrorist plot to attack religious institutions, military bases and airports. Officials said James, a former inmate at California State Prison, Sacramento, initiated the plot. While in prison, James headed a radical Islamic prison gang. After his release, he and Washington, another former inmate, recruited Patterson and Samana, from Washington’s mosque. All four were charged with conspiracy to conduct war against the U.S. government through terrorism. Washington and Patterson were sentenced to 22 years and 12 years, respectively. Samana was sentenced to 70 months in prison, and James was sentenced to 16 years. Read more »

May 22, 2015

Nader Elhuzayel and Muhanad Badawi

Elhuzayel and Badawi were arrested after expressing interest in traveling to Syria to join Islamic State. Federal authorities said they overheard a conversation between the two in which one proclaimed his desire to die as a martyr on a battlefield while fighting for the group. Elhuzayel was arrested at LAX before he boarded a plane for Turkey, and Badawi, who officials say purchased Elhuzayel’s ticket, was taken into custody at an Anaheim gas station. Both men have pleaded not guilty to charges of providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization. Read more »

Riverside

Nov. 16, 2012

Sohiel Omar Kabir, Ralph Deleon, Miguel Alejandro Santana Vidriales and Arifeen David Gojali

Deleon and Kabir were sentenced in February to 25 years in federal prison for a 2012 terrorist plot to travel to Afghanistan, join Al Qaeda and kill Americans. Vidriales and Gojali cooperated with authorities in the investigation and pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges. In March, Vidriales was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison; Gojali was sentenced to five years in federal prison. Read more »

Garden Grove

Oct. 11, 2013

Sinh Vinh Ngo Nguyen

Nguyen was arrested in 2013 while preparing to board a Mexico-bound bus in Santa Ana. He admitted to traveling to Syria the previous year to join opposition forces against the Bashar Assad regime. Authorities said Nguyen planned to become an Al Qaeda operative and lead an attack on coalition forces. He pleaded guilty to terrorism charges in December 2013. Read more »

Orange County

July 2, 2014

Adam Dandach

Dandach was arrested on July 2, 2014, at John Wayne Airport as he tried to board a plane headed to Istanbul, Turkey. He pleaded guilty in August to attempting to travel to Syria to join ISIS, and faces up to 25 years in federal prison. Read more »

San Diego

Oct. 9, 2009

Jehad Mostafa

An indictment was issued for Mostafa in 2009, alleging that he, a former resident of San Diego, conspired to provide material support to terrorists. Mostafa is currently believed to be in Somalia, possibly working with Shahab, an Islamist army with ties to Al Qaeda. Read more »

Aug. 26, 2014

Douglas McAuthur McCain

McCain, a San Diego resident, was reportedly killed while fighting for the Islamic State in Syria.
Read more »

April 16, 2015

Mohamad Saeed Kodaimati

Mohamad Saeed Kodaimati traveled to Turkey from San Diego in late 2012 and was in Turkey and Syria until he returned to the U.S. in March, according to prosecutors. Authorities allege that Kodaimati lied to federal officials about his links to Islamic State in Syria. He pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI and agreed to a prison sentence of eight years. His sentencing is set for Jan. 11. Read more »

Minneapolis is a Terror Axis, NPR