- The US military is for the first time making its own
plans for dealing with domestic terrorist attacks.
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- Under the plans, quick-reaction forces will be prepared
to deal with 15 potential scenarios, including simultaneous bomb attacks.
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- The civilian authorities would usually expect to plan
for and provide the vast majority of the resources and personnel for major
domestic emergencies.
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- Now military resources such as sniffer dogs will be easier
to deploy.
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- The Department of Defense has not traditionally taken
a major role in domestic operations.
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- The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 prevents the military
from taking part in any law enforcement, an important part of traditional
"states' rights".
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- The department has stressed that the new plans are just
a way of providing specialist help for the civilian authorities where units
are closer to the scene of an attack or other emergency.
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- The Department for Homeland Security takes the lead in
dealing on a national basis with terrorist attacks.
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- Planning process
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- A Department of Defense spokesman said: "It is vital
to the defence of our nation that we plan for contingencies and actions
necessary to deter, prevent and defeat current and emerging threats at
home and abroad.
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- "This planning process is an extremely complex process
encompassing numerous organisations including combatant commands, the Joint
Staff, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and sometimes outside agencies
before the plan is presented to the Secretary of Defense for approval.
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- "Traditionally, DoD resources and capabilities are
provided only when local, state, and federal resources and capabilities
have been exceeded or do not exist."
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- These resources might typically be sniffer dogs specialising
in detecting explosives or search and rescue teams to find bodies in rubble.
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- Admiral Timothy Keating, head of the Northern Command,
was quoted in the Washington Post as saying: "In my estimation, [in
the event of] a biological, a chemical or nuclear attack in any of the
50 states, the Department of Defense is best positioned - of the various
eight federal agencies that would be involved - to take the lead."
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- © BBC MMV
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- http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4132418.stm
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