Expert believes bin Laden represents new type of terrorist

Monday, Dec. 3, 2001 | 8:39 a.m.

Saudi millionaire Osama bin Laden represents the new type of transnational terrorist that is more likely to emerge in the future, an expert in weapons of mass destruction said.

Steve Hightower, a program coordinator for the National Emergency Response and Rescue Training Center at Texas A&M University, told emergency response workers at the Orleans hotel Sunday that state-sponsored terrorism has been waning.

In its place have come independent operators such as bin Laden and the Japanese sect Aum Shinrikyo, which killed 12 and injured 5,500 in a 1995 sarin gas attack in a Tokyo subway, he said.

Future domestic terrorism is likely to involve more "lone wolves," racist movements, single-issue fanatics and factions that believe the United Nations is trying to take over the United States, Hightower said.

"One reason terrorism works is that it is very cost-effective," Hightower said. "What you will see more of is asymmetrical warfare. Why go after our strengths when you can go after our weaknesses? We have a free and open society. That's a potential weakness, but I don't want to change that.

"Terrorism's intent is to change your behavior. Terrorism is not random. It's intended for a purpose and it has a psychological impact on many people.

"The other thing terrorism tries to do is produce casualties, and sometimes in a spectacular way."

Hightower's lecture and slide presentation helped open HazMat Explo conference and exposition, which runs through Thursday and is sponsored by federal, state and local emergency response agencies. About 400 emergency response workers from around the country are expected to attend.

The U.S. can expect future terrorists to be more decentralized, go after a wider range of targets, rely more heavily on violence and use subcontractors to carry out their work, Hightower said. When he asked the 150 people in the audience how many thought bin Laden was behind the anthrax attacks in the United States, no hands were raised. He agreed.

"It's too amateurish," he said.

Hightower, a retired Army Special Forces colonel, said most terrorists still prefer low-technology methods over complex ones.

Timothy McVeigh used readily available ammonium nitrate fertilizer and fuel to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995, he reminded the audience. The Sept. 11 hijackers used small knives to commandeer the airliners. Roughly 75 percent of terrorist acts involve explosives, he said.

Terrorists have another weapon in their arsenal: A philosophy that allows them to kill.

"If you are a terrorist, people who do not believe as you do are the enemy," Hightower said. "You begin to dehumanize them. If you are the enemy, you do not have a value. And if you have no value, what I do to you is insignificant."

Terrorists choose targets for different reasons. In the case of convicted 1993 World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef, it was the name of the twin towers and the capitalism they represented, Hightower said.

"Do you think the guys who flew those airplanes into the buildings had the same mentality?" he said. "Quite possibly, but they're not around to ask."

Many terrorists also want themselves or their cause to be recognized. For that, they rely on numerous tactics.

The most common have been assassinations, armed assaults, bombings, hijackings and hostage taking. Newer tactics include cyber terrorism, in which computers are manipulated to create havoc, and the contamination of agricultural goods and other products, Hightower said.

Potential mass-casualty bioterrorism is a cause for concern, Hightower said, but it would be difficult to carry out because of factors such as the danger of handling deadly pathogens and uncontrollable conditions such as weather.

"It's not as easy as you think," he said. "Pathogens don't do well outside the human body. They don't do well in sunlight."

Another lecturer told conference participants that federal agencies stand ready to assist local governments in attacks involving chemicals. But James Holler, emergency response chief for the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry in Atlanta, said the Sept. 11 attacks in New York City exposed problems that occur when there is a lack of coordination among government agencies.

"Not to take anything away from New York, but it was fragmented in the first couple weeks in terms of who was in charge," Holler said. "The Environmental Protection Agency did not take a proactive approach. There were 10 environmental agencies calculating data and passing it on to New York, and New York got swamped."