Professional Notes

Running Gear Entanglement Systems Protect Ships and Facilities
Commander Stephen W. Surko, U.S. Navy (Retired), and Kenneth G. Bullard

On 24 April 2004, terrorist insurgents mounted a suicide-boat attack against Iraq's vital Khaer al Amaya offshore oil terminal near al-Basra. One boat was intercepted by a coalition boarding team; prior to boarding, it was exploded intentionally, killing two U.S. Navy sailors and one U.S. Coast Guardsman and injuring four others. Within 20 minutes of the interception, two other terrorist boats managed to penetrate the exclusion zone around the oil terminal and were engaged by Iraqi security personnel using small arms. Both boats exploded near ships tied up at the terminal. No damage to the offshore facility was reported, but authorities immediately shut it down, although it is one of only two terminals capable of handling Iraqi crude oil for export.

These events recall recent attacks attributed to al Qaeda. On 12 October 2000, an explosives-laden boat exploded alongside the Cole (DDG-67) in Yemen's Aden harbor, killing 17 U.S. sailors and injuring 39. Two years later, an explosivesladen boat rammed the French oil tanker Limburg off the coast of Yemen, killing 1 crewman and injuring 17. The trend from earlier attacks to the most recent assaultfrom single boats against relatively soft targets to coordinated, multidirectional attacks on alert, defended targets-greatly complicates defensive preparations against future waterborne attacks.

For the past seven years, the Navy and other U.S. government organizations have sought the necessary technologies to stop noncompliant vessels. A mission needs statement for nonlethal weapons was approved on 25 April 1997, and a capstone requirements document for nonlethal vessel stopping systems was approved on 19 August 1999.

Exclusion Zones and Barriers

One of the primary measures for protecting ships in ports is establishment of an exclusion zone around the vessel or terminal. Exclusion zones are integral to force protection. To be effective, however, they must be enforced by a layered defense system capable of stopping and (if necessary) destroying noncompliant vessels. Integrity of boundaries must be maintained actively and vigorously, which is key to defense against waterborne attacks. Recognizing threats in homeland waters, the Coast Guard established "protection zones" in the navigable waters of the United States on 14 September 2001, to regulate vessel traffic in the vicinity of large Navy ships.' Similarly, the Navy has established force protection zones around ships, as described in NTTP 3-07.2.1: Antiterrorism/Force Protection (Newport, RI: Navy Warfare Development Command, September 2001).

Barriers are a most effective means of establishing exclusion zones. Force protection barriers on the water:

* Serve as demarcation lines by providing force protection personnel with clear boundaries

* Help determine intent by providing a clear warning to boat traffic

* Deny access to boats, depending on the type of barrier

But barriers have limitations. They must be monitored; even ashore, fences can only slow determined intruders. In addition, there are complications related to maintenance, adverse effects on port navigation, and environmental impact.

Numerous types of boat barriers are available, with varying degrees of effectiveness and cost. In early 2001, the Naval Facilities Engineering Service Center at Port Hueneme, California, completed a thorough review of port security barriers. Ten barrier concepts were evaluated on their ability to stop a small high-speed surface boat or to provide at least a fiveminute delay of a sneak attack. Cost estimates for the systems were as high as $2,000 per foot; lead times for delivery of a deployable system were as long as two years. The most effective and readily available barrier solution was judged to be a modified floating dredge pipe, which cost $363 per foot.

Current Running Gear Entanglement Systems

Sponsored by the Department of Defense Counterdrug Technology Development Program and the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate in response to Navy, Coast Guard, and Customs Service interest in interdicting high-speed boats, the running gear entanglement system (RGES) was developed by the Naval Operations Other Than War-Technology Center (NOOTW-TC) at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren, Virginia. The RGBS is a specially constructed net fabricated with high molecular-weight polyethylene rope in weighted loops that can firmly entangle propellers.

There are two major RGES models: the Coast Guard's surface-launched MkIO and its MkI 1, a static barrier system. Several boat-stopping demonstrations of both versions have been conducted. The MkI 1 comes in 100-foot sections, including floatation buoys, light buoys, and anchors; it costs about $3,500 ($35 per foot). Its first demonstration took place on 1 March 2001, when a static RGES net was successfully employed during a force protection test for the Laboon (DDG-58).

During development of the RGES barrier system, it undertook limited deployments that yielded valuable lessons. In February 2002, NOOTW-TC responded to a request from Seventh Fleet and provided 3,500 feet to the Blue Ridge (LCC-19) while the ship was in Singapore harbor. Unfortunately, no arrangements were made with Singapore to employ the system and it was not deployed. The lesson here is that use of barrier systems overseas requires advance coordination with host governments.

Another deployment underscored why barriers must be monitored. In March 2002, NOOTW-TC responded to a request from Naval Station Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico, for a passive barrier protection system to support security requirements at the Vieques live-fire impact area. Although more than 3,500 feet would have been required for a complete system, NOOTW-TC could provide only 800 feet of the RGBS and training for naval station security personnel. Contrary to guidance offered during the training sessions, the barrier was not monitored. Thus, protesters were able to cut and disconnect parts of the barrier one evening, perhaps while attempting a penetration. Clearly, any barrier system must be properly deployed and its integrity actively monitored and maintained.

In April 2002, the Coast Guard successfully established an exclusion zone around the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth, Massachusetts, with a MkI 1 static barrier RGES to validate deployment and retrieval processes. Since then, a user manual and training film have been developed. Coast Guard deployment of the MkI 1 has been delayed in part by the environmental assessment process for semipermanent installations in U.S. waters. To allay ecological concerns, the Coast Guard has initiated a formal six-tonine-month environmental assessment of the Mk11 system. At the same time, it has deployed 20 Mk10 surface-launched RGBS units on various small boats. Environmental concerns with the Mk10 were mitigated because the line is retrieved immediately after each use.

Conclusions

As with any barrier system, the RGES is not a silver bullet. It requires tending and is cumbersome to deploy and retrieve. But the system provides a clear demarcation line for the exclusion zone, gives clear warnings to waterborne traffic, and can reliably stop propeller-driven craft. Unlike some barrier protection systems, which essentially are permanent installations, the RGES can be carried by operational units and reconfigured in response to specific tactical situations.

War has always been a come-as-you-are event. Because the current struggle against terrorism is no different, the services should use what they have right now. The RGBS is relatively inexpensive and readily available today. It gives our sailors and allies an extra layer of flexible and adaptable protection against waterborne attacks.

 

Put Warfighting Technology in Perspective
Lieutenant Colonel Phillip J. Ridderhof, U.S. Marine Corps

Under the current National Military Strategy, it is arguable whether the United States is on the strategic offensive or defensive. Operationally and tactically, however, its military forces are primarily on the offensive. Further, although there is a renewed interest in defensive capabilities under the heading of homeland security, the overwhelming emphasis of the Department of Defense is to create offensive, power-projection capabilities.

Our opponents will be on the defensive, but they will not be passive. A competent defensive posture uses measures to extend and attrite the attacker so as to gain the initiative and counterattack. This concept is not new; it is fundamental to war fighting. Although the attacker always has the advantage of initiating action at any point of his choosing, the defender has an equal advantage in the strength and timing of his counterattacks. We must examine our current and envisioned approaches to warfare to ensure that future enemies cannot exploit our weaknesses to defeat us in combat.

Perils of Net-Based Warfare

While there are great possibilities and advantages in the evolving network-centric warfare concept, a force heavily dependent on information dominance as an element of combat power has serious vulnerabilities. Specifically: smaller, dispersed, and less capable "netted" forces are open to piecemeal defeat if their information links are severed or heavily degraded. In fact, the dispersal of fire, maneuver, and command-and-control capabilities envisioned in future forces runs counter to the ongoing and positive trend of concentrating combined arms at lower and lower tactical levels.

Net-centric advocates hold thatthrough information links-lower level tactical units are more capable of effective combined-arms operations. But these links potentially are tenuous. And net-centric forces may be more likely to deemphasize the personal, face-to-face knowledge of each other, which is key to the bonds and trust that steel successful tactical units against the inevitable chaos of battle. Close personal bonds enable different elements to achieve implicit communications and act, react, and coordinate in the heat of conflict with a minimum of explicit information sharing.

Compounding this danger is the present trend to treat integral elements of combined arms as separate functional concepts, such as "dominant maneuver" and "precision engagement," while simultaneously encouraging combinations of dissimilar service units at lower and lower levels—i.e., joint arrangements as ends in and of themselves. This kind of thinking is based on methodology currently popular in much of the defense community: an analytical approach that emphasizes breaking down the battle into its component parts, and a modular business approach that views service units as interchangeable parts to be combined and recombined at will.

These approaches fail to grasp the intangible qualities necessary to recruiting, organizing, training, and employing cohesive tactical units. As philosophical ways to view warfare, they are inimical to the development of warriors who are able to think from a perspective of synthesis. The combined-arms whole is much more than the sum of its parts: maneuver and fires can no more be separated than inhaling and exhaling. The common culture of the service heritage is a much stronger binding element than perfect information flow. For example, while similar in many respects, soldiers and Marines are different animals. They act under differing motivations, look to different sources of pride, and prefer different unit "personalities."

The isolating tendencies of a functional approach to battle, exacerbated by a technological philosophy that replaces close working relationships with data being transmitted over bandwidth, present adversaries with ready-made seams along which to concentrate their efforts. An enemy does not have to degrade the entire net, but only links to those U.S. elements that are especially exposed: separated by distance, not bound by an intangible cultural link, and hobbled by a focus on a single battlefield function. Whether such a unit is a fires node, sensor node, or command node, it will not survive if it is unlinked from the centralized network. The enemy's counterattack will not have to be a general, identifiable offensive. He can be selectively precise at a time and place of his choosing.

Perils of ISR Focus

The increase of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities is a key effort in transformation of the U.S. military. These capabilities are viewed as a replacement for combat power because seeing more accurately can enable commanders to more efficiently allocate fewer forces. The goal is for "persistent" ISR that can continuously identify and track the enemy. Its overriding assumption is that, whether the enemy is a single terrorist or an armored division, once U.S. forces locate it, they can kill it. In general, this trend has a solid record of success. Our forces can put more than adequate firepower on our adversaries when they are revealed.

The historical danger is overconfidence in ISR capabilities. The driving philosophy underlying Lieutenant Colonel George Custer's actions at the Little Bighorn in 1876 was to find Indian warriors and fight them. The Army's main problem in the Indian campaigns of the American West was one of ISR. Once the Indians were located and pinned in combat, U.S. forces routinely emerged victorious. The idea that the Indians might engage in overwhelming numbers was a remote and discounted possibility. When that happened at the Little Bighorn, Custer's failure was overconfidence, not insufficient ISR.

A similar argument pertained to Operation Anaconda in Afghanistan in 2002. The immediate lesson of Tora Bora was that U.S. ground forces were needed to isolate and prevent the escape of al Qaeda and Taliban forces. At the same time, however, enemy forces "trapped" between U.S. and coalition forces conducted local counterattacks with surprising effectiveness. Even with the overwhelming U.S. firepower and assets that were available, the fight devolved into several desperate company-level actions. Solving the ISR problem of finding the enemy did not lead automatically to discovery of the enemy's capabilities and intent. Focusing on ISR as the primary challenge, instead of preparing to engage the enemy effectively in a number of different scenarios leads to an overconfident mind-set and reduces the ability of leaders to adapt to the unexpected. And the unexpected is par for the course in warfare.

Perils of Precision

The natural corollary to greater dependence on accurate ISR is emphasis on transforming the application of all aspects of combat power to precision operations. This phenomenon is most apparent in the realm of fires. Precision is becoming the primary philosophy behind planning and delivering bombs, missiles, and artillery rounds. The components of precision are accurately locating the enemy and accurately putting munitions on that target. Although seemingly straightforward, this is a much more daunting process than merely putting munitions exactly where we aim them. The ever-present fog of war and a thinking enemy's ability to evade or confuse our ISR efforts is apt to diminish our ability to accurately locate his forces. Thus, while we may be able to deliver a missile where we aim it, we will not always be able to aim with a great degree of certainty. Without area fires as a complement, our adversaries might well elude precision fires and cause us to rapidly expend costly munitions on useless targets.

Captured in the emerging concept of effects-based operations, the capability of placing a munition precisely where it is aimed has been lifted conceptually and applied to defeating the enemy-the ability to predict and cause precise effects on him. The notion of precision effects is a case of mistaken phenomena; it represents an overly analytical approach to warfare. Pursuing actions to exert intended effects on the enemy is a concept as old as warfare itself. It does not presume, however, that we can predict those effects precisely. Most battlefield successes result from the execution of multiple actions that have multiple intended effects. The assumption we can accurately predict the cause-and-effect chain and sequence of defeating the enemy can lead to the same overconfidence that comes from overreliance on ISR superiority. At best, we may not be prepared for the speed or manner of the enemy's defeat and thereby miss opportunities for exploitation and pursuit. At worst, we will suffer setbacks or defeat because of our inability to adapt to changing circumstances.

Conclusions

Although this note warns of perils, it is by no means a call to turn back the clock and stop developing and fielding advanced networking, ISR, and precision capabilities. Rather, my intent is to encourage realistic assessments of the value of the nation's developing offensive capabilities and recognition of the fundamental sources of its combat power. No matter how quickly technology advances, the heart of warfare will remain in the humans who direct and do the fighting. Prudence demands the assumption that our adversaries are sure to execute an aggressive defense and find symmetrical and asymmetrical counters to every technological advantage we develop.

The Achilles' heel of the United States will not be so much in its capabilities, as in the expectations and assumptions its forces carry into battle. To ensure victory, we must continue to embrace conflict as a complex and unpredictable phenomenon that requires warriors who are educated and prepared for chaos-as well as thoroughly trained in the latest technology.

 

Information Technology Quick Win Is a Myth
Lieutenant Commander DaneIle Barrett, U.S. Navy

Consider the story of a well-intentioned Navy officer, Lieutenant Commander John Doe, assigned to the information technology (IT) division of a shore command. He accepts an offer for a demonstration of a new knowledge management product offered by a commercial vendor. Lieutenant Commander Doe is impressed by the apparent capabilities and userfriendly interface of the product. Having worked for seven years in managerial rather than technical IT roles, he does not have the background to question capabilities of the product that may be critical to ensuring its interoperability and functionality in Navy networks. He shows the product to his boss (not an IT officer), who likes what he sees and thinks it would be great for solving at least some of his unit's internal document management problems.

The boss trusts Lieutenant Commander Doe's recommendation and believes he could reallocate money from the current budget to pay for the product in its first year. If the product works as advertised, he is confident higher authority will seek to make it a Navy-wide system and support it centrally as a program of record managed by a systems command. Lieutenant Commander Doe's command soon buys the product. Anxious to see the product succeed in the Navy, the vendor offers a service support agreement, which the command also buys to assist in the technical support tasks it is unprepared to manage.

The contractor moves data to the new knowledge management system, creates user accounts, and customizes the product for the command. Once the system is up and running, Lieutenant Commander Doe is rewarded with a glowing fitness report for his initiative and technical expertise in finding a solution. His boss mentally concludes that his document management woes are behind him. They show the product to other interested commands and the public affairs officer generates positive press about the command's success. It is an IT quick win. ... Or is it?

In an attempt to solve an immediate problem, a Band-Aid was applied when an operation was needed. This story illustrates a situation that is repeated with growing frequency. The IT quick win brings with it a multitude of problems from the standpoints of technology, operations, and management, and it highlights systemic flaws in the way IT solutions are purchased and implemented in the Navy:

* Commercial products sometimes rely on vendor proprietary code that is not necessarily compliant with industry standards and will not interoperate with similar systems. In this case, once documents are stored in the system, they probably will be accessible only if the user is logged on that specific system.

* Long-term maintenance of the system will be challenging and costly. System administrators must be trained on the specifics of maintaining the new system because it most likely will not be part of their training pipelines, or it will need to be perpetually maintained with a service contract.

* New-start rules were circumvented, so the system is not a centrally managed program of record. When it becomes one—and must be competed openly-a completely different product may be chosen, thereby introducing new integration challenges.

* How will the data in the old system be accessed from ships? If the system is Web based, users most likely would be unable to access the information because many shipboard users are not authorized Internet access even when bandwidth is available. To solve this problem, another quick-win solution is in order: duplicate equipment afloat to provide the desired capabilities. But this introduces a multitude of engineering challenges. In addition, most commercial systems are built to meet commercial environmental requirements. They often do not work when placed afloat, where bandwidth is limited (if available at all), synchronization and replication pose unique challenges, and separate or specific hardware may be required.

* Adding hardware for each new application or Web service provided to the ship puts a tremendous burden on the shipboard support system that affects limited space, critical power, and air conditioning. Additional maintenance personnel are required because vendor service contracts normally are not extended afloat. The product may or may not comply with Department of Defense (DoD) information assurance standards. If it uses unusual router ports or protocols, as some products do, it will not be accredited to run on DoD networks.

Problems inherent to the IT quick-win approach are apparent, yet they are repeated with alarming frequency. Navy leaders should solve such systemic problems with long-term solutions and stop rewarding those who find stand-alone solutions to broken systems. They should tie incentives and rewards to actions that solve systemic problems. And to do so takes an integrated, systems approach that combines the right people, processes, and technology to create a learning organization and culture of innovation. The most difficult task is to change a culture that unintentionally supports proliferation of systemic problems. The Navy's Industrial Age mentality will not support Information Age progress—which is the only progress the Navy should accept.

Enterprise Approach to IT

The organizational value of IT relies on its ability to be networked and logically connected to other systems and information sources. To support Chief of Naval Operation Admiral Vern Clark's vision for "Sea Power 21," ForceNet must be a networked and connected architecture and framework without extensive interfaces and integration roadblocks. The scenario described above leads to stovepiped systems that owners attempt to connect to other systems and networks as an afterthought-usually at great expense and effort. The Navy needs an enterprise architecture—a blueprint for naval networks across the service-based on an openstandards, component approach, where pieces of the architecture can be swapped out as vendor-neutral solutions emerge. The architecture should rely on shared storage, processing, and networked infrastructure to reduce the large number of today's duplicative data sources and IT infrastructure. (This is especially important in the shipboard environment.)

Many IT technologies, such as single sign on (SSO), offer the ability to log into an IT system once and gain access to all programs with the same user name and password. They rely on enterprise capabilities that the Navy has no mechanism to support. Thus, many SSO efforts are being set in motion throughout the Navy without master plans for tying them together or replacing them with enterprise solutions to improve users' experience and security. The ironic result is that SSO technology is implemented numerous times by each system provider. Navy IT leaders must develop an enterprise architecture that supports open standards, industry best practices, vendor neutrality, and shared infrastructure; they should reject products that do not comply strictly with this architecture.

Operationally, this architecture must provide joint, coalition, and allied multilevel security. Standardized replication and synchronization mechanisms to asymmetrically push data and information to units afloat are essential for situational awareness and decision superiority. With proper governance, the process for updating approved acceptable standards need not fall prey to the classic bureaucratic behavior that stifles IT innovation. Leaders would be able to purchase IT solutions that comply with these improved standards. Other than in research-and-development efforts, the Navy should stop procuring systems that fall outside this framework.

IT Acquisition Reform

Part of the reason the Navy and other services look increasingly to the IT quick win is because the acquisition process cannot keep up with the rapid pace of changing technology. There is hope that recent DoD 5000 Series acquisition policy reforms will improve IT acquisition by fostering innovations such as spiral development. While these changes are a step in the right direction, implementation of them is not occurring quickly enough and they are not a panacea. Rewards continue to go to program managers and action officers who find inventive ways to circumvent the system.

The Navy should lead the charge to expand the IT acquisition transformation process begun under the DoD 5000 Series. In addition, the Navy should reward those who redesign processes that provide systems faster and who fix internal processes and organizations. The lifespan of technology-historically tied to Moore's Law of 18 month processor speed doubling-has been overcome by events. An acquisition process that relies on a two-year cycle to obtain funding, another year for design, and two or more years before the technology is available on ships means the Navy cannot integrate emerging technology quickly enough. It will fall farther and farther behind technologically feasible solutions as the rate of advancement increases. Only wideranging reforms will instill a "crossingthe-brook" mentality, which requires looking ahead and finding the stones that will allow you to leap across without getting stuck in the middle. Once reforms are in place and technology can be purchased and implemented in a matter of weeks or months instead of years, the necessity for IT quick wins will diminish significantly.

Establish a Learning Organization

For the Navy to change and become an IT learning organization that is responsive to the needs of those in the system, the behavior supported by the institution must change. According to Peter Senge in The Fifth Discipline: "At their best, efforts to develop learning capabilities blend 'behavioral' and 'technical' changes. By this 1 mean that people are working on themselves while they are working on 'their systems.'"¹ In an IT learning organization, changing management skills for improving processes that leverage new technologies has a greater organizational effect than technology implementation. The management of change must be taught at all levels of the organization. Positive change behaviors must be highlighted and rewarded. Organizations that go for the IT quick win tend to "pave the cow path" by applying current processes to new technology, thereby negating the benefits of new technology. Moreover, the reality is, after technology is applied and processes fixed, most early technical solutions are obsolete. Cultures that rapidly adapt IT solutions to previously examined and improved processes should be reinforced and rewarded.

Key to becoming a learning organization is the need for IT institutional competence throughout the Navy. A learning organization that views change from the systems (rather than the parochial problem-solution) approach will go a long way to improving enterprise information sharing and interoperability. In the story related above, it would have led the well-meaning officer—and his senior officers—to ask the vendor different and more informed questions before the decision was made to procure the product. For example, answers to the following key questions would have reduced many of the adverse effects of the technology they selected:

* Which set of open standards does the product comply with?

* Does the product provide merely a Web site, or does it provide true Web services where data can be stored once in a standard format and shared by many applications?

* Are the data stored on the system accessible to outside users?

Integration of IT user training at all learning levels for officer and enlisted personnel will improve skills and technological orientation and increase overall institutional competence. Creating a learning organization, however, is more than merely a function of training and education. The new information professional (IP) community is composed of restricted line officers and tasked to plan, acquire, operate, maintain, and secure the naval network and the systems that support the Navy's operational and business processes. It is responsible for ensuring that-systems are reliable, available, survivable, and secure.

As the IP community's technical expertise grows, this community can be instrumental in user training programs. The IPs have a critical part to play in transitioning the Navy to a learning organization. They can act as IT and process-change evangelists, educating organizations in the skills that enable them to adapt to new technology. In turn, this will transform operational and business processes by more rapidly and efficiently leveraging the powerful capabilities of emerging technologies.

Conclusions

These are daunting challenges: developing the culture of a learning organization will require dedicated leadership training for Navy officers and sailors. But they are achievable with committed leadership and structures that reward resolution of systemic problems rather than IT quick wins.

The Navy must encourage innovation and reinforce systems-based thinking and solution approaches at all levels. Because its culture concentrates on fixing the problem rather than fixing the system that created the problem, the Navy needs to adopt a conceptual framework that focuses on interrelationships between actions by examination of whole systems.

 

Coast Guard Dogs Fight Terrorism
Captain W. Russell Webster, U.S. Coast Guard (Retired)

Specially trained canine units patrolling busy U.S. ports are some of the Coast Guard's newest weapons in the 21st-century war on terrorism. Each year, U.S. ports host thousands of foreign-flag ships carrying multinational crews and cargoes from around the globe. Former Coast Guard Commandant Admiral James Loy noted that the 11 September 2001 attacks could have occurred at maritime facilities.

The key to successfully combating maritime terrorism is maritime domain awareness (MDA): complete knowledge of which ships are on the ocean and of the people and cargo aboard them. It enables law enforcement agencies to focus their scarce resources on specific vessels of interest. Ideally, MDA takes place as far away from U.S. waters as possible, even in foreign ports before ships depart for the United States. In some cases, however, the Coast Guard must board and inspect vessels in or just outside U.S. ports.

High-Interest Vessels

High-interest vessels (HIVs) generally are large foreign commercial vessels (600-1,100 feet long), often with all-foreign crewmembers. Law enforcement officials decide whether to board them depending on factors such as their flags of registry, crew nationalities, types of cargo, and last ports of call. Bostonians probably are most familiar with the large liquefied natural gas carriers that are HIVs. After the 11 September attacks, they were prohibited from entering the port of Boston until adequate security measures could be put in place. HIVs require differing levels of scrutiny by the Coast Guard, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Customs Service, and-oftentimes-counterpart agencies in other nations.

Dogs are especially useful for searching large HIVs (including cruise and container ships) because of the many sizeable areas where explosives, terrorists, and terrorist-related materials can be hidden. An incident in October 2001 demonstrated the possible threat. Egyptian Rizik Amid Farid was intercepted dockside in Gioia Tauro, Italy. Unlike most stowaways, he was smartly dressed and found living in a 40-foot cargo container. Farid's comfortable living accommodations included cell and satellite phones and a computer. He also had airport diagrams, credentials indicating he was a aircraft mechanic, a Canadian passport, and a one-way airline ticket to a foreign destination. Obviously, Farid carried documents and apparatuses that an illegal immigrant would have been unable to obtain or afford.

Dogs In Search & Security Roles

Dogs are not new to the Coast Guard or the port of Boston. During World War II, the service's Beach Patrol used 1,800 dogs to protect coastlines, ports, and harbors from German incursions and sabotage. The Coast Guard has renewed its interest in using them for homeland security because of their ability to substantially reduce the amount of time spent searching for suspicious people and cargo. In 2001, data indicated that less than 2% of the 6,000,000 shipping containers that entered the United States annually were inspected by law enforcement agencies.

As of this month, the Coast Guard has 19 dogs trained to detect explosives. Each canine will be paired with a human handler. Dogs and masters will bond by eating, sleeping, and training together for most of the animal's life. As in World War II, human-canine teams will be as efficient as two or more people (depending on circumstances) in searching HIVs and other large ships. Future applications could call for sending these teams out to search ships before they enter port.

Trained detector dog-handler teams are skillful at exposing explosives and other hazardous materials that terrorists may try to smuggle into U.S. ports in foreign trade ships. The dogs have proved their mettle in a number of situations and gained the reputation for great alertness and for being formidable attackers. According to one government study, a large dog, attacking with teeth bared, is often a more dangerous adversary than a man with a gun. Other government studies indicate that the dogs' security usefulness is increased significantly when an enemy's religious beliefs hold that canines are unholy and unclean. In such cases, the mere knowledge that the Coast Guard employs canines might dissuade would-be attackers of ships and critical facilities.

Dog-handler teams will be part of welltrained Maritime Safety and security Teams (MSSTs), Coast Guard professionals who provide highly mobile boat forces and security elements for protecting ports. The MSSTs are billed as the Coast Guard's special forces, with teams based around the United States, including near Boston. They are rapid-response organizations that can deploy humans and canines within hours to distant locations for antiterrorism operations.

The Coast Guard has taken old tricks and updated them for the war on terrorism. Using canines as guards and detectors of stowaways and explosive materials may well prove more advantageous in this war than it was in the past.