There are several inspirations behind this post: the recent terrorist attacks in New York City and the New York Police Department’s (NYPD) historic and pervasive struggle with terrorism. Over time, based on the success of domestic terrorists in launching attacks in New York (both within the city and across the state), the World Trade Center bombing in 1993 and again after the heinous Al Qaeda terrorist attack on the World Trade Center (WTC) complex on September 11, 2001, critical decisions were made by law enforcement officials and mayors which implemented a litany of counterterrorism practices in the long struggle to confront rampant terrorism in New York City. This blog post examines the NYPD Counterterrorism Division (and to a degree the NYPD Intelligence Division) and how this law enforcement entities practices became the envy of the world.
Terrorism in New York and The NYPD Response
A question begs, prior to the Port Authority bombing and the New York City Truck attack, how did the NYPD respond to disparate terrorist attacks that impacted the metropolis?
The 1970s and 1980s represented an extended period of domestic terrorism across the United States with a wealth of terrorist attacks occurring in New York City. Some of the active terrorist groups during this period include the following: the Black Liberation Army (BLA), an offshoot of the Black Panther Party, Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional (FALN), the Jewish Defense League (JDL), the M19CO, the Weather Underground Organization , and Omega 7 just to name a few.
Some of the principal terrorist attacks that occurred in New York City that occurred during this period include (1) “On January 27, 1972, members of the Black Liberation Army (BLA) killed two NYPD policemen in lower Manhattan;” (2) “On December 29, 1975, a bomb killed 11 people and wounded 75 at New York’s La Guardia Airport, (3) and in September of 1980, members of Omega-7, an anti-Castro exile group, assassinated a diplomat attached to the Cuban Mission to the United Nations in New York.”[1]
There were several significant reasons that account for the failure to deal with the omni-present specter of terrorism in the city. The budget crisis in New York forced politicians to cut the size of the NYPD as means to deal with the financial situation. A second reason is that there was little cooperation between Washington and local law enforcement officials in the city on what do with the accelerating wave of terrorism. Third, the natural “institutional rivalries” between the NYPD and the FBI further exacerbated tensions. To be clear, the absence of cooperation in many areas impacted investigations, undermined attempts to confront various terrorist groups and their members, and intelligence gathering on future attacks.
To deal with the absence of cooperation between Washington and New York, “several “institutions, policies and approaches created and employed during this tumultuous earlier period [the 1970s and 1980s] were foundational and remain part of today’s domestic counterterrorism repertoire. These include [the creation of] the Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs)—law enforcement’s primary organizations for conducting terrorism investigations; and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court, which issues warrants for domestic surveillance involving terrorism and other national security threats.”[2]
From the perspective of the NYPD, it is important to note that despite these new arrangements, the law enforcement entity still had to confront several issues. Without a formal mission to confront terrorism and attendant resources to support operations and a still undefined counterterrorism strategy, the NYPD remained reliant on the FBI and the federal government for assistance.
Even with assistance from Washington, the federal government’s response and commitment to confronting terrorism remained problematic. As William Rosenau points out, the federal dilemma is viewed this way: “In the end, the U.S. government never waged a “war” against domestic terrorism in the years between 1970 and 1985. Rather than framing terrorism as an existential or civilizational challenge, policymakers stressed the criminal aspects of terrorist activities and their threat to public safety and security.”[3] These dynamics served to undercut the NYPD’s heroic counterterrorism efforts.
As noted, “Law enforcement can be at the center of an effective counterterrorism strategy.”[4] The NYPD’s response to a spate of terrorist threats and attacks from disparate groups during this period represents an illustration of how a law enforcement organization is forced to constantly adjust their counterterrorism tactics to confront a myriad of threats in the 1970s and 1980s.
During the 1990s, the NYPDs counterterrorism units were slow to adjust to the Islamic Wave Terrorism.[5] It is during this period that Islamists loyal to Egypt’s Omar Abdel-Rahman (aka “The Blind Sheikh”) and Al Qaeda increased their presence and launched critical attacks in the city. In the case of Al Qaeda, the 1993 World Trade Center is the seminal event that identified that Osama bin Laden’s transnational terrorist organization must be taken seriously. Moreover, the attack demonstrated that a new era of terrorism had come to America. Despite the threat to New York City, the mayor’s office, and to a degree, the leadership within the NYPD, both were lethargic in shifting resources to confront this nascent threat.
Post-9/11 And Counterterrorism Changes In The NYPD
The September 11, 2001 attack is the event that created the dramatic reconstruction of the NYPDs counterterrorism infrastructure. Additionally, the senior leadership of the NYPD recognized that a new attitude and a revamped counterterrorism vision are required to safeguard the city from future major terrorist attacks.
After the September 11th attack in New York, Ray Kelly, the NYPD Police Commissioner, made a bold statement: “I knew we couldn’t rely on the federal government. I know it from my own experience. We’re doing all the things we’re doing because the federal government isn’t doing them. It’s not enough to say it’s their job if the job isn’t being done. Since 9/11, the federal government hasn’t taken any additional resources and put them here.”[6]
In the light of the NYPD assertions about the failures of the federal government (the FBI and CIA in particular) to secure New York City from foreign terrorist attacks (this includes the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the 2001 attack), what actions did the NYPD implement to secure the city from future attacks?
The logic behind the dramatic changes within the NYPD is as much about the realities of the Metropolis which went beyond the political strife between New York City and Washington. According Kelly, “We are doing all these things because New York is still the No. 1 target. We have been targeted four times, twice successfully, and the city remains the most symbolic, substantive target for the terrorists. These are cunning, patient, deliberate people who want to kill us and kill us in big numbers.”[7]
Thereafter, commissioner Kelley set out to restructure the NYPD. Kelley articulated the subsequent changes this way: “It’s a different world. We’ve redeployed. We’ve got 1,000 people on this. All seven subway tunnels under the river are covered, and it’s the same with all the other sensitive locations. It’s taken constant attention. It’s extremely difficult. But make no mistake: It’s something we have to do ourselves.”[8]
The NYPD counterterrorism division altered the landscape on how to confront terrorism in an urban setting. The NYPD not only examined terrorist threats at home, but it sought intelligence on terrorist threats elsewhere in the country and equally important on attacks that were launched around the world. To implement this change, the counterterrorism division was completely revamped. Those changes were described this way:
The place is so gleaming and futuristic—so unlike the average police precinct, with furniture and equipment circa 1950—that you half expect to see Q come charging out with his latest super-weapon for 007. Headlines race across LED news tickers. There are electronic maps and international-time walls with digital readouts for cities such as Moscow, London, Tel Aviv, Riyadh, Islamabad, Manila, Sydney, Baghdad, and Tokyo. In what is called the Global Intelligence Room, twelve large flat-screen TVs that hang from ceiling mounts broadcast Al-Jazeera and a variety of other foreign programming received via satellite. The Police Department’s newly identified language specialists—who speak, among other tongues, Arabic, Pashto, Urdu, and Fujianese—sit with headphones on, monitoring the broadcasts. There are racks of high-end audio equipment for listening, taping, and dubbing; computer access to a host of superdatabases; stacks of intelligence reports and briefing books on all the world’s known terrorist organizations; and a big bulletin board featuring a grid with the names and phone numbers of key people in other police departments in this country and around the world.[9]
Lydia Khalil described counterterrorism within the NYPD this way: it is “Part think tank, part detective agency, part paramilitary organization, the New York Police Department’s (NYPD) counterterrorism program has become one of the most sophisticated in the world.”[10]
The NYPD as a Counterterrorism Model
Why did the NYPD counterterrorism division become the envy the world? There are a host of rudimentary reasons to validate why the counterterrorism organization assumed prominence since September 11, 2001. As stated previously, it is the largest law enforcement entity in the world, with over 35,000 personnel. Second, its restructuring included the use of former senior members of the CIA.[11] Third, that not being enough, the NYPD created roles for the some of the best civilian counterterrorism scholars in the country, and perhaps most importantly, Commissioner Kelley, with political cover from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, usurped the authority of the federal government which is responsible for the security of the Metropolis. Not an easy task, and one that upset officials in the FBI, CIA, Department of Homeland Security, and elsewhere in the federal bureaucracy, this decision represents one of the key variables that sets the NYPD apart from any other local and federal law enforcement entity in the world.
Are there other supporting indicators to validate the preeminence of the NYPD in counterterrorism? In a subsequent illustration of the NYPD’s counterterrorism preeminence, “In its efforts to anticipate new threats, thwart emerging plots, nip radicalization in the bud, and harden the city’s targets, the NYPD monitors developments in hot spots around the world for tactical innovations, keeps an eye out for radicalization trends in Europe, and tracks Al Qaeda affiliates. It understands through painful experience that events overseas can manifest at home.”[12]
Due to the sheer size of the counterterrorism unit, the NYPD can make use of “periodic surges of security personnel to strategic locations like mass transit and rail stations and iconic sites. Such surges are designed to disrupt terrorist plotting and planning by suggesting that counterterrorism forces are constantly on the alert and able at any moment to appear on the scene.”[13]
The use of “The Hercules units” which “is an elite, heavily armed, semi-tactical police unit that appears out of thin air on a daily basis around the city. This unit can be found at the Empire State Building, the Brooklyn Bridge, Times Square, or the stock exchange—wherever the day’s intelligence reports suggest they could be needed”[14] represents a major component of the counterterrorism expertise that exists within the NYPD.
The creation of the Critical Response Command and the supporting 120-plus personnel is yet another component that demonstrates that the NYPD continues to innovate.[15] When one adds the Emergency Service Units (ESU), efforts by the NYPD to patrol the waters, tunnels, and bridges to prevent attacks, along with the training and resources and billion dollar-plus budgets, there is little doubt that counterterrorism in NYPD is at level not found in any law enforcement entity in the United States or around the world.
Analysis
The NYPD’s path to the preeminent law enforcement organization in confronting terrorism evolved over time. If one were to examine the numerous terrorist organizations and the rampant attacks that dominated the headlines in the 1970s and in the early 1980s, one can conclude that the NYPD was overwhelmed. There are other factors that hampered the counterterrorism efforts of the NYPD.
Within city hall and in the governors’ office, though terrorism represented a salient problem, it was by no means a priority at the local or state levels. What accounts for this failure of leadership at two levels? It is often overlooked that successive mayors and the governors had to confront the reality of the spiraling financial crisis that impacted city services. Consequently, to address the financial woes, the NYPD personnel was significantly cut and the fight against terrorism received scant resources.
Inside the law enforcement entity, the leadership within the NYPD recognized the burgeoning terrorist threat, but crime, in many forms, across the city was rampant. In addition, the NYPD experienced a crisis of confidence for its failure to deal with increased criminal activity and the corruption within its ranks that dominated the headlines in city papers. Taken collectively, these and other factors, reduced the NYPD’s ability to seriously address the specter of terrorism in the city.
It the midst of these and other problems, the NYPD used the JTTF as a vehicle to not only confront terrorist organizations in the city, but the law enforcement entity made the decision to increase intelligence efforts to track the activities of terrorists and their benefactors. These surveillance activities set the stage for a dramatic increase in counterterrorism raids on the senior leadership of various terrorist organizations (the Puerto Rican separatist group, the FALN and the Jewish Defense League are just a few examples) that operated in the city. In a bold move, the NYPD even decided to infiltrate several terrorist entities which further assisted in the dissipation of the domestic terrorist threat.[16]
The concentration of counterterrorist personnel to confront the domestic terrorist threat, left the NYPD unprepared to deal with the evolving Islamic terrorist wave that evolved during the mid to late 1980s and early 1990s. It was not until after the 1993 World Trade Center bombing that NYPD formally increased their resources to tackle this evolving threat. Still, the NYPD efforts was not yet sufficient to meet the threat. The tragic events that unfolded on September 11, 2001 induced the structural changes that created the single-greatest law enforcement counterterrorism organization that is now the envy of the world.
To its credit, the NYPD asserts that it foiled numerous post-9/11 terrorist attacks. Much of this done with extraordinary counterterrorism surveillance and raids. There is little doubt who represented the force behind the extraordinary counterterrorism changes, Commissioner Kelley.
The NYPD’s successful counterterrorism practices are not without their critics. On this point, Tara Lai Quinlan, a writer for Sustainable Security, argues “critics counter that the [counterterrorism] program was ineffective, involved significant infringements on civil liberties, made New York City much more militarized, and contributed to the further erosion of police legitimacy in targeted communities.”[17]
In addition, the NYPD still confronts a wealth of issues with the federal government. For example, long after 9/11, intelligence sharing remains a challenge between Washington and New York. Similarly, “relations between the NYPD and FBI and other federal agencies [is problematic]. The NYPD has also wrangled with the Department of Homeland Security over funding and lines of authority….”[18]
Under the current structure of counterterrorism rules and procedures, the NYPD has dramatically reduced the likelihood of a subsequent 9/1l-style terrorist attack. Though soft target and lone wolf attacks consistent with those inspired by transnational entities such as Al Qaeda or the Islamic State are likely, the NYPD with the assistance from the FBI, has reduced the threat of such attacks. In the final analysis, “One thing that can be agreed is that the NYPD became the first American police force to spend over a billion dollars and countless man-hours to implement a host of new terrorism fighting measures in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.”[19] This represents one of several legacies earned by the preeminent law enforcement entity in the world.
[1] William Rosenau, “The “First War on Terrorism?” U.S. Domestic Counterterrorism During the 1970s and Early 1980s,” CNA Analysis and Solutions, October 2014. https://www.cna.org/can files/pdf/CRM-2014-U-008836.pdf.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] For a comprehensive analysis of the Islamic Wave of terrorism and its impact on New York City, see John C. Miller, Michael Stone, and Chris Mitchell, The Cell: Inside the 9/11 Plot, and Why the FBI and CIA Failed to Stop It (New York: Hyperion, 2002).
[6] Dennis G. Fitzgerald, Informants, Cooperating Witnesses, and Undercover Investigations: A Practical Guide to Law, Policy, and Procedure (New York: CRC Press, Taylor Francis, 2015), p. 94.
[7] “NYPD Intel Unit,” Broodingcynyx.blogspot.com, May 5, 2011. http://broodingcynyx.blogspot .com/2011/05/nypd-intel-unit.html.
[8] Craig Horowitz, “The NYPD’s War on Terror,” NYMag.com, February 3, 2003. http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/features/n_286/.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Lydia Khalil, “Is New York a Counterterrorism Model?” Council on Foreign Relations Brief, September 10, 2009. https://www.cfr.org/expert-brief/new-york-counterterrorism-model.
[11] Some of the activities of the often-controversial revamped NYPD Intelligence Division are viewed this way by one author, “Kelly’s counterterrorism program was forged through close links with then-current or recent members of the Central Intelligence Agency, including 35-year veteran David Cohen, who sought to blend NYPD know-how with high policing intelligence tradecraft. The data shows that changes within the NYPD’s Intelligence Division and Counterterrorism Bureau included stationing officers overseas from London to Hamburg to Amman, and sending detectives to gather intelligence in Afghanistan, Egypt, Yemen, Pakistan, and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, among others. The hiring of intelligence analysts with language skills in from Arabic, to Pashto, to Urdu also allowed the NYPD to monitor communications and media accounts that might signal terror threats to New York City. The Intelligence Division also developed independent strategies for identifying vulnerable individuals and potential terrorists. The Intelligence Division also engaged in additional covert surveillance and infiltration operations.” See Tara Lai Quinlan, “The NYPD’s Post-9/11 Counterterrorism Programme,” Sustainable Security.org, August 4, 2016. https://sustainablesecurity.org/2016/08/04/the-nypds-post-911-counterterrorism-programme/.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Clark Kent Ervin, “New York City’s Preparedness for Terrorism,” The Aspen Institute, Aspen Homeland Security Program, October 2009, Washington, DC. https://www.aspenin stitute.org/publications/new-york-citys-preparedness-terrorism-catastrophic-natural-disasters/.
[14] Sgt. Glenn French, “How NYPD’s Hercules Team Serves as a Model for Counterterrorism,” Policeone.com. December 8, 2015. https://www.policeone.com/swat/articles/51474006-How-NYPDs-Hercules-team-serves-as-a-model-for-counterterrorism/.
[15] Mark Morales, “NYPD Deploys First Wave of Officers From New Counterterrorism Unit,” Wall Street Journal, November 15, 2015. https://www.wsj.com/articles/first-wave-of-officers-from-new-nypd-counter-terrorism-unit-deployed-1447710622.
[16] A great example is the NYPD’s infiltration of the Jewish Defense League (JDL). For more on this point, see the book by Richard Rosenthal, Rookie Cop: Deep Undercover in the Jewish Defense League (New York: Leapfrog Press, 2000).
[17] Quinlan, “The NYPD’s Post-9/11 Counterterrorism Programme.”
[18] Khalil, “Is New York a Counterterrorism Model?”
[19] Quinlan, “The NYPD’s Post-9/11 Counterterrorism Programme.”
