Ideas in POLICE American FOUNDATION Number 15 Policing July 2012 Policing Terrorism Gary LaFree lthough terrorism has past. However, some optimism This balance between being much in common is provided by the fact that the effective in counterterrorism A with ordinary crime strong connections to community efforts and maintaining the trust (LaFree and Dugan 2004), it that produce the best results of the community should not be also raises unique challenges for for policing in general may also taken lightly but in some ways policing. Perhaps the greatest be the same characteristics that resembles the challenges police challenges center on how to are most useful in preventing have long faced in responding use scarce police resources to terrorist attacks and responding to crimes that require proactive fight crimes that are relatively to those that are carried out. At rather than reactive methods. uncommon, that have national the same time, providing support I divide this essay into four and sometimes international for counterterrorism must be parts. In part one, I consider the implications, and that require done by local police in such a frequency and characteristics of intelligence that may be limited way that it does not erode their terrorist attacks on the United or altogether unavailable at the effectiveness in communities. States, especially since 9/11. In local and state levels. But despite these challenges, it is hard to Ideas in American Policing presents commentary and insight from leading crimi- imagine any effective national nologists on issues of interest to scholars, practitioners, and policy makers. The policy on preventing terrorism papers published in this series are from the Police Foundation lecture series of the same name. Points of view in this document are those of the author and do not or responding to its aftermath necessarily represent the official position of the Police Foundation. The full series that does not heavily rely on the is available online at http://www.policefoundation.org/docs/library.html. hundreds of thousands of sworn © 2012 Police Foundation. All rights reserved. police officers that serve the Gary LaFree is professor of criminology and criminal justice United States. Addressing these at the University of Maryland and the director of the National complex challenges requires a Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to level of cooperation across federal, Terrorism. Dr. LaFree is a member of the Police Foundation’s state, and local jurisdictions Research Advisory Committee. that has not been typical in the this section, I briefly examine international terrorist attacks series peak in 1991—just before global terrorist threats to the is the Global Terrorism the collapse of the Soviet Union. United States, foreign groups Database (GTD) maintained Attacks then fell off even more that target the United States, and by the National Consortium sharply so that total attacks just terrorist attacks within the United for the Study of Terrorism before 9/11 were at about the States. In the second part of the and Responses to Terrorism same level as they were in the essay, I consider how terrorism (START), headquartered at the late 1970s. Following the US-led is similar to and different from University of Maryland (LaFree invasion of Iraq in 2003, total ordinary street crime. These and Dugan 2007; LaFree 2012). attacks again rose sharply, coming similarities and differences have Terrorism in the GTD is defined close to a series high during important implications for as the threatened or actual use of the last three years of the series policing terrorism. Perhaps most illegal force and violence by non- (2008 to 2010). Fatal attacks importantly, terrorism more state actors, in order to attain a are much less common but are closely resembles crimes that have political, economic, religious, or significantly correlated with total gained prominence in the last half social goal through fear, coercion, attacks. In general, there was a century, like hate crimes, drug- or intimidation. At the time greater gap between total and related crimes, and gang violence, this essay was written, the GTD fatal attacks during the 1980s and than crimes with older, common included information on more early 1990s than there was before law roots, like homicide or than 98,000 terrorist attacks from or since. The total number of robbery. In the third part of the around the world from 1970 to fatal attacks from 2008 to 2010 is essay, I consider some of the ways 2010 (www.start.umd.edu/gtd/). at about the same level as it was that the 9/11 attacks changed In the next section, I use the in the peak year of 1992 (about policing. Because much of the GTD to indicate the nature of the 2,000 attacks per year). police work aimed at preventing global terrorist threat, the threat terrorist attacks happens at the from foreign groups that target Terrorist Organizations federal level, I will examine the United States both at home that Target the United in particular major changes in and abroad, and the threat of FBI strategies since 9/11. The terrorism within the United States. States move toward a more proactive My colleagues Sue-Ming Yang approach to terrorism after Global Terrorism Trends and Martha Crenshaw and 9/11 has important implications I recently tracked the attack for policing at all levels. And, Figure 1 shows total and fatal patterns of fifty-three terrorist finally, I conclude by taking the terrorist attacks from 1970 to organizations identified by the 1 information from the first three 2010 from the GTD. I include US Department of State as sections and considering some of a marker to distinguish attacks representing the most serious the implications for policies on before and after 9/11. Total threat to the United States policing terrorism in the twenty- attacks rose sharply during the (LaFree, Yang, and Crenshaw first century. 1970s and 1980s, reaching a 2009). Collectively, these foreign terrorist groups were linked to 1 The Nature of the Our data record no domestic nearly 17,000 attacks. However, attacks for 1993. The original data on we found that just 3 percent of Terrorist Threat which the GTD is based were collected by the Pinkerton Global Intelligence these attacks by designated anti- At present, the longest running Service, which lost the data for 1993 US groups were actually directed in an office move. We have never been terrorism event database that able to completely reconstruct these at the United States. Moreover, includes both domestic and missing data. 99 percent of attacks targeting —— 2 —— Figure 1. Worldwide Total and Fatal Terrorist Attacks 1970–2010 domestic attacks are the rule. The fact that most terrorism is local underscores the importance of strong local policing. Trends in Terrorism Attacks Within the United States Developing a valid data source for terrorist attacks within the United States has been challenging. Most early terrorism event databases (e.g., ITERATE, RAND) excluded domestic attacks and, as a matter of policy, the US Department of State did not publish data on domestic terrorist attacks in its Patterns of Global Source: Global Terrorism Database (www.start.umd.edu/gtd). Terrorism series. Brent Smith and his colleagues (Smith 1994; the United States did not occur National Liberation Front), and Smith, Shields, and Damphousse on US soil but were aimed at the early twenty-first century 2011a) have contributed a US targets in other countries (al-Qa’ida, the Taliban)—as great deal to our knowledge of (e.g., embassies, multinational well as a trajectory that did not domestic terrorism by codifying corporations). We also found exhibit wave-like characteristics FBI arrests and prosecutions that more than 90 percent of the but instead was characterized by for terrorism, but these data are non-US attacks were domestic irregular and infrequent attacks limited to federal cases. The GTD (i.e., nationals from one country (including the Popular Liberation includes data on both domestic attacking targets of the same Army and the Moro Islamic and international terrorism nationality in the same country). Liberation Front). going back to 1970; however, We used group-based trajectory The results of this analysis the original data provided no analysis (Nagin 2005) to examine underscore the importance of simple mechanism for separating the different developmental proximity for terrorist targeting. domestic from international trajectories of strikes that Terrorists, like ordinary criminals, cases. With funding from the targeted the United States, and are likely to choose targets US Department of Homeland concluded that four trajectories close to their operational base. Security’s Human Factors/ best captured the attack patterns. However, when attacks occur Behavioral Science Division, for As shown in Figure 2, these further from the terrorists’ home the last three years my colleagues trajectories constituted three very bases, they are more deadly. In and I in the START Consortium distinct terrorist waves—which framing counterterrorism policies, have been building a database occurred in the 1970s (including our results highlight the need to on terrorist attacks against the the Red Brigades and People’s put threats into perspective by United States, called Terrorism Liberation Forces), 1980s acknowledging that international and Extremist Violence in the (Shining Path, Farabundo Marti attacks are the exception and local United States (TEVUS). —— 3 —— Figure 2. Trajectories of Attacks on the United States of 53 in the early 1970s, attacks Anti-US Terrorist Groups 1970–2004 reached a secondary peak of 142 in 1975. Attack rates again declined throughout the end of the 1970s and early 1980s, falling below fifty attacks per year for most years. Interestingly, the total number of domestic attacks since 9/11 has generally been lower than at any other period during the past forty years.