| From The Editor October 2, 2006 |
Training FacilitiesThe White House budget request for fiscal 2007 appropriations for USSOCOM places a big emphasis on training facilities. The establishment of U.S. Marine Corps Special Operations Command (MARSOC) drives some of this military construction. Gary Jackson |
| QUOTE OF THE WEEK |
| A politician will do anything to keep his job -- even become a patriot. William Randolph Hearst |
| PROFESSIONAL ARTICLES, EDITORIALS AND OPINIONS |
Last Ramadan was the bloodiest in recent history. In Iraq, the first day of the Muslim holy month opened with a devastating attack on the International Red Cross and Iraqi police stations, killing 42 people and wounding 200. Later in the month came two simultaneous bombings at Istanbul synagogues, followed five days later by another set of two attacks on a British bank and British consulate in the Turkish capital. Ramadan 2003 also saw a suicide attack on a Saudi housing compound, and a foiled plan to attack pilgrims in the holy city of Mecca. A plan to blow up a hotel in Yemen used by Americans during the holy month was also thwarted. |
| BREAKING NEWS FOR THE PROFESSIONAL |
Crowded ERs Raise Concerns On ReadinessEmergency rooms at many hospitals are routinely stretched to the breaking point, raising concerns that they would not be able to handle victims during a terrorist attack or natural disaster, according to congressional testimony yesterday and a new federal study. Between 40 percent and 50 percent of emergency departments experienced crowding during 2003 and 2004, the study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found. It deemed an emergency room to be crowded if so many patients flooded in that ambulances had to be diverted to other hospitals; if people in urgent need of care had to wait an average of more than an hour; or if at least 3 percent of patients simply gave up and left before being seen.Full Story Gunman, hostage dead after high school siegeAn armed standoff at a high school in Bailey, Colorado, ended after three hours Wednesday with a hostage and the gunman dead. The gunman walked into the school and took hostages in a classroom, where he later fatally shot a female student and turned the gun on himself as a SWAT team stormed inside, authorities said. Local media and the Associated Press identified the Platte Canyon High School student as 16-year-old Emily Keyes, citing co-workers, friends and classmates. She was flown to St. Anthony Central Hospital in Denver, where she died at 4:32 p.m. (6:32 p.m. ET), said hospital spokeswoman Bev Lilly.Full Story FBI Is Casting A Wider Net in Anthrax AttacksFive years after the anthrax attacks that killed five people, the FBI is now convinced that the lethal powder sent to the Senate was far less sophisticated than originally believed, widening the pool of possible suspects in a frustratingly slow investigation. The finding, which resulted from countless scientific tests at numerous laboratories, appears to undermine the widely held belief that the attack was carried out by a government scientist or someone with access to a U.S. biodefense lab.Full Story EnemiesThe FBI, the CIA and other intelligence agencies continue to struggle to plant agents in, or recruit them from, deadly Islamist terror organizations here and abroad. The FBI, for example, did not have under way a single active investigation this past spring of al Qaeda or any Islamist group anywhere in the United States. Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network is not alone in posing a threat of new attacks. The FBI believes that Lebanon-based Hezbollah has set up terrorist cells in at least 10 U.S. cities.Full Story Great Lakes machine guns raise ire in CanadaThe United States Coast Guard has started to patrol the Great Lakes with machine guns mounted on their vessels and is conducting live-ammunition training drills on the U.S. side to prepare officers to combat terrorists flooding across the border from Canada by boat. The automatic-weapon drills started earlier this year but came to light only in the past two weeks after information about the Coast Guard's move to create 34 permanent live-fire training zones in the Great Lakes was published in the U.S. federal register.Full Story |
| JOB OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE PROFESSIONAL |
|
TO FILL OUT AN APPLICATION AND SUBMIT YOUR RESUME AND DD-214 CLICK HERE Questions regarding Security Consulting or Training at Blackwater (252) 435-2488 |
| SECURITY FOR THE PROFESSIONAL |
States, Counties Begin to Enforce Immigration LawPolice here operated for years under what amounts to a "don't ask, don't tell" policy toward illegal immigrants. As elsewhere in the United States, law enforcement officers did not check the immigration status of people they came into contact with, and in the vast majority of cases, a run-in with the law carried little threat of deportation. But that accommodation for the burgeoning illegal population ended abruptly in April, when the Mecklenburg County sheriff's office began to enforce immigration law, placing more than 100 people a month into deportation proceedings. Some of them had been charged with violent crimes, others with traffic infractions.Full Story With Senate Vote, Congress Passes Border Fence BillThe Senate gave final approval last night to legislation authorizing the construction of 700 miles of double-layered fencing on the U.S.-Mexico border, shelving President Bush's vision of a comprehensive overhaul of U.S. immigration laws in favor of a vast barrier. The measure was pushed hard by House Republican leaders, who badly wanted to pass a piece of legislation that would make good on their promises to get tough on illegal immigrants, despite warnings from critics that a multibillion-dollar fence would do little to address the underlying economic, social and law enforcement problems, or to prevent others from slipping across the border. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) surprised many advocates of a more comprehensive approach to immigration problems when he took up the House bill last week.Full Story Suspect in Slaying of Fla. Deputy KilledA man suspected of killing a sheriff's deputy was shot to death in the woods by police Friday after an all-night manhunt in which searchers walked shoulder-to-shoulder through the tangled brush. SWAT members did not see the man until they were beside him because he had dug himself in beneath a fallen oak tree, Sheriff Grady Judd said. The man refused to show both hands when officers commanded him to, and they opened fire when it appeared he was carrying the slain deputy's gun, Judd said. It was unclear if the man also fired the weapon.Full Story Protesters face off at Ky. GI's funeralDemonstrators squared off Saturday outside a funeral home where a service was being held for a solider, the first such scene in Kentucky since a judge suspended a state law that required a 300-foot buffer zone for protests at military funerals. Dozens of demonstrators surrounded London Funeral Home, waved American flags and exchanged shouts for more than an hour before the service with members of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., which tours the country protesting at military funerals. Church members held signs across the street that read, "America is doomed," "Thank God for 9/11," and "Thank God for dead soldiers." The family of Sgt. 1st Class Charles Jason Jones had invited a half-dozen groups to wave full-size American flags, express their support of U.S. soldiers and honor Jones after hearing about the church's plans to protest the funeral, according to military officials.Full Story Al Qaeda in Iraq beckons nuclear scientistsAl Qaeda in Iraq's leader, in an audiotape released yesterday, called for nuclear scientists to join his group's holy war and urged insurgents to kidnap Westerners so they could be traded for a blind Egyptian sheik who is serving a life sentence in a US prison. The speaker, who identified himself as Abu Hamza al-Muhajir -- also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri, also said that more than 4,000 foreign militants have been killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion in 2003. It was the first known statement from the insurgents about their death toll.Full Story |
| TRAINING FOR THE PROFESSIONAL |
Mirror Image Training: Training to Combat TerrorismMirror Image is a tactical and strategic training course developed and owned by the Terrorism Research Center. TRC instructors have trained hundreds of military personnel that are subsequently deployed to active combat operations, as well as large numbers of first responders, law enforcement, and security professionals. Mirror Image is an intensive one-week classroom and field-training program, designed to realistically simulate terrorist recruiting, training techniques, and operational tactics. During the course, participants will receive insight into the mindset and rationale of the terrorist through hands-on experience with the methods and means terrorist employ, education about terrorist ideologies and the cultural dimensions that influence their decision making process. Military, law enforcement, intelligence, and security professionals will, in turn, be able to see themselves as the terrorists see them and understand the weaknesses in their own environment that the terrorists will seek to exploit, and which all too often they miss. Armed with these insights participants will leave the course better able to anticipate, prevent and respond to multiple terrorist threats. November 12-17, 2006: Blackwater Training Center, Moyock, NC A detailed brochure may be downloaded at: www.terrorism.com A Registration Form/Information may be downloaded at: www.terrorism.com Questions on TRC training, please contact Betty O'Hearns-Hines, Training Coordinator for the Terrorism Research Center. Email: betty@terrorism.com Phone: (727)360-4302 voice or (727)409-1754 |
| FRANKS REVIEW |
Service Equipment ReviewBeretta CX4 CarbineLast week we took a look at the Beretta PX4 Pistol in .40S&W. In my opening comments I mentioned how, on occasion, it takes several years for a new design to evolve. While that is certainly not an issue - given that one of the most popular pistol designs in history remains little changed after about a hundred years - in this case Beretta was smart and developed a new pistol design that worked hand in hand with a new carbine design. This week we're going to take a look at the Beretta CX4 ("C" for Carbine instead of "P" for Pistol), its features, niceties, and which of those features enable it to work efficiently with the PX4 pistols. In today's law enforcement environment, given the reality of Active Shooters (and we've seen two school shootings just in the past week alone) and the potential terrorist threat that is near impossible to predict, I think it's imperative that law enforcement professionals at least examine their handguns and long guns to predetermine deployment configurations and challenges.Full Story Can Be Viewed At: http://www.borelliconsulting.com/evals/guns/berettacx4.htm Recreational Equipment Review"Austere" Conditions"Austere": defined as without excess, luxury, or ease; simple; limited; severe / OR severely simple; without ornament. The term "austere" has, in recent years, to mean combat environments. Certainly those definitions would apply to such situations. Nothing about combat or survival conditions is luxurious, easy, simple or ornamented (unless with ugly images). While the topic may not be recreational in nature, this week we're going to take a look at what common recreational items, typically used for camping, backpacking, hiking, fishing, hunting, etc. can be used to survive under those "austere" conditions. Such austere conditions can be created by manmade (terrorist) or natural (hurricane) disasters. We don't have to remember very far back to see examples: Hurricane Katrina certainly created an austere environment in New Orleans (and other areas). A sufficiently destructive or emotionally / economically impacting terrorist event would also create such an environment. What do you have on hand that would serve the need?
|
| CHAPLAINS CORNER |
MIDEAST, PEACE???
|
| BUMPER STICKER |
|
| CONTACT INFORMATION |
|
The Blackwater Tactical Weekly is a free weekly e-publication. The BTW provides readers valuable information from diverse sources regarding tactical and strategic security issues. Editor-in-Chief – Gary Jackson (btw@blackwaterusa.com) Questions regarding Security Consulting or Training
at Blackwater (252) 435-2488 Editorial Calendar: The weekly theme may change at the discretion of
the Editor based on current events. To view an archived BTW, Click Here |
| LEGAL NOTICE |
| Blackwater USA (the "Company"), provides this Newsletter as a source of diverse information to its readers. The Company does not warrant or endorse the products or services advertised in or reviewed in the Newsletter. The views and statements of the reviewers and commentators presented in the Newsletter are entirely their own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Company or its affiliates. The Company does not monitor or warrant the accuracy or reliability of the material provided in this Newsletter or presented at any of the third-party websites to which links are provided in this Newsletter. WARNING: Use of certain of the products and services discussed or reviewed in this Newsletter can lead to personal injury or death. It is critical to follow manufacturers' instructions in using such products or services. The Company will not accept any liability for damages, injuries, or death resulting from the use or misuse of any such products or services. |
 |
    
 
|
|
