Weapons Attack Research Articles

A Situational Model of Displacement and Diffusion Following the Introduction of Airport Metal Detectors

Much of the discourse surrounding counterterrorism centers on the inevitability of displacement, or the substitution of another form of terrorist attack in place of the one that has been thwarted. Yet a longstanding tradition of research in situational crime prevention finds that displacement is far from inevitable, and often depends crucially on the specific features of the incidents in question. In fact, crime prevention efforts are often followed by a “diffusion of benefits” (i.e., crime reductions) to incidents, groups, or locations that were not the intended target of the intervention. The current study examines various forms of displacement and diffusion in response to airport metal detectors among terrorist groups that had been involved in the perpetration of aviation attacks prior to their implementation. Using data from the Global Terrorism Database, the findings from interrupted time series models suggest a complex set of displacement and diffusion effects with respect to alternative attack modes, target types, and weapon usage.

Research on Gas Gush Smoke Camouflage Device for Transport Vehicle

Transport vehicle gas gush Smoke camouflage device, By use of its own power system and storage devices, Will be made in advance the size of the different, structure, function of polystyrene particles blown apart, Thus formed around the top of the vehicle and polystyrene particles as the main ingredients of camouflage a Smoke, To cover vehicles and interference against the infrared guidance, the purpose of the millimeter wave radar guidance weapon attacks.

Wartime Nuclear Power Plant Security Protection Research

Nuclear power as an important energy which benefits human being,is being more and more widely used in many countries all over the world. Under the condition of information war, threat to nuclear power plant security from precision weapon and terrorist attack is serious. This paper analyzes major threats nuclear power plant be facing to in wartime such as obvious exposure symptoms, limited own protections and large impact on the war potential. Then several main methods are discussed to strengthen safety protection of nuclear power plant. Firstly, strive to improve the early warning ability of nuclear power plant. By this means, more time can be obtained to make nuclear power plant protection to prepare. Secondly, counterattacks, interference and disguise simultaneously should build another effective barrier. In the last, it is considered that research on protection and rescue of nuclear power station should be strengthened also.

Dissuading Biological Weapons Proliferation

The terrorist and anthrax attacks of 2001 spurred many countries to raise defences against a possible biological weapon attack, and potentially dissuade state and non-state actors from developing these weapons. Yet these programmes' dissuasive value – creating strong barriers to entry – has never been analysed. This article argues that current biodefence efforts are counterproductive and more persuasive than dissuasive, because they rest on a biological threat narrative that emphasizes the benefits of bioweapons rather than their problematic development and use, and they fail to impose a high cost of entry in the bioweapons field. The dominant biological weapons narrative perpetuates several misconceptions, including that there are no barriers to biological weapons development, that expertise is easily acquired from scientific documents, and that new technologies are black boxes with de-skilling effects. The net result is popularization of a cost/benefit analysis in favour of bioweapons development. To remedy the situation, I suggest correcting these misconceptions by reshaping the biological threat narrative, and recommend policies to achieve a greater dissuasive impact, stressing the role of the Biological Weapons Convention, preventing access to tacit biological weapons skills, and criminalizing bioweapons proliferation by making the development and use of biological weapons a crime against humanity.

Around the World

In science news around the world, the incoming Australian government won't include a science minister, U.N. inspectors say they have found convincing evidence in Syria of a chemical weapons attack with sarin, reviews of a U.S.-led "golden rice" study in China suggest the study didn't fully comply with regulations, and more.

Lest we forget: why the use of chemical weapons must not go unchallenged

On Aug. 21, 2013, many thousands of people in a suburb of Damascus, Syria, developed symptoms and signs of neurotoxicity after what appeared to be a chemical weapons attack.[1][1] More than 1000 people are reported to have died. Graphic video footage posted online prompted chemical weapons experts

U.N. Taps Special Labs to Investigate Syrian Attack

Special laboratories that investigate alleged chemical weapons attacks are getting a rare call to action from the United Nations after the horrifying events in Syria.

Punitive military action in syria will just prolong the suffering

As news of the recent alleged chemical weapons attacks in Syria emerged, a health worker in Damascus said he wished there was as much discussion on how to help those affected by the attacks as there was about who was to blame. We at the global health charity Medact understand all too well his frustration.

Glanders: an overview of infection in humans

Glanders is a highly contagious and often fatal zoonotic disease, primarily of solipds. In the developed world, glanders has been eradicated. However, prior use of B. mallei as a biological weapon and its high mortality in inhalation animal studies has affirmed B. mallei as a biodefense concern. This threat requires the development of new glanders medical countermeasures (MCMs), as there is a lack of an effective vaccine and lengthy courses of multiple antibiotics needed to eradicate B. mallei. Here, we present a literature review of human glanders in which we discuss the clinical epidemiology and risk factors, potential routes of exposure, symptoms, the incubation period, and specific diagnostics. This review focuses on pulmonary glanders, as this is the most likely outcome of a biological weapons attack. Additionally, we outline current treatment regimens and propose a clinical definition of human pulmonary glanders infection.

Using Force Against the 'Weapons of the Weak': Examining A Chemical-Biological Weapons Usage Criterion for Unilateral Humanitarian Intervention Under the Responsibility to Protect

The civil war in Syria has demonstrated the international community’s inability to act to protect civilians caught in mass atrocities during cases of U.N. Security Council deadlock, with permanent member vetoes presenting a significant legal obstacle to international humanitarian intervention. The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) construct, created in response to the NATO intervention in Kosovo, was originally designed to overcome such Security Council paralysis by transforming the debate from the 'right' of states to intervene to the 'responsibility' of the entire international community to protect civilians, as well as opening the door to legitimate unilateral humanitarian intervention in cases of Security Council deadlock. However, despite the innovations of these 'hard R2P' principles, the R2P framework was weakened during U.N. adoption into a 'soft R2P' that is reflected in the current legal impasse over Security Council authorization for humanitarian intervention.This article examines a chemical and biological weapons (CBW) usage criterion as a condition legitimizing unilateral humanitarian intervention under R2P. A CBW usage criterion for R2P intervention can provide the international community with a framework for legitimate humanitarian intervention to end chemical and biological weapons attacks against civilians and deter such attacks in the future. Such a criterion would increase support for a principle of R2P intervention across realist, institutionalist and cosmopolitan perspectives, strengthening a norm of humanitarian intervention in cases of CBW attack and promoting the international community’s overall ability to protect civilians in war. To provide legitimacy to act against future such atrocities, the international community should thus begin efforts to incorporate into the U.N. framework an R2P principle authorizing intervention in cases of CBW use against civilians.

WHO releases guidelines for treating chemical warfare victims after possible Syria attacks

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released guidelines on treating patients exposed to deadly chemicals within days of reports of possible chemical weapons attacks in Syria. The interim WHO document, released Aug. 27, guides health workers on the identification, triage, decontamination and

After-birth abortion: the intuition argument

The argument advanced by Giubilini and Minerva is an important one, but it suffers from some shortcomings. I briefly criticise their reasoning and method and argue that after birth abortion...

Organizational Leadership and Natural Selection

Two recent books challenged my thinking about human nature and organizational leadership: The Social Conquest of Earth by the distinguished biologist Edward O. Wilson and Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. Wilson's controversial thesis is that through natural selection, humans have two genetically determined behavioral drives that sometimes clash-one individualistic and selfish and the other collaborative and altruistic. Jobs described to Isaacson his view of what it takes to fire up the altruistic genes to create a great collaborative team, an idea that challenges popular ideas about leadership. Jobs seems to have developed a management philosophy that synthesizes selfish and altruistic drives, challenging popular ideas about great leadership. Wilson writes that Charles Darwin anticipated a combination of individual and group selection . For instance, Darwin proposed, an individual motivated by pure self-interest might invent a weapon or other means of attack or defense that would help a tribe to increase in number and supplant other tribes. In such a tribe, there would be a better chance of producing more innovative members. Wilson builds on this, writing: If we assume that groups are approximately equal to one another in weaponry and other technology, which has been the case for most of the time among primitive societies over hundreds of thousands of years, we can expect that the outcome of between-group competition is determined largely by the details of social behavior within each group in turn. These traits are the size and tightness of the group, and the quality of communication and division of labor among its members. Such traits are heritable to some degree; in other words, variation in them is due in part to differences in genes among the members of the group, hence also among the groups themselves. The genetic fitness of each member, the number of reproducing descendants it leaves, is determined by the cost exacted and benefit gained from its membership in the group. These include the favor or disfavor it earns from other group members on the basis of its behavior. The currency of favor is paid by direct reciprocity and indirect reciprocity, the later in the form of repetition and trust. How well a group performs depends on how well its members work together, regardless of the degree by which each is individually favored or disfavored within the group. (55-56) he logic of Wilson's argument, buttressed by his examples of strong collaboration in groups, is that altruistic genes are fired up by threats to a group. Experience confirms this logic. It does not take exceptional leadership to get people to collaborate when they're threatened. Spontaneous altruistic actions often occur in war and competitive team sports. As Wilson writes, humans are compulsive group-seekers, tribal animals that satisfy this need variously in extended families, organized religion, political groups, ethnic groups, and sports clubs. When people are threatened, their group identities are instinctively strengthened. This is dramatically evident in recent Middle Eastern conflicts where religious group identities are matters of life or death. Similarly, people sometimes identify so strongly with teams in sports that they see opponents as deadly enemies. A game of soccer football even provoked a war between Honduras and El Salvador in 1969. In all likelihood, there is considerable variation among people in the strength of their individualistic and altruistic genes. Some people are more altruistic and helpful than others; some are extremely individualistic. But modern bureaucracies are structured with the assumption that people are most strongly motivated by self-interest. Managers are taught that if organizational roles and processes are designed well, each individual's output will combine to produce the desired product. When I was a consultant to the executives of a large technology company, a vice president complained that the CEO would listen to the views of the vice presidents but then make decisions by himself. …

Endemic Disease in Afghanistan: How an Improved Biosecurity Framework Could Alleviate the Threat to U.S. Troops

As it is currently structured, Afghanistans biosecurity framework is weak and offers little to no protection to US troops against the threat of either infectious disease outbreaks or a biological weapons attack by terrorists. If fact, the only legitimate biosecurity practice of the Afghanistan government is to respond to outbreaks of infectious diseases. Such responses are debilitated by a devastated infrastructure, harsh and often times impassable landscape, and non-compliance by Afghan citizens.5 As such, US troops (and, indeed, Afghan citizens) are left susceptible to these endemic diseases to a degree beyond their own control. I believe an alternative biosecurity framework could be implemented that would alleviate this threat.6 Because Afghanistan remains a decentralized and tribal society, the crux of this proposal is that biosecurity measures are to be reallocated to the local, tribal level. I will further expound in greater detail on the reasons for this proposal in section four below.

Role of Dentist in Forensic Investigations

Teeth can be used as a weapon of attack or defense. Dentistry has much to offer to law enforcement agencies in the uncovering and solution of crime. The permanent teeth develop throughout the first two decades of life, and physiologic variations, pathologies, and effects of dental therapy may be recorded in the hard tissues of the remaining dentition throughout life and beyond. It is the role of the dentist to help extract this information and use it in the identification of the unknown body. Human teeth and dental restorations have proven to remain stable during a long time as well as in extreme situations such as fire. Therefore, dentist can play an important part in the identification of severe mutilated bodies of unknown persons. The teeth may also be used as weapon and, under certain circumstances may leave information as to the identity of the biter. Analysis of bite marks is the second major responsibility of the forensic dentist. The general practitioner has a major role to play in providing the accurate dental records on which much of forensic activity is based.

From biodefence to biosecurity: the Obama administration's strategy for countering biological threats

The Seventh Review Conference of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), the first international treaty to outlaw an entire class of weapons, was held in Geneva in December 2011. On 7 December, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton became the highest-ranking US government official to address a BWC meeting. Secretary Clinton told the assembled delegation that ‘we view the risk of bioweapons attack as both a serious national security challenge and a foreign policy priority’. At the same time, she warned that a large-scale disease outbreak ‘could cripple an already fragile global economy’. Secretary Clinton's speech reflected a new understanding that the range of biological threats to international security has expanded from state-sponsored biological warfare programmes to include biological terrorism, dual-use research and naturally occurring infectious diseases such as pandemics. Recognizing these changes, President Barack Obama released a new national strategy for countering biological threats in 2009. This strategy represents a shift in thinking away from the George W. Bush administration's focus on biodefence, which emphasized preparing for and responding to biological weapon attacks, to the concept of biosecurity, which includes measures to prevent, prepare for and respond to naturally occurring and man-made biological threats. The Obama administration's biosecurity strategy seeks to reduce the global risk of naturally occurring and deliberate disease outbreaks through prevention, international cooperation, and maximizing synergies between health and security. The biosecurity strategy is closely aligned with the Obama administration's broader approach to foreign policy, which emphasizes the pragmatic use of smart power, multilateralism and engagement to further the national interest. This article describes the Obama administration's biosecurity strategy; highlights elements of continuity and change from the policies of the Bush administration; discusses how it fits into Obama's broader foreign policy agenda; and analyses critical issues that will have to be addressed in order to implement the strategy successfully.

Vaccination in Pregnancy

The recent H1N1 influenza pandemic has highlighted the potential for viral infections to cause severe disease in mothers disproportionate to the general population and have deleterious effects on the fetus. Vaccines have been used in pregnant women for over 200 years. Current guidelines recommend vaccination with only inactivated virus due to potential risk to mother and fetus with live vaccine. The exception is during times of pandemic or biological weapons attack, when the risk of life-threatening disease outweighs the risk of vaccination. A paucity of data is available regarding actual risk and mechanisms of live viral vaccine transfer from mother to fetus. Pregnancy-induced changes to the maternal immune system, effects of maternal infection on neonatal immunity, and the role of the placenta in transmission of infection and passive immunity to the fetus are incompletely understood. The aim of this paper is to review available data pertaining to newer vaccines such as the pandemic H1N1 and HPV vaccines in pregnancy, the role of Fc receptors in active transport of immunoglobulin across the placenta, and cytokine activity during maternal infection and after vaccination. We will also discuss potential areas for future research.

Doubting the Global War on Terror

Soon after Al Qaeda's terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001, the Bush Administration described its new grand strategy: the "Global War on Terror". This article examines the 'two-track' process that US neoconservatives and 'echo chamber' media used, to promote the GWOT grand strategy. It re-examines why many experts and institutions expressed doubt about specific claims the Bush Administration made to support the 2003 Iraq War. Historical counterfactuals suggest that the Bush Administration's Global War on Terror could have evolved very differently . . . or not occurred at all.

Bioterrorism and U.S. Domestic Preparedness: Bureaucratic Fragmentation and American Vulnerability

This article takes a closer look at the United States’ domestic preparedness program. Beginning in the mid-1990s, the domestic preparedness program has served as the United States’ disaster response and management option in the case of a biological or chemical weapons attack. In its early years, the program focused solely on chemical weapons, but eventually expanded to cover the threat of biological weapons as well. The program, however, is fragmented, leaving authority in the hands of over a dozen different agencies. This leaves the authorities, capabilities, and resources needed to effectively implement the program divided across multiple bureaucracies. In addition, the program is essentially made up of a series of legislative initiatives, causing it to be desperately uncoordinated. Given this organizational fragmentation, we ask: does the domestic preparedness program really prepare the United States for a biological weapons attack?

Increased accuracy of SHPB test apparatus to better evaluate naval steels

The use of high strength steel alloys for shipbuilding applications has increased in recent years in an effort to decrease costsassociated with the manufacture (i.e. material and welding costs) and operation (i.e. fuel economy) of naval vessels. The use ofthinner hull plate has implications for many design criteria, including high strain rate (impact and shock loading) performance.Increasingly, numerical modeling is being used to simulate high strain rate loading events on naval vessels, such as collisions and weapons attacks, with a goal of assessing operational limits. Accurate and reliable high strain rate material data must be used to ensure the accuracy of the numerical models. Confidence in measured data can only be achieved if the potential sources of errorin the measurement system have been eliminated, minimized or characterized. The mechanical behavior of three naval alloys, MIL S-16216K (HY-80), ASTM A517 grade F and CSA G40-21 350WT cat 5 were quantified under high strain rate (103s-1) compression using a Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar (SHPB) apparatus. A systematic error analysis was conducted on the SHPB apparatus to identify potential sources of error in the test set-up, data acquisition and data processing. The identified sources of error were then eliminated, minimized or compensated for, in order to improve the accuracy of the testing apparatus. SHPB compression data are compared to quasi-static tensile behavior. Metallography was conducted before and after high strain rate testing in order to investigate the deformation mechanisms that occurred in the alloys during the high strain rate loading events.