Fundamentals of Distributed, Networked Military
Forces, NUWC-NPT Technical Report
Excerpts: "What you see in the
airport has nothing to do with security. This is the biggest presentation of
eyewash that you could possibly imagine," says Charles Slepian of the New
York-based Foreseeable Risk Analysis. (...)
According to Slepian and many other experts, the system of random checking
is neither efficient nor effective. Precious resources are being wasted,
Slepian says, by detailed screening of mass numbers of travelers who are
unlikely to pose a threat, by screeners not qualified to look for
terrorists.
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Excerpts: But last week's
announcement that scientists in New York had used the company's mail-order
molecules to make polioviruses from scratch has prompted questions about
whether the DNA synthesis industry deserves closer scrutiny, (...).
For decades the United States and other nations have sought to limit the
risk of biological warfare and bioterrorism by placing controls on the
cultivation and shipment of dangerous microbes. The new work threatens to
undermine that approach by proving for the first time that potentially deadly
viruses can be built from the ground up.
Mail-Order Molecules Brew a Terrorism
Debate, Washington Post
Excerpts: The American air campaign in
Afghanistan, based on a high-tech, out-of-harm's-way strategy, has produced a
pattern of mistakes that have killed hundreds of Afghan civilians.
On-site reviews of 11 locations where airstrikes killed as many as 400
civilians suggest that American commanders have sometimes relied on mistaken
information from local Afghans. (...)
The Pentagon often relies on information from warlords and other Afghans
whose loyalties are unclear in a country riven by decades of war and tribal
rivalries.
Flaws in U.S. Air War Left Hundreds of Civilians
Dead, NYTimes
Excerpt: Jose Padilla, a.k.a. Abdullah
al-Muhajir, supposedly plotted to build and detonate a radiological "dirty
bomb." He is a U.S. citizen. Yet he's being detained by the military --
indefinitely, without seeing an attorney, even though he hasn't been charged
with any crime. Yaser Esam Hamdi is also a U.S. citizen. He, too, is being
detained by the military -- indefinitely, without seeing an attorney, even
though he hasn't been charged with any crime. Meanwhile, Zacarias Moussaoui,
purportedly the 20th hijacker, is not a U.S. citizen.
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Excerpt: The president proposed merging 22
agencies into what would be the third largest Cabinet department.
Congressional hearings during past weeks demonstrate increasing doubt about
many aspects of this proposal. A top concern is that too many agencies are
being shifted around, with too little thought about how this gigantic merger
can be managed without losing critical focus on defeating a terrorist threat
that remains both real and urgent. Senators and representatives from both
parties also worry about what would happen to the many non-homeland security
functions (...).
Greater Focus Needed in Homeland Agency, Newsday
Excerpt: The future distributed, networked
system will typically have a large number of elements. Although elements can
individually perform the basic functions as defined above, interesting
collective behavior begins even when the number of elements is more than two.
More complex behaviors develop as the number of elements grows, and networks
of tens of elements can exhibit very intricate interactions. Extraordinarily
nonlinear "tipping points" can occur when some systems have about 500
elements, but, importantly, the tipping point can disappear with somewhat
fewer elements.