Is Metro Manila ready for a major terrorist attack?

The Arroyo administration has discovered a gaping hole in the country’s capability to respond to and cope with the consequences of a major terrorist attack in Metro Manila.

Briefing members of the Cabinet before the National Security Council meeting in Malacañang recently, Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes said the country has very "limited response capability" to cope with a terrorist attack similar to what happened last week in New York and Washington.

"We can only surmise that our capabilities in the other areas of the country are very much less," Reyes said.

Reyes presented a preliminary assessment of the government’s response capability in case a disastrous incident is triggered by a major terrorist attack in the National Capital Region. The assessment was made by the National Disaster Coordinating Council (NDCC), which Reyes himself chairs as defense secretary.

Numerous and serious flaws

Simulating a terrorist attack of the same magnitude as the assault on the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington D.C. last week, the defense department found numerous flaws in the emergency response system that goes with the country’s disaster preparedness.

For instance, there is no existing institutionalized command and control systems that is recognized or known to all responding emergency and disaster mitigation units. As such, there is a serious deficiency in clearly defining accountability and responsibility in case of a major disaster.

"There is no clear chain of command structure, particularly in the National Capital Region (NCR)," Reyes noted.

Moreover, there is a serious problem in communication. There is no universal communication network or frequency where all responding teams could switch on to automatically in times of emergency.

In terms of search and rescue operations, the NDCC pointed out the lack or the complete absence of a minimum standard for various groups involved in such delicate operations. The standard should focus on three basic factors – people, equipment and procedures.

Even government agencies, like fire fighting units have inadequate equipment to suppress major fires. Fire fighters have difficulty entering buildings to fight and put out fires. Normally, fire fighters stay outside burning buildings and train their hoses toward the direction of the fire.

The Bureau of Fire Protection has admitted that it cannot handle fires caused by industrial, chemical and other hazardous materials, and that it severely lacks the capability to handle fires in high-rise buildings.

The government also lacks facilities to take care of large numbers of people displaced by catastrophic incidents, like a major terrorist attack. There is an urgent need to build capacity to accommodate displaced people in Metro Manila for over a long period.

Potential terrorist targets

The departments of defense and interior and local government have identified at least 273 vital installations in the capital as potential terrorist targets, including Malacañang palace, bulk and power plants, the mass transit systems, television and communications facilities, and foreign embassies, particularly the US mission in Manila.

At least 57 privately-owned facilities have been identified as vulnerable targets, especially the oil depot along the Pasig River in Pandacan District. There are also a total of 358 buildings in Makati City’s central business district that are potential targets of terrorist groups.

Reyes said the government, through its intelligence community, has stepped up efforts to predict and prevent potential terrorist attacks in the capital. Using its links with foreign intelligence agencies, the intelligence community has started to track down and monitor movements and activities of suspected foreign terrorists and their local counterparts.

The military and the police are also at the forefront of providing active security measures and systems to lessen the potential of a terrorist attack in Metro Manila.

Improving ‘predictive’ capacity

Reyes said increasing and improving "predictive" capability is currently the government’s main weapon in its warning system against a terrorist attack. He said it would take more time, resources and effort to bring the country’s disaster and emergency response capabilities to a modest level.

He said the defense and military establishments are taking no chances in preventing a major terrorist attack in the country, since the government lacks the resources, the system and procedures to cope with the consequences of an attack similar in magnitude to last week’s assault on the World Trade Center in New York.

At the National Security Council briefing, military intelligence established the links between domestic threat groups like the Abu Sayyaf, and international terrorist organizations.

Osama Bin Laden’s RP links

A military intelligence report has long confirmed the connections between the Abu Sayyaf Group and the Al-Qaeda (The Base) organization set up in 1988 by Saudi fugitive Osama bin Laden.

Bin Laden’s brother-in-law, Mohammad Jamal Khalifa, set up non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Mindanao to funnel funds to radical Islamic groups in the country. One such Arab-based NGO is the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO).

The slain leader and founder of the Abu Sayyaf, Abdurajak Abubakar Janjalani, was recruited by Khalifa and sent to Syria and Libya for guerrilla training. Janjalani was among 1,000 Filipino-Muslims who joined the Islamic brigade that fought the former Soviet Union’s occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s.

Bin Laden’s network in Mindanao was confirmed by Mohammad Sadiq Odeh, a suspect in the August 1998 bombing of US embassies in East Africa. One of Bin Laden’s former assistants, Wadih El Hage corroborated Odeh’s statements.

The arrest in Manila in 1995 of two accomplices of Ramzi Ahmed Youssef, the principal suspect in the February 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, further confirmed the existence of Bin Laden’s terrorist cells in the country.

One of those arrested in Manila, Abdul Hakim Murad, even admitted traveling to Mindanao to train the Abu Sayyaf in handling explosives. Murad’s arrest also uncovered a terrorist plan to bomb US commercial airliners flying routes in Asia.

Code-named Oplan Bojinka, the plan included a plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II who visited the Philippines in January 1995. Bojinka is a Serbo-Croat term for explosion.

Military intelligence said that although the Philippines is relatively low in the priority list of terrorist targets compared to countries in Europe, it is not exempt from the threat of international terrorism owing largely to the established linkage of foreign terrorist groups with the local extremist Abu Sayyaf Group.

"Given the country’s Muslim population and its strong ties with the United States, foreign terrorists are likely to exploit these issues to propagandize their extremist view," the military intelligence briefing said.

And because of the Philippines’ lax immigration and counter-terrorist laws, foreign terrorists are expected to continue viewing the country as a target of operation and a staging or transit area for their transnational activities, the intelligence briefing said. — CyberDyaryo